Reagan Cooper would have found the place eventually. He wouldn’t have needed to be told the way, whether by friend, or by dream. He had a way of getting into places he shouldn’t. He had a way of doing what he wasn’t allowed.

Rows of similar houses hurried by. He sped on his BMX bike past an array of privacy, chain-link, and white picket fences. The rain clouds had passed over, leaving a light blue sky over well-tended lawns. No one was out in the brisk October afternoon. TV’s flickered to life behind ivory-curtained windows on either side of him. The street below rolled forward into a soon-to-be sunset on the far western border of Hedgeburg.

“Lets check it out,” Drew said.

Nicholas nodded. “When?”

Reagan hadn't brought a compass, or a canteen, or a backpack of oddments like Drew would have, neither did he dress in combat fatigues like Nicholas. He had nothing to amplify the game. He wouldn’t pretend he was a lone wolf soldier stalking a nameless jungle, or a knight boldly charging forth on a fantastic quest. He would be himself, because he had a strong sense that life really was a game after all.

“Saturday,” Drew said.

“And what about you?” Nicholas asked, looking intently at Reagan.

Reagan sighed silently into the wind. Briefly closed his eyes. The cool bike-ridden breeze danced through his tangled brown hair and denim jacket. It was freedom. For a moment.

“I’m not allowed to.”

The twelve-year-old had fled the confines of his yard that Thursday afternoon after his friends had left. His yard was large, nearly three full acres sleeping inside tall, neatly trimmed bushes. It was full of choice geography and set middle of the block near the south side of the small town. His friends often congregated on his island, making his confinement bearable, would have also gone a long way into making him chief, but Nicholas or Drew held that position. Whoever was in command, there was many a game to be played. Sometimes though, when opportunity arose, when the confinement, and the game got the better of him, Reagan would set off into Hedgeburg alone.

His friends were talking a lot the past few days, which is how the games usually began, and while he didn’t understand the things they were talking about, they seemed to be exciting things, mysterious things; things, for better or worse, he had a great longing and desire to know. This longing and desire for adventure would well up in him, like a grape ready to burst on the vine. It was at once a wonderful, uncontrollable, and miserable feeling.

His friends had been talking and were now getting ready to start doing. This was their pattern. He desperately wanted to be the one doing this time—and by himself too—before Nicolas and Drew and everyone else did what they did: make him hear a story about it. Hear about how much fun it was. Just like always. It made him ache inside. He would have to listen. The grape would burst. The listening was like being devoured.

He was now crossing bridgeway avenue, almost to his destination. Reagan loved this end of town. The houses were more sparse here, the lawns larger, less contained, closer to meadows. It smelled of soil, wet grass, and dark drying asphalt.

He pedaled harder. His tires hummed to the road beneath him. Up ahead, enclosing the horizon, lay a rich summer forest with a golden field spread out before it, and guarding the field, in such an odd lonely location, the town laundromat.

“What do you think’s down there?”

“I have no idea.”

Reagan coasted up to the squat white building and dismounted. He walked his bike alongside him, noting the impassable fence that extended to the neighboring properties. He peered behind black decal-letters that read LAUNDR-O-MAT that were stuck to a large rectangular window. Fluorescent lights hummed inside. Several washers and dryers stood sentinel. Faint odors of fabric softener and warm clothing wafted on the air. All was as he remembered it.

He looked first at the house to his left, then to his right, then to the ones behind. Satisfied no one was watching, he pulled open the front door and cautiously walked his bike inside. Nicholas stood in the corner, startling him—no, he realized, it was only a t-shirt dangling over a vending machine of stale crackers and detergent boxes. All was peaceful here and unmolested. He moved to the back door of the laundromat and exited with his bike as quickly as he could.

Behind the Laundromat a trail lead off through the field to the edge of the Woods.

“I used to go down to that part of the woods all the time,” Nicholas said. “There’s just the creek.

“Maybe it’s down there now,” Drew said.

