Te Amo ✯Wattys2015✯

viginti

I sat on the side of the road with my backpack pulled up awkwardly behind my back. I escaped the mansion due to excitement. It was the first day of preschool after all, so I ignored my parents' incessant jabber about having to be with Ralph. I woke up so early that I exited the home without disturbing anyone from their sleep. However, what I didn't anticipate was my little plan to backfire.

Now, I was sitting out on the sidewalk with nothing to do.

I huffed out a sigh as I watched puffs of smoke form from my breath. I made an attempt to touch it but every time my hands tried to close around it, it was already gone. This went on for a few minutes before I pouted in defeat and lay back on the snowy sidewalk, pulling my little coat tighter.

I was surprised I could dress myself, much less put my shoes on, but that wasn't so hard. Shoes with laces were hard to put on, and everything else just involved a lot of pulling and looking. Looking for the rack of dresses and pulling them down.

Then, the rack of coats.

Then, the drawer with the stockings I saw nanny take out for me once.

I was interrupted from my thoughts when a white cat passed a couple feet away, and I beckoned for it to come over. It stared at me curiously before it lazily made its way to my side, rubbing against it.

I laughed, petted it, and lay a kiss on its forehead.

"Lacy! Where are you?!" a voice called out in the silence, startling me and in the process, the feline who jumped up in fright and manage to scratch my wrist.

It didn't take long before I was crying helplessly on the ground.

"Mr. Long! Oh, Mr. Long! Please, slow down! I'm not as young as I used to be!" another voice accompanied the first before it exclaimed. "Oh, my! Who do we have here?"

I couldn't string out a proper response because I was still crying from the pain. It wasn't long before I felt something being pressed to it, and I looked up with bleary eyes.

A kind woman with small features and hints of gray spattering her hair was staring down at me in concern before I felt her pull me up to her saying, "There. There. Everything's going to be alright now. I may not have a first aid kit, but we can always make do with what we have until the school opens."

She had a thick accent.

"Mr. Long, if you could lend me your water bottle for a moment," she said, directing the request over her shoulder before a bottle was in her palms.

She opened the bottle, took the cloth from my skin, and wet it with some water before wiping it softly against my skin, repeating the process a couple of times and avoiding using the same side she used before. And, more to my disbelief, she manually cut a ragged strip of her dress, so she could wrap it around my wounds.

At this point, most of my tears had cleared away, and I found myself looking at the boy who continued to stare down at me curiously. It was uncomfortable. I never had the experience of being stared at so intently before so the mere thought of having this boy stare at me like some foreign substance made me do nothing but squirm. The woman seemed to have noticed because she looked back to the boy and sent him a glare. The poor boy could only step back slightly and bow his head.

The woman was now looking back to me now with concern in her eyes, and it took me a while to realize she was wondering why I was out alone.

"I got lost," I blurted lamely, and the same thought seemed to have reflected in her thoughts because she gave me a gentle smile.