A/N: Sorry for the delay in update, and sorry this chapter sucks. I have plans for the next few though... they should be good :)


It had been nine days before I found myself in familiar territory. Before I saw the trailer up ahead in a clearing and felt my feet pushing me forward somehow, despite the aching pain in my empty stomach or the dull throb of my cut and torn feet. It felt like I was one of them moths that came to the light on the trailer at night. I was just drawn to it. I found the steps, and then the door, and pushed inside. Nobody was home, not that I expected they would be. Nobody had missed me at all. I bet nobody even knew I had been missing. I didn't really care that much as I shuffled straight to the kitchen, dirty ragged and hurt. I found some bologna in the fridge and some old stale bread on the counter but when I put it together it was the best thing I could ever remember eatin' in my whole life.

I finished my sandwich and that's when it hit me. How alone I was. The emptiness of the trailer seemed to fold in on me like darkness. This wasn't how it was supposed to be. I hated my daddy and my brother and I hated my momma too, but I didn't wanna be alone. I didn't want this.


Three Days Before…

It took me hours to shake the wolves, completely but I figured out if I stayed away from their turf they left me alone. Mostly. Enough that I didn't have to worry about 'em that much. They might've been better than the snakes I found next or the hunger. I stopped being able to find myself berries and then I started eating leaves and worms. I figured it was better than dyin' or starving' to death. Besides, part of me knew Merle would be proud. He'd probably think I was being a man. A real man.

A real man wouldn't cry, but sometimes I still did. Especially at night when I was cold or hungry. I was glad nobody could see. I was also glad that even though I was cold and hungry I knew nobody was gonna be comin' in my room. Nobody was gonna be touchin' me like always happened at home. I was lost but I was safe. Maybe it didn't make no sense but somehow I felt safer here than I did at home. Well, mostly.

I thought the wolves had been the worst of the dangers but ain't nothing that smarts like about twenty five bee stings. I heard once you had to get the singers out, Merle told me that, so I sat there picking them out with tears on my cheeks, but nobody saw that either. I didn't think I was ever gonna find my way home, and once I thought maybe if I just sat still maybe someone would come find me, but after half a day I realized what I shoulda known all along. Weren't nobody lookin' for me. Ain't nobody who cared.

I had started sleeping in this old hollowed out tree at night, thinkin' that maybe I could just start livin out here if I just had some kind of weapon to hunt my food with. I had my tree and I could get some clothes if I stole 'em off somebody's house. If I could ever find somebody's house. I had all these plans in my head, but that's when things started to look familiar. I recognized some trees, and some old stumps Merle had burned some mice alive on. I shuddered at the memory but continued forward. I was more tired than I knew, and my feet carried me faster than my mind could tell them too, but home was near. I could sense it.

I wondered how long I had been gone, and I counted on my fingers, trying to remember by the nights because I remembered those the best. Nine, I thought to myself. It had been nine days,