Night had fallen faster than I thought. I had been so careless, lingering too long with Mrs. Squirrel, and now the forest was dark, heavy, and unfamiliar. My paws moved as fast as they could over the soft ground, but the darkness seemed endless. Every rustle of leaves made me jump. Every broken branch underfoot felt like it might announce me to the predators that lurked here.

Then, I saw her.

The Big Bad Wolf.

She stepped out of the shadows like she had been waiting there the whole time. Older, taller than any rabbit should ever face, her fur gray with streaks of scars from fights I could only imagine, and her eyes—sharp, calculating, unblinking—locked on me. She didn’t make a sound. She didn’t need to. Her presence alone made the hair on my neck stand up and my stomach twist.

I froze. My paws refused to move. My chest tightened, and every breath caught painfully in my throat. I tried to convince myself to back away, to run, but my legs felt like stone.

My mind started racing—what if I did something wrong? What if I made her angry? I imagined her leaping, her teeth closing on me, tearing me apart. I could feel the panic squeezing my chest as I pictured every possible way she could hurt me. My thoughts went somewhere darker, somewhere awful: what if she decided I was prey in more ways than one? I didn’t want to think it, but my mind wouldn’t stop. I was small. I was young. I was helpless. And she was so much bigger, so much stronger.

I forced myself to take a tiny step backward. My paws slipped on the leaves, and my ears twitched uncontrollably. I couldn’t tell if she had noticed—or if she was just waiting. My heartbeat pounded in my ears so loudly I could barely hear anything else. The forest around me felt unreal, as if the trees themselves were pressing closer, listening, watching.

I tried to imagine a way out, any way. Could I duck behind a tree? Could I run fast enough? My mind filled with worst-case scenarios: I would run, she would follow, I’d stumble, she’d catch me, and all the horrible things I had feared would happen. I couldn’t think rationally. Every instinct screamed danger, screamed “run!” But every instinct also screamed “don’t make a sound, don’t make a move.”

The wolf tilted her head slightly, and I thought I saw a flicker of amusement—or maybe it was hunger. My stomach dropped. I imagined her leaping forward, clawing, biting, dragging me into the darkness. My eyes watered. My breath came in short, shallow gasps. I wanted to scream, but I couldn’t. I didn’t dare.

I backed up again, slow, careful, each paw trembling. My paws scraped against twigs and leaves, making tiny noises that sounded deafening in the stillness. The wolf didn’t chase me. She didn’t even move. And yet, the tension was unbearable. I felt like she could snap at any moment, and all the awful scenarios I had imagined could suddenly be real.

I thought about my family—my little brother, my parents—and how much I wanted to get back to them. The forest seemed endless, dangerous. And in the middle of it, the wolf was a constant, living reminder of how small and weak I was. I had to escape, but my fear had me frozen, and my imagination filled every second with the worst possible outcomes.