Entangled

The man raised the ax above his head and swung it at me. I felt the sharp pain as the blade dug into my trunk. My branches shook with fear making my needles rustle. The man dug the ax into me again and again. Why was he doing this to me? 

I had seen this man before. He came from the big house almost every day. Usually, he left us alone, but every winter he came to the forest and took a pine back to his horrible lair. We didn’t know what they did to us in that house, all we knew was that in spring they would drag the dead carcass to the edge of the forest and leave it there to finish rotting. It was awful.

“Pine, no!” Maple said, rustling her branches. “No, no! Not you! Why does he have to take you?!”

Maple and I had always been together. Decades ago we both started as saplings in the forest. We grew together. Our trunks grew side by side. Over time they became thicker, almost touching. Our branches grew taller and wider until they were so long they started to cross each other. We were always locked together. 

I heard the groaning crack of my trunk as it gave way. I started to fall. My branches pulled away from Maple, a few needles fell off as she tried desperately to hang on to me, but it was no good. I crashed to the cold ground with a loud thud. The man walked around and started tying some rope to me. He whistled and shouted something Human toward the house, but I couldn’t understand it over Maple’s sobbing.

I couldn’t stand to see her so upset. I was terrified, I was in pain, and I still didn’t know what they were going to do to me. Other humans gathered around and started lifting me, the man started dragging me toward the house by his rope. Maple’s sobs turned to wails. I had to do something to comfort her, but I didn’t know what to do.

Slowly, they dragged me through the door. I watched Maple until she disappeared behind the walls. The humans kept shoving me through their home until we reached a large room. I shuddered as I noticed the wooden floors. What kind of monsters were these humans? They muttered at each other in Human for a while. They all pulled at my branches and trunk, digging their fingers into me and pulling at my needles. A few more scattered to the floor as they set me upright into some kind of bowl. 

Luckily, the bowl had some fresh water. I drank heavily, trying to recover from the shock and pain of being cut down. The humans all breathed heavily. I was happy to know I’d at least inconvenienced them. They muttered more and left the room. I was alone. As I looked around the horrible room I noticed something across it. It looked like a large opening in the wall, but I felt no chill from the outside. The humans had covered the edges in some kind of fabric.

Through the opening, I saw, to my great relief, that I could see Maple. She was still shaking and wailing outside. I shook my branches, but she didn’t see me. The stupid fabric must have blocked her from seeing me. Still, I was happy to know I would be able to watch her. There had to be a way to get back to her. We had never seen a tree attempt it before, but there had to be a way. 

I spent that whole night trying to think of a way out. I couldn’t even think of one. Early the next day, the humans came back to the room. They carried boxes in their arms. I shivered thinking of what horrors might be in those boxes. As they reached in they pulled out knotted fabric, circles, and some kind of star. They walked over to me. If I hadn’t been terrified I might have been curious about what they were doing. 

They gathered around me, they tied the knotted fabric to some branches and hung circles from others. I saw the man appear suddenly. From his box he pulled out some kind of green string. It looked like icicles were all along the string. He began to wrap the string around my body. Were they going to move me again?

When he finished he lifted the smallest human to my top, the human put the star on my top branches. After that, the man grabbed the end of the green string and connected it with some kind of orange one. As he did the icicles began to glow, they felt warm. The humans cheered and stared a while before leaving the room. I was alone.

I glanced out the opening. Maple had stopped sobbing. She just sat there blankly. It seemed she had even lost the will to even sway in the breeze. We must have seen the strange lights from the humans a dozen times. We always wondered what made those glows every winter. Well, now I knew. I would tell her when I got back to the forest. If I got back. The doubt crept into my mind. I might never see Maple again.

The next few days progressed slowly. The humans placed boxes under my branches, wrapped in paper. Paper. Would their abuse of my kind never end? They even had the nerve to color it for their amusement. My horror was only doubled the following day when they began to shred the boxes apart, the smallest humans cheered the loudest as they did so.

I turned my eyes from the horrible scene and looked at Maple. I would never tell her the horrors I saw here. She didn’t deserve to be tortured by them like I was. I thought my suffering might never end. Then, all at once, it did.

The next day the humans ignored me entirely. Then the next day, and the next, and the next. After that day they almost never looked at me again. Each day I got weaker. They stopped adding water to my bowl. The female human would come by with some twigs tied to a stick, more savagery. She used it to sweep up my dead, falling needles. She even had the nerve to look angry as she did so. If I was going to die, then I was glad to make her suffer until then.

I wasn’t sure how long had passed anymore. The only thing that told me of the passing seasons was Maple. I watched as the snow finally began to melt from her, her frozen branches became more flexible, and small buds formed on them. It would be spring soon. 

I wanted to die. I was thirsty, I was falling apart, I was in great pain, but I had to hang on. I needed to let Maple know everything was okay. I remembered how we shuddered at the corpses of old pines. I couldn’t let her see me that way, I had to be alive when she saw me.

It would be time soon. I could tell. The humans finally removed their sick coverings from my branches. My needles had mostly fallen, and the ones that remained were dry and brown. My once proud trunk now looked pale and sickly. I didn’t have long left. Would I even make it to Maple?

I looked longingly at her. I missed the days by her side. Laughing and swaying in the breeze, our branches entangled. I glanced down at the sad little stump that remained of my body. I expected to see it as dried up and pathetic as I was, but it wasn’t. It looked almost new, and some of the cuts had even begun to heal. What was happening?

That’s when I saw. One of Maple’s roots overlapped mine, just above the ground. I hadn’t been able to see it when we were next to each other. Our branches weren’t the only things that were entangled, even our roots had grown together, and my stump was healing because of it. I knew now what I would say to her, the words I hadn’t been able to find when they first brought me to the house all those weeks ago.

It was time. I was much lighter now. The man didn’t need help as he dragged me to the outside. I heard Maple’s gasp as my body came from the house. Her new buds began to tremble. I would miss her, but I was happy to know she wouldn’t be completely alone.

“Maple, my stump is healing,” I said weakly. She stopped shaking. “No matter what happens, you and I will always be entangled. Watch over my stump. It will grow again. So don’t be upset, I will always be right there with you.”

I heard her sob softly at this, but I didn’t worry. I did what I said I would. I made it back to her.

The man dropped me by the side of the road and walked away. It was time now, I had already held on too long. As my vision faded I heard Maple’s sobs echoing around me. She would be okay, I knew that now. We would always be together.