Chickentown, Minnesota. You know how when people are talking about ‘the middle of nowhere’? Even they aren’t picturing a place as dull and dimmed as Chickentown, Minnesota. A town who’s only claim to fame is… chickens. The chicken factory that nearly every person in town works at. So much to the point that no matter what happens in one person’s life, the whole town knows it by the end of the day once it’s been whispered in the chicken factory.

This was Candy’s life, too.

There was even a school that didn’t cater to the intellectual or the creatively-inclined but rather forced the lifelessness of the town down its students’ throats in hopes that that might intrigue them enough not to pack up their things and never return. The sad thing was the frequency that it actually worked. The town didn’t have a huge population, but the population it did have was comprised entirely of natives who had yet to even attempt to leave. Candy’s class was full of chicken-pride, and she was certain this was the town’s key to success.

While the town seemed to thrive on chickens, Candy’s misery only stemmed from them. The initial torture was in the school that crammed chicken-pride down her throat. Classmates who found her odd and off-putting just for not having certain level of pride for a town that was barely on the map in the first place. Her day was full of Deborahs and their hatred for her and desires to make her life miserable. And Miss Schartzes filled with so much love for chickens that there seemed to be no room for any dissent within their walls.

Yet surprisingly, this slow hell wasn’t the worst part of Candy’s day. The worst part of her day was the walk back to her home from school. The moment of calm before the brewing storm that was her father’s anger at the world, more often than not being directed at Candy herself. She almost felt like a lightning rod for trouble at this point. Her life was made miserable by drawing the hatred of her classmates and teachers at school, and made even worse by being the usual target for her father’s drunken rages.

It made these walks seem like the highlight of her day… hell even her entire life.

These walks were here brief moments of freedom from the stifling hell that was Chickentown. On these walks there was no taunting from classmates, no rage from fathers, no chicken-pride being crammed down her throat. It was just her. For a brief moment in time it was just… her.

That was why Candy drew out these walks. Why she let any little thing distract her from reaching her destination at a reasonable time. And today’s distraction was… well there was nothing to really describe or explain it. Every day Candy walked past the same houses, the same streets, the same fields that made up the town. But nothing was less noteworthy than the expanse of land past the town. Every day candy walked right past it, knowing that it held nothing of interest to her. And every day it continued to be…. Itself.

Yet today, as Candy trudged back to her home with the taunts of Deborah heavy on her mind, she felt a slight breeze that almost tugged her toward the field. And today…. She stopped. She stopped and looked out at the prairies beyond the town as the breeze died down. There was nothing there. Nothing to see. But for some reason… She felt almost drawn to that spot.

With a shake of her head Candy dismissed the thought and continued her walk back home where her father’s screams greeted her as she headed straight up to her room.