Hiding

I’d be found soon. I had no doubts on that score. I’d run till I could only breathe in short gasps, until sparkling stars filled my vision. I’d collapsed in this tiny clearing. I sprawled on my back and stared at the million shades of green above me. Such beauty, each leaf too small to distinguish its separate form. My eyes traced the path of hundreds of tiny branches, winding into the sky in search of sunshine. Birds were there, unseen for now, but felt in the trembling of leaf and branch.1

Soon, now. Then all this would be in the past. Nature’s beauty replaced with stone walls. I wouldn’t be able to hide from them forever. One of the big branches, parent to half the canopy above me, caught my eye. I pulled my reluctant body up and stretched my arms high. I could just touch the bottom of the massive branch. A small jump and the coarse wood was holding my weight.2

I swung, pulled, kicked until I was up, the only casualty a skinned knee, an almost pleasant sting. I settled back against the sturdy trunk. I was aware now of the individual birds, hopping impatiently from branch to branch, unhappy at my presence near their homes.3

From here the leaves were individual works of art, each a roadmap of tiny veins. Some were whole, others had been the victims of child butterflies. I thought I could spend years looking and still not know each one.4

Instead I knew the memory of this place would be all I had. They were getting closer now. The noise of their passage had been at the limits of my hearing moments ago, but now was trembling the peace around me. I stood as silently as I could, pressing myself to the weathered trunk. Perhaps the shadows would shield me for a time.5

Their voices were distinct now, though individual words blended into the wind and rustle. So little time. My eyes closed as I drank in the feel of the rough bark, the gentle wind with its touch of autumn, the sound of bird and leaf and insect. The last of my freedom.6

“Olly, olly, oxen-free!” The voices broke through my reverie, and I looked down at my captors. “Come on, Jane, we have to get back.”7

With a sigh I pulled away from my hiding place. Down now, back to the cars, and civilization, and tomorrow….school.