The Beginning Hour

Chapter Three: Of Creeks and Valleys

"Chesser."

Someone shook Chester's shoulder, pulling him from sleep. A bird twittered cheerfully overhead. Chester blinked groggily several times before his eyes remained open. It had been a long, uncomfortable night. His neck ached and his spine protested against any movement.

Brian was hunkered down next to Chester, peering into a small rat hole at the base of a tree. "You missed it," he pouted. "I saw a fairy."

"Fairy," a high, listless voice repeated.

Chester sat up quickly, despite a sudden pressure in his lower back. Emma shifted her weight in his lap. Her head no longer lay limply against his shoulder. "You're awake," Chester cried.

Emma nodded stiffly, eyes never veering from the hole. Relief, so thrilling that it might easily have been mistaken for excitement, bubbled up in Chester's chest. He planted a kiss in Emma's matted hair. He'd never actually kissed his sister before--or anyone beyond his parents, for that matter. Emma appeared wholly unaffected by his outburst.

Brian flopped back down next to Chester. "Emma saw it, too." His voice was defensive, despite Chester's lack of expressed doubt.

"Oh," Chester neutrally replied. Brian usually wasn't the imaginary-friends type, but stranger coping mechanisms have been known. After all, didn't the Sherlock Holms author start believing in fairies after losing a son? 'At least,' Chester reassured himself, 'Brian isn't the only one.'

"It was a boy fairy." Give Brian an inch of encouragement and he'd stretch it a mile. "You know how I could tell?"

Chester carefully inspected Emma's face. The bruise was darker than yesterday and, as predicted, her left eye had swollen shut. He wasn't truly concerned, however, until she sluggishly reached up to scrub her eyes and missed her face on the first attempt.

Brian continued undeterred. "Because he was green and brown. Boy colors!"

Chester pulled back Emma's ripped dress to double-check that she hadn't injured her arm or side. The skin was smooth and flawless. Finally, he noticed Brian staring at him expectantly. "Brown and green," he obediently responded. "I didn't know fairies come in those colors."

One sentence was all Brian required. "Only boy fairies," he lectured, now clearly considering himself an expert. "Fat boy fairies with long hair."

"Fat with long hair, huh?" This conversation was beginning to amuse Chester. "Must have been a middle-aged hippy fairy."

Brian completely missed Chester's sarcastic undertone. "Is that what they're called? Hippy fairies?"

"Only the ones in California."

"But we aren't in California." Brian paused and the corners of his lips turned down. "You're teasing me, aren't you? Emma saw it, too."

Chester started to grin before realizing that there really wasn't anything to smile about. He frowned instead and stood. Emma felt heavier today than she had the evening before. "Shall we start?"

Brian stole one last glance at the rat hole before grabbing Chester's belt like a leash, signaling that he was good to go.

Chester hesitated before setting out. Though each individual oak and birch sported its own unique tangle of branches and elegant pose, their sheer number made them very poor landmarks. Suddenly an unhappy thought occurred to Chester: yesterday, in his desperation to put distance between himself and the robed psychos, he'd walked completely at random. He hadn't pegged the forest as large enough for this to be problematic--especially not given its suburban location. Now he wondered whether he shouldn't have 'planted', hugged a tree, and waited patiently for the rescue crew.

Brian's voice broke Chester from his reverie. "I'm hungry. Can we make some macaroni and cheese when we get home? The Dino Hunt kind?"

"Sure." Chester set off. As sickening as the thought may be, Chester had to acknowledge the fact that his parents wouldn't be searching for them. What if nobody came? It would be better, he decided, to get further lost than starve to death doing nothing.

This time, however, Chester made sure to keep the rising sun at his right. Good things come to people who head north.

Brian had lost his zombie-like silence of the day before. The journey soon became an endless string of car games. He named his favorite trees after characters from Thomas the Train Engine. Chester wasn't sure what features made specific trees stand out to Brian; in his eyes, they were all identical.

At Brian's insistence, the two brothers walked backwards in intervals. "This way Big Foot can't track us," he explained. Chester gave a mental sigh of relief: Brian, it seemed, had suddenly entered an imagination-rich phase. This was definitely an improvement upon losing the ability to distinguish fairy tales from reality, which had been Chester's initial prognosis.

"I'm blind," Brian loudly declared.

"Shhhh," Chester admonished him. Emma had laid her head down on Chester's shoulder and closed her eyes, lolled by the gentle rocking of his stride. She appeared to be asleep, rather than unconscious. Chester wanted her to stay that way.

"You're me seeing-eye dog." Brian stiffed the arm that connected him to Chester's belt. "You've got to lead me."

