Natalie Farewell

Picnic

CHAPTER 1 ~~ Picnic

"Nat, I'm just gonna go fetch my phone from the car. I will be right back!" Henry said and bent down to kiss Natalie gently on the forehead. She nodded and continued setting up their picnic. This was a perfect moment for Nat. Sitting on a classic red checkered picnic blanket, a food basket with fruit, sandwiches, champagne and lollies, wearing a pink striped singlet and denim shorts, her long brown hair neatly straightened, was the perfect moment for Nat. Henry was the one that made everything better. His handsome smile, short stubble across his face and dark brown eyes and dark brown hair made him somewhat attractive. They had only been dating for three weeks, yet for Natalie, they were perfect for each other.
She looked down at her phone to check the time. Henry had been five minutes just to retrieve his phone in the nearby car park.
'It shouldn't take this long,' she thought to herself. She lied on her back with her head resting on her handbag looking up at the sky. The grass tickled her feet, as she couldn't quite fit on the blanket. The clouds were moving slowly and Nat decided to make shapes, as you do. Scanning the sky, Nat found a bunny, a smiley face and one cloud she couldn't quite make a shape out of. As though she was set on a mission, Natalie needed to make a shape out of this cloud. She tilted her head to one side and there she saw it. She saw it, but she didn't know it. She groaned in frustration, as she didn't know she saw something. Nat sat up. Picking up her phone, she checked the time again. Henry had been gone fifteen minutes now and so she stood up, slid on her maroon vans and walked towards the car park.
Henry's car was clearly still sitting in the same spot. The messy paint job that was peeling and the rust frayed up from the bottom of its doors, made the car seem like Henry had driven it through an angry mob carrying weapons and heavy machinery. However, it was just how it was before and no Henry was in sight.
Nat was worried, but tried to keep positive at the same time.
'He wouldn't have ditched me,' she thought, 'Henry would never do that.' The thought of being abandoned still triggered her mind. Where else would he be? Looking around the car park there was nobody around, only a few cars in spaces. Nat decided to walk to the picnic again, just in case he might of walked back there without seeing her somehow. She started to feel hot. Hot and sweaty, as she approached the picnic they had set up for themselves.
Nobody was there.
Nat felt her head throb and tears welling up in her eyes, blurring her vision. What had she done wrong? Why would Henry just walk off? Suddenly something came across her mind. If Henry wanted to abandon her, why would he walk and just leave his car behind? Maybe he felt like fresh air. The confusion she had was ridiculous. Nothing made sense and there was no possible answer to this situation. Except for two that were super unlikely. One would be, he was taken by an alien spaceship that was looking for a tall handsome boy. The other unlikely situation would be that Henry was taken. Taken by people. Kidnapped. She breathed heavily and swallowed hard. That could never happen, she kept telling herself. She packed up the picnic and walked back to the car park for the second time.
As Nat was about to unlock the wrecked and rusting car, she realised she couldn't take Henry's car. She couldn't just take his car without permission. That would feel weird. She sighed a loud and over-exaggerated sigh and started to walk to the main road, struggling to hold back the tears.
As she walked past the rusting and peeling car, she noticed a small white shape on the dark cement. She hadn't seen it when she was last in the car park. But Nat just kept walking because she thought that was the least of her worries.
What she didn't know, was that that should have been the thing she was most worried about. What she didn't realise was that this very shape was the shape she saw in the the clouds.