A lone yellow wolf was sitting by himself on the edge of his school hallway, reading over his notes from that morning. That wolf was Xavier, a 9-year old pup, spending yet ANOTHER recess inside. He was never one that took a liking to playing with the other kids, since all the others played stuff like hopscotch and tag. Him? He looooooved playing pretend, but none of the other kids seemed to like it… they just sorta laughed at him. So he spent his recesses inside, doing whatever he COULD do. It was just another day like this, but little did he know that this day would turn its head around into one of his best.

"Hi there!" a soft voice exclaimed from behind his book.

Xavier put down his book to see who said it, and it was a pink jackal, one that he had seen in his class before, but he couldn't quite remember her name… Nevertheless, he was surprised that today someone else stayed inside too; he really didn't know what to say.

She looked at Xav and smiled. "You're in my class, right? You go sit by yourself every recess, and I thought you must get lonely here all by yourself…" she recounted.

He looked down at the floor for a little bit. "Yeah, it does… a little bit…" he whispered back, just barely audible for her to hear.

She giggled a little bit and sat down next to him. "You know, you're REALLY smart! You answer almost any question that we get!" she exclaimed.

"You… you really think so…?" Xavier whispered back.. He'd never heard anyone call him that before…

"Yeah!" she giggled. "You're really cute too!" she said while winking at him.

Xavier's face beamed up. "R-really? No one's… said that before…" he spoke, a bit louder this time!

"I'm Ciara." she replied. "What's your name?"

"I-I'm Xavier…" he whispered back, turning his head away a little bit.

"Hey, that's a nice name!" she exclaimed back. "Hey, do you wanna play outside with me? It'd be nice to have someone else to play with…"

"I-I.. I don't know…" he mumbled back. "All the other kids are playing… hopscotch or tag or… jump rope and… I don't… really like any of those…"

"Well, what do you like? I really like playing pretend!" she explained back.

Xavier's face lit up, even bigger than before. "You like playing pretend? I-... I really like that too! None of the other kids seem to like it though…" he said, both happy and sad.

Ciara gasped. "Really? Well, maybe we can do pretend together! I think you'd be really got at it!" she giggled.

"Y-you think so?" Xavier replied. "Well, sure we can do it!" he said as he was standing up.

Ciara stood up as well and smiled at him. "Yay! You wanna go meet by the flagpole?"

Xavier nodded. "Sure! I'll be there as soon as I put my books back."

"Alright then! See you there." Ciara said, waving and giving him another wink as she went outside to meet Xav.

As he was putting away his books, Xavier realized that this was the first time that anyone had reached out to him. He was excited and thrilled to finally have a playmate, so he put away his books as fast as he could and ran outside to meet Ciara.

That was the start of a childhood friendship that would last for years to come. A friendship that even the Great War couldn't break.