"Yeah, I'll lead you." Chester dropped his voice an octave and he darkly amended, "Right off a cliff, I'll lead you."

Brian laughed. The light and happy sound filled Chester with guilt. He shouldn't be making Brian laugh, not after what happened the day before. Not with their parents dead.

'Don't cry,' he mentally pleaded with himself.

Chester felt a pull on his belt. He turned, tightening his lips against an involuntary tremor. Brian's arm had gone lax and his eyes were trained on Chester's face. The boy looked like a forlorn puppy trailing behind its owner.

Chester forced a smile and straightened his shoulders. Emma gave a sigh of protest. "I thought you said you're blind." The falsely stern tone was offset by an equally false grin. "For a blind person, you can see awfully well, don'cha think?"

Brian perked up immediately and slapped his free hand over his eyes. "I can't hear, either," he cheerfully informed Chester as though deafness was a fun and enjoyable disability to have. With minimal effort, Chester had molded Brian's mood back into its former state. The level of control he'd exerted shocked Chester out of his mental funk.

"I'm like Helen Keller," Brian prattled innocently, completely unaware that he'd just been manipulated twice. "You have to lead me. Tell me if I'm going to run into anything."

Chester shrugged to the trees. "How will you hear me, then?"

"I can't hear you," was the sing-songy reply.

O O O

It was nearly noon before Chester encountered any sign of the endless forest's end. The first change he noticed was the ground cover.

By then, the sun had risen high in the sky and Chester's shadow had shrunken to a life-sized height. Chester was entertaining Brian with full-body shadow puppets in an attempt to keep the kid's mind off his empty stomach. "Look," Chester directed Brian's attention. He tilted his head to the right and hiked Emma up higher in his arms. "I have two heads and no arms."

Brian giggled. To a five-year-old, there's nothing funnier than fake multiple or missing body parts.

Spurred on by his success, Chester bent his head over Emma's still-slumbering form. The result was a formless shadow. "I'm biting Emma's neck," he clarified. The puzzled expression on Brian's face gave way to delight. "I'm Dracula."

"Me too," Brian trilled, flapping his arms like wings. "I'm a flying Dracula."

Chester, his head still bent toward the ground, suddenly realized two things: Firstly, Brain didn't know who Dracula was; and secondly, dried weeds were clustered around the base of the nearest tree.

The weeds were clearly long dead. Their color had faded to a shade slightly sicklier than that of dust. The stems appeared so frail that Chester wondered how they could still be holding the brown, shriveled dandelion heads aloft. Like misplaced peaks of sand, a single touch or breath of wind would surely have sent them crumbling.

Chester went a few paces out of his way to tread on the weeds. They gave way instantly under his feet. The first step in their journey to becoming soil had been officially completed. The crunch was satisfying.

It wasn't until five minutes later, when green grass began to appear, that Chester wondered why the forest floor behind him had been devoid of life. It made little difference. Green grass in the middle of summer with no sprinklers around meant only one thing: there must be a natural source of water nearby--and right then, water sounded very appealing.

The sound preceded the creek. It took nearly half an hour for Chester to track down the origin of the gentle gurgling. Toward the end of his hunt, he threw his head-only-north plan to the wind. Though the day wasn't hot and they hadn't been stranded long, Chester felt unquenchably thirsty.

Brian was the one who finally located the illusive water. He wandered too far ahead, searching for fairies, and suddenly disappeared from sight. Two days ago, Chester would have been vaguely surprised by Brian's invisibility act. Today, however, wasn't two days ago. A panic filled Chester's chest and he sprinted toward where he'd last seen Brian. High strands of grass grabbed at his legs, sacrificing themselves to impede his movement.

Suddenly, the thick sea of knee-high grass came to an abrupt halt. Muddy banks fell sharply down two or three feet, cradling their precious cargo, before rising up again and returning to the overgrown lawn as though there'd been no detour at all. From mere meters away, the break in lilacs would have been undetectable.

Brian stood silently in the center of the creek, water lapping at his knees, clearly in awe of his find. "Chesser." He squinted up against the glaring sun. "It's cold." Then Brian shivered, grinned, and dunked himself in quick succession.

"Cold," a voice murmured, repeating Brian's declaration. Emma had awoken from her listless stupor. Her good eye visibly followed the dancing water, trailing off into the distance. Chester hadn't seen her vision focus since she'd taken the hit to her head. A weight he hadn't noticed until now lifted from his shoulders.

Chester slid down the creek bank, jostling his charge like the ravine jostling the delicate stream. The water was exactly as Brian had described: cold and irresistible. As Chester washed himself, he felt the ache in his back and arms ebb away. The icy flow numbed the back of his hand. When Chester splashed water onto Emma's face, she leaned into the touch.

