Three Wishes

Tweak

"Mommy come home?"

Ranger Marsh stared out the door, holding the door frame with one paw, eyeing the place his wife disappeared into days ago. His eyebrows were furrowed, and his mouth was set, as if he were processing some grim news. He looked down at his three year old daughter. The little bunny looked up at him, too young and too innocent to understand what had just transpired.

"Mommy come home?" she asked again, wrapping her tiny paws around her father's leg, grabbing fistfuls of his pants. Marsh looked back into the swamp they called home, a mess, a labyrinth of absolute darkness.

Something had happened.

"No, Tweak. No she's not." Tweak pouted. "Mommy not like us anymore?"

"...I don't know." In that moment, he was so caught up in his thoughts, that he wasn't sure what to say. He wasn't even aware of what he was saying to his little daughter. He did notice when she bowed her head, and sniffled, tears falling to the ground. Sighing, he picked her up. "Sweetie, your mother loved you. But..." He sighed. How to tell her that her mother needed to get away from the swamps?

Tweak sat in her bedroom that night. Any other night after such bad news, she would've gone to sleep with her father. But, it was late at night, and she hadn't understood a word he said over dinner, so she stayed away.

She looked around at all the things in her room. Toys and trinkets and treasures from places her mother had gone. Her mother loved to travel. When she went away, Tweak thought nothing of it. She knew she would come back.

Why did Daddy say no?

"Tweak?" She turned around, seeing her daddy in the doorway, rubbing his eye sleepily. He smiled at her. "What are you doing up?" he lifted her into his arms, and sat down on the bed. "Daddy?" Tweak squeaked, her voice no louder than a whisper.

"Yes?"

"How come Mommy no come home?"

"Well...I'll tell you when you're older." Marsh relented, not knowing what to say.

"Daddy?"

"Hm?"

"You always come home?"

"...I sure will." He couldn't even dream of abandoning his beloved daughter.

She was all he had left.

The next day, more strange things happened.A woman Tweak had never seen before came to the house. At first, when Tweak saw her white fur and silver hair, she thought it was Mommy. It was thoroughly disappointing when it wasn't.

"Tweak, this is Mommy's little sister, Aunt Tessa." Marsh explained, kneeling down, and placing a paw on his distraught daughter's face. "I have to work, so she's going to live in the house with us, and take care of you." Tweak looked at him through her eyelashes. If she was being honest, she didn't really want them. There was something about her aunt and cousins that made her feel weird. But, Daddy had a point, so it wasn't like she had much choice.

She kept close to her father until he left. When he walked out the door, she was hit with a sudden fear that he wouldn't come back.

"Darling." She turned to her aunt. Tessa was looking down at her as though she were something a dog did on the floor. "These are your cousins," she explained, gesturing to her three children. "I expect you to be nice to them. These darlings have sacrificed so much to come live with you."

"This is Nicky." she placed a paw on her eldest son's head. "This is Cody. And this," she patted her only daughter's shoulder. "Is Lila." Lila wasn't smiling. She looked at Tweak with murder in her eyes. Tweak swallowed. "Aunt Tessa? I don't think Lila likes me."