The Orphans in the Woods

After Gertrude put on her favorite pink shirt and some clean jeans, she began to look through her clothes to see what she should pack. She pulled out her suitcase, the one her mom had given to her that she had never used yet, and began to put the clothes inside. She figured jeans, sweaters, basic t-shirts , socks and underwear was all she would need. She thought about her snowsuit, the one she always wore when she'd go ice-skating or playing in the snow. It was bulky and would take too much room in her suitcase, but she wanted to bring it. Maybe she could find a big bag to put it into. She turned to go back to the bathroom to grab her toothbrush, and she was slightly startled when she saw her brother standing in the doorway watching her.

"I can't fit the snowsuit into my suitcase," she told him, "But I think I should bring it."

Rohan nodded in agreement, "We'll just throw it into the car."

"The car?" Gertrude asked perplexed. She hadn't thought about how they were going to get to the cabin. "What car?"

"Mom's mustang," Rohan told her, "I just gotta find her purse because that's probably where the keys are."

"Are you serious?" Gertrude said almost laughing, "You don't really think that you can drive Mom's car do you?"

"I know I can," Rohan said irritated, "Dad let me drive it a few months ago."

"What?" Gertrude said in disbelief.

"It's really not that hard," Rohan explained, "Just that I don't have a license yet so we'll probably be best driving at night and I have to be real careful."

"This is crazy," Gertrude shook her head as she walked past her brother to the bathroom. She grabbed her toothbrush and went back to the suitcase.

"I know what it sounds like," Rohan said defensively, "But I'm going to do this regardless what you think."

Gertrude made her bed in her "not so perfect" way. She knew it wasn't as tight and tidy as Mom's way, but she was a lot smaller than Mom so it was good enough.

"It's just nuts Ro," Gertrude said looking up at her brother still standing in the doorway. "We are just kids. I'm going with you, but I really don't think we are going to last that long. We're either going to get busted or something. We don't know how to take care of ourselves yet."

"We're going to learn Gretch," he told her firmly, "Dad's prepared me in lots of ways. We are lucky that we have somewhere to hide."

Gertrude shrugged flippantly, then said, "Whatever you say. You're the man now... but I still think we're acting crazy."

Rohan walked down the hall towards the kitchen. He felt hungry again and he spotted a box of cereal on top of the fridge. There was a little bit of milk inside and he poured what was left into the bowl. Then he went to sit at the little kitchenette table against the wall in the kitchen. He set the bowl on the table and when he went to pull out the chair, he saw his mother's purse hanging from the back of the chair.

"Eureka!" he said happily as he set the purse on top of the table next to his bowl of cereal. He smiled as he ate his cereal and thought about Gertrude, Aunt Velma, and what the voice of his mother had said. He also thought about his parents dead bodies in the bedroom in the back. What should he do about it? Should he try to bury them? There was no way he could drag them to a proper burial spot. And if he got caught it would look very suspicious. Should he cover them up with something like big plastic garbage bags? That might be all wrong too. He couldn't figure it out, so he decided to just leave it alone.

Gertrude came into the kitchen and saw that there was no milk left for her to have a bowl of cereal with. She frowned at her brother for a moment.

"What am I going to eat?" she said outloud hoping that he'd feel guilty about not sharing the last of the milk.

"There's some eggs in the fridge," Rohan said.

She rolled her eyes knowing that meant she had to cook again.