chapter 4

Chapter 4: The big difference.

The next days I slowly got used to divide my attention between what was my usually day, and that, what I did do with Cindy.
I took some more time to be with my normal friends, the remark about “Intentions” had told me, that there were also old friends, I did need too, and that I had made other promises, had other obligations in my daily life.

I did ask Cindy one night: “what do you do, when I am elsewhere? Are you always around, or are you doing other things, too?” So I found, what she did, when I did not see her around.

She said: “To be able to be the bést friend I can be, I have to know, what is going on in your world. The first days, I stayed just around you, as you do know.
During later days I went to visit your friends, without showing myself, to see what kind of kids they are, and what sort of things they do, when you are not around.
To do that, I have learned at my school in Homeland. My teacher told us: what friends you have, tells a lot about who you are, so that is why.”

I wondered: “Why do we not learn such simple things, that are so useful in the same time?”
Cindy said: “What I found is, some people have so much other things on their mind, that ample time is left to just sit, tell the family what they did today, and listen what the others tell.
Only a few families take that time anymore!
They are the lucky ones, for that way, people are the most important values in their lives.
I also have seen families where everybody has such a teleffff…”

She stumbled over the word so I helped her out: “Telephone? You do mean, like at my friends Britt’s house, where everybody has a phone, with a button on the photo of a family member, and you automatically get that person on line, when you do press that persons image!”

Cindy nodded, “that is easy going, but nobody has to do something real, to talk things over. You do not really see the face of the other person, so it is not easy to find out, if they do speak the same things they do think.”
There was such a difficult idea again.

I said: "I was told to tell always the truth, was not anybody?"

“No, not everybody does think this way, so we, Homelanders, think it is important, to look someone in the face, when we talk.”

“And what more are you doing, when I do not see you?” I asked, deep in my heart a little bit jealous, she was able to do different things, when I was doing the boring mathematics, or geography at school.

“I do travel your world in a fashion, you cannot imagine. You only can that, when you do remember, how you travel when you are dreaming.”

“You say, you can travel, by just wishing to go there? Just as I seem to go in my dreams? How odd! Or… no not really, I do the same in my dreams.
And it has the same strangeness, it will have for my friends, when I should talk about you, while they cannot see you! But why do you do so?”

“Traveling and discovering your world, is for me like going to school. So I do understand better, what I have to do, but also what I can expect from my friend, you Lea, while you live in this world your whole life.
I did not, till some days ago, remember?”

“So what you are doing is the same, as when I went traveling to a desert, and find out, how people over there survive, or going to the jungle to do that there?”
Cindy smiled relieved, I did understand.

“I now know more about what we together can do, and how we can stay friends, until I am old and grey, like my grandmother. I also understand better, why taking the time to learn things, and the way they work in your world, is important for you, to get a job later.
Knowing so, our friendship will not stand in the way for you, to live a life like most people. But I even did learn something more important!”

I hardly could imagine what, but asked like an echo: “Even more important?”

“Yes,” Cindy said. “Remember our conversation about being a member of the pack?”

I nodded: “That was, when I did not think, you could learn something from a cat. There still is a riddle about that, I could not solve.”

Cindy did look me straight in the eyes, as if she could read the answer right from my heart, and not only with her ears: “What riddle?”

“The one about that being as well good as bad. I still have not found out how come, while I really wanted to find that answer myself.
I have not, yet,” I answered honestly.

She said: “For that answer, you did not go away enough, out of your circle of friends or family. You do live in a safe place, where everybody does know each other.
A place also, where you do know, whom to trust.
Over here, you cannot find that answer, unless there suddenly comes somebody new living here, that cannot be trusted like the others.”

The idea that somebody I could not trust would live in my town, has never past my mind.How strange.
That sounded like some programs on television, Mom and Dad did not like me to watch, or the 8 o’clock news, I mostly was not allowed to see, only the Kid’s news.

“So there are some things going on in the world, my parents are protecting me from. But what can I learn, when I am old enough to watch that kind of news?”

