First Date

Trees, trees everywhere!  Anna was fuming. She was exhausted and starving and regretted ever coming on this miserable hike.  

“Ralph, admit it. We’re lost.” 

“Shush. I’m listening for Queenie… Hold on… Yes, I found her!” Ralph yelled, rushing into the woods.

“Hey, wait for me!” Anna hurried after him until they reached a hidden mountain stream. 

“We made it.”

“Made where?” Anna asked.

“To Queenie,” he said pointing to the stream. “She’s the lady who runs in the shadows and never fails to guide a lost hiker home.”

“Hah! So, I was right. We were lost.”

“Oh, shut up.”

***

I wrote this fun piece in response to Carrot Ranch’s January 16, 2023 99-word Flash Fiction Challenge about a lady shadow.

I wanted the lady in the shadow in my story to be something positive. I remembered the girl Anne in the book Anne of Green Gables naming places around her. In so doing, these landmarks became like friends to Anne and she connected with them. For example, she called Barry’s Pond the “Lake of Shining Waters”. The secluded pathway she and her friend Diana took to school was named “Lover’s Lane”. And the grove of trees between Green Gables and Orchard Slope where Diana lived, became the not so “Haunted Woods”.  

In my story, the lady in the shadow is a stream, affectionately named “Queenie” who guides hikers safely out of the woods.