The girl in the forest.

People tend to believe that everything has been said and that nothing else can surprise them, but every time new things are born, and I was there, in a time that did not exist and in a place that still does not exist... or something like that was what they told me when I was with them.

My family and I are in the forest, we like to live surrounded by trees and animals. My father leaves very early in the morning in search of food for his pets and my mother stays behind milking and fixing whatever needs to be fixed on the outside. My siblings and I fight over the housework. Someone fetches water, someone makes the fire stronger to make breakfast and someone fetches eggs and milk.

This time it was my turn to go for water. I love to go to that place where the water is so clear that even throwing stones into the bottom doesn't make it dirty. I like to collect the water and take the opportunity to wash my hair, take a bath and then go home.

I like it because in the shade of the trees I can listen to the sound of silence. The trees above let in few rays of sunlight and all around the breeze is cut by the thicker branches of the big trees that make a roof and crisscross each other.  The birds are there somewhere, I don't see them but I hear them, it's a song like a ceremony, it's so harmonious that while I bathe, I relax and only feel accompanied by the sound of my heart that beats slowly.

But there is something new there on the roof of the trees. There are small lights like fireflies, they filter from the sun but they seem to play and invite me to play.

And I accept, I move back and forth and they move with me. The little lights of the sun now become bigger, they come together and go down. They surprise me, what is that? What is it?

*"Don't be scared, we just want to play and you always come to play alone".*

I get up from the water and try to get out of the water, but they say...

*"No, don't do it, if you get out you won't be able to see us..."*

Then I turn my head and say.

*"’See us?’ Are there more like you?"*

*"Yes, there are many of us here but only pure souls like you can see us."*

That's when I could see that all the lights that were on the roof on the branches of the trees were not sunbeams, they were the lights of those little people that group together and form beautiful figures.

Why could I never see them? I asked...

*"We were waiting for a time when you wanted to play like you did today, we love to play. Do you want to go where everyone else is?"*

And I nodded and we floated and played along the shore of that place that was getting more and more beautiful. Lots of lights were coming in from the trees, there were some vines hanging down and full of little flowers that looked like curtains in the air and were beautifully swaying in the gentle breeze. There was a smell like caramel with vanilla and when you cook the syrup from the peach candy. What a fragrance! Wow.

We arrived at a bend not too far away, I told them that I would only stay a little while because I should go home to take the water I collected.

To which they replied…

*"It doesn't matter how long you stay, because this time never ends because there is no time. So, when you want to leave you can do so and not a second more will have passed since the beginning of our meeting."*

*"And you are not afraid that someone will ask me and I will bring them here?" *

*"No, you would never get here without our help, because this place doesn't exist. It is in your mind and in the minds of all of us, that's why we have selected you to play and to get to know us. Here are endless games that you will love."*

That's how she spent a long time playing until she wanted to go home, with the promise that when it was her turn to fetch the water, she would come back again. Her friends accepted it and again left her in the same place.

She took her water to take home, and there were the little lights on the roof formed by the branches of the trees, but now she knew that they were her water friends and that she would return another day to that place that does not exist and where the hours never end.

Thank you for reading, commenting, and to all my sponsors.