"𝐿𝑜𝓃𝑔 𝒶𝑔𝑜, 𝒻𝒶𝓇 𝒶𝓌𝒶𝓎,

𝒞𝑒𝓃𝓉𝓊𝓇𝒾𝑒𝓈 𝒷𝑒𝒻𝑜𝓇𝑒 (𝓎)𝑜𝓊𝓇 𝒹𝒶𝓎𝓈, 

𝐻𝓊𝓂𝒶𝓃𝓈 𝓁𝒾𝓋𝑒𝒹, 𝓂𝑜𝓃𝓈𝓉𝑒𝓇𝓈 𝓇𝑜𝒶𝓂𝑒𝒹.

𝐵𝑜𝓉𝒽 𝓈𝒽𝒶𝓇𝑒𝒹 𝐸𝒶𝓇𝓉𝒽 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝓈𝓀𝓎 𝒶𝓈 𝒽𝑜𝓂𝑒."

(Once Upon A Time – A Nursery Rhyme

Source: https://youtu.be/X2znUtDl5gs)

The sun was high in the sky, inviting and warm. Pete and Lola kept glancing through the window at another afternoon of playing games outside they would miss. They wanted to go out, but they had to listen to Grandma's tales. It was the same since they arrived at Grandma and Grandpa's place, a week ago. It would be one long holiday.

Pete and Lola did not want to spend the summer with their grandparents. They were big kids now; they just had their tenth birthday at the end of the school year. They did not want to come, but Mom and Dad insisted they had to spend time with Grandma and Grandpa, and what better than summer for that?

It was now seven days later, and Pete and Lola had to spend their tea time with Grandma telling them stories for babies.

"Grandma," Pete interrupted the old woman, "Unicorns don't exist! No one has ever seen any!"

"Are you sure of that?" Grandma asked him. "What if I tell you that I found one of them when I was just your age?"

Pete and Lola looked at each other and sighed. Grandma would again tell them about the forest behind her house, and how there was a magic path you could follow to find the World of Fantasy.

The problem was that there was no path in the forest. Pete and Lola had entered it on the second day of their stay at their grandparents' house. They could not go far into the trees. There was no path, no easy way to go through.

"I had just turned ten, like you," Grandma was telling her story. It was the same story she had told the day before. And the day before that one. And, again, the day before...

"At least, she did not start with 'Once Upon A Time'," said Pete in a low voice to his sister.

Lola shushed his brother. She was not sure how Grandma would react. Until now, her brother and she had been quiet and had listened to Grandma even if they got bored. They did not know if Grandma would be upset at them if they just left and went outside.

"Are you telling them again your story of the Unicorn?" Grandpa asked. He just entered the room with a pitcher of lemonade and two glasses.

"Here, kids." He filled in the glasses and gave to each of his grandchildren. "Drink, it is warm today. Why don't you let them go play outside?" He asked Grandma.

"Oh!" Grandma looked surprised. "You prefer perhaps to play in the garden?" She looked at Pete and Lola, some red on her cheeks. "You shall have tell me you wanted to enjoy the beautiful day outside," she added, contrite. "Go play! Shoo! Shoo! I can tell you my story later."

❀❀❀

"Do you think we can ask Mom and Dad to come and get us? I don't want to stay the whole holidays here!" Pete asked his sister. The two children were seated by a big tree. The garden was big with many gnarled trees. It was almost as if the woods lying behind the fence started a short distance from the house. The garden was like a gate to the forest.

"I don't know..." Lola was usually the one complaining the more, but now, she was pensive. "We can try to call them tonight, before or after dinner."

As if the problem was solved, Pete jumped on his feet and started running toward the house shouting "Cookie!" He did not want a cookie or any other sweets. He just wanted to play with Grandpa's dog. Cookie was brown with some white and black spots, the same colour as Mom's chocolate cookies.

The rest of the afternoon was warm and full of laughter, with Pete and Lola finally enjoying their playtime outside of the house.

After running and rolling between the trees, throwing the ball and playing tug of war with Cookies, the children started to forget Grandma's crazy story of unicorns.

But when it was time for dinner, that evening, the whole nonsense came back. As she was passing the dishes, Grandma started again with her story.

"As I told you already, I just had turned ten, like you are now when I met my best friend. I didn't have a lot of friends in school, and it was summer holidays anyway, so I was alone at home, this home..." Grandma looked around her as if she was not seeing them but something from her past.

"This home is in my family since as long as I can remember. My parents and their parents before have lived here. And perhaps your parents will come and live here when the time will come."

Pete and Lola looked at Grandma with question in their eyes. Was the story about the unicorn coming or was Grandma just getting lost in her memory?

"I was alone and bored. This is when I decided to go explore the forest behind the house. There was a path bordered with pretty flowers. I just followed it for few hours. In the beginning, I just went a bit along the path and came back home for teatime. Then, after a time, I spent longer hours in the woods. Until, one day, I stayed the night out."

"And your parents let you out the whole night without looking for you?" Lola asked, with obvious doubt in her eyes, and her voice.

"Cool!" Pete was impressed, and as a ten-year-old boy, the boldness of the adventure appealed to him. "Were you frightened? Did you see wild animals? Did you get lost? What did you eat? Were you not hungry? And Thirsty? And what about..."

