The Sunset
Lets start with, not so long time ago when I was a kid, I was always curious about a dark, grim looking forest at the edge of our town. Lets just say the town looks like a very old eastern european town that has like a couple thousand people who live in peace with near zero interruption from the outside world. The townspeople, as you would imagine would say things like 'Stay out of the forest' and 'No one has ever returned from the forest' thus making my small mind think of it as dark and scary. My brother, who was four years older than me, used to tell me stories, legends as he might say about Castle Forest. He said that the legends stated that there is a castle in the middle of the forest. The castle was so big that another forest grew inside it. Now, we could only see the drawbridge of the castle which still stands till today. He wanted to see it. He asked me if I wants to see it. As a kid, a stupid kid I must add, I said yes! 100% yes! The crazy part is that he thought that it was a sign that he (and me) should walk through the forest and see it for ourself, "It would be our greatest adventure together!" he said.
I never thought he meant what he say when he decided to actually venture into the 'no one ever comes back' forest. We started planning. I was, obviously on the food department. Gather three dinner worth of bread he said. Every dinner I would keep the bread instead of eating it. The soup does not go well without the bread but I went through it like a champ. Mom would never suspect since I love eating and keeping food was never an option. Well mom, you guessed wrong. My brother he on the other hand, he gathers the other needs. He took a lamp, enough kerosene for a supposed one night journey, a compass, some rags that he colored red and you get the deal. Everything that two person would need on a dangerous walk in a dark and supposedly haunted forest. The plan was simple. We head out after sunset and we should be home by dawn. Head out to the center of the forest and we should be good. Everything was good until we had a mishap. Kris was the mishap. Let me rewind a little bit and tell who Kris is. Her name is Kristinha. She grew up together with us and I consider her my brother's girlfriend but he denied it. Kris, as I called her was actually our neighbor but she moved to a bigger house at the other end of the town. Her father is now one of the most important figures in the town and they usually lived somewhere farther away from the forest.
Kris's father decided to turn their old house into a barn. Long story short she caught my brother stealing a lamp from the 'house-barn'. She has her girly charm as my brother would describe to 'persuade' my brother into telling her what our plan is. The day has finally arrive and that evening a few hours before we head out I saw Kris sneakily went into her old hideout behind the barn. She had that nervous but excited face all over her and frankly, she made me feel nervous. I remember how I was sitting by my bed in my room contemplating my choice to follow my brother. When he came in my room, I looked him in his eyes and asked
"Are you sure Drey?"
"I'm not.." He replied with a less than assuring tone then continued
"But we got to do this. Its our only chance" with a smile on his face. I did not know what kind of chance he was talking about but nevertheless I felt a bit better. He has always be behind me every time I feel bad and he still is till today.
"Besides, Kris is already waiting for us" he said with a sarcastic tone followed by a smile.
The sunset. Its beautiful but it marks the end of a day. How sometimes inconvenience can come from a beautiful thing never cease to amaze me. A whole forest is between us and the questions we had since, well since forever. Is there a castle? How does it look? We stood there looking at the sun, thinking it might be our last time. I still don't know why at the time but I knew it somehow, I will come out of this a new person. Maybe my life change maybe it will not but this journey will bring us a whole different perspective on how we look at our life. I remember looking back at my house in the distance, feeling sad, but then Drey hold my hand and looked at me and say
"Here we go, Ivan." and then started walking forward. Every step we took means that we are getting farther and farther from mother. I looked back one time and all I saw was trees and darkness. I whispered to myself that then sun will come up sooner or later but oh boy was I wrong.
TO BE CONTINUED
