The Woods At Night

Chapter 2

We drove for about a day before we got to the town. There was a sign we saw on the way in that reads, Welcome to Lucky Tree! Remember not to trust raccoons! We hope you enjoy your stay!
That's a weird thing to put on a sign. Although, this is a strange place to put a town too now that I think about it.
As we're unpacking the moving van I get a bunch of notifications on my phone. What the hell? One is a text from Vivian that just says "sorry, he wouldn't stop bugging me" and the rest are a ton of messages on Instagram from Nate. I know I should have made my account private before I left. He requested to be my friend on Snapchat and Facebook too. I hit delete on his requests and I decide I'll block him on Insta later. I put my phone on mute so I can get more unpacking done. I can't wait to get my room set up the way I want it. Eventually the day turns to night and as it does I see billions of little dots lighting the night sky. I know these are stars. I've learned about them in school but I never got to see them myself since I've always lived in cities where the lights from the buildings blocked out starlight. This place is much different than the city.
I get on my newly dragged in bed in my room that's twice the size of my old room. Smaller towns have bigger homes I guess, or maybe it's the difference between a house and a tiny apartment.
I plug my phone in and turn it on only to see I have more messages from Nate and his friends. Great. I open Instagram and skim the messages he sent me, then I delete all of them because I've decided in advance that anything Nate says is unimportant. I block him and everyone else who's been spamming me all day. An hour later he messages me from a new account asking why I blocked him. Of course he's got spare accounts just to piss me off. I decide to ignore it and go to bed, I can deal with it later anyway.
I wake up to the smell of about 50 pies that the neighbors probably dropped off as welcoming gifts. I go to my Instagram and open Nate's messages to tell him to fuck off. I skim the messages first though.
Why did you block me?
Why did you leave? Are you going on vacation or something?
Why are you being so rude, you could have at least told me you were going somewhere!
Couldn't you have at least come to my birthday party and said goodbye to me?
Can you tell me when you're coming back? Please?
Shit. I forgot his birthday was on the last day of school. He told me to come over to his house after practice for his party about a week ago.
Sorry, forgot it was your birthday. I reply.
Also I'm not coming back, my mom and I moved away yesterday. I'm all the way in another state and I'm never coming back to the city again.
Goodbye Nate.
I hit send on the message and put my phone down, heading downstairs to get some of that pie.
When I get there my mom is already having a slice.
"Wow, the people out here are so nice! I talked to some of them and they might bring their kids to meet you, maybe you'll make more friends here." My mother says.
"That or I'll be the new kid outcast and stay unpopular." I say, being realistic.
"Or..... that." She replies. When I'm done with my slice of pie I decide to go explore the town since it seems like a nice day out now that school just ended and I'm curious to see what the place is like. So I go put on some shorts, a band tee shirt, grab my phone, and head out. I walk around and pass some other houses, a small police station, a decent looking diner, a gas station that looks halfway abandoned, a small playground, and a pond. Some little kids in swimsuits run past me throwing water balloons at each other. I almost want to join them. I go climb a tree and get a good view of the town from there, I can see everything, as small as this town is it actually has quite a bit of stuff. I put on some music and stay there just admiring the perfect view.