She had been there for hours; not that she was complaining. It was a warm summers day with a nice breeze and they were under the shade of an old oak tree. Overall it was a pretty pleasant experience. She only wished he would just say something, not that the silence bothered her, but so she would have some inkling of what he was thinking. He had his head in her lap and she was putting her hands through her hair while he lay there staring at the sky. Most days she was lucky to get more than a few sentences out of him he always just observed and thought. She was happy whenever he was around though no matter how quiet things got his presence made her feel like nothing else in the world mattered and she liked that. She just continued running her fingers through his hair, encountering knots at times but breaking them with ease. He had unruly hair and she wondered if sometimes he didn't even bother brushing it. He was strange in a lot of ways and no one seemed to have him figured out. She wondered if sometimes when he was thinking that maybe he was just trying to figure himself out. He had told her once that everything was beautiful and deserved to be admired, she only responded by saying what a wonderful thing that was to say. He stopped talking again after that and just looked at her, not in a creepy staring way but like he was observing every part of her. She loved to be looked at like that because it made her feel like the nothing else existed. The silence was finally broken as he said,"I wonder what the meaning of this all is." He got up and turned his head to face her and she knew that was enough.

A friend of mine asked me to add to this story when I showed it to him. He was extremely concerned about the tree so this next bit is for him.

In Regards to the Tree

It had been some time since there had been any people to see the tree. It was beginning to think it would never see another human again. Then one day a small human girl came to the tree and sat under its shade. After a few hours the humans father came to tell her it was time to eat. When he found her by the tree he asked how she would like to have her own tree house. In the months that followed the father worked on the tree house every day that the weather permitted him to. At first the nails bothered the tree but after some time it grew accustomed to it. When the tree house was finally finished the human girl returned and was there almost every day. After many seasons passed she wasn't a small girl anymore. And all the while she aged the tree was always there too. She brought her first boyfriend there. And came there crying after they broke up. The tree was like a good friend someone she could always count on. And eventually she grew up and wasn't around anymore until one day she returned and brought her husband to the tree house. And eventually she was showing her child her tree house. And so the tree wasn't alone again for a very long time. Finally many generations passed and the little girl was gone. And men came and decided the tree house was old and unsafe. So they tore down the house on the hill and cut down the tree. But eventually after many years passed a horde of humans approached the stump. The man who led the horde sat down on the stump and began to tell a story.