Quote:
The Least Traveled Path (12) : In addition to the beautiful seasonal displays, the local botanical garden has set up a beautiful winter maze. Dense, lopsided fir trees that couldn’t be sold for holiday decor have been utilized to create the walls. The ability to disappear in the maze is impressive; the trees are so dense that it’s impossible to see through them, and if you try to push through them you’ll only wind up scratching or cutting yourself. You’re never really too far from the entrance or exit, and you can hear the voices of other people exploring the maze, or the celebrations at the festively decorated pavilion, but the deeper you get, the further away from all of those things you feel. For a moment, it feels like you’ve wandered into some alternate universe; the voices disappear and you feel alone. You can’t hear anyone–and they can’t hear you. You can’t see anything over the tall maze walls, and no matter where you go, you can’t seem to find your way out. Everything starts to feel cold and distant–and then suddenly all color, all smells, all sounds return. You still feel a little out of place but it’s nothing you can’t shake off. If you could just find your way out of here, first.
In the spirit of continuing to vlog all the fun things that the city was putting on for the winter season, to mine as much Content TM as she could out of the experience, Lianhua made her way to the winter maze the city had set up. Honestly, it was a great idea--and long enough that it was easy for her to wander and just...chat while streaming away. She was careful to obscure her route a little, lest people feel she was spoiling the maze for fellow locals, but really, it seemed to have plenty of viable paths and that felt like a silly concern overall.
Chatting away at her viewers was the easiest thing in the world, given the chance. This was why she loved doing the Influencer Thing; getting to reach out to people in a way that would have been impossible otherwise. Getting to talk about her day and gossip about her latest hookup or her brother's relationship with his Ridiculous Giant Boyfriend, tell people that she had run into the fabled snow bunnies with him, even whine about the stupid cinnamon fog and get a couple acknowledgements from other Destiny City locals that they had too.
It made her feel...less alone. Like someone wanted her around, even if it was just strangers on the internet. And no, she was not going to evaluate that any deeper. It wasn't a pleasant thing to think about, and she would rather not, simple as that. Instead, she turned her camera on the surroundings, taking in the gorgeous firs and chattering on about how they made a much more fun maze wall than say, hedges or corn, didn't everyone agree that they were so much fun?
Really, she almost didn't notice when the chatter of other visitors started to fade away. It was only natural, wasn't it, drawing closer to the center of the maze? She'd find her way back eventually, obviously. and if she herself got quieter as she wandered, that was just her taking in the sights. Nothing to worry about.
Until she paused in her walk, and it felt as if everything, fro a moment, faded away.
It was as if the rest of the world had disappeared into the background of her awareness. As if she'd made a single wrong turn into a dead end, and suddenly there seemed to be no way out.
And yet....she didn't feel panicked. Just...alone.
She turned around to go back the way she'd come, and suddenly everything seemed to snap back into place. Her eyes drifted to her phone, and she winced--chat was lit up with [Is she okay?] [Just stanidng there...] [Hey flowergirl, you good?]
Maybe two dozen messages, from different people, asking if she was okay.
"Sorry chat," she said, a little guiltily, "just got a little lost in the magic of winter! Didn't mean to worry anybody, I'm good now!"
A lame excuse, sure, but the wave of relieved messages indicated that people were buying it.
...Now she just needed to find her way out of the maze.
[wc: 511 words]
