???

  Scurrying over to the cream painted fridge, I slide the pre-made sausage rolls into my pink, floral, piic bag. Wait, was I supposed to make desserts instead? I wonder while zipping up my bag. Oh well, too te now. I shrug, knowing there’s no time to do anything. I dart my eyes to the small analogue clock hanging on the wall.

  Ah shit…

  I increase the pace , rushing out of the kit towards the doorway of my y house. I unfasten the buckles of my leather sandals and slide them on, unsciously gng up at the family portrait on the wall, looking longingly at my father. The house hasn’t been the same since he died. He had sickle cell anemia, a disease where red blood cells don’t get enough oxygen, well at least that’s what we think? As almost all his cells didn't regee, no matter the amount of donor transpnts he received. His passing unhinged my mother and she began talking about bizarre i things. So crazy it drove my brother away, he couldn’t stand me ‘eaining’ her delusions, always insisting oing her down with the truth every, single, damn time. It broke my heart to see my poor mother struck with the reality of a truly dead husband and knowing her own distress has pushed her children away. Anguished by her loss she admitted herself into a care home, though I still talk to her whenever I .

  Bringing out my phone, I quickly flip it open and look at the time. I’m so te…I grab the keys off the rad throw them into my bag, swinging the door open and head out in a sprint. I miraculously make it to the bus, paying the fare aling down onto my seat, I lean against the cool window, a luxury in trast to the warmer enviro outside. I stare out into my grim, dated town filled with eyesore tower buildings and miserable people. I ’t wait for my tract at the school to end so I move out of this suffog town. No one thrive in these ies pstic cities with or opportuo succeed.

  As we pull into the bus station, I hop off the bus into the gss fishbowl of a station, and walk towards the ‘meeting pce’ and wince. Amelia, Ellie and Millie stand there with a disappointed look. Yeah yeah I know I'm te, so what? I think as I jog over to them and apologise for my ck of time ma. We have a quick versation as we get on our bus, the chariot to our deliciously beautiful destination, all words intended as I know Ellie brought victoria sponge cake. I’ve never been more excited for a dies day out than when cake is involved.

  Getting on the bus, we watch as the view shifts from our decrepit, meek town and its crowded, dirty streets, to where hilly fields and flowered covered pi a dense woodnd forest. Finally, nature's bliss! Getting off, we walk to where we see the high summer sun strike the tall leafy trees, strike them in such a way that it looked as if it was creating a world where only streams of light flow. Sitting beside the trees on the edge of the woodnd, we survey the wild fields of tall flowers where the occasional rabbits pass. The overwhelming sense of ess and freedom arises like I y dormant forever just staring at the view. As if the encapsutiy of the ndscape is unsciously draining you of all your worries and impurities. As if nothing mattered in this view of flowing grass and colourful vegetation.

  A feeling that everything is fine, where my mother is herself, my brother isn’t astray and father…alive. I ighe twinge in my chest, and join in the ughter with my close friends as we pluck the tomatoes out of our sandwiches, as if they were diseased and to eat them would kill you instantly.

  “Good for the pnts.” I ugh, as if I had to justify my childish pate of dislikiain veggies. We all nod in unison to the justified hate of tomatoes.

  "It's quite hat we all meet up, even if it's only during the holidays." Amelia, a dear friend of mine, mentions.

  It is ’s difficult to keep es when your fast approag uable adult life is seemingly being thrust upon you. Yet for moments like these where we meet up and act as if e and time away from each other has never ged, it is nice.

  Nevermind amusing, seeing how time has ged the people you used to watch, anxiously approach their school crushes and horribly fail into an exploding mess of words, and cry about it afterwards.

  "It is nice...So ni fact, that I feel as if we o do something, to maybe…Well, I don't know...Walk off our lunch? Or hide our lunch." Ellie smiles, ping the side of my stomach pyfully, causio give her a smug side eye. The gall of that girl!

  Ellie gets up and runs into the dimly lit forest giggling and looking back at us, as if urging us with her eyes and her body to e and py with her, just as though we were no longer a scatter of women in our early 20s, but 12 all ain.

  Those of us still sitting at the piic just look at each other and unanimously agree to ighe norms society has agreed for e. In uniso up and run towards Ellie, ughing and pushing each other along the way.

