1. The Forest Between Us

My name’s Gilly, but you won’t see it again in this diary. I don’t like writing it down or saying it out loud unless I have to. Here’s why: two days before I was born, Mom told Dad she wanted to name me Gilly. Dad had another name in mind. They argued and didn’t speak for those two days. Mom got so upset, she went into labor early—two months early. And that’s how I ended up with her name choice.

Mom says I’m making it up (I do make up lots of stories, to be fair) and that her being sad and me being born early aren’t connected. But I don’t buy it. I also think Dad, who lives on the other side of the forest, about a night’s walk from our house, still doesn’t like my name.

Mom won’t tell me what name Dad wanted to give me, not even a hint. I could promise to water every single flower in our garden for a hundred hearts on Orti (that’s our tangerine tree), and she’d still keep it a secret.

Because she doesn’t tell me, and because I think about Dad every day—pretty much the whole time it takes the sun to drop from the sky—I came up with another name for myself. It’s not really a secret, but no one else knows it. It’s the kind of sweet name I bet Dad would’ve picked for me.

One day, I’ll see Dad again. I’ll tell him the new name I came up with, and he’ll smile. The argument he had with Mom will be over, and everything in our forest will feel right again. I hope that day comes soon.

And sometimes I wonder—what if the new name I came up with is the exact same one Dad had in mind all these years? Wouldn’t that be the most incredible surprise?

I need to tell you more about me and my life. You already know my name, that I have a few secrets, and that we have a special tangerine tree in our backyard covered in little hearts I carved myself. You also know my family can switch from super happy to super sad in no time. But there’s a lot more to my story than that, and I capture it all in my diary.  

I write in it every day (it’s just a plain notebook with drawings of animals and plants I’ve doodled on the cover). I don’t write too much, though, because I’m convinced my pencils have tiny souls, and they need breaks, or else they snap—kind of like some people I know. So, between entries, I draw animals or flowers or sometimes just leave a little blank space.

One day, when the time feels right and Orti drops all its tangerines, I’m going to turn my diary into a real book. I’ll edit and proofread it (two fancy words Mom taught me—she likes to write too) and split the entries into short chapters, about 683 words each. I’ll pick 683 because it’s my lucky number. Once, I tried counting all the tangerines on Orti’s branches, but a squirrel came to sit with me. We ended up playing a staring game, trying not to laugh. I won, but I completely lost track of my count. After that, we both decided to call it 683.

I think the book will need about fifty chapters, because real books always have chapters, and I want my notebook diaries to feel like a real book more than anything. I don’t know who will read it—maybe kids my age, their parents, or even grandparents. And if they have any witches in their family, I really hope they’ll read it too!

When I turn my diary into a book, I’ll make sure this very page goes right at the beginning, where it belongs—even though I’m writing it long after most of the notebook is filled. That’s part of what Mom calls the magic of editing. But enough about that for now. I think my pencil needs a break for today.

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2. The Wednesday Ritual

Once, when we had tangerines, I’d peel them and drop the peels along the path, just in case I got lost. Someone could always follow the trail and find me.  

Orange is my favorite color.  

Once, when we had sweaters, I wasn’t cold.  

Every night before bed, I say my prayers. I’ve written more than ten of them in my notebook. Mom helped a little, but I came up with the words myself and memorized each one.  

Mom says I shouldn’t say “once when” for things that will come back, like tangerines or sweaters. But I think it fits. Just because something’s supposed to return doesn’t mean it feels like it will. Like rain—it used to fall all the time. Now, there is no rain. Mom says it’ll be back, but for now, it feels like another “once when” to me.

Mom and her friends trust nature, but I’m not so sure. I trust Orti, of course, and the river—it’s just a short, easy barefoot walk from our house. I trust the ants and most of the birds, too. But I don’t trust thunder or those heavy clouds, especially the ones that creep in at night when you can’t even see them.

Mom’s friends have funny names: Odelia, Mississippi, and Eternity. I have no idea who named Mississippi. Once, when I got lost, she was the one who found me and brought me back home. I remember Mom telling her she didn’t know what to do with a girl who’s always getting lost.  

Now, there isn’t a single tangerine anywhere around here.

Dad taught me how to peel tangerines. Every time I peel one, I think of him—how tall he is and the warmth of his hands. He showed me the right way when we lived in a different place, a strange mix of desert and oasis. He moved here first, and then we followed. That’s when Mom’s new friends—Mississippi, Odelia, and Eternity—started visiting.

Mississippi has a thin, buzzy voice. When she talks about her trips around the country, she gets so excited, like they’re the most important adventures anyone’s ever had. I don’t know why, but once I start thinking about Mississippi, it’s hard to stop.

