MASK BOY
There once was a boy who was discontent with himself. So he placed a mask over his face to hide his form from others.
He felt happy for a while, though as time went on, he began to wonder who he might have been if he had never donned the mask. But try as he might, he could not remove it.
One day, a winged herald, who had witnessed his plight, came to console him. She gave him a strange box, which she placed in his lap. The herald told him that although the mask cannot be removed, he may change the things that dwell behind it. She told him that the box will give the boy direction and that he should place the favourable aspects of his self inside of it.
When he opened it and looked inside he saw the nature of progression. A vague, unfocused outline of the future revealed itself to him and he realised that this moment, however difficult it may appear to be, will some day be in the past. The past is just prologue to his life’s overarching story. In realising this, a great mass erupted from behind the mask, a chaotic world of his own image. The growth was as beautiful as it was terrible and as promising as it was terrifying.
The boy still did not know what was to become of his self. Though now he held hope that some day he may find some level of contentment within. He continued to refine the world that dwelt behind his mask and even began to build upon his outer world.
As the years went by, the mask’s edges became harder to recognise, it faded into him as his world continued to render itself. He was older now, and realised that the mask was as much a part of his story as the cocoon is to a butterfly. It was a necessary aspect of his progression. He wondered why the herald had never told him this.
The boy who was no longer a boy felt himself merging with the world he had created, his legs turning to tree roots, his head became a canopy, his box was now a palace.
He was ready to embrace his new reality.