Yesterday (Will Poulter fanfic)

Exploring

"Come on!" Iris ushers me along, stepping ahead of me, braches breaking beneath her feet.

I huff, trying to keep up with Mrs. Energizer Bunny, "Do you even know where we're going?"

She laughs, "No, that's the point of exploring."

"We've been walking forever, how much longer are we going to explore?" I say.

"Until we find something cool." She nods.

I groan, "Legs growing weak.....limbs growing cold.....I see a tunnel."

She rolls her eyes, looking back at me, "Quit your whineing, you big baby."

I shadow my eyes as we climb over a log, "We could be at home, making videos of ourselves doing dumb things, or writing song parody's-"

She cuts me off, "But here we are - out in nature!"

"You left Percy alone in your room reading J-14, and you dragged me out in the woods."

"First of all, you're super physically fit, and second, you love the woods." She wags a finger.

"Not when dinner is soon!" I whine.

"You're thinking about food at a time like this? Look at the trees! Aren't they pretty?" She says, taking a deep breath and stopping.

I nearly run into her, "Yeah, yeah, nature is pretty, flowers smell nice- can we go home?"

Iris gasps, "Hey, look at that!"

I look around, trying to see what she sees, "What?"

She runs over to a tree, and grabs something I never would have seen. A camouflage ladder leads up to a camouflage nest in a tree.

Iris looks at me, grinning, "We should both be able too fit on! Come on!"

She pulls herself up on the rungs, her hiking boots squeaking a little. I'm glad I wore my Nike's, because the ladder is a little slippery and my shoes have good grippers. We finally reach the top, finding a little ledge of sorts and sitting down on it. It's sort of like a chair, because it has two sides to keep us from falling.

Iris smiles, "See?"

I shake my head, looking at her, "How did you even see this?"

She shrugs, "I've always had good eyesight. And there is always something to find."

I hum, "You are way too positive to be a thirteen year old."

She rolls her eyes, "Dang people stereotyping teenagers."

I shake my head, "I swear, you see everything. You always know when something is wrong with anyone, and you always see the good in people and you're good at finding things in trees. No one else would've ever looked up here."

She smiles a little, "Eh, I've trained myself to search for things. Expressions, good, adventure and promise. I'm sure someone would've seen it. I wonder who left this here? You think we're on someone's property?"

"Probably." I shrug, "We should get off, before we get caught."

She waves it off, "Nah, there's not another house around here for a good five miles."

I gawk at her, "Is that how far we've walked?"

She nods, "Yeah, but we did it an hour!"

I scrunch my face up, "That's because you were running!"

"Well, I know these woods pretty well." She shrugs.

"I thought you said you'd never been over here before." I contradict.

"I haven't." She says, "I just know the creek we've been traveling by, runs east, and that the lake is east, so if we follow the creek long enough, we should run into a path to get to the lake."

I shake my head, "And if we don't?"

She thinks for a second, "Then we're screwed. Hey! Look!"

On that positive note, she points across the trees and I see small dots of yellow in between. She squints, "Looks like a feild.....you have to pass a field to get to the lake. Come on, let's go!"

She slides down the ladder quickly. I follow, with a little less grace, "Iris! Iris, what if that's not the feild you're thinking of? What about the creek?"

"The creek is not going anywhere!" She calls, still running.

I shake my head, running after her. Although I don't have as much stamina, I am a much faster runner, so I catch up with her quickly. She trudges along, moving fast, until we finally come to an opening.

Before us is a feild with tall, yellow grass, that plays out in sections, like you would see at a farm. It lays in a perfect square shape, with feilds on either side of it.

"Cool." Iris mutters, walking into the grass.

My eyes widen, "Um, Iris, ticks! Ticks exsist! Especially in the springtime! You're going to get Lyme's disease or something!"

"Well, then I'll rest assured that I got it from my sense of adventure. Keep up, we've still got to keep heading east." She says, going to the left, towards the neighboring feild.

I sigh, following behind her, muttering, "Sense of adventure, she says. This will be fun, she said. Keep going east, she says."

"I can hear you."

"I know, Iris."

As we pass through the tress to cross into the other feild, we notice a wodden structure on the other side. I squint looking up ahead, "What is that?"

Iris cranes her neck, "Looks like a gazebo."

I now eagerly press forward, in front of Iris, "Let's check it out."

Iris grins, jogging behind me, "That's the spirit, good madam!"

We grow closer to the building and I see that Iris was correct. It's a large wooden gazebo, with a old shingled roof. At one point in time, it had a screen around the pillars, but now they've fallen out to let the cool air blow through. We walk around, trying to find the entrance. This gazebo is different from others, because it has a door. I try tugging on the handle, but it's stuck and it won't budge.

"Darn it." I mutter.

Iris points, "Look! There's a hole!"

I see where she's pointing, just a few feet away from the door, and just large enough that we can crawl through. Iris is closer, so she's the first to slide in. I crouch down, crawling through the wood, being careful to avoid splinters. I stand I the gazebo, the air smelling old and musty. The floor is sturdy, despite how the structure looks old and adondoned.

Around the sides of the gazebo, are small wooden benches and I can see the rust on the door from inside. The ceiling is arched slightly, with a small candle chandelier that sways in the breeze. All but one of the screens have been knocked out of the pillars. The inside is rather large and spacious, and the meadow that surrounds it give the place a surreal and almost eeiry feeling.

I raise my eyebrows, "Wow."

Iris grins, "We are coming here, like, everyday for the rest of our lives."

I pace around the place, searching, "How has no one found this?"

Iris sits on one of the benches, looking out at the surroundings, "Same way no one has found that camp perch, or that old abandoned shack near the brook. No one ever explores anymore."

I nod, "We have to bring our friends here."

She smirks, "Looks like we found a new hang out spot."

We glance at each other, but don't say anything for the remained of the time that we're there. We just enjoy the stillness of the lonely woodlands.