“I am not,” Corinthia said, quietly, “speaking into a flower like a telephone.”Communicating with the forest was one thing.Looking silly was quite another.
“Oh, yes, you are,” Stevie said.
Drew was already peering into a thicket, looking for a likely conversationalist.
“Go talk to a tree,” Stevie commanded, and then scampered off after Drew.
Corinthia shook her head, but the motion seemed to catch the attention of the guide, who wandered over.
“Having trouble finding a tree to talk to?”he said, as if this was the most normal thing in the world to discuss.
“I guess so,” admitted Corinthia.It was just the right amount of truth to spare his feelings: she did not want to find a tree, and therefore was having trouble finding a tree.
He stood, unfazed and rooted, simply nodding and looking at her with calm kindness.“Why don’t we try body radar?”
Corinthia did not like the sound of body radar.“What’s that?”
“You just close your eyes,” he said, matching movement to words, “and you hold your hands out, and youfeel”—there was that word again—“until you notice something.”
“‘Notice’ something?”
He opened his eyes, as if this was all the explanation needed.
“Notice something,” she repeated.
“Feelsomething,” he amended.
“So should I be noticing something or feeling something?”
He gently patted her shoulder.“Why not both?”And with that, he ambled away to where a small group of people were on hands and knees, speaking into tiny buds on wild blueberry shrubs.
Stevie and Drew were nowhere to be seen.
Corinthia sighed.Why did it have to be woo-woo?Why couldn’t it just be matter of fact?When she found Mr.Thriller, it was allright there, no fuss.
She could do this.And she could do it her way.
She closed her eyes.She held out her hands, tentatively, not quite extending them all the way, vaguely hoping that no one was actually looking at her.There’s nothing to it, she thought.It was there before, it will be there again, even if it seems like there’s nothing to feel except this flaming-hot heat—
And there it was.
Soft, at first, like the lights of the library tree seen at a distance through half-closed eyes: little pinpoints of silver.
Corinthia’s eyes flew open.The sun dazzled the silver specks into nonexistence.Hesitantly, reluctantly, she closed her eyes again, this time stretching her arms out all the way, hands open, palms out.
Twinkle, twinkle, little stars—there they were again.
For the first time in a very long time, Corinthia remembered what it was like to play outside as a child: the tyranny of time, fallen away; the contentment of roaming a place that belonged to you whether you owned it or not; freedom, golden and fleeting as the rays of the setting sun.
This time, when she opened her eyes, she did so slowly, carefully, taking care to notice where the specks had been.
A pine tree.They had been around a plain old pine tree, not too tall, with bunches of needles so fresh and green that, in the wind, they looked like exuberantly shaken pom-poms.
“I guess it’s you, then,” Corinthia said.She moved over to the tree, casually, hoping no one would take notice, or, heaven forbid, follow.She gently took hold of a low branch and pulled one of the pom-poms closer; after all, if a thing was worth doing, it was worth doing right.“Could you”—she paused, considering—“could you please explain to me why all these weird things are happening?”
The sky could have opened, or trumpets sounded, or any number of strange and wonderful things, but there was only the distant call of an eastern towhee.Kweep!
“Excellent,” Corinthia said, letting go of the branch and brushing off her hands quickly.“That was extremely helpful.”She had used body radar as instructed, found a tree, and asked it a question.Duty fulfilled.She returned to where the guide was already beginning to explain the next activity.
