text: Morning light filtered through the canopy overhead. The lilting song of a thrush broke through the last remnants of twilight, heralding the start of the new day. A hand twitched amongst the leaf strewn meadow. The meadow air felt thick to this stranger who had appeared as if from thin air. The young girl finally rose to a seated position, her rumpled dress wrinkled and flowing about her as she looked about the grassy meadow, a clear look of growing surprise on her face. Her green eyes settled upon the five standing stones that rose ominously around her, their moss-covered surfaces staring blankly back at her as if they she disturbed their quaint little gathering. Niamh tried to work out what had happened since last night as she shook the sleep from her mind. She recalled having a fight with her parents, a silly argument over a boy she had been seen with yesterday afternoon. Her father had heard about the innocent tryst between the two from a nosey neighbor. Much was said but she only recalled her father forbidding it and what would her mother think? In her anger she had cursed at him and ran off into the woods leading behind their house, scurrying under the picket fence where boards hung loosely. She remembered a thick fog settling in around her much like a thicket blanket. Before she knew it, she could see no further than the nose on her face. Stumbling further forward, she had left the wooded path in into a clearing. In her haste, she become increasingly tired by this point and decided it best to rest in the quaint clearing. At least the ground was soft and adorned with moss and leaves, providing a soft bedding for her to lay upon. However, it appeared she had taken more than just a short respite and instead fallen deep asleep. Attempting to gain her bearings as she looked around, she noted a small ring of mushrooms had formed about her makeshift bed and appeared to fall within the circle made by the stones standing like guardians over them. This sent a chill through her body and she began to worry a little as the coincidence eerily resembled stories she was told of by her grandmother. "No, no, pay those stories no mind. Only old tales of fae and magic, children's stories to entertain and scare children into behaving. I'm no child.." she told herself. Gathering her dress about her, she rose and took off in the direction she thought was home. Angry father or not she felt a sudden urge to return home, unable to shake the nagging feeling of the concentric circles she'd awaken to. Leaving the clearing, she hoped she hadn't strayed far from the path. She breathed a sigh of relief when she came across a group of loose rocks she knew and played upon as a child. Picking up the front of her dress to keep from tripping she picked up the pace and soon broke through a gap in the trees to what would be the familiar sight of her home she knew to be just on the other side. ...only it wasn't there. In place of her house with picket fence and driveway leading to the street of the cul-de-sac she lived on was only a small, almost wild looking clearing. Amongst the weeds and short grass, a squat thatch roofed house made from timber rose before her. Gone were the SUVs that lined the road up and down her block. In their place, cows with their silly gaping faces stared back at her with their jaws endlessly working on the cud tucked away in their cheeks. Sheep milled around, grazing on long grass as their blunted teeth gripped and tore the blades of verdant green from the ground. From the thatch roofed home emerged a man, clad in an old kilt and tunic, looking as if he was posing for a historical reenactment of an 18th century Irish highlander painting. Niamh slowly realized her grandmother may not have been blowing smoke up her backside about the fae folk stories. Perhaps she wasn't mistaken and had just been whisked away to a time closer to 1800 than her own year of 2020. "Oh, this cannot be happening right now. I'm going to wake up and realize this was nothing but a bad dream." She pinched her cheeks till tears formed in her eyes but the idyllic scene before her remained unchanged.