I could hear my friend Sam calling for me, so far away, his voice was so faint. This was impossible, as Sam had only just been standing beside me when we both stepped into the corn field. It was as if the maze of tall green, ripe stalks was a whole different world, a place where our understanding of distance and time no longer applied. I was worried for Sam, for Billy the watermelon-buffalo, for all the apricots, and for Boo the ra-corn. Boo I probably feared the least about though, to be honest, as she was made from corn and so had the best chance out of all of us to navigate her way through the maze. I hoped that Sam would find Boo, or that Boo would find him, and then maybe they would together find me. Thinking about what to do, I moved through the stalks in the direction which I thought my friend would be.

Sam? Are you safe? Or are you lost too, like me, I wondered.

It sounded to me like the call had come from the left, only a few yards away.

How did he make it past me without my hearing him.

"I'm over here!" my voice called back, but to my surprise it was not me who had spoken.

Was being in the mirror world and being in the corn maze the same?

"Hello!" I called out.

Thankfully, it was my own voice that I heard.

Then I heard it again.

"Hello!" said my voice, but this time, the sound came from above my head.

I looked up and saw one of the cobs of rich corn had drawn back its greenery. A face smiled down at me.

"Who are you?" I asked.

"Who are you?" the corn-cob face echoed back at me in an identical tone and rhythm.

"I'm Jess," I said.

"Well then I guess, Jess, that I'm Jess too," said the face. "If you cut me loose then we can both navigate our way to freedom."

"I'm sorry," I told the corn-cob face. "I don't have something that can cut you free."

The corn-cob face frowned and then growled.

"I'm sorry… I'm sorry…" I said. "How about I quickly step back out of this corn field and go ask the Sssssss-nenna if she has some stuff I can use?"

The corn-cob face laughed, and not in a nice way.

"There is no way back," my voice told me, but using a mean tone that I would never use, not even when talking about people I did not like.

"Of course there is," I replied. "I just step out of the cornfield, like this."

As I took a big step back, I found myself still surrounded by stalks.

"Like this," I repeated, taking another big step.

"Like this…" the corn face said in a mocking and mean way. "Like this…"

I noticed to my surprise that even though I had taken two backward steps, I was still standing beside that mean old face of golden corn.

"So how do I get through this maze?" I asked.

"The only way is forward," said the corn stalk. "Going backward will take you no way at all."

"So, I go this way, and always straight?" I asked, pointing ahead of me.

"Yes, and no," replied the corn cob.

"Yes, I go straight ahead, but not always?" I then asked, more confused.

"No, and yes," said the less than friendly vegetable.

"I shall need to find a way to cut you free," I said with a sigh.

I began to wriggle the base of the stalk, like I was pulling a gigantic weed out of my father's garden.

"Ow… Ow… You are hurting me," complained the stalk.

A chorus of voices suddenly affronted me.

"Free us, too…" some of them said.

"Don't hurt us…" begged others.

"Don't delay…" warned one or two.

"No… I cannot delay… I must keep going…" I decided. "I am sorry, but I cannot stay here any longer…"

"Come back, this instant!" cried the corn cob, but this time the voice it used was different.

"Free me, please," whispered the voices of the stalks as I marched, determined, through them.

After ten or so minutes I felt like I had only gotten myself even more lost.

"Help!" I cried. "Someone please help me!"

The cobs of corn bent down so that they almost touched my head.

"If you help us, then we shall help you," they whispered into my ears.

"But I can't help you," I tried to explain. "I have nothing sharp that I can cut with and I need to cut you free."

"Use your sharp nails," suggested one.

I'd been nibbling my nails the whole time since we had first run away, Sam and I, from the strange puppeteer and his army of wooden marionettes.

"Use your teeth," said another.

I bent down and attempted to take a bite from one of the stalks, but the tall green stem was way too thick and tasted like straw.

"Perhaps you could use your wit and imagination," a third stalk thought.

"My what?" I asked.

"Is not your wit sharp? How brilliant is your banter?" one of the other faces of corn asked me.

"Sam is the far better talker," I suggested.

"A pity," moaned the cob.

"Search around then, if you are a better seeker than speaker," the cobs all cried. "Sometimes the Stuff leaves stuff behind."

"I guess it is worth a try," I replied with a shrug.

Making certain that I only moved forward, and never back, I began to crawl on my hands and knees, checking between the tall stalks for anything sharp.

"What about this?" I asked.

In my hands I held a dazzling diamond, the size of my hand, shaped like a cat's paw, ending in tiny sharp claws.

"Give my stalk a swipe," suggested a cob.

I did, and the claws sliced straight through it.

"I am free!" called the head of corn. "I am falling."

It landed with a loud, painful wail, but then jumped up and began hopping away.

"I'm free! I'm free!" it giggled with glee. "Come along, do not tarry, come follow me…"

And so, that is what I did. I hurried after the cob that bounced along, until it disappeared from my sight. That was when I swiped at another, and then another, each time my guide got away I would easily find a replacement. In this fashion I made it all the way through the maze, only to discover, when I popped out again, I was back at exactly the same spot as where I had started.

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