Dear Diary

Dear Diary,

Dad found me paper and a pencil so now I can tell you about our trip!  

We have been walking for a very long time. I don’t remember when we left, but Dad laughed when I asked him and said it was “many a fortnight ago”. I don’t know why he thinks that's funny because I don’t know what it means. Dad is weird sometimes, but I like hearing him laugh.

We are resting now. We walked so much today that my feet felt like they were going to fall off. When I get really tired, I ask Dad to carry me on his back, but he looked even more tired than me, so I just kept walking. Dad wanted to rest now, so we found an old house to sleep in. There isn’t anyone home, but that’s okay because it means I get to explore on my own!  

The house is really small. It’s just like the last house we stayed in. I walked through all of the rooms and I found a cat plushie under a bed in one of them. It’s a really cute white cat, and it has a small brown spot on one eye. I showed Dad after I found it, and he said I could keep it! I think I’m going to name it Spot.

Dad is telling me to go to sleep now. He said I can pick any bed I want to sleep in, so I picked the bed in the room where I found Spot. I really like the clouds and flowers painted on the walls because they remind me of summer when my birthday is. I think I would be friends with the girl who has this room. I wonder if she’s on a trip with her family, too.

This bed is really warm. I told Dad that he can come sleep next to me, but he said he isn’t tired. He gave me a kiss and tucked me and Spot in and then left. He’s in the living room now. I can hear him humming through the hallway.  

***

Dear Diary,

We left the house today. I held Spot under my arm as we walked away. We had to walk through the whole town as we left, which was really nice because I got to look at all the cool old buildings. I love walking through empty towns because of how my voice echoes when I talk. Dad let me run in front of him for a little bit, and every time I said something the echoes were so cool. But, I didn’t get to run around for a long time because Dad wanted to play our game. 

You probably don’t know what our game is, so I need to explain. Dad came up with it. Whenever he puts his finger up to his mouth, I have to be quiet until he tells me to stop. If I don’t, I lose. Dad told me about it when we left on our trip, and he said that it was going to be our trip game. He wants to play it a lot now. Today when we were walking in the town, he grabbed my hand and ran behind a pile of boxes next to a building and told me he wanted me to play a round.

I’m getting really good at it. It’s kind of boring to be quiet for that long, but I find things to do while I wait. Today when Dad wanted to play, I sat behind the boxes next to him and watched a bug on the side of the house. It was a really pretty bug, and it was bright yellow like a lemon. I watched it crawl all the way up the wall of the house, and when it got to the top, Dad said the game was done and I won.

I win a lot. I’m really good at being quiet when I have something else to do. Usually, when I win, Dad gives me something cool. Today, he gave me a cookie from our food bag. It was small, but it was so good. I can’t remember the last time I had something sweet.  

After that, we had to keep walking. I put Spot back under my arm and walked through the rest of the town holding Dad’s hand. We are far away from the town now. We are still walking, but I learned how to write at the same time as I walk. Dad says he thinks it's funny how fast his little girl learns to “adapt”, but I don’t know what that means.

***

Dear Diary,

We met other people today! I don’t remember seeing other people on our trip before, but Dad and I found a group of them. There are three guys and one girl. We stopped to rest by the road, and Dad and the guys are talking now. If I listen, I can hear what they are saying, but I don’t understand it. They use too many adult words.

The girl is sitting next to me. She says her name is Marci. She’s a lot older than me, so she looks like she is almost as old as Dad. I don’t know why she did not go talk with Dad and the other guys. Maybe she does not understand them, either.

Marci looks really pretty. She has red hair like a cherry, which is really cool. I have never seen red hair before. I told her that her hair looks really pretty, and she laughed, but in a nice way. She ruffled my hair after that and gave me a blue flower from her bag. She said she found it while she was walking and she said that I should have it.

I like Marci. I hope we can bring her with us on our trip.

Dad just came back now. He looked like he was happy when he saw me and Marci. I asked him if Marci is coming with us, and he said that they all are. I’m so happy to have new friends!  

***

Dear Diary,

I learned the names of the rest of our new friends. The big and scary man is called Ollie, but he actually is not that scary. He gave me a piggyback ride when I told Dad that my feet hurt and played “I Spy” with me while we were walking. He really likes Spot, too. I like Ollie.

Santiago has a funny name. It is a little hard to pronounce, but Ollie helped me learn how. Santiago looks very tired, and he doesn’t talk a lot. He smiled when I showed him my diary, and he also showed me how to spell his name, which was very nice of him.

