The Little T-Rex's Great Big Roar

Kai loves dinosaurs. In Kai's pocket, always, lives a little green T-rex figure. But the kids at the park all say, "Dinosaurs are just scary." Kai squeezes the figure tight. Somewhere inside every big, strong thing, there is a gentle spot. Kai knows it. Even if nobody else believes it.

GRRRAAAOOOW!!! A real roar shook the park. The kids on the slide ran. The kids on the swings ran. Kai's feet almost ran too — but then. Right after the roar came a tiny, tiny "…whimper." Kai's feet stopped. And then they started walking — toward the sound.

Behind the big tree stood — a little T-rex. Green, just like the figure in Kai's pocket. "GRAOW!" It roared when Kai stepped closer. But Kai noticed something. The little rex only roared when Kai went near the broken swing — the one with a chain hanging by a single, about-to-snap link.

Kai tried an experiment. One step toward the swing — "GRAOW!" A step away — quiet. Over to the slide — quiet. "I knew it!" Kai's eyes went wide and bright. "Your roar is an 'it's-dangerous!' roar!" The little rex's tail went pat, pat. A roar isn't scary. A roar is the sound of keeping someone safe.

And so the two became friends. When Kai held out the figure, the little rex nudged it, ever so gently, with the tip of its nose. It tickled, and they laughed together (a T-rex laugh sounds a little like a roar). But then — "Hey! There's a dinosaur!" "It's dangerous!" "Drive it out!" Grown-up voices. Behind the tree, the little rex made itself small, small, and trembled.

The grown-ups gathered, rope in hand. Kai's heart went thud, thud, thud. And right then — a tiny toddler wobbled away, all alone, straight toward the broken swing. Nobody saw. Not the toddler's mama. Not the grown-ups with the rope. Only one pair of eyes saw it — the little rex's.

The little rex burst out. "GRRRAAAOOOW!!!" Its biggest roar ever — a keeping-safe roar. The toddler plopped down in surprise. And in the very next moment — CRASH!! The swing's chain came down. Right where the toddler would have been. But to the grown-ups, it looked like this: "The dinosaur attacked a child!" "See? Dangerous!" The rope moved closer. In the whole wide world, only Kai knows the truth. What will Kai do?