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I stepped out of my car in my black funeral suit and my nose and ears were bombarded with the scene around me. I could smell the water from the lake, clean but old, and the grass rolling up the hill. It was as beautiful as how it had been the last time I'd set foot here. I looked over then, to the site of the forest and slowly the memories washed over me like a second baptism. This was my home—the place I had grown up the most.

"Maria! Maria get back here! I'm not your damned babysitter. Mum wants you to help her with Matthew's crib."

Maria stopped mid-run, turning to look back at her older brother with wide eyes. She had been on her way to the lake to look for new rocks to add to her collection.

"Michael Edan, you said a bad word. I'm telling Mum right now!" Rocks could wait; getting Michael in trouble was top priority. Maria started running back clumsily toward the house, her dress flying about very un-lady like.

Michael started after her in a swift walk, but then slowed as realization seemed to hit him. "No you won't! If you do I'll tell Mum that you took her cooking pots and played in the dirt with them. She'll raw off your behind, Maria!"

The ten year-old-girl sighed, knowing that she had no dirt on her brother that he didn't have on her in the same degree or worse. Defeated, she pulled her heavy feet forward to the house. When she swung open the door, her mother's voice could be heard bellowing through the rooms unpleasantly. "Maria Elizabeth Freely, get your bum over here! I need help with the painting! I called for you fifteen minutes ago!"

Matthew was born about two week earlier. Premature, so Mum and Pa had been busying themselves with accommodating the house to fit another baby's needs earlier than they had expected. They would have used the crib they had before, but Maria had broken it by playing in it a few weeks before, so now she was stuck with helping make a new one. Most of her punishments were dealt with that way—a trade: destruction for development. The only problem was that Maria never meant to destroy the things she did; it was just what she blamed on bad luck. "There's no such thing as bad luck, Maria, just intelligence and stupidity. You need to decide which one you want to use more often," her mother would always tell her. It was a nice way of saying to stop making stupid decisions, so Maria could never really get angry with her for saying it.

Three hours later, Maria was free to leave but it was already dark so she couldn't go back outside. Maria was definitely the sort of child who enjoyed the outdoors so the peskiness of bedtimes and ‘no outdoors after dark' was always tugging at her nerves. Slowly, like she was swimming through molasses, she climbed up the ladder to the loft above the kitchen. She and Michael shared the space, but had tried their hardest to separate it into two functioning bedrooms. On Maria's half, designated by a white linen bed sheet hanging between the two children's beds, everything that graced the space was something natural she'd gotten from outside. On the headboard she hung a chain of white flowers that had long since wilted but still let out a slight aroma of the rain of spring. On her night stand stood a collection of rocks so varying in size, shape, and color that it resembled a miniature art gallery. There were four posts holding up her bed, so each one had its own adornments, most being little figurines she'd made from the wet mud from the shore of the lake. And waiting for her return each night was some sort of bug she'd collected during her adventures the day before and would have to be replaced in the morning with another. It was as much of the outdoors as she could capture on the inside and as she changed into her night clothes and spoke to Winky the caterpillar, she day dreamed about what she could do when she went outside the next day.

"You and Julie stay out of that forest, you hear me girl?" Mum was calling as she packed the two girls some snacks to take with them outside. "Be back before dark and you better not have torn your dress when you return this time, Maria."

Unfortunately, Mum's words always fell on deaf ears. Maria could care less about her clothing and her skin and her hair and the stupid bonnet that covered it. All she cared about was the outdoors and getting more of it each time she went outside. The problem was that she'd gone most everywhere she could to experience it except for the forest.

As she and Julie went along, Maria tried to coax her friend.

"Julie, what would you say to going into the forest? Just for a quick look?" Maria kept her eyes forward as she walked, knowing better than to look at Julie. The other girl would be able to see that she'd already made up her mind on going in.

"No way. Your mum said no and so did mine. Don't you remember what happened to that boy James when he went into the forest? He didn't never come back out again." Julie stopped to pick some flowers.

