Howl Silently My Love

Nature's Ally (3)

Chapter 24

“Alex, slow down.” Mom called after me as I pushed my way through a thicket and hurried along. I didn’t have time to slow down, the day was running by and she was walking at some leisurely pace.

I turned to her. “Mom you promised you could keep up.”

“I know and I can but you’re moving really fast and well I don’t exactly know the whole way so it’s not like I can just take charge and march my way through this place.” Her face dropped when she saw the look on my mine. “Look I’m sorry that I’m ruining your walk Sweetheart.”

She was doing it again.

I sighed. “No, Mom I never said that . . . I’m just really excited to have you walking with me and I wanted us to hurry to the creek so we can start bonding much faster.” The lies I had to tell to appease my mother.

She smiled in relief. “Oh, well I’m trying Honey and don’t worry we’ll have plenty of time to bond.”

I forced a smile then continued walking.

Just beyond the thicket I could make out another path. I pushed through and ran right into a wolf that snarled at me. I gasped jumping back and tripped over a rock that was just behind me.

“Honey, are you okay?” Mom called as she pushed through the thicket. I was about to warn her to stop when I looked up and realized that the wolf was gone. It was like it had vanished or something . . . I stared in the empty space that the wolf had been in for a while before looking up at her.

“Yeah . . . I just tripped; couldn’t see through the thicket.”

“You see, that’s why you need to slow down you could have hurt yourself.” She had with a little too much concern.

“Sure.” I said jumping up and continuing. As I walked I couldn’t help but wonder where the hell that wolf had come from. When I thought back I couldn’t remember seeing a body; just a head snarling up at me. What was that for?

Something moved in one of the trees just above us. My head flashed up immediately and I could have sworn that all the birds were glaring at me. Their heads followed my movement as walked but none of them made a sound. Nothing made a sound actually. In the far distance there were wolfs standing by trees and also staring at me but they didn’t seem to move.

“Wow, it’s so peaceful in here.” Mom said, breaking the silence. “It seems like the perfect place to really get away and think.”

“Yeah, that’s why I picked it.” I lied.

“Well good for you.”

We continued walking in relative silence, and by relative I mean Mom talking and me pretending to listen making it a one-sided conversation, until we got to the creek. I stepped out in time to see a few wolves disappearing into the trees—literally they walked into the barks of the trees and simply disappeared. All this freaked me out and I was ready to just leave but I couldn’t spook Mom so I had to maintain my composure. If not for myself then for her because where as I knew I could probably outrun them, she had no such luck.

“Wow, it’s been so long since I’ve been out here.” She said, taking a seat on the large rock by the water.

I raised an eyebrow at her. I thought she didn’t know the way. “You’ve been out here before?”

“Yes, your father took me out here a few years back. This was where he proposed to me. Of course he blind-folded me so I wouldn’t know where we were going and I kept tripping so much that he almost gave up on the surprize but once we got out here I saw that it was all worth it. You should have seen this place. At a certain time the sun would hit here just right and you could swear that something was ascending or descending from the heavens. Birds used to fly in and out of the trees to snatch the wild berries from that bush over there.” She pointed to a half dead shrub that I had always thought was never good in the first place. A berry bush huh? Well then what happened to it . . . oh yeah . . . “This place is nothing like it used to be. “She looked down into the water with a reminiscent smile. “This water used to have fishes of every colour you could imagine. I especially like the bright orange ones because they always seemed to glitter.” She sighed. “I wonder what changed all that. I mean at one point you could even see dear and there was this pack of wolves . . . they were . . . well they were peaceful, if you could call them that. I used to sit and watch them as they hunted and travelled. They didn’t seem to notice me even when I was in the forest but now I don’t see them anymore . . .”