The Little Cloud's Goodnight Journey

As the sun sank low and the sky turned soft shades of orange and pink, a little cloud named Puff began her evening drift across the horizon. Below her, the world was slowly getting ready for sleep.

She floated over a quiet farmhouse, where a farmer was latching the barn door for the night, and gave a gentle drizzle of dew to the thirsty flowers in the garden. She drifted over a small town, where lamplights were flickering on one by one, and let a soft breeze carry the smell of rain toward open windows.

Puff passed above a forest, where owls were just waking up as the smaller birds tucked their heads beneath their wings. She floated over a beach, where the waves grew gentler and slower, whispering goodnight to the sand.

As the stars began to twinkle awake above her, Puff felt herself growing softer and slower too, drifting lower until she rested just above the treetops. The moon rose quietly to keep watch, and Puff let her edges blur into the darkening sky, feeling perfectly calm.

Down below, in houses and burrows and nests all across the land, eyes were closing one by one, following the same soft, sleepy hush that Puff had carried with her all evening.

High above it all, the stars finished waking up, twinkling gently as if they, too, were settling into place for the long night ahead. Puff drifted one last time above the sleeping treetops, watching over the quiet world just a little longer, before she let herself grow still and soft and dim, like a breath let all the way out.

Somewhere below, in a small cozy bedroom, a child watched the very last of Puff's soft shape fade into the dark sky through the window, and felt their own eyelids growing heavy too. It was, after all, the same soft hush that had followed Puff the whole evening, drifting gently from the sky right down into every waiting bed.

Far above the rooftops, Puff drifted past one last chimney, releasing the tiniest whisper of mist that curled like a lullaby note before dissolving into the night air. She had said goodnight to farms and forests, beaches and bedrooms, and now there was nothing left to do but rest herself, tucked among the softest, highest clouds of all.

Goodnight, little cloud. Goodnight, whole world below.