Willow Tree

1 - in the Tree

   WILL CONTAIN MENTIONS OF PARENTS FIGHTING

   Sitting there head facing the desk, Anastasia listened to her parents fight yet again. She walked to her bed side table and opened her drawer. Feeling around she couldn't find her headphones so she went to her closet and tried to find them. Failing yet again, there was one more spot that they could be. Downstairs. She sighed closing her closet and then closing her bed side table drawer and just dealt with the yelling. If she went downstairs she would be dragged into their fight and she didn't want that.

   She unplugged her phone from the charger and slid it into her hoodie pocket, she cleaned up the homework on her desk letting her future self deal with the un finished homework. She opened up her window and sat there, figuring out how to jump out. It's been a while since she has jumped out the window, because usually she has her headphones with her to block out the yelling.

   She loves her parents, she really does. But sometimes they can get a little out of hand. She knows they want a divorce, but they try to stay together to keep Anastasia happy. But all they are doing is causing themselves and her more pain to have to deal with them fighting. She'd rather have to switch between her parents' houses then hear them fight like once a week.

   Realizing that she's done it before and her body can handle it, she just put her feet on the wall, scoots over to the edge, and forced herself off the window sill. She lands on the ground roughly, but that isn't her bother right now. She stood up and looked back into the house, the yelling. She turned around and walked towards the gate to exit the yard. As she was, Anastasia realized that she forgot her book in her room. She shrugged it off and continued on walking out of her yard.

   Closing the gate behind her, she sighed edging away and away from her house made her feel more and more calm and at ease. She looked down to the ground and saw what frequent path that she has before, was now almost gone. Grass has grown, and is going back to it's original state, instead of bent over and showing signs in constant use. She kept on walking nearing the place she wanted to be, and the grass didn't stop getting higher.

   In the distance, she saw it. Her favourite place. The willow tree she knew and loved. When she was young, and the grass wasn't as tall, she and her friends would run around this land that lots of people knew and loved. Many would run around, and many would plant food and flowers and people would pick them and bring them home, it was forgot land by the higher up's and this was a place people used to escape the real world, and hang out.

   As Anastasia snapped back to reality, she was a few steps away from the area. When she got to the tree, she started climbing up to her favourite spot. A spot hidden, but yet you can see everyone and everything.

   She put her head down, and enjoyed the view. In the distance she saw a figure, walking towards the tree. She waited until the figure got closer and closer to see who they were, and to see if she knew them.

   The figure turned out to be a boy. With blond curly hair. And that's all she could really tell from him.

   "Hello?"

   The boy called out. Quietly, Anastasia climbed down from the tree to greet the boy. Now that she got a closer look of him, he was a couple inches taller than her, and he had brown eyes.

   "Hello, I'm Anastasia. What's your name?"

   "Hi, I'm Markus"

   "Hi Markus, nice to meet you. C'mere I have a spot in the tree perfect to sit in."

   Anastasia brought Markus up into the tree to a comfortable spot so they could talk and look out at the view. The two sat and talked for a couple of hours about absolutely anything. Nothing to personal, but they did talk about a lot.

   Anastasia pulls out her phone to check the time, her eyes widen and she realizes how late she is.

   "Hey Markus, it's been really nice but I have to go, my parents are probably really worried about me."

   "Oh, it's alright. Wanna meet up here tomorrow?"

   "Yeah! For sure."

   "Alright, see you then."

   Anastasia climbed down the tree and took off towards her house. Before she entered the front door she quickly texted her mom that she was out visiting a friend she met from school. Anastasia opened the door and saw her mom pacing around the kitchen murmuring words to herself. Anastasia closed the door and her mom looked up to see what her daughter was back.

   "Oh! Anastasia! How glad I am to see you!"

   Her mom ran and hugged her daughter and squeezed her tight.

   "Oh sweetheart, you have no idea how worried I was!"

   "Oh, I think I do."

   "Where did you go? You never told us anything!"

   "What? I'm pretty sure I told you before I left. Well, I texted you."

   "What? No."

   Her mom grabbed her phone and saw that she had a text from her daughter in her recent notifications bar.

   "Well it didn't show up. I would've heard the notification."

   "Oh, I guess it just sent now. Or it didn't send before."

   "Sweetheart, you can text people. You have a SIM card."

   "Oh, yeah. That's right. I'm not sure why it didn't send then."

   "Well at least you are back."

   Anastasia started walking towards the stairs before her mom stopped her

   "What do you want for supper?"

   "What do we have?"

   "Well, your father just went grocery shopping, so really what we usually have."

   "Oh, sweet. I'll have spaghetti then."

   "Alright, I'll get it going."

   Anastasia walked into her room closed the door and plopped down right on her bed. She pulled her phone out from her pocket and held it up above her face.