Salina stepped across the soft grass to the foster homes’ playground. Her black hair, set in pigtails down to her knees, streamed behind her in the gentle breeze. The ten-year-old's wide violet eyes scanned the playground as she stepped over the log that separated the play area’s grainy wood chips from the bright green grass of the field.
As she walked past the foster children…no the playground children, Salina hated the term foster-anything. So, the playground children around her age stared at her.
Blushing and nervous, Salina willed her legs to carry her as fast as her ten-year-old muscles would carry her, while still trying to look casual. She came to a swing with faded red paint on rusty hinges and sat.
Staring at her new, shiny Mary Jane’s and navy socks pulled to her ankles she thought, ‘Back to home base again.’ Which pretty much meant, “Foster home again.”
This was her fourth in ten years. The first was Johnson Pratt for two years. Pratt was prim, proper ,and stern. Then was Gregory Smith for three. Smith was one of her favorites, perky, artistic, and fun, like one big family. She almost forgot she was a orphan. After that, quite reluctantly, was Herald Jackson for three…no four years. Jackson was rated in the middle of the first two. Then, before now, was Jeremy Harrison for only one year. It was just like Pratt.
Why did she go to different adoption centers?
Being adopted. Salina stubbornly knew her real parents are out there. She’d stay within the trial period for new parents, one month, and told them she wanted to go back to the center. After a few tries, they shipped Salina to the next “torture house”.
She rocked the swing softly and took a silent bet at how long she would stay here, when suddenly she was pushed off the swing. She knew as she sat up that her school uniform, a white dress shirt and a blue, gray, and white plaid skirt, was ruined.
“What was that for, Jason?” a boy with hair like leaves in the fall and eyes “blue as the sky”, as Salina would describe them later, held a tan hand out for her. She took it gratefully, the contrast of her skin on his made her look white as a ghost.
“Buzz off, William.” Jason, tall, bleach-blonde, green-eyed, pig-nosed, sounded William’s name with a sneer at the end. He made it sound like Will-yum.
William pretended to think, “No!” He grabbed Salina’s arm and pulled her into the wood by the playground. They ran until they came into a clearing.
It was an almost perfect circle made entirely out of white birches and one magnificent pine that towered at least five feet over the other trees. One huge solitary stump was laid smack in the middle of the grass and wild flowers. It was at leas three feet in diameter and a circle of multicolored things stood at the top.
Salina walked closer. Mushrooms! A circle of mushrooms in every shade, hue, and pattern.
“Whoa.” she whispered, still breathing heavily from the run there.
“I read-pant-about some-pant-thing like this-pant-in a book.” William was gasping for air, too.
“William it…” Salina started.
“Will. It’s Will.” he corrected her with a lopsided grin.
“Will it’s a faery ring.”
* * *
On the exact day that Salina met Will, Luna found herself sitting on a flat rock with her back against the apple tree in the front yard of her country foster house.
Luna was peering with her violet eyes over the white picket fence of the old Crawford house across the street. The house’s cream colored paint was worn and peeled, the white shutters creaked, and the door frame was cracked. Opposed to Luna’s brick-red painted, white shuttered, immaculate house the Crawford house looked like a run-down shack.
From what Luna could understand by spying over the fence, the mother was brunette and in her late thirties, the father was dirty blonde and in his early forties, and the son had auburn hair and was near Luna’s ten-years-old. They family were all fit, carrying clearly heavy boxes and furniture into the house, and had and enormous brown dog who shadowed, both protectively and obediently, behind the boy.
The boy was taking a box through the door, the brown dog trailing behind him still, when his mother stopped him at the door and said something to him. As she spoke he turned his head to face Luna’s house with wondering eyes.
Luna glanced down to hide the fact she was watching the new family. She didn’t turn when she heard heavy footfall and the panting of a dog close to the edge of her yard.
“Hi!” a boys voice spoke cheerily from behind her.
Luna turned fully around and saw the boy was smiling nervously. Closer up she saw he had silvery gray eyes and tan skin. His face was boyish and handsome.
“Hey.” she was determined to get a conversation started with this new boy, “So you just started moving in?” she asked as her chin length black hair fluttered in the sudden breeze.
“Yeah.” he answered vaguely, “So, what’s your name?”
Luna stood up and wiped the back of her worn jeans with her hands. She held out her hand.
“Luna.”
He took her pale hand in his tan one, the contrast was surprising, “Bobby.”
Bobby’s dog sat on his hunches and whimpered.
“This,” Bobby gestured to the colossal dog, “is Bud.”
Bud barked and nudged Luna’s hand with his wet nose. She scratched behind his ears carefully, not wanting Bud to bite her. After all, the dog’s head came up to her elbow. Bud panted happily and Bobby looked impressed.
“Bud never takes to people this easily.” Luna just grinned at him.
She suddenly sprang up and grabbed the lowest branch of the apple tree. Her feet were dangling at least a foot off the ground.
"What are you doing?" Bobby had this puzzled look on his face.
"Climbing-ugh-duh!"
Bobby just laughed and grabbed a branch that was out of reach for Luna. They both climbed until the branches were to thin to hold their weight. Both Bobby and Luna settled on the same branch and look out to into the flat country plain. they sat there for a minute then by some unspoken signal they started down.
"Have you ever noticed that you tree here is hollow?" Bobby leaned against the trunk and picked an apple.
"Really?" Luna thought he was joking until he knocked on the bark with the apple. There was a definite hollow ring in the tree.
Luna cocked her head to one side and thought for a moment the suddenly lashed out with her foot. Her worn sneaker hit the tree hard and a hidden door swung open on creaky hinges. The door was at least three feet height and tow feet wide.
"How did you...?" Bobby trailed off, at a loss for words.
Luna shrugged. "To tell you the truth I just wanted to see what would happen." she ducked down. 'Outside,' Luna thought, 'the tree is at least eight feet in diameter. So the hollow should be at leas seven feet across.' she began to crawl through the door.
* * *
On the same day that Luna met Bobby, Ayisha was walking through the trail of her suburb park with an unexpected new friend.
"So," Ayisha could not take her violet eyes off Edward. For a ten-year-old he was strong and cute. He had auburn hair and emerald green eyes, "did you just move in?"
"Yeah I live up the street." He smiled at Ayisha.
"Really? Both of us do, too." interjected Ayisha's friend Tracey. Tracey had her crush-girl eyes on.
"Mayb-bring bring" Ayisha sighed as her cell erupted into annoyingly high-pitched rings. She took the silver en-V out of her pocket and pressed talk.
"Hello?... I'm with Tracy, Leah... Yes... By lunch... 'Kay bye." Leah, her foster mom, called wondering where Ayisha was. She clicked the phone shut and stuffed it in her pocket.
Nobody talked for a few minutes. Then they came upon an fork in the path one was marked and the other was unmarked. Edward grabbed the girls' wrists and pulled them toward the unmarked side of the fork. Tracy,,,
Sorry got to get off now.
See you!
