They did not arrive quietly.
They arrived curious.

Three presences held in amber and leaflight, watching me with knowing eyes — not startled, not shy, but amused by the act of being seen.

When I raised the lens, they did not withdraw.
They leaned into the moment, lingering just long enough to test my patience and the forest’s restraint.

They wanted the photograph.
Not to be captured — but to see how long I would follow, how carefully I would look, how much time I thought I was owed.

They stayed longer than the others.
Long enough for certainty to soften.
Long enough for the moss to feel complicit.

And then — smiling without faces, vanishing without apology — they slipped back into the green.

The forest closed behind them.
Only warmth lingered.
Only the quiet sense that I had been allowed to witness something that was never meant to remain.