As the maple leaves fell onto the stones,
the music in her headphones kept playing.
The ground would rumble as her feet hit the pavement, the boom, boom, boom,
echoing into the tops of the trees in the park.
Puddles from yesterday’s rainfall reflected pictures of her shiny new sneakers that matched her sweater.
Her head swayed to the beat as the breeze paid no mind to brushing her loose hair.
A new figure appeared in the picture, not paying attention to his surroundings.
His head was in a book, the words forming pictures in his brain.
The teen’s mind was still lost in her harmonic tunes as she collided into the guy with the glasses,
knocking the book out of his hands and his glasses to the ground,
knocking the headphones off her head and her into a puddle
“I-I’m sorry!” “I’m sorry!”
A flock of birds perched atop some branches,
watching the scene play out below.
“I should have been paying attention.”
“No don’t worry, you’re fine.”
She brushed herself off. “Is that ‘Turtles All the Way Down’? I love that book!”
“Oh um yes!” He handed back her headphones.
Squirrels were now scurrying to see the dialogue, mingling with each other about the humans
“Well, I’ll be on my way now.” As he went to pick up his glasses,
a shiny black bird swooped down and plucked them from the ground
“Hey!” Before he could even react,
the girl started running through the mud leading into a thick forest with who-knows-what in there.
Quickly following behind, the teen tried to catch up with the the other one,
who was impatiently waiting to head into the forest with him.
“Hurry! The bird’s getting away.” She went in without hesitation
“Wait, I’ll just get new ones it’s–”
But she was disappearing as his words were left in the air.
***
The bird of oiled feathers paid no attention to the person who was screaming below,
“GET DOWN HERE!” She picked up a small rock and threw it in the general direction of the flying fowl.
The aviary was dodging every stick and stone being thrown around it.
Not that it was hard.
She was bad at aiming anyway.
“Look out!”
The girl tripped over a tree root.
“Ugh…” She brushed herself off.
“Are you alright?”
“I’m fine.”
“Listen, we don’t have to keep chasing
it down. I’ll go buy new ones.”
“We’ve already come so far. Besides, it would be easier to leave the forest this way.”
She pointed in the direction the bird was going.
“We don’t have to run. We can just follow it.”
He nodded. “Sounds good.”
***
Wings now glimmering in the setting sun, the glossy, oiled bird finally settled down for its adventure.
“It’s been nice getting to know you Alice.”
“Same to you Mark! We should be close to getting out. I know these woods like the back of my hand.”
The speckled starling, having perched on a fence had dropped the boy’s glasses onto the ground,
though the teens were too busy chatting to notice.
The bird nudged it over to them.
“Look, your glasses. The bird must’ve dropped them.”
He put them on and looked into the colors melting in the sky.
Tangerines, cotton candies, and crystal violets mixed with the clouds to form an alluring autumn sunset.
A perfect way to end a newfound friendship and adventure.