Maria scoffed. "Yes he did. He was only lost for three hours. He got out on the other side and got back to his Mum and Pop as right as rain. That way of the story is just that: a story kids made up to scare each other and then dare each other to go in." "But Maria," Julie began to whine. She always whined when she knew she was about to give in to something Maria wanted but she always gave it a last go anyhow. "Maria they said there are wolves in there and not just the regular kind. The people who change into wolves kind." Julie visibly shuddered and Maria laughed at her.

"They're called werewolves, Julie, and there's no such thing."

"But Nathaniel said—"

"Nathaniel was just joshing you. Gees, Julie, do you believe everything blokes tell you anyhow? They're all liars. Just ask your mum, she'll tell you so."

Julie looked confused, but finally as if she was being forced, she agreed. "Only for a quick minute though, Maria, you promised." "I didn't," Maria retorted, sounding slightly offended. She shook her head as they continued toward the thicket. "But alright, if it scares you that bad, Julie, we'll only go for a quick minute."

So they went in for a few minutes and came back out again, just as Maria said. She never was the sort of person to break a promise, even when it went against what she really wanted to do. She was loyal like that, to her family and to her friends.

The girls didn't see much, just some trees and rocks and a thick layer of rotten leaves and grass littering the ground. But that was enough for Maria—she'd seen enough of it to get that feeling. It was the sort of feeling she got when she woke up in the morning and knew she'd get to go outside and play. A sort of dropping in the stomach, but not painful or abrupt; a pleasant sort of drop that felt like she'd swallowed a cup of joy and it settled down into her stomach as wonderment. There was something there in that forest, something more than what could be seen from the edges.

James, the boy who got lost, Maria remembered, had seen something. Seen or heard something in the Forest of Crest Hill. She didn't tell that part of the story to Julie—most kids didn't think on it. But Maria did. She thought on it long and hard many times. James had been older, almost eighteen, so Maria had the feeling that whatever he had encountered was just too much for him to handle. Maria was different though and she knew that she could handle it and she knew that whatever it was, she had to see it for herself.

Maria was the last one to hear the news. That was wholly contributed to the fact that she had spent her day out in the forest like she knew better than to be doing. She still hadn't made her way too far in for fear of not making it out again before dinner and knowing how much trouble she'd be in if her parents found out. She timed things well. She knew that when there was school, she couldn't really explore any, so she just went into the thicket to see if she could hear anything. The sounds were usually dull and distant. There was a river running through the forest somewhere because she could hear the soft trickle, but it was way too far in to investigate on an afternoon after school. On weekends, however, when she could get out of bed at the early light of dawn, eat an apple and set out for playtime as she usually did on weekends, she had most of the day to stay out. After so long Mum stopped trying to get her back in for lunchtime and just said that she had to be back for dinner. Maria had no problem with this at all, because then she had a good five straight hours before she had to show her face to Michael; it was one of the rules for being excused from lunch. She had to check in with Michael before she could go back out again. Then she'd have about seven whole hours till she had to go back to the house for dinner.

So when she'd checked in with Michael today, he hadn't said a word or made any indication that anything was wrong. It was about noon then, so once she'd seen her older brother and he nodded to her for confirmation, she headed back out around the hill and the lake—the long way to go into the forest undetected by Michael or her parents. Then when the sun began to shine through the thin trees at an acute angle, she knew it was time to go back for dinner. Except when she got to the house, the door was thrown open and there were people muttering and hovering around the kitchen table. She didn't smell any meat cooking on the stove. She blinked a few times in confusion and then inched over to where she saw Michael and Nathaniel. She tugged on her brother's trousers.

"Michael, what's going on?" She whispered because the air in the room seemed to call for quiet.

Michael looked down at his sister, almost as if he didn't recognize her for a split second, then his eyes widened. "Jesus, Maria, where have you been?" He was whispering back in the same manner, so Maria must have been right about the volume in the room. "People have been looking all over for you. Something's the matter with Matthew." Michael never was the type to dance around the subject; straight and to the point seemed to be the way he liked to get things out.

