Near Death Experience

A Move and a Near Death Experience

By: Infinite Analeigh

Moving from Seattle, Washington to the tiny town of Bandon, Oregon was not my idea of a good time. Or idea. I hadn't wanted to move from Seattle. Bandon had a population of like, five as far as I knew. My parents, my little brothers, and me. Bandon High was the only high school in this whole town and I was being forced to wear a uniform. No, not uniform, but 'dress code'. As if there is a difference. The only things aloud are green, black, or a white polo's, jeans, or kaki pants.

The thing that bothers me the most about this town (besides the uniforms and lack of any clothing stores) is that it's so quiet. I miss the sound of traffic, street musicians, and the everyday random street sounds. The forest surrounding my house seems to dampen all the other sounds that I should be hearing through my bedroom window.

I shove one of my many boxes away in frustration. I don't want to put all of my stuff away on these stupid foreign shelves. I would rather be packing it and moving too Seattle. I sigh as I take out my cell phone; no missed calls. But I don't get any service anyway. I perk up, I bet Sarah, my best friend, has been trying to call me all day but couldn't get through.

I stand up and stretch the cramp out of my legs from constantly kneeling and unpacking boxes. As I walk out my front door I ignore my mom when she asks me where I'm going. I've decided to have a one-woman protest of this move by not speaking to her until she realizes what she has done to her only 16-year-old daughter. So far she hasn't even noticed my silence.

I still have no service as I wander around my front yard with my hand held above my head. I turn to the right and walk into the forest. The forest is literally only 100 ft from my house because my house is the last on my street. The moment I enter the woods the little sounds that there were of my neighborhood (i.e. me next door neighbors car alarm going off and his three dogs barking in response) are instantly silenced.

As I walk through the trees I marvel at all the green. Almost every tree is covered in a thick covering of green moss. Even the sun shining though the trees is tinted a light green color. I stop when I notice the tree directly in front of me. It definitely looks climbable. I put my phone in my jeans pocket and pat it to make sure it is secure. I jump up and grab the branch closest to the ground and walk my way up the trunk, my black low top chucks proving to have almost no grip left on their bottoms. Pulling my body onto the branch proves harder then I thought it would, but I somehow manage.

Standing on the branch I reach up and grab the branch above me. My feet slip a little as I pull myself up but I make it. I look down and judge that I am about fifteen ft off of the ground. That should be high enough to receive at least enough service for a text. I pull out my phone and promptly drop it.

Standing 12 feet from my tree is a giant bear. No not a bear I realize but a wolf. A giant mutant wolf. I don't think it has noticed me yet; at least I'm praying that it hasn't noticed me yet. The huge…thing walks toward my phone and starts to sniff it. All I can think is please don't eat it pleas don't eat it and then it does something even worse then putting some scratch marks on my screen. It picks my cell phone up in its mouth and starts to walk away, since it's walking below the branch I'm currently sitting on I have to lean over to see where its taking my precious phone.

I hadn't realized that I had leaned so far over until I slip off. You know how in the movies the person will slip off of a tree or a building but they grab onto a ledge or branch below them and sort of hang there until someone saves them? Well that didn't happen to me. I scream as I fall, trying to grab onto the branch below mine but only succeed in scraping my hands against the rough bark.

I expected to die on impact or break every bone in my body but instead of intense pain and dirt I feel something soft and furry underneath me.

I open one of my eyes slowly and find myself staring into the giant wolfs shiny teeth. Both my eyes instantly pop open and I scramble backwards clumsily. The wolf sits up and starts walking towards me. I can feel my eyes filling with tears and I hear myself start to whimper. Even as I am sitting there literally frozen stiff with terror the thought that I am being a complete and total coward passes through my brain.

So I run the back of my hand across my eyes and wipe away my tears. I decide that there has to be something I can do. There has to be some way I can get out of this situation alive. I start looking around-I don't even know what I'm expecting to find-maybe a gun, but hopefully a light saber. Instead I find a stick about two feet long. It's laying about two feet from my hand--judging from the distance between the wolf beast and me I realize that I could probably reach it before it can eat me.

I go for it.

I speed crawl over to the stick and pick it up while I stand. I am now almost even with its face again. I hold the stick up above my head and spread my feet preparing to take a swing at this things face. I unconsciously close my eyes in preparation for possible animal murder (or human murder depending who wins). I pull my arms back and—

It barks, startling me so bad that I drop my 'weapon'. The moment the stick hits the ground it breaks in three pieces, it's so rotted out by rainwater. I look back up to stare into the face of my attacker and find it sitting back on its haunches with its tongue lolling out.

I slowly drop my arms and really look at it for the first time. It appears to be tame, not some monstrous animal like I originally thought; it wasn't even drooling. His paw slid forward pushing a small object towards me and I realize with surprise that its my cell phone. I bend down to the ground and pick it up.

I grimace, still no service. I look into my rescuer-turned killer-turned rescuer again and smile. I feel like saying 'thank you' but it feels ridiculous considering it is just an animal. I decide to say it anyway.

'Thank you." I say quietly. Still a bit traumatized.

It barks back immediately almost as if it was saying 'your welcome." I laugh at myself because these trees are obviously making me crazy-and for all I know-hallucinate. The wolf looked really soft. Its-his I noticed-fur was a beautiful russet color, long and shaggy, but it was matted with bits of dirt and moss. I absently wonder if it will let me wash him. He would probably bite my hand off.