The Woods, as they called it, was huge and utterly encircled Hedgeburg like a vast wooden ocean. What lay behind the laundromat was merely one arm of it—a notably primeval arm. Despite its size and omnipresence, one couldn’t just enter the Woods from anywhere. Some portions were behind private, dog-guarded property, others grew inaccessible due to layout, some were just uninteresting, and there were always fences to contend with. However, there were many portals into the Woods, if one really wanted to go, and Reagan knew most of them—including the one he presently passed through.

He brought out the kickstand and considered the overgrowth ahead. A powerful feeling washed over him—the undeniable feeling that pulled him through life—the longing and the desire, the wonder with the soft touch of sadness. Fear of punishment came almost as quickly. He had an idea to go back, to avoid trouble. But, he realized he was already in trouble, and since he was here, he sat off down the path into the Woods.

“We all had the dream though. Unless someone’s lying.”

The dead grass and vegetation was tall and rough but barely withstood him. He reached the brambles marking the start of the Woods soon enough and the rusty barbed wire fence that encompassed it. He scouted around for some kind of trail inside, for the one he followed had disappeared. After finding none, he grabbed a branch and vaulted over using the spring action of the solitary line of ancient barbed wire that had fused into the surrounding trees.

Reagan looked back at his bike and the somber dark blue sky toward the south east.

“What about you?”

“I’m not allowed to.”

He moved forward.

Ahead was a dense tangle of undergrowth and briers that tore into his jeans and legs as he moved through. He also noted level ground was quickly giving way to the descent of a steep bluff, leading, he saw, sharply down into a world of eldritch trees and deep green adventure.

After a few moments spent looking for a path and handholds, he gave up and just slid down the verdant hill, damaging his jeans further.

On reaching bottom, a few bird and insect chirps greeted him. He heard something that sounded like running water. The creek. He’d heard stories. How bridges would sometimes be built across; fishing; swimming even. This whole place, he saw, would have been perfect for a game of War or Hide n’ Seek. It was amazing—not like the part close to home, which amounted to little more than a weedy overgrown lot.

All concerns of punishment left him. He wanted to press on as far as he could. If there was a punishment, it would be over soon enough.

“Don’t go down there, Reagan. Don’t go without us. We all had the dream. We all saw what was behind it.”

Why was he here again? The game. Yes, it was that ultimately. But there was something else. Drew said the creek, if followed, would lead to a... pioneer cemetery. A cemetery they all should avoid. Yes! And that was what all of this was about. Wasn’t it?

He had pretended about having the dream, so they wouldn’t suspect.

The cemetery was what this was really about. An old cemetery was perfect. That was what the game about having dreams was for—so they would have an adventure finding the cemetery—an adventure Reagan wasn’t allowed to attend. Not this time though. He would get there first, before Drew and Nicolas made it just another story. Another one of their stories.

But he realized now, having been pulled along by longing and desire only, that he had no idea where to find this cemetery, or even the creek leading to it.

Still, he pressed on, believing he would find what he was looking for.

He climbed over and slid down several other bluffs, and his excitement swelled as the sound of moving water grew louder.

The creek arrived soon enough.

It was a bit anti-climactic. For one, it smelled foul. Like a sewer. For two, it was shallow and narrow—not the rushing river he’d imagined. Certainly the cemetery would be better.

“All things pull toward us,” Drew said.

He followed the creek for what seemed like a few minutes, admiring the forest, the dry but still colorful wildflowers, the brittle cascade of leaves falling down the wind. He came to forks now and then and took which paths seemed best to him.

He’d been there, going this way and that, taking everything in, for a very long while. At some point, he became suddenly aware of himself; where he was; what had happened. He looked above. The sky had grown dark gray.

“But nothing is on our side,” Nicholas said.

The longing and desire departed like a traitor, leaving worry in its wake.

How long had he been out? Drew and Nicholas had left when the rain started. The rain had lasted about half an hour and had just finished when he slipped away with his bike. How long had he been gone? It might have been a couple hours. He had no idea. Time had gotten away from him. What if they were looking for him? He hadn’t hidden his bike very carefully. What if someone noticed it behind the laundromat?

