The Dinosaur Who Counted Stars

At the edge of a valley where the grass grew soft as feathers lived a little dinosaur named Pip. Every evening, Pip stood beside a warm, flat stone and waited for the first star. He liked to be the very first one to say hello.

One night a ribbon of clouds covered the sky. Pip counted one cloud, two clouds, three clouds. He waited so long that the warm stone began to cool beneath his toes. Then a firefly landed on his nose.

“Will you be my first star?” Pip whispered. The firefly blinked once and floated down to the grass. Another blinked beside the stream. Soon the valley was full of tiny lights that seemed to answer one another.

Pip followed the lights toward home. He found his grandmother arranging fern leaves into a bed. When he told her the stars had come down to visit, she made room beside her and asked him to show her where they were. They counted the lights nearest the nest, then let the ones farther away keep their own quiet.

A little breeze moved the clouds. One silver star appeared right above the fern bed. Pip thought about standing up to say hello, but his feet had found a comfortable spot. He gave the star a small nod from his pillow.

His grandmother began humming the tune she used when kneading bread. Pip knew every note, even the space between the last two. By the time the second star came out, his eyes were closed. The firefly blinked by the nest one more time and drifted out over the valley.