Werewolf Forest

Werewolf Forest::Chapter 1

Bright afternoon sun shone through the emerald leaves of the forest. I listened to the chorus of song birds as I walked through the under-brush. I had been walking for at least an hour and must be miles away from my home by now. If home was the appropriate word. I broke though the wall of trees and into the soft sea of grass that covered the meadow. The familiar trickling of water calmed me as it passed over the miniature waterfall and into the large crystal clear pond. A deep breath shuddered through my chest causing a sharp pain to shoot from my newly inured rib. The pain didn't bother me too much. I was used to it. The cool night breeze gently caressed my face as I sat cross-legged on the cool ground. The sky of the summer afternoon reminded me of paintings in an art museum with the gentle brush strokes of pale oranges and pinks strewn across the canvass. I lay on my back enjoying the utter blissfulness of the moment. But I couldn't keep the day's events at bay for long.

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"Maggie!! Where's my dinner?!" yelled my father

"I just got home. I didn't have time to make it yet." I answered calmly

"I slave all day for you and this is how you repay me?! I should kick your lazy disrespectful ass out on the streets!" Ever since my mother died my father had gotten much worse. He had never been very good to begin with what with the late night parties, demanding anything he wanted when he wanted it, smacking my mother around, keeping all the money to spend on himself, and all of the young female 'associates' he had to have dinner with all the time at their place. But now he had gotten much worse. He was drunk almost every night; never paid the bills, brought home every drunken girl from the bar, and now without my mother as a punching bag he downgraded to a certain sixteen your old sophomore A.K.A me. And since my best friend, Andrew, had disappeared a year ago it had been ever the harder to deal with.

"I just got home dad! How 'bout you go and make it yourself? You've got two hands!"

"Why you ungrateful little..." I dodged a punch aimed at my face but managed to catch a different one in the rib-cage. It didn't help that my father took five years of Taekwondo back when he was my age. He had let me go at the bruised rib thinking it had hurt much more than it did. In the three years of being put through this I had learned one thing: play dead. I found that if I acted like one punch had grounded me that he would normally walk away. Normally. Occasionally he got really angry and after I took my dive he would just keep coming and coming...That's how I got landed in the hospital under an assumed name.

I had run straight to the forest. I had discovered it across a deep river that was a short walk from my house. There was a shallower part farther down river where I could jump across some stones to the other side. The forest stretched for miles and miles covering the hills in a green blanket. I had explored the forest as much as I could, though never getting farther than maybe three miles in. But no one lived there as far as I could tell. In fact the forest looked undisturbed by humans in general excepting myself. No one had ever bothered to come over here for hunting or camping because the currents in the river were too strong. And plus there was a more easily accessible forest in the opposite direction so this one lay almost untouched by humanity.

The sound of footsteps brought my thoughts to a halt. I jumped to alertness and searched for the origin of the sound. I saw nothing but still heard the footsteps getting closer. I quickly scrabbled up a tree trying to hide from whoever or whatever was coming. As the sound grew closer I kept completely still and breathed as slowly and as quietly as possible. A boy about my age appeared. I hid farther behind the covering of leaves, not wanting to be found. The boy had scruffy dark hair and tattered clothing. He was dressed in what seemed like home made clothing. His eyes were a deep brown and he seemed extraordinarily muscular for his age. His jaw was very angular and he had an almost...aged look to his face, knowing. He turned his head from side to side as if looking for something. He didn't seem to have noticed me...yet. The boy ventured farther into the clearing still looking from side to side. He then jumped forward, arms stretched, like he was going to belly flop on to the ground. Then in the blink of an eye the boy was gone. Only a dark figure of a dog, running away from the tree that I clung to, was left. I sat there in my tree perch in utter shock. I did not understand what I had just witnessed. How could it be possible? Maybe I had just imagined it. No, I had just seen a young boy turn into a dog before my eyes. It was crazy, but true. I saw no signs of the dog-boy so I climbed down from hiding and set off towards the river and my house. I was determined to see this boy again, if for no other reason than to prove that I was not crazy. As I crossed the stepping stones I stopped at the sorrowful howl of a lone wolf.