"We should go kayaking down here," Brian suggested as he cupped his hands to drink from the water.

The creek ravine was less than five feet across, far too narrow for a set of kayaks, but Chester enthusiastically agreed. For the first time in nearly a day, he didn't feel like crying. An image of his father in a kayak overlaid the pattern of dappled sunlight, which filtered through oak leaves onto Brian's auburn hair. "Yeah. Kayaking."

"But not before macaroni and cheese."

"The stream leads north." When Brian glanced back over his shoulder at Chester, bewildered, Chester found himself densely elaborating, "There's Dino Hunt macaroni and cheese up north."

"You're goofy," Brian informed Chester with a shake of his head. He then turned and headed down the creek, reaching out his hand to brush some lilacs tumbling over the bank as he passed.

O O O

The good mood stemming from their find didn't last nearly as long as Chester would have liked. Within half an hour, Brian's pace had slowed. "I'm tired," the five-year-old complained at regular intervals. To keep from being too predictable, the "I'm tired" was occasionally followed with "and hungry" or "and my legs hurt" or "and I'm missing Show and Tell at Kinder Care. I was gonna bring in my dinosaur collection." Brian only owned two model dinosaurs--one of which had gone missing weeks ago.

Chester stood in silent awe that, after the events of yesterday, Brian could be upset over missing Show and Tell. He wondered how well Brian truly understood the seriousness of what had occurred. Several times, when Brian had wandered ahead (but not too far ahead--Chester learned his lessons well), Chester felt as though crying or screaming might sooth the dark thoughts swirling around his head. Only focusing on Emma and the ever-thickening lilac beds kept him from going temporarily insane.

As they passed another bend in the stream, Brian plopped himself heavily down on the edge of the bank. "I'm tired," he dramatically sighed.

"You think you're tired," Chester snapped in return. He didn't bother pausing to wait for Brian. "I'm the one who's been carrying Emma all day. And all yesterday. I think my arms are permanently stuck in this position."

Despite being tired, Brian kicked his heels forcefully against the side of the bank. "It's too much uphill."

"We're not going uphill," Chester called back over his shoulder. "Water can't run upwards."

However, as they walked further Chester found himself eating his own words. The stream was, indeed, heading uphill. Gradually, the ground became steeper--by no means steep enough as to be insurmountable, but certainly steep enough to give Chester a workout over time.

"It must be the water pressure," Chester found himself explaining to Brian. "The water has enough momentum to push itself up the slope."

The water moved slowly, taking its time to pause at waist-deep picturesque swimming holes. Brian either didn't notice or didn't mind the contradiction. "I'm going to race that stick," he declared, but he ended up sitting down for another break instead.

"Come on," Chester urged. Fatigue and hunger were beginning to show on Brian's face. Each time Brian sat down, Chester felt a tug of urgency pulling him onward. "We're almost to the top," he truthfully coaxed. "Then it will be downhill."

Brian stood reluctantly, trotting a few paces to catch up. Emma turned to face Brian, still leaning heavily on Chester's chest, and held out a hand. "Stick?" she asked.

"Nah." Brian shook his head and pushed Emma's hand back down. "It's too far ahead. It won."

The stick did indeed win. It had already mounted the hill and dropped off into the unknown, beyond an ever-approaching grassy bluff. The top of the hill cut the world into two halves: one an endless blue, the other a rippling green and gold. An old oak straddled the divide, like a staple holding together two repelling forces. Yet another photographic moment was added Chester's growing list.

It took Chester and Brian a good deal longer to reach the tree than Chester had anticipated. With a point of comparison to give Chester some bearing, he realized for the first time how agonizingly slow their pace had become. They'd reached the point of no return: to backtrack would take a lifetime.

At the ridge, however, points of no return ceased to matter.

The land dropped out from under them. Though the hill had been sloping gently up one side, it fell sharply on the other. Chester found himself standing on the brink of a miles-wide basin, a deep valley cupped between forested hills and rocky mountains. In the center of the basin floor lay a mammoth lake--by far the largest and bluest lake Chester had ever laid eyes on. It reflected the towering mountain peaks like a giant looking glass. To the left of the lake, the mountainside had been partially leveled and was littered by old stone ruins. Circling up past the ruins, on the opposite side of the lake from Chester, ran a long winding railroad track.

Chester blinked. He looked behind him and saw a bare stretch of trees and tall grass. He looked forward and saw a scene from National Geographic meets Travel Magazine. The contrast was so sharp, so unexpected, so visually stunning that it knocked Chester breathless and he was forced to lean back against the tree. The tree didn't seem to mind.

