The Girl and the Hedgehog

Lily spends her days in her beloved garden, wearing her yellow rain boots and blue dungarees. One morning, she spots a small hedgehog with brown spines and a cream face, a little leaf stuck to its back, and quietly follows it along the garden path. When the hedgehog reaches the tall wooden fence at the end of the garden, it finds no gap and paces up and down, searching for a way through. Lily realizes that hedgehogs need safe paths to roam, to find food, and to meet other hedgehogs, so she decides to ask her neighbors for help.

Her first visit is to Mr. Patel next door, a tall, stooped man with grey hair and round glasses, who cuts a neat arched gap at the bottom of his fence and shows Lily how to smooth the edges. Then Mrs. Okafor, cheerful and sturdy in her floral headscarf and orange apron, brings out lemonade and flower seeds and organizes the whole street. On Saturday morning, the neighbors gather with tools, and by lunchtime every fence has a little gap, lined up like small doorways and planted with marigolds and daisies. That evening, Lily waits by the first gap and watches the hedgehog travel through every garden, finding beetles and worms and meeting another hedgehog along the way. This gentle tale, written by Çınar BİBER, can be read on Masalcı Baba.