Story - Deer

Art by: Nico Talamona
Story by: Alice

The sun shone through the trees, illuminating the forest floor with its warm, golden light. I took a deep breath and resumed my quiet stroll, thinking by now it would be time to munch on something.

As I came closer and closer to a clearing I saw previously I began to feel... uneasy. There was something strange, a weird sensation at the back of my head. I was being observed. 

But from where? Who was it? In this part of the forest there’s supposed to be nothing more than small animals and birds, that’s why I come here! Unless… Realization washed over me as I sharply turned to my right. It’s there, I can feel it. It’s one of them!

I stilled my breath, forcing my palpitating heart to calm down. Unmoving, I searched for the figure with my eyes. ‘Calm down’ I thought ‘you need to see what kind of animal it is. The color of its mane, if it’s holding something’.

As I was going through my mental list, I finally noticed it. Them, actually. It looked like a male and female couple; their eyes wide open just as their mouth as they scanned my body up and down.

I felt observed, but I calmed down as soon as I noticed that they not only weren’t carrying anything suspicious, but their mane was bright and colorful. That was the final proof I needed to understand there was no danger.

While I puffed out a small breath and my muscles relaxed, the male took out from its back a small object that glinted under the sun. ‘I was right’ I reassured myself ‘they only wanted to look at me with that thing’.

In my long life I saw quite a number of these weird animals, the not dangerous kind speaks with hushed sounds and moves very slowly once I look at them, so as to not bother me. They usually hang around for a few minutes, looking at me with those peculiar objects.

I remember an owl talked about them not too long ago, I think He called them “humans”.