My name doesn't matter

Part 3

When I look back at it now, I can see where things went wrong.  Between my footsteps and the gravel of the trail was the thinnest layer of our reality.  The harder I ran, the more it shattered.  Then, before I realized it, it had broken enough that I slipped through, and, before the hole closed up behind me, Darren slipped as well.

The trees grew taller with every step I took.  Slowly at first, but then very quickly.  Like when you start to grow up and the countertop in the kitchen gets closer every day until, before you know it, you're looking down on it.  It was like that but in reverse.  The trees towered over me, and I was very small.  I was very small and very far away.

The sound of Darren's feet crunching in the gravel behind me had vanished.  Like me, it had grown smaller and smaller until it was gone.  I thought it was because I had outrun him.  That wouldn't have been hard to do.  But, it wasn't.  The sound of my feet hitting the rocks had also vanished.  The gravel itself had given way to larger, smoother cobblestones.  I didn't notice until I stopped running and leaned forward to pant like a dog.

I bent forward and heaved in every breath.  My backpack slid over my head and dangled.  I saw that the rocks looked different.  I caught my breath.  I rose up slowly.  Finally, I saw the woods around me, now wild and untamed, looming over me like a crowd of strangers when you're lost at the mall and you can't find your mom.

Looking around, I saw that the road forked ahead of me.  I didn't remember a fork in the path, but I knew that I had never walked the whole trail before.  It could have been just a part beyond where I usually stopped and truned back.  It wasn't, but I could've never known that then.  If I had, I would have still made the choice I did.

I turned around and slowly made my way back up the trail to the road.  Part of me hoped that the reason I stopped hearing Darren was because he had turned back.  As I walked, the road never changed back to gravel.  The smooth cobblestones made a loose claytering sound as I stepped on them.  I stopped and looked up at the trees again.    That's when I heard another sound coming down the road.