Bedtime Story
Disclaimer: All materials belong to J.K. Rowling.
"Mummy," the little boy's voice squeaked. "Why is there war?" She looked into his eyes, his big, brown, innocent eyes.
Where was she to begin? He was her son, her only son, her only child; she was meant to protect him from danger, from all that was bad in the world. Even knowing was dangerous.
"Well, sweetie," she began, hearing her voice crack with every word. "Do you know how mommy and daddy sometimes fight, when we yell?" He nodded his head; that part he could understand, that, to him, was real. "But sometimes things bigger, groups of people, countries, continents they disagree with each other, and they go to war.
"Jimmy says that people die in wars, do they?"
"Yes, sometimes," she said it so it wouldn't have to be so bad, but the question was coming she could feel it slowly creeping upon them like the war itself.
"Will daddy die?" His brown eyes full of innocence looked up at her wanting an answer. How she craved for it, innocence; to know nothing and to not know you knew nothing, to live life carelessly.
Will he die, she asked herself? No! He won't die, he's going to come home and we will be a family again, a better family; we won't fight, everything will be fine.
"No, darling, daddy isn't going to die." She kissed him goodnight, extinguished the candle, and sat in the hallway repeating, "Daddy isn't going to die." She wanted to believe it, and so she did.