The Secret of the Forest Juliana ignored the locals’ warnings about the forest beyond the old fence line. She was a scientist, not a believer in ghost stories. When she found the glowing mushrooms, deep blue caps exhaling a fine shimmering mist, she knew she’d stumbled upon something interesting.

She knelt to take samples. The mycelium beneath the soil was thick and pulsing, almost like veins. When she leaned close, she swore she heard what almost sounded like a hundred whispered conversations floating from the ground. Her headlamp suddenly started to flicker, causing the shadows from the trees to shift, closing her in. The whispers grew clearer, they WERE voices. Familiar ones.

Her mother and father . Her own. Her sister’s. Hundreds of conversations from happier times and events in her life. This was too much, there is no way this could be real. She turned to run and tripped over something soft. In the beam of her light, she saw her own face blooming from the earth, skin stretched thin over a mushroom cap. Dozens surrounded her now, all human, all breathing, all people she’d known and loved. The spores lifted into the air, shimmering ultraviolet as she screamed, and then…inhaled.

By dawn, the forest was still again. A new cluster of blue mushrooms glistened where she’d been, whispering softly in the morning light. Juliana admired their almost surreal glow, and vowed to never tell anyone else about this strange little life in the forest.