AN -- hey everybody just a few words before you read; i wrote this at least.... what, 2 years ago?? at least a year and a half and then took it offline about a month or two after i posted it because it wasn't getting such great feedback (or in my opinion that is) so i decided to post a chatper here and there whenever i am in the middle of posting for my 2 much better other books, My Kidnapper wears a Feather in His Hair and Pirates, Kings, and Love. Oh my. so as always dont forget to read/comment/vote!! ok ill shut up so you can read. enjoy!
PROLOUGE
The jungle. That’s all I’ve ever known my whole life. I could tell you where every boulder, every river, every cliff, every waterfall is. I could tell you where the crocodile’s swim, where the monkeys swing from the trees, where the leopard naps lazily in the shade. I’ve swung from the vines and climbed every tree. But now, I’m away from all of that, the life I used to know. I don’t know anything about this strange place or their customs, but like I said, this is my story, and its just beginning.
Chapter 1
I don’t remember much of my mother, except a song. It was the most beautiful song I ever heard. Sweeter than the gum that oozes from the gum trees, and more harmonious than a songbird. It sounded like water that gently trickles in a stream. I sing it everyday, trying to remember more of her, but I cant. She died trying to nurse a sick woman when I was two. Papa never likes to talk about her because I think he loved her very much. I did too.
After my mother died Papa started taking me on his expeditions with him. Papa was a captain of a beautiful ship called The Enchantress. We sailed all over the ocean and to many different places. On my fifth birthday though, a hurricane came and destroyed our ship. I fell in the water when a huge wave crashed on deck. Luckily I knew how to swim, but the water was constantly choking me. Every time I spat out water, more filled up my mouth. Papa found a small boat and saved me from the water. We looked all night for the crew, but it was as if they all just vanished.
I don’t remember how long Papa and I were sitting in the middle of the ocean, but I remember waking up one morning and seeing large trees and sand. Much of The Enchantress washed up on the shore of the island as well. Papa made a small hut out of reeds for us while he started to build a house in a small clearing inland. I spent all my time exploring the island. Of course I never could go far because I was so young, but there was still a lot for me to discover. Papa built our house out of the remains of his ship, and I helped him decorate it. We used flowers for some color, and used berries to color the walls a bit.
When I was 6 Papa let me wander off. I had watched birds and heard their calls and learned to mimic them by blowing into my hands, so Papa and I used birdcalls to communicate when we were apart. I learned every part of the island by foot. I tried to learn how to climb a tree, but I was so small and the trunks of the trees were so wide I couldn’t do it.
Papa and I somehow felt like we weren’t the only humans on the island ever since our boat washed up on shore. I found a house in a tree while I was exploring one day. There was a ladder to climb up to it, so I climbed up. It was just like a large tree house, but I looked like somebody was living in it. I looked in a window from the front porch. There were three hammocks, and trunk of clothes, and a kettle on a table, steaming. I knew then that Papa and I did have neighbors. I wanted to meet them. I wandered what they were like, where they came from, what clothes they wore. Like Papa tells me, my curiosity got the best of me so I walked in.
Whoever they were they must’ve been from a place with people because they had forks and plates and other common household things on the table. I thought I heard a noise and looked up. I dropped the fork I was holding when I saw a small girl in a tattered dress with dark hair and striking blue eyes. I looked closer and realized it was me. I picked up the fork and put it back on the table and walked over to the trunk in the back of the tree house. I carefully looked to make sure nobody was looking and opened it. There were clothes. Shoes, pants, socks, shirts, skirts. I closed the trunk and left, not waiting for whoever lived there to come back and find me in their stuff.