This game was over. The cemetery would have to wait. He would be in a lot of trouble now.

“What about you?”

He turned back and realized he had no idea where he was.

The creek wound and split confusingly. Nothing looked familiar to him. The sky was growing dark and a dense fog came lurking in.

Reagan strained his ears to hear a sound of Hedgeburg, but there was nothing but birds and insects.

He moved quickly in what he hoped was the way he came, hurriedly crossing several bends, then climbing and sliding down several bluffs. Afterward, he was filthy, exhausted, and completely lost.

He collapsed on the ground. Sleep began to overtake him.

He laid on the wet floor of the woods for a few moments more before deciding he had to act.

“I’m not allowed to.”

Not very far away at all, set a clearing of small white stones.

It was the cemetery. The pioneer cemetery. Hope welled in him.

Other than several tall trees, the flora here was scant. Further on, the weathered white stones dotted outward into the deepening fog, and he saw the crest of a hill. He walked toward it. The ground was soft and mossy. He could almost believe he saw a glowing portal ahead.

Regardless of that, if he could just leave some kind of token behind in the cemetery, chip a stone, anything, something proving he was here—then what? The game would be his. The story, for once, would be his to tell, and they’d be forced to listen, to be devoured.

Maybe then...what? It would all come crumbling down.

Escape.

As he followed the gentle rise, he saw that it ended abruptly in front of him. There was the glowing portal. The door leading to worlds untold.

He shook his head. Sighed. It was too late now. There was no glowing portal. Not now. Not here. It was pretend. He knew that something like that couldn’t possibly exist here. In his imagination, certainly, but not in Hedgeburg. He could pretend it, but that was it. If it had been really real they would have found it. They would have enclosed it. This, whatever it was, glowing in front of him, this mental picture, this pretend, was just another hedge. Another fence.

As these disparaging thoughts fluttered around, he decided he might as well just leave—just give up and turn the other direction and walk until he smacked into a wall, or a house, or even another arm of the Woods, closer to home. He'd deny this to his friends. All of this. Then he'd forget the whole thing, like the inevitable spanking, the moment it was over. He turned back.

Drew and Nicholas stood in his way.

Reagan starred at them for what seemed like a very long while. They stood motionless.

“What?” Reagan asked.

As he watched, more shapes moved from behind tall ancient trees and out of thick gray fog. Another Drew. Another Nicholas. Then more. And more still. Soon, the entire Woods, the entire green wooden ocean that fenced-off Hedgeburg from everywhere else was full of them.

“You pretended to us.” Drew said in unison. It was a roar that shook worlds down.

“Why did you ruin our game?” Nicholas demanded.

Reagan thought about the question. He was caught. He would have to answer.

“Remember, Reagan. It is best you do as we say. Always. We care for you. Stop pretending to us. We are your friends.”

Reagan was lost in dark nothing. Tumbling backwards. Reaching for something. Anything. The roaring voices echoed around him.

“You’re not my friends!” Reagan yelled. “You keep me here and feed off my wants!” He paused for a moment, mustered his strength, then screamed with all his might like an insolent child: “I never get to have anything!”

“If you knew that,” the voices softly asked, “Why did you come here?”

There was silence. A deep conciliatory silence. Reagan now found himself laying in the well-tended backyard beneath a somber blue sky, in a cell of tall hedges, on the south side of town.

“Because,” Reagan sighed into the all-consuming, ever-present, green wooden ocean. The longing and the desire had pulled him into this trap. He should have listened. Listened to the real Drew. To the real Nicholas. They’d both had the dream about the door in the cemetery and the prison it opened up on. They’d warned him. He shouldn’t have went into the Woods that day alone. He shouldn't have went there at all.

But he didn’t tell them that.

“Because I’m not allowed to,” he said to the devouring silence, and defiantly shut his eyes.