Seventeen year old Misty Cellars lives in a double-wide trailer where she bargains with a local drug gang to keep her mother out of prison. After losing her father to heroin, she is invited to a weekend church gathering, or so it appears. Instead, M...
It was a late Friday afternoon and the waning summer sun shown through the maple trees, scattering bits of light over the browning grass. It had been an unusually dry summer in Northern Maine, and this wasn't the automatic-sprinkler type of neighborhood. It was the brown grass, three messed up old cars at a minimum in the front yard type of neighborhood.
Misty sat by her bedroom window, looking out at the maple tree. Luckily, none of the winter hurricanes during her childhood had managed to knock over the tree, and she loved to see it when she sat, daydreaming, gazing out the window.
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She saw a flicker of red through the tree, and her heart skipped a beat. Was he out of prison? Misty shook her head, wishing she could go back to dreaming about the upcoming weekend. A few summers ago, she and Jenna were swimming in the algae-dense swimming hole, when she saw a beautiful, slim, older girl walking across the old bridge. She and Misty made eye contact, and the girl gave her a sad smile. Though not much older than Misty herself, the girl had a worn, tired look about her, which made her appear much older. There was something about the way the girl looked at Misty that made Misty feel suddenly aware of her own innocence. The older girl looked at them with a mix of sadness and nostalgia, her smile telling Misty that she should hold onto these moments of pure childhood bliss for as long as she could. Because there was something in the town that was bound to take these moments away from her, whether she liked it or not. She was seen as innocent only because there were things, especially back in those woods, that Misty had yet to discover. Or, worse, that had yet to discover her.
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Though they were heading into their first year of high school, Jenna and Misty were still more concerned with who could climb higher on the rope swing than getting their first two-pieces, as they called them, and they couldn't care less what the Chase boys shouted at them from their busted Trans-am when they were walking to the beach. It was their life, so naturally, they were at the center. As she and Jenna goofed off in the old swimming hole, Misty saw the girl navigate the mismatched concrete slabs with practiced efficiency. The large pieces of concrete lay on the other side of the bridge, a result of an abandoned old dam, and they made the perfect hangout. She lay down atop the highest, narrow wall of concrete, face to the sun, faded blue jeans exposing sharp hip bones beneath a skin tight crop top, upon which Misty could barely make out the shape of a small butterfly. Not ten minutes later, an enormous boy, no, maybe even a man, emerged from the dirt path that led down to the bridge. He had shaggy red hair that made me Misty understand why some people called it "flaming red." She and Jenna exchanged wide-eyed glances. "Um." Misty gulped. And she and Jenna both dove under the water at the same moment, knowing it was the only surefire way to suppress their laughter. They both knew what the other was thinking: He looked exactly like some kind of demon.
