Scenic Forest

Chapter Six- The Reason

It had been a few weeks since I started living with Lydia or it seemed like it. I really didn't pay attention. All I could remember is the smiles I had and the laughs I produced. The jokes Lydia told and stories I heard. Even if it was just the two of us, it was never lonely.

"And then, Clement fell down the hill," Lydia exclaimed. I gasped trying to cover a laugh.

We were cleaning the cabin and telling stories about our past. I found out that Lydia could play violins, she's a master cook, she's only ate a human once and hated it, she loved sewing, and makes food for Preces at night as a sacrifice. She has fifty other siblings and she was second born. Her parents praised Preces just as much as her too.

"I tried to tell him that he wouldn't make it," she promised. "He just went and jumped. He was a bloody idiot!"

I busted out laugh unable to contain it. I was laughing so hard that I had fell on my butt landing in a dirty puddle of water and knocking over with a bucket of dirty water in it. The water landed on me. Now, Lydia was laughing and soon I was too.

"That's what you get," she said in between laughs. I glared at her playfully and stood up dripping all over the floor. Then I got an idea. I started shaking violently like a dog spreading the dirty water everywhere. Lydia squealed and tried to run away. She kept apologizing repeatedly but I didn't listen. Soon, I had to stop because I was getting sick and my brain felt battered and bruised.

"Good, you stopped," Lydia said exhausted.

"Only because my brain is a precious thing to this world," I said smugly. I flipped my hair over my shoulder dramatically. Lydia did what seemed to be an eye roll, which was creepy since she had eight eyes.

"Whatever, now go wash up," she ordered. "There isn't a lot left and I have eight legs so it won't be to hard."

"Are you sure," I asked. "Another two would help a lot."

I reached towards her still covered in dirt. She crawled back so quick that she became a blur. She was now on the roof glaring at me.

"Go," she demanded. She threw a clean dress, a towel, a scrub, and a bar of soap at me. I laugh as I caught them. I leave them cabin chuckling and smiling to myself, but I feel my smile slip realizing that I had a life outside of the forest.

There's no one there for me anymore, I told myself. Uncle Clyde's gone and even if he's there does he loves me? Was he always against me? Did he know that the family was out to kill me?

I ran my fingers through my curly hair and flipped it again. I got to the river looking at it in joy. My mind already tangled and thinking about the feeling of the warm rushing river water made me melt. All the tension in my shoulder diminished.

I began to take off my clothes behind the rock and slip into the river quietly. I take the scrub and the soap and being to clean myself. And as I did, my mind focus on what happened that night. What did Calvert want to do with the ring? If I really should of left Uncle Clyde? If I had stayed and somehow survived the attack would the family attack soon after? The possibility of that was extremely high. Knowing my family, they would panic and get rid of me quickly before I could do anything.

"Oh lovely," I whispered to myself. I sighed and slowly continued washing myself. I began to hum.

I hummed a song to my mother taught me. It was creepy and dismal but had a nice but sad story lyrics in it. It told a story of a young girl looking for love and friends. She wanted it all. She got it but in the end lost it after becoming greedy. And she was back at the start.

"And the moon called from the past," I sang. "Its light mocked her as she laid lonely in her empty works. She had to start again."

I sighed and lowered myself deeper into the river. I thought a fish would past by but this river like the forest was empty. Even though the water was clean and a good size. I was happy though. I had my own privacy and living with a talking spider. Who could predict that the fish would talk too?