Maria turned her head, staring at the adults' bums that circled around the table in front of her. She couldn't see anything, not even her parents. The words Michael said made a heavy impact on her chest and she felt her stomach drop, but it wasn't the pleasant kind of drop this time. The drastic difference between the two feelings was amazing, but Maria was too focused on her confusion to analyze it too deeply. "What do you mean something's the matter? He's got a cough?" She knew that if the baby had a cough then there wouldn't be a show like this, but there was something inside her head that demanded that she dumb down the situation and not make it out to be as terrible as it looked. "No he doesn't have a cough, Maria. There's something wrong with his eyes." Michael didn't even look at her as he spoke this time; he just kept his gaze straight ahead.

Maria's brow furrowed now. "His eyes? What's the matter with his eyes?" Last time Maria had seen the baby, his eyes seemed fine to her. She hoped that he hadn't gotten them poked out somehow, though he couldn't crawl yet so she couldn't see how that would be possible. "When he opened them a few hours ago, they were clouded over. Sort of like there's something growing over them. Pa called the doctor and he's now saying that Matthew could be blind."

A disbelieving snort came from the girl and she shook her head at him. For some reason she felt an overwhelming relief flow through her. "That's rubbish. He wasn't no blind kid when I was looking at him last. Are they sure they got the right doctor?"

Michael's words now eased from his mouth as they would if he were trying to converse with a four year old. "Maria, you can't tell someone isn't blind by looking at him. He's the one that can't see you, not the other way around. Besides, you're not the professional here. Dr. Morgan knows what he's doing and he says that Matthew isn't responding to visual stimuli."

Now Maria was getting angry. She felt the annoyance boil in her chest and she wanted to lash out at Michael for even believing what this doctor was saying. And why were all these people in the house anyroad? They didn't need to be there. He bloody well wasn't their little brother. There was definitely nothing wrong with Matthew. All of these people were just daft and when Matthew was older and could talk, he'd tell them just how daft they really were.

She had nothing else to say to her older brother. She felt ashamed that he'd give in to this nonsense so easily. She stomped out the open front door and charged her feet up the hill and faced the house, waiting until all the people had left and she could see what was really going on.

Pa, believe it or not, was the one who knew how to calm her down when she was angry. He never really did anything but talk to her, but there was something about his tone that set her right when he spoke.

When she saw him hiking up the hill toward her, she lowered her frown farther down on her face and crossed her arms over her knees that were pulled up against her chest. She was brassed off and there was no way she was just going to let Pa change that with one look. He could do it too. When he reached her, he just sat down next to her and looked out over the house and the trees. A comfortable silence fell in between them and after a while she leaned to the side toward him, resting her head on his shoulder. She felt his arm move around her own shoulders but didn't move.

"Michael said you didn't like what he told you. Sorry about all the people being in the house but we wanted to be positive that there wasn't anyone who had seen this before or knew how to fix it." Pa stopped speaking as if he was collecting his thoughts. "He's blind Maria. I'm sorry that it's happened and we don't know how, but it's true. We can't just deny the truth." Now she knew where Michael got it from.

Maria shook her head, though it wasn't doing any good. It was true whether she wanted to believe it or not. "Why Pa? What did he do?"

"Didn't do anything as far as the doctor can tell. He just woke up from a nap and his eyes were like that. None of us seemed to notice them like that before so it seems as if it's just come out of nowhere." He squeezed her shoulder and she fought back tears by biting hard on her bottom lip.

"It's not fair. He's just a baby. He can't have done anything wrong to deserve this. He needs to see. He has to see the trees and the hill and the lake... the birds and the dogs and goats... what's he gonna do without seeing, Pa? How's he going to make it?"

"Come on now, child, don't be so foolish. You know as well as I do that he'll do just fine. We aren't his family for nothing, y'know. We'll help him through it. He'll be just as capable as all the other kids out there. You'll see."

Maria stood then, though, shaking her head furiously as a few tears slid down her cheeks. She faced her father and for the first time, was not convinced by his words. "I don't want to see Pa. I want him to see. He can't be fully living if he can't see the world around him. That's not living at all." Then she turned on her heels and stalked down the hill, back into the house and straight to her bed without changing her clothes.

