The Tales of Whispering Hills

Chapter One

It was a chilly Friday in early November as Hazel was walking down the sidewalks of the Whispering Hills Shopping Center after school. There was fog over the mountains in the distance, and the leaves fell as she walked beside the deli and the boutique. It wasn't long before she found the shop that she was looking for, the Dollar Store, and walked into the store, escaping the gasoline smell from the parking lot and the cold.

Inside, she bought some card-stock and markers for a school project, and some light brown nail polish with her extra money. The lady at the counter was kind and she got the chore done quickly.

She walked back outside, and noticing how cold it was, zipped up her pale jacket and pulled her hood up over her shoulder-length brown hair. As she walked, she noticed her breath made little white clouds in the air in front of her, for a few seconds she distracted herself and pretended to be a dragon, then held an invisible cigarette in front of her lips and blew out the smoke.

Hazel hated the cold, it was her only weakness. She started back down the sidewalk looking at the people eating ice cream through the Fro-Yo shop's front windows, decorated with decals and slightly fogged up around the edges. She thought it was odd that people would be eating ice cream in the cold weather, but she didn't give it a second thought. The citizens of Whispering Hills were strange.

She walked down the sidewalk and across the street out of the shopping center. After a few paces she broke off from beside the street and headed into the woods, where she knew there was a shortcut.

The leaves crunched under her feet as she walked through the woods to her neighborhood. She lived in the most boring neighborhood of them all. All the houses were grey, lifeless, and populated by seniors. Her best friend Monnie was the only other kid that lived in the neighborhood, besides her and the grandchildren of their neighbors, who only came over on the weekends.

The leaves under her feet weren't the golden, orange, and red leaves of early fall, but the remains of the leaves that hadn't fallen off the trees in October. They were brown, dead, and frail, they were the ugly part of fall that most movies and books don't portray.

Hazel had lived in Whispering Hills for about 5 years. Her little sister, Audrey, her father, James, and her had moved to forget about the car crash that cost the family the life of their mother, Elizabeth.

Hazel and her sister missed their mother dearly, but their dad had missed her the most.

James had been devastated by the news. Elizabeth and James had known each other for most of their lives and were best friends since they were big enough to walk. They had always been there for each other, no matter what. So, the passing of Elizabeth had taken a huge toll on James mental health and he was still recovering from the effects. But nothing made him happier than when Audrey asked to hear stories about her mother.

Audrey had only been 3 when Elizabeth had passed, she didn't recall much of her mother, but loved hearing the stories her father told her. Her face always lit-up, she smiled wide, and her eyes filled with awe every time she was told her about all the brave things her mother had done.

Hazel missed her mother reading her bed stories, and missed her mother singing her songs, even though she wasn't the best singer, and missed everything her mother did. Hazel had gotten her brave personality from her mother. Of course, she wasn't the exact degree of brave as her mother, who was a lawyer in life, but she couldn't have become brave from her father, he was a huge coward and had relied on her mother for protection.

Occasionally, Hazel felt like Elizabeth was watching over her. Now was one of those times and she felt at peace as she walked between the trees and through the small streams that divided the area around her.