“Mumee? Would you tell me a story?”
The child’s mother sat on her bed, and the girl’s shoulders slumped. The stormy grey eyes she looked into seemed to be calculating an escape route. That was the thing about Sally’s mother. She was always worrying, and she never gave two bedtime stories. ‘Wise girl’ Sally thought ‘Daddy says mommy likes to be called wise girl.’
“Please wise girl?” Sally tried imitating her father’s begging look. It worked.
“Which one would you like to hear?” Sally’s mother asked.
“The one about the flying ship.” And the tale began.
“Once upon a time, there was a beautiful, young girl. She had curly black hair with sparkling grey eyes.” Mother began. Sally smiled, the girl in the story looked exactly like her. “She had everything anyone could ever want.” Mother continued, “But she was so lonely. Her beautiful prince had been kidnapped, and that was why the girl was on this magical ship. She was going to find him. Her name was Annabeth. After many long days of journey, Annabeth finally found the place she was looking for. It was called Camp Jupiter. Annabeth could sense that her prince was not far away.
Annabeth was so happy to see her prince again that she couldn’t sit still. It took all of her will to not jump over the side to meet the boy sooner. But Annabeth was also worried. She was afraid that her prince had forgotten her. It had been a very long time since they last saw each other and before the prince went to this far away palace, a spell was placed on him. So that he would not remember anything and wouldn’t be able to look for Annabeth. But their time apart was over. The magical flying boat had finally landed in the middle of a huge field.
Annabeth searched for her prince among the many faces in the crowd and, upon finding him, was happy to see he was doing the same. It was there Annabeth spotted her prince for the first time in months. A smiled spread across her face. Annabeth stopped worrying for the first time in months, he would remember her, Annabeth was sure of that. A wide grin was plastered on his face, but Annabeth was wary. She looked at the many girls standing, studying him, and jealousy coursed through her veins. She smiled back though, her moment was not about to be ruined. Annabeth sprinted from the ship and did the natural thing: gave her prince a nice big punch to the arm. ‘How dare you get yourself kidnapped? Do you know how much I worried?’ Annabeth said.” At this Sally giggled, then quieted down quickly, as her favorite part was coming.
Her mother opened her mouth to begin the story again, but stopped. Sally turned around to see a man with sea green eyes and messed up hair and smiled, “Daddy!” she exclaimed, “You’re home!”
He smiled, looking past Sally to his beautiful wife, “Yea, I am.”
