1,

The doe was old. She must once has been a dappled white and brown fawn, but she was presently draping silver. The snowy pelt cascaded down the legs and cheeks and chin, clumping in those subtle spots. The hoofs disappeared and then reappeared every time the doe took a step. And those steps seemed to take forever and pained the doe to the extent of violent torment and misery. To the outside observer, the hoof prints made slowly in the grass by the doe resembled a newborn sea turtle taking those first experimental belly slides across the sand and into the glassy water. Or a sailor wobbling around before he receives his land legs after a few years out at sea.
With the hoary down and feeble steps, there was single thing the continued to be lively in the doe the many years she had lived through, while her body gradually became disabled. They were rimmed with creases and tear residue, but the sparkling baby-breath eyes never failed to enchant. They were the color of blindness, as many old deer eyes tent to become after years of service; however, the silver doe’s were not cloudy, but held a charm in them. The allure goes concealed to the inattentive, but piercing to the vigilant watcher.
An old wise tale speaks of the eyes acting as entryways to the soul. On humans, it’s almost always true. They betray their owners continually. But deer eyes mostly display terror when any moving thing other than the wind sights them. When they are unaccompanied, they are restful and at peace, selecting the correct vegetation to east and to line their nest for the juveniles. The doe never felt anxiety or foreboding at company. Her eyes remained brilliant at all times, and that set the doe apart from her relations. They began to feel alarmed around her, and then even at the passing thought of her.
When the doe was adult-like and tanned in the correct spots, her valued mother drifted away from her. It was many years until the notion of abandonment crossed her thoughts, and when it did, it did not trouble her, for the doe was long over her upbringing. She had scrambled around wildly for food, and only after long hardship did she form a small nest and a store for herself, in order to survive the harsh frost and snow.
No buck dared approach her. For each sensed something different, strange in the Silver Doe’s eyes. And in the way of her structure: how she held and carried herself. There was no contact, needless to say, and the silver doe spent her life alone, spouseless, childless, friendless, for years on end.


2,

Clara Mill had run away.
She was far, far away where her journey started in her hometown of Maple Springs. Her parents would be undoubtedly frantic with worry. But Clara would not think of her parents. As an only child, she knew her disappearance would break their hearts more than if she had a brother, or sister.
Clara also knew she would turn around and travel back to Maple Springs if she did not keep her mind focused on her very important goal.


3,

Saris swung her brother’s sharp axe down, hard, and ruptured the oak log on the chopping block. She had no protection for her hands and only a faded flannel shirt layering her forearms. The toothpick-like wood bit hard into her skin, but she continued at her tough work, for she understood she could not take a break. Sari’s older brother would be coming home much too soon for her liking. He’d be expecting a burning fire in the hearth and a roasting dinner on his table so he could stop in and eat, then depart again.
With her lungs gasping for air, and her fallow muscles straining against her, Sari finished splitting the logs and laid the axe aside, resting it in the packed dirt at her feet.
She prided herself in accomplishing this sore task, and took a few sparse moments to seize her breath, but knew she could not relax as long as she wished to. Sari gathered up the splints of wood that could fit in her arms and vanished around to the entryway to the to the small farmhouse where she only had just begun to call home. She copied her previous motion with the remains of the firewood until all of it was piled into the wood box.
When Sari had built a crooked teepee in the fireplace with a number of her logs and warped sticks from outside, she set about lighting it. She scuffled around in the few cabinets and drawers positioned in the small kitchen counters, finding a small matchbox only half teeming and a colony of thin and scrawny mice. They all darted way into their wall hoes when Sari had brandished at them.
Although Sari had been puttering around the small farmyard for a few weeks now, striking a match was still beyond her. But though her Papa had constantly taken charge of the fire, Sari had often observed him while he was juggling the tiny matches in his practiced hands. It had appeared to be straightforward, at the time. But as she ruined a few on her first attempts, she realized shat years of practice her Papa had kept veiled.
Several struggles later and Sari had made a small flicker on the matchstick, and then a flame. It grew and spread and consumed the brittle wood quickly. She dropped the match down into the teepee, where, miraculously, it grounded on some kindling and blossomed into a blaze.
Sari started constructing a stew of her own creation and set it on to poach when she had became aware of the flames she had created in her moment of clumsiness.
Sari sat down in one of the scarred wooden chairs with her only book, A Little Princess. She enjoyed reading more than everything else in the world, and once it had been her most celebrated pastime, but now it was merely a distraction from her grueling work when she could squeeze it into her busy schedule, but only just. The setting was too unfamiliar to her for her to read without fretting about all her other chores she had to maintain to keep her brother’s feeble farmhouse underway.
When Sari understood that the scenery inside the house was too confined for her and her Sara Crew, she stimulated outside to carry on with her comprehension. That didn’t work well either.
The only time in the day that Sari gets an opportunity to read her book is when her stew is brewing. When she exits the plants and wildlife around her and steps into her imaginary world, she disregards everything around her and concentrates wholly on the words on the page.
Her nightly stew had been boiling, as always, but Sari paid it no interest - she had vanished unreachably into her book again. She was assembled in a bed of dried pine needles and comes, reading, when her vision became clouded by visible smoke. Her nose overflowed with that dreaded smell and that was enough to awaken her from her reading stupor.
Astoundingly, only the stew was enormously heated, and appeared thicker than average. Sari saved it by adding more water to it, and her brother noticed.
“What new did you do to this stew? It tastes different,” he asked that night, licking his lips, openly considering if it was any good.
“I added some new spices, Kaz. Do you like it?” Sari kept her worry of what her brother would say tightly locked up and off her face.
“Yes, I do,” he said. “Make it the same way tomorrow night.”
But at the next dinner and the many following, the stew was nothing exceptional.


