"Forest For The Trees" by Jenny L. Morash

Julie’s steps slowed, as she reached the crest of the hill, and then stopped completely, leaving only the sound of her slightly ragged breathing to disturb the crisp air of an early autumn night. This was, had always been, her favourite part of the day. When she could leave the stress and tension of a long day spent in the office behind, and slip away into another world. There was something almost spiritual about these evening runs of hers.

The day she’d found this bit of forest, with the winding path that ran through it, shed thought she must have stepped into another world completely. She never ran into anyone else on her daily jaunts along these paths.. just herself, and the trees. There was something almost magical about these woods, as if they were some piece of a world long forgotten, plucked from a story and deposited here, just for her. At times, she even thought she could hear distant voices, calling her name, and the sound of merry music enticing her into the shadows off the path, though once returned to her home, under the bright, modern lights, she discounted such things as the result of spending too much time cooped up in her office.

This night, though, she stopped, looking down the hill into the little glen off the side of the highway, where ‘her’ forest resided. Pausing was something she very rarely did, but something felt.. different, tonight.

** Julie…**

She shivered a bit, then shook her head, ignoring the whisper in the back of her mind. Just another long day, she thought, and turned her attention to the hollow before her. It truly was a beautiful place, pine, maple and oak trees intermingling, the latter only just now starting to turn. The branches dipped, and swayed, and while it seemed almost as if they were beckoning her further in, Julie knew in the back of her mind that it was only the wind moving them about.

** Julie… we’re waiting.. **

“This is nuts,” Julie said aloud. “Snap out of it, girl. Finish up the run, so you can go home and get something solid into you.”

Giving herself a shake, Julie started to jog once more, heading down the now-familiar path, and into the trees, the crunching sound of her footsteps against the gravel and sand path falling in counterpoint to the beating of her heart. The stillness of the forest closed around her, like a comforting blanket drawn about the shoulders of a fretful child.

** Julie… we’re waiting… come dance with us.. **

It’s funny how the mind can change in an instant, choices made that you never would have believed. Sometimes, when a path is offered to us, we just have to take a deep breath, close our eyes, and head off in a completely new direction. The analogy could be made to Julie’s choice that evening.. except that the words are more literally true than in most cases. None know just what layd waiting for Julie in the shadows of the forest that seemed to have existed for only her. All that is known is that, when anxious coworkers and friends reported that Julie had gone missing on one of her evening runs, there was no sign of her along the path she normally ran. The path that lead straight through those old fields on the outskirts of town, that had lain fallow for years now….