Miles: "Wh-who who a-a-re who whoooo are y-yo"
-Who are you?- he was asking in his head but the sounds couldn't be made out correctly by his twisted tongue and his throat felt tightened from shock. She's a fairytale character in "real life" or so it seems. -She's beautiful.- He's not scared of her at all, he's drawn to this "woman" standing in front of him. He cannot formulate words at all. Completely in shock by what he's seeing. A woman with pure white skin, in a white-blue sun dress, blue eyes and white pupils, long silver hair standing a couple feet away with her hands behind her back and tilting forward. With one eye closed while the right one is looking directly at Miles. A cute mischievous smile on her face. She was an angel.
Miles: "wh-"
???: " 'Who are you?' Is what you're trying to ask right?"
Nods.
???: "I think a better question would be 'what are you?' " She says standing up straight now.
Confused.
???: "I'm Hope. I'm YOUR Hope. As to what you can call me, call me Ashlyn, hope that name works." She says looking up, touching her chin in thought.
Still confused.
-What? What is she, toying with me? What is this ? Is this a dream? This woman must have an awful disease to have lost all her melanin.-
Miles: "—!!"
She jumps to stand in front of him in a single graceful leap, but it's so inhuman to do.
Miles: "Who are you...?" He says in disbelief.
Ashlyn: "Isn't it too late to ask? Thought I made it clear already, I'm Ashlyn, YOUR HOPE." She says standing in front of him pouting and blushing.
He turns his head and simply smiles in disbelief.
-hehe... heheheh hahahaha. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
AHAHAHAHA. This is too funny. What is this a prank? Where the fuck is the camera? Hahahahaha, when will the crew come out? What does she mean she's my hope? Is her ego that big? Sure she is captivating but that doesn't make her be my literal hope, I don't even know if she's real.-
Ashlyn: "Wha- why are you smiling like that?"
She says still pouting and turning her back on him.
Miles: "I'm laughing at how stupid I am for following an imaginary chain into the forest and now talking to a complete stranger."
Ashlyn: "——a stranger..."
He returns to a serious face and starts questioning where he is and who he's talking to all over again and is questioning why she looks so down in spirit, or hope.
Ashlyn: "I guess yes I'm basically a stranger to you considering you never feel me really... B-But we connected today!"
-?????-
Miles: "What the hell are you talking about?"
Ashlyn: "Come on, I felt you today." She gets an inch closer.
Ashlyn: "It was the first time in so long." Another inch.
Ashlyn: "You felt me, don't deny it." Another.
Ashlyn: "I know you did, you and I should be very connected." Another inch.
Miles: "BACK OFF." He says as she was about to place her hand on his chest.
She takes 2 steps back.
Miles: "What do you mean we 'connected'? And where AM I...?"
His attention drifts away from her and starts looking around more. He's in a forest, which looks bit normal but something feels off, and a fog is falling slowly. What was off about the forest is it was completely dead and in shades of black and white only. He can't really see past a couple 50 feet and he starts freaking out. His heartbeat starts racing, faster and faster, faster. He's completely pale and shaking.
Panic.
-ahhhhhhhhhhhhh my head. Why am I lightheaded all of the sudden...-
Miles: "Where, where am I? What is this? Who is she? When can I go back? I don't like this..."
He mutters
Fog falls lower and denser.
Miles: " huff huff haugh ahhh AHHHH..."
Difficulty breathing.
Miles: "-!"
Ashlyn: "There there..."
She says after stepping forward and touching his cheek delicately directing his eyes into hers, making him sleepy but calm and once again
hopeful...
Ashlyn: "Have H O P E in this place and me."
Miles: "Okay..."
-What was that, she took away my worries with a single touch. It's unreal. My mind is...
blank.-
Ashlyn: "Hey, what's that chain on your foot?"
Miles: "I don't know, it appeared on me one day and hasn't gone away, so I followed it and it lead me here."
She stares at it for a bit, confused.
Ashlyn: "Say, Miles, let's go walking for a bit."
Miles: "So you don't know anything about it?"
Ashlyn: "No, but we can see where it goes and we can talk and get to know each other more. We need to."
-What does she mean by that?-
They start off walking, the chain behaves the same way it does "outside" She leads the way as they walk through the monotone forest. It gives him bad vibes because the whole place is saddening and dead, like if a fire had gone off recently. It smells like a normal forest and the air is chilly. Every steps makes a crunching sound and there is no path they are following. The only reason he's not running away or panicking is because she touched him that one time. But he started feeling a bit off again and it was noticeable so when she turned her head back to look at him-
Ashlyn: "Hey!"
Miles: "-?!"
Ashlyn: "Don't be nervous, okay?
Miles: "Oh yea..."
And they kept walking forward, Miles moving more relaxed and Ashlyn walking with her hands behind her back looking up, head up high. He noticed very late but her hands have a dark spot. When he focused he noticed they were crosses on her palms. One on each palm, they looked like perfect tattoos. Just a normal black cross like those in Christian beliefs but he didn't pay it much attention, compared to everything else, it was an insignificant detail.
