“The Great Civil War of Differences was the greatest war of isolation.”
—The History of the Pine States by Walter Aderson
The lights flickered and hummed as Ella slowly walked down the creaky wooden stairs. She never liked basements. They always gave her the heeby jeebys because she knew what types of creepy crawlies most likely made their home in the cracked holes and corners of the cold cement floor. This meant she wanted to make the trip down to the basement as quick as possible—to avoid waking them up from their afternoon nap. Ella winced as her feet hit the cold cement and stood at the bottom of the stairs looking at the brown boxes labeled with permanent marker penmanship that took up most of the basement, a stationary bike, and a box that held an artificial Christmas tree. Her eyes fixed on a black trunk covered with a thin layer of dust that sat in the corner peaking behind a box labeled Christmas. As she got closer, and pushed the brown box to the side, she noticed a silver key that hung snugly in the keyhole. She knew what this trunk was, one of the only things of her parents that the government didn’t take, but she didn’t know what was inside. Her uncle had mentioned it shortly after she moved in, but she never could gather enough courage to see what was held inside. It was too painful.
It had been two years since her parents’ disappearance or, as the government called it, “a tragic accident.” She shook her head as if she was trying to shake away the painful memories of the day her life turned upside down. “I’m so sorry, Ella.” She could still hear her uncle’s words as he held her as her world crumbled. Her uncle had been there for her the last two years. He wouldn’t admit it, but he needed her just as much as she needed him. She enjoyed their mornings together. The eggs and toast he would make her every morning before school, and he even allowed her to drink a small mug of his coffee that he brewed every morning. Her uncle had always been in her life. He only lived a short walk away from her and her parents’ cabin. But these things didn’t take away the heartache she felt from missing her parents.
The last two years consisted of Ella trying not to think about her parents. She went to school, walked back to her Uncle Charlie’s cabin, ate supper, did her homework, and wished each night the nightmares would disappear and never return. Her nightmares started after her parents disappeared. The dream was always the same. It would consist of her being in the kitchen of her old home, her parents making breakfast––her father playing a melody on his harmonica as her mother would greet her with a kiss on the top of her brown hair—and then there would be a loud knock at the door, and POOF her parents were gone. She would wake up with her heart racing, tears puddled in her pillow as she lay in a disgusting pool of her own sweat. She would change the sheets before her uncle woke up in the next room, get dressed for school, and pretend it never happened. They would disappear for a week or two and then come back with vengeance.
Two weeks ago, the nightmares had returned, and her eyes showed it all. Ella thought maybe they had come back because of the talks she had with her uncle about traveling to a place called the Uniteds. There were strange things happening in the Pine States, and her Uncle Charlie didn’t want to wait until something strange happened to them.
The part that gave Ella the most nightmares was that she really didn’t know if her parents were actually still alive or not. The government, who her parents worked for, said that her parents had passed away in a train accident, but when her uncle went to confirm their identity, they wouldn’t allow him to enter the building.
For weeks after, her uncle would pace around the house trying to figure out what really went on. “I know it’s a bold statement, Ella, but I think there is something strange going on. I’m HIS brother! A blood relative! I should know the details . . .” he continued while flipping through work notes that Ella’s dad had written down and left in a secret place only Uncle Charlie knew about—the rest were taken by government officials.
“There must be something here! There must be. Some kind of clue . . .”
Ella never understood what her uncle meant by “something here.” She was too heartbroken to ask. She also never knew why her uncle was so angry when the Pine State officials came to their door and demanded he hand over any notes that her dad had since they were technically owned by the government. But she figured taking anything away that reminded you of someone you loved would make anyone upset, especially when you are already heartbroken.
After a while, her Uncle Charlie stopped talking to Ella about her parents’ disappearance and instead let her focus on adjusting to her new life. Until things in the community started to get strange. People were quietly disappearing, and no one was talking about it. Except for the school kids on the playground who would only discuss it when the teachers were nowhere in sight.
“Jasper’s mom is missing,” her school friend Anne said in a nervous whisper as they sat on the merry-go-round. After a couple weeks of chatter and mysterious disappearances, Uncle Charlie brought up the Uniteds again.