The shortest one is called Troy, and I don’t really like him. His skin looks a little gray, which makes him weird to look at. He also laughs a lot, but not in a nice way like Marci. His laughing scares me a little bit. I don’t think Dad likes him either, so he doesn’t talk to him a lot. Dad does talk to Marci a lot.

We stopped for the night earlier. We are not in a town, so we stopped by a big cave that we found. It was really dark, but Santiago made some torches and we walked all the way to the back. The cave has a really cool echo like the town, and Marci and I had a fun time laughing inside it.  

It’s the middle of the night now. Ollie and Troy are sleeping, but Santiago and Dad are outside. I don’t know what they are doing, but Marci is awake with me, so it doesn't really matter. I can’t hear anything from outside because Ollie is snoring and Marci is talking to me about what my favorite part of the trip was. I love Marci a lot.

***

Dear Diary,

Troy isn’t on the trip with us anymore! A lot of things happened today and we are resting now so I can write fast.

I don’t really know what happened, but while we were walking, Dad stopped when he was looking at Troy. I was drawing a bird that flew by us, so I was not paying a lot of attention. Dad started yelling, which was a little confusing because he never yells. I don’t like when people yell because it makes me nervous. I didn’t understand all of what he was talking about, but I think I heard him talk about a “bite”. 

Marci took my hand after that and walked with me away from the group. She looked scared, so I think that she doesn’t like people yelling like me. We walked for a little until I couldn’t really hear the yelling anymore, and then Marci stopped and let me go.

I asked Marci why Dad was yelling, and she smiled and said that it doesn’t matter and that my dad was so smart that he would “solve it all quickly”. I said that was true, and that my dad is the best dad in the whole world. She agreed with me and then pointed to a butterfly that was on a tree close to us. She held Spot for me while I drew the butterfly in my diary and we spent a long time watching the animals and flowers that were around us.

After a while, Marci took my hand again and said that we were going to walk back to Dad. I was happy to be back with him, and I think Marci knew that so we walked back quickly. When we found the group, there were only three of them standing on the road: Dad, Ollie, and Santiago.  

Marci let me go after that, and I ran to Dad. He picked me up so fast and gave me a really tight hug. He doesn't hug me like that a lot, so it was really nice. I asked him where Troy was, and he said that Troy had to go on another trip by himself. I gave Dad another hug and said I was happy he was gone, and Dad said he was too.

Now I like everyone in the group! No more scary Troy!

***

Dear Diary,

Today was such a good day! I’m in a real bed right now, and I just had a big meal that was so good it made me cry!  

You are probably confused where I found these things, so let me tell you: we found a town with people in it today! It wasn’t empty like all the other towns Dad and I walked through. There were actual people there! Dad, Santiago, and Ollie were really happy when we found it, and Marci and I were too. Dad asked me what the first thing I would do is, and I said eat. I’m always hungry!

The entire town is surrounded by a big gray wall, so we had to enter through the gate at the front. When we got there, there were two ladies who stopped us from getting in. They said they had to “search” us, which meant they checked our arms and legs and skin that was not under our clothes. I did not really care. It was actually kind of funny since I still don’t know what they were looking for. Maybe it had to do with what happened with Troy? I'm glad they let me pass, then. I don't want to be like Troy.

After that, they let all of us in and we got to pick out our rooms in the spaces they had open. Dad and I are sharing, Ollie and Santiago are across from us, and Marci is next door. The food was really good, too! I had stew and real bread for the first time in a while. Dad joked that it was better food than he can make, but I don’t think that’s true. He’s a good cook.

I’m getting really sleepy now, so I think I’m going to go to bed. Dad is asleep next to me, and he’s really warm. Spot makes a good pillow, too.

***

Dear Diary,

It’s the middle of the night, but Dad and I are awake. Marci is here too. They woke me up in the night and Dad told me we needed to “leave right now”. I asked him why, and he looked a little scared but he smiled and said that we were going to be late for the next stop on our trip if we didn’t.  

We played our game again as we left. I stayed quiet the whole time we walked through the town. We hid a lot in alleys and behind houses, but I was always quiet. Marci is really good at the game too. She didn’t say anything the entire time either.

We are back on the road again now. Marci is carrying me on her back, so I have time to write. Dad looks really tired, but he and Marci are holding hands now, and he seems happy. I like when Dad is happy.

I don’t know what happened to Ollie and Santiago. Dad says they might meet up with us later, so we will see. I don’t know what happened to the town either, but as we were leaving, I remember looking from an alley out at the people walking slowly around the town, and they all had gray skin like Troy. I don’t remember them looking like that when we got there a few days ago. I’m kind of glad we left because if the people were like Troy now, I would hate living there. Who would want to live in a town full of Troys?