Quaking

Write using the following subject word: Quake

The tree was so inviting, it could hardly surprise anyone that Tabitha found herself gazing toward the top, gazing beyond the brilliant blaze of the autumn yellow canopy at the single streak of green. The season left the world, or at least that particular patch of California, a striking range of colors from bloody red to crunchy brown, but green… Green migrated with the wiser of the birds when the first cold snap cracked away the warm shell of Summer. To find a pine of any size in this forest of fickle trees is like finding a small haven from all the world, where seasons mean nothing. It could hardly surprise anyone that Tabitha found herself gazing toward the top, contemplating.

The boughs of this tree were perfect, thick enough to support her weight without doubt, but not so wide that her ten year old hands had trouble grasping them. It was as though the tree was tailored to her, grown from that patch of earth for her alone. The branches formed a perfect ladder, even and dense as high as she could see. She took hold of the first branch, preparing to swing herself off the ground. A gust of wind pushed its way through the crowd of trees, and the cluster of Aspen surrounding her tree quivered and rasped, shook with excitement and fear. Tabitha shivered and lifted herself into the arms of the pine.

The climb was easy, her slim frame squirreling lithely round the trunk. The gust of wind had resigned itself to a steady breeze, gently rocking the verdant king, and giving breath to the shouts of the Aspen below. Faster than she could understand, the branches grew thin and sparse, the trunk as thick as the bottom bough. She was at the top of her climb. She smiled and looked around. The entire landscape bent beneath her godly perch, the old farmhouses stacked on the horizon like forgotten toys, her family’s home standing proudly on the bank of the stream which cut a path of brown and gray into the distance. The sun was shining sideways on the planet, casting shadows deep and long across the dry-brown earth, bowing, kneeling, paying homage to their new queen. In that throne, the world was hers.

The breeze grew discontent once more, as though the idea of a child queen was too much to bear. It grew into bluster, into a powerful gust that made the trees below shout in surprise. Even the pine began to sway beneath the force of the wind, rocking and swinging so that her throne might have been a ship on a golden-orange sea. She decided it was time to relinquish her lofty position for the time, though she would return one day to rule over her kingdom once more. She smiled at the thought.

The smile quickly vanished as she realized that her arms would not unhug the trunk, which was feeling dangerously insubstantial. She could not bring herself to slide down from her seat to the stepping branch below. She looked down toward the ground, but could not see it through the branches and pines. She shivered, cold and frightened, on the edge of panic and swaying beneath an angry wind. She shook. Her bottom lip quivered. Her eyes wavered wetly. She cried.

Her rescuer, drawn by a father’s worry and the sound of panicked sobs on the wind, climbed to the top of her tree and wrapped her arms around his neck. He carried her down, carried her home, she shaking and quaking cold and tense and weeping against his body.

Not very queenly, she thought as they walked away from the tree.

The Other Side is conspicuously absent.