Forest of Rope

Chapter 19

‘Just kill me now,’ a tired frightened voice pleaded in the back of Riley’s mind as the plane lurched into another assault of turbulence. Riley hated flying. Always had. Always would.

He sat locked in a death grip, constricted to a point of near-suffocation by his seatbelt which he’d fastened extra tight just in case. Alexis rolled her eyes when his hand grabbed hers by accident during a particularly violent episode of shaking, creaking and whirring.

‘Are you gonna be like this the whole time?’ she asked him over the deafening blast of the engines and she wasn’t even joking. Riley ignored her with a scowl and released his hand but Alexis snatched it straight back.

‘Calm down,’ she reassured him, giving his hand an involuntary squeeze. Riley felt her new ring press tightly against his palm, meshing with his own.

‘You’re not dead yet.’

The flight felt indescribably long and tedious. The further they rocketed over the Pacific, the faster time caught up with them. Somewhere above Hawaii most of the crew and passengers decided to ring in the New Year at thirty-thousand feet. For a brief period there was free champagne and pretzels which Riley would have been mad to refuse. He’d chugged it down before he could clink his glass and had shut his eyes hoping to pass out by the time they got done singing Auld Lang Syne. He didn’t really take much notice to Alexis who had been shedding silent tears the entire time behind his back.

‘What’s wrong with you?’ he asked her at least ten minutes later when the cabin had quieted down.

‘Something in my eye,’ she insisted moodily, sinking lower into her economy seat.

One day and seven time zones later Riley awoke to the muffled sound of the captain announcing their approach onto Haneda airport. Cautiously, he leant over Alexis who remained unconscious and peered out the porthole of a cabin window. At first, it was difficult for Riley to dissect what was heaven and what was earth (if they were still on Earth) as they glided into the realm of Tokyo.   

The glittering expanse of skyscrapers below dwarfed Riley’s memory of San Francisco, appearing as an impossibly large and impossibly complex three-dimensional mirror sprawling out in all directions, reflecting the skies of coral pink and burnt orange ceaselessly. His mouth parted in a lopsided stupor at the sight of it. He drooled in awe over the ultramodern structures which almost had him convinced that they had advanced several years in time as well as space.

He nudged Alexis awake so that they could share this incredible moment of fascination together but she shrugged him off grumpily and didn’t open her eyes until after they had touched down.

Shortly before landing Riley had come eye to eye with the horizon. For one hundred miles the dying sun hung like a flawed jewel over the unexplored depths of the cityscape. The feeble rays splintered through the fragmented clouds lingeringly and then all of a sudden extinguished, leaving behind a faint afterglow which resembled the disorientating residue of a camera flash.

The last thing Riley saw before dipping under the gargantuan reach of the sky tree tower was what appeared to be a mound of snowy earth surrounded by a sinister green moss. It was only later, after being bombarded with numerous travel brochures and tourist guides, that Riley realised that what he’d seen was Mt Fugi and at its base, as beautifully treacherous and consuming as the ocean he’d flown across, Aokigahara forest. 

Hello! Sorry for the delay. This is a short but necessary introductory chapter into the second half of Riley and Alexis's story. Hope you liked it, tune in for more updates and share the story with your friends if you can :)