Little Red

ONE

It'd been ten years since that day.

"Daniella!"

A ten-year-old Daniella ran into the kitchen at the sound of her name being called to see her mother with a basket in her hands.

She never meant for it to happen.

"Yes, Momma?" Daniella asked as she looked up to her mother.

"I made some soup for your grandma because she isn't feeling too good today, and I want you to take it over to her. Can you do that for me?" her mother asked.

Daniella nodded her head as she grinned at the thought of seeing her grandmother.

She was a naive little ten-year-old girl.

Daniella walked through the woods with a hum and a red cape that covered her head as the cold autumn wind blew around her. She stopped when she heard the sudden sound of a twig snapping and slowly turned her head.

He took advantage of that.

"Well, hello there, little girl. What have you got there?" the tall wolf said as he slowly walked around the frightened child.

"A...a basket of...of goodies," she stammered as her hands gripped onto the basket handle.

The wolf raised an eyebrow at her as he asked, "Oh? A basket of goodies, you say? And just who might these goodies be for?"

"My grandma. She...she's um..she's sick," Daniella said as she tried to keep her breathing under control.

That time, the wolf stopped right in front of her with a fake pout on his features, but to the little girl, it hadn't seemed that way.

"Oh, is that so? I am so incredibly sorry to hear that," he mockingly told her.

Daniella looked up at the wolf and became nervous at his intense stare, so she looked around the forest before she cleared her throat and said, "I have to get going now. My grandma really needs me."

She should've listened to her mother. She should've just taken the usual way, but Dani wanted to give her grandmother a special gift of her own, so she made a shortcut through the strawberry bushes.

What a horrible mistake that was.

The wolf nodded, but there was a certain gleam in his blue eyes that sent the already frightened child on edge.

"And just where might that be?" he questioned with a smirk.

"Just across the bridge at Normy River. She lives in the little brown cottage," Daniella answered as she rubbed her hands over the handle of her basket.

The wolf raised his eyebrows in slight shock that the little girl had actually given him a truthful answer, but he quickly covered it up with a seemingly friendly smile.

"Mm, I see. Well, I suppose I should let you run along. Wouldn't want to keep dear grandmother waiting, now would we?" he questioned.

Daniella widened her eyes at the thought of making her poor sickly grandmother wait for her and quickly shook her head as she said, "Oh, no sir, absolutely not!!"

"Well, it was very nice meeting you. I do hope to see you again sometime...Little Red," the wolf said before he walked around her in the opposite direction.