Arrival

   A girl walks down black pavement. Dark hair, pale in complexion. Wearing a brown school dress and a white dress shirt underneath, with knee length socks, a striped tie, and Mary Jane shoes. Across her eyes are also big, round glasses that made her look almost cartoonish. All the way out here, it looks like there’s nothing for miles in either direction. Just her, the road, the occasional car that passes by, and the forest beyond. It’s so early that not even the sun has made an appearance yet. Even so, Hao Hao knows that today will be a terrible day.

She just moved here. The young girl of fifteen hadn’t had many friends back home anyway, but it was more than here, and she already missed her old route. She used to go down the street and onto the subway. Now she had a five mile walk in front of her. At least it was quieter, she supposed. It was nice that there were no other people. Talking was always so hard for her; what if she did something wrong? Stared a little too long or said something weird. It was easier not to talk at all, in her mind. She hung her head, pretending to fade away from the world.

She heard a noise almost like a light rain, but she didn’t feel a thing. Her head popped up. She didn’t see any rain. Couldn’t smell it either, but she wished desperately that she was wrong. She loved the rain. Almost as much as a child loved ice cream; she felt her world was at peace when the drops hit her face. None came right now, however. She put her hand out to feel for it. Disappointingly, nothing came.

While she looked, she saw something in the distance. A thing, floating in the air. A white fuzzy ball of light hanging out amongst the darkness of the tree branches, with a tail of sorts. What was that? The thing smiled. It couldn’t be a plant, but it also wasn’t like any animal she’d ever heard of either. It seemed to be beckoning her forward.

Hao Hao took a step forward only for it to turn away from her. It ran into the trees, and Hao Hao went after it. Curiosity spurred her. She wanted to know what that thing was; if she didn’t know better, she would have said it was made of cloth. It looked like a fuzzy blanket. What could it be?

It led her deeper and deeper into the forest, and soon she lost sight of it entirely. She stopped and sat at a stone by the river. She tried to listen for it, but rushing water from a nearby river filled the air. It had gotten away, it seemed, and as Hao Hao looked up, she realized she had no idea where she came from.

All the trees looked the same to her. Tall and brooding. Birds chirped, frogs croaked, and other critters skittered about just out of sight. Bugs of all types were flying about; none particularly bothered with her. She tried to retrace her steps, but all they did was lead her back to the river. It was time to admit it: she was lost.

Just as she was about to panic, a man in a canoe passed by.

“Sir! Can you tell me where I am?” Hao Hao asked.

The boat stopped. The man in the hood faced her, but she couldn’t make out an inch of his face. A black aura seemed to cover it. She might’ve been scared, but the voice that came from was entirely normal. Friendly, even. “You’re lost?”

“Yes. I… Um…”

She wasn’t sure how to describe the fuzzy thing, and it dawned on her that it sounded very much like she was a stupid young girl that chased after a butterfly into the woods mindlessly. And, well, that is pretty much what happened, but she didn’t to say that a stranger. With no other words to give him, she let the conversation trail off.

Even so, he nodded, “You must be trying to get to school.”

“Yes.”

“Let me take you. It’s past this river and over the lake.”

“Really?”

“Yes.”

Hao Hao didn’t know her new school was by a lake. Her parents had gone over with her the route she was supposed to take, and she didn’t remember seeing it on the map or them mentioning it. But…. That could be explained away easily. She was new. She probably just didn’t see it or something. She asked, shyly, “It wouldn’t be out of the way for you?”

“I’m going to the school. It’s no trouble at all.”

And so, Hao Hao took the man’s hand (it was surprisingly cold) as he helped her into the boat. The man used a long, wooden stick to paddle with. They were off within a few moments.

He asked her, “So, are you new around here?”

“Yes.”

“Where were you before?”

“Across the sea.”

“Ah.”

The boat moved at a good speed. Faster than she expected; maybe she wouldn’t even be late (which was a negative in her mind.) The river water grew louder. The trees seemed to grow taller as they went, blocking the little amount of sunlight that was trying to break through the early morning haze.

Just as she was about to relax, she felt the entire world shift. Like it was turned upside down and then back around. She felt herself spin once, and when she returned to the feeling of normalcy, she noticed she was soaking wet.

“What… what just happened?”

“Sorry. Forgot to warn you about the waterfall.”

“There was a waterfall?” How come she hadn’t seen it coming? She had been facing away from it, yes, but she still should have heard it, and why couldn’t she see it now that she was looking back in the direction they had just passed through? The area was flat. No sigh of any waterfall.

A long pause, and then the man answered, “Yes.”

As she wrung out her uniform of water, she noticed something strange. Was her uniform darker than before? It seemed fully black now. She could’ve sworn it was brown before, but maybe it was just too dark to make out the color.

The trees seemed to get taller, and a thin fog rolled in. Hao Hao studied the trees only for a pair of eyes to stare back at her. Glowing yellow. Was that a deer? She rubbed her eyes and then they were gone. Perhaps she had imagined it.

