A Snake Falls to Earth: Newbery Honor Award Winner

by Darcie Little Badger

I wondered how anyone found each other in a place where it was so easy to become lost.

The gentle sun, which caressed me in patches of warmth squished between leaf-shaped shadows, felt so nice against my face. I almost forgot about my anxieties.

They say the path to anywhere-you-please is not concerned with the rules of space or time. It slithers snakelike through forests—mostly in the world of spirits and monsters, but occasionally on Earth—fleeing from the people who want to catch it. That’s why no map leads to the path, just like no map can lead to a roaming pack of wolves. Guess that’s also why most people who walk the path do so unwittingly.

“That’s the problem with being a shape-shifter. People always assume you’re in disguise. My best friends don’t trust me at all, do they?”

The path to anywhere-you-please cannot be found, and I never expect it to find me again. That’s okay. I’ll always be grateful for our single encounter, and for its grace to guide me home. A place where the water binds two worlds; where coyotes confide in monsters; where hawks and mockingbirds discern revelations from ancient trees; where my best friend basks in the sun beside me; and where I can spend long days in the company of new family, as I search for the family I left behind. I don’t need the path anymore.