Some Quiet Place

she informs their mother. Her smile is still secretive. “We were dancing.”

At this, the woman’s frown deepens. “Were you alone?” There is suddenly fear in her voice. “Tell me you were alone,” she orders when neither of them responds.

The girl looks out to the trees, as if even now she’s drawn to them. “We were alone, Mom,” she parrots. “I’m sorry.” She embraces her, trying to placate, but she doesn’t look away from those quivering shadows.

“We’re fine,” the boy says.

Glancing around warily, like something else might come out—something far less welcome—the woman ushers them into the house. “No more going to out there without asking me first,” she instructs. “And no more dancing. All right?”

The boy agrees, but the girl glances over her shoulder one more time as she follows her family inside. She pauses in the doorway, mouths something—a name—and an Emotion shimmers into view behind her. The Emotion is achingly lovely, and she grasps the girl’s shoulder hard. The girl doesn’t even flinch. Her expression is soft and dreamy. All her focus is on someone in those woods, someone who is watching her just as intently. His face is hidden in shadows, but he lifts a hand in a wave. The girl blows a kiss.

“Honey, what are you doing?”

Slowly, reluctantly, the girl turns her back on the woods and goes inside, closing the door behind her. The Emotion visiting her vanishes.

She is Love.

Mora looks at me with her big, brown, dewy eyes. “What do you think?” I ask the cow, her teats warm in my hands. Swish, swish. The sound of milk squirting into the pail is familiar, rhythmic, and my muscles relax. Mora shifts and huffs through her nose, taking no interest in my dream. She focuses on the hay in front of her.

The barn is still. The cows chew slowly, their jaws going around and around. Suddenly, though, the peace is disrupted. My senses sharpen and my nostrils flare, recognizing the scent. It’s the presence I encountered on the way to school, the one I followed out into the woods that night—the hooded woman.

A breeze rustles my hair. I’ve been expecting this visit, and this time, I’m ready.

“It’s almost time,” a low voice says behind me.

I turn, unsurprised. “Time for what?” Playing the game even though all my instincts go against it.

She’s hunched over, like being near me is causing her physical pain. Once again she’s hidden in layers of clothing—the same black sweat pants, black boots, and black hoodie as before—and all I can see of her face is the tip of her nose. “You’ll see, won’t you?” my visitor says through her teeth. There’s an underlying waver to the words; she sounds exasperated, worried, scared. But there are no Emotions. Proof that she’s not human, if I needed more than I already do.

I concentrate on the motions of my hands. “Why is it that you answer my questions without giving me any real answers?”

Of course the stranger doesn’t answer this, either. She stands there and watches while I finish. Eventually I get to my feet, the small stool scraping across the dirt. “You haven’t given me enough information,” I tell her, locking Mora in her stall with one hand and clutching a bucket of milk in the other. “If you really want me to … remember, or feel again, then I need more.”

Now she sighs. “Oh, you’ll get answers. Of that, we can be sure.” Her hood flutters and I get a whiff of forest. Her essence is so strong. Without giving me a chance to define it, she walks away. The doors to the barn are open—they weren’t before. She wants me to follow again. Quickly I go put the pail in the cooler.

I trail her outside, unwilling to give up just yet. “What’s your name?” We slosh through the mud—it’s raining.

“Later,” she dismisses me. I knew she wouldn’t tell me. But she’ll make a mistake eventually, and when she does, I won’t miss it.

She’s leading me into the fields, toward the trees, like last time. Mom and Tim are in the house for the night, both lost in their own existences; they won’t notice I’m gone. I know that if I let this woman slip away again, I may be losing my last and only chance to find the missing pieces to the puzzle.

She mutters as we walk. “The power hasn’t faded yet. You’re beginning to break through it, though. It’s almost t-time.” Why does she sound as if she’s in pain?

A moment later her words register. Almost time. This is more than she gave me the last time we spoke. I don’t press for more. The corn stalks brush my shoulders on either side as I follow. My visitor moves at a steady speed, but I stay on her heels. She isn’t trying to run from me. She must want to show me something.

We abandon the cover of the crops and plunge into the darkness of the woods. We hike in silence, save for the sound of the wind in my ears. We’ve left the farm behind, and she’s taking me east of Edson. The wall of nothingness hardens; Emotions are nearby. There are Elements, as well. I sense Greed and Hope and Rain and Curiosity weaving through the trees, answering their summons as they were made to do.

“You have a purpose,” I venture after a brief silence. “But I don’t know it. Have we ever met before?”

She sighs, an irritated sound. Then she starts to run, and I quicken my own pace to keep up. Our surroundings speed by in blurs of green and black. She swerves around a tree trunk. She’s careful to keep her back to me, keep her face concealed in that hood.

We’re slowing down. I move quickly to avoid a fallen tree hanging over our path; it’s caught in a V between two others. At first I continue, following my mysterious visitor, but then I process the trees, stop, jerk around, and study the V formation again. It’s getting dark out, and the trees’ outline stands out in the orange twilight.

“So you do recognize it.” Her voice sounds somewhere behind me. “I wondered if you would.”

I barely hear her; my attention is fastened on the V … the trees … the shadows …

Something inside of me clicks, and my nothingness cinches painfully tight when I realize the truth. This is the place. This is the clearing. Those are the same trees that surrounded them; those are the same dark shadows, the same grass, the same leaves. This is the place that haunts my dreams.

This is where he died.

I don’t have to close my eyes to see the image. I’ve painted it dozens of times, drawn it, seen it in my sleep, in my daydreams. It’s permanently embedded into my brain, an enigmatic tattoo. There is the beautiful girl, her face twisted in anguish, the blood spilling out onto the grass I see now, and the boy she holds in her arms …

The stranger steps into my peripheral vision, staring at

the scene with me. The air around her shimmers with power. “Understand that this is not the actual place where it happened,” she tells me. “I recreated it to test the p-power on you.” As she says this—her voice still holding that odd, tight note of discomfort—the V formation melts away and becomes nothing but erect, unfamiliar trees. I hardly notice this, though, because the stranger is doubled over. I take a step toward her, but her hand flies out to keep me away and her face is turned in the opposite direction. It’s obviously important I never see her or learn who she is.

This is the first time one of my theories has been confirmed as fact; this was done to me. It was not something of my doing. Is this being admitting that she’s the one who placed it? And not only that, but she seems to know the story that appears in my dreams and memories. Remember for both our sakes. My awareness and instincts sharpen, but all I say is, “Why did you bring me here?”

It’s darker now. She’s unable to reply for a moment, but then she chokes, “I told you. You need to break it, you need to face … ” It’s like there’s a lump in her throat that prevents her from saying anything more—she swallows and halts mid-sentence. But she goes against my expectations by managing to spit, “I came back because it’s not safe.”

It’s random. There’s nothing to bring on the sudden realization. But I stare at this powerful being and wonder how I didn’t see it before. “You’re the girl, aren’t you?” I ask softly. The girl in all my dreams. Who smiles and weeps and loves.

Yet again she doesn’t answer. Is it because she can’t … or she won’t?

It’s so obvious. They’re the same size. The voices may be a little different, but that’s easy to alter. The