Pip rolled across the sun-warmed leaves of the woodland clearing. Something glinted — a perfect, polished acorn sitting all by itself.
Pip picked it up and turned it over in his paws. 'Have you dropped your acorn?' he called up to the red squirrel.
'Nope! Those are mine,' chattered the squirrel, pointing a claw at his own nest. Pip looked down at his single acorn and kept walking.
A fluffy rabbit hopped past with her babies trailing behind. 'Have you lost your acorn?' Pip asked softly. The mama rabbit sniffed the air.
'No thank you, sweet hedgehog,' she said, nudging her bunnies toward the clover. Pip kept walking, his shoulders drooping, the clearing growing quieter.
He wondered if the owner was long gone, or sleeping, or simply didn't miss it at all. His grip tightened on the single acorn.
At the forest's deepest edge, Pip heard a tiny voice. A family of field mice stood in a ring around a dandelion clock, their ears perked high.
'We lost our wish acorn,' whispered the smallest mouse. 'Without it, we can't make a wish.' Pip looked from the acorn to the trembling little face.
Pip bent down and placed the acorn gently in the center of the dandelion ring. The smallest mouse let out a soft little sigh of relief.
Pip walked back across the clearing as golden evening light filtered through the trees. Behind him, the field mice blew on the dandelion — whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!
The smallest mouse waved a tiny paw. Pip waved back, and the clearing felt somehow bigger, somehow warmer, all at once.
Pip headed home through the quiet woods, his steps light, the empty space where the acorn had been feeling just right.