Answer

THE ESCAPE

I could hear their voices call out from a distance. The voices carried with them dread more than they did love. The echo of the woods drowned them into the stillness of the evening. I could hear the voice of Aunt Susan, my brother Sam and Big Foot. Big Foot was my step-father. They were not sure what the news of my mother’s death had driven me to do, having taken off into the cold evening air. A thorn had pierced my little finger, and droplets of blood stained the leaves as I walked past. Two doves were calling each other out in deep tones. The turns they took could be mistaken for guidance. It was as if each one was telling me they knew the spot I wanted, as the other one called back to disagree. I walked on. The three voices had receded in the distance, and I stumbled on a stone covered in the thick undergrowth. Then I saw it.

I had been here about three times before. My mother would hold my hand, lead me into this spot and we would sit here for hours. I picked the little rock she always sat on. There was a blade of dry grass that was neatly sitting on the rock. I picked it up and sat. The sun was going down now. Its scarlet hue slit through the leaves and dark branches ahead. The blood-red rays pierced right into the woods, and I thought of them as a thousand laser beams all aimed at me. I was relieved that most of them missed their target. Even the two doves had ceased their cooing, perhaps afraid that the impending darkness did not deserve to hear them call each other out. A bat hanging in the low branches feet away stretched and flew to a nearby branch. With the night coming, it was finally happy that it would eventually see. There was no terror in its flight—just a confident affirmation that this was her territory, and not even an intruder could scare her away.

The sun was gone now. I remembered that it was at this very spot that I had once asked her where all the light comes from when the sun was already gone. “That is the light of heaven,” she had assured me. A wind rustled over the treetops, and they gently bent to let it pass. There was no other sound. It was as if the trees, the bats, the undergrowth, the wind, the doves were one. There was a butterfly that stumbled in with the wind before a leaf blocked her. I fixed my gaze upon her. She changed position, and sat as if to directly watch me. The wind bent the leaf again and it floated away, happy to move away from the cold, unfeeling stare. I closed my eyes. I knew my mother was here somewhere. I could feel her presence in the leaves, the air, the hisses and most of all, the silence. I knew she would have wanted me to get off the camouflage of the woods and pick my own spot. There was a ruffle of dry leaves from behind me. I did not open my eyes until I felt the tap on my shoulder. I was ready to return home now, the blade of dry grass tightly clutched in my fist.