Pouflons Prompt Fills

They were small and soft the first time they curled up by Ixora’s side, a baby bird eyes unopened, candlelight so thin that it felt like a breath could blow them out. They pressed in close to her and they sighed, setting their tiny, delicate head down on Ixora’s foot. Ixora didn’t dare to move - they didn’t know if it was for fear of waking them or for fear of hurting them.

They were so small.

When they ran for the first time, words not quite in their mouth yet though the sounds of joy certainly were, Ixora ran with them. To play with them, to catch them, to keep them from darting out of the clearing with a light bump from Ixora’s hip. When they both wound down, rolling in grass and covered in leaves, Ixora stood up first and waited for the strength in the wobbling reeds that were their legs to come back to them. They leaned into Ixora’s side again, and they came up to her elbows. 

They were so small.

The first time their parents brought a pippet home, a gnut with a notched ear, she watched their hooves carve a wide circle into the grass from their racing. The gnut would dash against the back of their head and chirp in glee, pulling their ears, declaring them “it,” and they’d take off around the circle again after it. Roles changed, they both laughed, and then the gnut, excited, went in the thick of the trees and disappeared. Ixora stepped up when they started to run after it, just before it barreled back with a loupine on its heels. She charged, head first, and it was by some god’s good graces that their parents came before anything more than scratches found them all. Ixora rolled the gauze around their leg, and they smiled, shaky, up at her.

They were so small.

When their mother was gone for one week, then two, then a month, then three, it was the first time they both slept alone in the house. When their parent didn’t come back from their search for her by the day they’d said, it was the first time neither of them slept. Ixora got them both tea, blankets, books, a board game, two salads with limp leaves and stale bread. She curled up close by their side, a seabird with no port, a lantern sputtering for lack of fuel. They pressed in close to her and they sobbed, pushing their tired, damp head into her shoulder. Ixora didn’t dare to move.

They were so small.

Cooking was easy. Cleaning was easy. Shopping, haircuts, bedtime stories. She came to enjoy it, really, the busy work of it all.

The hard nights weren’t easy. The stares out the window, the questions, the comfort she felt like she wasn’t the right person to be giving. 

She’d keep the dinners coming and the cleaning going and the stories on tap whenever Musli wanted them. She’d keep them warm and in one piece. She’d watch them grow up. 

She hoped they’d be taller than her one day.