Because I want to pet him and I am already, obviously, crazy, I decide to try. I walked slowly out to him with my hand outstretched in front of me so he can smell me. Hopefully he won't smell my fear and get nervous. He doesn't seem to mind when the tips of my fingers brush the top of his head so I let my hand gently rest on it. His fur is soft.

"Good wolf" I coo.

He starts making a deep rumbling sound in his body, almost like a cat purring. I am now rubbing him with both hands despite the fact that my hands are turning brown with dirt and that I am probably making the scrapes on my hands infected. His tongue lolls out and he starts panting a little. I feel like my best friend who screams "PUPPY" and runs toward every single dog she sees, but I can't help it. He's just so big and fluffy. Plus, I realize with despair, I had been in this town five days and had only had contact with my brothers and parents…I was in need of a new companion—even one that wasn't human.

I wanted to keep him but I remember what my mom said when I asked her for a tiny puppy—I could only imagine what she would say if I showed her this huge thing. He was really thin underneath his fur though. Dangerously so.

"Are you hungry boy?" I ask him.

I could swear that he nodded his head, but of course, he didn't. Ooh I hope he doesn't have a nervous twitch. I take it as a yes anyway. I figure that if I leave him here and go get him some food that he will probably be gone by the time I return, so I decide to see if I can sort of lead him to my house.

"Come on, get up." I say while pulling on the fur at the nape of his neck. It works! I smile in satisfaction as he follows me toward my house.

When I can see my house I slow down our walk a little. "How am I going to do this?" I mutter to myself. I can't let him get too close to my house for fear that my mom will see him and freak out. "Okay. Stay here boy. Stay. Sit." He sat. Was he trained? Maybe he escaped from a circus? Wouldn't surprise me, he was a bit of a freak. "Good boy!' I run the 125 ft to my house and ignore my mom again when she asks me where I've been.

What can I feed him? We don't have any pets so there was no random dog food lying around. I open my fridge to judge the contents in there. I have an almost whole steak left over from dinner the night before. I pull that out and put it on a plate. What else? I have to contain my squeal of excitement as I see the chili in my cupboard. I open two cans of chili and poor them over the steak. Now to get it out of the house without my mom or the twins seeing me.

Luckily we have a door in our kitchen that leads to the backyard. As I slam the door shut behind me I hear my mother shouting "Charlie! Where are you off to now?"

When I reach the wolf (he was still there!) he stands up. He is literally taller than my 5'1' and a half self. I set the plate on the ground. He immediately begins inhaling; the plate is licked clean within a minute. He lies down (what I perceive to be) happily and looks up at me with the most adorable chocolate brown eyes I have ever seen. I slump down next to him and begin to stroke his head.

I don't know how I could have thought that he was vicious and trying to kill me, even though he was huge and had razor sharp teeth he was still adorable as all get out.

"I think I should name you." I say, more to myself then to him. "After all, if you are going to be my only friend in this horrible town then you should have a name." After a few moments of deliberation I decide, "Sebastian! Yeah that's perfect for you!" he doesn't seem to mind the name I've chosen for him, at least he doesn't protest.

I keep on talking, "my name is Charlie Flores, yes I know that's a boys name—I was named after my dad. I am sixteen years old, in the 11th grade, and I enjoy long walks on the beach. My life really sucks right now. Wanna know how? I'll tell you, Sebastian. My parents are both writers and they got it in their heads that they wanted to move out of a big city—and when I say big city I mean beautiful Seattle—and into a small town in Oregon. Because it will," and here I stop petting him and use air quotes, "'clear their heads and start they're creative juices flowing.' They're crazy. I tried to tell them that they were ruining my life, but they wouldn't listen. And for some reason my little brothers thought it would be fun to move. But it's okay for them because they have each other. And if no one likes them at this stupid school that's okay because they don't need anybody else. But, I'm not going to have anyone, I just know it. Everyone's going to be like 'oh, look at the freaky new girl' and they're probably going to be racist 'cause they are small town logger types…"I had to stop because I was crying too hard to speak. Sebastian sat up and began licking my face until I was laughing. "Stop! Stop!" I squealed. He continued to harass me until I hear my name being called.

"Charlie!" I hear my fathers voice calling.

"Charlie boy!" from the twins.

I immediately stopped laughing. "Oh. I guess I better go. Don't let them see you Sebastian or they will call animal control." He doesn't move. "Oh, Sebastian, you have to go. I stand up and hug his neck goodbye. "Oh gees, I'm crying again. Why am I so emotional? Come on, boy. You have to go. Go. Gogogo!" I whisper in his ear as I hear my family getting closer. Sebastian turned and runs away so fast and quietly that it seems like he just disappears.

When I return home my mother still hasn't realized that I am being an activist like she has always wanted me to be, and am protesting the sight of her. "Charlie, honey, your father signed you up for school today. We looked for you because he had questions about which classes you wanted to take but we couldn't find you anywhere. We both decided that the best choices for your electives would be Art, Journalism, and Ecology."

I snort. As if they couldn't just call my phone. They have finally gotten what they wanted—me in all they're hippy dippy classes. I keep walking to my new room and slam my door. I search through all the crap on my floor until I find my I-pod. Turning up my music I drown out the sound of her yelling at me through my door. Because my favorite powerpop song comes on I feel an uncharacteristic surge of energy. I start cleaning.

Authors Note: so! What do you think?? This is my first Fan Fiction… please please review and tell me what you think. the next chapter starts with Charlie's first day of school.
I embrace constructive criticism…and praise :