Her every word sounded so inspiring it's impossible not to calm down or be influenced by her. She had to be a mix of a mermaid and an angel. Her appearance was far too captivating and blinding like that of an angel, and her voice was the sweetest and comforting voice ever, like that of a mermaid's song. But that wasn't enough to stop him from having some doubt in his mind.
Miles: "Where are we going exa-"
Ashlyn: "Hussssshhhh, have some trust, I will take you somewhere where I will explain to you what I know."
Miles: "Okay..."
Musical notes seeped into his ears and soothed his troubled brain. They keep on walking slowly the same way for a couple minutes. Nothing about the forest really changes. Everything seems the same but he holds some faith in her for, no reason, but he still does.
Ashlyn: "Close your eyes please."
Miles: "But-"
Ashlyn: "Hush and trust." She said half-giggling.
He closes his eyes and she takes his hand to walk him along the forest and it makes him drop his guard and simply trust her.
-!!!, Ahhhhahhh, I have truly nothing to worry about, I'll just follow her. Her hands are delicate. They feel like flowers. How long will this go on? Ah doesn't matter, I'm fine with this...-
They walk around 100 feet until he feels leafs under his feet, green ones. There were no leafs the whole time he walked with his eyes open. So this is incredibly odd. Yet he decided to keep his eyes closed holding hope in her. He feels a couple vines hit his face as they keep walking another couple feet.
Ashlyn: "Open your eyes." She says into his ear after going behind him.
Miles: "-?!"
Miles: "Whoa! This is beautiful."
Ashlyn: "It's my field, the Field of H O P E.
A field of Irises. All green and purple full of life. All the same flowers yet different in their own way. A field of flowers standing from just his feet to past his knees. He looks up and sees a sky painted by the hands of Pierre-Auguste Renoir helped by God himself. A perfect baby blue with light clouds moving around making shapes, different shapes depending on the eyes who see them. He hears a sweet melody, like if Chopin composed it but he can't see where it comes from or track the sound to anywhere, as if the wind itself was playing it. His eyebrows all the way up and his jaw dropped in shock and in awe. Eyes sparkling with a new hope in them. A new hope for this place. A smile forms on his face as a breeze hits him.
Ashlyn: "This is, H O P E." She says standing beside him.
Miles: "I like H O P E."
Ashlyn: "If thats true then, feel me." She whispers.
Miles: "I want to feel you."
He says closing his mouth and walking into the field slowly, feeling the flowerers graze his hands as he walks. He stops at the center of the field where there are no flowers, just soft grass, and lays down on it. Ashlyn follows along and lays down too right beside him.
Miles: "So tell me."
Ashlyn: "Hmm?"
Miles: "Tell me. What IS this H O P E that everyone talks about? What's this hope I'M feeling?"
Miles: "Tell me. What are...you?"
Ashlyn turns her head to the left to face him while he just stays looking up, admiring every cloud. The she turns back and gazes up at the sky above her. She reaches up her right hand as to reach the sky and then looks at her cross.
Ashlyn: "That's a hard question because the answer isn't perfect. Superficially looking at hope, all it is is a wish or desire for a certain outcome of a situation. But I have to tell you, real H O P E is much more than that. Hope is present in every situation no matter how little. Hope is the feeling Kandata felt after seeing the spider thread appear in front of him. Hope is very similar to faith. Hope is a trust in the small probability of a future. It's a belief. You may be in a situation where your desired outcome is near impossible but hope is what tells you to attempt it either way and try your best for it."
Miles: "Is hope the same as the faith many people carry then?"
Ashlyn: "Yea, faith and kind are a brick of the same wall. They go hand in hand. Look at the cross i have here."
He starts running his fingers all over her palm looking at the cross.
Ashlyn: "The chances a God exists are low aren't they? But faith and H O P E are what make people believe in it. It pushes them to live their whole lives according to what a book says because of H O P E.
She turns to him with a kind smile on her face.
Ashlyn: "You haven't felt hope in a while right, Miles?"
Miles: "No..."
Miles: "Honestly, I thought it was stupid. I didn't think it was necessary in life. I thought I'd just live life as the time went on and follow what everyone else does. I-I was planning to just find a job and live alone forever 'till death finally knocked at my door and told me it was ti-"
Ashlyn: "You know Miles. I know everything that's happened to you."
Miles: "So-?"
He looks at her shocked.
Ashlyn: "Yes. I know what little Miles' hopes were as a kid. I know what they were before "it". I know what they are now too. They've almost vanished. Ever since that day they nearly disappeared, I almost disappeared. But you can still H O P E. Hope for a better future."
Her words resonated in his head as he processed what he heard. "I almost disappeared." -What does she mean by that? And how much does she know? But if what she says is true then, I guess I'll ask more...
Miles: "Is it possible to hope for the past..."
He muttered remembering the past. His eyes looking at everything and nothing.
Ashlyn: "You can H O P E you weren't the cause of his death..." She whispered sweetly.
