He reached for his very serious bottle of ink, meaning only to admire how tidy it looked beside his pencils.
But his paw nudged it.
Plip.
A single drop of ink fell, right in the middle of the perfect, empty page.
Oliver froze. His whiskers trembled. A blot! A horrible, lopsided, not-at-all-planned blot! He snatched his blotting paper, dabbed at it once, twice—oh dear, that only made it spread into a funny little splodge with a tail.
“It’s ruined,” he whispered. “The whole page is ruined.”
He sat very still, staring at the splodge. Then, quite against his will, his nose gave a tiny twitch. The splodge looked… rather like a duck with very surprised feet.
Oliver did not move. He did not breathe. But inside, something small and curious wriggled awake.
Sign up to unlock all story paths and interactive features!
Sign Up Free