This is the final chapter of part 3.

 

Just as my eyes open, I’m greeted by an energizing and encouraging faint sunlight from the window. It’s seven in the morning, and luckily, my cramp isn’t nearly as intense as it was earlier. I decide to get out of bed, because the arts festival starts at ten. When I get myself up, I notice the puddle of vomit in the carpet next to my bed. I could tell mom to clean this filth up, but she’ll likely freak out for not hearing about my cramp sooner, and she’ll keep me home from the festival.

 

For now, I decide to quickly grab a smooth and clean white tee shirt, grey sweater and jeans, and rapidly I leave the room to avoid the foul smell. Nothing is more important to me now than going to the festival. With my cramp fading and putting on a fresh outfit, I finally feel ready.

 

Mom drives me to the park where the festival is located. When exiting the car upon arrival, I feel the brisk air and notice the spring colored grass and the dense green forest in the distance. Because it’s still early, the park is pretty quiet with not many people. I decided to arrive at around the opening because I cast a secret decision spell earlier this week. It told me to be here at the earlier hours. I’m not sure whether or not I should trust this as I’m not sure whether or not that spell really worked, but I chose to do what my spell told me.

 

It doesn’t take to long for me to realize that it was a good idea to trust the spell. I gain this realization as soon as I notice a familiar looking girl around my age with dark, shiny and smooth red hair in one of the tables spreading cream cheese on a bagel. With the familiar face and the hair, she almost looks like a character from my recent dreams. I examine the girl as she takes her seat near the outdoor stage setup to watch the high school boys’ band concert. It doesn’t take too long for me to realize that this girl is Lauren. And it’s not just a guess from my dreams; after looking through these childhood photos, I know that this girl is Lauren.

 

Another reason why I’m certain about her is because although she’s otherwise a total stranger, I feel a sense of familiarly when near her, like we’re already best friends. But I’m not sure if she feels that same way too. I’m almost certain that she is Lauren, but even if I am correct, I highly doubt she remembers me. 

 

I decide to sit next to her to view the concert, pretending I have no clue that this she is. As I listen to the energetic school band music played by the talented teenage musicians, I occasionally glance at the dark redhead on my left. She’s staring at the concert and occasionally looking at who seems to be her little sisters on her other side. I actually remember Lauren having a large family with tons of siblings, though I never met them. Now I’m basically 100% sure she is Lauren. It’s very tempting to talk to this girl, but I just can’t initiate a conversation with someone that likely doesn’t remember who I am, after all this time.

 

After the concert, the tiny crowd ascends from their seats. I’m not exactly sure what I should do now, especially if it’s currently the perfect opportunity to connect with a long lost friend but I just can’t do it.

 

I don’t know why, but I somehow decide to enter the area of the park that feels the most magical, and that is the dense forest. I head away from the growing crowd and festival setup to the quieter forest. I just enter with no fear of getting lost, just like a curious and unsupervised little kid. I try to remember the paths I take and stay on the main trail so I could find my way back, but entering the deeper part of the forest just seems like my top priority, even ahead of finding my way back.

 

What stands out to me about this forest is how familiar it looks. As soon as I step in, I get this mental flashback; a flashback of a period when life seemed more magical. It’s coming back to me; a time when I used to write these cheesy short stories. The stories were about me and my friends, including Margie and Lauren. I decided to make me and my friends’ fairies for some reason. I wrote some of these stories in the summer after kindergarten. It was during that time when mom took me and my siblings on a nature walk in these exact woods. During these hikes, it was just very enchanting. I felt as if it wasn’t just a story; my friends and I were actually magical beings. And that forest was the source of our powers or something. Throughout that summer, I used to beg mom to take me on more nature walks. I wanted to feel close to the magic again. Those hikes were just incredible.

 

One of my favorite memories, one that just returned at this very moment, was this one day when I passed a tree. It looked similar to one of the trees in my backyard, but it seemed to have a tiny door under it. I was so happy to find that door because I actually overheard a friend talk about a tree in the woods with a door in the kindergarten classroom. I was so jealous of her for finding that tree. I didn’t realize I was walking past it during all those walks until that day. In fact, now that I remember that moment, that was the day before meeting this one girl in summer camp. When I think back to that girl, she reminds me a bit of Nyssa.

 

I was so delighted by the sight of that tree. I looked hard the door hoping to discover it again, but I never found it. I only went on just a couple more walks after this anyway.

 

I travelled to the woods less and less when I started first grade due to mom being busy with her new job I think. I didn’t think too much about the woods after being distracted by the wave of new experiences when progressing through my new elementary school.

 

During the later part of elementary, I enjoyed watching the news because I wanted to be the cool kid that watches TV all the time. I watched the news because I didn’t have cable and it looked adult-like. I think I heard this story of someone getting lost in the woods once. This changed my perspective on the forest. I refused to go on nature walks again in the fear of getting lost. The woods morphed from being magical and inviting to dense, confusing and haunted.

 

My fear faded away though, when I was reading fantasy stories about the woods in fourth or fifth grade. The fear vanished, and those stories made the woods seem magical again.

