CHAPTER ONE

I watched as the movers packed the boxes into their truck. I leaned against the branch and sighed. I hated moving. Too bad for me that this was the fifth time in the twelve years of my life that we were moving. The worst part of it was that we were moving to some out of the way town where I would be home schooled because there was no middle school. There was an elementary school that my sister would go to but I wasn't in elementary. Plus my dad wouldn't be there because he had to start commuting to his job. I grabbed the trunk of the tree I was sitting in. I was going to miss him a lot.

The only reason we were moving to this town, Autumn Leaf, was that my parents grew up there and my mom desperately wanted to move back. So when my dad decided it was time for a new house (our old one was really old and cracking in some parts) she had begged and pleaded that we would move to Autumn Leaf. My dad for some weird reason, just can't say no to her when she puts on her puppy dog eyes and he agreed.

"Mellisa!" I heard my mom calling me from somewhere in the house. "You all packed?" "Yes Mom." "Well come get your suitcase honey!" "Okay." I sighed one last time and swung my legs out of the tree and wormed my way down the trunk. I wondered if they had as comfy or as easy to get into trees like this in Autumn Leaf.

I walked up the stone pathway to my house, kicking my sneakers against the hand rail. I was going to miss this old house like I would miss all my friends. I winced. My friends. The two words echoed through my mind, reminiscent of two things, the good memories and the fact I was leaving them in about twenty minutes.

I walked over the threshold and stopped short. I just could not get used to the fact that my living room now looked like a maze of boxes.

I picked my way through the boxes to my room on the second floor. It was completely empty except for my suitcase and a box of stuff I was going to need when we got to our new house.

Our new house. The thought brought a new dilemma into my mind. Our house here was comparable to a giant sewing basket. On the same scale, our new house was more comparable to a pincushion.

I could hear my mom starting up the motor on our minivan. I grabbed the handle of my suitcase and put the box under my arm. I rattled down the stairs like some beast was after me and stopped when I got to the bottom of them.

What was I so excited about. I walked with a more dignified pace to our car and shoved my stuff in the trunk.

I got into my seat in the back and waited for my mom to yell out the windows, one last time, the address of our new house.

I sat back in the car and resigned myself to my fate. Little did I know then how fateful this trip would actually be.

The car trip started out like a normal car trip aside for the fact there were boxes over every flat and diagonal surface, the floor, the seats, my lap, the list went on and on.

Five hours later we got to our new house in Autumn Leaf, as tiny as I remembered it.

My mom pulled up in the miniscule driveway with more than a little trouble.

I pulled out of my pocket, the gift that my best friend, Isabelle Douglas, had given me a couple days ago. It was a locket, embedded with three aquamarines in a triangular shape. Inside was a picture of her and me taken a couple months ago.

That was before I knew my family was moving.

It was a picture of the two of us, sitting next to each other on my bed at my old house. We were both smiling like crazy and when I looked at that picture I wondered how my mouth could smile that big. I hadn't smiled like that in a while.

I remembered that day like it was yesterday. Isabelle was staying at my house for the weekend which meant two sleepovers in a row. That was a record for both of us.

We had just finished having a pillow fight when my mom had come upstairs with her camera (who knew what she was doing with it) to find out what the racket was about.

When Isabelle saw the camera she asked my mom if she could take our picture together. My mom said we looked so cute she would have taken our picture anyway. So she took our picture and Isabelle put it in the locket.

On the other half of the locket there was a folded piece of paper that Isabelle had asked me not to look at until I was settled in Autumn Leaf. Now I was in sort of settled in Autumn Leaf but I decided not to look at it until my sister got here.

By then my mom had figure on how to get the car into the garage and still be able to get out of the car so we got out and walked into the house.

I ran upstairs to my room to unpack the box.

My room is right up the stairs right across from my sister's room. The movers had gotten here when my mom was trying to park and they had her permission to start unpacking and had done so immediately.

By now my bed was set up except for the mattresses which had not come in yet and the movers were trying to get my dresser through the door.

My desk was also set up. I managed to squeeze by them and dumped my suitcase and my box onto the frame of the upper bunk.

Sometimes my sister sleeps in my room so I have bunk beds.

Around thirty minutes later the mattresses had come and so had my bedside table and bookshelf so now I was waiting for my sheets so I could make my bed.

The sheets came eventually and around two hours after most of the house had arrived, including my room, and it had all the large pieces so all we needed to do was unpack stuff like dishes and throw pillows.

My mom was doing all those last minute things like talking to the movers about the bill and checking the silverware and heirloom dishes, basically running around like a maniac which gave me the premonition that as soon as the movers left, she would collapse on the couch and ask me to go find her the aspirin.

I was busy opening up the box which contained the stuff I would need immediately and couldn't wait until we found the box that contained it.

What I had in there was my toothbrush, my toothpaste, my scrapbook that Isabelle and me had made that contained all the pictures (the good ones of course) that me and her could find of us, my teddy bears and other assorted animals (yes I still have my stuffed animals, it's quite a large collection really.) my pictures, and my locket which I had put around my neck after I looked at the picture in the car.

