Summer Loving with Dryad

I ran back out and looked at the tree Helena liked to use to enter into the forest's energy. If only I could somehow use that portal on my own. I ran to it, desperate to try, but the tree held firm against my will. I wouldn't be able to make it there on foot. I jumped into my car and started to speed down the path. The path was just wide enough to allow my small car passage, I knew that I wouldn't be able to take it the whole way to tree, but I just needed to save as much time as possible. I felt bad as tree branches scraped against my car and snapped off. I said a silent sorry and hoped that the trees would forgive me. I made it nearly to the narrow path with the interlocking arch of branches before the trees finally closed in around me enough to block out the car. I jumped out of the car and ran down the path, praying that I could make it in time.

I stepped into the clearing and immediately I could feel the heat from the fire. It was coming from the opposite side of the clearing. It hadn't reached the clearing yet, but its intense red glow could be seen through the tree line. I couldn't see Helena so I ran across the clearing and into the trees on the opposite side. With each step the temperature seemed to increase ten more degrees but I pressed on. I found Helena standing on a rock near a small stream just a little into the trees passed the clearing, the fire was raging just twenty feet away. Helena was covered in ashe and in several places her hair had been burned. She was wearing one of the summer dresses I had bought her; it was so covered in ash and burns that I couldn't tell what color it had been. Helena was focused with her hands held out towards the fire. She would gesture to a tree and it would uproot itself, falling back into the flames to try and prevent the spread of the fire. The trees would fall with a great creaking and popping sound and would send a gust of wind into the flames. The flames grew larger from the influx of air, but also seemed to be smothered out a little by the falling tree and dirt cloud. The fallen tree would immediately catch on fire. It looked like Helena was slowing down the flames in this section, but the flames were already starting to advance along the flanks of Helena's last stand.

Helena turned and saw me, tears left paths of clean streaking down the ash that was coating her face.

"What are you doing here?" she yelled over the roar of the flames.

"I want to help out," I said.

"Get out of here, please!" She said and then turned back to stopping the fire. I knew that she couldn't stop the fire, but she could slow it down. If I wanted to I might have time to get back to my car and reverse until I could turn around and drive away. I could survive. I was scared. I ran, but instead of running away I ran towards the fire. I jumped up onto the stone beside Helena.

"I'm staying with you!" I said as I pulled the pin lock from the fire extinguisher and held it at the ready. Helena looked like she wanted to argue, but then she smiled softly, kissed me even softer, and turned back towards the flames. Between Helena, my fire extinguisher, and the water in front of us, we were able to slow down the flames, but they continued to creep along our sides. My lungs felt like they were on fire and I could feel my skin getting burned from the intense heat radiating from the fires. We held the flames back for maybe ten grueling minutes when suddenly Helena let out a cry of pain and started to fall. I caught her and steadied her.

"My tree," She said, I turned around and saw how the flames had nearly formed a ring around us, and back in the clearing I could see flames starting to lick along the oak tree. I made sure she was steady on her feet and I ran back to the clearing. The flames were starting to climb up the side of Helena's tree. Helena cried out louder as the flames grew around the tree. I started to spray at the base of the flames, but their was so much them around that it was hopeless. The flames grew closer and the air was so full of smoke that I couldn't breath. I managed to beat down some of the flames that had grown along the tree. The flowers in the clearing were igniating from the heat of the flames. The whole field was ablaze.

The fire extinguisher ran dry. I couldn't breath and my whole body felt like it was one big burn. I collapsed. I looked through the flames and saw Helena was down on the ground too, the flames had become too much for her. She collapsed to the ground from the heat. We looked at each other through the dancing flames. I smiled, trying to reassure her that it was going to be ok. It hurt to even move my face that much.

The wall of flames and smoke grew thicker, separating us from one another. I closed my eyes, not wanting to watch as the flames advanced the final distance towards me. The heat and pain became too much as my whole body seemed to be being backed before the flames could even reach me. I held in a scream, knowing that I had to hold in as much oxygen as I could since this would be my final breath. A moment later when I thought I couldn't take it a second longer I heard a loud sizzling sound from all around me. I opened my eyes and saw plumes of steam going up as water was being poured onto the fire. The wall of flames between Helena and me started to die down. Helena was still crumpled up on the rock, but now standing on either side of her were two beautiful girls. Their skin was bright blue and it seemed to be constantly shifting around like light reflections on a gentle flowing stream. They were Naiads. They were directing the water out of the stream, using it to quench the flames between Helena and the tree.

