You’ve never been the kind of person that others gravitate toward. For some reason, people always seem a little awkward around you, and you’ve never quite understood why—but after a while, you stopped trying to figure it out. Instead, you learned to just live with it. You’ve become good at keeping your own company.

It’s become routine for you to spend time in the woods, hiking up the mountains and finding a tree to climb. You usually make your way to the highest branch, where you can settle in with a book, or sometimes just sit and watch the wildlife—listening to the gentle splashing of the creek below. It’s peaceful, almost serene. It’s the kind of quiet that makes up for your lack of friends. Almost.

Nothing ever changes out there in the woods. It’s always the same—the same towering trees, the same birds chirping in the distance, the same small animals darting through the leaves. The only things that shift are the seasons—leaves falling in the autumn, then returning again with the spring. So, of course, you never expect anything different. Not today, not any day.

But…

Maybe you’re losing it, or maybe that kid over there is actually wrestling with a bear. Yeah, no, this has to be some kind of hallucination. You must finally be losing your mind.