The base of the river opened into a large body of water. This seemed to be the lake he mentioned before. Looking underneath the waters surface, she found the water to be clear enough to make out everything. Several fishes swam by. Bright like an aurora borealis, the schools of them were so colorful she could hardly believe it. Seaweed reached up from the surface of the lake floor; trying to grab her, she imagined.

Her eyes went wide as she thought she saw a human. A woman. Hao Hao almost shouted for the man driving the canoe to stop. That they needed to help the woman below the water, but she looked again and saw only the tail of a fish as it dived below her sight, into a cave. Was that a mermaid? Hao Hao shook her head. That was silly; mermaids were fantasy creatures. Real only in the sense that you can read about them in books or watch them in movies.

“See something?” He asked.

“Ah, no. Nothing. Just the fish.” She said, thinking she must be going crazy.

She looked through the water several more times, taking in many of the sights. Every fish and frog, every fiber of the flora. She thought she even spotted a seahorse and several crabs, but she reminded herself that those were salt water creatures, she was pretty sure. Either way, she didn’t see the mermaid again. Nor even just the tail part, so that she could actually confirm to her imagination that she hadn’t seen a mythical creature.

Eventually they came to a mossy section of the lake. It grew all over the water, and though it didn’t seem to stop their travel, it did make it impossible to see below the water. Hao Hao’s eyes shifted to land. It was thick and haunting now. Not anything like the one they had entered. This one looked borderline dark. The trees above so thick in foliage that the sun couldn’t shine through. Forest paths by the lake were lit with blue-flamed streetlight. She wasn’t sure how it was possible, but it was the coolest thing she’d ever seen.

Squirrels scuttled around the forest floor with nuts in their cheeks. Geese and ducks line the pond water in droves. A crane was pecking into the water for its next meal. She thought she spotted more deers, way off in the distance.

“What is this place?”

“This are the mystical woods.” He said. Hao Hao was in awe, and he added, “It looks pretty now, but be careful when it’s dark. There are some big animals in there you wouldn’t want to face.”

She nodded, but she couldn’t see why he mentioned that. She had no plans of coming out to school at night. Unless she saw the white fuzzy thing, but even then, she vowed to herself that she wouldn’t get lost again trying to keep up with it. If she did see it, she’d approach quietly.

About ten minutes later they reached a wooden dock. Lamps of blue lit it just like the forest before, and she could make out a silhouette of the school in the distance, on top of the hill. Single-story. Smaller than her other school, and smaller than she expected too. That had to be only one building, she realized. It might very well be a very large school still, just hidden right above and beyond what she could see, and the dread set in all over again.

The man in the hood helped her out. He said, “What’s your name?”

“Oh, um… Hao Hao.” She whispered.

“I’m Jim.”

She felt embarrassed. He took her all the way here, and she hadn’t even asked for his name. She attempted to speak, but it only came out in a light whisper, “Thank you, Jim.”

“No problem. Have a good day.”

‘You too’ she tried to say, but the words didn’t come.

He started to tie the ship down. Hao Hao stepped away and pulled her backpack in front of her, looking for her schedule. Fumbling through rulers, folders, books, old candy wrappers, and many other loose papers, until she finally found it. Sent through the mail, along with an introductory booklet of sorts. Hao Hao wasn’t used to the customs here yet. She fumbled through it, trying to find a map of some sort that might help her find her first class.

She walked slowly as she had. So much so that Jim caught up with her and told her, “You won’t be needing that.”

She looked at him and asked, “I won’t?”

“No. Truth is, it’s really outdated, so it isn’t much help, but I almost forgot. I’m supposed to give you this.”

He handed her a map of the premises. As she thought, there were more buildings to it, including boys and girls dorms. The introductory paper definitely didn’t say anything about that. In fact, just as Jim had said, she couldn’t remember anything from it that resembled this.

“Um….”

“Yes?” Jim asked.

“Am I at the right school?”

He stared at her. Well, actually, she couldn’t see his eyes, so she couldn’t say for sure that he was staring at her, but it felt like he was. He said, “You said your name is Hao Hao, right?”

“Yes.”

He pulled a crumbled piece of paper from his pocket, smoothed it out, and looked it over. He said, “Yep. You’re on the list. This is the right place.”

“Really?”

He showed it to her. It wasn’t anything fancy. Definitely not a formal form, but it was a list of names. It went:

Alice

Cleo

Daichi

Emily

Hao Hao

Joy

Kirai

Mae

Sumi

Taeyang

Her name was indeed there. Strange that all of the students’ names were just written on a piece of paper in a canoer’s pocket. Or maybe it was wrong for her to assume he was working. She asked him, “Do you work at the school?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you a teacher?”

“Not really. I’m more like… a guardian, if that makes sense.” It didn’t to Hao Hao, but she didn’t ask. He told her, “Now go on. Meet your classmates in the home room. Or wherever they are.”

What did he mean, wherever they are? If it was time for home room, then they should all be in home room. In her old school, if you were late, they’d give you a stern speech and then drop you a grade.

Hao Hao didn’t argue. She walked up the wooden steps towards her new school.