  I lift my long blue skirt and run, jump and wheeze trying to catch up with Ellie..Man I o get into shape..

  Catg up to her, I tackle her to the ground, ughing as we both turn to face the sky for a brief moment to catch our breaths. Calming ourselves down briefly, we slowly get up as the others catch up with us from pyiween themselves on the journey into the dense woodnd.

  "Should we go to the pond? I want to wash my hands." Amelia suggests to the group. Causing Milie to speak up in turn.

  "Is that really true, or are you going to pluck the reeds from the pond and chase us again?" Millie questions with her arms crossed, remembering our st visit to the pond .

  Amelia just stares at her as if she's a deer in the headlights.

  "Uhh…I'm unwilling to ahat." She adds before walking off into the dire of the pond.

  "We might as well go, something to add to our adventure before we catch the bus home." I add, pushing Millie and Ellie into the dire of the small body of water.

  Along the way to the pond, we make sure to distance ourselves away from the edge of the path where a steep slope runs along one side. It's not a big slope, yet it's still slippery and steep enough that you could sprain an ankle or two. Nevermind the dense shrubbery located along the slope and base, that would most definitely cause a nasty bruise or cut.

  So either way, it's best to stay on the side of the path where there's ft o it and not a steep slope of a bruiseful fall.

  The line of trees oher side of the path bee less dense as a small openiween them show the hidden away small le of a pond surrounded by sparse amounts of reeds. Amelia and Ellie rush to the pond to wash away the dirt and grime on their hands as Mille and I slowly make our way towards them. I hoist my skirt to just above my knees and kneel on the dry ground dipping my hands into the lukewarm water, turning to see Millie doing the same. Serenity captures me once again, well atleast I thought so until a cold a sensation hit my hair and giggles followed suit.

  “Hehe whoops…” Ellie sheepishly grins holding her hands to her mouth as if it was a great act.

  “Oh you’re…SO ON!” I shout, colleg a handful of water in my hands, cmbering to my feet and rushing towards Ellie as she pyfully screams and runs back towards the dire we came from.

  Gaining on her I threw the water towards her, missing pletely, yet having fun in the chase. Though it quickly dawns ohat I am without any ons in my arsenal, I am pletely defenceless against this lunatic. I stare at her bnkly as she slowly turns to me and gives me the deepest devilish grin. Run!

  I squeal as I turn to run away, dug into the wooded surroundings to escape my foe. I find cover behind a tree a distance away from where the pond is.

  I catch my breath as I wait out Ellie’s attempts to find me. Hearing a noise in front of me, I peer out from behind the tree to see a shadoast the small colle of trees oher side of the path. Holding my breath , I creep out and follow the track I think the shadow goes. I hear a rustling noise and spin towards it to see the shadow just pass a tree. Idiot I see you. Swiftly ging my movements I run towards the shadow. Envisioning my soon to be victory in slow motion, I reach my hand out in front of me, hoping to catch Ellie by surprise but in a rge stride forward, the derees before me dissipate.

  Time and prehension evade me as I cross the path aer on the edge of the slope . The shadoears before my st stride as I lose the fight with gravity and suddenly time seems to slow, I turn to face the shadow that guided me to my eventual fall. Dad? Before I even e to terms with who or what I saw, I register the steep slope before me filled with dense prickly shrubbery. As I hit the ground I watch as my world moves quickly as I'm propelled down the slope to the forest floor. I instinctively throw my arms up shielding myself from sharp thorns, tless branches and prickly pnts. Before I lose sciousness, I swear I see a ring of white mushrooms and then life as I know it is bcked out.

  Weightlessness, as if I was floating on water, the feeling encapsutes my semi scious state. It feels like a familiar sensation from my childhood, when my family and I had goo the local baths, and I had found enjoyment in drifting aimlessly on the surface of the pool. Feeling as though I was pletely ued by my own mass, a surreal moment of bliss and ess.

  Yet this feels different from that quaiion, more ominous...As if I had fallen into a hole I couldn't quite reach out of. Or if I had tumbled into a pce where my soul didn’t wholly belong.

  A feeling of dread and hopelessness fill me as my body y bruised and battered on the now ft ground.