The Second

"How many things do you think flicker in to existence and then back out again, each moment as we just sit here?" Miranda asked, her gaze fixed out the window over the sink in to the grassy field now bathed in twilight. Abigail ran through the long grass in the pale moonlight, fingers cupped to try and catch the fireflies that were lazily rising and blinking in the dark. "What small, wonderful things quiver and become, and then dissipate because our reality can't handle them?
"You're tired," her mom said to Miranda from the kitchen table, a small chuckle in her words.
"You're dodging the question," she shot back, taking a sip from her coffee mug and smiling as her daughter curled up on the ground outside, utterly intent on the miraculous thing she had managed to capture.
"And you only ask questions like that when you're tired and your filter isn't working, honey," she said, an understanding look to her now. "You always waxed philosophical after working hard or staying up too late. Or getting up too early, which probably won't happen tomorrow after all this!" she motioned to the hallway, lined down both sides with cardboard boxes. Silent guards at attention, holding what was left of their lives. It had taken them only half an hour to move everything inside.
Miranda wished she'd had the money to send more boxes ahead via mail. It seemed like so little to start over with. Another sip of coffee, the old evening ritual of her mother's (decaf, though, so as not to keep herself awake) that she was now partaking in. Passing of the torch. Or cup, rather.
"Abby's having a great time outside. I was worried she'd be grossed out by all that nature, city gal that she was," her mother chuckled.
"She loved going to the park and the zoo... anything with animals or plants. I'm really glad she gets to have this, gets to get dirt on her hands and shoes," Miranda explained... all things said over the phone but somehow actually having meaning when spoken in person, handing over the manual of what her daughter did and was with someone who would need to know as well.
She thought back to her young daughter's toddling exuberance in the fall, picking up leaves and carrying them around. The children of New York City had been beautiful and eerily detached, staring at this leaf-toting creature like something alien. Country mother, country baby, she had thought to see her. She knows there's fields somewhere with warm soil to bury your toes in. She knows there's trees for climbing, and flowers for picking, and streams to catch frogs in...
...then, unbidden, the tears welled up and spilled over her cheeks, landing with solid taps in to the metal sink's tub.
"There it is. I've been waiting," her mother said, rising and coming over to envelop her in a huge, warm, quiet hug.
"Kids don't belong in a city, Mom... I don't know why I stayed... I don't..." her words were thin, stretching to get through a throat clogged tight with sadness.
Her Mom squeezed a little more tightly, rocking slightly and nodding, not interrupting until the tears had flown and begun to calm down, and there was more air than sobs in Miranda's lungs again.
"You stayed because Jonathan was a good man, and because it wasn't here. And I understand that. I was happy that you got out of here. Go'Tree just wasn't the right place for what you were trying to do at the time."
"And now it is," Miranda said, wiping the dampness from her cheeks and blinking away the salt-sting in her eyes.
"Not necessarily. Right this moment, it is. Don't think of it as being stuck here forever. Think of it as a stopping point while you martial your resources," her mother said, letting her go but with a squeeze to the shoulder to offer a last bit of comfort and reassurance.
"You don't want us to stay here?" Miranda asked in surprise.
"Well of course I do, honey. I love the idea of seeing my granddaughter every day, and seeing you, too. But I also know that this is a small place, and sometimes it's got a small mind about the world. You may need to move on. I'm okay with that. I'd rather you and Abby be happy than parked somewhere that chafes at the both of you," her mother explained, back at her seat and sipping her cooling cup of coffee.
Abigail had resumed chasing after other fireflies, the fate of the original captive now a mystery. Her quietness and focus in the dark was uncanny as she tracked down the small blinking lights. Miranda smiled to see her single-mindedness, then turned and joined her mother at the table.
"I don't think I've processed everything, I'm just warning you," she said cautiously, stirring her coffee with a fingertip, "so there may be more of THAT," she motioned with a circular gesture to where she'd just been crying, "coming up."
"You're more worried about it than I am, honey," her mother said simply, "It is a hard thing to uproot your life just by itself, nevermind after the death of a spouse. Plus you just drove 400 miles away from where you established yourself..."
"Yeah but this was home, I know this place," Miranda interjected.
"This WAS home, honey, but you outgrew it before high school was over. You're familiar with it. It, however, isn't familiar with you anymore. There's going to be some settling. I'm sorry to point that out, you've got a lot going on. But it's true," she pursed her lips at the thought.
The curiosity was going to be the worst part, Miranda had known. People wanting to see what someone looked like that came back from NYC, especially under bad circumstances. People wanting to gloat over what some might want to see as a failure, trying to be fancier than one's upbringing. All of it, the awkward reintroductions and the snarkiness of high school mates was perched in the back of her head and the pit of her stomach, twin vultures picking at her constantly.
"You know what Miranda? Fuck 'em. If they bug you, ignore their existance. Bunch of small town yokel sons of bitches anyway," her mother snorted, noting her daughter's look.
"Mom!" she laughed in shock.
"I'm serious. If they're so small minded as to take joy from somebody's sorrows, they aren't much of a Christian to begin with," she waved the lot of them away with the back of her hand, "so fuck 'em!"
