Dust (Of Dust and Darkness) (3 page)

             
My molars
crunch down
on the
corner of the
sunflower seed
, cracking the shell, and I dehull the exterior for the edible kernel within.
As I nibble on my prize, I
grimace as Meg slowly saunters her way toward me, hands on hips with a wicked half smile. “So how’s the rump,
Rosie
?”

             
“Just fine,
Meggy
.” She scowls at the cutesy use of her name
,
but
she
can hardly say anything since she did it first. To bug her just a little more
,
I add, “Mustard sure is having fun with Poppy today, huh?” Her
smile
drops
,
her head
whipping so fast you’d think it would snap off, just
in time to see Mustard collect
ing a white flower that landed
atop Poppy’s head. Poppy smiles as he
gently
tucks it behind her ear, his arm lingering longer than necessary. “I know you like both of them, but don’t you favor Mustard over Tin?”

             
Annoyed, Meg returns her attention to me, eyes pinched hard enough for
skin
to
crease
across her forehead
in several waves
. She
swoops
in fast
and rams me, scooting my body sideways involuntarily. Taken aback, she squeezes beside me atop the anther before
my defensive maneuvers can kick in
. Now
she’s
sitting comfortably and I’m only half way on.

             
“You really shouldn’t be eating that, you know?
” She says it with an annoyingly sweet voice, but her tone is smothered with snobbery. Meg crosses her legs and lays her hands on her knee, one atop the other, kicking out the upper leg rhythmically. “
Two of us should
easily
be able to
fit on this flower.
And o
ut of the two of us, you’re definitely winning in the hip department.”

             
Ugh!
She doesn’t even
see
my evil glare because she’s so wrapped up in watching Poppy, but I know she feels my scowl when the corners of her lips slowly creep upward.

             
I need air
. And
not the air every living thing around me has choked on the past few minutes. Real air – fresh, from Mother Wind herself. I leap off the coneflower so abruptly it bounces Meg up and down, and a few of the purple petals break free. My wings take flight and I shoot through the air, dodging trees and swaying branches until the evil laughter coming off Meg fades away. Only then do I slow my flight
and head for my place of comfort
.

             
I burst through the treetops and my jaw drops in awe at the beautiful sight before me
, immediately calming my irate manner
. The coming storm creeps along the horizon
,
painting the sky with shades of grays and blues, the clouds tumbling toward me over a neverending floor of
luscious greenery
that dance and twirl with Mother Wind
. Bright streaks of
white
light skip
sporadically
across the sky and I see a flock of birds in the distance take flight, spooked by the thunderous roar above them.

             
As I hover over the forest canopy, I inhale several deep
, cool
breaths. The rain coats the land before me, saturating the soil, leaves and flowers. The earthy smell hitches a ride with
the wind
and makes its way toward me. It fills my nostrils and lungs, and quiets my mind. I slowly descend atop a leaf on
one of
the emergent
tree
s
that poke
above the canopy, leaning back on my elbows and crossing my legs
.
The leaf
sways back and forth, and jerks
me
occasionally when a
gale
passes, but I don’t mind. The movement is almost hypnotic.

             
I sigh with content. This is why I love my tree house near the canopy. The air’s more alive up here, continuously circulating around you,
prickling your skin with goose bumps,
swaying you gently back and forth, as if Mother
Wind
herself is rocking you softly in her arms. The others just don’t seem to get that, happy enough with the musty air expelled by the life at the bottom of the
forest strata, where fungus and decaying matter pad the forest floor.
But not me. The higher up the better.

             
Between
cool
breezes, I hear a rustling in the tree beneath me, but the massive number of leaves protect the sound’s maker. I startle when a figure punches through the canopy, but calm when I realize it’s just Tracker.
His skin the same hue as mine, his muscles curve subtlety along his arms and legs, his body lean for quickness but not built for strength. His eyes are tan, similar to the color of dried moss that hangs off this v
ery tree, and his hair a light
shade of brown too.
He pauses momentarily to take in the skyline, as enthralled by the sight as I am. “Wow. I rarely come up this high. And never when it’s about to storm.”

             
I softly murmur
mmm-hmm
as I return my attention to the
clouds
swirling
in the
sky.