4,

Clara Mill had run away.
It had been two days since the night of the letter, the letter she received that made her expedition decided. She carried it around in her back pocket, and she could feet it burning a hole in her dirty and worn blue jeans.


C-
I would not attempt to contact you if the situation were not desperate. I feel it is too risky for you, but I cannot help myself in asking; I am at my brother’s farmhouse on Williams Road. My brother’s name is Kaz. He is never around, and I am in dire use of company. Please come, but beware; the roads can be hazardous at more times than at night.

Love, S
P.S. Your departure must remain a secret.


5,

Uncle Joel was horizontal on his floor mattress in his shabby apartment, opening and shutting his eyelids repetitively and promptly. His beloved dog, Axle, lay obediently on his feet, gazing unblinkingly up at her master. His balding head and strangled graybeard splayed wildly across his flat pillow, and wriggled into the creases when he crooked his head.
A short and smart rapping on the door, so silent it was almost inaudible, attained his shell-like ears. Uncle Joel was irritated at the sound that was disturbing his almost-sleep and did not take kindly to it. He rolled over until his fishhook nose was pressed up against the cracked plaster that made up his walls.
“Uncle . . . Uncle Joel?”
He had been expecting a voice, but his apartment hadn’t heard the voice, but his apartment hadn’t heard the young man who had spoken for countless years. He turned his neck only just enough to confirm his accusations; it was his nephew, Kaz Ausen.
“Uncle Joel, are you awake?”
The Uncle’s nephew was upon him now and Uncle Joel could sense Kaz’s morning breath warm on his neck. The old dog finally lifted his head in notice of the man, but seemed to have memorized his scent years ago. Axle went back to resting, as he saw no threat, but Uncle Joel knew better. What Axle didn’t know was the emotional feelings tied to his nephew. He didn’t like to dwell on the past.
“Yes, I’m up,” Uncle Joel said crossly because of the fact that he remembered Kaz’s persistence, and that he would not leave him alone without informing him of troublesome events and asking him for advice. “What a wonder this is,” thought Uncle Joel. “I didn’t believe I could remember much of anything these days, especially of my sister’s family.”


6,

Clara Mill had run away.
The hole the letter burned in her back pocket was large, and so was her abounding book-bag, though the weight of it had nothing on the former. She could see where William’s Road began, and it made her body excited and restless to get there. It was agonizingly close. Clara was anxious to see Sari, to hear her voice for the first time in little over three weeks, to hear her speak of her adventures.
Clara was very close to quenching all her anxiety. But although she was almost there, it was almost dark. And she knew Williams Road was lengthy and it would take a long while of searching houses before she found where to find her friend.


7,

The creek bed was a good place for forgetting.
The water rippled silently, as if in sorrowful mourning, and the willow boughs wept overhead, and Kaz was feeling the enchantment this spot had held for him since his early childhood.
He chafed his eyes with his hands to try to flee the weariness that followed him like a shadow these days. Ever since his sister had come to live with him, Kaz has been attempting to keep his entire woe secret, as to not trouble her.
He had come here to remember, and then forget a certain memory that had been especially annoying to him, and he wanted it to stop driving him, bit, by bit, into insanity.
“Sari, oh Sari,” Kaz thought. “Why did she have to enter my life now?” Kaz had deliberated, after his Papa packed up and had taken her with that he would never see either of them again. But he was only half-right. Kaz never had seen his Papa again, never questioned his situation(s), and did not acknowledge his subsistence until the social worker appeared at his farmhouse with the sister he had not seen in over a decade in tow.
“This is Sariah Ausen. She claims to be your sister,” the social worker had explained when Kaz opened the door. He remembered the social worker for his wrinkled face that took on the shape of a balloon with a dirty blond haircut. The balloon made his body out of proportion and had Kaz wondering how is skeletal neck could hold it erect.
Kaz recovered quickly from this row of thought, and turned his attention to speculate the half-grown girl in front of him.
She was about ten, or eleven, and was built pettily. She looked like a bird, a hummingbird, next to Kaz’s muscular form. Yet it was undeniable they were siblings. She had the same caramel-colored tresses as Kaz – fine, with soft curls – identical high cheekbones and heart-shaped jaw line. They had always been the features that marked him as someone you expect to be wearing handcuffs. But Sari didn’t have the piercing gray eyes, the ones like storm clouds on a summer day, crisp and cold, which her brother occupied. She wore their mother’s eyes.
They were dark green, the green of an evergreen’s needles. They were captivating, they really were.
That more than anything led Kaz to believe the girl in front of him was really his long-lost sister. He had those eyes etched permanently into his brain, had seen then soften with warmth too many times to ever forget. He had pictured those exact eyes in his mother’s face, asking them for advice in life because he couldn’t ask the original ones. They had been gone for three months.
Now, after all that time, seeing those eyes and being unprepared for it was a punch to the gut for Kaz. He attempted to look away, but found he couldn’t. He could only stare into them, could only feel he falling deeply.
* * *
kaz snapped suddenly out of his sleep, and disoriented, understood it was only a dream and that he had fallen asleep. He felt instantly improved after he remembered where he was and why he had come. He looked around to observe his surroundings:
The wind was bending the willow’s branches to the extremes and Kaz had a fleeting thought that they might break and come tumbling down to bury him. But that thought was short-lived. It was clouded over by the wind, and the lack of brightness. Kaz looked up and saw the stars winking at him through the slight, about many willow leaves. It was later than it had been when he came to the creek bed. He stood up to hurry back to the farmhouse for Sari’s evening stew.


