The Light's Calling

Chapter 1

"Autumn" is the whisper that could be heard from the distance, but she didn't pay much attention to it as she walked through her neighborhood, making discoveries in each yard that she passed. The thick, wet grass beneath her feet felt very soggy and wet, and the strange thing is that it also smelled like something familiar. She felt like it smelled like what something fresh would smell like. Fresh sheets, fresh clothes, fresh fresh like the freshness of something that is new. It was definitely the morning dew that created this scent, as it always made its presence known in the morning, but by nightfall, it would fade in the grass.

Her shoes were getting wet from the moisture in the grass, and she started to feel it as it made its way through her shoes, and then her socks, and finally to her feet. It felt cold, like the cold you feel in the night when the covers have been pulled up too high, and you have your feet dangling just on the other side. The gust produced by a person walking by or when the heater kicks back on gives you this quick brisk feeling that wakes you in the night looking for an easy solution to the coldness drawn to your bare feet.

She walks through each yard searching for the thing that brought her here the other day. She feels as though she is on a mission, and she has been given this mission by someone who loves her very much and wants her to make this discovery on her own, for it will do her some good to learn about whatever it is that has her searching tonight. Every 2 or 3 houses, she hears the dogs bark and the branches cracking as the wind gusts blow through her little, quaint neighborhood in the southside of Chicago. The further she gets from her house, the further away the voice gets that was calling her name until she no longer hears it amongst the barks, whistling wind, and her footsteps hitting the wet grass beneath her.

She stops in her tracks, and takes a deep breath, not realizing that she is definitely out of it for sure. She breathes in, and as the air fills her lungs, her chest comes out all the way to here, and then it goes back in all the way into here. She'd say the distance between her and the other side of her lungs was the same as the distance from her to like two feet in front of her. She is warm, but her cheeks are bracing themselves because they feel like ice with tiny little icicles hitting her every time the rain drops pick up with the wind that is blowing in her direction. Her thick, kinky curly hair catches the drops just before they fall on her long, perfectly curled black eyelashes. She puts out her tiny, dark mocha hands, and sees every teeny drop fall on the surface of her palms.

"Brrrrr" she says to herself the closer and closer she gets to the place she was looking for. She pulls up one of the dark red sleeves of the wool sweater she is wearing beneath her coat, and its tiny tiny fibers scratch her soft brown skin, as they makes their way just past the face of her clock so she can take a look at her pink barbie watch. It marks 7 minutes past 7. She looks up and sees nightfall present itself in all its glory. She knows she is near.

"Pumpkin spice, mmmmm" oh it smells so wonderful. She thinks this to herself as she takes in another breath that is so rich that her mouth begins to water. It smells like fresh pumpkin bread with a bit of nutmeg, pumpkin, of course, and a dash of cinnamon.

She catches herself losing focus on her mission, and she reels herself back in to the matter at hand, but she trips on her shoes and falls face first into the muddiest, wettest, dirtiest, grassiest, yuckiest patch of grass she has ever fallen into in her entire life. As she pushes herself up, she sees a hand in front of her, reaching out to offer assistance.

She follows the hand and sees a strand of golden hair at the elbow and then keeps following the arm to see the face connected to it. She reaches out and takes the hand that has offered assistance when she needed it o so desperately. The hand is soft and warm, and it smells like cotton candy, and then she takes the other hand, and this one feels sticky and slimy and it has tiny pieces of COTTON CANDY.

"Hi, Suga!" she says as she looks me in the eye, chewing the last bit of cotton candy she had in her hand.

"Uh, hi!

"Whacha doin' out here on this cold cold night?" she asks with great curiosity in the sweetest southern accent the girl had ever heard. She would say she sounded like those ladies with the big dresses and the pretty curly hair and the umbrellas with the frills, the ones you see walking around town with 3 to 4 friends, as the boys gawk at them because they are all so wonderfully beautiful and dainty.

"I was looking for this" she says as she puts up a picture she had taken the other night of a girl in a window with pink light all around her that came from her hands.

"Where'd you get that, Suga?" the girl that helped her up says as she glances at it with her eyes squinting to look at it closer and closer. Then, she pulls it out of the other girl's hand in that moment and says "You're looking for me."

"Are you sure?" she says to her, not quite convinced that this is the girl she saw the other day, the one that was drawing and had pictures of everything from rocks, to windows, to baby ducks, puppies, people, paper bags, etcetera etcetera hanging on her wall.

Nodding, she reassures her "Yes, Suga, it's me. What's your name?" she asks in a way that is almost demanding that the other girl share it with her. She feels as though she shouldn't tell this girl anything in that moment, but she isn't quite sure if it's fear or disbelief, but then she sits down on the ground looks down at the mud puddle in front of her, and then looks up at the girl's perfectly blond locks that look as though she has sunshine lighting through it, under it, and over it, and she replies.

"You tell me your name first"

"Alright, Suga. My name is Destiny. Yours?"

Suddenly, she feels a tug from behind her that was pretty strong, and she turns around really quick, ready to defend herself, if need be.

"Autumn! Mom is looking for you and she is worried sick. What are you doing here, and who is this? You, always making friends" her brother says as he nudges her to leave with him, but Autumn reaches out her hand, and shakes Destiny's hand. "Autumn's my name, and discovery is my game. You, missy, are the reason I'm like 2 blocks away from my house" Autumn says as she shoos away her brother. You're probably also going to be the reason I truly have no real explanation for venturing so far from my house, when mom tells me it isn't safe so late at night.

"Autumn, are you coming or not?" her brother says as he reaches out for her hand.

Autumn grabs her brothers hand, and she waves goodbye to her new friend "I'll see you tomorrow, same time, same place, if you're game for it," Autumn says as she walks away.

"You got it, Suga! I'll be here!"