Page 74 of Our Little Moments

“I don’t know.” Hazel’s smile turns sad. “We’ve all changed a lot in the last few years.”

Nate halts to a stop as he wraps her in a hug. I swear her eyes get teary and my heart cracks.

I stop too, walking over to them to hold and squeeze her hand. She smiles up at me.

She untangles herself from us, wiping her eyes. “Neither of you need to worry about me, okay? Truly, I’m fine. There are just days that hit harder than others.”

We start walking again and the silence is heavy. I think back to all the times I saw Hazel emotional about her relationship with her siblings. While it happened for many reasons, there’s one of her siblings that seems to bring emotions out of her more easily.

Layla.

It shouldn’t surprise me.

Isabella walks over with a proud smile on her face. “I found Sam. We only have two left!”

I grin back at her enthusiasm. “We’re doing great!”

She eyes us. “Have you three been looking around together? We should all go on our own to look. We’ll find them faster.”

I turn quickly to look at Hazel and Nate, trying to read what they want to do.

Nate’s eyes are already zoomed in on Hazel. She looks at both of us with a smile no one would be fooled by. “Great idea, Isa. We should look on our own. I’ll go left.”

Nate jumps in. “I’ll continue straight ahead.”

I look back at Isa whose face screams confusion. “Okay, good. I’ll go right.”

“I’m going to retrace our steps to see if we missed anyone,” I declare.

After that, we all go our separate ways.

I walk quietly, my mind running wild with questions. Should I go back to Hazel? She seemed really sad. But, at the same time, what can I even do? I can’t fix her relationship with her siblings.

A weird twinkle hits my bloodstream, interrupting my thoughts.

Then a scream echoes in the forest. Then another.

I panic and look around for a disaster. I look up to find the trees’ branches all merging together, like the forest’s trees are all uniting as one—

I did this.

A wild grin breaks free at the realization.

I. Did. This.

As if I needed confirmation, neon green butterflies are floating in the air. This isn’t just my magic in the piano room starting to come back to life. This is big. The forest here is huge and I interconnected the branches of every tree together.

I feel like me again. My eyes tear up a little.

“Hey!” a voice calls out from above me.

I practically jump out my skin. I look up to find Jay upside down, his legs stuck in the branches I intertwined.

“How did you get stuck in there?” I ask with a small laugh as I walk closer to the tree.

Jay groans but laughs with me. “I was hiding here and then you made the tree do this weird thing and I lost my balance.”

“At least you didn’t hit your head.”

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