8,

Clara Mill was very near to her destination: she could feel it in her bones.
She was near the dead end on Williams Road and there was only a run-down old farmhouse left for her to check. There was a grove of pine trees enclosing the red-rusted mailbox and the overgrown, gravel driveway. The whole scene was old fashioned, and it made Clara wonder if there was electricity or running water. From what Clara knew of Sari, she would love to live there. Clara could only rust that he brother loved it, also.


9,

Uncle Joel was waiting.
He was on a bank of a fresh water creek and had his socks and shoes off and alongside him. His toes blurred under the transparent water as he watched them ripple in the slim current.
He could smell the our-of-site evergreen trees surrounding the traditional farmhouse where he was raised, even though he couldn't see either of them. He could taste the stifling pollen in the sir; see dandelion puffs weaving through the sweet breeze. Daylight filtered through the leafy blanket above him, and plots of grass, weeds and flowers lit up in response. Moss and vines nurtured up the rough bark of the willow trees that shaded him and Axle.
“Uncle.”
Uncle Joel turned at the calling voice. It was Kaz.
“Finally,” he said impatiently. “I’ve been waiting at the Willow Grove for nearly and hour. What took you so long?”
“I had some business to sort out.”
“Well, at least tell me why I’m here,” Uncle Joel snorted.
“How well do you remember my father?” Kaz asked suddenly, as if not sure how to phrase his wording.
“I only met him a few times,” Uncle Joel answered. “ At your parent’s wedding, and at your baptism.”
“I realized that, but what do you remember about him?”
Uncle Joel pondered carefully before answering. “He was a burley man and a was drunk more than was good for him. He had a hot temper and after took it out on your mother and yourself.”
“Anything else?”
“Yes-“
“ Do you know I have a sister?” Kaz interrupted.
Uncle Joel did not know how to react to his nephew telling this family secret. So he did the best he could. “A sister? Why don’t I know about her?”
“My father took off with her when she was only a moth old. She’s twelve now,” Kaz said.
Uncle Joel was flabbergasted. “And you’re telling me all this now? I’ve seen you more than once since then!” His normally weary voice was straining against all of his yelling, but it didn’t make the concept any less serious.
“ I thought she was dead,” Kaz answered sheepishly.
Uncle Joel was lost for words at his nephew’s confession, however small it was.
He started to feel self-conscious about what he was doing. He could feel his arms shuffle at his sides, clutch at his pockets, and his legs still wilting feebly in the clear water. His mind was occupied with how his eyes were betraying him to Kaz, but try as he did, Uncle Joel could only begin to challenge the bewilderment within them.
His only thought was; “How could a woman like Olivea Ausen possibly have another child and not tell her only sibling?”


10,

Clara Mill was there.
The floor had a few dust-clumps, but was otherwise clan beneath her tatted tennis shoes. The expectant cobwebs littering the ceiling were absent and there were no petrified lies in the room’s corners, though holes in the walls indicated the presence of mice. The cramped kitchen looked vulnerable and unused next to the roaring fire in the open hearth. A stew was boiling in a cast iron pot over it. Steam was gradually mounting from it to warm the dank corners of the room.
Thoughts were racing through Clara’s head, almost too fast to comprehend, but all of them centered on her friend. “Sari is here,” they said at last in harmony. “Go and find her.”


11,

The doe’s tatty bones groaned in the fresh morning dew as she slowly extracted herself from last night’s resting-place. The overgrown grasses around her were twisted in her pelt and lugged increasingly at the doe as she rose. Wildflowers perfumed the air and, last twilight, it had been that and their vibrant colors that had drawn the doe there.
The doe nibbled at some stems to help the process of removing herself, and found she was more ravenous than she had ever let herself become. She then gnawed more voraciously, and forgot about her meal acting as a cage.
The silver doe sat back down, and gnawed until her stomach was bloated, and it rumbled again. But not from the previous hunger that had haunted her waking. It was because it was in danger of bursting. It was a volcano, threatening to burst at the slightest bit of movement.
The doe may not have the prime brain in her part of the forest, but it was inaccurate to call her dim-witted. She sat back down in the indented area at her feet and snuggled deeper into the half-stems and remaining grass around her, preparing to wait out another day and night without shifting significantly.


