Nature

“Nature never lies,” I wrote in my journal.  “Humans are the only liars I have ever encountered.  The cruelest of beasts as well as the laziest.” 

I never got tired of being outside, of simply going for a walk or sitting in the sun.  I have never understood my friends who don’t go outside except for to get to and from their cars.  I always found nature was more straightforward than my coworkers and I was spending increasingly more time learning how to work for myself and make my job as remote as possible.  I had always been impatient and stubborn and always wanted people to do what is right, only to get let down time after time. 

Nature at least had the decency to abide by a reasonable and predictable schedule.  Animals knew what to eat and how to get it, where and when they should sleep and when to have babies and how to take care of them.  Most of my coworkers couldn’t usually manage to take care of themselves and I was scared to ask who had children.   

I looked up from my journal to see a figure hunched over and walking toward me.  It had to be Peter.  He was the only one brave enough to search for me when I was researching and the only one who could walk that hunched over without falling.  Then I saw what the problem really was.  He had been shot.