“Outside! Outside!”
The trees, seen through the long, slim pane of glass at the front door, are still crowned with most of their brown crisp leaves. They sway in the brisk wind. She waves at them. They are calling to her.
“Mommm, outside, outside! MOMMM!!”
Mama looks up from her computer and glances outside. It is raw and gray and looks like rain.
“Honey, it’s too cold out there.”
“Outside, outside!” she insists.
Standing on her tip toes, she can just reach the bottom of the front doorknob with her fingers but can’t turn it.
Mama sighs. They have fought this battle many times. Mama knows Freya will stand at the door, demanding freedom for as long as it takes to wear her mother down.
“Alright, then put on your shoes and jacket.”
Quickly and deftly for someone just turned three, she chooses her heavy boots and puffy, green-patterned jacket and puts them on. She stands in front of the door, and eyes Mama expectantly.
Mama opens the door and shivers as the chill wind blows in.
“Now stay here in the front yard where I can see you.”
Freya says nothing. She knows that Papa is working in his shop in the woods. It’s at the end of a long winding gravel path and that’s where she wants to go. She walks down the porch steps into the yard.
Mama is watching through the window, so Freya can’t go yet. Freya never feels cold, and her jacket hangs open. She takes some time touching her special plants in front of the porch. She plucks one of the last, faded blooms from a low branch of the camelia bush. Rubs the soft petals between her fingers, then brings it to her nose and sniffs. Sticks the tip of her tongue out and tastes it.
“Yucky.”
She casts the bloom down, then steps on it for good measure.
A glance over her shoulder shows that Mama is still watching. She tests the bounds of her allowed territory by walking into the ivy next to the driveway. Mama doesn’t react. This is good. Freya squats amongst the tangles of the ivy and calls to the magic. It doesn’t always answer. She waits, letting her mind dwell on all that comes alive in her books: the cat in the hat, the little blue truck, Santa, Elsa. She focuses on the matted ivy. Finally, she sees a diminutive man-form peep through the leaves. It is a grouchy looking mite, made of brown and green leaves with red berries for eyes. Freya knows that even if Mama were standing next to her, her mother would not be able to see the little magic man.
“What is it this time?” he rustles.
“Wanna be here but not here.” She darts a look back at the house and then tips her head towards the path through the woods. She points at the gravelly trail.
“What will you pay me?”
Freya thinks and reaches into her pockets. She finds a pink hairband and a penny and lays them both on the ground in front of the stern little figure.
“Okay,” crackles the magic, “But be fast, this will only last a short minute.”
Freya looks back at Mama, who has turned her face away from the window as she bends to pick up baby Vance.
Freya stands quickly and dashes down the quarter mile path as fast as her short legs can carry her.
In the next moment, Mama looks back to the window and somehow still sees Freya squatting in the leaves. She turns her attention again to the little boy in her arms and nuzzles his neck.
Freya is flying down the path, startling squirrels, blue jays, and a small black racer snake, who slithers out of her way fast as lightning. Freya laboriously climbs the four wooden steps to Papa’s shop. She pushes open the old door. Papa is sitting at his computer. It has three big screens, and Freya knows one is for her.
“Me want CocoMelon, Papa!”
Papa smiles and lifts her to her seat in front of the screen on the far left and starts the cartoon show.
Mama looks up from her giggling boy and sees no Freya anywhere in the yard. She draws in a breath sharply.
Her phone, on the table next to the front door, dings once. Automatically, she looks over and is relieved to see the one-line text:
“Freya is here, I’ll bring her back before lunch.”
Mama is glad but puzzled. She shakes her head and wonders.
“She was sitting in the ivy just a minute ago! How did Freya get all the way to the shop that fast, Vance?” she asks Vance, who says,
“Da da da da.”
Mama sits down on the sofa and continues playing with her handsome son.
In the ivy, something small and brownish-green slips away, accompanied by soft crackling.
THE END