12,

Foggy waves caressed her in moist fingertips, millions of them. When she looked at the hands, she could never distinguish the exact shape; catch only glimpses from the corners of her vision; only see her skin vanish into the damp.
Her white dress was solid on the irregular waves, but at the same time, it was the precise color to act as camouflage. When she looked beneath her, she discovered rolling hills and valleys, and from where she was, hidden in the billows of clouds, she could see the details of the slightest wildflower.
Her nose was petite and straight, and underneath, her smile was tremendous when applied. Her skin was the palest shade of porcelain, adding to the growing effect of a tall, but able doll. Her eyes were almond-shaped and dark, but her extensive hair was even darker. As she sensed something sweeping against her back, she documented feathered wings attached in between her shoulder blades. One small whisper was all it took to be told of their strength.
The angel called herself Caroline.


13,

Ivy wound densely up the tree Kaz was leaning against, blindsiding the wood from ever evading its clutches. He ran a few fingers through his wild hair and sat upright to survey the area: The sky was cloudless and perfect; the sun was beaming down on the world; the light breeze gently lifted nature’s work up from its place and then settled it back down.
The roses, tulips, violets, and buttercups created a forest around him. What would by many beautiful colors become churned and imprecise to his eyes, and the shrubs at their bases didn’t help the image. He blinked fiercely, and chaffed his eyes with the soles of his hands. Then, when he released them to see the result, one plant caught his attention.
About six feet in front of him, a bleeding-heart plant blossomed. It stood as if it were smirking, and so instinctively, Kaz cringed as if it were suddenly to attack, but he never took his eyes off the plant. He was afraid that if he looked away, the Bleeding Heart would disappear.
Preparing himself for the worst, Kaz stood up on stiff legs and inched forward one foot, and then two, three, four, five feet. He stopped and examined the majestic stance of the stems and the strategic position of the flowers. Even though the colors of the other plants swirled in wild patterns around it, and a pleasant breeze stirred the trees overhead, the bleeding heart was eerily still and silent.


14,

The clouds were silent and motionless, but the calm told Caroline more than any crowd ever could.
By her count, three days and two nights had passed, but since sunlight was always peeking through to reach her, and Caroline’s stomach no longer growled from hunger, keeping track of time was no small task. But the rolling green grew pristine and then faded with the passing of days. Caroline remembered seeking constellations in the heavens during her short life, though they were never visible from her position in the sky. Her wings ticked like a metronome automatically, and gave Caroline something to focus on, as well as to calculate the moments.


15,

Kaz started awake with a throbbing heart and ragged breathing. His dream of the bleeding heart plant frightened him beyond any other dream he’s had. Not that it was scary, but that the familiarity was too eerie to acquire all at once.
It brought to mind memories of Mae, Tiffany, Gina, and so many more names and faces. But one especially stands out in Kaz’s mind. Her name was Caroline Bowers.

“Hit me again, Kaz.”
“One more ‘til morning, eh, Kaz.”
“Fill me up, Kaz.”
All the drunkards at The Palestine Tavern shoved at each other in an effort to reach the bar and receive their drinks. Many small bar fights broke out in a constant glow. Kaz was bartending, alongside his buddy, Rogar. They had taken up the jobs to pay off their own debts here, and both Kaz’s mother, and Rogars’ father thought they were at a friends’ apartment when they were scheduled to bartend.
The other reason that the boys took the job offer was all the girls. They flirted with Kaz and Rogar for free alcohol and they seceded at it regularly. My. Evans, their boss, never caught on to this charade, as he was always intoxicated with his own brews.
Then one night, a girl came in alone. One glance told Kaz that she was young and a natural beauty. Her skin was cream and roses, and with straight facial features and a tall, hourglass figure, she exceeded all of Kaz’s typical prospects. But that one glance also told him that she would be more than reluctant to talk.
“Rogar,” Kaz voiced. “Cover for me.”
“Sure thing,” he replied, but Kaz had already ducked out of the bar and was making his way over to the girl.
“Hey,” Kaz said, curving around to cut her off from her path.
“Excuse me,” she said.
“You look a little lost,” Kaz said, ignoring her request. “I could give you a tour, since I work here and all.”
“No,” the girl replied briskly. She edged around Kaz, but again, he moved to block her.
Kaz deliberated his answer for a moment, and then guessed, “Well, you seem to be looking for someone. Anyone I can help you with?”
Then it was the girl’s turn to hesitate. “Well, maybe. I have to drive my brother home, and he said he would be here. His name is Dalton.”
“Hhhhmmmmm . . . I don’t think I know that name, but most of the guys hang around either those tables,” – Kaz motioned toward a group of tables in the back left corner where many college-aged boys were drinking and, and Olivea Ausen’s words, being hooligans – “or at the bar,” he finished.
The girl sighed heavily and turned back to the table, as her brother was clearly not at the bar; there was only Rogar talking to a brunette and a redhead. “I don’t see him here. He must have already left,” she assumed.
“Oh,” Kaz said. “Could I buy you a drink, then?” Kaz’s hand was tapping tensely at his side while he asked this. He wasn’t acting like his standard smooth self. Something about this girl, he noticed, was different than all the others who hung around here and were easy for him to pick up. Was it that this girl was dressed only in street clothes – blue jeans and a plain white tee – as opposed to the tank tops, and miniskirts that was the casual around here? Or was it the fact that although she wore no makeup, she easily outshone any and all girls Kaz had ever met? Was it her walk? Her voice? But at the moment, none of that mattered to Kaz. He just had to know her. “But maybe we should begin with our names. I’m Kaz. Kaz Ausen.”
She grinned up at him.
“My name is Caroline.”