Brian took the new development in stride. Finding a hidden valley, it seemed, was nothing near as exciting as finding a hidden stream.

Or a hidden railroad.

"It's a train track," was the first observation Brian made. "Like on Thomas the Train Engine, except not as shiny, and there aren't any train houses."

Wait. Chester straightened, dizziness forgotten. "A train track..."

'Thank god,' he mentally breathed. 'We're saved.' Then he hiked Emma further up in his arms, cuffed Brian from behind, and strode purposefully down the grassy hill. "Let's get going. We've got a train to catch."

Walking downhill after an upward hike works magic. Brian ceased to require tri-hourly breaks. He raced sticks down the stream and picked lilacs for Emma, insisting that Chester plant them in her hair. He'd probably seen girls with flower crowns on television, because Brian would never have made an association between lilacs and curls on his own. The flowers refused to stay put, but Emma giggled when they fell, making the effort worthwhile.

As they descended the hill, the forest grew denser. The repertoire of undergrowth expanded to include scraggly bushes, followed by prickly vines (without blackberries; Brian's disappointment knew no bounds), broad-leafed clovers, vine maples, and finally sprawling ferns. The trees grouped closer together. Sunlight was scarcer, but grew stronger to compensate. For the first time, just after Chester had finally found a destination to head for, he began to truly fear becoming lost.

With dropping elevation, the creek became deeper. Several small streams joined from either side, and soon the water was rushing fast and strong. A few logs had fallen across the riverbed and boulders lined the sides, lending the water a powerful appearance. By the time they'd reached the valley floor, Chester had increased his following distance from the river and insisted that Brian stay a safer distance from the steep banks.

As the ground leveled out, night began to set in. Like the day before, fog rose from the ground and the light became sharper before slowly dimming. This evening felt colder than the previous one; but then again, the sensation may have merely been a reflection of Chester's increasingly critical state of mind.

As they walked on, painstakingly picking their way through brush and over logs, a quiet settled over the small party. Emma fell asleep on Chester's shoulder. Her breath tickled Chester's neck. Chester's arms began to ache again, after having spent the greater part of the day blessedly numb.

Brian, too, noticed the silence. "There aren't any owls," he observed, pulling himself up on a large log with both hands. "Are they sleeping tonight?"

Chester peered into the dusk. Trees loomed above him, filling the sky. They appeared mammoth enough to house countless owls. "Maybe the owls are just being really quiet," he offered. "I bet there's a lot better hunting here."

Brian mulled this thought over in his head as he slid down the side of the log. "I don't want them to hunt," he finally replied. "I don't want the mice to get hurt."

"The owls have to eat something," Chester reasoned. "They'll die if they don't eat."

This clearly wasn't the correct response for the situation. Brian halted. Chester took several steps before noticing that he was no longer being followed. He turned and waited for Brian to catch up, but Brian continued standing still, tracing patterns in the bark of a tree and refusing to look at his brother. In the shadows of the giant trees, Brian appeared very small and vulnerable.

"Come on," Chester whispered. He wasn't entirely sure why he was whispering. He retraced his steps to Brian's side. "Let's get to the lake before dark. I'll bet there will be bats there. And stars on the lake. That sounds cool, huh?"

Brian nodded at the tree, his back to Chester. Then he leaned closer to the tree. The small movement indicated to Chester that Brian hadn't actually been listening to a word he'd said. "I don't want the owls to kill the mice." The soft voice cracked. "Can't they just eat berries?"

"Brian," Chester murmured. Suddenly the night seemed much darker, and the forest much wilder. "They're in heaven." Brian turned from the tree and buried himself in Chester's baggy shirt. "They're in heaven," Chester repeated. "They're smiling down at us."

Chester never doubted the existence of God. Never, that is, until then. The thought of his parents in heaven comforted him so deeply that he felt an urgent desire to instill the coping mechanism in Brian as well.

Heaven, as a coping mechanism?

A chill ran down Chester's spine. "You've got to believe me." Brian's shoulders shook, but Chester could tell that he wasn't crying. "If you don't, you'll go nuts. I swear to God--to God, Brian--that they're in heaven."

Chester wanted believe himself, but the more he tried, the emptier his chest felt.

Emma's breath tickled his neck. Brian's hand looped under his belt. They walked on, following the pounding river, until at last the trees parted to reveal a wide expanse of milky stars and lapping water.

Chester coaxed Emma awake. He didn't want her to miss this bright, moonlit enclave fending off the encroaching darkness. She would always remember the wide circle of Christmas lights above and below, reflecting off one another with perfect clarity until she couldn't tell up from down, ground from sky, heaven from earth. She'd remember. He'd make sure of it.