Sarah comes here alone. She doesn’t remember exactly when this became her spot, but these woods comfort her like a grandmother. It’s the place where her heart relaxes enough to open up and play. Sarah’s feet crunch along the path. It is a sound she waits for like a birthday.
She is silent with the brittle leaves, and with the smell of November. She breathes it in, and imagines herself inside a living painting filled with falling leaves, gray skies, and busy squirrels. She wishes she could stay here forever.
The steady rhythm of her feet takes her back to the autumn she stopped caring about trick-or-treating. She used to love dressing up and going door to door to the neighbors for Hershey bars, Kit Kats, and company. She stopped caring about everything that fall. Well, almost everything…
The move was unexpected. Her dad said they would still be close, but he stopped coming over to tell bedtime stories, and to protect her from the long-armed monsters that lived under the stairs.
She still hadn’t gotten used to living in an apartment. She missed her old back yard, Roberta’s tree house, and the apple tree she named Rosanne.
(Scroll through my blog for more peeks into Sarah's world. I have been writing about her for years... If you leave a comment, please check back. I always respond.)