16,

the evergreen’s branches swayed lazily in the breeze, raining delicate needles down into Sari’s hair. She laughed one of her clumsy giggles as she shook them off. Then they rained on the ground too.
This wasn’t the highest up she had ever climbed; though it wasn’t the lowest, either. Sari was resting at the tree’s midsection in a group of five branches, all spread out evenly in the shape of a chair. She was facing away form the cabin, which made it harder to keep track of that night’s cooking, but to Sari, it was worth it, for the view was gorgeous.
From her perch in the Living Chair, as Sari had christened it, she could see out into the woods. Buts of foliage cut her view down considerably, but most of the sunset was still visible. The view was spectacular, when it was light enough to see the distance. It showed a shallow valley, overflowed with wildflowers. At one side, the piney woods continued unabridged. Willow trees had long ago taken over a small area at the other part of the valley. A freshwater stream separated the grove from more trees.
“Sari. Sari. Down here,” a voice called from the ground. “Look down here.”
Sari twisted her shoulders to have a glimpse at the base of the pine tree. To her surprise, her friend Clara was smiling up at her.
Sari remembered scrawling out a short letter in her butterfly handwriting when she had first arrived at the farmhouse. She had then walked down to the nearest post office, which was four miles away. Sari had not wanted Kaz to know about Clara; surely she would never be allowed to stay with them, if only for a little while. Sari knew she missed her selfishly, knew that she should not separate Clara from her parents. Also, she knew that she needed Clara like a boar needs water. She was dependent on Clara; her heart told her so.
“Sari,” Clara called again.
“I’m coming,” Sari answered. She began to climb downward as swiftly as possible, in order to reach Clara.
When Sari got her feet steadily back on the ground, they hugged as only best friends could.


17,

It started as only one night, and only one drink, but stretched into many pleasurable evenings.
As their relationship grew, Kaz discovered everything about Caroline: her family, her favorite card game, her fruit preference, everything. He also gave her everything. That’s why when Caroline wanted to meet his mother, Kaz obliged without dispute. He arranged to bring Olivea over to Caroline’s house the very next day, to meet her and her brother and parents.
As the purple pansies danced to a song only they could hear, Kaz and Olivea Ausen ambled up the front pathway to the Bower’s house. Their house was reasonable sized, with pale yellow siding a plenty of windows. Trees and flowers sprouted from the ground and window boxes, and ivy tangled up and around the chain-link fence on one side of the yard. The grass was neatly cut, but the lion-head doorknocker blew that out of Kaz’s mind. Its mouth was open, teeth bared, lips pulled back, and its mane was unruly. Kaz was fearful to even touch it, but he also knew that his mother wasn’t about to.
Caroline pulled open the door almost immediately after the knock sounded, and beamed when she saw Kazs’ face.
“Hey, Charlotte. Parents home?” Kaz said coolly, but only because of his mothers’ poaching eyes. He took her hand in his, and traced circles into it with the flat of his thumb. Inside of him, fireworks were imploding.
“Yeah, they’re in the den.” Caroling lead Kaz and Olivea down the hall and into a room with red-gold walls and white wicker furniture. The left wall was a glass panel, and a backward image of the room in front of them was shown.
A 42’’ flat screen TV was backed against the far wall, and a preseason football game was on. Carolines parents and brother was situated on the couch and in the one chair. Their expressions were furrowed when they were directed at the TV, but smiled when the glanced Kaz and Olivea.
The woman stood up from the couch. Her hair was a braided rope of fire trailing down her back, and her eyes were gray. They were lit up like Christmas lights.
“Hello, I’m Grace, Caroline’s mother.” She smiles again and holds out her hand to Mrs. Ausen.
“Olivea. This is my son, Kaz.” She shakes Graces’ hand with her free one. Her other one was latched through her sons’.
“And this is my husband, Jay, our son, Dalton, and our daughter, Caroline.” she continues. “It’s nice to finally meet you both.”
“You, also,” Olivea responds. She had let go of Kaz’s arm, not because she could feel that he wanted her to, but because something about Grace’s presence had eased her in a way that was unique. Her aura, it would be called.
“Eeeehhhhhhhh.” Jay, who had hovered in the back ground, on the couch, let out a groan that was painful to those who had only heard it.
“Oh, Dad. Is that your headache again?” Caroline asked comfortingly. “You should go lie down.”
“I guess I will,” Jay responds wearily. He rises from the couch, where he was sitting, and crosses to the doorway. “It was nice meeting you, Kaz and Olivea.”
“You too,” they muttered in unison. He left through the doorway that they had entered through.
The evening continued on pleasantly and Jay was almost forgotten. Towards the end of the night, when Dalton was anxious to go meet with his friends, and Olivea’s eyelids were drooping heavily with sleeplessness, Caroline remembered her father, and treads up the stairs to check on him. She was not gone two minutes when Grace offered to show Kaz’s mother her studio, since she made her living as a painter. They ambled to the second floor after Caroline, leaving Kaz alone with her brother, Dalton, which he couldn’t help but be despaired about.
“So . . .” Kaz started, willing Dalton to also make an effort at conversation.
“Listen, Kaz, I know that there’s no easy way to say this, but I need you to stay away from my sister.” Daltons voice was low as he inquired this. “You seem like a nice guy, but I don’t think you’re the right person for her. Dalton rose from the white wicker chair that he had been stationed in the entire evening. “My boys will find you, if you choose not to listen.”
The gates in Kaz’s mind closed abruptly when Carolines older brother spoke his expectations. He suspected that Dalton had been waiting all evening for the words he had just said.
“I’ve seen what happens to girls who date boys like you, Kaz,” Dalton finished. “and Caroline’s nature is too frail to put up with that.” He exited the room, and Kaz distantly heard the front door slam behind him after a seconds pause.
That was when it happened.


