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The wind is making the grass sing, and soon he starts whistling behind me, a tune that goes perfectly with the myriad nature sounds all around us, pulling it all together into a symphony.
I’ve never felt this alive.
I stop and grab his hand as he stops beside me. He’s stopped whistling, but that doesn’t matter, because the song is already in my heart, playing loud. And it will never stop.
I grin at him and start running, pulling him along. The wind in my hair, the soft ground beneath my feet, his warm hand in mine, and the whole wide untouched world before us. This is life. Plain and simple. This is everything.
* * *
The sun has set and the long dusty purple twilight has now pretty much passed too. The evening star has been joined by many others, her sisters, and the nearly full moon is lighting our way in a misty silver.
In darkness, this world looks even more alive, and I keep walking, Eagle’s hand still firmly in mine. I feel no tiredness, no thirst or hunger. We’ll never reach the heart of all this vast beauty, but I mean to try.
I’ve lost all sense of direction while we walked, yet I still feel a tug to a spot somewhere behind us and to the left. I’m sure that’s where the camp is, so I’m sure we’ll find it again easily. Maybe not tonight. This is only the beginning of our spirit journey. I don’t expect it to end quickly. Three days, maybe more. How are you supposed to complete it in less than three days?
Usually, a person is supposed to venture on it alone. But Eagle and I, we’re so connected, so joined, it is only right and fitting that we complete it together.
“Wanna eat something?” he asks, his voice floating to me on the velvety night as though a part of it. We’ve reached the top of a slight ridge in the land, where a few trees are preventing the grass from growing as thick and lush as everywhere else.
Food is nowhere near the top of my mind, but we’ve been walking and running for hours and we probably should eat something. Plus, this is the best spot for a picnic we’ve found yet.
“Sure,” I say and stop, then stand there swaying with the breeze, one with the rustling leaves and whistling grass.
He spreads out the blanket and takes off the backpack he took over carrying awhile ago.
I sit cross-legged on the blanket and he does the same across from me. The first thing he pulls from the backpack is the flashlight. Good thinking. The canopy of the trees over our spot is keeping out most of the moonlight and keeping us in near complete darkness.
He turns on the flashlight and holds it under his chin, so the beam illuminates his face from below, casting dark shadows and sharp angles.
“Time for a ghost story?” he asks.
“Come on, be serious,” I say and try to grab the flashlight from him. All well and good that he’s in a playful mood, but after the deep, profound connection to the world I felt while we walked doesn’t mesh well with these mundane jokes.
He holds the flashlight just out of my reach, and deftly snatches it away every time I almost manage to grab it, laughing the whole time.
My vision is quickly filling with large red dots from having looked directly into the beam one time too many. So this is no longer funny. Not that it ever was.
And as he snatches it away yet again, my hand groping at nothingness and my eyes seeing just red-dotted darkness, two bright yellow, round headlights appear in the distance. Suddenly I’m in my nightmare, yet wide awake in the here and now too. Eagle’s laughter sounds like he’s very far away even though he’s sitting right next to me.
“There, the car,” I whisper and point. “The lights.”
He turns in the direction of the headlights and peers at them for a couple of seconds.
“That could be the road.” But he doesn’t sound all that certain.
“I didn’t hear any cars, did you?” I ask.
He turns off the flashlight. “It’s probably nothing to do with us, but just in case.”
I can barely make out his face in the darkness now.
The headlights are still shining bright and Eagle is watching them very intently.
“That car looks like it’s on some sort of a road. See how there’s no grass in front of the beams?”
“Why is it just standing there?” I ask speaking in a whisper. “It’s just like the other night.”
“Just speak quietly, don’t whisper. It carries better in the silence.”
