The Missing Piece

In a world far removed from the ordinary, there was a place called Nibbleton, where harmony reigned and every being was a perfect circle, smooth and unblemished. The sky above was always a soft mint green, and golden light bathed the fields below. But within this land of serene symmetry lived Pippin, a creature who had never felt at ease among the others.

Pippin was not like the rest. He carried a flaw, a jagged bite taken out of his green, round form. He didn’t know how it had happened, but the absence haunted him. The other creatures noticed, too. They would glance at him out of the corners of their eyes, murmur behind his back, and in time, those murmurs turned into a suffocating silence. Pippin became "the flawed one," a label that seemed impossible to shake. No longer able to bear the weight of their judgments, he chose to leave, retreating to the quiet edges of Nibbleton, where the grass grew wild and the rivers sang soft, melancholy songs.

There, he wandered, aimless yet searching for something he couldn’t name. Days passed, and with each step, Pippin wondered if he would ever find his place in a world that seemed so perfectly complete, while he himself was incomplete.

One morning, far from where the familiar fields of Nibbleton faded into the unknown, Pippin found himself by a stream. The water shimmered, reflecting the vivid hues of the world, and it was there he saw her—Eve. She was a strange, beautiful creature, her body a canvas of swirling colors that danced in shades of blues, purples, and delicate pinks. But something was wrong. Despite her vibrant appearance, parts of her form were smudged, as though the paint had been wiped away.

Pippin approached her cautiously, his curiosity outweighing his usual fear of judgment. Eve noticed him but did not recoil in surprise. She didn’t stare at his jagged scar or look away uncomfortably. Instead, she met his gaze and smiled—a smile that made Pippin feel seen for the first time in a long while.

“Do you paint?” he asked, hesitant, unsure if he should intrude on her world.

Eve nodded. “I do. When the world feels too empty, I try to fill it with color.” She paused, her smile fading slightly as her eyes wandered down to the smudged patches on her own skin. “But sometimes, I forget to color myself.”

Pippin understood her in a way that didn’t need words. He, too, had forgotten to take care of the empty places within himself, instead choosing to hide them, to cover them up rather than face what they meant.

They spent the rest of the day by the stream, talking quietly as the water flowed around them. Pippin learned that Eve’s smudges were the result of an old heartache. She had once loved deeply, poured every part of herself into that love, until one day it faded away, leaving her incomplete and broken. Now, she wandered, trying to paint the world as a way to heal herself, though she feared she would never truly be whole again.

As the sun began to set, casting a golden glow across the sky, Pippin spoke softly. “I think we’re alike, you and I. We’re both missing something.”

Eve turned to him, curiosity flickering in her eyes. “How do you mean?”

Pippin ran his fingers over the rough edge of his bite mark. “We’ve both lost pieces of ourselves, but maybe…” He hesitated, feeling the weight of his words before continuing, “Maybe we don’t need to be whole to feel… enough.”

Eve gave him a sad smile, her eyes distant. “I don’t know if I’ll ever feel enough,” she whispered.

But Pippin wasn’t willing to accept that, not yet. Tentatively, he held out his hand, and to his surprise, Eve placed a small, delicate brush in his palm. His heart raced as he dipped the brush into the soft purples and pinks of her colors, then carefully, gently, began to paint over the smudges in her form. His strokes were slow, deliberate, filled with kindness and understanding. When he finished, Eve’s colors seemed to glow brighter, though her smudges remained faintly visible beneath the fresh paint.

“I can’t undo what’s been lost,” Pippin said softly, “but maybe we can make something new.”

Eve looked at him, her eyes wide with something unspoken, then slowly nodded. “Maybe we can,” she agreed.

She reached out and traced her fingers lightly over the jagged scar on his body. “You’ve been carrying this as a wound, but perhaps… perhaps it’s a place where something new can grow,” she said. Her touch was light, but as her fingers moved over the edges of his bite mark, it began to glow. The scar didn’t disappear—it remained—but now, it shimmered softly, transformed into something beautiful, something unique.

From that day forward, Pippin and Eve became inseparable. They traveled across Nibbleton, painting not just the world around them but each other, filling in the spaces they had once feared would never be whole. Pippin would give Eve a part of his heart, and she would offer him her colors in return. They didn’t try to hide their scars or their smudges. Instead, they embraced them as part of who they were—flawed, yes, but beautiful because of it.

With each new day, they discovered that love wasn’t about being perfect. It wasn’t about fixing every flaw or filling every missing piece. It was about sharing the pieces that remained, letting them form something new, something even more beautiful than what had once been whole.

And as they wandered together through the golden fields of Nibbleton, hand in hand, they realized that in their brokenness, they had found something far more precious than perfection.

They had found each other.