Lost and Found

Crystal Falls

Katrina POV

Since coming here, my favorite thing by far, was the times I spent on walks with Adrian. He had said that spending some time outdoors, and stretching my legs would help me feel better, and to be completely honest he was right. In the past I had hardly been allowed to go outside, let alone enjoy the world around me.

I was nervous at first, what if I was found by my family? Or if Adrian decided I wasn’t worth his time after all and left me for dead? The first day I had only agreed to walk around the perimeter of the forest, with the lodge in sight at all times. However, watching him light up and tell stories about the places we walked through, and seeing how gentle he was with me as we went, made it easier and easier for me to see him as a person and in turn to trust him.

Today he told me he was bringing me to his favorite place. He had brought a picnic basket, which had made me giggle the first time I saw it. I had told him that I had never seen one in real life, and that I didn’t think people actually used them. He had responded with a laugh of his own asking me how else he was going to carry our lunch?

It was nice to have normal interactions like these. The more I was around him the safer I felt. He didn’t make me feel stupid. He listened to me, and answered my questions. I still couldn’t believe that he would be able to accept me, but that was through no fault of his own. I knew as he got closer to me, he would start to see all of the things that everyone else had seen in me before. Eventually he would leave and I would be alone again, but was it selfish of me to want to hold on to this dream a little longer?

I was brought back from my thoughts by Adrian announcing that we had arrived. “This,” he added a dramatic flourish, “is Crystal Falls”. He had told me it would be beautiful, but I couldn’t believe that there was actually something just as perfect as what I was seeing. We had come out of the trees and face to face with a living winter wonderland.

A perfectly circular lake spread out before us, to the far right a frozen waterfall cascaded down disrupting its flawless surface. A light dusting of snow covered the trees, and bushes surrounding us. He led me forward to take a closer look at the water, and to my surprise, the ice was clear. I could see straight down to the bottom where tiny little flickers of light caught my eye. I looked up at Adrian in shock, “Is that why it’s called Crystal falls?”

Adrian looked at me with a smug smile, clearly happy with my reaction. “Only part of the reason.” He took my hand, and led me toward the waterfall. I watched in shock as he pushed aside a boulder twice his size and let me into a cavern behind the ice.

If I had thought outside was beautiful, nothing had prepared me for this. The light filtering in through the frozen falls reflected off of thousands of crystals. Some smaller than a grain of rice, some larger than my head. I had never seen anything like it. Adrian pushed the boulder back and set our basket down. “THIS is why it’s called Crystal Falls.”