Selene Left

A Story by dklp88

A woman deals sits in a valley of grass.

Helen Rourke sat, emotionlessly, in a valley of grass. The wind flowed throughout the valley, tussling with her honey coloured hair (which she kept short and utilitarian, though she did allow herself one luxury; she kept her hair long over the ears) and causing small ripples in her dark green blouse, as well as the thinly striped waistcoat that she wore over it. The grass was cool to her feet, by still being slightly damp from the morning’s dew. She was staining her favourite pair of slacks, that used to be a light grey, but she did not care much for it. Her face was tinged pink, a side effect from receiving too much sun several weeks ago. Her green eyes were staring at a point that was in front of her, but not focusing on it. The late morning sun was only starting to heat up the valley, and therefore Rourke still felt cool. She had been sitting there for several hours, unmoving, before finally using her arms as levers to lift herself up.

Standing, with her arms to the side, Rourke had very little curves, lines or anything. Her breasts never showed in any of her shirts, and her hips remained tight to her body. It was as if her body had decided to emulate a cane, with her head being extremely bulbous in comparison to the rest of her body, almost forming a sphere. Her nose lay flat against her face, her ears hid behind her hair, and her mouth seemed nonexistent when she pressed her lips together (which she did quite often). In fact, she was quite commonly confused to be a man; she rarely corrected such inaccuracies. It wasn’t that she wanted to be confused for a man; it was that she cared little for the people who made the mistake.

She closed her eyes, retreating deep into the recesses of her mind. She started to march forward, placing one foot in front of the other heavily. Her body unconsciously adopted the beat to Chopin’s Funeral March to walk to, as if there were an actual death to mourn. But after a few minutes of such walking, the pattern broke down, and she started walking to an imaginary beat, one that was seemingly wholly her own. Her movements were solid and direct, if someone was to interrupt the path that she had adopted, it would be to their detriment. Her movements jarred a small bracelet down her arm, until it had finally peeked out from underneath her sleeve. Designed to barely fit around her wrist, it was gold all around, with a slightly larger centerpiece. The letters BG were emblazoned on it. It denoted her belonging to the upper levels of the Banner & Goldstein Bank. It had shut down three days previous.

But Rourke was not pondering that. Nor was she pondering where she was going to get her next job. She would have her pick of jobs. She had made quite a splash with the Banking World, by playing office politics the exact same way that she ran her business operations; she only cared about the bottom line. Most of the bankers found her repulsive in her handling of other bankers. B & G found her irresistible. That’s why at the tender age of 26 she found herself the youngest female executive in B & G history. The original Banner & Goldstein were both 24 when they formed the bank, Goldstein the younger by 127 days. That fact alone could land her many choice jobs. The fact that her division, small loans, made record profits for her first 18 quarters? That could also land her many choice jobs. But the main thing that worked for her is that she fired 65 percent of her staff in a decision that took only eight days to come up with. She set up priorities list, chose whom to fire from that, and gave out the due notices. When people filed into her office to complain, she ignored them and continued to work, even as they screamed, shouted, even threw things at her. It was often joked that if B & G put her in charge of HR, they would never have gone into financial trouble, but it would have meant that Mr. Hanley (the last CEO of B & G) would have lost his job.

But Rourke’s mind was far away from any of those topics. Instead, Rourke was pondering an idea to develop the valley, to use it to house another testament to human innovation. For, as Rourke was certain, that was the purpose of everything in the universe. To be used in order to create, and only for the desires of the self. Nothing else mattered. Her movements finally came to a halt. Even though she wasn’t looking, she had instinctively stopped about ten feet before the valley was cut through by a road, although no cars were traversing it at the time. And Rourke stood there, still with eyes closed, yet looking as if she was taking everything in.

The day wore on, and the sun increased its heat. Rourke started to sweat, just a little bit, then profusely, staining her clothes to make them far darker than they already were. Her hair dampened to her forehead, and some sweat would drip from the tip of her nose every now and then, in an uneven pattern, as if to match the pattern set by the person herself. But Rourke still stood, with eyes closed, and unflinching. It was as if she had turned off her ability to sense the outside world, so she could work on some grand internal problem. To the outsider, however, there was no hint of what such a problem could be. She seemed an unfathomable mystery, whose full depths could never be explored entirely.

In reality, though, her thoughts were simple. She was still developing the valley. She had noticed some signs of iron ore in the hills, iron ore which could be refined and used. She noticed trees dotting the valley, trees which could be cut and used. She noticed stone anchored firmly to the bedrock underneath the soil, which could be blasted and used. What they were used for did not matter. All that did was that they were used, to construct and form something. That was what resources were for, to be used. And those were the thoughts that carried her through her journey. All her dream needed in order to be kicked off was money. And Helen Rourke knew where to get money.

After several hours of motionless standing, Rourke finally opened her eyes. She started walking, in the opposite direction to where she walked previously. Her movements did not betray any stiffness that she might have felt after standing in such a manner for the several hours that she did. Instead, they were as solid and flowing as usual. And she continued to march, in that off beat manner of hers, away from that road, and back to her plans. Back to her little ideas, plots, schemes. Back to her dreams that she hoped to force into reality. And back to her desire to develop the little valley of grass.

Rourke continued to march to the beat of her own drum.