The Forest

Doubt

An inside rival of character existed in the middle of the forest.  And a slow and steady progression of uncertainty began stirring inside of Jack, against his own will.  Every entry was intent on devouring a young boy's chance for success.  But every exit revealed riddles of survival hidden deep somewhere in the minds of Forgotten's Forest.  And together, they would exist.

It appeared as a stoney structure at first glance, carved in a shadow of envy, petrified and numb. Honored by the withering vines of ivy at its base, it was once a structure of strength.  He approached it, treading carefully over the scattering veins of dormancy threatened by the obstacle of power it evoked.  Its eyes were weak and scarred.  Its mouth was idle.  And its face was sculpted around a pout of anger it despised.  The pedestal, clumsy and unstable, anchored the forest to the rise of its control in one lonely stem.  And out of its existence, a world of doubt emerged.

Jack stood facing it, like an ornament within its grasp, then circled around it slowly, ignoring the incompletion of its form.  On the backside, the gargoyle left a hollow entry at its core.  It was covered in moss and weeds from within, twigs and bark.  At its sides, its voice drooled words on stone too cold to answer.  And from above, it stood crumbling in the ruins of a climb never endured.  But as he walked back again to face the stare of its grip, he was consumed by the cunning reminder of its greedy intention to thrive. 

"Who are you?" Jack said.  

"I am your strongest weakness," it spoke out.

Jack froze, listening to a silence between them as the ground answered in a gentle roar.

"What amusement I find in your choice," it spoke again.

"What choice?" Jack said, now growing with impatience under his feet.

"The one you cannot see."

Jack resisted, trying to avoid the confusion of its dialogue.  He watched lips that didn't move.  He watched eyes that didn't care.  He heard ears that didn't listen.  But from within, he watched a garden oath of doubt flourish inside.  Long seams of roots gathered together at its core, and underneath, an unruly and disorganized center of weeds raced to survive.  They tangled themselves in unison around a compromise of fear.  And in moments, grew into a stalk of weakness in front of him.  

Jack began to feel the immediate attention of an enemy and a stranger he wanted to know.

"Can YOU see yourself?"  He asked.

"Yes." 

"Well then--tell me what you see," Jack demanded.

"I see before me, a mirror of flesh that reveals every enemy as a witness. I see a crime with no proof. A puzzle without a piece. And I see one step closer to failure."   

"How did you get here?"

"Never mind how you found me Jack. What is in your hand?"

Jack glanced down at his fist, tightly coiled around itself.  He could feel his knuckles begin to soften and skin seep deeply into the dirt he clenched inside.  He opened it to grinds of soil camouflaging his palm, now beginning to sift through the fine cracks between his fingers and fall to the ground.  

"And now Jack--I see a young boy trying to find a way."

As it covered the ground and dusted the withering vines around the foundation of decaying stone, the forest floor reached out for the last few grains of soil, quenched with the oil from his sweat.  And Jack felt an unmistakable strength building inside of him.     

"It never enters proud or exits wounded."  

He touched his lips and paused, sensing the wake of a storm defeating itself.  And under his feet, he could feel the rise of earth below him, conquering its purpose.  Its climb, a slow and steady outcome, began to absorb the mantle of stone in gentle waves of gravity.  And the thick guise of leaves and stones surrounding its base caved in to the gully of its rise.  It endured the clash of trials and crumbling will of a weakening statue.  It swallowed up time in deep cracks of complacency and narrow ridges of regret and melted fear into action.  And as the march of soil continued its dominance up its stem of doubt, Jack surfaced to the eyes of a young boy's chance to enter again and face the masterpiece before him.