Mission Street Woods for the first time. The cloud had winked at him. He followed the cloud and followed the footprints and went missing for six days.
What did I do here for six days?
What did she do with me?
SNAP.
A twig cracked under Christopher’s feet. The children looked behind them. David used the distraction to take off running. The children turned and followed.
“Daaaavvvviiid,” they hissed.
David put his head down and ran faster. Trying to outrun their voices.
“Dooo yooouuu knowwww wheerrrreee yoouuu areeee?”
David broke into a sprint. Two little girls ran in front of him.
“Oh, David. You’re back! We’ve been waiting for you! It’s almost finished!”
David screamed and made a hard right. It was all Christopher could do to keep pace. David sprinted over the billy goat bridge and jumped into the cold water, trying to lose the girls. Three mailbox people rose from the water. Their zipper eyes open. Moaning and reaching for him. David jumped over their outstretched fingers. Rancid and rotting. He landed near the old hollow log. The man in the log popped his head out.
“Hi, David! It’s almost finished!”
David jumped over the man just as two deer came out of the woods. Three more deer hit the trail. David turned left again. Three more. David turned right. Five more. David stopped. He was surrounded.
“Do you know where you are, DavId?!”
Suddenly dozens of mailbox people came from the shadows. They opened their mouths, struggling against the stitching. The deer walked closer. Baring their teeth. Christopher picked up a rock. He didn’t care that it would give away his position. He had to help David. He wound up and was about to throw it at the leader just as the deer jumped for David’s throat.
That’s when it happened.
The moment lasted the blink of an eye, but Christopher could still see each step clearly. He saw David Olson close his eyes. He felt the boy’s mind go quiet. Then, he sensed a charge in the air as his mind was filled with imaginary thoughts. Suddenly the sound around him died as if the quiet of his mind had absorbed it like a sponge. And there was nothing left but imagination. Christopher could not hear David’s thoughts, but he knew what they were from the result.
David Olson began to fly.
It didn’t look like anything Christopher expected. David wasn’t flying around like Superman. He wasn’t a superhero. He was just a little boy who found himself in the air as if floating on a thought. An invisible cloud instead of a cape.
The deer crashed heads into each other, locking antlers.
You can fly like Iron Man.
Christopher closed his eyes and calmed his mind. He didn’t have David’s level of training, so he didn’t think he could fly without the nice man there. But he tried to picture himself weightless anyway. He tried to see himself floating on the wind like a leaf. Or a feather.
Or a white plastic bag.
Christopher felt his feet lift off the ground for a second. He tried to gain his balance like a tightrope walker at the circus. But this tightrope didn’t go across.
This one went up.
With his eyes firmly shut, Christopher pictured himself moving past one branch. Then another. Climbing the tree with his imagination instead of his hands. He saw himself above the treetops. The trees standing under him like green fluffy clouds. The moon full and bright and blue. The sky above it filled with stars. Space reaching out as wide and deep as time is timeless. Deep space the ocean, and Earth a life raft. The stars not shooting. The stars still.
The stars dying.
In his mind’s eye, Christopher looked up ahead and saw David flying toward the clearing. Christopher pictured himself planting a foot on the tops of the trees. Running across them as if walking on water. Gaining speed. The leaves falling like petals under his feet. The fever breaking out over his body like whispers on his skin.
David Olson is…
David Olson is…terrified.
Christopher could feel David begin to fall up ahead. He looked exactly like the birds Jerry used to shoot out of the air. But it wasn’t a bullet that brought David down.
It was something in the clearing.
Christopher opened his eyes and lowered himself under the treetops to hide. He moved quietly, branch to branch. He heard movement under him on the path. Running. Whispers. Christopher moved to the edge of the clearing and stopped. His eyes searched the ground for any sign of David, but there was nothing except one mark in