The Outside (Discontinued)

Chapter 2

Emmaline

I fall onto a pile of damp leaves. Not overly pleasant on a cold winter’s night. The desert is gone, replaced by a thick forest of pine trees. Not only is it a thick forest, I can’t see any light showing which way the sun is coming up. I stand up, brushing the leaves off my clothes. I stumble in the dim light. It appears to be night time in this surreal world. Or maybe the tree canopy’s just too thick to allow any light through.

Fear and anxiety take over as I spin around, searching for sunlight, or for the silvery portal through which I came. My trembling eyes find nothing, and my legs collapse beneath me, sending a gust of leaves from underneath me. I lay in a heap on the damp ground. A lonely tear slides gently down my cheek. Realizing I may never get to go back to my world, I curl into a ball amongst the pine needles and the leaves and the mud.

Soon my face is drenched in tears. As if the weather in this world responds to feelings, rain begins pelting toward the ground. I drag myself to the hollow base of a tree and cram myself in the small space, wishing this was all a dream; I know it isn’t. I don't know when or how, but through all the tears, the fear and the rain, somehow I fall asleep.

                                                                ~~~~~~~~~

Ash

I haven’t told anyone what happened; they eventually found out she was gone. ‘Emmaline’s stunt,’ as they call it, is the talk of the town. I can’t get it out of my head, how she looked so scared, so shocked to see me there, as if she hadn’t planned on seeing me ever again. Her face as she disappeared is something I’ll never forget. 

 I’ve barely left my house for these past few weeks that she’s been gone. I can’t bear to go outside, to see people staring at me, their eyes shouting it’s all your fault. It seems that everyone knows I was the last one to see her.

I haven’t slept much since Emmaline disappeared. Tonight, after waking up from yet another dream – always the same dream – I sit on the window ledge in my room. With the cracked old wood of the window sill digging into my back and my feet propped up against the other side of the sill, I stare down the road toward the desert where Emmaline was last been seen. I can’t see the desert, houses being in the way and all that, but I know it is out there, and I hope Em will come back, or at least that shiny thing will appear and take me to her. I stay there for the rest of the night, looking past the houses into the starry sky, wondering what is really out there.

                                                                ~~~~~~~~~

Emmaline

 I rub the sleet from my eyes, yawning. I move to stretch out my limbs - my arms hit what feels like rough, splintered wood. Opening my eyes wider, I look around myself to see the small confines of the tree I'd crawled into last night. It hadn’t been a dream.

I slide out of the hole, landing in a puddle of mud. Oh great, I think to myself as I stand up. The forest ground covers my worn out jeans, and I breathe a slight sigh of panic as I search around for my bag, darting frantically between the trees. I stop immediately and look around slowly in amazement.

What had been a forest of pine trees, just a moment before, were now maple trees, covering the pine needles with their red and golden leaves. There is no way this could be happening; trees don’t just transform before one’s very eyes! But here I am, and this is happening. I sink to my knees and pick up a vibrant crimson star shaped leaf, turning it over and over in my hands. Looking up again I see the leaves changing from various shades of green to a range of reds, oranges and yellows within seconds and then dropping to the ground.

My hand grabs at one in midair. I unclench my fist in time to see the crumpled purple leaf turn a dry brown in colour. Frowning, I stand up and reach for another one.

“Stop!”

I jump and swing around in fright. My eyes dash back and forth between the trees, trying to discern where the voice had come from. Slowly I lean against a nearby tree, and a sudden wave of calmness rains down upon me.  That’s when I see her.

Possibly the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen saunters out of the trees, as if from nowhere. Long blonde curls stretch halfway down her back, hardly stirring in the breeze that shakes the leaves on the trees. Her dress looks as though it were made from silk by one of the finest seamstresses of the 1800’s.  She carries herself in a way that I have never seen any person move. That’s when I realise it: she isn’t human. The faerie’s elegant wings unfold from behind her, their beauty causing me to gasp audibly in awe. 

"You shouldn't do that," she whispers. "The forest around here - it's not a good thing to mess with the forest. Let's get out of here, before they come!" 

The faerie grasps me by the wrist and pulls me along. Her grip is warm on my arm as I stumble after her through the ever changing forest.

"Before who comes? Who's out here?" I ask, avoiding the obvious question, where am I?

She whips her head around, frightened, but continues dragging me with her. Suddenly and all at once the leaves on the trees turn brown and then to black, raining down upon us and leaving the branches bare. The ground beneath our feet turns black and ashen, the wind causing ash to swirl around our ankels as we run. The beautiful, colour-filled forest is now a dead and gloomy place, and I sure do not want to linger any longer.

“Come along, we’re not safe here,” she says matter-of-factly. As if I couldn’t have figured that out myself. We ran.