The next day, Dan was only half-present. In his classes, either no one noticed or no one cared. Mr. Green, Dan's English teacher and the only one who would really realize he was acting a bit off, was absent again. (He had been so for the past couple days.)

He was lost in daydreams, thinking about what could be in the forest.

Even though it was literally just a flower, he wanted it to be more. He wanted it to be so much more.

He got home, made tea, then completed his homework. He practiced piano for a little while, just to occupy himself.

When he told Sarah he was going out again, she looked a little surprised.

"Again?"

"Gotta take advantage of the weather. I'll be back before dinner."

And although this was true and the lingering warmth of early November was fading, it was mostly about exploring the forest.

He had around an hour and a half, because Sarah was one for routines and they always had dinner at eight.

It was a little colder than yesterday, Dan noticed as he huddled into his sweater and vest. Enough that by the time he reached the stretch of forest he'd been in yesterday, the tips of his nose and fingers were a bit numb.

He slipped off his bike and this time propped it up against the tree to his left. There was no one in this town who'd steal it, he knew.

And he stepped into the woods.

He wasn't really sure of what he expected; maybe for daffodils to start sprouting in his wake or for the daffodil goddess to pop up from the ground and inform him of his quest.

But what he found was a small, shriveled form of the white and yellow flower, pulled up cleanly and seemingly drained of life.

Dan knelt down and picked it up, twirling the brittle stem in between his long fingers.

It seemed perfectly healthy just yesterday; what had happened?

It could have been anything, Dan's brain supplied. An animal could have bitten it, someone could have cut it, the weather could have gotten to it. Really, you're overthinking a normal thing.

Dan was just about to finally give in to the voice of reason when he heard what sounded awfully like a sob.

His head whipped around, so fast it hurt, but Dan didn't care. He stood, then stayed absolutely still. Who else was there?

"Hello?" he tried. The only response came from the wind whistling through the trees.

Had it just been a bird? There were odd noises from the lot of them quite often.

A twig snapped, from somewhere to Dan's right, and he turned in that direction slowly, not wanting to alarm whatever -- or whomever -- it was.

He had headed out early for this exact reason: to catch the last stretch of sunlight before evening struck.

And with the still-golden sunlight streaking across the sky, Dan could barely make out a dark figure in the shadow of a particularly thick maple.

There was another sob, and despite Dan's empathy for the person, a wave of relief swept through him at the admission that he was not going crazy and hearing things.

"Hello?" he tried again, more cautiously this time.

A slight rustle. Maybe the person was shifting on their feet, making the dead leaves crackle.

It wasn't someone he knew, that was for sure. Everyone in this town was aware that Dan was about as harmless as it got; they wouldn't be hesitant to reveal themselves.

The flower held loosely in Dan's right hand twitched, startling Dan to the point where he jumped and dropped it.

Taking his eyes off the figure, he bent down to pick it back up and abruptly stopped.

Right before his eyes, the daffodil was writhing, growing. Coming back to life.

Dan scrambled back, heart beating out of his chest.

Roots grew slowly out of the severed bottom, and the leaves lost their lack of luster. The petals straightened and stretched themselves out.

From his position on the forest floor, Dan looked up at the maple.

The figure was no longer there.

Dan checked his watch, which read 6:58. He'd planned for almost another hour of exploring.

Oh well. He knew it was about that person in the maple tree, but they were gone now, and likely now coming back anytime soon.

Dan brushed his curly hair out of his eyes and dusted off his overalls, finally taking stock of just how cold he was. He rubbed enough warmth back into his hands to be able to feel his fingers, then scooped up the flower, which had stopped moving.

He lay it down in his bike's basket as he pedaled home the long way, mulling over what had just happened.

There wasn't much to mull over, seeing as he had no idea what had just happened.

But he did imagine quite a bit about that mysterious figure.

They seemed to be around his own height, but Dan couldn't be sure. It was too far, too dark.

When he walked through the back door, he could see his sister when he passed the hallway Sarah was sitting in the doorway of her room. (She liked to sit in doorways, bending her long legs up to her chest; it was very inconvenient if you weren't watching where you were going.) She looked up when she heard him.

"Back already?"

"I just couldn't stay away," Dan teased. "Missed you too much." It wasn't really teasing, though, because a similar situation had occurred just two weeks ago, where Dan had come home when he missed Sarah.

"Colder than you expected?" she guessed, taking in his red cheeks and nose.

"Mmhmm," he agreed, taking off his vest and walking into his room. He lay the daffodil on top of his dresser, then went out into the kitchen to fill a jar with water. He placed the restored flower into the water, then put the jar on his desk.

He came out minutes later with a blanket wrapped around himself, then slid down into his own doorway to face her. (Their rooms were right across the hall from each other.)

"How's Ross?" Dan asked.

Sarah nodded. "He's good. A little stressed out, because he's gotta catch up n'all that, but he's good." Ross, Sarah's best friend, was recently hospitalized from a car crash. He'd been sent home earlier today.

"Do you wanna invite him over soon? Not tonight, but maybe sometime this week?"

"I think he'd like that." Ross already ate with them at least once a week anyway; he was practically a part of the family.

They fell quiet, but not awkward-quiet. More like each-caught-up-in-their-own-head quiet. Dan and Sarah were both daydreamers. Minerva crawled into Sarah's lap and started purring loudly as the girl scratched her ears.

Both siblings were drawn out of their respective reveries as Sarah's watch beeped, reminding her of the time.

"Well, I gotta go make dinner," Sarah said, drawing herself up from her sitting position in the doorway.

"M'kay," Dan replied, watching her go, then going back into his own room to examine the flower.

When he took it out of the jar and lay it flat against the pale wood of his desk, it looked perfectly healthy.

In fact, it may have even looked better than it did while it was in the ground.

Because it's warmer in here, Dan told himself. But somehow, that didn't squash the lingering fact that the figure in the maple tree had definitely done something to it.

Dan decided that he'd take the flower in tomorrow, that his science teacher would let him borrow a microscope after class.

Looking at the flower under a magnified lens did nothing to help his confusion.

The daffodil had something strange in its cells, but Dan couldn't compare it to any others because it was November and they were all dead.

It was something yellow, a small stream of a golden fluid, making its way through the flower.

Dan looked closely at the stem and realized it was turning the slightest bit yellow.

Whatever was happening, the figure in the maple tree could explain it, Dan was sure.

So he carefully tucked the microscope back into the cabinets and made his way out of the room. He unlocked his bike from the bike rack and set off on his way.