Chocolate Strawberry

“Violet, it's time for your fencing lesson! You already skipped your magic lessons, you can’t skip fencing too.”

“Mom, why do I have to fill all my time up, I just need some time to relax.”

“You can’t relax AND be a high elf. Now, let’s go to your fencing lessons.” Coral dragged Violet by the arm. Violet just gave up and went to her lessons.

“Why can’t I be like the other high elves? They never need a break. They never get burned out. What’s wrong with me?” Violet thought after the most difficult and tiring lesson she had this year. “I just want to run away. I’ll eventually get caught, but in the meantime, I could just relax.”

Violet didn’t think through most things, she was impulsive by nature, and running away did not break that habit. She immediately began packing her favorite snacks to munch on and some money. More money than most morphlings or orcs would ever see in their lives. She figured that money would get her the essentials.

Coral wouldn’t know Violet was gone until the morning. She never checked in on her daughter unless Violet had another “important skill to be a respected member in society”. Violet figured she would have a full night to explore. That would give her enough time to get to morfling territory. They had the best fields to lay in, or so Violet heard.

When the last sun set and darkness captured the sky, Violet said goodbye to the place she had been her whole life. Finally, she was actually experiencing a life of species unlike her own. As curious as Violet was, she was more tired, and in desperate need of a nap.

While she traveled across Merlin path, the road got a little more worn down, the path was a little more discolored, and the gravel was a little less smooth. But Violet didn’t care about that. She did care, however, when she saw the morfling territory in its entirety.

City. It was all city. Not a single tree in sight. An overwhelming smell filled Violet’s nostrils. It was a mix of cigars, smog, and bad coffee. There wasn’t a tree in sight.

Violet approached a morphling, characterized by their short curly hair that hid their horns. “Hello! Do you know where—” Before Violet could finish, the man walked away. A hoard of morflings followed, almost trampling her over.

“Haven’t you ever seen a crosswalk before? Move out of the way” a stranger shoved Violet onto the sidewalk.

The truth is, Violet had never seen a crosswalk like this. The ones back home didn’t have lights to tell you when to walk, they didn’t have a crowd of people moving at one time, and they especially didn’t have people shoving each other.

“Are you new to this town?” the stranger continued.

“Yes… Do you mind showing me where the trees are?”

“You really haven’t been here in a long time. We cut down all the trees a long time ago to build factories and houses. There’s a small patch of forest the city was forced not to cut down, just take two lefts, a right, and another left and you’re there. Gook luck kiddo!” The stranger walked away.

Violet’s feet dragged on the concrete. She had been walking all night, and at this point she was exhausted. She kept telling herself that she could rest when she got to the forest. She couldn’t possibly sleep near this busy, dirty street. Step after step felt heavier and heavier. Her blinks were longer and longer.

“Finally,” she thought, “it’s so sunny here…”. Violet’s knees gave up as she plummeted to the soft grassy floor. She breathed in the crisp breeze, and let her eyes close as the sun warmed her aching body. Her mind drifted with the wind as her body lay unconscious.

Violet woke up to a morfling shaking her down. His green skin startled her, most morflings she had seen so far had slightly elven features, or features of other species. This morfling was just a chameleon with no mix of any intelligent species. The only thing that gave this morphling away was the tiny horns on the top of his head and the fact that this chameleon could talk.

“Are you okay? You’ve been knocked out for the past few hours,” he paused for a moment, then continued, “Please don’t be dead. I’ll be killed if someone dies on my territory!”

“Who are you? What is this place?”

“I’m Mint, protector of the Bluebell forest. But the real question is, who are you?”

“I’m…” Violet considered giving this morphling her real name, but her mother’s voice kept ringing in her ears “morphings will take any chance you give them to steal everything they can from you”. So, out of fear that he would take her for ransom, she gave a fake name, “Lilac. My name is Lilac.”

“What a pretty name! It reminds me of my daughter’s name, Violet.”

Time seemed to slow down. Was this just a coincidence? Was this stranger really Violet’s father? Everything matched up, Violet’s father disappeared before she was born, Violet’s love of nature, and her mother refusing to tell her about her father.

Violet combed her fingers through her hair, and she stood, mouth agape. She felt two small horns, small enough so that it could be mistaken as a bump, but now that she was considering her new identity as a morphling, they became a lot more noticeable.

“Are you okay Lilac?”

“Tell me about your daughter. Is she with you now?”

“No. Unfortunately, my ex, Coral, forbade me from seeing her again. You see, inter-species couples are extremely taboo in Coral’s area. So, Coral decided that it would be better to raise a baby alone than raise one with me.”

“Coral…”

“Coral Misty. Do you know her or something?”

“Yeah…she’s my mom.”

“Violet?” He transformed into an elf, and rubbed his hands through her hair. “Your baby horns are coming in!”

Violet gave him a big hug. Maybe he could understand her. Maybe he explained why she was like this, not quite elven enough. Maybe they could be a family again. Maybe Violet’s mother could finally accept her.

“Do you want to meet my mom?”

“Let’s go right now! She really wants to see me again?”

“I’m sure she will!”

The two set off, getting in a quick nap, and traveling through Merlin road. They talked and talked about their lives before they met. All the highs, the lows, and the naps. Violet had certainly gotten her sleeping gene from him.

Soon enough they arrived at the Mistys’ palace like home. Coral answered the door, expecting a mailman, or something of the sort.

The look on Coral’s face was something of a nightmare. It was the kind of face you’d make if someone was being murdered in front of you.

“Mom—-“

“Violet! What are you doing, bringing this man into our home?”

“Coral, I want to be a part of our daughter’s life.”

“No. You know full well I can’t.”

“Just come live with me. Sure, you’ll face judgement, but you’ll finally be happy.”