Mississippi has one black tooth and a lot of white ones. She’s short and beautiful. Once, when I got lost in the woods, she found me and brought me home. After Dad left us—one Thursday, just as the sun was setting—she started living with him.

I was standing on the porch when Dad came to kiss me. He hugged me, and we both cried. I clung to his sleeve, not wanting to let go. A moment later, Mom came out and hugged me too. That evening, Dad left.  

What I remember most is him being sick for a long time—probably because he had to leave us. Mom kept telling him he was getting worse. So eventually, he went.

When I’m sick, I have to stay in bed.  

Now Dad lives with Mississippi on the other side of the forest. Mississippi and Mom are still friends.  

Orti is our tangerine tree. I’ve given names to all the trees around our house, and I remember every one of them. Since the day Dad left, I’ve gone out to the yard every day and carved a heart into Orti’s trunk. If you ever see a tree covered in tiny hearts all the way up to where its leaves begin to drape, you’ll know that’s my Orti. 

Orti is as tall as six or seven yanakas stacked on top of each other, but it’s still not the tallest fruit tree in our yard.

But I didn’t explain what yanakas are. I’ll try to do it later, because yanakas always love getting more attention than just a passing mention.

Sometimes Mississippi comes over from the other side of the forest and brings photos. She and Mom never talk about Dad. Every time she visits, always on a Wednesday, she squeaks about everything—places she’s been, things she’s seen—but never about him.  

Odelia and Eternity show up too, either right before or right after Mississippi, but it’s always on the same day.

When Mom’s friends visit, they play cards. They start as soon as the sun sets—Mississippi says it’s too warm to play before that—and one time, they kept going until the sun came up.

Mom usually wins, which makes sense to me—she’s my mom, after all. Odelia and Eternity don’t mind losing, but Mississippi? Not a chance. When she loses, she gets so mad she flings all her cards into the air. When that happens, the game has to pause until she calms down.

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3. The Lost Family

Our forest has rabbits, snakes, little monkeys, and lots and lots of yanakas. I can’t really explain what kind of animal the yanaka is, but there are many of them in our forest. Since I didn’t know its real name and Mom said she had never seen one, I gave it a name myself.

I’m not scared of the yanakas, but I don’t get too close to them either.

I like the color green, but I really like orange more. You can trust me on these two colors because I usually don’t lie, and I almost never lie to people I don’t know.

The people I know are my dad, my mom, Mississippi, Odelia, Eternity, the gardener (I won’t write his name—he’s half-shy, half absolutely not, and might prefer to stay a mystery), and Oggy. Oggy is easily one of the most interesting people I know.

Oggy and I are the same age. He lives nearby, in a house that isn’t bigger or smaller than ours, but it has more blue colors and more windows.

When Mississippi first saw Oggy, she said out loud that she always dreamed of having such a sweet child.

If you leave my house and turn right, you’ll get to the salt lake. If you go straight, you’ll end up in the middle of the forest. But if you turn left, you’ll probably get lost, so bring tangerines just in case.

I asked Mom where the rest of our family is (besides Dad). Like, where are my grandparents and uncles and aunts and cousins? Mom said we used to be a huge family, the biggest one, but they all left, and now it’s just me and her. I think she was joking, but her jokes are sometimes a little sad. I think what she really meant is that she wishes she knew where everyone went.

I love my mom.

“Brelli” is a word Oggy taught me. It means super excellent, like really, really good. Oggy makes up words that are better than the regular ones, and because we’re best friends, he says I can use his magic words too. So when Mom or Mississippi or Eternity or Odelia says something, I can answer back with one of Oggy’s special words, and it makes whatever I say feel even stronger.

I don’t think magic is real, but I totally believe in Oggy.

Oggy doesn’t really think the prayers I write in my notebook work, but when I pray, he still sits next to me and listens anyway.

One time, Oggy showed me how he could juggle three tangerines. I couldn’t stop watching, and he said it wasn’t magic at all, just practice.

Tangerines make everything feel extra special.

Sometimes strangers come to our house. I just hide behind Mom or pretend I’m super busy so I don’t have to talk to them.

If I lie to people I don’t know, it makes my stomach and throat feel weird, like a knot. But I can lie to Odelia and Eternity and not feel anything, probably because they’re always so busy with their own stuff and never really notice what I say. Even when I told them they were super nice and that I loved having them over, or that their shoes were amazing, or that I rode an old yanaka, they didn’t even notice I was making it all up.

I think if I ever catch a yanaka, I’ll tell it my secret name, and maybe it will take me somewhere amazing, like where everyone is waiting for me. Maybe even to the house where my dad lives.

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