Page 1 of River & Rue

preface

​. . .​

rue

I fell out of a tree and broke my leg when I was eleven. Needed surgery, a brace, the whole nine yards. Missed weeks of school.

It was a whole thing.

I wasn’t supposed to be climbing the maple in our front yard—or any tree, for that matter—but my parents weren’t surprised when they heard my little brother screaming for them. When they came out of the house and saw Teddy sobbing over my writhing body, they didn’t even run.

I still recall my mother’s first words to me when I woke up from surgery. Despite the dizzy delirium of recent anesthesia, or maybe because of it, the memory remains frozen in my mind. As clear and crisp as fresh ice.

“You keep reaching so high, Prudence, and someday the fall will break more than your bones.”

She was right.

1

rue

​. . .​

catalyst

My caffeine wore off two hours ago. My ass is numb, my back aching. I haven’t seen another car for miles, and I’m starting to think I might never see one again.

Six hours of driving yesterday, a shitty night’s sleep at a roadside motel, and four hours on the road today are doing my grip on reality no favors. Despite periodic assurances from my GPS that I’m still on the planet, my eyes are convinced I’ve slipped through a portal to a different dimension.

Colossal redwoods crowd the narrow road, slowly reclaiming it, their distant crowns obscuring all but a serrated sliver of blue sky. Sunlight falls through the crack in flashing intervals, giving the faded asphalt a flickering liquid aspect. I can’t look directly at the surface for more than a few seconds without wanting to hurl.

Beneath the canopy, the shadows are deeper, the light more ephemeral. Dark umbras dilate in my peripheral vision like beckoning arms. Misty, glowing beams dance across shivering ferns, beds of emerald moss, and loamy fissures.

But it’s the redwoods themselves that are breaking my brain. Their enormity is inconceivable, their combined presence tangible and oppressive.

These aren’t trees. They’re sentinels of time. Cathedrals of memory. Breathing, seeing tombstones of forgotten dreams and lost gods.

And I’m trespassing.

Any second, my car engine will die and a cadre of alien warriors will emerge from the shadows to surround me. I’ll put up a noble fight—gouge some eyes, kick some balls—but alas, they’ll overpower me. I’ll be dragged before a tribunal of elders. Condemned to death for trespassing on sacred ground. Then, on the eve of my demise via carnivorous tree roots, a surly, undeniably handsome rebel will rescue me from my cell. But he’ll have nefarious ulterior motives⁠—

Thunk.

My front tire drops from pavement to dirt, my stomach plummeting the same two inches. I quickly course correct, then spend the next minute waiting for my heart to stop trying to convince me I nearly drove off a cliff instead of a tiny shoulder.

The good news is I feel like a gallon of espresso just hit my bloodstream.

Shifting from one numb ass cheek to the other, I jab the button to roll my window down. Warm air whips around me, drowning out my music and tossing my hair around my head. I suck in greedy lungfuls, relishing the potent fragrance of woods, moss, and brine.

The scent, so unique and new to me, sinks me deeper into this moment. Where I am—where I’m going. A destination two years in the making. A dream finally coming true.

With a glance at my navigation screen, my pulse picks up again—this time in anticipation.

Almost there.

I take the next turnoff onto a road even narrower than the previous. Over the next two miles, the forest begins to release its dominion. Signs of civilization return: a stack of mailboxes perched at the end of a gravel driveway, a car pulling into a small parking lot near a public trailhead. I glimpse a few people on the trail with those fancy aluminum hiking poles.

The air cools slightly, the scent of the ocean increasing. After a final hill and a curve shadowed by a border of Douglas firs, I spot a cluster of buildings in the distance, rustic colors blending with the surrounding nature. Beyond, the deep blue of the Pacific Ocean stretches toward a horizon made indistinct by haze.