When You Were Young

Wendell bumped into Samantha as an owl hooted. "I want to go home," he whined for the millionth time since they'd left.

"Shut up," Prudence said.

"We're lost," he said.

"We're not lost. We just haven't found what we're looking for yet," she said. She picked Samantha up off the ground and then set out once again.

"What are we looking for?" he asked. Samantha thought this to be a good question. In the hours of stumbling through the darkness, getting dirt all over her pretty dress, they didn't seem to be any closer to finding anything.

"I don't know. I'll know when I see it," Prudence said.

"But how?" Samantha asked.

"Trust me, I'll know. Now could you two shut up? I can't hardly think with you two carrying on," Prudence snapped.

Samantha began to cry and threw herself back to the ground. "I'm tired," she said. Her belly growled. "And hungy."

"Then maybe you should go back," Prudence said. "It was your idea to leave in the first place."

"I didn't wanna come out here," Samantha said. "It's dark and scawy and dirty." Wendell seconded this with a nod.

"You two are such babies. I'm going on by myself and you can do whatever you want." Prudence stuck her nose in the air and spun around. She marched off into the trees, leaving Wendell and Samantha to shiver in the dark.

"Pwoodance, come back," Samantha called.

Wendell looked all around and then sank to the ground next to her, sobs wracking his body. "We're lost," he said. "I want to go home! I want Mommy."

She put an arm around his shoulders, hugging him close. "Pwoodance wiw come back. She won't weave us here."

"Yes she will. She hates me."

"No she don't. If she hated you, she wouldn't bwought you. She didn't want to weave you."

Wendell considered this a moment. "You think so?"

"Why else she bwing you?"

"To get rid of me," he said. "Then she won't have me around anymore."

"We can find her," Samantha said. She got to her feet and then helped Wendell up. "You can have these. They keep you safe from any bad things." She handed the tiara and scepter from the princess costume to him.

"Are you sure?" he asked as he put the tiara on. She nodded and took his arm, leading him in the direction Prudence had gone. They didn't get far before they heard a monster wailing and thrashing in the brush ahead. "It's going to eat us!" Wendell screamed. He pulled on Samantha's arm, but she couldn't move.

This is it, she thought. I'm going to Heaven now like Molly's mama. I should have stayed home. I never should have left. In that moment it wasn't Veronica she realized she'd miss but Molly. Molly who had treated her so kindly and gently, just like a real mother. When Molly woke up tomorrow and found them gone, she would feel so sad. Samantha thought of Molly crying by the hearth earlier as she spoke of her lost mama. Now Samantha, Prudence, and Wendell were all lost. I'm sorry, she thought, resolving to go back if she were spared.