Forest’s Hearts

Prologue

I must have walked this path a thousand times before, yet my mind doesn’t remember it. My body must, as I haven’t stumbled over any rocks or roots, though my mind is wandering far away. Pictures I have seen flash in my mind’s eye as I walked closer and closer to my destination. I should remember everything about this place, as I supposedly spent the happiest four years of my life here, yet besides the vaguest memories that I don’t even know are truly mine, I feel nothing. My mind is completely blank.

I sit on a large rock next to the path to rest. My body needs that so much anymore. In my childhood here, I could have easily ran this path without a pause carrying a bag and thought nothing of it. The child that lived here is so different from me. She was short and stocky, with hair cut like a boy’s and tan skin that gleamed in the summer sun. She was healthy and athletic, and she could easily whip any boy.

I am not her anymore, I could barely remember being her. My wrists and ankles ache, and I rub them. My body aches if I don’t take my medicine regular or if I strain myself, both of which I had been doing since I left home two weeks ago. A body cannot expect to forget almost dying and spending two years in a hospital bed going in between fevers and consciousness. Those two years killed the little girl and made her become a young woman.

I am pale, a blinding white that rarely sees the sun. My hair is so long I can now sit on it. There is no denying I am female, my torso curves, my breast show. My body is weak and weary, and my limbs fragile. I am of a delicate constitution, and get ill easily. I am concerned with my looks, and have avoided mirrors for fear of screaming upon seeing myself. I am quiet and shy, not loud and friendly like she was. I am often compared to a china doll, while I use to be thought a boy.

I have changed, yet I am at the point to know if I want to change or not. I feel slightly refreshed and can continue my long trek.

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I am surprised. The cabin still looks the same as it did in all the pictures. Still two stories of wood and glass surrounded by the forest, with only one path that leads to town and the rest miles of trees. I am relieved to have finally made it. If only I could soak in a nice hot bath for a hour or more, but I know that is impossible. There is no bathtub and barely any hot water in the cabin. There is also no electricity anymore. The gas has been turned off. Noone comes here anymore, but the groundskeeper and housekeeper that come every other week for a day to clean the house and cut the grass that surrounds the clearing in which the cabin stands. When they come I must hide, as if I am discovered they will not hesitate to report me and I will be shipped home. I have overcome to much to get here.

The door creaks when I open it. I drop my backpack by the front door, grateful to finally be relieved of it. Besides my clothes at the point of ruination it also holds necessities such as a sleeping bag, flash light, canned foods, some cash, and all other things expected of someone who is camping. At least, I think I have everything. I am not a camping person anymore. I loath sleeping outside and going without a heater or air conditioner. If you ask anyone who has known me in the pass six years if I was the type of girl to run away from home, and travel five hundred miles by foot and hitch hiking, to spend my summer in a practically abandoned cabin without any luxuries, and said cabin happened to be where I almost lost my life at eight, everyone would laugh at you and claim that you were crazy. I am not that type of girl, not anymore.

But, a part of me still is that forgotten eight year old, who would have done this in a heart beat.

I walk through the house, trying to soak up anything I might half left here, but nothing comes. The floor boards give a welcome squeak as I walk, trying to tell me this is were I belong, but not why. The rugs are musty. The housekeeper must not do a very good job for a layer of dust does cover everything. The furniture is minimal, a table and chairs, a sofa, and two beds is all that remains from when my mother and I moved back into the suburbs. Everything else came with us or was sold. I am surprised my mother never thought of selling this place. But, it had been in her family for years, and it might hold some sentimental feelings that she cannot longer speak about. Or maybe noone would be a house and land that hide a beast capable of killing a human.

I walk out to the back porch and yard. The yard only has a few feet of grass before everything disappears into the trees. I can feel that little girl stumbling up these steps at dusk, in so much pain and bleeding, bleeding so much. I think I can still see a few blood spots on the porch. I walk down the slightly rotted stairs and across the grass until I stand at the edge of the forest.

I hesitate to enter it, remembering the last time with a vagueness that scares me. I don’t know how I ended up near death, just that it happened in there.

“Hello,” I say softly to the trees that stand near the edge. “I am Evangeline, do you remember me?” Nothing, as I thought, happened. The forest did not answer back. Would it had answered Eva, my childhood nickname that I now detested, back?

“I’m Eva,” I say to it, but nothing happens. It is a lie, I am not Eva. I am here to find her.

Eva would not have to beg some sort of permission from the forest to enter it. She already had the forest’s blessing to roam amongst the trees and animals. She wouldn’t shudder at the spiders or snakes, as Evangeline did. She was bold and fearless, and that was why she died. Evangeline came into her body as her corpse laid in the hospital bed. This wasn’t Evangeline’s home, this was Eva’s. Evangeline was just here to find if Eva still existed somehow.

A gentle wind swept over me. The leaves slightly swayed and I felt more strength in me then I had in a long time. Perhaps now I could enter the forest? But I couldn’t. It was still too soon. I gave one last glance of pure agony at the trees before I retraced my steps and went back inside the confines of the cabin. I am Evangeline, and I am scared. Scared of the forest, of the animals, of the beast, and of Eva, for I know if I found her I might no longer exist.

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Author's Note: No, this story is not based on Loveless. The idea came way before I even read Loveless. What happened to Evangeline will be explained in later chapters, such as the accident and what lead to the accident. Also, why she is at the cabin in the first place. Next chapter, will probably cover her hospital stay and maybe parts of her life. Depends on my mood.