The Uniteds was a place where Ella’s mom was originally born but then moved from when she was a baby. Her father (Ella’s grandfather) had been paid by the Pine States to move his business (a typewriter business that sold and fixed typewriters) to expand the territory and bring innovation. Then the war took place—the Great Civil War of Differences—and the Pine States turned into families struggling to put food on the table. It was no longer a place of innovation but a place of survival. Ella always remembered her grandpa saying, “If you don’t work for the government, then you’re tough outta’ luck.” And Ella’s family had some of that luck, but currently, she felt her luck had completely disappeared.
Ella noticed on the front of the trunk engraved names—Frank and Alice Everhart. She slowly rubbed her finger over the names and then turned the key. As she lifted the lid, it creaked as she held her breath for a moment and peeked inside. She pulled out a tattered book titled Native Flowers of The Pine States by Susan Jenkins. Ella slowly opened the book to the first page that read, This Book Belongs to Alice Everhart. Ella moved her finger across the words as her stomach began to flip. She closed her eyes tight and tried to remember the years her mother would plant daisies next to their small cabin. Her mother’s favorite flower.
“Flowers make everything beautiful, even in the bleakest of places,” her mother would say with dirty hands and a garden trowel in one hand as she pushed her black curls away from her face. Ella’s mother would encourage Ella to dig for earthworms and help pick the vegetables they had planted in the spring—spring and garden season were Ella’s favorite times of the year.
“The daisy means cheerfulness and joy. It also means new beginnings,” her mother would say matter-of-factly. Her mother loved to store facts and share them with Ella whenever they planted vegetables and watered flowers. She also loved to tell stories.
“The daisy was the flower your father gave me on our first date. We went to the community garden.” She giggled like she had a secret. “Did I ever tell you that story?” Little Ella shook her head and waited for her mother to continue.
“Well, for our first date, he gave me daisies—my favorite—little did he know that a small bee was also favorable to my flowers.” Little Ella’s hand covered her small mouth in shock. “What happened, Mommy?” Ella’s mother chuckled, and a bright grin appeared on her face while she picked up a watering can and began to water the cucumber plants.
“Well . . . the little bee’s friends decided to follow, and before we knew it, we were rushing toward the pond.”
“Oh no! Daddy’s allergic to bees!” Little Ella said with wide eyes.
Her mother’s face broke out in a smile as she looked up toward the sky.
“We found ourselves having an afternoon swim after that.” Ella and her mother looked at each other, and giggles erupted from the bottom of their bellies. Ella loved her mother’s laugh. It was deep and rich with joy. She loved those garden memories, but each time she remembered them now, the sweet memories came with bees that stung her already broken heart.
Ella loved the smell of daisies and how they seemed so wild and free. She wished to someday be wild and free. But now daisies made her stomach churn. So, she put the book back and noticed a large red book at the bottom of the trunk.
The book was cracked and weathered with a thin layer of dust. She blew the dust off, revealing the words The Book of Secrets and Other Lands. For a moment, Ella could have sworn the letters twinkled, but she reassured herself that she was just imagining it. Ella set the book down and wiped off her glasses with her shirt. It must have been dust, she thought to herself. It had to be. She sat crisscrossed on the green shag rug that lay next to the line of dusty boxes—her uncle loved collecting old pieces of used carpet and making them into rugs that decorated his cabin. The spine cracked as Ella opened the book and gently flipped through the pages until she stopped at a picture of a woman. The woman stood dressed in a long black dress, stoically standing in front of a treehouse with a raven atop her arm. There was something about this woman that gave Ella the shivers. On top of the page read, The Raven Queen. For a moment, Ella almost felt as if the Raven Queen was staring right back at her with her piercing green eyes. Of course, that was impossible. It was just a book. It’s just a book, she repeated to herself.
But just in case, Ella quickly flipped to the next page with a shiver. But before she could see the next page, the book seemed to jump from her hands and land on the hard cement floor with a SMACK. Ella looked down to see a page that read: To Ella: Explore without fear.
