There are advantages to the perspective of childhood. Namely, everything seems a whole lot simpler. Why's and How's don't matter so much. The way things are can be traced back to relatively simple explanations, such as "the sky is blue because green was already taken by the grass", or "snow is cold because angels left the freezer door open" (both explanations I heard myself as a child.

For someone who's been through everything from imprisonment, to being sucked to another world, to getting wrapped up in a full scale war... Eventually, Cream will grow up, and won't have that childish simplicity to hide behind anymore.

38. Pocahontas Soundtrack, Where Do I Go from Here?

Cream makes her last flower crown the day after her twelfth birthday.

She wants to use flowers from her own garden, even though there are usually nicer ones growing in Amy's, because it seems appropriate. The problem being, of course, that Cream was born in January. There aren't many flowers growing anywhere right now. It snowed a few days ago, and even though most of it has melted, you can still see your breath in little puffs of ice. There's a sliver of ice coating the pond, and a half melted snowhog, with the twig-spines falling out of its back and half of its carrot nose missing.

The carrot was probably eaten by a Chao. She'll have a word with Cheese about it later. That is, if she can understand what he's saying today. It's getting harder to, lately, because understanding Chao is something only small children can do, and Cream...

Well. Cream isn't all that small anymore.

A few people walk past as she wanders. They smile at her and say hello politely, and Cream says hello politely back, but nobody asks what she's doing, even though it must look silly: a girl like her wandering around a garden in a blue dress and woolly scarf. But then, the general consensus in their village is that the little rabbit girl is... Well... Not entirely right in the head.

For that matter, neither is the pink hedgehog that lives next door to her; or the fox with two tails who talks to his machinery, or Sonic (everyone remembers his name). In fact, whenever other people reference their little group, it's usually with aside glances and uneasy words. They aren't cruel words. Not at all. They're just... confused.

Cream can't say she blames them. She supposes she can be peculiar, but that's only to be expected, because she's one of the people who chooses not to conveniently forget about events she doesn't understand. Most people around here, Cream has noticed, hardly remember what it was like to be sucked into another world, even though you'd think something like that was pretty memorable. Most people try not to talk about when the Metarex came, or the day the sky turned into kaleidoscopic. People don't like to remember things which confuse them, so they try to act as if they never happened in the first place.

Cream supposes it's the same thing with her and her friends. What was it that Tails had called it? Oh yes, that's it: "A Weirdness Censor".

Cream the Rabbit is twelve years old. She can do the junior crossword without needing a dictionary, fly a plane, shoot a plasma cannon, and sometimes, she wakes up in the middle of the night crying because of bad dreams that she can't remember afterwards (though she has a pretty good idea what they were about). She once lived in another world, fought ghosts, battled robots, and helped to stop a war.

She also saw how the war ended. All the people on her world had seen back then was a bunch of shooting stars and lights. Cream had actually been there. Those few distant stars racing through the sky had been the Metarex, a glowing seed, Cosmo, and Sonic and Shadow rising into the sky and becoming brighter than any star...

Cream chooses to remember. Forgetting would be to forget what Cosmo did for them.

She still makes better flower crowns than she does anything else. Or she could if there were any flowers about, but one thing that's still the same now as it was when she was six years old is that the weather is never convenient. When you want to go out to play, it rains. When you want to go out and make some symbolic reference to your childhood, the ground is too hard and cold for anything to grow. It's the same difference.

So Cream sighs in irritation and sits down by the pond. She can see her reflection in the ice. People keep telling her how different she looks now. She's Momma's Big Girl and Amy's Not-So-Little-Sister. Every time Vector calls he recounts a story about when Cream was "just about up to here on my kneecaps" and Tails stutters around her more than he used to. Cream knows why, because she's had the sleepovers with Amy, complete with games of Truth of Dare, and the occasional attempt at world domination by Eggman...

And sometimes, Cream realises, it all feels a little silly.

The way her childhood way, that is. Not that her childhood is over yet, but it feels like a very long time has passed since she was in the human world. She hasn't been into space since they came back from fighting the Metarex. She went three years without sitting in a cockpit, and yet, when she did, how to steer had just come back to her. It was like riding a bike, Tails said; you never really forgot.

And that's just as well, because Cream sometimes feels that if she didn't have the photographs and the abilities and the beautiful Peony Rose, Cream doesn't know if she could believe those four years had really happened and she hadn't just dreamed them.

She has seen more than anyone could possibly imagine seeing. She's been to war. She watched the heavens exploding. She nearly died because a robot who used to be her friend went crazy and started trying to kill everyone. And she doesn't want to think about how long she's been away from earth, because now she's old enough to understand the definition of "Time Paradox". The thought of Chris and Helen and Ella growing old and grey in what, to Cream, has only been a few years is...

Cream doesn't want to think about it. She doesn't want to think about the fact that some of them might not be alive anymore, and have no idea that it was her twelfth birthday yesterday. In that sense, Cream supposes, she's just like everybody else. Remembering things which at their core were often bad or strange or disturbing takes a lot of effort, and sometimes doesn't seem worth it.

Cream has difficulty working out what she's supposed to do with herself. The world wasn't made for people like her, who can watch people dying, make flower crowns and talk about visiting other worlds. Sometimes it's hard to be content with who you are and what you have, no matter how nice what you have is, or how much you went through so you could keep it.

Or maybe, Cream thinks, that's just another symptom of growing up: not knowing who you are.

She looks at her reflection, and tries very hard to see the changes everyone is talking about. But the only thing Cream can see is the tuft of fur which likes to hang over her forehead. She might be a little taller, but asides from that, most of Cream's changes took place on the inside.

She's so wrapped up in the icy reflection, that she doesn't notice Sonic's arrival until he's gone again. Which isn't unusual. Often, the only indication you get that Sonic is here is the whooshing sound he makes as he shoots by.

And whatever he leaves behind.

What Sonic has left behind this time, is a basket, sitting on the doorstep. A very full basket. Cream leaves the pond, brushing flecks of ice away from her thin dress and walks back to the step. The basket is filled so full with snowdrops, that they're pouring over the edges, and some have gotten battered by the high speed at which Sonic travels. There's a note tucked in between them

To Cream,

Better late than never right?

Happy 12th Birthday.

S.

The note looks as if it was scribbled very quickly, but then, that's the way that Sonic does everything. And Cream smiles as she sits down on the step, thinking that a crown of snowdrops will be as nice as anything, and begins to carefully thread the thin, green stems together.

My world has changed, and so have I.
I've learned to choose and even learned to say goodbye,
The path ahead so hard to see, it winds and bends,

But where it ends all depends on only me.
In my heart I don't feel part of so much I've known.
Now it feels it's time to start a new life on my own.

But where do I go from here?
So many voices ringing in my ears.
Which is the voice I was meant to hear?
How will I know, where do I go from here?