Taking the Throne: A Daniel Tiger Tragedy

Chapter I: Dying Dreams

I waited for Trolley outside of the castle alongside my cousin, Prince Wednesday. We were 10 years old, and Wednesday loved nothing more than to bully me. He would constantly tease me, often targeting my lameness in my legs, and feel no remorse for it.

Trolley came up, ringing its bells, and let us board. Wednesday rushed on first and watched with a sadistic expression on his face as I slowly went aboard with my crutches.

"Can you be any slower?" he jeered.

"I can't help it, Wednesday," I sighed. He would always complain about how slow and useless I was.

"That's Prince Wednesday to you, Chrissie. Get it right."

I rolled my eyes as the school comes into view. "Why does it even matter? I'm your cousin."

Wednesday's face took on an expression of mock horror. "I'm still a prince! You have no right to disrespect me like that you-you...orphan!"

As Trolley screeched to a halt in front of school, my eyes started to fill with tears. He had never targeted my parents in his bulling before. I raced off of Trolley as fast as I could with my crutches as Wednesday laughed at me. I burst into the classroom and ran to Elaina, my best friend.

"He's doing it again!" I whined, sitting next to her.

"That little brat," Elaina replied. "He'll get his comeuppance someday."

The school day came and went with plenty of Wednesday's torturous teasing, but soon it was the end of the day. Everyone got onto Trolley and it went around the neighborhood, dropping my classmates off. When Trolley got to the castle, Wednesday and I would get off and Tuesday would get on. He would babysit Margaret and help her with her homework every day.

At home Wednesday and I generally avoided each other. He knew that if the king saw him bullying me, he would be incinerated. I would just stay in my room and do things on my laptop. I'd message my friends (basically anyone in the class who wasn't Wednesday) and have fun and play games with them. Sure, they only lived a few houses down, but anywhere in public was unpleasant with the risk of Wednesday lingering around.

And so this is how things were, until a day in late October.

It was a Wednesday morning in October, and I was anticipating the worst. Wednesday was always at his worst on Wednesdays, for that was when he was most prideful. Even home wasn't safe from Wednesday on Wednesdays. So, on Wednesdays, I would go help Tuesday with babysitting Margaret.

I loved hanging out with Tuesday and Margaret. Sometimes Elaina would even come along, but that was only because of her massive crush on Tuesday. This day, however, was different. Tuesday had caught a cold and could not attend his daily ritual. I was on my own.

When Margaret and I got to her house, Mrs. Tiger greeted me. She was always busy and Mr. Tiger was usually at work, so she was grateful for Tuesday and I.
That day, instead of playing outside, Margaret wanted to stay in her room and play with toys. While we were playing, Margaret suddenly stopped playing and a stoic expression took her face.

"Miss Chrissie?" Margaret asked.

"Yes?"

"Do you know where Danny is?"

I sighed. The Tigers had told their daughter that Daniel had "disappeared", and she didn't know what happened to him. I guess that she just wanted to ask others if they knew where he went. In that moment, I figured that she was ready to find out. She was not. In retrospect I should've consulted her mother, but I didn't.

"He went to... heaven."

"What? Why?"

"Because he passed on."