[ This is for an English assignment. We were simply to write a short story with a full plot, and so that's what I did. I'm really proud of this, so I hope you enjoy :) ]

Ink dripped from the pen to the paper, bubbling up before expanding out in a small, perfectly round circle, staining the paper with a dark black spot. The writer glared at the dot, her heavy, tired eyes looking for anything on which she could blame her empty mind.

Setting the pen back into the inkwell, she leaned forward, running her small, dry hands through her matted and dirty brown hair; it hadn't been washed in what felt like years. Pulling at the tangled curls, the woman groaned in frustration before resting her head face down on the desk in front of her.

For this woman's entire life, she was able to invent and dream up hundreds of ideas for stories. But now that she was being paid for it, all ideas seemed to have suddenly vanished from her mind, leaving it as barren and empty as the parched throat of a lost desert traveler.

The writer leaned back, stretching over the back of her sturdy, uncomfortable wooden chair, raising her arms high above her head. Maybe some walking around could spark an idea. She stood from the chair, pushing it backwards with a loud squeak across the floor. Wrapping her itchy, green robe tightly around her waist to keep her warm, the woman pushed her chair in and nearly tripped over a broken chunk of the concrete floor that had been destroyed so many years ago that the woman could hardly remember it not being there. Even so, most days she found herself tripping over the cracked piece of the flooring.

The woman let out an audible sigh before reaching down to slip a finger through the handle of the base of a candle. The dim, flickering light of the candle barely illuminated the study the writer occupied, allowing the corners to be concealed in dark, heavy shadows. 

Stepping forwards in bare feet, the woman scanned around the dark, dusty room for any sign of inspiration. Holding the candle up to a shelf of books, her heavy brown eyes skimmed the spines, yet they were greeted with nothing but boring titles of recollections of deceased rulers and their failed attempts at peace in their now catastrophe of a country. She had no interest in writing tales of defeat; she'd had enough of that in her life as it was.

The woman turned to approach another bookshelf, but her candle flitted past a figure that lurked in the corners of the study. Out of the corner of her eye, the writer noticed the outline of a pale, thin arm become visible for a just a brief moment before it was jerked back into the darkness of the shadows.

The woman whisked around to face the corner, her already nearly burnt out candle flickering wildly, revealing little of what resided in the shadowy corner of her old study. Raising the candle ever so slightly, she cautiously peered into the empty space by the walls. All of a sudden, a pale, thin face appeared mere inches from her own, the ghastliness of its skin in stark contrast to the blackness of the shadows around it.

The writer let out a startled cry, stumbling backwards before slamming into the side of a nearby standing shelf of books, which shook dangerously in response to her unceremonious impact with it.
The thin, frail silhouette crept from the corner over towards her, the dim light of the candle finally revealing to the woman what this creature was. An eerily familiar grin sprouted over the creature's face as the woman's eyes grew to the size of grapefruits, realizing what it truly was staring back at her.

"You," she gasped out, taking several deep breaths before continuing. "You're not real." Her words were scratchy and dry, as though she hadn't spoken a word in years.

The grinning, hunched-over creature laughed flatly, its voice high-pitched, short, and breathy, as if there wasn't enough space in its lungs to occupy the amount of breath needed to speak or laugh. It stretched its long, lanky arms out, skin drawn tight across them and its three-clawed hands, before curling them back up by its sides.

"Yaba," it said, its grin growing impossibly wider, a dark, bloody mass of gums filling its mouth instead of teeth. "Of course I'm real. You created me." 

Yaba, as the writer was called, shook her head furiously, sweat beginning to bead around her forehead and on her neck under the collar of her robe. Her hair began to plaster itself to her skin as she continued to stare at this creature in front of her, this creature who shouldn't be standing in front of her, but was.

"Kofi," Yaba rasped, "you're a work of fiction. I wrote you. You aren't real." 

Yet again, the creature, Kofi, let out a breathy laugh, peering up at Yaba with gaping black holes that took the place of normal human eyes. After several moments with no reply, the creature looked down at the broken concrete floor, as though ashamed with the way it had been acting.

"You looked as if you needed help," Kofi replied simply, its voice high and quiet as it stared down at the ground in humiliation.

At the simplicity of its words, Yaba sighed, lowering the candle that she had been holding high above the creature's head. The writer knew Kofi, of course; she had created it. She knew that this creature was disturbing to look at, with its small, thin, bony frame and translucent grey-white skin. However, this revolting animal, this Kofi, was nothing more than just a scared little creature that didn't know where it belonged in the world. It was a shy, timid, and humble creature who simply wanted to help others to help find itself.

"Alright," Yaba said kindly, "you can help me." She looked down at Kofi, who stood only about as half as tall as the woman. Kofi peered up at the writer with giant eyes that, while black and empty and soulless, seemed to fill with delight at Yaba's words.

Kofi waddled over to the bookshelf with small, round feet, clambering up to stand on a lower shelf, gripping tightly to a higher shelf to study the titles of the hundreds of old books lined up on the tall shelves.

"What about these?" The small creature squeaked, pointing up shakily to the line of dark, leathery brown books that Yaba had been inspecting earlier. Kofi leaned back, briefly losing its balance as it teetered on its footing on the shelf.

The woman snuck her hands around the back of her neck to peel her sweat-soaked hair from her skin, tossing the mass of hair behind her shoulders. Padding across the concrete floor, she followed with her eyes to where Kofi's tiny, frail finger was pointing. As she gazed, she realized Kofi was pointing right to the tomes that she had just passed over before meeting the strange creature.

"I'm not interested in writing about our country's failures, Kofi," Yaba sighed, looking down at her robe before picking at a stray piece of fuzz that had stuck to the fabric of her sleeve.

"No, you don't understand!" Kofi spoke up, instantly grabbing the attention of the writer. Yaba's dark eyes shot up suddenly, staring wide-eyed at the small creature in front of her. Kofi wasn't supposed yell; it stayed hidden from attention. That was how Yaba had written it. If Kofi was yelling at her, then its idea must be of at least some importance.

"Don't take it for the sad ending," Kofi continued, never taking its deep black eyes off of Yaba's, "but write about the things that could've changed the sad ending. Write about what would've happened if it had ended happily."

The writer opened her mouth to reply, but the words that had settled on the roof of her mouth refused to move to her lips, and she remained quiet, simply thinking over what Kofi had just proposed.

Write the happy ending. That thought had never occurred to the writer. She had only seen the text for what it was, and not for what it could have become. It was a brilliant idea, a brilliantly different idea from all of those that were commonplace in the realm of literature in her country.

Yaba passed by Kofi to pick up one of the old books, the pages inside yellowed and fragile from having been left untouched for decades. Each word was written small and simple, and as the text of her country's history fit together on the pages, an idea sprouted in the recesses of Yaba's mind. She just had to look at the details a little differently.

A large smile spreading across her face, Yaba closed the heavy book, holding it firmly to her chest as she spun back around to thank Kofi, the writer's once heavy eyes now swimming in excitement.

"Tha-" Yet she never finished her phrase, as it was stopped short at the sight before her; or rather, the lack of sight before her. The spot where Kofi had been standing mere seconds ago was now empty; the only thing greeting her in the study was the cold, quiet darkness and the dim flicker of the candle resting on her desk.