Janna was six when she first wandered into the other world.
Her Mama sent her into the woods to fetch mushrooms and fiddle heads for
supper. She took a little basket and her favorite blue coat with the green hood
and matching mittens. The sun was high and bright in the sky, but it hadn’t
been spring long enough to warm the woods. She pulled on her warm wading boots,
because the best freshies grew along the creekbed, and the easiest way to get
them was to wade in the water, like Mama showed her.
She felt very grown up to go alone, but Ellie was sick in
bed, and Papa was working in the village, and Mama had to take care of Missa
Painter, whose baby didn’t want to come yet, even though her water broke and
made a mess all over Mama’s clean thrushes and Janna knew she’d have to sweep
them all up and lay down fresh ones after supper. But even that couldn’t dampen
her spirits to be charged with finding the freshies for their supper.
She soon wandered off the path, because of course all those
freshies had already been picked. But she kept a close eye on the red ribbons
that fluttered around the trees to mark the safe way through the woods. She
knew better than to wander out of sight. The will-o-wisps would lead her
farther and farther among the trees and she’d never find her way home again.
She crouched down to examine a frog that sat on a rock, and
it hopped away. Still crouching, she took a little step closer, and it hopped
away again. She took another step and another, as it hopped ahead of her. Did
it turn around to look at her? She looked up with a start to find the nearest
red marker. There it was. And there was the little creek. Surely there would be
good freshies there.
Janna splashed from one bank to the other in the creek,
humming a little song her mother sang when they hunted for freshies together.
When her basket was full of fat round mushrooms and bright green fiddleheads,
she stopped and looked around. She didn’t hear any birds singing or any other
animals moving in the trees or the leaves on the ground. She didn’t see any red
ribbons, but she wasn’t too worried. She wasn’t wandering around in the woods. She
would just walk back down the creek until she found them again.
The creek curved ahead, and she thought it would be all
right if she walked that little bit farther to see what there was to see in the
woods. There was a huge oren tree growing on the left bank, and the creek
curved around its broad roots, like maybe the tree had gotten in the creek’s
way when it was growing up. Janna took a few more steps and came around the
tree. Shocked, she jumped back behind it and pressed against its smooth bark.
The basket dangled from her loose fingers, in danger of tumbling all the
freshies into the cold creek. She set it on the bank against an oren root, then
crept back around to take another look.
There was a line in the leaves that stretched as far as
Janna could see. On her side were the familiar, if somewhat foreboding, woods.
On the other side, fresh green grass and a meadow of spring flowers spread out
before her. The sun was setting, and Janna admired its beautiful pinks and
oranges and purples. Then she remembered it was several hours until sunset— beyond
the distant mountains on the other side of her house from the forest.
Janna crept along the creek bed to the edge of the woods.
She watched the water rush past her feet toward the line—and disappear where it
met the grassy meadow. Then she saw the beautiful blue butterfly, as big across
as both her hands stretched wide. She smiled with delight and reached for it,
took a step, then another, and then she was in the meadow, racing across the
grass, chasing the butterfly fluttering always ahead of her reach.
She stopped, out of breath, and looked around. The sun was
so low in the sky, all the colors were fading into dark, but it was still warm
on her face—so much warmer than she could ever remember. She took a deep breath
and smelled the heady perfume of the meadow flowers, the rich scent of
fresh-cut hay, and a sharper tang that bit at her nose and made her cover her
nose and mouth in alarm. Was it fire? She looked all around in alarm, but she
saw no sign of flames. She took another cautious breath. What was that bitey
smell? Maybe she didn’t want to be here. Mama would be worried about her, and
wanting the freshies to start their supper. Janna had collected enough for
Missa Painter, too, if she could eat anything.
Janna turned back toward the woods and stopped with a gasp.
They were gone. The meadow filled the space where her woods had been, leading
up to a mountain she had never seen. She had never been this close to a
mountain before. She looked up and up. Clouds hid its peak, and several large birds
wheeled in and out of the clouds. She took a faltering step, and another. Where
were the woods? The creek? Her basket of freshies? Where was her home? Janna
took a deep breath and blew it out through an “o” like Mama always taught the
Missas to do. It didn’t help. Tears blurred her sight, and her deep breaths quickly turned to raggedy sobs.
“Mama? Where are you? I want to go home!”
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Dogs in house:
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Houdini, Brindle, Bacon
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Music:
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Sting’s charming “St Agnes And The Burning Train”
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February word count:
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2543
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