My Heart

Her father's mouth widened in surprise, and she ducked her head, wondering if she had misread him. She had thought he would be proud, but now she had a feeling she was about to get into trouble. She flattened her ears to her skill and scuffed a paw in the dirt, looking up at him remorsefully. Her extra long tail sweeped the earth behind her slowly, as through too cautious to continue its happy parade.

“I know dad” she said “But it wasn’t a real fight or anything. We-I made friends with a baby honey badger and the momma just told us off, she didn’t mean uhh-me, any real harm.” she lied. That honey badger had been pissed when it had seen them playing with its baby, but no need to tell her pappa that. She was really bad at this lying thing, she needed to work on. She just had to hope to hell he wasn’t paying attention to the ‘we’ and ‘us’ that slipped in.

She was more than happy to move the conversation on to defenses, and quickly moved her paws into position, digging in her toes and dipping her knees for balance. “Like this, Da” she said, diggin in her chin and ruffling up the fur near her neck.


Speech