She felt like she was drowning in the sand. Her vehicle, a pleasant pale pink, ready for a day at the beach, was not suited to a life in this muck. The small grains got everywhere, between the seats, under her clothes, in her sandwhich somehow.

She drove near the water, hoping that it would help her find her way out of this place.

She’d run out of supplies eventually.

She needed out.

The sky was grey, dull, lifeless against a sea of equally lifeless beads of sand. In her wake there was nothing but remote dissatisfaction and discomfort.

Time dragged on. And on. And on again.

The water never changed. It always reflected the present, steady, constant, seemingly never turning. She was sick of it.

After days, weeks, she did not know for time had ceased to have meaning, she found her way out of the sand and onto the stone.

It was rough, she felt as if she were running over every pothole in the world. The jostling and bumping and the frankly concerning sounds the things at the top of her vehicle made only lent credence to her claim.

Her CD player had ceased working before this nightmare began, and no radio station in their right mind would broadcast this far, therefor her thoughts were the only company to be had.

It was exhausting.

Where was she going ?

"Away." Part of her would always complain.

"Home." Her more positive side would conjure.

They were always both wrong.

Sure, this rocky spring was not so similar to the dead sand that had occupied her tired eyes for so long, here there was life, and water. But there lacked people. Emotion.

Anything that mattered.

Thus, she pressed on.

Away turned out to be more rocks. The water was a rusty orange, she did not even consider taking a moment to bask within. There were signs of what had once been trees, rotting and knotted, free of anything familiar and safe.

Some might have found this beautiful.

She was furious.

The car door slammed behind her with a shudder. Bits of sand fell off with the force of it. She wished they would dissappear and stop getting stuck between her toes.

She screamed.

A loud, hoarse, wild thing. The bottled up rage, the questions she would not, could not allow herself to ask. It all spilled out.

Gripping at the sides of her face she felt them, hot and wet on her face. Tears.

Her chest was heavy, her heart consumed by a lonely spirit. She needed people. Where was her day at the beach ? Why her ?

Why this endless landscape of grey and now, sometimes, orange ?

Was there a lesson to be learned ? Was there a god, and was she furious with her ?

No one could tell her. No one could listen to her ravings. No one could offer her a snack bar after a good cry. No one to tell her they liked her top, and she’d smile and look to her datemate knowingly.

She missed xem.

Crouched on the ground, the blanket of tears over her eyes did not allow her to grasp the situation.

She would not believe it, even if she’d seen it.

Sobs raking through her, she curcled up on her side. Fœtal position. Like the child she was.

She would not die alone. She couldn’t. She was expected at the beach. Her new swimsuit was still beneath her shirt. No one could appreciate it here.

She couldn’t find a way out of "here".

She was alone.

And yet, she was not as alone as she’d let herself believe.

The wind picked up, for the first time. She felt the chill of it against her skin, brushing the fluffy mess of her hair into her face. She spat some out, yet bits of it clung to her tongue. They tasted like dust.

On the rock where she’d shouted out her frustrations, the rock she’d allowed her tears to spill on, the rock where the water lazily lapped. Something had begun.

Unseen, unheard, untouched, a tree had sprouted.

By the time she had gotten to her feet, fearful now, the tree was taller than she had ever been.

She resisted the urge to bolt. Her feet stayed grounded, planted to this spot she cared little for.

The tree grew ever taller, thicker, taller still. Leaves blossoming and dying and blooming anew all within the span of a breath.

Life, it had to be.

Her feet were soon covered in the leaves that turned crispy and orange. It matched the stone and the rust water.

The… clear water. How had it changed ? This spring was damaged, unsafe, and now the water was as clear as that which she drank at home.

Home, she wanted it desperately.

The tree, she now knew, was a cherry blossom. It should not have been able to thrive in these conditions.

The sheer force of will of this being drove her to tears once more. Hope. Relief crashed over her harder than any wave she’d ridden, harder than any pothole she’d driven up this path.

She could not give up. Her tears spilled onto the dead leaves, her appearance bedraggled and sandy, mattered not to this being. This creature that seemed much older than it could ever be.

She hugged the tree, her thoughts scrambling to explain her behavior. Before she knew it, she was back in the car that had been her prison for longer than she cared for.

In the side mirror, she noticed something. A clump of flowers had gotten stuck in her hair.

She smiled.

She could do it.

Before she knew it, the stoney, hole-ridden path turned to smooth concrete. The desolate and deceased surroundings became lush and verdant, the sky transformed into a colourful demonstration of hue.

Her car, pleasantly pale pink, complimented her surroundings instead of taking away from them.

She stopped by a sign, the puddles nearly still beneath her feet.

The rain was welcomed, because she knew it would feed whatever came next.

She’d made it away, now it was time to go home.