~Chapter One~
It’s a good thing I took my motion sickness pills. These windey mountain roads have turned from pavement to gravel. I have my knees up to my chest while sitting in the front seat with my dad. He’s playing his own music on a speaker, mostly 80′s rock. It isn’t exactly my cup of tea, so I have earbuds in and my hood up, some strands of my hair in front of my face. I still can’t believe we’re actually moving.
All sixteen years of my life spent in Moscow, Idaho, and my dad suddenly decides it’s time to move to some obscure town I can’t be bothered to remember the name of.
Great.
I sigh as I watch the trees flash by. The scenery isn’t much to brag about. A fire had just come through, so most of the trees just looked like sticks in the ground, and the few remaining pine needles were brown. I had found the interesting enough to look at, but it had turned away some thirty minutes ago.
We’re passing a site where fire had gone through twice and something about it strikes me as eerily beautiful. The trees in the field are a light gray with no remaining bark or branches. But the ground... it’s just covered in bright purple flowers my dad told me were called fireweed.
We whiz past this small, barely noticeable trail leading deeper into these woods. I can see through the gap in the trees it leads to a greener forest. There’s a split second where I think I catch a glimpse of yellow eyes in the trees, but I pass it off as my own reflection in the window.
Oh yeah, I have these bright yellow eyes, and they unsettle even me. People tell me they think they’re pretty, but I’ve caught people jump when we make eye contact.
I’m jolted out of my thoughts as we hit a big bump and am forced to focus on the “Arriving in Elk City” sign.
Wonderful.
It’s not long after we pull into the driveway of our small log cabin. I look around and grimace.
This is it.
Home sweet home, I guess.
