Quest 233

[primrosella]

[Private || Hackable by Friends]

Next week is Givin Thanksgiving, isn't it? The fourth Thursday of the month, I think it was. That's a week from tomorrow, then, and my third one here. It'll be the first one I've ever spent without Sam, too.

I said the same thing about October, last month--that it'd be my first October without Sam. I remember I was worried that it would be horrible without him or Blue here, since I always counted on them so much for all those little things that I never noticed they did until they were gone. And it did turn out rather horrible, didn't it? Or at least, it seemed more horrible than other Octobers have been. My first one here didn't seem very troublesome at all, but then last year's was awful with the monsters and the cannibals and that awful pumpkin patch. Of course, it did end on a good note with all the visitors coming to see us and to see it off, so perhaps that has something to do with the way I remember it.

It probably also has something to do with why this one seemed to end so sadly by comparison, since I did have such hopes that it would be the same, and I'd get to see them all again. And it's not just Sam and Blue, either--I miss Mother and Daddy, too. And I miss Daventry. I didn't even get to see it in my dreams, the way I usually do; I usually like that curse, and have pleasant dreams for it, but this time I only had nightmares and they were of Tamir, of all things. Tamir and that awful spider Rumplestiltskin. Ugh.

And the first of next month, it'll be six months without Sam. A whole half a year without him around. Did I ever think I might someday have to go this long without him around? The other times he left, it was for hours or days. And now, already, I'm counting it in months.

I remember when I first got here, how strange it was to think I'd been gone a month. I remember counting them all, watching the second of every month, because it meant I'd gotten one month closer to being here a year. And then it seemed as though everything changed when it was, because a year was something important, something meaningful. It meant I'd count everything differently from then on. And now I'm doing the same for Sam being gone, counting months again. I'm almost to half a year, now.

Will I still be here when it's a year since he had to go back to save his world?

June first. Just two months away from my second-year anniversary, when he left. And then Blue was gone my anniversary month, himself. August is always a terrible month near the end.

And it's almost the twenty-first of November. Four months and five days left until I turn twenty. Twenty! Mother would have a fit if she knew. And poor Alexander is still only seventeen, back home, because I've lived all these years without him and they're all stuck in that moment, waiting for me.

I've changed quite a bit since I came here, haven't I? Am I still that girl Sam came to rescue from the fountain all those years ago, now that I know some magic and I'm learning to drive the car and I can coax the Library into most anything, with a little luck? I can cook boxed food in the microwave without any trouble and I can recognize curses when they repeat and I know how the random weekends work, even if I still hate them at times when they make me do something horribly embarrassing. I'm not frightened when I wake up as a bird, and I plan my Halloweens with costumes that I'm not afraid to turn into, and I look at some months of the year and expect them to be bad while trusting that others will be good. I can press the right buttons to watch Sam's movie when I miss him, and I have a whole closetful of dresses--modern and old-fashioned alike--that I can wear and have worn to all sorts of events, and I'd never think of building a fire on the floor of the kitchen to cook over, now. Am I still that girl?

"Choosing one thing doesn't have to mean rejecting the other", Dr. Chase said.

I wish I didn't have to learn magic to protect myself, rather than doing it to help protect my family when I get home. I wish I didn't need the magic defenses around the Warehouse to hide behind when I'm afraid. I wish I'd never had the thought that I ought to learn to drive a car because someday someone might be injured as badly as Sam and I'd need to take them to the hospital in a hurry. I wish my friends were never hurt so badly that I'd have to take them there in the first place. I wish I didn't have to practice with a sword because I'm afraid of being defenseless, and because someday a bow and arrows won't be enough.

I hate the feeling that it's not enough. I used to be able to whistle for you, Mother, and you'd always come running for me. Did you ever feel this way, once upon a time? Were you and Daddy always afraid for me because of what happened to Alexander, and I was just too young or too foolish to notice?

I remember a day when I never thought I would see my eighteenth birthday. Now I'm coming up on my twentieth.

Sam...all those years ago, when you told me it always gets better? And all these years, I've consoled myself with it, imagining that you told it to me because of this time or that, this catastrophe or that chaos? I think I see, now, what you really meant when you said it. Why you needed to tell it to me. And I remember what else you told me, too, the time when you met me the same way. When I came back from sometime in the future to speak with you, and you carried a message for me. I still remember it.

The trouble with messages like that, with learning that bit about the future, is that it's hard to tell the time when they were meant to be used. There are plenty of stories that way--magic rings or tokens or gifts that ought to be used or opened in moments of greatest peril--and the hardest part is that the hero has to know when it's really the moment of greatest peril, so he can properly use his gift. If he guesses wrong the one way, he'll use it up when he didn't need it, and the magic will go to waste; if he guesses wrong the other, he'll save it too long and it will be too late, and it'll never be used at all because the moment will pass and end in failure.

Is this the moment I was speaking of, when I told you to pass along that message? Is this the moment when I need it most?

It's good advice. I made a resolution to listen to good advice, didn't I?

I'll go tomorrow, Sam. You always were one of the things I was most thankful for, you know.

[/Private]

It really is turning out to be a silly month this time around, isn't it? But I don't think it's so bad to have a silly month, after all, and especially not at this time of year. It's always a relief to have a few relaxing curses--if, er, having things in one's refrigerator jump out and run around and wreak havoc can really be called relaxing, of course--in a month, and particularly when it's November, since we're all still a bit worn out from everything that went on in October. We didn't get this sort of respite last year, I remember, so it's certainly something to be thankful for, that we've had one this year. Last year there were those awful boxes, and it was right around now when--

And speaking of being thankful for things, it's Giv Thanksgiving a week from tomorrow! For anyone that doesn't have Thanksgiving in their own world, it's a day of the year set aside for people to think about the things they're thankful for, and usually to get together with friends and family and have a great big dinner for it, too. We don't have it back in Daventry, either, but my best friend introduced me to it when I first arrived here, and I think it's a lovely holiday, and certainly worth celebrating.

Oh, which reminds me! Penny and I were talking about having a big Thanksgiving dinner next week for anyone that might want to celebrate, since it's always more fun to have everyone together for one big one than scattered all over at a lot of smaller, separate ones. And we were thinking of having it at the Warehouse, with plenty of different dishes so that everyone has something they like. So if anyone would like to come and celebrate with us, please do let us know? We'd love to have you, and we'd be more than happy to make sure to cook something you'll enjoy for it, if you'll only let us know you're coming and what you'd like best to eat.

And, er, if it turns out there's a curse that day, then we'll just try to make the best of it, as we always do, and have one more thing to be thankful about when it's all over.