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Apparently, neither of the girls liked napping. They wanted to be awake for everything. They clearly couldn’t handle not having one, though, because they were terrors by the end of the day.

I saw that pattern even now.

It was late afternoon when I’d finally had enough. They were always good in the car, so I packed them up and took them out on the country roads, wondering if they would fall asleep. Beatrice drifted off first. Agnes was stubborn about it, but ten minutes later, she did the same thing. I decided to make my destination Rainwood, just to go through a town similar to Strawberry Springs.

I’d hardly ever come up here back when I lived in the area, but I knew of it.

It was in just as rough of shape, and I wondered how they were doing.

There was no way I could stop without risking waking up the girls, and I needed another hour of quiet time so they wouldn’t be even worse as night fell. I thought about Rainwood as I headed back into Strawberry Springs. I took all the back roads I could, and eventually I wound up in a very familiar place.

As I passed by a wood fence with only one entrance, I couldn’t help but stop. As curious as I was about Rainwood, I never spent enough time there to get attached. This was very different.

I was near Hugh’s property, and on that property was the spring that Jade and I had spent most of our childhoods at. I’d done my best not to think about this place, but I’d checked in.

The tree line was still the same. The large field we would sneak into hadn’t changed much either. It felt like I’d stepped into the past, and if it weren’t for the two girls in the back seat, I would get out of the car.

“Why did we stop?”

The question jolted me out of my thoughts, and I turned to see that Agnes was awake.

“You could have slept longer.”

“You stopped.” She shrugged.

Beatrice slowly opened her eyes. “Are we back home now?” Her voice was thick and she yawned. I had a feeling she was still tired, but I knew that once the girls were awake, they wouldn’t be going back to sleep anytime soon.

“I didn’t mean to stop.” I looked back out at the field. “It’s a place I used to come to. There’s this cool spring back there.”

“Really?” Agnes went for the harness of her car seat. “I want to see it.”

I didn’t know how this five-year-old was able to get out of her seat so quickly, but she bounded out of the car mere seconds later.

“Agnes!” I called, chasing after her.

“Wait!” Beatrice yelled. “I can’t get out of my seat.”

I cursed under my breath and went to her side of the car, getting her out as quickly as I could. The second her feet were on the ground, she was following after Agnes, who was already near the tree line.

“Girls! No!”

That word only urged them on. I had to jog to catch up to them and grabbed their wrists the second I could.

“But you said you used to come here!” Agnes yelled and tried to tug out of my grip.

“There’s a certain path you have to follow to get to where I used to go. And I don’t know if that’s still there anymore.”

“So let’s find out!” Beatrice said with a smile.

“No,” I repeated. “We’re going back to the apartment.”

Both girls frowned. Agnes kicked a rock. “You never do anything fun with us.”

“And I never got my rock,” Beatrice whined.

“There’s one right next to Agnes. She just kicked it.”

“That’s not cool enough. I want a better rock.”