Honest truth: does this sound ridiculous?

The wind beat hard on the windows. In the distance, a confused beagle bow-wowed as the fierce breeze whipped and whirled through the trees. That night, the bluster was nearly continuous, as if a giant were inhaling and exhaling, attempting to blow out all his birthday candles.

Caleb Larson scowled out his attic window. He knew she was out there. The strange girl across the lake. He could not see her now, for it was dark and rain droplets were beginning to be thrashed across his windowpane. He had seen her many times before, though, doing many strange things. Caleb knew she was on the edge of her dock, standing there. He imagined her smiling and sighing as the current of air rippled through her skirts and long, wavy, light brown hair. It bothered him. He did not know why. He only knew it was bothersome.

Perhaps it was because he did not know why she was this way. He had thought many times of how awkward and stupid it would be for him to canoe across the lake to say, “Hi, what’s your name? Mine’s Caleb. I was just wondering why you always stand outside on clear nights and why you enjoy absorbing the wind and why you sometimes lay outside reading and soaking up the sunlight for hours and sometimes like to dance in the rain?”

It wasn’t more than 60 yards across the lake, but Caleb had never met the girl who lived across there in his whole two years of living in the big cabin with his mom, younger sister and younger brother. His dad had passed away a year before the move, and left the remaining Larsons a significant amount of money. Emma Larson had always wanted a lake house, and so, after recovering from their loss, Emma and her children, Caleb, Lynn, and Josiah had packed up and left the suburbs of Cary for the calm, peaceful lake house life in Creedmoor.

Caleb was homeschooled, as were his siblings. Lynn was 17, and in her junior year in highschool. Josiah was six, and just beginning kindergarten. Caleb was 18, and about to graduate. Caleb looked down from the window to a paper on his desk. The acceptance letter from the University of South Carolina Upstate grinned back up at him, for Lynn had drawn a gigantic smiley-face in the blank area underneath the signature of the dean. This was it! April, May, then summer, and in August he was off to study History for pre-law. It did not matter that perhaps it was not what he wanted to do. It was something to do, and a career path approved by his mother, as well as his late father.

Caleb wondered about the strange girl. What would she think of him going to law school? He would not be here anymore to see her strange behavior. How depressing. Perhaps she was graduating too. She would also probably be leaving for college in August. Maybe she had also gotten accepted to USCU. She might possibly be in some of his classes. They could be study buddies. He was sure she would make an interesting study buddy. She would have many strange opinions.

She was also homeschooled, he knew, because she was often outside gardening or reading during school hours. Why had Lynn never gone over there to introduce herself? They were both probably around the same age. It would not hurt. But Lynn was too introverted. Lynn kept to herself, as the strange girl did, but she preferred the indoors.

Was the girl really out there? Caleb had to know.

With that determination set, Caleb picked up his shoes in his left hand and crept down the attic stairs slowly, dodging all the creaks. His mom was in her room reading, Josiah was asleep, as was Lynn. Lynn always went to bed early.

Caleb softly padded down the hallway on a long, thin green shag rug that ran along the wood-paneled and wood-flooring corridor. He descended the next stairs less carefully, as the master bedroom was now the furthest away. He found himself facing the living room, and immediately repented into the kitchen. He walked around the kitchen table to the back door, where he put on his shoes. He had to know if she was out there, and, further, he had to know why she was. What was it she felt in the wind?

Once outside, Caleb scrambled to the end of the Larson’s own dock. He peered over the lake as the wind wildly pulled and yanked on his hair and clothes. There she was, doing precisely what he imagined her doing. Maybe he had known because he had seen her unconsciously in a split second through a raindrop. It could happen. Anything could. Caleb was about to make one of those anythings.

Without thinking he walked back off the dock, kicked over the canoe, secured the oars, pushed the boat into the water, climbed in and furiously rowed across the lake. Fortunately the wind was in his favor; it almost caused him not to have to row at all at some points, for the water would carry him. As he got closer, he saw her standing there on the dock with her eyes closed. She was stunningly beautiful. Her hair was longer than it looked from the Larson property. She was wearing a single white tee shirt, a long, baby blue flowing skirt, and had no shoes on. Her muscular arms hung at her sides, palms facing the lake and fingers spread out, as if to take it all in with all her senses. Caleb was sure he would startle her, and attempted not to get too close, in hope that she would see him from a distance first, and perhaps beckon for him to come closer. But the wind blew him too hard. He was probably five feet from the dock when she must have heard his oars slide through the water (in vain of going backwards a bit), and opened her eyes. They were the most beautiful, radiant green eyes, and they stared right back at him in a slightly shocked manner. The eyes softened almost immediately, and the girl smiled.

“Have you come to join me in taking in this sensual weather?” She asked, to his surprise. “I don’t mean to be provocative in saying it’s sensual, but that is really the only proper way to describe it.”

Caleb was rendered speechless, and to his dismay the girl laughed.

“You are the boy from across the lake who is always fixing things,” the girl went on softly and pleasantly. “Why have you come here?”

“I wanted to know who you are,” Caleb finally said, realizing a moment afterwards that this sounded stupid.

“I am the person who is standing before you. My name, if it makes any difference, is Aimee, and I would like to know why you have come over here at ten in the night to ask me who I am?”

“You fascinate me,” Caleb confessed, “and I want to know everything about why you do what you do.” He thought a moment. The wind was dying down. He patted the seat in front of him in the canoe. “If you want, you can get in and I can row around our little area while you tell me about yourself.”

Aimee looked hesitant, but Caleb must have let off a very acute air of sincerity that convinced her, for she carefully climbed into the boat and sat facing him. The moon was two days from being full, and shone bright over the lake. A breeze blew which was of a much more forgiving nature than any preceding it; the giant must have been running out of breath.


Please...I need your honest opinion. I tried to start this certain story, and this is the way it came out, unintended. I couldn't help it. If you don't understand you'll just have to believe me. Anyways, I just want to know if this is good for anything...I'm not being as serious as I sound, but I do want the truth, because I am certainly not sure myself. :)

~Jessica