I went looking for that tree again, believe me. I had to prove to myself that I hadn't just imagined things. I wasn't tired at all that morning, but I guess it caught up to me later, because I ended up taking a nap that afternoon.
I thought I knew the woods really well, but I guess I was wrong. I've been trying to find that tree again ever since and I haven't had much success. It doesn't help that I don't remember exactly what kind of tree it was or how I got there. It was somewhere past the cherry tree, I remember that much, but how far past it I'm not sure.
I did find the clearing with the willow tree, or at least I think it is the same tree. It matches my memory of that night, but I don't have any way of telling for sure. It's kind of odd: was I in a different world, or the same world made weird? I've never heard of anything like this before. Always in the books the people who go to another world find themselves someplace different, but I seemed to have ended up in a Twilight Zone version of my backyard.
Cassie doesn't believe me, of course, but she did set up this website for me. She hasn't really helped me look, but I guess I wasn't really expecting her to either.
Thing with my mother have been calmer. We haven't had any big blow-ups lately, and I've been trying not to upset her, really I have. Sometimes I feel like I don't belong here at all.
That about sums up where things stand right now. I haven't given up, but I don't have any way to prove to anyone what I saw.