Grandpa's laugh boomed in the kitchen. All those questions and Pete's animated face was quite a sight. Even Grandma was looking at the boy with amusement in her eyes. Lola also was trying to hide her chuckle to her brother.

"I think it is enough story for today," Grandpa's booming voice declared. "The children had enough of it for now. And you are telling them the same story since they arrived. Perhaps you can tell them another one tomorrow. The one about the monster in the house, perhaps?" Grandpa winked at Grandma.

"Oh... well... Am I boring you?" she asked Pete and Lola. "I so wanted you to try and go meet the Unicorn in the Forest... but it seems you don't believe me. That is too bad. She will feel lonely if no one goes see her, play with her..."

"Really?" Pete sounded excited. "You would let us go to the forest and spend the night there," he asked his grandparents, eager for the adventure.

❀❀❀

"But, Mom! It's boring! Grandma is always telling weird stories! We didn't even get to play much, only today they let us in the garden. We have to listen to the same story every time. We want to go home!" Lola was on the phone.

After the dinner, Pete and Lola's parents had called to get some news from the children. Grandpa answered first, saying that all was going okay. Then Grandma talked a bit but she left the phone to the children after a few minutes only.

Now, the two brother and sister were alone, asking their parents to come and fetch them.

"What? What story? You want to know what Grandma repeats all the time? She said her best friend was a unicorn when she was ten." Lola answered. He mother paused for a short moment before telling she had heard the same tale when she was young also.

"So. Will you try to find it?" She asked.

"Not you too, Mom!" Lola exclaimed. "Pete wants to spend the night in the forest now. Please! Can we come home? Can you come and get us back? Please! Please! Please!"

❀❀❀

"Is everything okay, children?" Grandma asked when the call ended.

Pete and Lola were back in their bedroom living room with their grandparents before going to bed.

"It's okay, Grandma," Pete answered. We are just missing Mom and Dad, and the friends we have at home. But, today we played with Cookie and we had fun. Right, Lola?" The boy did not want to tell Grandma that they asked Mom to take them back, He did not want her to feel sad.

"It is normal, Pete, to feel a bit sad away from your parents. But I hope you will have a lot of fun here during your holidays. I had a lot of fun when I was young, here. I made a lot of friends in the forest. Perhaps you could go and play in the trees... Who knows what you could find." Grandma added with a soft smile.

"You know, Grandma," Lola looked at her with tired eyes, "we don't really believe your stories are true. We are not small kids who believe in monsters under the bed. Are you making fun of us with your stories?"

The soft smile turned into a sad one on Grandma's face. "I understand, Lola. You do not have to believe me. But it would not be too bad if you went into the woods and played around. Don't go too far and you can take Cookie with you. He knows his way in and out of the woods."

After those words, Grandma helped the children to prepare for bedtime. She brushed Lola's hair and tucked Pete under the cover. She kissed the two of them and left their bedroom, closing slowly the door behind her.

"Lola?" Pete asked in the silence. "Do you think Grandma is upset with us?"

"I don't know, Pete."

The silence came back in the dark bedroom. Only a night light was on, near the door, if the children needed to go up during the night and go to the bathroom.

The door opened, making almost no noise.

"Are you sleeping?" It was Grandpa who came to say goodnight.

"Grandpa?" Pete looked at the old man, shyly, "do you think we upset Grandma?"

"No, Pete. It is okay. Grandma just wanted to share a bit of her childhood with you. You know, she really spent a lot of time in the forest, behind the house."

"But, do you believe unicorn exists?" Lola asked.

"I think anything is possible if you want to believe it," Grandpa answered with a smile.

"I wanted to kiss you goodnight," he added, "and also to show you something."

Curious, Lola and Pete kept silent as Grandpa lighted a bedside lamp.

"I wanted to show you this. It was in Grandma's drawer. It is like a treasure to her, so be careful with it, okay?" He extended his arm, two pieces of paper in it. The first one was a drawing done by a really young child. The second one, a map.

"What is it, Grandpa? This drawing, it looks like a kindergarten kid made it."

"It is, indeed," the old man answered. In fact, your mother drew it when she was five years old. She had been in the woods with Grandma, and she came back with a lot of stories about beautiful animals. She made this picture of her new best friend."

"And the map?" asked Lola.

"The map, your grandma swears that it was what led her to the unicorn in the forest." Grandpa looked at the two children seriously. "Now, I don't say that this unicorn business is real or whatever. No, what I say is that if you wanted to go into the forest, you could use this map. To go in and to come back, just in case you get lost, for example. Perhaps you could just go there, play a bit in the trees and come back? Grandma would be happy thinking you went to explore, and you would have some playtime alone with no storytelling at teatime."

The silence was back in the bedroom. Lola and Pete looked puzzled at the two pieces of paper and Grandpa looked at the children with a grin like a Cheshire cat.

After a moment, he kissed each of them goodnight and left the room, closing softly the door.

As they drifted off to sleep, Lola was thinking of a way to get out of this strange holiday at her grandparents' house. Pete, on his side, was trying to find which animal his mother had drawn when she was five.