Into the trees

Around the campfires, there was music, talk, and dancing. Teenagers sprawled in a circle; their eyes gleaming like sequins stitched onto shadows, reflecting an amber glow licking at firewood. While all the time, the flames hissed and flickered; cautioning predators to keep away. Light and warmth a grudging niche of comfort; safety and sanctuary from the monsters that lurked, ravenous in the dark.

The balmy autumn dusk crept in around us; sticky and pervasive, while the tepid rain peppered our faces, and the flames guttered for a moment, fizzing anger. The last warm weekend of summer. Untroubled for once by the everyday routines of work and home that for now lay faraway, peripheral to the revelry at hand, people hovered, circling lazily, as the fire sputtered smouldering embers into the August night, before the breeze snatched them away and out of sight; twisting through the warped branches of the nearby trees that skulked, brooding, on the brink of the forest.

I crept between silhouetted figures, as their laughter curved away like rainbows. Past the boys that slouched like dogs in the long grass, sunburnt grimaces distorted by the torch beams, as they tossed back the dregs of a silver flask that flashed in the firelight. Past the girls that lolled across each other’s knees, their hair mussed from endless dances and their eyes betraying lack of sleep, while all around the festival wound down to a gradual close. I sidled through them, skirting the clink of bottles and the intertwined limbs, until I finally caved exhausted into a vacant space.

I slumped against my companions, their cracked dry smiles widening in acknowledgement, while I rubbed at the mud spattered on my legs, further chafing skin that already stung sore with the promise of bruises. Between the banter, and the raucous choruses roared late into the night, there was no breath for mention of garments ruined, dank with dirt and the skeletons of leaves that clung to me still. Skin sliced to slivers by snarls of bracken, barbed and callous. Half-murmured concerns were easily smoothed and excuses made; the revelment continued.

*

The dirt tracks leading back to the campsites had long been swamped, thick with mud churned by a long weekend of over-use, cloying to tired feet. By the last night most people had given up any attempt to use them. They were mostly empty by then, coiling away under the sallow yellow light that seeped from the lanterns strung at their edges.

Instead, people scrambled over the battered fencing that lined the forest border, screeching and cackling as they stumbled over branches, then disappearing into shadow. Unsure of the way back along the desolate path, I followed, trailing the sound of the footsteps ahead of me, leading me deeper into darkness.

I was lost within minutes. Twigs snapped and shivered on every side, and the footfalls in front of me had long since faded. Thorns clawed from the bushes, snagging on my clothes, stinging my legs. Overhead, the stars burnt bright, watching. I was almost grateful when I heard them approaching; faint at first, steadily coming closer.

Hot breath, sour and stale, and feral, muscled flanks, poised to pounce. And hissing insistent in the back of my mind: the rasp of fairytales half-remembered, whispering that the wolf can never be out-run.

*

It was the nearing of voices that made them leave. Drunken blundering through the branches and the jeers that followed; hoots of laughter that reached the clearing and were swallowed by the weeds. I kept my eyes shut long after I’d heard them bolt away, their loping bounds damp thuds on the ground, growing weaker, and the crack of leaves splintering under their weight. Eventually, when I was sure they were gone, I hauled myself up onto a nearby branch, squat with moss, listening as the quiet crowded back in, steeping everything in silence as the air turned colder.

It was much later by the time I saw the fires, glinting jewel-bright still, despite the hour, when I had begun to think that I would never find a way out of that maze of gnarled, disfigured trees; their arms reaching out, threatening as I passed, knotting together, thwarting any chance of escape. But in the end, they relinquished their hold; their serpentine limbs thinned and the bucking roots that sought to trip me calmed, eventually giving way to dry, packed earth.

I sank down beside my friends, sick with secrets. And I never told a soul.

. . . . . . . . . .

Text by Janie Doll, painting by David Hancock "Into the trees" acrylic on canvas, 6 ft x 4, 2005.