Pella and the White-Striped Pebble

Pella the puffin chick sat outside the family burrow. Beside her lay a smooth pebble with one white stripe. She rubbed the stripe with her wing. Her brother, Nori, was building a tower nearby. He tried several flat stones before the top one stayed still.

Grandma came to sit beside them. "What a tall tower!" she said. Nori lifted his head. Pella wanted Grandma to look at her that way too. Her own stones had kept falling. What if Grandma thought she couldn't make anything worth looking at?

"I made it!" Pella said. The words came out quickly. Her tummy tightened. Nori opened his beak. "But I was building it all morning." Pella pressed her wing over the striped pebble. "I put the top on," she said. But she hadn't done that either.