It was probably when I was fifteen-six or so when my parents would do something like this, I just ran off through the woods, not carrying about the brambles and briar that caught at my clothing as I ran just…aimlessly, not carrying about what direction I was going, what was happening around me or anything really, just looking forward as my eyes burnt from welling tears, my boots crunching through twigs and underbrush as the thin whip-like branches caught at my clothing, ripped through my hair or caught along what exposed skin I had around my hands and face. I just ran until I couldn’t hear anything or anyone around me, letting the quiet and darkness consume me and hide me as I grabbed onto the side of a tree, looking behind me to see and hear if I was being followed. I wasn’t of course, but there was still a deeply rooted paranoia in my mind, I could feel my heart hammering in my throat, sweat starting to bead down the back of my neck and my chest tight with how much trouble I was having breathing. I just needed to be out here a few hours, a few hours to let my parents boil down and out of their anger before I sneak back into my room.
I breathed deeply as I pressed my back to the tree, resting my hands on my knees as I looked towards the sky, the full moon glaring above me like the world’s eye looking down on me like even the world knew just how pitiful of a person I am. I looked around as I found myself in a slightly unfamiliar wood, I’ve spent enough time in the woods behind the house where I’ve made marks in the tree barks or on stones with various other materials because of just how long I’d been out there, but there was…just nothing around me like that, there were no trails worn by my own feet or bike treads like in the woods behind the house, the trees around me thick and twisted and wrapped around and about each other due to being so close together, branches wrapped and twisted into a thick blanket canopy above my head letting the moonlight trickle around like someone was shining a flashlight through a strainer or something, this swaths of various mosses and other plants making curtains on the lowest ones I had to part as I moved my way through the forest, just for a sign of generally what area of the woods I was in. Going straight forward, there was probably two-three hundred yards between the street my house is on and the edge of the walls looping around that mansion, but in any other direction it goes on for upwards of miles and miles, thick and dark to the extent that someone unfamiliar with the area would find themselves lost in seconds. The air was crisp and cold, making my breath fog as I breathed, the crunch of twigs and bramble underfoot making me far more lucky that I had had the time to put my boots back on, though some of the skin on my neck and along my jaw burnt and stung with being scratched.
The coldness let the fog cling low to the ground as it roiled around my shins, the hoots of owls and various other nightly birds and other nightly creatures filling my ears and making my senses that much more honed because of the knowledge of what kinds of creatures are out here, even as close as we are to the town and all. The smell of pine and cedar along with the smell of the slight rot and other of those good “bad” scents that just are extremely natural and part of being this deep in the forest. Each crunch of each footstep making me flinch at how painfully quiet it was where I was, I let my hands trail along the bark of trees to keep myself on my feet.
I don’t think I ran straight through the forest nor did I double-back, I just kept running forward, whatever direction the running took me is where I went and wherever I ran was left in my wake by how much I was running and my general knowledge of the forest allowing me to know how to avoid the painful plants and things like poison ivy or poison oak, though I dress covered enough that those plants really wouldn’t bother me that much.
Yet, as I walked…there was something I could hear that made my blood run icy cold which how out of place it was, a wolf’s howl, but far louder, rougher and rumbled far more aggressively than other wolves I’ve heard out here. All I knew is that I am going nowhere closer to it, nowhere where that sound was getting louder.
Lights started to adorn my vision as I made my way away from the sound, but the sound wasn’t on my right where my parent’s house should be, but on my left and the lights was a might brighter wash than the neighborhood where the house should be. The lights were brighter, warmer toned and there were far more of them which told me at least that I was within light range of the mansion as I used the lights as an anchor point as I faced the lights and walked sideways to keep me facing the house as I walked in the direction of the street to get out of the forest. I walked close enough I could at least rest my hand on the wall around the house’s grounds to keep myself on the right direction path to the street as I soon found my way out of the forest and my boots met the pavers of the street. I brushed my clothing off from the few leaves and things that had gotten caught in my clothing as I looked to my right back in the direction of the neighborhood before I sighed softly and rifled through my pocket’s for my phone, there were enough lights on in the manor to tell me that…there was probably a very good chance that Raven was awake, so I just went through the pages of my phone before sending a short text to Raven just asking if she was awake. She quickly responded that she was awake and was asking if I was okay. I said that I was, but that I was also outside and that I’m not sure I’ll even have a room or something to return to: I was saying that last part mainly as a joke because that’s just how I handle a lot of things, I have dark humor, what am I going to do? Raven seemed to pick up on the joke, but just told me to wait a minute or two. The gate soon creaked open inwards as the iron whined softly as I heard bare footsteps on the pavers soon as I looked around the pillar.
“Did your parents throw you out?” Raven asked, standing at the end of the driveway, dressed in black silk trousers and this wrapped kimono like blouse of the same black silk, patterned with skulls and bones, her black hair was back in a braided twist on the back of her head, she had no makeup on making her features look sharper and more severe…almost like she’s had surgery or something to make her features so extremely sharp and angular, her eyes looked like these endless tunnels of darkness and her skin almost looked blue under the moonlight.
“No, just…my dad is under the impression that I told you that my parents are terrible people and you told your parents and that your dad refused to let him even in the doorway of the house.”
“You didn’t tell me, I could tell he’s a terrible person by default of his personality.” She said crossing her arms, that wolf howl ripped through the forest again sounding…far closer, I hadn’t realized that in my process of getting to the road and to the manor, made me get closer to the sound of that howling wolf. It sounded like a screaming, rabid bear and not a wolf, but I still could not place where in the forest it was coming from…but it was getting louder as I approached the house.
“He came home: screaming and hollering all that fucking bullshit about how I’m at the fault and everything like that. That’s I’m a mistake, a waste of space, broken and that I was the reason the family failed and there’s nothing good and or redeemable about my existence…the usual things they yell about when this happens.” I said as I softly shrugged, “I snuck out my window, I do usually whenever this happens, it’s not a new thing.”
“Come in, we just finished dinner about an hour or so ago, but I’m sure we have something if you’re hungry at all.” She said resting her hand on my shoulder, her touch supportive and feather-light, but…I could tell the meaning behind it and recognized her being wary of my slight distaste for touch, waiting for my reaction before she let her hand fully make contact, I smiled softly as I rose my hand and just rested it over hers to thank her for it which made her softly smile, expression kind, soft and caring as she looked down to meet my eyes, “If you just need to wait out a few hours, you can here.”
“Thank you, Raven.” I said quietly
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