The White Tree

When you have very little to do, the hours seem to grow long and longer. Five minutes seem like thirty, and thirty minutes seem like a full hour. Taking walks around the entire neighborhood lost its novelty and I had caught up on all my reading. It was during this time that I learned the meaning of the phrase, "boredom is not a burden anyone should bear."

So in my desperation to get away from boredom, I called up Catherine and the others to carpool somewhere, preferably a place with electricity. Thankfully everyone was available to hang out, so away I went to pick up my friends and fiancee to steal them away. During the drive I heard several horror stories about what had befallen them in the meantime: Florence and her family had to clean out broken glass from not only her shed, but from her garage as well. Vivian's stove stopped working, which meant that they could not even warm up soup for mealtime. The window to Naomi's family room had a nice big tree branch thrust through it, making an unholy mess. Rebecca had to deal with her poor mother twisting her ankle on something. The injury wasn't too serious, but it made things harder on Becks.

We stopped at our nearest Sonic and ate a yummy lunch there. As we sat in my car, wondering what to do next, Catherine said, "Let's go to the park. I want to take a walk through the woods."

At first we were all a bit shocked that she would want such a thing. As you know, Catherine had developed an irrational phobia concerning forests, so at first I didn't know what to say. But she looked at me with this expression of 'trust me, I know what I'm doing.' I did trust her, so I complied. "The park it is, then."

On the way there Naomi asked, "So has Dr. Frey been helping you?"

"Mmhmm. Very much. He's a huge help."

"How are your parents doing?" Rebecca reached over and patted her arm.

"They're doing good. They're such troopers about this whole thing, making sure that I'm safe and keeping their eyes on me. Sometimes it get a bit much, but it helps."

Vivian said, "What do you want to do in the woods?"

"Walk around, get a feel of the place again. I want to see if I can do it."

After that, we spent the rest of the ride in silence. I trusted Catherine to know what she wanted to do. Maybe her fear of playgrounds would be conquered as well. All too quickly, we reached our destination. I parked the car and said, "Well, we're here."

As we walked towards the woods, I patted Catherine on the shoulder in comfort. I wanted to let her know I was here.

Vivian was the first to walk in, and halfway down the path she looked back to see if we were coming. Rebecca followed, then Florence, then Naomi. I hesitated walking along with them, since I didn't want to leave Catherine waiting. But she gave me a firm push, saying "No. If you're in there, it will give me a lot of incentive."

I whispered, "You can do it, Cathie."

To be honest I wanted to be right there with her, to hold her hand at let her know that everything would be alright. But if this is what she wanted and if this helped her, then so be it.

I walked as far as the girls did, turning around to see what Catherine would do.

She stood at the mouth of the forest, looking at the path and took one hesitant step forward. I saw her mouth the words 'here come the sun' as if it were a prayer that kept her from harm. She didn't close her eyes as she walked; Catherine kept them wide open as if in defiance, it seemed. With each step she got more and more confident, so much so that she walked right past us.

We cheered loudly on her behalf, and in my happiness I bum rushed her in a hug. I was so happy that she had faced her fears. I gave me hope that she would completely get better, and we could look back on all those frightful times and laugh.

All six of us walked down the long path, chatting and now fully enjoying ourselves in the soothing shade of the forest. I don't know how long or how far we walked, but in the fork in the road, we saw something...chilling.

Before us was a dead, white tree. The branches were bare and gnarled as if writhing in pain. It wasn't small by any means, but it wasn't big either. Hung on those branches were trinkets held with twine: bird feathers, fish scales, bottles of what looked like blood and dirt, pieces of goat horns, broken glass and mirrors, an entire assortment of bizzare and disturbing decorations. The trunk of the tree was not spared from oddity: some parts were smeared with what I assumed was ash from a burned thing. Some words were written on it (carved into it) in a strange language that neither I nor anyone else could identify.

Catherine tugged at my hand, "I want to go now. I don't like this at all."

I turned to look at her and saw that her face was nearly at white as the tree. I saw fear and anger in her eyes, but nothing that suggested violence. Without looking back, we all walked quickly away from the tree and to my car.