One of them advanced towards me with a floating flow of water to fight the flames while the other stood as a sentinel over Helena's body. The approaching one walked past me and started to douse the flames on the oak tree. Once the flames where lowered there she came back for me and effortlessly picked me up and slung me over her shoulder. Her body felt cool to the touch and soothed some of the pains from my burns. She dropped me in front of the tree and took care of more of the closest flames. The fire was still raging along the sides of the clearing, but the area between the stream and the oak tree was clear of flames for the moment.

The naiads picked up Helena and carried her towards the water. I reached out for her, wanting to tell them to stop, and to take me with them, but my voice was so hoarse that all I could let out was a groan. As the naiads stepped towards the water I heard a loud sound from above. I looked up to see a helicopter skimming along a little above the trees, dropping tons of water down onto the flames. I looked back towards the girls and saw them step into the water and start to disappear into it, taking Helena with them. Another helicopter showed up as the first was still doing its strafing runs with its water to combat the fire. I saw repel lines drop down out of the helicopter and two rescue workers repelled down. They ran over to me, said something, and lifted me onto the bright orange litter that they carried. They were gentle but my whole body screamed with pain from the burns. They attached me to a line underneath the helicopter and went back up the line. The helicopter started to raise up above the trees to evacuate me out of the path of the fire. I stared down at the dying flames around the clearing. It looked like the fire was under control, but the flames could also continue to spread and overtake the oak tree. I looked down at it for as long as I could, praying that the fire would be snuffed out before they could overtake the oak tree. I prayed that Helena would be alright. I passed out from the pain once the adrenaline faded away.

My memory comes and goes over what happened next. I remember being in a hospital, but not how long I was in there. They gave me painkillers and a sedative when I got to the hospital to ease my pain. Whenever I came back to consciousness my first thought was always of Helena. I wanted to ask my nurses and doctors if she was ok, but they wouldn't know who I meant and even if they did, my voice was too raw to speak. It hurt to even breath. What must have been a couple of days after I was first brought in I was finally coherent enough to talk to my doctor. He told me how first and second-degree burns covered most of my body. Some of them were more severe, but that as long as they keep it from getting infected then I would be ok. I had also done some damage to my lungs from inhaling so much smoke. I felt like a mummy with how much I was bandaged up.

Everytime I would wake up I would look around for Helena, but she was never there. I began to worry that her and her tree hadn't survived the fire. I longed to reach out to her, but I had no way to contact her. I wondered if maybe I was crazy and there never had been Helena, but I knew that others in the town had seen her. Or had they? I had nothing to do in bed but watch daytime tv and think, and when I got to thinking too much without a chance to write my feelings out, then it often went to overthinking until I was running circles in my head.

Glen visited me half way through my hospital stay. A beautiful girl was pushing his wheelchair. She looked familiar.

"How are you doing?" he asked me.

"I'm mostly bored out of my mind, and the burns are painful and itchy, but I'm alive so I can't complain," I said.

"Sorry about that. I had hoped that my granddaughters would have gotten to you sooner," he said.

"What?" I asked.

"I knew that the fires were heading your way so I sent my granddaughters out and let the fire department know, but I didn't know too much ahead of time. Sorry boy, my sight just isn't as strong as it used to be," Glen said.

"What are you talking about?" I asked again, still somehow not understanding what he was saying.

Glen sighed. "Show him," he said to his granddaughter. Her whole body turned into water for a moment before shifting back to looking like a human.

"You are the one who saved us?" "Thank you," I said.

"You're welcome," she said.

"Helena isn't the only one of her kind out there. There are others out there, but not many of the old world creatures are around anymore." he said. "I have been keeping an eye on Helena over the years, making sure that she was ok and seeing if she would make contact with any humans."

"Why? And why not make contact with her, why let her think that she was on her own?" I asked.

"I wanted to, but I couldn't make my presence known to her until after she found her human," he saw that I was about to ask another question and interrupted me. "Our kind are dying out, what you think of as the fae or mythical creatures. The only way we can continue on is if we start to mix our bloodlines with humans, which is difficult because if we reveal ourselves to the wrong human, then we risk revealing our entire world. This was something that Helena knew instinctively. Some humans have the blood of the fae from their ancestors long past, and it is these humans who are compatible with our kind." I thought over what he was saying. I had thought about what it would be like if Helena and I stayed together, but the more I fell in love with her the less I saw the differences between us. "When you are feeling better you can come talk to me in my shop," Glen said. Before they left Glen's granddaughter stepped forward and held her hands over my body. Water formed from the moisture in the air, and then it dropped down onto me and under my bandages. The water went up and down my body, leaving in its wake soothing sensations that made the pain from my burns disappear for the moment. "That should help ease the pain for now. Let's go dear," Glen said. I celebrated my freedom from pain by finally being able to fall peacefully asleep.

