The Wings Of A Caged Bird | First Draft

chapter 48: at the cedar forest

Simply put, the cedar forest of Greenwoods is an absolute disappointment.

It feels almost mockingly so, given how "disappointment" is a word I heard often growing up.

The forest is a lot smaller than we initially imagined. It's not as dense as most of the other parts of the forest, which is to say there aren't that many cedar trees to begin with. It's evident that there used to be a lot of trees here at some point in time, but most of them have been cut down. Now the only sign of their existence is the remnants of their trunks, roughly the size of my lower arm.

"Wow, um . . . " July clears his throat. "Not many members in the family, I see?"

"They've been murdered," I say, as I look all around at the mess. It can't even be called a forest anymore. It just seems like someone randomly planted a bunch of identical trees here and there and called it a day. It almost feels like a sad, tragic wasteland. Okay, maybe that's a slight exaggeration.

I'm more affected by this than I should.

"Well, cedarwood is quite popular, you know?" He looks up. "But hey, they're so tall!"

I do the same and indeed, most of the remaining trees stretch far up towards the sky. Cedar trees look a bit like pine trees. Their branches don't stretch too far from the trunk. And the leaves, which are incredibly green, are arranged in flat bunches, reminding me of those miniature Japanese bonsai trees.

After staring for a while, it doesn't feel that special anymore. I let out a long sigh. "We came all the way for this?"

It took us around three hours to reach here. I called up Tiara and asked her about how to get to the cedar forest from the motel. She laughed for a long time from the other end of the receiver. Apparently the idea of Cedar visiting a cedar forest is funny even outside July's rotten sense of humor. Tiara ended up telling me the exact thing Mr. Aziz had: to find that trail and follow it for twenty minutes. I told her that there I have a traumatizing memory there, so no way. She probably thought I was kidding. But she then told me a different, longer route.

During the call, Tiara also mentioned that aunt Sayra's lost ring has been found. She left it in the bathroom of the house of her friend Sara, the one who got married recently. After she found out, she wanted to badly apologize to me, and tell me to come back. But Tiara didn't give her my number. She thought I would need more time to get over it.

"I'm not mad at her, Tiara," I told her, "but you're right. I guess I need a bit more time." The scar was a bit deeper than I thought. Tiara, too, is wiser than I thought.

Presently, July shrugs. "No need to be so sad, darling. It might not be the best, but family is family, right?"

I let out a laugh. "You're going too far with the family narrative now."

"'Cause it's funny!" He giggles. "Anyways, aren't you gonna choose a tree?"

"Ah, right." I look at the polythene bag in my hand.

July and I decided that we're going to leave a memo of our visit to this forest. We're going to choose a tree and carve our initials on it. Then we will dig a hole right under that tree and bury something memorable for the three of us.

And by three, I of course mean me, July, and Dawn.

"Well lucky there aren't many to choose from," I reply, feigning excitement.

"Wow, you're really salty about this." July grabs the tree near him, presses his feet against the bottom of the trunk, and does a clean half-swing around it. Then he hugs the trunk tightly with both his arms and looks up, his eyes dreamy.