MORNINGSIDE MEADOW

Season Two · Episode 2

The Slow Crossing

The grass was still damp near the roots. Morning light lay across the narrow path, and a little warmth had begun to gather on the stones.

Rill came sliding around the bend and stopped just before he bumped into Thimble. She was sitting in the middle of the path. “What are you doing?” he asked. “Waiting.” “For what?”

Thimble pointed. A snail was crossing the path. It had come out of the grass on one side, and its two long feelers reached toward the other.

Rill lay down beside it. “It isn’t moving.” “It is,” Thimble said.

They watched. The snail stretched its feelers forward. Its little body followed, slowly enough that Rill could hardly see it happen. A grain of sand appeared behind it. “Oh,” Rill said.

He slid over to the clover and back. The snail was still crossing. “Did I miss anything?” “No.”

Rill went to the stream bend. He dipped one paw into the water, shook it dry, and hurried back. The snail had moved past the grain of sand. “I missed it!” Thimble shook her head. “You can still see it.”

A breeze moved along the path, bending the grass at its edges. The snail drew in one feeler, then stretched it out again. A small patch of sunlight moved across its shell.

Rill lowered himself beside the snail. “I can go slowly.” He took one very small step. Then another. He held his next foot in the air for so long that he tipped sideways into the grass.

Thimble looked at him. “This is difficult,” Rill said.

The snail went on.

By the time it reached the other side, Rill had been to the low hill twice and around the burrow ring once. Thimble had stayed where she was.

The snail touched the first blade of grass. Its feelers disappeared beneath it, and then its shell followed. A thin silver trail crossed the path behind it, shining where the sunlight reached.

“It made it,” Rill said. He stood at one end of the trail. Thimble stood at the other. “That took all morning,” he said.

Thimble looked toward the grass where the snail had gone. “Not for the snail.”

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