After the painter had left, the area went back to being normal. Too normal. It was painfully boring and the author doesn’t feel that this story needs to progress across a consistent timeline. So a flashback was in demand. Luckily, the rock had a dark secret, he wasn’t always a rock. In the past, he had been a boulder, not a boulder like the one by the riverbank, but the boulder.

On the day of the ro—boulder’s birth, there was an earthquake. The very earth fidgeted in anticipation of the events to transpire that day. The epicenter of the earthquake was in the middle of a mountain range. Halfway up one of the mountains were two giant slabs of granite. These slabs constantly hit against each other during the earthquake, causing bits and pieces to break off. One of these pieces was much larger than the others; it was the size of a small house. As it hit the ground, the earthquake stopped. The earthquake’s job was done, so it went away and the earth itself calmed down and was content to watch.

The boulder was jagged from being born from a slab fracturing. It was an odd, organic shape with sharp edges. Nothing like the smooth rock that would come from it. It was a striking red and gray color that made it brick out like a sore thumb.

Of course it was just a boulder, nothing special about it. The earthquake ending right as it hit the ground was just a coincidence. Plus, earthquakes have happened around this mountain range every so often for thousands of years. That earthquake was nothing special and was only limited to that area, not the entire world.