The tops of the trees were already brown, orange, yellow, but the bottom leaves clung to green. Delia wondered if they were resistant to turn because they were closer to the roots or if they were too close to the ground to hear the winter winds.
Her phone pinged. She resisted the urge to check immediately, savoring the mystery of the message with all of its possibilities by taking a sip of her cider hiding under the splintered wooden bench. She knew exactly where to place her canteen so that it didn’t sit on uneven ground or run amok with an ant hill., such as they were this late in the year.
While she didn’t answer the phone, the message could be anything she could hope. Once she answered, she would know. She was always a better writer of text messages to herself than anyone else.
After listening to the river water hit the smooth autumn rocks a few more charged moments, she sought the inside of her fleece-lined jacket for the phone.
“What’s up?”
Now is the time to think of the clever response that will make her life seem more exciting than a lunch break alone with only the wild bend of the river for company.
“Taking a break from the bakery with a walk at Clark Park. You?”
That sounded more captivating to her ears than moping around damp leaves with the smell of sugar icing and rolled fondant lingering.
How many times had she been at this bench? It was one of the few places where she could go three or four times a week without getting looks that she couldn’t – or didn’t want to – interpret. She just hated staying home.
The ping again. She was less hesitant to savor the anticipation this time. Now she was craving some human interaction like it was a hot stick of dynamite instead of a faceless digital voice.
“Nothing much.”
Even though the cold was biting into her cheeks and through her wind-worn hair, she wondered if the river water was that raw. It always seemed to be moving, after all. She unleashed her rubber-sole shoes to feel the murky water and sucking mud hiding clay in her toes.
Maybe it was that she was just as frozen as the water.
Delia had just broken up… well… she had just been broken up with by Mason, but there were a never-ending line of suitors behind him. She thought she was going to marry him. After being independent for so long, and going from place to place and man to man, she had finally come to a point where she was ready to settle down.
Now it looked like she might just have to settle.
Or maybe she wasn’t marriage material in the first place.
Suddenly the realization of how absolutely alone she was in these woods hit her. Not a single human breath could be heard. The only sounds were the fight of the dead and alive leaves overhead and birds calling to each other, making her the unintelligible one.
How different was this feeling from a crowd?