As we journey among the Spring
Let's go, let's ride...
Hello friends,
Here we are again, at our meeting grounds. Digital, of course, but we’re all here, no? I come to you fresh off teaching a spring fantasy writing camp for teens, and I am so, so inspired. The kids—despite all this—will be just fine. As fine as they can be.
I am so inspired that I’ve written a fantasy short story that I’d like to share, about a journey.
What sort of journey? Well, you’ll just have to see. So join me. Let’s go; let’s ride.
as we journey among the Spring, a short story
1972
Springwood Forest; the forest of many lives, of many whispers within its bushes and under its soil. It was no normal forest, they’d say, if such a thing even exists, and it was no normal trek were you to find yourself among its trees.
Springwood had few travelers; for few knew about it at all. And those who did know called it Swing, a sort of melding together of its one word so it flowed right off the tongue. An even more mysterious name of an already mysterious land of which could be found on no one’s map.
Travelers would say, ‘I’m going to Swing,’” and like it’s limited notarity, few knew what that meant.
“Swing? At your big age?” The folks would ask. Because usually, all travelers were older than eighteen.
And the travelers nary explained, because if you did not know about this forest yet, you weren’t supposed to know. Sarah knew. She was nineteen, and she’d known since she was ten. Her mother told her, whose mother told her, whose mother told her, too. And always, when one was told, they were also warned to keep it to themselves.
Sarah learned of it one day when her mother sat her down and said, “It’s time I tell you about Swing Forest.”
The mother told Sarah it was close by. Closer than she thought, and that, “You’ll find it. One day.”
“When’?!” She asked, but her mother gave her no answer, only that when she found her way there, the hardest part would be finding her way out. “And when you do, child, you will be different. You will be changed.”
Sarah nodded, perplexed as she was. Could tell by her mother’s tone that there would be no more details. And she grew weary, oh so weary, of this “Swing” forest, with its funny name and curious lore.
As the years went on, Sarah grew obsessed. She never told a soul, but in her mind she would wonder. Searching up and down the isles in her library for even a mention of this forest. She called it "Swing,” then "Springwood,” then “Spring Time,” like others called it, so her mother told. But nothing. No signs at all. No where to point on the map, no hints from any book at all.
Till one day. Sarah was going to bed. “Was” being the key word. But a bright light out her window shone so vividly that any sort of attempt at sleep would be a joke. So she hoped out of bed and looked out her window at a far enough distance in case running would be at all necessary. And there it was. In place of the house next door to hers were trees and trees and trees. A forest. The forest—she just knew it. This was Swing.
You might have thought Sarah would be curious enough to see more, but you would be wrong. Dear Sarah, instead, hopped in bed and shuddered at the thought of this world of which she’d been told, because she’d never expected it all to happen like this. So suddenly, after years of nothing. Like it’d been there the whole time. She’d never considered how it would feel to find it, or for it to find her.
But Sarah could not hide even though she wanted, because right as she tried her damnest to settle in between her sheets, that whole bed beneath her back collapsed. Down fell Sarah to a new bed made of dirt and moss, and grass between trees she’d just seen, now surrounding her.
No bedroom, no house, no neighbors, no more. Just forest, as far as her eyes would land. Then whispers. Quiet, quiet whispers but as if inside her ears. So close, yet so inaudible. Just a stew of words like gumbo bubbling inside her head. Quite reasonably, Sarah froze. Just on the ground there, frozen and looking ahead. As if that’d get her out, as if that’d show the way, until she gathered herself and rose in a huff, because there was no getting out if she did not move.
There were small spaces between the trees like roads, where Sarah could walk down. She had about five options, but simply wandered down the road right in front of her. She couldn’t tell you why she did.
The whispers didn’t stop, but she was so shaken that they seemed quieter under thumping anxiety. And she began to notice things. Things one doesn’t often see in “normal” forests. Like bright purple mushrooms glowing beneath her feet. Or a family of deer just sitting, watching her walk by. Of which she’d usually jump at, but this time kept it moving, not feeling that fear she’d expect to feel. And she kept moving, worried, weary, but moving.
Head swirling all around her as if at a gallery because she felt she was seeing art. Through trees she saw a sky of dancing stars, so many of them swishing by, begging her to make a wish, and so she did, in passing, still walking, as nonchalantly as someone making a note to themselves to wash the dishes when they got home.
But then she felt, beneath the ground, a rumble. She froze once again, wanting to grab onto one of these giant trees but hesitating, like the tree were alive and breathing and requesting she ask first, so she did.
“Can I lean on you?” She whispered, like the whispers between her ears, and the tree said yes. Louder than anything else she heard. So she leaned on the tree, then hugged it as the ground rumbled even more; then there was no rumble but a quake, opening the earth beneath her. Right in the middle of this path she’d chosen.
Sarah ran. Thought no more of this tree or these whispers. She ran far away from the crack in this earth’s foundation. Unsure of what else to do. Until she ran so hard and aimless that she hit the face of another tree. This time a giant one, way more giant than the others, causing her to fall to the ground.
The whispers grew louder, the earth still rumbled. She was shaky but not too shaky to rise up again and get to running, far, far away until, “Stop!”
Oh, and she did. Eyes closed now, as if when she opened them, she’d be back in her own room. No luck. That same voice, like sweet maple, smooth and dark, spoke, “Be still.”
And so she did, and she noticed it was behind her, coming from that giant tree. The one that stood way bigger than the rest. She obeyed it. It seemed the right thing to do.
“Now listen," said the tree.
“Listen?” Sarah thought. Listen to these mumbles in my ear? Listen to this rumble in the ground? Listen?
But she ignored such doubts and quieted every part of herself. Listened, listened. Listened.
For a moment, she only heard that whispering gumbo. Then more moments, and more. And more. And more! She grew impatient, tried closing her eyes again, this time to block out the glowing plants shooting stars in the sky. She stood there, eyes closed, listening, for a long, long time until those whispers became one sound. One lone bustling voice saying, “Keep moving, Sarah. Go back to where you came. You know the way out.”
She shook her head. There’s no way she knew her way out of this, no way she knew. But again the voice said the same, “You know the way.”
She stood there, wondering, doubting. But what did she have to lose? Not moving would be nowhere. Turning around would be moving, but it scared her. So she moved ahead, like the voice said.
Walking towards a gash in the earth, slowly but surely. The closer she got, seeing something that wasn’t there before. It confused her, but still she walked. Until she was right back there, where somehow, a bridge had appeared over the break in the ground. A bridge! So she walked some more over it, and in the direction it guided her. The voice still assuring her, “You know the way.”
She kept walking, much slower now, each step like its own answer to a question she didn’t even have to ask out loud. “You know the way.”
And she walked and walked right to her window, wide open, waiting for her to climb inside back into her room, where this all began. Baffled beyond belief, she dared herself to turn around. That forest was gone! No Swing, no Springwood. Not one forest in sight. Only her neighbor’s home, dark under the night sky but just as familiar as always.
How? No one could tell her, but in her gut she knew... she knew.
Alright everybody! I hope you enjoyed this journey. Feel free to share it, or share your thoughts in the comments.
Where does Sarah go next? What will her mother say when she reveals she’s been to Swing? Or, does she already know? All questions I’m playing with, of which I may share here one day. But I also love the idea of a story that ends but isn’t truly over.
In the meantime, I hope you’re finding whimsy and/or pockets of joy in the wake of early spring.
Talk soon,
Jasper