Bullseye. His eyes start to get watery. Tears sliding down his eyes into the grass below. A frozen waterfall unfreezing suddenly and running once again. Running down a dry desert. A heart starts to beat harder and faster and his vessels dilating. A knot tied by fishermen on his throat and butterflies in his stomach too. A bad feeling yet a good one. Crying is usually a sign of sadness. But now it was a sign of relief. Miles needed to let some out, but like anyone he was holding as much back as he could but with her mermaid voice-
Ashlyn:"'Let it out'." She said sweetly like his mother and father once said. When Miles was a kid and feel on his bike and he was trying to hold the tears in and fake the toughness. Acting like a rock when being cotton inside. And once again she whispered in his ear.
Ashlyn: "Miles....let it all out, and get back up after. That's H O P E..."
Miles: " Augh...ahhhhh..." And he starts sobbing.
Ashlyn delicately grabs his hand and hold its tight while Miles lets out his pent up feelings. Her hands this time make him cry more only, but it's a good thing, this is how he will calm down.
Time goes on and he finally stops sobbing. He didn't talk "to let it out." Instead he "cried it out." He said in tears what he couldn't say in words. The tears talked for him. He felt renewed. He lay there for a while, still, completely still. Her hand still holding his. If she weren't holding it, he would've felt depressed about it. Crying without hope at the end is just nihilism. But crying with a smile after is what hope is.
Ashlyn: "Do you have H O P E now?"
Miles: "I have hope. I have you now."
Miles: "I still feel like hoping for too much or for something irrational is useless, but even then I can't help liking this feeling. For sole reason, I feel like no matter how low the chances of me finding happiness are, it's worth a shot."
Ashlyn: "That's what H O P E is Miles."
Miles: "I still don't understand everything right now. Im assuming your like a physical form of my feelings. I feel so dumb for feeling so calm with you. But I guess thats the whole point. In the small chance you are real and good, then I will hope and choose to believe in you."
Ashlyn: "You got the idea now, it's a simple feeling. Not much to it, but it's a strong feeling. You I like feeling you Miles."
Miles: "I never knew how much I would end up liking you either."
Ashlyn: "Let's go. We're leaving." She says standing up and letting go of his hand. He sits up too.
Miles: "What? why? I like it here." He says smiling from ear to ear.
Ashlyn: "Staying here too long will be dangerous." She said somewhat dryly, without that inspiration in her voice which shocked him a bit.
They get up and leave the field. The field wasn't infinite nor big. It was only 1/4 of a mile in radius. He noticed there were walls around very late. There was only an entrance and the walls were intertwined wood. The Field of H O P E was closed off from everything around it. Nothing could be seen from inside it or outside of it.
-Why'd we suddenly leave? It was all going well. So odd.- He thought to himself.
Outside was a bit of green around the Field of Hope but the rest was the same ugliness. They started walking again. He was trailing behind her again wondering where they were going. He notices there were tracks in front of Ashlyn. She was following them. But they weren't foot tracks. Rather it was softer sand. With dead white grass on it. It was very subtle but still noticeable to him. He was wondering if it was a good place where they were going, or if it was even a proper place. Mostly because he couldn't imagine any place being better than the Field of Hope.
Miles: "Oh I forgot to ask again. Do you actually not know anything about my chain?"
Ashlyn: "No, sadly I don't. But I'll ask when we get there."
Miles: "Where are we going?"
Ashlyn: "We're going to meet my best friend." She said without even looking back. But he could tell she was smiling subtly.
-Who? Who would her best friend be? Is it another "feeling"? I wonder how much time has even passed so far. I'm going to check my phone real quick... HUH?-
His phone did not give him a time. At all. It read 00:00.
-What in the hell? It's not giving me a time. That's so weird. Where am I really..."
He was completely weirded out but he just put his phone in his pocket again and stayed quite. Now it he understood where ever he was, was simply not the real world.
Ashlyn: "We are almost there..." she said in a sung tune.
He couldn't help but feel calmer. He started looking at Ashlyn again. She's actually not too short. She reaches around his forehead. Her hair looks really full of volume and lively now compared to earlier. Her nails were purple too.
-Wonder what my other feelings will look like. If i will meet any others. Ashlyn looks like what one would expect hope to look like. What would negative feelings look like?-
Ashlyn: "We're here."
She says pointing at a tree right in front of her. The only tree that's alive. It looks strong and well taken care of. It looks like a giant sequoia tree.
Miles: "Huh? What do you mean this is it? And why is this the only "living" tree?"
He observes more and as she smiles in silence. Then he gets closer to her and notices some kind of stairs on the tree.
Miles: "Who put those?
Ashlyn: "——"
Miles: "Wha- why are you so silent?"
She stares at him smiling. Then points up.
Ashlyn: "Her. She's the answer to all those questions."
He looks up only to see a small house up at the top of the tree and peeking over a small silhouette. A a radiantly yellow figure waving her hand at hyper speeds.
???: "Heyyyyyyyyyyy!!!!"
-No.... no no.-
Miles: "Another one ...?"