Every day going forward, I would look out the front window towards that tree. Just as the other ones had before, it looked like it had creases where it shouldn’t. A tree so captivating in its grotesquity that I could not look away despite the fact that I really shouldn’t be as mentally attached to it as I was. Each day it took longer and longer for me to snap out and realise I hadn’t eaten anything all day, and as the time between my wake and my hunger pangs grew so too did the amount of lawn that had begun to wither, individual plants and blades of grass wilting and dying in a spiral pattern surrounding the tree, and with each day getting closer and closer to the house. The rate of rot gradually grew to the point of touching the house, eventually climbing up the wooden surfaces like a shadow painted onto the facade.
The rot grew to the windowsill, then towards the inside which caused the wood to shrink. Mum was so sick of it she had started to get contractors in for quotes to replace the rotted wood and hopefully get rid of the tree that seemed to be causing it all. Each of the contractors would investigate, get inside, touch the rot on the windowsill. As an animal in nature would change temperament when they notice a predator stalking them, so too did these people change as they stood within the shade of that tree touching the house. They changed, in an almost imperceptible way. After examining the area they all became irritable at questions about how this had occurred and refused to take the job or attempt any repairs when my Mum asked. For me, though, they were still irritable but at least gave the reason of “just don’t want to”.
I went to my room and started to watch videos online as I would normally do, and came across a curious video that was recommended to me, a Wizard telling whoever would watch about the truth of the world. I was curious, so I clicked on it- -and the video finished, I wasn’t even sure what I watched, it was something to do with being a superior version of the species, with hard skin to deflect against pain. It sounded like it had some appeal. It mentioned something about people being uprooted from traditional values by people who don’t understand their place, about how we should be above them. That didn’t sit right with me, there was some odd appeal to it but I knew that it shouldn’t have it. It struck an odd chord in my mind.
I went back to the kitchen to get a drink, I looked at the window frame that looked out into the tree that looked like it was wearing skin just outside the house. The tree stood out in the darkness somehow, as if it were well lit in the night without any external lighting. The odd darkness on the window frame had grown to encompass it, and somehow was darker than the darkness of night that was contained inside of it.
I drank my drink, tried to look away back towards the bedroom I came from and continued walking towards my room but I couldn’t help but look back at every step. I paced forwards and backwards down the hallway not really thinking about anything but unable to think of nothing. Before I realised it, I touched the darkness that framed the window. At first it felt like moist wood, maybe we had a water problem? My curiosity satisfied I began walking towards my room and was overcome by a deafening irritation, like my body wasn’t correct, my ears started ringing and I became disoriented. I couldn’t help but go outside into the dead of night where the tree sat and look around at the ground as if I were trying to identify something. I tried pawing at the ground with no real objective or progress, before I knew it I was in the garage grabbing an axe. The sound of knocking over cans and little scattered objects irritated me beyond belief and every time it happened I became more frustrated which caused more slip ups which caused more irritation. I went back outside with the axe and started attempting to cut the tree, I swung and made no mark, it made me think about the Wizard. I swung again and my joints felt like they were malformed and stretching while grinding against the rest of my body. I swung again and my Mum had come outside to ask what I’m doing, I shouted at her before I realised I was saying anything an went back to swinging. I swung again and stopped to realise I had accomplished nothing, there was no mark on the tree and all I had done was hurt myself and the people around me. I dropped the axe and went back inside to go to sleep.