The Wolves

A pack of wolves, they had said affronting the demise of attractiveness. She pursued, determined and deaf to the advice she didn't seek to find that beyond the sulking forest life hid the death of her curious ills. She had nothing to protect herself with except her nagging persistence, a red riding hood that made her invisible to her own wounds. With each little step, the forest grew darker, the bark and skins became hardened amber, the leaves became green and jaded. There was a frightening howl from the inside she heard this from across the path like ghosts circumventing the heart of graveyards. Her way forked into not just two paths, but four, each way representing the call to elements -- life, money, career, and love -- split before her like four suits to a deck of cards, where, to pick one card would mean to deal with the whole pack. And on this nook she had been affronted by a pack of wolves. They had said too much to the ill demise of her naivete.