18,

Across the dirt clearing, through the heavy and scarred wood door, passed the kitchen, the conjoined dining room and living room, and into the second of the two narrow bedrooms, two girls were situated on an old twin bed.
One had hair that reached her elbows and was the color of a mouse, and a tall, but also slim frame. She was clothed in worn blue jeans and a baggy t-shirt, and a black bag decorated with pins bearing mottos was at her feet.
The other girl had caramel locks, identical to Kaz’s in both color and texture that stretched just passed her shoulders. Since this girl was facing toward the doorway, it was possible for Uncle Joel to see her button nose and raised eyebrows. But her eyes were what caught him off-guard. They were a deep shade of green, and they immediately reminded him of his sister, Olivea, when they were children and being raised in this miniature farmhouse. Then, her eyes were care-free and forever turned up at the corners. Blue crescents never drooped beneath her eyes and Uncle Joel could easily coax a giggle out of her mouth.
The last time that he had seen her, her eyes were ashes. Fire had caught every dream that she had once wished for and burnt it into unrecognizable bits and pieces that lay useless. The only love that had held in her eyes was for Kaz. Her little boy would bring in firewood or weed the garden and the pride in Olivea’s eyes would shine so bright that it would create crevasses that light would filter through. That never ceased, as she grew older.
Uncle Joel had expected that he would never again see the pair of eyes in front of him until he reached the gates of heaven. But this girl, who is obviously the sister that Kaz had spoken about, did see through Olivea’s eyes
When they had meet at the Willow Grove, on the bank of the creek, his nephew had explained how his sister had come to live with him and though it didn’t take much effort to keep her occupied, Kaz couldn’t handle living around her while he was still grieving the death of his mother. He had asked Uncle Joel to please take her, and look after her while she needed it. But after witnessing how similar she is to his late sister, it had him reconsidering.
Olivea’s daughter finally looked up from her conversation and to the doorway, where Uncle Joel was supported between the doorframe. Her eyes first turned puzzled, then lightened as she reconized and older version of her brother. By then her friend had also twisted to see Uncle Joel.
His niece rose and took two steps towards him while her friend watched with wide eyes.
“I am your Uncle Joel, your mother’s brother,” he says. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting you, Sariah.”
“My friends call me Sari. And this is Clara,” she answers, gesturing to the girl with the long hair. “Did my brother send you?”
“Yes. We better talk,” Uncle Joel sighs.


19,

In the weary morning light, the doe’s injuries seemed worse than they truthfully were. But as the doe’s age wasn’t youthful, he had reason for concern.
The gap in her leg was tiny, only a small one from a thorn bush, though a steady stream of blood flowed freely over her calf. A rose thorn protruded from the gash.
The Silver Doe stumbled and fell to the forest floor. She was at the base of a pine tree, one in a grove full of them. The needles provided a cushion for her to rest on, though the ends of them were sharp as daggers.
Across from the grove, a small farmhouse lay in a clearing. It was weathered a pleasant brown and the doe had to squint to tell the difference between it and the woods surrounding it.
The doe closed her eyes, and inhaled in a deep breath. The air was scented with pine, freshly turned-over dirt and, faintly, of poppies and honeysuckle. Birds chirped overhead and the doe savored the sweet, harmonic notes.


20,

Caroline laced her fingers throughout the seamless billows of cloud and breathed deeply. The air was lukewarm, and carried no other particles, like pollen. That was one detail of her old life that Caroline was eager to forget. Her nose and throat used to clog each spring because of allergies and it had made outside tough for her to endure.
Caroline stretched out on her back. The down beneath her expanded and did not confine her wings, though her head was not supported while she was in that position. She attempted to push herself up using her elbow and found that the fleecy cloud was grasping her with an iron grip. It was like tree sap; it latched on and had thrown away the key. When she stirred both of her arms, they were stuck where she had first placed them.
Now that her attention was on her arms, and her legs once she tried them, she noticed that the bits of the cloud that her skin was touching were glowing a faint light, like the radiance of the full moon. It was steadily growing stronger and more confident with each pulse. Though Caroline knew she had the right to be terrified by what was taking place, she thoughts were strangely serene and her heartbeat kept its regular rhythm.
When she began to sink into the cloud, it felt like a string was fastened around her midsection and was being reeled in like it was attached to a fishing pole. It wasn’t painful to Caroline; it didn’t even tickle.
Caroline sunk through the cushions and the string never seemed to release its hold on her. Neither did the clouds on either side of her, but as she traveled through them the luminosity grew stronger until her vision was nearly blinded by the light. Her hair bunched up around her ears and attacked her mouth because of the clouds pushing it upwards.
Carolines thoughts were still calm, and strangley, she caught herself thinking of how nice it would be to escape from her palace in the clouds. She loved the view, and the freedom of wind enlightening her to sights and judgments that she would have never noticed on her own. But Caroline felt trapped here, like this place, that was a paradise at first glance, was a prison specially created for her. And now that she was finally out, Caroline secretly rejoiced.
And then the string loosened as the clouds swallowed her whole.