What was this book? Ella thought. Ella set down the book next to her, reached into the trunk, and took out a rolled-up map. She slowly unrolled and read The Land of Snow and Ice. Ella had never heard either of her parents mention this place. Neither had she seen a map like this before. Her curiosity grew, and she had to figure out what this place was. She would come back to explore the mysterious red book, but for now, it gave her too much of a chill.
* * * *
Ella carefully made her way up the creaky wooden stairs as the rolled-up map hid snuggly under her arm. When she reached the top of the stairs, her uncle was sitting at the kitchen table, drinking a hot cup of coffee as he scribbled notes in his notebook. Ella placed the map on the kitchen table.
“What’s The Land of Snow and Ice?”
“The Land of Snow and Ice?” Her uncle looked up with a furrowed brow. He unrolled the map and laid it gently over the kitchen table. “See those initials?” He pointed to a cursive F and E that hid in the bottom right corner of the map. “That’s your father’s initials . . . I’m not sure what The Land of Snow and Ice is . . . or any of these other places . . . but this is a map your father created. I know that for certain. I thought the government had confiscated all the maps . . . but they must have missed this one. Where did you find this?”
“In the basement . . .”
Ella’s uncle smiled. “I’m glad you were able to find it.”
Ella had never heard of The Land of Snow and Ice, and she also had never seen any of the maps that her father had created for work. Those were all supposed to be locked up in a government building.
“Did your father ever tell you what we did? I suppose he couldn’t, but now it really doesn’t matter, I guess . . .the secrecy, I mean . . . since the department closed.”
“I just knew he created maps, and you helped but that’s it.” Ella shrugged and looked back down at the map that lay flat on the kitchen table.
“Here, sit down.” Ella’s uncle smiled and patted his hand on the wooden chair next to him.
“I think you were about three or four, so you probably don’t remember any of this, but your father and I went on what the government called a ‘map exploration trip.’ We were sent to explore the territories outside of the Pine States and create maps from the information we gathered so that the government could use them. I did the gathering of the information, and then your father created the maps from the information I gave him.”
Ella remembered the time when she had written a story about a magical land. She had given it to her father to read, and the next day on her nightstand was a map of the land she had created for her story. Ella knew that her father made maps. His maps were beautiful, she loved them. At least the ones that she saw, the ones he created for her.
“What did the government do with the maps?” Ella asked.
“We weren’t fully sure. We still. . . I mean . . . I’m still not fully sure.” Her uncle’s brow furrowed. “Some people told us that for many years after the war, people stayed in their territories, and no one explored. So, maps became outdated, and even though people were isolated in their own territories, the government still needed to know what was outside. But most people didn’t fully know what the Department of Maps and Exploration was truly for. Even those of us who worked there.”
“If you’d like, you can keep this one. I know your father would like you to have it. As long as you don’t bring it outside.”
Ella gave a small smile. “Thank you.”
Even though it hurt, it felt good to hear about her parents. For just a moment, remember them even with the pain. Before her parents disappeared, she never really asked them about their jobs. She knew a little about what her father and uncle did and knew that her mother had worked on the exploration side of the department to help plan explorations. But she never asked questions, and now she would give anything to ask her parents questions.
Her thoughts were interrupted by her uncle as he sipped his coffee and placed his mug on the kitchen table.
“If it’s okay, I’d like to talk to you about the Uniteds. I think we should leave soon. I have this feeling that if we don’t leave soon—I just think it may be harder to leave if we wait.” Her uncle could read the hesitation on her face.
“Ella, I think you would really like it. You can read whatever you want. Not like here. Those books that your mother used to talk about, you can read those same books. They call themselves the freedom state. And they have libraries there. Rooms filled with bookshelves where you can read anything.” Ella could tell that her uncle was trying to overcompensate with optimism so that she wouldn’t be able to see his fear, but Ella could see right past it. But she knew he was only trying to keep her safe. Things were getting scary, and even though he wouldn’t admit it, she had a feeling his plan also included finding out answers about her parents. She just didn’t know what his plan was yet. She hated the thought of saying goodbye to her friends, but she missed her parents more, and she knew she had to find answers, even if it meant traveling to the unknown. So, she sat at the kitchen table and listened to her uncle’s plan on how they would escape to the Uniteds.
Crystal Lynn Writing 