THINGS WE LOST IN SUMMER.

CHAPTER 4 - WISHING TREE.

Night pressed hard against the windows. Noah couldn’t sleep. The cassette sat on the dresser like it was watching him, daring him. He’d turned it over a hundred times, fingers tracing the worn edges, the faint blue letters Elia. But without a player, it was a sealed mouth, a voice trapped in plastic.

Every time he closed his eyes, he heard her laugh. Not faint. Not memory. Loud, alive, like she was right there beside him. Come on, Noah. Race you to the top.

He jolted awake more than once, heart pounding, sweat chilling his skin.

By morning, he couldn’t stay in the house. The silence there was too thick. He unfolded the map again. The next red X burned into his eyes The Wishing Tree.

He knew exactly where it was.

The walk there took him along the outskirts of the lake, water still and dark, reflecting a sky heavy with clouds. As a boy, the lake had been his escape swimming until his arms ached, floating until the world went quiet. But today it felt different.

Halfway down the dirt trail, he saw something carved into a tree trunk. His breath caught, initials N + E.

He touched it with trembling fingers. The bark is rough beneath his skin. A flash hit him, sharp and blinding.

Elia’s hand, clutching the knife, her grin daring. Don’t chicken out, Noah. We’re gonna be legends.

He remembered pressing the blade, carving the lines shaky but permanent. Her laughter spilling bright through the trees. That day had felt endless.

Now, the cut was grown over, weathered by time, but still there. Still them.

He pulled away fast, his chest tight, and forced himself down the path.

By the time he reached the Wishing Tree, the sky was dimming, clouds swallowing the light. The tree loomed massive, its trunk twisted, branches reaching like arms desperate for something out of reach. Its base was carved with dozens of initials, dates, symbols decades of wishes scratched into bark.

But Noah’s eyes went straight to one mark near the roots, a star not carved, drawn but in faded red ink.

His pulse jumped, Elia’s symbol. She’d drawn it everywhere her notebooks, her shoes, the back of her hand in Sharpie.

He crouched low, brushing dirt away. And there it was, tucked into the roots, wrapped in wax paper like some secret gift.

His hands shook as he pulled it free. Another note.

“If you’re here… don’t stop now.”

His stomach dropped.

The same looping handwriting. The same impossible truth.

The paper smelled of earth, faintly of pine, like it had been waiting all these years. He pressed it flat, desperate for more. But that was all. No explanations. Just another push forward.

Wind rushed through the branches, a low groan like a voice. The leaves hissed. He spun fast, certain someone was behind him.

No one. Just shadows.

Still, the feeling wouldn’t leave. Eyes on him. The same as yesterday at Dragon’s Nest.

He backed away from the tree, note crumpled in his fist, breath ragged. His body screamed to run, but his mind dragged him into the past back to that summer, back to this very tree.

Elia had stood barefoot in the dirt, her arms wide. This tree grants wishes, she’d whispered, eyes wild with belief. But only if you give it something back.

He’d laughed then. Like what?

She’d looked at him, serious, the kind of serious that made him quiet too. A secret. Something true. Something you don’t tell anyone else.

He’d stared at her, the bark rough against his back, the summer air thick around them. And then, clumsily, at seventeen, he’d said it I think I love you.

The memory ripped through him. He staggered, hand clutching the tree to keep steady.

She’d gone quiet then. Not laughing. Not teasing. Just staring at him with something unreadable in her eyes. And then she’d whispered back: Me too.

That was the last time she’d said it. The last time he’d heard it.

And a week later, she was gone.

Noah’s throat burned. He pressed the note to his lips, eyes shut tight.

The wind howled through the branches again, louder this time, and he swore he heard her voice tangled in it. Not laughter. Not love. A warning.

Don’t stop.

The words rattled in his head. He turned in a circle, searching the shadows, every muscle wound tight. The woods felt wrong now. Too quiet between the gusts. The kind of quiet that holds its breath before something breaks.

He shoved the note into his pocket and stumbled back onto the path, heart hammering.

Behind him, the Wishing Tree stood dark and bent against the sky, its roots gnarled like claws gripping the earth.

The next X waited on the map.

Ghost Rock.

And whatever Elia had hidden there, he wasn’t sure he wanted to find.

But he knew he couldn’t stop.

Not now.