Fuck 'em indeed, Miranda thought with a small smile. The twin vultures shied away in the face of the abrupt expletive.
They sat there quietly listening to the crickets and frogs trilling their songs out in to the night just beyond the walls of the house. Miranda thought of checking on Abigail to make sure she was okay but knew somehow within the bounds of that field she wouldn't come to any harm. Instead, the quietness of the kitchen was embraced by the two women.
It was broken by Abigail banging through the screen door to stand in the kitchen with a worried look.
"Mommy it's past my bedtime."
Miranda looked at the ticking clock over her shoulder and noted it was half an hour past the usual time. "Yup. It is."
"Do I need to get a bath and go to sleep?" she asked.
Miranda knew her daughter was seeking patterns to hold on to, in this new place. But just for that night, she thought, it wouldn't hurt to let things slide.
"Nope. You wanna play outside some more?"
The little girl nodded, unsure.
"Then get out there. No bath tonight. Just play until you're ready to come in."
The slam of the screen door again, the hammer of shoes down the steps were the response. Her mother smiled at her.
"She'll be exhausted in another half hour and come in asking to go to bed. I know her," Miranda chuckled.
"You will be too, better go get the beds ready," her mother replied, rising. Then an odd smile crossed her face. "I just realized something."
"What's that, Mom?"
"Maiden, Mother, Crone. All together in one place. Didn't they say that was some sort of powerful triad?" her mother mused.
"That's some pagan leanings, there. Maybe?" she shrugged. She wasn't sure who this "they" was she spoke of.
"Well, it feels powerful," her mother said with a smile, then swept down the hallway to the stairs, intent on clean sheets in rooms long unoccupied.

The First

The ringing of the faded macadam under the car's tires had been going on for so long she no longer even registered the sound. Eyes squinted against the mid-day sun, she piloted the old Chevrolet down the state highway, trees, tobacco and cornstalks passing in staccato linear fashion on both sides. Occasionally a guard rail rose up and slinked alongside the road for a mile or two before bending back down to the high weeds and grass and disappearing.
They were alone on that road for miles. Only an old red pickup pulling on the road an hour past had broken up the monotony of staring at grey lanes and blue sky.
It was a wonder, she thought, that she hadn't gone in to trance and rolled them off the road.
And with that, her eyes flicked to the rear-view mirror to get a glimpse of her fellow passenger.
A set of blue eyes looked up to meet hers, surprising her. The passenger hadn't made a sound, so she couldn't tell how long they'd been awake. One long moment to look at those eyes, beautiful and deep blue. Her husband's eyes. But not her husband's face.
"Hey, baby girl. How you doing?" she asked the small passenger.
The blue eyes grew a smile under them, telling her she'd awoken a minute or two ago.
"Momma I'm hungry," she said, eyes dropping to study hands that picked at lint on her pants and whatever crumbs on the car seat she hadn't managed to swat away before strapping her daughter in at the last stop.
"We're almost there, baby girl. Can you hold on for a bit more?" she asked, locking eyes again with her child.
"Soon?"
"Yeah, we'll be at Gramma's house soon. Almost there, I promise," she said, and smiled. And because she had never lied to placate her child, the child trusted her and nodded, playing with the hem on her skirt. Apparently her usual play companion, a stuffed armadillo, had fallen to the floor during her sleep.
A large pothole in the road jolted the entire car, rattling all of their worldly belongings at the points they had been artfully shoved to make sure they made the move down safely. The distracting sound of china clinking on china reached her ears for the fifth or sixth time, causing her to think again to herself, "I swear, if something is chipped when we finally stop..."
The country was starting to feel familiar by degrees. She knew the bumps as they were coming now, braced herself for them. Marked how weeds had grown up in cracks widened by time and weather on the berm, or snaking out in to the lanes themselves. Noted a sapling that had shaken in the midsummer storms of her youth was now a sturdy chestnut in the middle of a field. Funny, she though, she had assumed it would be cut down for being in the way.
Finally the small green sign for SR 17 shot past on its small industrial metal pole and she slowed to the turnoff. No official off ramps or signs for gas and food in this part of the world. Mostly due to there being none.
Her car bumped down on to the far less heavily traveled road (if that were possible in this middle of nowhere-ness they were currently traveling in.) and the fine layer of grit and gravel began to spit out from underneath the tires immediately. To her surprise, the familiar sound made her shoulders relax. Her body had been holding on to the stress of the journey the entire time without realizing it.
Funny too, she thought, that this is what it takes to feel like I'm home.
The car rolled along the ancient pavement, covered by ancient oaks who's branches clawed out from both sides and twined in the middle, blocking most of the sky from view. At the slower speed the sound of cicadas droned through the windows at them, a million tiny insect didgeridoos.
In the back seat her daughter's blue eyes widened. "What is that?"
"Cicadas. They're everywhere down here," she replied, a small smile teasing its way back to her face as her daughter pushed her head against the glass. "You know, I can roll the window down if you want to hear them better."
"It's dusty," her daughter made a face to the idea, eyeing the clouds the car was somehow kicking up on what was supposed to be a modern paved surface.
