Crackjaw
When she isn't paying attention - which is most of the time - her tongue tends to loll from her mouth, pink and fat and hanging loose in the air, but sometimes the Star scolds her harshly, and, when this happens, her left ear will turn backwards as though listening to someone behind her, her head might tilt in that moment, her yellow eyes not seeing the stretch of grassy landscape ahead of her. Her head is tipped to one side now and it gives her a quizzical sort of expression, something strange and almost canid. This is not a purposeful impression - she has never even seen a dog, although she has, on occasion, heard coyotes yapping along the tree-line or seen a fox slip through the undergrowth smooth as a snake, but they are more cat-like than dog-like.
You look like an idiot, the Star snaps harshly in her mind and the filly snorts at it as if it has told a joke, the corners of her lips curling up into a tortured grin, but she snaps to attention in the same moment, gathers her pieces back together, her tongue tucking up tight against her upper palate where it becomes just a shade less obvious that so much of her lower jaw is missing. She almost looks normal.
Not even close.
The left ear flicks back again. She is so thin, and her rough hide wears thin over the bone of her hip and shoulder, her abdomen hollow, her mane and tail as dry and brittle as the hollow stalks of last year's pokeweed. She wears this suffering without knowing it should be any different, she does not know that she should be as slick and fat as any other horse, or that the others are not sung to sleep by the growling of their bellies. She has no experience to compare against her own, and hunger has ever been her companion.
Where should we go?
The bushes - there, by the creek.
Her ear flicks forward again and the ungainly filly makes her way to those bushes, nosing through them in search of any soft fruits that may still cling to their branches. The pickings are few, the birds are far better and faster at such foraging, but she plucks the rare few shriveled berries she finds, crushing them with her tongue against the sharp edges of her teeth, patently unwary of her surroundings. The Star does all the watching.
Someone is coming.
You look like an idiot, the Star snaps harshly in her mind and the filly snorts at it as if it has told a joke, the corners of her lips curling up into a tortured grin, but she snaps to attention in the same moment, gathers her pieces back together, her tongue tucking up tight against her upper palate where it becomes just a shade less obvious that so much of her lower jaw is missing. She almost looks normal.
Not even close.
The left ear flicks back again. She is so thin, and her rough hide wears thin over the bone of her hip and shoulder, her abdomen hollow, her mane and tail as dry and brittle as the hollow stalks of last year's pokeweed. She wears this suffering without knowing it should be any different, she does not know that she should be as slick and fat as any other horse, or that the others are not sung to sleep by the growling of their bellies. She has no experience to compare against her own, and hunger has ever been her companion.
Where should we go?
The bushes - there, by the creek.
Her ear flicks forward again and the ungainly filly makes her way to those bushes, nosing through them in search of any soft fruits that may still cling to their branches. The pickings are few, the birds are far better and faster at such foraging, but she plucks the rare few shriveled berries she finds, crushing them with her tongue against the sharp edges of her teeth, patently unwary of her surroundings. The Star does all the watching.
Someone is coming.
Crackjaw
@[midsommar] weird starter, enjoy.