A short story by Ezra Nadav

Every autumn, when the air turned sharp and gold, the other squirrels of Willow Glen gathered acorns. But not Pip. Pip gathered stories.

While the others scampered through fallen leaves with cheeks stuffed full of winter food, Pip climbed from branch to branch with arms full of books — tiny ones, large ones, even one bound in blue velvet that smelled faintly of sea air. The others thought him strange.

“Books won’t fill your belly, Pip!” they chattered.

But Pip just smiled, his tail flicking with quiet purpose. “Maybe not,” he said, “but they fill something else.”

His hollow in the old oak tree was already overflowing. The books were stacked in careful piles: Tales of Daring Feats, Herbal Wisdom of the Woodland, The Song of the Stars, and A Beginner’s Guide to Friendship. Each one a treasure he’d found left behind by humans who picnicked, wandered, and forgot.

Sometimes, on crisp nights, he’d light a firefly lantern and read aloud. The forest seemed to lean in and listen — the trees creaked softly, the leaves shivered, and even the wind held its breath. Pip’s favorite was a story about a sailor who navigated by heart instead of stars. He liked to imagine the sailor would have been proud of him — a squirrel charting his own strange course.

One particularly cold evening, as the first snow began to fall, Pip heard a faint rustling outside his tree. He poked his head out and saw a small bird shivering on the branch.

“Lost your way?” Pip asked.

The bird nodded weakly. “I stayed too long in the north wind. I can’t remember which way my flock went.”

Pip thought for a moment, then scampered inside. He came back with a small, worn book titled Maps of the Sky. “This might help,” he said, opening it to a page filled with stars drawn in silver ink. “See? That bright one there is the North Star. Follow it south, and you’ll find your way home.”

The bird blinked. “You’re giving this to me?”

“Of course,” Pip said. “What good is a story if it can’t help someone find their way?”

The bird took the book carefully in its beak, thanked him, and flew into the snow, a faint glimmer of silver guiding the way.

Word of Pip’s kindness spread. Soon, animals began to visit his tree — a hedgehog looking for courage before hibernation, a fox learning how to tell the truth, even a young hare who wanted to understand why the moon was always changing shape. Pip would rummage through his stacks, find the right story, and send them away a little lighter, a little wiser.

By midwinter, the hollow was nearly empty. Pip sat by his window, watching snow fall thick as wool, and felt a pang of worry. He had no acorns stored. No food. Only empty shelves and the soft memory of stories shared.

As hunger gnawed at him, a soft tapping came at the door. One by one, his forest friends arrived — the bird, the hedgehog, the hare, even the fox — each carrying something small: berries, nuts, seeds, and a few tiny twigs of honey bark.

“We thought you might be hungry,” said the hare shyly.

“And lonely,” added the bird, fluttering in.

Pip’s whiskers twitched. His heart felt full to bursting. “You remembered me.”

“How could we forget?” said the fox. “You taught us to remember what matters.”

That night, they all gathered inside the oak, sharing food and stories as snow whispered outside. The hollow glowed with warmth, laughter, and the rustle of turning pages. And Pip realized something he’d never found written in any book — that stories, like acorns, are meant to be shared, not stored.

When spring returned, the oak’s branches burst into green. Pip climbed out and saw the forest alive again — birds building nests, fox kits tumbling in the grass, and his friends waving up at him from below. He stretched, smiled, and took a deep breath of sunlit air.

Then he picked up a small blank book, dipped a quill into ink made from crushed violets, and began to write.

It was called The Library of Leaves.

And at the bottom of the first page, he wrote:

“A squirrel once thought he was saving books for himself,

until he learned that every story, like every season,

belongs to everyone.”

The End.

For Now.