That night Maria dreamed about being in the forest. She followed the sound of the river further and further back, deep into the heart of the trees. When she found the water she was amazed at how beautiful and clean it looked. It was like a secret spring of water. If they ever ran out, they could come and get water from here and never be thirsty again. She knew it had to taste good and she knelt down on her white dress and cupped her hands into the water, sipping it from her now icy fingers. It was delicious. It rolled down her throat like the river flowed through the trees and she felt her entire body come alive with the taste. Standing up, Maria surveyed the surrounds. Everything here grew greener, fuller and looked more incredible than anywhere in the forest. Rocks and ground were crawling with grass and flowers and bushes full of berries. It was beautiful.

She sat on a rock and began singing a song that she'd learned in church, when she saw a flash of light out of the corner of her eye. She turned her head quickly and saw nothing. "Odd," she told herself, but went on singing on her rock, her eyes taking in her secret kingdom. Everything here was perfect and made sense. Life was as it should be. And then she saw the light again, though this time it was right in front of her. The girl froze, watching it dart around quickly like... well like it was alive. Some sort of bug—a firefly? No, they didn't light up constantly and this looked only like a ball of light, zigzagging around her head and over the water she'd just drank. She blinked hard and tried to rub the sleep from her eyes. Surely she was just tired and dreaming it up.

The ball of light flew straight toward her face and stopped in front of her, surveying the strange face that was her own. Maria looked back in confusion and surprise, opened her mouth to speak and woke up.

"So that's what he saw. That's what's in the forest," she said to herself as she sat up in her bed. She didn't even have to go into the forest and check to know that it was real.

Kim wasn't speaking. She stayed in the car, but I could feel her eyes burning into my back from behind that tinted glass. She had seemed slightly nervous about something besides the funeral, so I was glad that I got this time to myself. It wasn't that I didn't want to know what was on her mind, but I wasn't sure that I could deal with it, whatever it could be. If I had this time to reminisce, to re-experience life as it was when I was a child, then I could probably give Kim the time and attention she needed to explain what was on her mind. Possibly on the way back.

My focus was on the surrounding area now. I was six when we moved away and yet it seemed like it hadn't changed a bit, even twenty-one years later. I walked to the bottom of the hill and stood there, lifting my arms out to my sides like I had when I was younger and played airplane with Maria. The wind blew across my face, chilly and filled with moisture, and I closed my eyes and lifted my head toward the sky—and screamed. It was years of frustration, confusion, and anger released in a single, heart wrenching scream.

"...and don't you ever take your eyes away from him, you hear me Maria? Michael will be outside working on the barn, so don't go bothering him unless something is really wrong, alright?"

"Yes mum, I know. I've watched Matthew before. We'll be fine," Maria spoke without looking at her mother. She held her finger out to her little brother who grasped it firmly, only because Maria had moved his hand to where her finger was. He didn't know it was there otherwise. "Your Pa and I will be this afternoon. All his milk is in the ice box."

"Ok, Mum, I know. Just go already before you're late." Mum gave her a look but then patted her on the head and leaned down to kiss Matthew and closed the door to the house leaving Maria and Matthew alone.

"Don't worry boy, you'll see again. I promise. I'll get you to see again," she cooed to the baby, wiggling her finger a bit in his hand and smiling at him. Michael walked in then to get a glass for some water and shook his head.

"Stop saying that Maria. You don't have any way of making him see again. You should stop fussing over it and just move on." With that, he was back out the door and Maria stuck out her tongue.

"Ready Matthew?" When she had all that she needed to carry Matthew comfortably into the forest, she set out on her journey to prove her dream was real. With the baby strapped carefully to her chest in the holster, Maria took her usual way around the hill to avoid being seen by Michael and after a few minutes stood at the edge of the forest, not really sure where to go. Her dream hadn't specified the way to the place, so she'd have to just take a good guess. The stream would provide as a good directional tool so she stepped forward into the thicket toward the sound of the water.

Everything always seemed to be louder when she was trying to be sneaky. Her feet sounded like gun reports against the ground, echoing through the trees and stirring birds and who knows what else. The fallen limbs and leaves crunched and cracked loudly with each passing sweep and Maria was always sure that the Michael had heard everything and was on his way after her right then.

