The child is going to the woods, having not told a living soul, to spend a night alone, and find monsters and magic, or at least something wondrous.
They lie down in a blanket of vines and wait for a sound.
Hours pass.
The child has closed eyes and is almost asleep when they hear a noise.
It is a noise they have never heard before.
They should open their eyes- or should they?
If they open their eyes, perhaps there will be a monster. They will be sure of it, and the creature will be known.
Or perhaps they will find some great and brutal creature that will devour them.
That option might be better, truth told.
Or, finally.There are no fairies, no ghosts, no bogeymen.
It must be a deer, only a deer.
And if they open their eyes to find that, they will be crushed.
This is the perfect time to leave, run out into the deepest parts of the forest, where one might die, but one might also live there, in the unknown parts of the wood with creatures fanged and strange, in a land where there may or may not be magic.
The child is too scared.
So the child waits the rest of the night, eyes closed, shivering: and returns home to live their life in a land full of only ordinary wonders.