This story was first published elsewhere in March 2003. It was in the process of being beta-read when my hard drive crashed; and the "other" computer being crippled, I let it go, and sort of forgot about it for awhile, until Citrine reminded me of its existence. The original beta-reader wasn't available, though, so I put it back on the shelf to wait. Then recently Dreamflower graciously agreed to beta-read the piece. So I had this ready to go when another "dry spell" set in, and a good thing too.

There is no time for writing at present. Hope you don't mind making do with an "oldie", brushed off and sporting a new coat of paint.

This was written as a companion to the poem "Too Young", which can be found here at SoA at this link:

http://www.storiesofarda.com/chapterlistview.asp?SID=2578

Thanks for reading. As always, comments are most welcome. (And apologies, if you've left a comment elsewhere in the past few weeks and haven't received a response. It has been an... how to put it... interesting time, to say the least. Please know that the comments were most appreciated, and still are.)