"Okay, windows stay up. But you'll hear them all the time when we get to Gramma's," she explained.
Soon, by the way, she told herself. Really soon.
She was counting lanes off the road subconsciously... 3 left, 4 right, then home... only realizing it when she mouthed "4th left" at the sight of it. Not a single thing special about it, save the ancient macadam dissolved in to what was at one time a road covered in gravel. It was currently two ruts in the dirt with handfuls of gravel at intervals.
They bumped along the ruts, china clinking and boxes shifting crazily under the unusual motion. Each sway, though, was familiar in her bones. A little more pronounced, yes, but she knew exactly how long they had to endure it before...
... a meadow rolled in to view and the trees fell away. In the midst of it all was an old white house with chipping paint and a wrap around porch, every single screened window thrown open wide. A single willow tree swayed in a breeze that wasn't good enough to fight the heat outside their meagerly air conditioned box.
The porch screen door, she noted, was propped open with the same giant chunk of volcanic glass. As it always was. She had been afraid -illogically- it wouldn't be there for some strange reason.
Her daughter strained against her carseat straps and tried to press her nose against the glass to get a better view of what was coming. "Is that Gramma's house?"
"Yup. This is it, baby girl," she said, nodding softly.
"It's a big house!"
The surprise in her voice brought a laugh.
"You're used to apartments, that's why!"
They pulled in by the willow tree, nose up to the little metal rods with round red reflectors on them, and put the car in park. The road had been noisy, a quarter mile of bumping and grinding and clunking no matter what vehicle came up it. Her mother knew they were there and was certainly making her way to the driveway to greet them. She took a long moment to draw in her breath, releasing the steering wheel she had gripped for two and a half days, then let it out again slowly. Release the old now. Release it, because the new starts the second you open that door, she thought.
And then her mother was on the porch, spectacles and smiles and a long denim skirt even in that July heat. She waved to them. Then spotting her granddaughter, waved harder and grinned wider, wiping her hands on the faded apron tied at her waist.
"Gramma!" the little girl shouted, wiggling in her seat.
"Okay, okay, hold up. Let me unbuckle you before you vibrate through the seat and down through the bottom of the car!" the driver said, quickly throwing the driver's side door open and wishing the moment of peace bon chance in its passing.
 "Is that my Abigail?" her mother called excitedly, her drawl slipping primly in to the words spoken as she strode across the lawn with sure, quick steps.
She had barely gotten the last buckle off so it wouldn't scrape the girl as she got out, when Abigail went shooting out under her arms and over to the elderly woman.
"Gramma! We're here! We drove the whole way!" She leapt on to the older woman with a flying fierce hug.
"I can see that! What a big girl to drive so far!" she said, bending over to return a hug to the enthusiastic child. Then she looked up at the other traveler with concern. "How was that long drive, Miranda? Everything okay? You didn't call..."
Miranda nodded, "Yeah Mom. Everything went fine. Just a long, long, boring, long drive." She managed a smile, then turned and began to pull the child's knapsack and armadillo out of the car, casting about to where her duffel back had possibly shifted since this morning. As she did, a sudden wave of faintness took her and she leaned against the car frame, closing her eyes.
"Very long drives are very tiring. We can unpack stuff later, hon," the elderly woman said, detaching from the granddaughter to come over and lay an arm across the woman's shoulders for a half-hug.
Miranda raised her head just enough to clearly be heard as she spoke, "Yeah, but if Abby doesn't have..."
"DILLON!" the little girl yelled, running up to snatch the armadillo from her mother's hands.
"Nevermind. She's got him," she chuckled.
Her mother grabbed the knapsack as Miranda located the duffel bag and hoisted it to her shoulder. The grey Chevrolet's door closed with a solid thunk, and the knowledge that her next 2.5 days would be spent with feet planted on terra firma, made her smile a bit wider.
 "Momma! Is this our tree or is this everybody's tree?" Abby asked suddenly, pointing at the old willow.
"It's Gramma's tree."
"Gramma, can I climb it?" she asked excitedly.
"Just watch out you don't slip and fall," came the answer, the end of which wasn't uttered before both armadillo and child were up in the large V formed by the willow's diverging trunk.
"My lord, she's excited," the older woman chuckled.
"Not so many large willow trees in New York," Miranda admitted, "definitely not climbing willows at that."
They were at the steps to the porch when Miranda felt a hand on her back again, fingers squeezing her shoulder. She stopped to see her mother looking at her with the familiar tilt of the head and the smile that held fifteen different emotions.
"What?"
"It's far from ideal conditions, I know... but I'm glad to have you back, girl," the older woman smiled.
She nodded, too tired to front anything but affirmation at that point. Abby was hollering something about ants on bark, the steps squeaked under her stiff new(ish) shoes...
...And she was lost between times.
Playing in the meadow, climbing trees, chasing fireflies, chasing boys, all collided at once. She was no longer certain that she and her daughter were separate people, seeing her crouch down in the crook of the trunk to watch insects closely as she had clear memories of doing herself.
Another squeeze from her mother's hand, this time reassuring. She snapped back to the present. After a moment watching her daughter, she shrugged.
"There's just no getting away from Go'Tree."