“That’s a lot. And that is something, I am fleeing from in my world, too. The other side from being a part of something, a member.”

“I still do not understand, so help me to do that please, Cindy.”
I had tried, I really tried to understand. But maybe she was right: I was not old enough now.
And I had not seen that much of the world yet.

Cindy settled on her favorite spot: the end of my bed, with her feet dangling idly.
Only this time she held the furry toy-cat near by, and as thoughtless stroke it, like that action did comfort her.

“Now I finally know, you have enough understanding of how to be a trusted friend!” she said, while her eyes glittered as if little lights glimmering inside.
“You do ask the right questions. You dare to say: I don’t know.
You also have learned, to keep your normal life apart, from what we do together. So now, yes, now is the time to tell all. Listen well.”

In order to hear all, I lay down on my bed, with my face towards her, the same way I always do when I am reading one of my fairy-tale books.
Specially the one that were to big to handle easily, the ones with the drawings in them. She now had my full attention. Cindy had taken one off the bookshelf: Peter Pan. She opened it on the page with the pirates-ship and Captain Hook.

Then she asked: “Do you believe, there is a part of Homeland, where Captain Hook does live?”
I nodded, words were not necessary. Cindy told me enough to believe that.

She went on: “Then you also believe the more gruesome fairy tales, you were not allowed to read, when you were younger?” Again I only had to nod.

“Lea,” she said, “there are even more horrible parts in Otherland, when you are over the mountains, away from Homeland.”

A gasp came from my mouth, more I could not say, only wait till she was going on.
“In that part of Otherland live the people, who believe in the other side of ‘belonging to’!”

All I could ask was: “So that was, what you meant by: the other side of belonging to. I heard about groups of kids, who go into shops, to steal what they want, and where you only can belong to, if you can show, what you have stolen.
I never thought that to be true. But it is?”

“Yes” said Cindy, “and the most gruesome is, mostly the first one, the one who started such a group, was somebody from Otherland.
That Otherlander-person got bored of the easy stealing in our Homeland, where we mostly can rebuild within a reasonable time.
In Homeland, where I do live, we consider this a lesson, we have to learn, how we NOT have to act. A lesson in how we can stand by each other, how to overcome difficult times together.
The Otherlanders come to your world, when they get bored of what they call: easy adventures. In earlier times, this was not such a big problem.” Cindy ended with a sigh.

“How come?” I answered, while in my mind was the thought: how often do I have to ask that question? How much am I not aware of?

“Lea, you looked worried while you did ask that. Why?”

“While I do feel like a little kid, learning things of the world in a new way. Also wondering how much I have to learn about this new things. Wondering if there always will be new questions. And although you look just as old as me, you already have so many questions answered for me. But all I can ask is: how come?”

Cindy had more than one question to answer now, and choose to begin with:
“I did tell you, we all are prepared, to come to your world from a young age. So we learn quickly, and also from a young age, how to manage, what we need to know, how to survive.
We do not learn mathematics, not more than simple counting, while we do not need that mostly. Instead, we do learn about the true secrets of life, so we are ready, when the time comes to go to your world. And now is a very, very, special time.”

I nodded: “You said so before, but the other question is, why is it nów more bad, more special, than it was in earlier days?”

“Simple” said Cindy, and looked me straight in the eyes.
“You do know, there live more people on this planet Earth now, than ever before?”
Again I nodded.

“That means, there are less spaces, where you could have an adventure, and at the same time do not harm anybody.”
I frowned. That made no cense. “What?”

“I’ll tell you. You have read the story of captain Red-beard and his pirates. The one who fought all the other pirates, and every now and than also a ship that belonged in your world?
And you did read they had their own isles of treasures, their own fortresses, their own spaces in the Caribian you call that, I believe. There they mostly fought between themselves, so not much harm was done.
Not to much, in any case. But the free space, to have adventures on this earth, is getting less, and less.
There are so many people around now, that any place they like most, is taken. So they had to think a new way of doing things, to have an other kind of adventures.
They started to disrupt things.”