But he wasn't. He hadn't heard a thing—it was just Maria's senses overreacting in her anxious state. The minutes seemed to move forward like hours but soon she could hear the water getting louder and the feeling she had had in the dream returned to her. She was almost there. Finally, up ahead, even in the daylight, she saw the lights. A grin spread across her face as she advanced slowly toward them. She knew to be cautious, but she also knew that they wouldn't be frightened of her. They'd introduced themselves to her in her dream and had been expecting her.

The sight, even though she'd seen it before, took her breath away. The tiny lights floated around in the air, darting about above the river and the rocks. Maria stood still at the edge of the clearing, waiting to be invited. After a few minutes of watching the faeries from a distance, a few flew over to her, fluttered around her face and Matthew's and then went back to the stream. It was enough of an invite for Maria so she stepped forward and scanned the familiar location. It was her kingdom, though now she'd share it with her brother.

She set the boy down on the rock she had been singing on in her dream, a blanket underneath him to cushion his head. Waving her hand in front of his face, she noted the way his eyes stayed still and he didn't react to it at all. Nodding, she stepped aside and sat on a nearby rock in case he tried to roll and watched the faeries go to work.

And so they began their dance—a ritualistic flying routine that reminded Maria of a rain dance. They floated across the stream and around her brother as if on a stage, dancing for an elite ballet. Maria seemed to be audience enough, however, and soon enough they had all begun to circle around the baby, every other one dipping out of the circle to touch the boy's eyelids. Maria watched in joy and amazement, a smile on her face. Certainly this was all he needed. He was going to be able to see again, thanks to these beautiful creatures.

And then without warning, the baby began to laugh and his hands reached up toward the faeries, trying to catch them in his tiny fingers. Maria shot up off the ground and rushed over, the faeries moving into a semi-circle so that she could see her brother. Matthew looked straight at her, his now blue eyes sparkling in the light from the light and as she moved her hand to touch his face, he clasped one of her fingers and began to shake it, giggling.

After a few hours of showing Matthew around the small area, she gauged the time of day—almost noon—and knew she had to get back to the house before her parents got back or Michael noticed she was gone. They would certainly be surprised when they saw this. She ran home as fast as she could, careful of the baby in the pouch on her chest and settled him back into his crib comfortably with plenty of time left before her parents walked through the door.

"We got some chickens at the market. I think they'll be making some good eggs," Pa said as he walked through the door followed by Mum and Michael who had just finished with his work on the barn.

Mum looked at Maria and Matthew and smiled. "Did everything go alright, Maria?"

The girl nodded. "It did. Matthew can see again, Mum." She was beginning to pick up on the direct approach to speaking from her brother and father.

Mum looked at her with wild eyes. "What? Maria that's not even funny. You stop making such horrible jokes." She was clearly distressed by the comments.

Maria shook her head. "I'm serious! Come look!" She called them all over to the crib with a wave of her hand and the gathered around excitedly to see what Maria was talking about.

Maria looked down at Matthew and noticed something was different. She waved a hand in front of his face, held out a finger for him to grasp, but he didn't reach for it at all. Then she realized what was different. His eyes were clouded again—blue orbs of mist, like two tiny crystal balls. She looked up at her family with desperation.

"But I swear he could see! He was reaching up and grabbing my hands and everything!"

Michael scoffed and began taking off his sweat soaked shirt. "Maria's been talking about how she's going to get Matthew to see again." Pa sighed and squeezed the girl's shoulders. "Maria, if there was anything we could do then we'd do it. But there isn't. Maria, he's not going to see again. You can't make him see."

"But... but he could see, I swear it. I swear... Mum?" She looked at her mother expectantly. The woman looked disappointed. "Stop telling stories, Maria or you're going to get yourself into trouble. It's not nice of you to do at all." She turned and went to the stove to begin cooking dinner.

Maria looked back at her brother and sighed. What had gone wrong? He'd been looking just fine in the forest. What changed?