21,

The door to the farmhouse creaked open on unsure hinges and a slender girl with long mouse-brown hair exits. She treads over to where the doe is hidden, and gasps when she finally spots her. Though her gasp could have been because of the silver of her pelt, or the intensity of her eyes, the doe understood that the girl had seen the rose thorn lodged in her calf. She darted back into the house to call for help.
Another, more petite, girl with caramel locks and a ragged man with a gray-streaked scalp leave the farmhouse and hurry over to the doe. The girls arrive to her first, and are clearly aware of the does trusting personality. They could also see it in her eyes.
The older man comes next to the silver doe and crouches down next to her. Then he turns to the brunnett girl and sends her for bandages.
He gently looks into the doe’s eyes, willing her to trust him. The doe didn’t need to be convinced though. She understood that his intent was to heal, not harm her.
The first girl returned with bandages and handed them to the man. The other girl, the one that had followed him out of the farmhouse, inched closer until she was next to him, as before she was a few feet away.
She knelt down near the does head and said to the man. “I can keep her calm while you take the thorn out.”
The man retreated to the doe’s hind leg, where the injury was and set to work. The low throb that the doe had felt before was replaced with an increasing speed, and she sucked in a breath and whimpered, like a human would. The girl must have seen the pain in her eyes because she reached for the doe and the doe focused her eyes on the girl in front of her as a distraction.
“Look at me,” the girl kept murmuring. “Look at me.”


22,

The room that Caroline had appeared in was spacious, and contained only white walls, a white ceiling and marbled tileing for the floor. No furniture was present for her to sit on, but that was fine, as she no longer got tired when she was standing up.
The clouds had rested her gentely in this room a few hours ago, and at first glance Caroline had thought herself still suspended in the cloud. Though Caroline had already been in the room for a little over two hours, she was growing increasingly bored. Back in the clouds she had the hills and valleys to gaze down upon, but here there was only white with not even slight variation in the color. It all was beginning to blend together like a blizzard mixes snow and harsh winter air.
Caroline’s chocolate brown eyes began to drift shut; not because she was tired, but out of the weariness of having nothing to do.
Then an invisible door swung open from the outside. The door was full-sized, white and unfolded smoothly from the wall around it, which was why Caroline’s sharp eyes hadn’t noticed it before. Or it just could have not been there before.
The door glided open all the way so that the nonexistent doorknob was brushing the wall behind it. A long corridor lead from the doorway down about thirty yards and then turned left. No one was in Caroline’s sight.
She tried to suppress it, but her curiousity got the best of her. She stood upright and began to creep slowly down the hallway. Her feet, which were barefoot when she was in the clouds but clad in smokey ballat flat now, were soundless against the tiles.


23,

Kaz’s eyes readjusted to the sudden darkness. His wrists and ankles were both bound with sturdy rope and his mouth was gagged with an old rag. His eyes used to be concealed with a blindfold, which had just been removed by his captor.
He stood intimidatingly over Kaz and glared down from his full height. Kaz could see that he had dark eyes and dense eyebrows. His nondescript brown hair ran wild and swung down on his forehead. The skin on his face was black and white; drawn with the hollow curves and gouges that were company to little sleep. A gash like a lightning bolt ran from his left temple and over both of his lips and down his jaw, where it disappeared down his shirt. His lips pressed into a jeering sneer.
“Remember me, Kaz?”
The man’s voice spoke expectantly and surprised Kaz. He had been expecting more actions than words, and certainly not these ones. And the voice itself was recognizable to Kaz. It wasn’t one that he had heard often, but the few times that they had spoken were very memorable to him because of what they had spoken of. But now that the one thing that they had in common is gone, Kaz hadn’t been counting on seeing this man ever again.
The man leered even closer to Kaz, until they were eye level from each other.
“Spare me, Kaz. You know who I am.” He whispered.
He was right. Kaz knew who he was, however he was afraid to admit it to him because of what might be coming next. But he could feel his guard bursting outward and understood that there was nothing he could do to stop it. It was like attempting to keep a bubble caged. You couldn’t jail it and keep it whole. If it brushed against an iron bar it would pop into pieces. If you let it roam free it would eventually float down to the ground, where it would then break its iridescent spear. There’s just no way to win.
Kaz cowered against the floor in terror.


24,

White. There was white everywhere. Different shades, but always the same color. The only thing that varied were the shadows that crept up like gremlins. Caroline could sense them spying on her, watching what she would do next and daring her to turn the wrong way.
The corridor that she had exited the room from led to another hallway, and another after that. They were never-ending. A labyrinth of whiteness and shadows, and Caroline had grown tired of the mazes tricks. She had so far run into no one, though she knew civilization was around.
A pool of red stood out against all the white. It was at the end of the particular corridor Caroline was in, and once she spotted something dissimilar to her surroundings she was able to distinguish a pair of French doors behind the puddle. They were as tall as the sloped ceiling above and were only as wide as the person entering them.
Caroline approached the spreading puddle near the doors. Specks around the red group towards the middle like the liquid was too heavy for the floor to hold. As she moved around it to the doors, she notices that the crimson tiles are sloped inward.
The doors open easily at her touch, and she doesn’t shudder as she passes through them.