 

Despite my phobia never returning, reality seemed to return when I entered middle school. In fact, just last summer, when feeling a bit nostalgic after my dislike of 7th grade and the present at the time, I agreed to go on a hike in those woods for the first time in over five years. While they seemed magical years ago, when I hiked then, the woods just appeared to be a bunch of trees. I realized that the “door” might’ve just been an illusion. All I could think about during this hike is that some of the trees in this very forest were chopped down some time in the 50’s to build the elementary school I went to.

 

I thought the forest would remind me of this reality when I reentered today, but it suddenly seems magical again. It could be the new respect for my childhood. It could be the fact that I’ve experienced real magic in the past several months. Either way, this feeling is returning.

 

I take a few steps into the forest. It only feels more and more enchanting the deeper in I get. Eventually, I hear voices. The voices blend right in to the already mystical atmosphere, so they don’t startle me one bit. The voice is feminine, relaxed, and a bit high pitched. As I pay attention, I realize that the voice is reciting and repeating a poem which I try to pay attention to;

Your dreams are to be recognized,

But just recognizing them does nothing,

Strength is the key,

Belief is essential,

You have persistence,

But unleashing power and belief is the next step

 

When I finally understand this poem, it seems as if these words have actually given me strength and belief. This is the first time I’ve felt this empowered in the human realm. My attitude is suddenly positive too. What this poem makes me think about is the fact that Lauren, my childhood best friend whom I haven’t seen in over seven years, is within reach. Not only has my confidence increased, I am almost certain that Lauren and I will actually reunite…today.

 

I immediately leave the forest and quickly head toward the stage. By that time, it’s about eleven in the morning and this festival is a bit more crowded. By the stage close to the seats, I see Lauren. My nerves arrive again when I slowly step near her. I attempt to recall the somehow positive poem. Though the feeling of power tends to wear out during my trips to the human realm, it currently feels as strong as when I was in the Core. While waiting for my confidence to build up more and heading towards the friend, I attempt to cast another secret spell; it’s a spell that can get people to notice you. I wave my arms a bit, say this chant I happen to remember in my head, and I think of Lauren. To my surprise, about a minute after I cast the spell, Lauren looks at me and smiles.

 

“Hi! Nice to meet you! I’m Lauren” she says in a friendly tone.

My mind suddenly flashes back to the poem for a split second, “I recognize you!”

 Lauren’s face suddenly switches to a puzzled expression.

Again, I suddenly speak without time to think, “Did you go to Country Road Elementary? Were you in Mrs. Connor’s class?”

The redhead’s face lights up a bit, “Um, yes?”

“Remember me? I’m Daisy Green!”

 “Yes!”

 

I smile feeling proud and motivated by what I have done. I didn’t want to do anything other than giving Lauren a hug. During our brief reunion, my hope for finding Margie and where I came from just increases. I think it’s because I succeeded in reuniting with one friend.

 

 

I arrive home about a half hour after the reunion. Though what would’ve probably been my only task for today has been completed, I still feel the intense power within me. The poem is still glued to my head, repeating over and over again. Those words may be pushing me to head to mom’s computer as soon as I step inside. I want to check the photos again. Only this time, I feel like looking at photos from before kindergarten, the ones which I refused to look at before as I knew they were useless.

 

A few of the photo folders actually stand out. I’ve lived in the magical realm long enough to know how to sense where magic is. I seem to have evolved to see these miniature bluebell and coral colored particle thingies where there’s the presence of magic. I click on the folders with the most particles slowly dancing above it. Following these specs takes me to a photo of my three year old self playing in the playground with another tiny girl. The photo was labeled, “Daisy and Alessandra”. We were both riding one of those car shaped rocking horse things. In the background of the photo is an abundance of trees not unsimilar to the ones I’ve seen by the park and my elementary school.

 

“What are you doing?” a voice asks. I look behind me and realize its Missy, who I’m surprisingly happy to see.

“I’m looking at old photos”

Missy heads closer and looks at the picture, which she just sees as another ordinary photograph.  

“Hey, do you happen know who this girl is?” I ask. “The label says her name is Alessandra”

“I think its Alli Prizzi. I know her sister”

“Her sister? Who is Alli Prizzi?”

“Here, I’ll show you.”

 

Missy turns on her phone and opens up the social media app. She heads to Alli’s sister’s page, which doesn’t have a feed all that interesting in my opinion. Missy shows me a photo with Alli’s mom tagged in it, “I think there are pictures of Alli on the mom’s page; don’t tell anyone I’m showing this to you” Missy accesses Mrs. Prizzi’s page from the photo.

 

On the page, there’s a few pictures of Missy’s friend, but I also notice some photos of someone that looks sort of like the girl from the photo, but only a tiny bit. I actually went to middle school with her. She’s a year younger than me.

 

Missy taps a photo with Alli and two other girls. As I look at the photo, I notice that those particles are floating on the surface of this one. I think I know why, because the girl standing on the right of Alli, where the particle concentration is the highest, looks very familiar.

 

Before I could think straight who that girl is, Missy taps the picture for the tags. Her expression turns into a shocked one, “Isn’t that girl on the right the one you went to kindergarten with?”

 

I look at that familiar girl once again. I know what Missy is talking about. And with the high amount of particles where Margie is, I know there must be something very important about me finding her.