The next day, Maria tried to take Matthew again, but Mum won't let her take the boy by herself. Maria is completely outraged by this. Not only had she seen her brother see the world again, but now her family didn't believe her and didn't trust her with him.

So she did the last thing she really wanted to do—she told Michael what had happened.

"Maria, how stupid can you be?" Michael asked. They sat by the lake on the hill so that the hill obstructed the view of the house and their parents wouldn't see them.

"Don't call me stupid, Michael. It's true."

"Not just that, but how could you take him into the forest? He could have gotten hurt by all the limbs and rocks... what if you'd fallen while holding him?"

Maria looked at him angrily. "It doesn't matter, Michael, because I didn't fall. What I did do is see the faeries and watch Matthew regain his sight. He could see, Michael, I swear it." "There's no such thing as faeries, Maria." Michael was getting that tone again, the one that he got when he was getting tired of the current conversation.

"They are so! Dammit Michael, you just come with me and you'll see!"

He gawked at her, mouth hanging open. It wasn't just the cursing, but the genuineness that held in her voice as she spoke. He'd heard her lie before and usually she lost some of the fire behind it once the lie was beaten down enough, but she hadn't backed down. Reluctantly, he nodded at his little sister. "Alright, Maria. You prove to me that these faeries are real and I'll get Mum and Pa to let us take Matthew and you can show me just what you've seen."

And she did. Over the next few days she worked hard on getting the notion into Michael's head. He wasn't one to believe in such fantastical things, but seeing it first hand was definitely hard to contradict. She had been right. The faeries were real and if they were real, then maybe Matthew having been able to see while there was real as well.

So they began taking him back into the forest on regular occasions. In fact, after a few months they brought him back at least once a week, laughing and playing with both Matthew and each other. Through the magic of the faeries and the area itself, the three children created a tight bond of friendship and love that stood un-faltered to this day.

One day as the three sat by the stream, Matthew now a year and a half years old and wandering around the grass chasing a dancing light, Michael looked at his sister with a seriousness that she hadn't seen in quite some time, especially not while they were here. "Maria, we need to tell Mum and Pa. We need to tell them about this and then maybe Matthew will be able to see all the time and not just here."

Maria shook her head instantly at that. It was possibly the worst idea she'd ever heard. "No, Michael, are you off your rocker? Do you know what would happen then? They'd want to come back here. They'd want to... to take the faeries back home." Michael looked at the water. "What would be so bad about that?"

She stood then. "What would be bad? How can you even ask that? This is their home, Michael. This is where the belong—here in the secret cover of the forest. They're alive and they can't just be jarred and set on a shelf to keep Matthew seeing all the time. It's a nice thought, Michael, but you know it wouldn't be fair. Not to them and not to Matthew."

Michael sighed, apparently giving her the upper hand. "Alright, Maria. We won't tell them." He shook his head and laughed when a faerie started to tug on some of his hair. "They wouldn't even believe it anyhow."

Maria had explained to me time and again what the scene that held in my mind was. Six years of going back into the forest to see the same place. It was the only thing I'd ever seen so vividly in my mind without having to carve it from sounds and smelled. In a way, I thought that the two of them were selfish, Michael and Maria, taking me there and enjoying the sight of me being able to be just like them. But I wasn't. I never was and they didn't seem to accept that. It was the only thing I ever resented about my older siblings, as everything else in our relationship seemed to be perfect.

Kim knew it wasn't perfect. In fact, she knew the whole story. The reason I married her was because she actually believed me. Not many would but she had this childlike imagination that even the three of us had lost long ago. Long after I'd screamed, I heard the car door open and shut and Kim called out to me that we needed to go back. I knew she was right, but when I turned in the direction of the forest, I couldn't help but feel the longing to go back in and see once again. I thought better of it, of course, because I knew that I would be angrier for having done it than I would have for just walking away now. Walk away with the memories.

I got back into the passenger side of the car and turned my head toward the window the entire way home. It wasn't until that night that Kim told me that the forest hadn't been there for years now—they'd began cutting it down when they destroyed our house. It was the first time I'd cried in years.