#judygaia

[wildroseofarran]

Baby Hawk’s Eye View || Self Para

Judy sighed as she watched a lady bug crawl over a patch of sunlight streaming in from the canopy of giant sunflowers above her head. She briefly considered adding it to the jar on the little rock table she’d made by the door but there wasn’t really a point, was there? She used to collect bugs to feed the tiny spiders that lived in the corners of their house but that wasn’t nearly as fun as collecting them for Uncle Salt so he could have something to eat when Daddy invited him over for dinner.

But Uncle Salt was gone now, and so too was her desire to collect bugs.

She sighed again, looking around at the sunflower house. It was supposed to be a place for her and Uncle Salt to play when he came over. Daddy had covered the grass with a rug so their legs wouldn’t get itchy and prickly and he’d woven twinkly Christmas lights in between the flowers so it would be lit up at night. He’d left the rest of the decorating to her.

She made a table out of a flat rock she’d found by the river and some tomato cans for Uncle Salt’s food jar and a stick basket for some snacks. She’d taken the beanbag that had a rip in it from the den and put it over in the corner so they’d have a place to sit. And Daddy had even gotten her a little CD player and some books at Mrs. Pennyapple’s yard sale so they could have something to do when they weren’t playing in the woods.

None of it was going to be used now, though. Uncle Salt wasn’t in Edenton anymore. She and Daddy and Uncle Bash and Uncle Artie had flown over the whole entire town a bunch of times and they hadn’t been able to find him. He wasn’t in any of his webs or trees and Daddy had said he wasn’t at any of the hotels either. It was like he’d disappeared, just like in the movies.

But Uncle Salt wouldn’t do that, would he? He would’ve told them if he was going somewhere. Or his friend Ronan with the curly hair. Or the pretty lady that had made all the sunflowers grow with magic. He wouldn’t have left without saying goodbye to anyone, because he was their friend and friends didn’t do that. Friends always told you when they were leaving for a little while.

….Unless he was mad at them for something. Daddy was always saying how people said and did things they didn’t mean when they were mad. So maybe Uncle Salt was mad and that’s why he didn’t tell them that he was going away.

She got to her feet and started walking toward the woods. Why would Uncle Salt be mad? Had he had a fight with Daddy or one of his other friends? Maybe. Grownups had fights all the time, and Nonna said they tried to have them away from kids because the fights were usually about grownup stuff.

But if Daddy and Uncle Salt had a fight then wouldn’t Daddy know where Uncle Salt was? He would, right? And if they had had a fight, Daddy wouldn’t be confused about why Uncle Salt was gone. So that meant that there was no fight. Uncle Salt was just gone.

Judy came to a stop when she reached the tree Uncle Salt had covered in webs. A part of her hoped he’d come back overnight, but the tree stood as empty as it had been for the last few weeks. The webs hadn’t been touched, the jar of insects hadn’t been opened.

She sighed and sat down next to it. “Please come back, Uncle Salt. I miss you.”

#Baby Hawk's Eye View self para #judygaia #emmanuelgaia #tobysalt