Coral paused for a moment, reevaluating her entire life. “I said no. Violet, come back here. You can leave and never come back.”

Coral grabbed Violet tightly and pulled her into the house. She slammed the door, and flopped down to the floor.

“That damn shifter can’t tear my family apart.”

“Mom, you hid half of my life from me. I should be the angry one here. And you’re the one who taught me that you should never call people the s word.”

The corners of Coral’s mouth stunk farther down than ever before, she raised her fist, and opened her mouth, but she stopped herself.

“You know, you’re right. I haven’t been the best parent. You deserve to be with your father, especially seeing as you will probably run away again if I keep you from him.” Coral paused again, and mumbled to herself, “I’d like to see him again too…”

Violet ran to hug her mother, for the first time in years. Coral missed this feeling. All the high elves around her told her that she had to run her daughter into the ground so she can learn what it means to be an elf, but that just drove them apart.

“I love you mom.”

Coral cried, an ugly cry, the kind of cry you do when there’s no one watching you, judging you. “I love you too, my little chocolate bar.”

Coral opened the door to see Violet’s father, Berry, mid knock.

“I won’t shrink away this time. I want to see my daughter—”

“Berry, I don’t want to keep our family apart anymore. I only turned away from you because the people I thought were my friends would judge me for loving a morphling. But, I don’t care what they think anymore. I love you, and I really don’t want to be around them anymore.”

“Coral, I thought this day would never come. Join me, live with me in the city. Trust me, you’ll be so happy there.”

And, what Berry said was true, Coral was very happy living in the forest with Berry. She also needed a break, Violet wasn’t the only one. But, Violet is another story.

No matter how happy their family was, once they saw the horns, all people thought was what monsters they were. Sometimes they actually said it, called them shifters or mixers, a slur for inter-species couples. Sometimes they were even called disgusting. But much more common than that was the way a mother would stand in front of her child when they were in sight, the way someone would clutch their purse, and the way someone glared at them, scared and panicked. When Violet transferred to a new school, this all got much worse.

That morning Berry braided Violet’s hair into a traditional morphling hairstyle that complemented her horns beautifully. Two small braids wrapped around her horns, and a small piece of hair went through the braids, making it seem like two small plants were popping out of her head. Violet was ecstatic to finally be able to express this part of herself she didn’t even know existed. And now, Violet could finally be normal, take breaks, and not be doing something at every moment in the day. However, her mother still forced her to go to school and join the fencing team.

The outside of the school was relatively clean except for the litter spread about, the graffiti she could barely see on the east wall, and the kids. Apparently, most of these kids hadn’t discovered deodorant yet, much to the dismay of everyone who smelt them. Additionally, they were allowed to wear whatever clothing they wanted, and they certainly took that to the extreme.

“Hey, Morphling! What are you doing just standing there? Move.”

Violet was appalled by the disrespect this orc displayed. This would never fly in Violet’s old school.

“Did I stutter? Move, shifter!”

Violet didn’t know how to respond, she had never been in this situation. A tear started forming, and she ran to what she thought was her first period. But she had no idea where it was. Eventually the bells rang, and she was all alone. Everyone else was in first period, and she was lost, alone, and about to give up.

That was, until another morphling appeared. They were a little fly, and their bones snapped, cracked, and reformed. Their skin stretched and deconstructed. It was Violet’s first time seeing a morphling morph. It was quite gnarly.

“You're not quite an elf, are you?”

“I’m half. Half morphling, and half elf.”

“Did Tuff call you the s word?”

“Yeah…”

“He does that to me too. Don’t take it to heart, he’s just bigoted.”

There was a slight pause as Violet was building up the courage to ask her new morphling friend about everything and anything related to morphling culture. She decided against it. Admitting to her new morphing friend that she knew nothing about morphing culture would be embarrassing.

“So…do you know where Ms. Rock’s classroom is?”

“Yeah, but you can’t enter her class with that hair. Let me take it off for you.” She motioned her hands towards Violet’s horns, but Violet backed away before she could touch them.

“But I like my hair—“

“Trust me, you’ll be better off without them.” She motioned again, but this time they somewhat clumsily unbraided Violet’s hair. As the strands of hair falling down her face, so too did Berry’s hard work and love.

Once all the hair was down, it was put into a ponytail, a common elven hairstyle. Violet got flashbacks of every single day she was alive, through all of it, was the ponytail. For some reason today was the first day she felt dissatisfied with her ponytail.

The two went to class together. Room 333, although normal looking on the outside, gave Violet a deep sense of dread. A shiver went down her spine as she entered Ms. Rock’s classroom.

An orc…Ms. Rock was an orc. She scowled at the only two morphlings in the classroom. Violet got the feeling that she was staring at her about something other than being late. It was the same look Tuff gave her.

“Late…again. Fern, this is the second time this month, once the third time rolls around, you’ll be in serious trouble.” Ms. Rock motioned for Fern to sit in the sit in front of her, but Fern went to the very back of the classroom and found an empty chair far away from Ms. Rock. She rolled her eyes, and turned around to see Violet, still standing there. “And who are you?”

“I’m a new student. My name is Violet.”

A warm smile appeared across Ms. Rock’s mouth, probably wider than Fern had gotten from her all year. “An elf I see! Welcome to our school. If you need anything, anything at all feel free to let me know.”

“Yeah…” Violet sat down, next to Fern in the back.

Violet had never been treated like a morphling before. She always thought they were exaggerating it, the way other species treat morphlings. She had always been in a position where people didn’t treat her like that, so she never realized. It was right in front of her, the way her mother flinched at a morphling on the tv, the way she got quiet, and the way she would go out of the morphling’s reach as fast as she could. No one should be treated that way.