A Mother's Love

Every year in the Shawnee Mission school district there is this contest. It's called Reflections It's an opportunity for students to submit creative work in 3 different categories; literature,photography, and art. The entries are judged and then the winner goes on to the district competition. This year Sean decided to enter in the literature category and he won that division for the school. This is what he wrote


A Mother's Love

Sharp thundering booms filled the night sky with flashes of light and short glimpses of black clouds. Lightning shot cloud to cloud scoring the god's ocean with pixies only to live and breathe and grow in a second’s glance. Wind sails flew through the skies, writing and breathing through to the torrents of cloud. The winds played as they snaked through the vapor ocean, chasing each other in circles, ignorant of the terror, excitement, and destruction their playfulness caused. Children huddled with mothers in their underground caverns, filled with the loud banging of fire breathing monster, spawn of Hell's furnace; giant creeping crawling bugs made of shadow, threatening to devour them whole, and their heroic mothers vanquishing the foul beasts with soft caring words or warm, embracing hugs, or exciting stories of mythical lands, brave conquerors, and fantastic battles. The stories filled the darkness, dressing the child with his most potential weapon: imagination.

Ah, but alas, the stories could not last, for the biggest and most terrible monster came to pass. Its roar was louder and far more frightening than one hundred fiery demons, and its shadow large enough to swallow armies of shrouded night crawlers. The beast fell upon the mother and child's hideaway, tearing apart their home. The child terrified in fright reached for his mother's protecting hand, the hand that gave him strength and courage, but it wasn't there. When the monster tore away the home it smiled a wicked smile. Swirling and twirling it spied the mother and child, and greedily it reached with its monstrous hand and snatched away the child's mother and hungrily ate her up. But hungry it still was and reached for the child, and brave the child tried to be, brave the way his mother told him to be. But the monster was bigger and scarier than anything he had ever seen and fear filled his heart, making him cower into the deepest darkest corner, trying to run away from the terrible beast, but it found him. The child was too scared to look, the world felt so cold, so lost was he without his mother and her protective arms, her wonderful stories that made him so brave. What was he to do?

“Mommy!” he cried, tears fell from his face. Where was Mommy? The monster reached for the child; the world felt colder than ever, colder than winter's day where he and his mother would play in the snow for hours.

“Mommy!” But it was vain to try; nothing could be heard over this monster's roar, and his mother was to far away to hear him. He was so scared.

“Mommy!” he whispered in such a soft voice, like a butterfly's wing flapping in the breeze. Suddenly the world was warm and bright, the fear left, and the monster's roar was silence. He could hear birds singing and felt the sun warm his back— it felt like a hug from his mother.

“Jasper,” came a voice. The child knew that voice, a voice he loved so much. He looked up and saw his mother standing there with a warm smile where there once was a grinning monster.
He cried out happily, “Mommy!” and ran to her and hugged her legs.

“My little hero,” she said so lovingly. Her voice rang like a choir of angels and was more beautiful than a thousand harps. She put her arms around him. But this moment, too, could not last. Gently she pushed her son away and knelt down to both knees, as she looked into his eyes, his beautiful eyes she loved so much.

Jasper gasped, “Mommy, you're so pretty!” She seemed to sparkle and glow, perfectly flawless, like an angel. She smiled at his words, so innocent and honest.

“Jasper, my love, please listen” Her voice was so unfamiliar, but he knew it was his mother's voice, so he quietly stood there and looked back into her eyes and listened. “The monster is not gone yet, and you must defeat it on your own.” Her voice was filled with sadness hidden behind a mask of strength.

“Mommy, no.”

“Listen, Jasper.” She said sharply and softly. Jasper listened sadly. “I cannot be there, but I will be with you. I will always be with you.”

She gave him one last hug, and when she let go he was wearing a breast plate that felt like his mother's hug and made him feel brave and strong. “This will protect your heart and body from any monster or beast that may wish you harm.”

Upon his head she placed her last kiss, and from it grew a helm pointed and proud. “This will protect your mind from fearful and doubting thoughts.”

She held his tiny hands a final time and pulled away, leaving a majestic sword and a powerful shield with a butterfly painted along its broad bough. “Trust these to protect you and you will conquer the most frightening of monsters.”

And she said six words that were the last words she would ever tell her son in this life. These words filled him with understanding and wisdom, and the knowledge that he was never alone.

And when his mother left, and he returned to face his foe, the monster that so greedily stole his mother from him. He was a boy no longer, but a man, a man wise, strong, and brave, the fear in his eyes replaced by steel. And in one swift, powerful stroke he felled his enemy. And never again would he be frightened of any beast, for his armor, sword, and shield made from a mother's love never left him.

But the most powerful of the few precious things his mother left him were the six last words she told him with a smile impossible to forget. They stayed with him, giving him a reason to keep on fighting all the monsters, demons, and beasts that haunted the world that frightened child, teen, and adult alike. He fought bearing his armor and sword and the six words until his final breath, and when he died he saw his reason for fighting the terrors of the world. They embraced each other warmly, and the hero of the world told his mother:

“I love you mom.” And while still in the embrace she replied with the six words she said to him before she left the Earth, the words that fueled his drive to defeat the creatures of darkness, the words that defined his existence.

“I love you, my little hero.”
by Sean Fackrell 2010