The forest has probably never seen such a strange standoff before. Blue staring down the silent boy, one hand on her hip (her other arm unfortunately busy keeping the too thick book from falling onto the leafy ground), and her chin jutting out defiantly, while the boys face twists in some internal battle.
Blue's brow creases. It's not like she asked him something hard. But he's acting like she's Ms. Marlowe asking him to do a math problem on the board in front of everyone.
Okay
Not mute then. Just rude.
Blue barely has a chance to finish the thought, much less ask another question, before the boy scrambles to his feet and disappears between the trees. Blue's creased brow turns into a proper frown. The tree trunk and the worn spot at its base are both warmed from his body. Try as she might, she can't quite get settled into her book after he's left.
Blue doesn't end up asking Persephone or her mother about the finer points of ghosts. Forest-boy is added to her carefully hoarded collection of secrets. Not the good ones -- like forest of solitude or the polished bit of green glass she picked up on a rare beach vacation and keeps beneath one of the floorboards of her bedroom-- but the ones Maura doesn't necessarily need to know about. Like the crudely drawn witch with a crooked nose and bird's nest hair someone shoved into her backpack last Friday. Or the Mickey Mouse watch she lost to the river last winter. Little pinpricks of guilt.
She tries to put him out of her mind. He's never been in the forest before. Odds are he won't be there again. Except something about him nags at her like a splinter stuck beneath her skin. Maybe it's just guilt. The look on his face before he ran off keeps snagging in her memory. She's not mean. Not like Jenna at school. But, he looked at her like she was.
Two days later, Blue sits at the base of the beech tree in a pair of artfully patched jeans, her sneakers stained with sharpie where she's drawn intricate patterns along the side of the sole. Some of it has smudged and faded, she'll need to redraw the lines soon enough. The book she's reading is significantly thinner than the one from the other day (but only because she finished the other one, thank you very much, and her class isn't going back to the school library until next week) a look of intense focus on her face. She twirls one of her tight curls around her left index finger, teeth working against the inside of her cheek as she reads, her eyes flickering across the words.
The air is getting cooler, but the sun is still warm.
Later, Blue won't be able to say exactly what makes her raise her eyes from the page. But she looks up from her book and there he is. Standing in front of her. Forest-boy. Just when she convinced herself she'd never see him again. She bites her lip and considers him like she would a wild hare or bird crossing her path in the forest.
"How did you hurt your arm? Has someone signed your cast yet?" That's what people do when you have a cast. Blue's never had one or signed one. But she knows these things.
no subject
Blue's brow creases. It's not like she asked him something hard. But he's acting like she's Ms. Marlowe asking him to do a math problem on the board in front of everyone.
Okay
Not mute then. Just rude.
Blue barely has a chance to finish the thought, much less ask another question, before the boy scrambles to his feet and disappears between the trees. Blue's creased brow turns into a proper frown. The tree trunk and the worn spot at its base are both warmed from his body. Try as she might, she can't quite get settled into her book after he's left.
Blue doesn't end up asking Persephone or her mother about the finer points of ghosts. Forest-boy is added to her carefully hoarded collection of secrets. Not the good ones -- like forest of solitude or the polished bit of green glass she picked up on a rare beach vacation and keeps beneath one of the floorboards of her bedroom-- but the ones Maura doesn't necessarily need to know about. Like the crudely drawn witch with a crooked nose and bird's nest hair someone shoved into her backpack last Friday. Or the Mickey Mouse watch she lost to the river last winter. Little pinpricks of guilt.
She tries to put him out of her mind. He's never been in the forest before. Odds are he won't be there again. Except something about him nags at her like a splinter stuck beneath her skin. Maybe it's just guilt. The look on his face before he ran off keeps snagging in her memory. She's not mean. Not like Jenna at school. But, he looked at her like she was.
Two days later, Blue sits at the base of the beech tree in a pair of artfully patched jeans, her sneakers stained with sharpie where she's drawn intricate patterns along the side of the sole. Some of it has smudged and faded, she'll need to redraw the lines soon enough. The book she's reading is significantly thinner than the one from the other day (but only because she finished the other one, thank you very much, and her class isn't going back to the school library until next week) a look of intense focus on her face. She twirls one of her tight curls around her left index finger, teeth working against the inside of her cheek as she reads, her eyes flickering across the words.
The air is getting cooler, but the sun is still warm.
Later, Blue won't be able to say exactly what makes her raise her eyes from the page. But she looks up from her book and there he is. Standing in front of her. Forest-boy. Just when she convinced herself she'd never see him again. She bites her lip and considers him like she would a wild hare or bird crossing her path in the forest.
"How did you hurt your arm? Has someone signed your cast yet?" That's what people do when you have a cast. Blue's never had one or signed one. But she knows these things.