The river moved through the forest like a vein winding through an arm. The colors contrasted each other, the trees being a mixture of greens while the river was a radiant blue. The forest’s colors changed with the age of the trees. The young trees were a bright green while the older taller trees produced a dark melancholy green. The young trees were not tall enough to pierce the canopy and were left in the older trees shadows. This seemed to carry over to humans as well, the young being bright and full of energy while the old had reached their peak and could only go down.
Charlie sat on the bank of the river and pondered this relationship. His thoughts moved between the forest and his own life. He had lost his grandfather recently and it had a taken a toll on him. The old trees reminded him of the old man, strong and withered both of whom had seen a lot. His grandfather was a poor man and after his passing he only left a few tools and unpaid bills.
The sun moved to midday and the heat became unbearable. Charlie got up and began to make his way back to town. Moving through the old-growth forest he remembered the first time his grandfather took him hunting. They had shot a nine point buck not far from where he stood. Most of Charlie’s life lessons had been taught to him by his grandfather. His parents were killed in a car wreck when he was very young. This left him to the old man’s care, but he was never around, work had been his life. It seemed to Charlie that the old man never wanted to have free time but work and work he did. The old man had worked almost all of his life in the chicken farms. Working for the Ander’s company provided him a solid paycheck but at the cost of hard manual labor. Right before his death they let him off saying that his service was no longer needed anymore. How could you do this to someone who had been loyal for over 50 years? Charlie thought the betrayal of the one thing he was passionate about had killed him.
Leaving the woods behind him he began to walk down the road towards town. On his way a girl on a bicycle rode by and stopped when she got to him.
“Excuse me do you know where I can find the ferry dock,” she said.
Charlie was struck by the beauty of the girl. She had light brown hair and green eyes, the same as his mother.
“Its two mile down the road, there are signs for it.”
“Thanks,” she said whiling riding off.
Charlie couldn’t resist asking this girl on a date. He had never seen a girl so beautiful in his life.
“I haven’t seen you around here before, are you from the city?”
She stopped peddling and responded, “Yea I just wanted to get out for awhile and clear my head.”
“That must be nice, I’m Charlie by the way,” he said.
“I’m Kate and it was nice to meet you.”
Charlie wanted desperately to impress Kate but he feared that he would let her go and never see her again. There wasn’t much to do around here so all he could offer was to take her to dinner and drinks at the pub in town. To Charlie’s surprise she accepted the invitation to dinner and planned to meet him in town at seven. Kate rode her bike down the road towards the ferry while Charlie flagged down one of his friends in a pickup truck. Before losing sight of each other their eyes met for one last time.
Kate had been quite pleased by Charlie’s invitation. She found his curly brown hair and muscular physique quite attractive and it seemed to her that the night was going to be a lot of fun. All of her friends in the city were snobbish and condescending. They had booed her for wanting to spend the summer in such a place but to her it was the perfect escape. Her family owned a large estate just north of the town. Her grandfather owned the Ander’s chicken company and had made millions since he opened his first farm. Never actually doing any labor himself her grandfather had spent most of his time with the elite in the far off city. He despised the town and its people but he knew it was easy to profit from such simple people.
The Ander’s chicken company owned pretty much the whole town. Charlie despised the whole establishment and wanted to see it burned down. After being dropped off he found himself walking outside the factory where his grandfather had worked, he picked up a stone and threw it at a window. It shattered to pieces and this made Charlie feel a little better. Once away from the factory he went back to thinking about Kate and how he felt like she made him melt when they talked. He wondered where she was staying for the summer and how he had been so lucky to meet her.
We want to see the action! Also, the last line concerning the similarities between trees and humans is a bit too obvious to be mentioned in your book, I would think.