Blackness. That’s the first thing I remember. Blackness and warmth. Cramped warmth.
Then I fall. I don’t know where, but it’s cold not warm and I can still only see blackness. I try to cry out, but I don’t make a sound. Maybe I’m dead. How do you know if you are? Then teeth around me. At first, I think it’s mom or dad, but these teeth are sharper. I make my first sound, I know it because I can hear myself squeak. Then commotion all around. Sounds and voices I don’t recognize. No more teeth, but smooth cold hairless around me. Then warmth, but not cramped. I miss the cramp, the others, but I’m warm so I sleep.
I awake to the same smooth cold hairless (their paws or hands they call them I later learn) then something hard and cold, but wet and warm also, in my mouth. I’m starving so drink. No one to fight over it, only mine. This goes on: sleep and drink for what seems like an eternity. Sometimes different hairless paws hold me (they smell different) until one day there is a brightness in my left eye I can see (though I don’t know that word yet) blurry shapes and movement. These shapes slowly become clearer and my right eye does the same and I can see this creature (still not sure what it is, but it’s no squirrel) that holds me and rubs my belly which makes me squeak. It’s warm here, a different warm, but warm nonetheless.
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