“What is disrupt” I asked. There were so many things new coming now.
It was getting very, very late too, so I had a bit more difficulty understanding, and had to hide a yawn behind my hand.

“Disrupt is, making things go all wrong in a nasty way, and do that on purpose.”

“How can I understand this, just laying here, on my comfortable bed, with a full belly, a Mom and Dad who do love me. I have a brother, who does tease me a bit, but mostly is to busy playing with his own friends.
How?” I asked again, so I was certain, she would understand the upheaval in my head.

Just contrary I was expecting, Cindy started to laugh: “You are even quicker as I thought you could be!”

Now the mish-mash of thoughts even became greater, even more confusing.
What had I asked this time that was very good, or very bad? Or even unexpected?
Cindy said, still a smile on her face after her laugh: “We talked a while ago about Captain Hook, did we not?”

“And what has that to do with all this?” I asked, still confused.

“All and nothing” was the cryptic answer.

Riddles again, I thought.
Time I did need, time to think things over.
Time to give everything we talked about, its own place in my mind. Time also, to get used to the idea that nothing would be anymore, as it ever was before.

“Although we have little time, there is a way to get around this too!” Cindy told.

“How did Peter and his sister came to Neverland? You do remember?”

“With fairy-dust from Tinkelbell. But you are not Tinkelbell! You are Cindy!”

“Yes,” she said, “So I have my own way to travel to Homeland, and to other places.
That works, while I now have been here for the first time, through your drawing, and your mirror.
I found a friend in you, Lea, so I do have a base where you are.
When I am alone, I do it by just wishing to be on that place in your world I like to go to.
When you do trust me enough, and we together have done that often enough, you can do that too, later.
But first we do it the way, I found you a week ago: by drawing, and using a mirror as the doorway. That is the easiest way for you to do it! And for you the only way to come to my world: Homeland.”

“Oh, now you finally give the answer.
Does the drawing or the mirror need something special?”

Cindy said: “Not on this side, the mirror I mean, the drawing has to be made by somebody who, either believes it works, or feels like it will do so.
This works when we flee the bad-guys, or find someone, who feels to be like somebody, who can become a friend. Then the mirror sends the reflection to Homeland of what you draw.
That is the doorstep or the gate-way.
While on both sides the same image is, we can do the necessary step through the mirror. This is the shortest way there is.
Peter and Thinkelbell used the long way, while in earlier days not everybody had either a mirror, or drawing material. Now almost every kid has both.”

“Oh, that simple?” I said, “But on the other side, is it there that simple too?”

“Of course not, you do have to know where the gates are, or at least, what is the way to it, in Homeland.
Somebody, like my Grandmother, has to tell you where you can expect to find the ones, that belong to you.
And as I said earlier, there also has to be the luck, that there lives somebody, who can become a friend, and is making a drawing for a mirror to step through.”

“So…“ And I took a break in the words, to accentuate their being important, “That is, why you asked me to turn the drawing around, with the white side up. That was, so they could not see you anymore, while there was no reflection in the gateway!”
I felt a bit triumphant. This riddle I had solved all by myself!

“But,” I went on, “what do we do now?”

“Tomorrow, when you are rested, and have done the chores your Mom and Dad have given you, we draw a special drawing. I will tell you what you must draw for me.
Than, in the night, we are going to use this mirror to go to there.
Your Mom and Dad will think you are in bed, even will see you there, but we are going to try and make things right, to end this wrong-doing.

We are going to look if I am the coming Red-haired-Queen, or if there is another red-curly-haired-girl, who will make an end to this way of living.
And with that we make things in your world better too!” she ended with a hopeful but very determined face.

With that I went to sleep, to get rested for the things to come.
And I also had to get used to the idea, my life never, ever should be boring or easy again, while it sounded to become a very, very serious adventure.

© Nan van Daalen, all rights reserved