I smiled to myself. That locket was probably the most special piece of jewelry that I had ever owned. Not that I had owned that much jewelry. Other than my locket all the jewelry I had consisted of a friendship anklet me and Isabelle had made (who else would I make a friendship anklet with), a couple bangles that my great aunt had given me and old pair of my mom's earrings. I didn't have my ears pierced but I used to use them to play with. Other than that I didn't have much bling.

I'm not a girly girl and never will be but I'm also not a city girl. I like climbing trees and running in fields, that sort of thing. I barely knew how to turn on my mom's cell phone, not that I ever would, I have no interest in that type of thing.

I ran my hand through my red hair and my fingers got caught in the tangles. My hair is just past shoulder length and it's really kinky and curly. I got my dad's hair. My mom on the other hand has long brown hair that you can't really tell is brown at first glance. It's sort of a combination of black, brown and grey.

I reached over to my dresser to the box where the hair things were in.

"Mellisa!" I heard my mom calling from our miniscule kitchen. "Dinner." "Okay! I'm coming."

I tossed the hairbrush on the bed. Normally my hairbrush is my worst enemy but tonight, I was just glad to see something familiar.

I walked down the stairs into the kitchen. It wasn't as tiny as I thought it would be but it was still tiny. My mom was sitting at the table. It would be a cram for five people and be cozy for four but it was just right for two or three.

I sat down across from my mom and you could almost see the silence, it was so dense. My dad is usually the one who keeps the conversation going and without him it was like leaving the peanut butter out of a peanut butter sandwich.

"So Mellisa," my mom began in an effort to break the strained silence. "What did you do today?" as if she hadn't been there for most of it. "Not much." I answered, feeling as if I had to do something to top that pitiful attempt.

"What's in this spaghetti?" I tried to change the subject. If you get my mom started on cooking she will never stop. "Well tonight I added some parmesan into the sauce and I added basil, by the way do you think the garlic bread is to garlicky?"

"Oh no, it's fine." I took a small bite of the spaghetti off the top of my fork. When my mom is nervous, tired or grumpy you never know what she does with the cooking.

Once when she was mad about something (I didn't even know what she was mad about just that it was something tiny, she tends to get mad over nothing) and she was cooking but when she peppered the soup the top of the pepper shaker fell off and all the pepper got into the soup. Nobody discovered it until my dad took a sip of his soup and nearly knocked the table over, he stood up so fast.

"Um, Mom? Can I ask you something?" "Sure sweetie, what is it?" "Can I… can I…?" I desperately tried to think of something to ask. "Yes honey?" "Can I go exploring?" I asked triumphantly with a burst of inspiration. "Sure Mellisa, but stay in the backyard for tonight. You can explore the forest when it gets light outside." "Great! Thanks!"

I hurriedly slurped down the rest of my spaghetti and ran to get my sneakers. When I got outside into our backyard it turned out the only thing big about our house is the backyard. It was huge compared to our other backyard. It had what seemed like miles of grass and trees and shrubbery, all wonderfully unpruned and wild. There were trees everywhere and they were in little formations. I walked toward a large group of trees that were in a sort of triangular shape. There were lots of hanging vines that looked good and strong so I did what any twelve year old tomboy would do. I started to swing on the vines. They did prove to be wonderfully strong so I spent the rest of my evening building swings.

I played until it was dark and I heard my mom calling me in. "Mellisa time to come in!" "Coming Mom!" I yelled back to her. I jumped of a tree stump I was standing on and began to run toward the house. I knew I had to get a lot of sleep tonight. Tomorrow my dad was dropping off my kid sister before he continued on the business trip he was on. It would be the last chance I had to see my dad for four weeks so I wanted to be good and rested. I also wanted to see my kid sister, Heather, again.
She had been on a Girl Scout camping trip when we had to leave, so my dad was bringing her afterwards. She was one of the best sisters in the world because she wasn't a pest and wouldn't come running up and say "Count me in! Count me in!" to do something she was obviously too young for, she liked to do most of the things I liked to do, she was quiet and obedient but she still had spunk and her own personality and most of all, even though she was only seven, she was company. She was usually at home at our old house when I got home from school and then we would hang out and watch TV until our parents got home. I hadn't seen her since she left for her camping trip two weeks ago and I was very lonesome. Not that I didn't have company. Our dog, Zoe, is very patient and a good listener. You can't exactly keep up a conversation with her but she listens very well. By the time I had run all that through my head I was upstairs in my miniscule bathroom brushing my teeth. I had restrained my wild hair into a ponytail so this time, I could actually see my face in the mirror. My hair my not be that long but it sure is poufy. I got into bed and promptly fell asleep.

Ok, this is a little longer than the first bit. It is kind of a take on Brave but it came to me in a dream and I had to write it. Please comment and tell me if you like it because I have a lot more that I have not posted. I will wait for the first comment before I post the third installment. Yolo.