             
“You mustn’t let Meg upset you,” he says softly. I turn to see
his
kind, tan eyes gazing
down
at me.

             
I huff. “I promise you she didn’t. I couldn’t care less about her little antics. I just
felt
suffocated down there.”

             
“You seem suffocated with this place in general. I rarely see you in or around the Hollow
anymore
.”
Tracker circles me a few times, inhaling a few deep breaths himself. “
But
I can see why you prefer the air up here. Less…saturated.”

             
“How did you find me?” I ask, because only Poppy knows I come here, and because I had dipped and swayed so much through the forest I should’ve been impossible to follow.

             
His eyebrows lift
with
amusement.
“They don’t call me Tracker for nothing.”

             
Impressed, I reply,
“I had heard that you were good but I didn’t realize you were that good.”

             
He chuckles and nestles atop the leaf beside me, swaying in rhythm with me. “I’m not really. You were easy to follow. You left
the scent
of peppermint behind.”

             
I smile. I had completely forgotten
about diving
through th
e peppermint patch this morning
. I certainly don’t
smell it when I inhale
anymore
.
I lift my arm to my nose, and sure enough, a whiff of peppermint cools my nose again.

             
“To be honest, I’m a little surprised you’re still here.”

             
My forehead scrunches. “What do you mean? I don’t care that pixies like Meg play stupid games. I’m not going to hide from them or anything.”

             
“I wasn’t referring to Meg. I meant the Hollow. I’m surprised you haven’t left like those before us. You seem just like them.”

             
The wind
suddenly
whips our leaves
,
so
I
doubt
he noti
ces
my body snap
in reaction to his words
.
“How so?”

             
“They were all
loners that preferred to get lost in the forest
.
P
ixies in general are in tune with Mother Nature
,
but you particular pixies are more so.” I didn’t like the way he said
you particular pixies
– my nose actually wrinkles – like I was similar to those that
abandoned
our
village
and
never
came back
. “I’ve seen the way you look at our surroundings, Rosalie.
It’s like you see something the rest of us don’t
, and your wings glow yellow like those before you
. Like you know there’s more to life out there than what rests within our
Hollow.”

             
On the contrary. I am completely content with my surroundings. With my little tree house all to myself, the small watering hole at the edge of the Hollow that only I seem to
know about
, with all the types of bugs sharing the resources around me. I’m happy here. I like simplicity.

             
But I certainly never knew the pixies that left before me had wings that developed a yellowish glow like mine.

             
“Do you think the reason none of those
pixies have ever returned is
‘
cause they’re dead?” I ask
, the
whistling
wind competing
for Tracker’s attention.

             
“Some of them, yeah. But not all of them. No, I think they just found something this place lacked for them. What that something is though, I don’t know.”

             
“And you think I may know what that something is?”

             
He turns and scans my body with his eyes, like he’s trying to
analyze
me, like I’m some weird creature he’s never seen before. “I don’t know. No one really knows you that well. Not even Poppy. We sometimes wonder if you’re the next to take flight.”

             
My neck snaps
faster than one of those snapping turtles I came across in the river bed last week
. “Just
‘
cause I like to keep to myself
and stay in a different stratosphere of the forest
doesn’t
m
ean I’m itching to get out of the Hollow anytime soon.”

             
“See? Right there!” he bursts.

             
Surprised, I stammer, “See what?”

             
“You just said
anytime soon
. No other pixie in the Hollow would have
said that
.”

             
Flabbergasted, I’m left speechless and just stare at him in
disbelief. Not that he notices…it seems his
attention is more interested in the impending storm
.
I had no idea I came off
that way
to the others.  I have no desire to the leave the Hollow. I’m happy here
and
I know what I really want
,
so
I’m not going to
start
doubt
ing
myself over two little words
now
.

             
I
sit up and
curl my arms tightly around my legs
,
rest
ing
my chin on my knees. We sit in silence for a few moments, rocking back and forth with the breeze
,
listening to the harmonic hums of the hissing winds,
before Poppy pops up beside Tracker. She’s as surprised as I
am that he made his way up to my special little place in the canopy.

             
“Oh, I’m sorry you guys. Did you want to be alone?”
she asks with a suggestive, hopeful, smile.