The Kids Aren't Alright [Slash] [BoyxBoy]

Chapter Two: [Olive]

    Every day, I visit a meadow close to my house.

    It's not actually that close. In fact, most people I tell about it argues that I'm insane for going that far, every day, for a dumb patch of grass. But the walk is almost as important as the actual visit, to me.

    First, I have to find my way out of my absolute maze of a neighborhood. I almost have this perfected. It helps to pay attention to street signs, but I mostly pay attention to things like the park I have to walk past after school, or the closed down house covered in graffiti.

Once I escape the labyrinth, I need to cross the main road. This always gives me the most anxiety- The only time this road isn't covered in cars is in the dead of the night. Not to mention, there's no crosswalks. The first time I had the cross this road, I spent over an hour going up and down the strip, looking for the safest place to cross. I eventually figured out that there is no safe way. So I wait for a break and sprint for it.

Once I pass the road, I disappear in the forest and walk a little less than two miles. Then the foliage fades into soft grass and opens into sky.

Every time I get there I'm reminded of why I come back. The relief on my shoulders as I slide my messenger bag off and lay it gently on the grass. In the spring, the sun is still out and beating heavily, but matched with a light wind. I like to watch as the grass and trees shiver. Sometimes, when the grass is absolutely covered in wildflowers, I'll pick some of them and put them in my hair.

All these thoughts are running through my head as I near closer and closer to the meadow. The forest is starting to ease out, and I feel anticipation rising in my belly.

The meadow starts to loom in vision. I see the hint of dandelions, the wind carrying their seeds up to the sky.

As I get closer, something unfamiliar appears. I can't tell what it is at first. A brown-orange, thick line, protruding into the sky. Then someone walks past it, only confusing me more. I've only come across people here a couple times, and they were all teenagers. But that looked like a woman.

I step into the meadow, and something about the grass is dry and firm under my Converse. About three wooden frames, shaped into some sort of warped boxes, lay out just feet from where I'm standing, people in comical yellow hard-hats standing, pointing, and carrying wooden planks and supplies around them. Dozens of other frames expand backwards, covering the meadow and crushing the flowers.

Houses.

They're building houses.

I watch as a woman with a clipboard points two guys holding a thick bundle of wood to one of the frames, my hands trembling. There's only a small strip of the meadow left, a fraction of what it was before. They've built around a small pond, a thick layer of cement already wrapped around it. Will it be a fountain? Will it be a centerpiece? Will it be the same?

It's so unexpected and unprovoked that my eyes start to water. I take in a deep breath and wipe my arm across my face, but I only start to breathe harder. It's like someone took my neck between their fist and squeezed.

Feeling lightheaded, I lean against a tree and slide to the ground. The world is painted in silhouettes and for just a moment I think I'm going to pass out, pressure expanding in my head without stop, and then it all fades and I can see again.

"Okay, Olive," I whisper, rubbing my forehead. "Get up."

"Hey, kid!"

My head snaps up. The lady I saw earlier, tall with sweat-matted dark brown hair, rushes over to me, holding her clipboard at her side. She stops in front of me, her boots kicking up dirt. "Hey, you can't be here."