The Whispering Pines

TW: Mention of suicide and murder

James never got what he wanted. He always told me what he wanted, yet nobody ever knew what it was.

Come to think of it, I didn't really either.

James said he wanted a pine tree. But not just any pine tree, The Pine Tree, he said. Obviously, when you live in a forest in a little cottage like James, it's hard to want pine trees. You're surrounded by them for as long as you live here, in Whispering Pines.

People didn't like James. All they felt was pity and sorrow. James's parents had passed in the War, but it was surprising to James how nobody knew about the War but him.

"It was World War III, how do you not know about it?" He would say whenever an old lady gave him a puzzled look on his account of his parents' deaths. He was genuinely curious. The people who live in Whispering Pines are as old as can be, some like Old Lady, who has lived here since the town was created, back in 1902.

So, we're not a big town, only about 700 or so people, and many of them, like Old Lady, have been here for too long to count.

Yet James, who moved in just three years ago when his parents died, was the first to move into Whispering Pines since my family, 45 years ago. My grandparents had moved when the big city became too much for them. Gran's dementia was getting terrible, and Granddad decided to move to somewhere where you didn't have to remember everything. The only thing you need to remember in Whispering Pines is your neighbor's gossip, and the price of eggs that week.

Anyway, James would always have a sad, tired look in his eyes, and the reason was... nobody knew. People speculated over what it could be, possibly still mourning his parents, possibly because he never got The Pine Tree, or maybe from some unknown cause the elderly women gossip about.

"I heard that his so-called war gave him P.T.S.D, so he came here to escape his mind..."

"I heard that his uncle adopted him and then sent him out..."

"I heard that he's really a spy, and this 'war' is still going on, and Whispering Pines is his rural hideout because the enemy would never suspect us..."

Yet nobody, not even me, knows why James is really here.

James came to me this morning, and I awoke from the comfort of my bed to hear three sharp, staccato, knocks on my old wooden door. I zombie-walked to the door, and opened it to find James, standing unusually still, at my door. He usually fidgeted with something, whether it be a loose string on his shirt, or his own fingernails.

"Harper," James said, his voice trembling. I snapped out of the sleepy daze I was in and wiped my mouth with my pajama sleeve. "Oh my God, James, what's wrong?" I said as a tear rolled slowly down his cheek.

"I need the pine tree, I need it,"

"Why don't you just chop one down on the outer edges of town?"

"I... I can't, Harper, I need the pine tree!" James said this with an urgency that made my skin crawl. The elders truly believed he was a psycho, or at least mentally ill, and maybe I believed it as well.

"James," I said, putting my hand on his arm, which had just come down from pulling at his hair. James was still hyperventilating, and I didn't know what to do with him.

"JAMES!" I almost-screamed, careful not to wake anybody else, for it was merely 5 A.M. James looked up, his face streaked in tears. "Harper, you don't know how much I need this..." James said, his voice cracking.

"What? It's a freaking pine tree, James, Whispering Pines literally has them in its name," I said, getting more irritated with James by the second.

"No, no, it's not just a pine tree,"

"Yes, it is!"

"No, it's not. You'll never understand, Harper. You never will." James said, clenching his fists.

"Then why don't you just tell me why? I don't care if I understand or not, just why do you need a very specific pine tree?" I said, and James's face made me regret it, which rarely happens.

"I... I can't tell you, Harper. Do I need to make that more clear?" James's voice dripped with a weird, abnormal coldness.

"No... no, you don't..." I said, scared, "But you know what? Just leave, because what was the point of coming here?"

James's eyes seemed to melt, and he stuttered at first.

"I... I... the only friend I have here is you. The old people don't believe in the War my parents died in, and I don't even know why I'm here anyway. Well, I guess I can tell you a little bit about the pine tree."

I stare at James, whose eyes are still glistening.

"My parents didn't die in the War." James said quietly. My eyes widened and James cleared his throat. I motioned for him to come inside, as we were standing with the door wide open. James sat down with a sigh and ruffled his hair with his hands. "Continue," I said, sitting down on the chair across from James's. He took a deep breath and started talking.

"My parents and I used to live in a big city, far north of here, and my dad went first. He was drunk at 1 A.M., and some gang found him and thought he would be a good target practice. They didn't find his body until three weeks later. My mom could barely function after that, and she once didn't come out of her room for a whole week. It smelled like dying flesh in her room.

Eventually, she died of suicide. She couldn't take it anymore; being without my dad. I inherited everything, which wasn't much, but it allowed me to get out of the city and find somewhere where nobody would know my name. The pine tree, was my dad's favorite tree. It sounds really stupid; I know.

But I keep looking for the pine tree, one that me and my dad planted when I was still in the womb of my late mother. It's the only thing that I have left of him. The gang that killed him took all his stuff, which was on him.

He was planning on leaving me and my mom forever.

I never got to say goodbye; he was out the door so soon."

James sighed and quickly wiped his teary eyes. I looked at him, finally seeing his past, which had haunted him all these years. I didn't know what to say, so I got up and hugged him. It was a quick hug, but by the way he held me I could feel that he hadn't had one in years.

James quickly got up, bid me goodbye, and went out.

He didn't know that what he found outside that day would kill him, haunt him for all of eternity.

The tree had been found, and it was gone.