A New Woman

"Sam! Sam, I know you're in there!" Gia rattled the door handle, and the cheap interior lock popped open. She burst in, catching Sam and the dryad in flagrante delicto. Gia clutched a bucket of chemicals in her hands.

"Gia, no!" Sam cried.

"Aha!" Gia said. "I knew it!" With that, she flung the weed killer over the nut-brown nature spirit. Sam leapt aside.

The dryad, dripping wet, glared peevishly at them both.

"You're... you're alive," Sam said.

"Of course," the dryad answered. She thumped on the trunk of the tree in the pot beside her. "Plastic tree. Plastic dryad."

Baptism

A green-skinned woman clung to the wooden post. Overhead, the sign read, "Sycamore Lane."

"You know that's not a real sycamore tree, right?" said Donny.

The dryad turned nut-brown eyes to him. She nodded.

"Don't you gotta live in a tree?"

Another nod.

Donny scratched his head. "So how come you're here?" The dryad turned to look down the street. Donny followed her gaze. "My house is the fourth one down," he said.

"I am the last," said the dryad, not turning around. "The others... did you not wonder at the name of your street? This is our only memorial."