25,

A large ceramic bowl filled with water was pushed near the doe’s head by the caramel-haired girl. Since the night that she had come here, she had learned that the girls names were Sari and Clara, and the man was called Uncle Joel.
The Silver Doe had been allowed inside the farmhouse as soon as she could support herself, which did not take long, because despite the does old age, she was remarkably strong and her wound had healed quickly.
Sari probed expectantly at the bowl with one hand and inside, the water rippled at the slight motion. The doe dipped her head inside the bowl, only to take it out. The water tasted stale to the doe, with her heightened senses. She preferred running streams and brooks and creeks.
Sari’s mouth formed into a line. She wasn’t pleased that the doe refused to drink the water that she was offering her, and knew that it wasn’t the best water around. The doe gazed unblinkingly at her and she could feel her eyes follow her movements as she crossed to another tree to dump out the unappreciated water.


26,

Kaz’s kidnapper had returned from wherever he was before. He could imagine the heavy footsteps on the rotting porch outside. But now he was back and Kaz knew enough of this person’s power to be afraid of him. As if the ropes tied around his wrists and ankles and the gag in his mouth wasn’t enough indication of who’s in charge.
The door slammed against the wall before rebounding back into position. The man instantly dominated the room, but this specific man was not one that Kaz was expecting.
Then the one that he reconized stampeded inside. His presence was not reassuring to Kaz, nor did it increase his odds of escaping his captors. Kaz felt his hope of escaping deflating like a needle had popped it.
“Is he the one?” the newer man asks the original captor. “He doesn’t look like I remember seeing him.”
“Yeah,” he responded. “I’m positive that’s him.”
The men leer over Kaz, inspecting him. They were so near his face that if it were made of glass, their breath would fog it up. Kaz cringes away, but his attempt at it was stopped by the wall behind him.
“Don’t be afraid of us,” the new man sneered. “we’re not the real danger here."


27,

“Now, where do you think your brother could be, Sari?”
Uncle Joel, Sari and Clara were gathered around the dining room table, each picking at a bowl of stew. It had long since cooled to room tempeture, but they all were anxious about how they would explain the doe’s presence to Kaz. But their fretfulness soon switched to worry. Kaz never appeared and in their minds, possibilities of all the horrid things that could be happening to him at that moment with nothing that they could do to stop it. The doe sensed the tense atmostphere and lay listening with keen ears by the harth.
“He’ll be home soon,” Sari finally answers. “He always is.” She reached up a hand and flipped a strand of hair that was dangling near her mouth out of the way. “Besides, he’ll be angry if he comes home to the farmhouse while it’s this messy.” She stood up and swiftly strode around the spotless kitchen, spun about, and went to the living area, which was equally clean.
Clara, being the comforting friend that she was, left the kitchen table and followed Sari to the couches and the coffee table and sat down. But she didn’t relax. Her back was stiff and she obviously worried more about the stability of Sari than that of her brother.
Uncle Joel then sank into the match of Clara’s couch. He rested his feet up, resigned to waiting.
Sari was organizing the dresser full of numerous packs of cards, all of them scattered around and missing the other fifty-one that they are supposed to be grouped with. It was a long task and would take all night for Sari to complete.
Uncle Joel realized this. “Sari, do that another day. Take a nap while we wait for your brother.”
Sari agreed because she saw the sense in his proposition, not because she wanted to, and soon fell into the deepest sleep that she’s had in a long time.


28,

Beyond the door was Caroline. Her wait wasn’t long, but it was extended enough to make her anxious. The doors had opened up to another small white room like the one she had just exited, but the only change was an additional set of french doors across from the first pair.
She had tried to open them as soon as she saw them, but they hadn’t budged, and neither had the first pair of doors when she went and tried them. She was trapped. Again.


29,

Kaz’s mind kept wandering. It kept questioning his every move, wondering what would be considered right or wrong. One mistake and he was out.
Three times a day, a small metal tray was passed through the door. His meals were two slices of brown wheat bread, an apple that didn’t taste as fresh as Kaz would have preferred, and a bottle of water. Twice a day he was let out to relieve himself, and he was followed by one of his captors.
Growing up, Kaz had always been in control of his life. Olivea had allowed him to do what he wanted, to learn not to make the same mistakes twice. When she was gone, he was the adult in charge. But being here in Dalton’s hands, made him feel as powerless as a mosquito. Anything they wanted him to do he had to do it right, otherwise they would squish him between skin. Kaz had to tread carefully, because once you’re a prisoner, the ice you stand on is always thin.


30,

A man entered through the solid French doors. Immeadiatly, Caroline reconized him as an important figure, and stood to her feet. The man was average height – slightly shorter than Caroline – and radiated the kind of confidence that people would easily envy. His hair was cropped short and brown and his eyes reflected green the color of seaweed.
Like his height, his weight was also nondescript, but he was clothed in a tailored suit that matched the room, except for his shirt’s button and his bow tie, which were a contrasting black.
The figure stopped two yards before her.
“Caroline Bowers, your assistance as an angel of The Almighty is required,” he stated.
So many things were stooting through Caroline’s mind that all that she could do was stare.

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Tag der Veröffentlichung: 22.12.2011

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