It's the world out there that's fucked you, it's not your fault, right?

You wake up in the morning to your blazing alarm with a jump and your room fills your every sense. Faint outlines of your dresser, your window, and your shelves are all you can see. You rub your eyes as they adjust to the pre-sunrise light. You turn off your alarm and the room is quiet except for the creaks of your bed as you sit up. Your nose fills with the scent of your body’s odour after a restless sleep. Your shoulder sears in pain from sleeping on it. But rather than closing the blinds and getting back under the covers, back to the warmth, the security, you rise up to face the day. And when you’re in the shower, you could sit and let the hot water fall on you until you shrivel to nothingness, but instead, you face the bone-deep chill after opening the shower curtain and let the sweet scent of shampoos and soaps slip away from you.
You leave your house. You pick your axe off the ground beside your doormat and sling it over your shoulder. The early morning sun glares off the snow, tries to blind you. A plain of snow, dotted with pine trees, leading to a looming mountain range lies ahead of you. The crisp, sub-zero, morning air stings the inside of your nose. You can feel it as it fills your lungs. With your bearded chin held high, the scent invigorates you. You walk towards the mountains, passing through the pine trees. Needles litter the ground around them, the waxy points overwhelming the smell of the morning. The blood of these trees is hardened on your cold, steel axe slung over your back. You walk until the sun is high in the sky, getting closer and closer to the mountain. Sweat drips down your brow and you wipe it away with a plaid-clad sleeve. Plant life begins to thaw; the scent of a new day’s life is released in to the air. You stop in the middle of the plain next to a tree twice your height. You take your axe off your shoulder and let the toe of the blade rest in the ground. With a grunt you heave your axe up and swing at the tree. With the first thud, there is only you, the axe, and the tree. You become one with the axe as you swing it over and over; each swing sending chips of wood and spatters of sap flying. Your face is coated with the tree’s blood and your own sweat. The melting snow coats the blade of your axe, releasing a faint scent of cold steel. With a final roar and massive cut, the tree’s trunk cracks. You step back and let it fall in a rush of freezing air and pine needles. Your face remains emotionless through your heaving breaths.
Finally, you chop a piece of lumber off the bottom of the fallen tree. A cold wind blows in as the sun starts to sink behind the mountain again. You sling your axe back over your shoulder and, with the lumber in hand, head for home. Back through the plain you walk and the evening air freezes the snow and sweat in your beard. The scent of ice fills you again. The air dries; it’s too cold for snow. You reach your doorstep and set your axe down again, running a boot along the blade in an attempt to knock off some of the frozen sap. There’s a note pinned to the door that says,
“I took the kids and the car. We’re going to my mother’s. We’re not coming home. – A.C.”
You take the note off the door with your empty hand and go inside. The house is cold; the furniture smells as if it’s not yours any more, as if you’d entered someone else’s home. You light the fireplace and set your wood down in front of it. The smoke from the tinder wafts through the house. You take a cigar from your humidor and light it carefully in the fire. You sit in the armchair you thought was your own and let the burning wood and cigar fill your nose. Your face is still expressionless. Your mind wanders back to the spot you chopped the tree down today. You’ll have to go back tomorrow for more wood for this fire.

Yelp
The whip lashed across his back, ripped the wolf's flesh through his fur.
He didn't know why. He had done nothing.
Yelp again. Blood trickles down the wolf's flanks.
Whimper, the wolf lays on his belly and buries his face in his claws, he doesn't dare bite the hand that hurts him.
He stands and limps away in pain. He doesn't look back.

Les Masques

The man sat alone on the boardwalk on top of an aged briefcase. To his left was an ice cream shop, to his right, a public bathroom, well maintained by the city. An old, tattered fedora rested on the ground in front of him. Coins and bills littered the inside of the hat. The man’s plaid shirt was unbuttoned, the setting sun beating on his bare chest. People walked past him without looking, others paused and threw change in to his hat. Couples walking, friends roller-skating, people accompanied by their dogs, each person was potential income. The man scratched at the stubble on his chin.

“Help for a lost soul? Change for an unlucky one?” He called his normal pleas.

Some heads turned, casting scrutinizing glances at the man on the ground. Others fell to his appeals and put money in his hat. Most walked on, indifference or averted gazes from those not willing to help the man. His face remained unchanged, expecting, relaxed.

“Thank you sir. Thank you ma’am. Thanks buddy,” he changed his thanks, always with a bow, to the people dropping money in his hat.

The man took money out of his hat, stuffed bills down the front of his pants and coins in his pockets, filling his shoes with whatever he could. The day’s collection in his hat looked sparse once again.

“Help for a lost soul? Change for an unlucky one?” He continued his calls.

As the sun fell further behind the water, the crowds began to thin out. Shops closed their doors and lights flickered to life over the boardwalk. The sticky, stagnant air cooled as a breeze blew in from the ocean. Darkness fell and the flow of people trickled to a single person or couple every few minutes.

The man took the bills out of his pants and stuffed them back in to his hat. He stood and picked up his hat and briefcase. He walked in to the bathroom and inspected each stall before stepping out again and looking either way at the deserted boardwalk. He walked back in and set his things down in one of the stalls. He opened his briefcase and stuffed his full fedora beside several others, the same style, all similarly full. He emptied his pockets in to the hats, took off his tattered shoes and shook their contents in as well. Beside the hats was a pressed suit, complete with jacket and sterling silver cufflinks, covering a pair of shined, black, dress shoes. The man took off his plaid shirt, torn jeans, and yellowed socks, setting them in the briefcase beside the hats. He stepped out of the stall, suit in hand and stood in front of a sink. He dressed himself quickly and smiled at himself in the mirror as he tightened his tie. He took a small bottle of hair product from the inside of his jacket and tousled some of the product in to his hair, sweeping his bangs out of his face. With some paper towel and water he washed the dirt from his face.

He took to the boardwalk again, walking a short distance before turning inland, towards a parking lot. There were three cars in the parking lot. He made his way to a shiny, black, new, sports car. He patted his jacket for his keys and unlocked his doors. The man stepped inside his car and smiled a wolfish smile at himself in the mirror.

The man drove to a house and parked his car. It was a large house, two levels, plenty of clear windows, and a fence around the perimeter. He stepped in the front door.

“I’m home honey,” he called inside.

A woman came down the stairs to him. She walked in to his open arms and greeted him with a kiss.

“Hi sweetie,” she smiled up at him.

There was thudding on the floors upstairs as three children ran to him.

“Papa!” They cried.

“Bonjour mes amours!” He hugged them all at once.

“Long day at the office?” The woman asked him.

“It was indeed, but I made it,” he said as he put down his briefcase. Coins rattled inside, muffled slightly.

“I wish you would get rid of that thing,” she frowned at it.

“We couldn’t live without it,” he answered.