The Forest, by Julián Domecq

“The Forest”

The noise of the alarm clock woke me up, when I opened my eyes to turn it off I realize that I have forgotten to changed the alarm time. I was late for school. Fortunately my clothes were prepared in my chair and my bag was ready. I rushed downstairs and grab a piece of bread for the journey. In my way I noticed that the road that i always picked was closed. Many roads were opened to reach the school, but the one of the forest was the most exciting one.

            When I put my feet on the grass a strange wind gently caress my face. It was a huge forest, while I was almost striding, the idea of getting school had faded away and my head was flooded with all the things that i could do on that mysterious place. The branches with all the leaves barely let the sun beams through; I was imagining a whole movie on my subconscious. I tried hard to spot new animals or insects, maybe I could find a new specimen. In every single hole I peered, but it was in vain. Suddenly my head stopped the dreaming, and almost unwittingly my legs start running, I could only heard my exhausted breath.

            Suddenly a root appeared in the middle and my feet got tangled, in the blink of an eye I was on the floor, but it take me seconds to  realize that the soil had a quaggy texture. When I got up the nice and green forest suddenly turned into a creepy and gloomy place, the blossom flowers were now dead roots coming from some puddles that you can’t even see the bottom, the birds and rabbits that had been there a few seconds ago had mysteriously disappear and the only living creatures were a few frogs hidden in marsh plants. I took two steps and suddenly all the landscape were covered by fog and I could barely see where to put my next step.

            The idea of being late to school has completely disappeared, I was astonished, the road had completely disappeared and my head only cared about the strange change of a beautiful forest into a creepy and gloomy swamp. Never in my life I had saw this part of the forest, it was something new for my eyes. I noticed that my bag was much heavier than it was before; I turned around to see what was it and my scream was heard from miles away. A green and cold snake was almost reaching my neck when I threw the bag away and I did what I was supposed to do, run as fast as possible. In the moment that I rushed I couldn’t even remembered what was thinking , and again the only thing that I could hear was my breath and my steps hitting again the draft soil, the beams were all over the green grass, the trees and the blossom flowers appeared again as the swamp never appeared.

            Suddenly I was a few meters from the school, I was dirty and with my heart beating very quick, but my mind only thought on the strange things that happened on that forest. I heard the bell and my best friend came and asked me why I was all dirty and where was my bag and I responded: “Only the forest and I know what really happened”