Forever Dream — (Chapter 10) The Lonely Tree
Tags: Forever Dream, Short Story, Psychological, Magical Realism, Series

The Lonely Tree stands at the end of the mustard flower fields that extend out from Ami’s family home. Her father used to tend the fields in the summer for the seeds from which oil would be harvested and flower garlands that were sold on the streets would be made before he started an automotive business. Now the fields have turned wild, with an assortment of common mallows, dandelions, Japanese knot flowers and other weeds that seem to have trespassed into every crevice of free land.

It’s a wonder really, how the lonely tree manages to thrive amongst so many devious, little intrusions.

Sometimes, Ami, Yumi and I like to sit under its shade and while an entire day away. Today just happens to be one of those days. However, instead of whiling it away, we’re all engaged in a heated discussion that, frankly speaking, is leading nowhere.

“Maybe we should start stocking up supplies and run off to live in a cave or something for a few days? He won’t find us there!” Ami suggests, ever the opportunist when it comes to keeping me from going back. The number of times she’s suggested running away is uncountable, though a fearful guess would be a million.

Yumi rolls her eyes and flicks her forehead as she refutes the idea, “please don’t speak if us running away into nowhere is the only action plan you’ve got.” She then turns to me and ignores my snickering, shaking her head as she asks, “don’t you usually feel him coming?”

“It’s not fucking menstrual cycle? He’s not like PMS. She can’t always feel him!” Ami says on my behalf, but I can’t help laugh when she’s again flicked on the forehead for speaking ‘bullshit again’.

“I meant,” Yumi says turning to me and ignoring Ami who’s groaning in pain as she rolls around in the dandelions that form a perimeter around The Lonely Tree’s trunk. “Usually when you’re about to leave or when he’s near you can feel him come. You can feel yourself going back, right?”

I nod continuing her words, “and most of the times, I’m able to stop myself from leaving but I feel like… I don’t know. Like he somehow blocked my senses.”

“That’s bad…”

I swallow a lump of anxiety down as I watch both Yumi and Ami’s expressions turn sour. “Maybe…” Ami says, biting her lips for the right words. Both Yumi and I stare at her hoping for something, anything, that might help. “Maybe you need something stronger to keep you here?”

I raise my eyes at the suggestion, asking her, “you think I’m developing resistance or something?”

“Maybe? I mean, maybe you just need to amp it up just a little and then — “

“Nonsense!” Yumi yells back, glaring at Ami as if she suggested I eat a newborn baby or something. She turns to me and holds my arm, shaking me violently as exclaims, “you’re not doing that again! Anything stronger and you might die!”

I don't respond back, because I feel incapable of forming words and simply nod as I let her reiterate the warning. Ami’s words still ringing enticingly in my mind.

Maybe you need something stronger to keep you here?

“Well then, do you have any other better ideas?” Ami shoots back at Yumi, hands on her hip, nose flaring. “Or would you rather she be taken away again? Who knows for how long this time?”

A dull silence settles between them as I watch them fight like a toxic married couple over their child’s custody. Oddly enough, it warms my heart to see them quarrel about my wellbeing. As if I was someone in need of protection.

As if I was important.

“Well then, I’m sorry. I guess you would rather she fucking dies or something, huh?” Yumi yelled back — her hands on her hips and eyes bloodshot, she looks practically murderous.

“I’m not saying that! No one’s dying with just amping it up a little!”

“You know how close she is to overdoing it already!”

“I’m just saying it won’t hurt to try just once! No one dies in just one try!”

“You don’t know that for sure!”

Their little fight continues into the afternoon that I spend lying on the grass bed waiting for the tension to dissolve — it usually does after a while. I turn my attention towards the soft winds that make the dandelion stems quiver but aren’t strong enough to let the seeds fly away. My fingers hover over some of the flowers but I dare not touch.

By the time Ami and Yumi stop fighting the evening sun hovers in the horizon like a wet chamomile teabag, casting an orange glow over all things living — and me.

In the thick silence following their quarrel I find myself staring at the branches of the Lonely Tree and wistfully whisper for just my friends to hear, “The Lonely Tree is so romantic, don't you think?” My head is resting on Ami’s lap as she absent-mindedly plays with my hair and Yumi is sipping on some coke as she peers at the branches following my line of sight. Craning her neck to see what exactly it is that supports my claim. “I doubt it would be as romantic if there were three trees here though.”

The implication of my words doesn’t fall on deaf ears and Ami’s fingers stop stroking my hair and Yumi looks away from the branches to send me a glare.

“So loneliness is more beautiful than friendship?” She shoots at me, challenging me into another one of her heated debates.

“Sometimes,” I say, pulling Ami’s hand back into my hair. It’s trembling slightly but she doesn’t put up a fight. Sighing as she relents into carding it through my curls. “Sometimes loneliness is all the friendship you need. Sometime’s lonely people are their own best friends.”

“That’s just fancy bullshit talk,” Yumi exclaims, ready to start another fight, but Ami must’ve sent her a reproaching look because one look at her makes her deflate. She huffs annoyed and starts tearing at the dandelions surroundings us as he continues, “no one wants to be lonely. I know I don’t. I’d hate not having you two in my life.”

“Maybe that’s what loneliness is,” I say, smiling as pat Yumi’s lap and point at a dandelion stem near her knee. She gives me a silent look then plucks it and holds it out to me. “Maybe it’s just not being able to move on from that one friend. Maybe loneliness is just… maintaining your relationship with that person so much so that no other relationship seems important. So much so that you don’t make any more connections after that one relationship.”

Neither fills the silence that my words leave and I almost regret it. Almost, because there is no lie in my words though they are bitter. After a while, however, Ami speaks, her voice shaking. I don’t have to look at her to know her feelings are brimming in her eyes as she asks. “Do you mean like us?”

I look up at her and find her looking down at me, resentment shines bright in her eyes. I turn my gaze towards Yumi and anger reflects back in her eyes. I then look at the dandelion stem Yumi is still holding out for me and mumble a silent “Yes” then close my eyes and make a wish, blowing at the seeds — praying they would fly away and grant my heart’s desire.

When I open my eyes, the dandelion is untouched, the seeds adamantly stuck to the centre core, snidely looking down at me.