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“Poke poke.”
I opened an eye. “Did you just poke me while saying ‘poke poke’?” I asked. Leafy giggled.
“Hiiii!” She jumped around on the bed, and I groaned and rolled over.
“Leafy, it’s midnight. Go to sleep.” I told her. She sighed.
“I’m not sleepy,” she said. “I’m worried about something.” She whispered. I turned over.
“Worried about what?” I whispered back. Leafy looked down. She twiddled her thumbs for a moment before looking away. “Leafy.” She hopped off the bed and walked over to the window.
“The sky is pretty,” she said. She was right; the stars were exceptionally bright tonight. I too crawled out of bed and went to look at it with her. I noticed she was counting the stars, so I joined her.
“How many?” I asked. She smiled.
“Eighty-eight,” she replied. I grinned. She loves it when things are in multiples of eight. It seemed to be her favourite number. She returned to counting, starting all over again. I tilted my head.
“Didn’t you already count them?” I asked.
“I have to count them again,” she replied. “Shh.” I let her count, then once more.
“Lea-”
“What if one of them is a meteor?” She suddenly asked. “What would we do if there were suddenly 89 stars? And one of them gets bigger and brighter and closer and then it crashes into earth and we all die?”
I looked away. “Well,” I responded, “maybe I would take you downstairs, and you’d sit with Juniper Seed and wait for the meteor to hit. And then once it’s gone we’ll come out and feed Juniper Seed and we’d live.”
“What if there’s more than one meteor?” She asked.
I sighed. “Well, we’ll just have to hope there isn’t.” I rubbed her back and brought her back to bed. “It’s late, sweetie. Sleep. We have to work tomorrow.” Leafy groaned.
“I guess…” She said. She counted the stars one more time and then sat down. “I’m not sleepy…"
“You will be soon if you lay down, honey,” I coerced. She lay down next to me and burrowed her face into my arm.
A few minutes passed and Leafy still wasn’t sleeping. I poked her. “Poke poke,” I said. She looked up at me.
“What if the meteor strikes and we have to go downstairs and we’re not ready to spend a long time down there?” She asked. “We don’t have enough food to spend a month or even a week downstairs! We’ll starve to death!!” I sighed.
“We’re going to be fine, Leafster,” I said. She whimpered.
“But what if we’re not!! What if we go downstairs and there’s a bunch of bugs down there!?” She gently shook my arm. “You hate bugs! I hate bugs!! Juniper Seed can’t eat all those bugs herself!”
“Cats eat lots of bugs, sweetie. There won’t be that many and even if there is, Juni-”
“What about mice? We might have mice downstairs! Juniper Seed has never caught a mouse in her life!”
“Leafy-”
“And what about sunlight?! We’ll shrivel up if we have to stay down there!!”
“Le-”
“We have to have a lot of food and make sure it’s perfectly clean forever down there or else we won’t be prepared for a meteor strike and when there are 89 stars and we’re not ready we’re all going to die and I'm never going to see Coiny or Woody ever again and it’s all going to be my fault because I didn’t count right and it-”
“LEAFY!” I shouted. Leafy stopped talking and was now lightly shaking. “Things are going to be fine. You are going to be fine. Counting the stars wrong won’t be the end of the world. Please, calm down.”
Leafy whimpered. “But-...”
“Please.” I held her face and gently wiped her tears away. “I’m here for you. Calm down and go to sleep.”
Leafy looked down. “Alright…” she nuzzled herself into me and closed her eyes.
“Thank you. Goodnight, Leafy,” I said. She smiled.
“Goodnight, Flower,” she responded. “I love you.” I kissed her forehead and dozed off. Before I fell asleep, though, I felt her crawl out of my arms. She counted the stars again.