***

Later that night I woke and something seemed different. The very air seemed to be cleaner. I looked around, and there she was, leaning back against the wall cloaked in shadows.

She saw me stir and started to move towards the open window. "Wait," I said, my voice was hoarse but better than what it had been.

I noticed how she seemed hesitant to step closer to me. "Why are you staying away from me?" I asked her.

"I... I got burned," she said.

"Join the club," I said, gesturing to my bandage covered body. Helena stepped forward out of the shadows. Half of her face was burned, and parts of her hair and body had burns on it. She sat at the edge of my bed, facing away from me with her hair covering up her face. I sat up and brushed the hair out of her face and tilted her face towards me. "Helena, you're beautiful, and I would love you no matter what," I said.

"I love you too," She said and we kissed.

***

It was gradual, but slowly we healed together. Helena's medicine and ointments and creams that were prescribed to me helped my body heal up faster than it would have normally My doctor kept on getting shocked at how much of a recovery I was making. Helena's burns were healing as her tree recovered from the burns. Someday's were worse for the both of us, but we were by each other's side the entire time.

I spent nearly two months not writing, the whole time it felt like something was missing from my life. I wanted to write, but after how much I had written over the summer I felt burnt out. I couldn't help but smile ironically at the thought. It was Helena who got me to start working on my book. One day I walked by my desk and found the rough draft to my book printed out and sitting on my desk. It was a little intimidating seeing it there, staring at me. I asked Helena about it and she told me that when I was ready to get back to work it would be right there waiting for me. It had taken a few days but I had shown her how to use a computer and search the internet, but I was still surprised that she would do that for me. Later on that night I sat at my desk and started to go over my story. I had been away from my story long enough to be able to look at it from a new perspective and make the needed fixes. A month later I had a second draft finished up and sent it to my grandfather's lawyer. He congratulated me and I got access to the rest of my money. I had mostly forgotten about the money attached to writing a book, I had been so focused on finally finishing a book. What I didn't know was that my grandfather's lawyer had a brother who worked for a publishing house, and he asked my permission to send him a copy of the story. I hadn't thought about trying to get a book published, I thought it was one of the better things I had written, but I hadn't seen it as being publishable good. I kept this from Helena, not out of trying to hide it from her, but because I couldn't believe it and didn't believe that it would be published. I didn't want to talk about it and make it seem real, because if I did then it would get my hopes up only to hurt more when I was let down. Helena know I was hiding something and she was able to get me to tell her about all of it. She was almost too supportive.

A couple of weeks later I got an email from the publishing house. Helena saw me staring at the computer not doing anything so she walked over, overlapped her hand with mine on the mouse, and clicked it open. It said that they wanted to buy my book. I couldn't believe it, I was so happy. Helena hugged me, telling me that she knew they would want it. She held my hand and gently guided me to the bedroom to celebrate.

Much later on that night I got up to get a drink of water and I forwarded to contract to my lawyer to look over. He sent back a new contract the next day and I agreed to meet with a representative of the publishing house. The meeting went great and they offered me a contract on the book as a trilogy when I told them how many books I was planning on writing for the series. Helena almost didn't come with me on the trip, she was afraid to leave her tree behind, but she agreed to go with me. She was nervous at first to be out of the forest, but she loved taking in most of the sights in New York City, especially Central Park. I was too, I had never been there before. By this point Helena had perfected her human look and while she still looked like an other worldly beauty, it wasn't because she looked like a humanoid plant.

I was eager to get started on my next two books, but I decided to celebrate and surprise Helena with a trip to Europe. Glen had shown us that there was still more of Helena's people out there, and I hoped that going to the old world would help Helena find some answers about herself. I sprung the news on Helena and she loved it. She liked it even better when I told her how Glen was going to keep an eye on her oak tree for her.

I had a couple of weeks to get started on flushing out my trilogy before our vacation. I was back to writing under the oak tree and being hyper productive. I don't doubt that I could have even gotten well into writing the second book if it wasn't for how often Helena distracted me pleasant interruptions.

I was uncertain about how a future with Helena would play out, I knew that she would outlive me, but I loved her and she loved me so if she was willing to try and make this work then so was I.