Wow

Sal's POV

"Well…"

"..."

"The reason is," Sal peeked up but quickly dipped his head.

"Ha, I'll start from the beginning then."

Sal started to explain, though his claws grabbing the tree didn't lessen one bit, rather he tightened his grip.

"We sloths have a huge secret."

Rosa was genuinely hooked by Sal's words as he reeled her in with a juicy bait.

"The truth is," Sal said, "Is that we don't, um, we don't defecate for 7 days."

"Oooh, I see- Wait, what?" Rosa's face splattered in shock. Her usual calmness was shattered into pieces by Sal's cannonball of a confession.

"Yeah," Sal whispered, his claws stroking the bark restlessly, "Sloths don't poop for a week. We keep it inside of us so we don't have to always climb down the tree to poop. If we aren't high in the trees, we will be exposed to danger and unwanted attention."

Sal glanced at Rosa cautiously.

"I don't like others prying into, you know, into what happens behind the scenes."

"It is such an embarrassing thing that sloths do, that's why I don't want to share anything about this!"

Sal shoved his face into the tree, nestling his head in his chest. The embarrassment was branding into his mind, a burn that will never disappear.

"So to clarify, you don't poop for a week, climb down for one day to get rid of all the feces, and climb back up? Rinse and repeat?"

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"Yeah, that's pretty much the case," Sal commented. His grip on the tree was as if he wanted to strangle it alive.

"Wow."

Stunned, Rosa stood in place, her red eyes dilating in the moonlight.

"For 7 days…"

Rosa's world views have been completely destroyed.

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Why Does Time Move So Fast?

Sal's POV

Perhaps sensing how invasive her own question was, Rosa returned to her senses as she apologetically coughed.

"Sorry for overstepping my boundaries. But your ability isn't weird or bad, it is simply different from what I used to understand about the digestive system. Being different shouldn't be perceived as something negative."

"No no, it's fine!" Sal waved the apology away, his face no longer hot enough to fry food.

"It's fine since you're just trying to learn! I really don't know anything about myself. I just learned that I'm nocturnal. We're merely exchanging information!" Sal remarked, "You know a lot, Rosa. You're really smart."

"You flatter me, Sal."

"No, I really mean it! After all, you get to venture into the whole rainforest, it makes sense for you to know a lot more. I mean, I'm not as mobile, I'm a sloth after all!"

"As a sloth, I can barely hop around as you do."

"I'm simply here. After all, what can I do besides eating and sleeping? I eat slowly, digest slowly. I sleep for hours and hours while everything around me is so lively. Everyone else is just so fast, so quick."

Sal drawled his words out, his small beady eyes looking afar into the dark rainforest. As he kept talking, he didn't even realize where the conversation was headed towards.

The atmosphere, from awkward and heated, turned quiet and calm.

Rosa blinked her large red eyes, the silence permeated through her skin and to her bones, obliged to keep silent.

Sal kept talking, hints of solemness made the damp air stick onto Rosa's throat, congesting up her voice. She couldn't even croak.

"Sometimes I wake up and wonder where I am. The leaves are all rustled up, or the flower I spotted before disappeared. A tree branch missing, a new sprout growing, a new shadow slinking in the shadows…"

"But then I realize, I am still at home, it's just the amount of time I've been asleep for, I won't be able to see the change."

"Time goes by so fast."

"In a blink, it will be all gone."

"And I can't do anything to stop it."

Rosa listened to Sal's words attentively, her eyes glowing more and more in the night's glowy dew.

Her heart, like a water droplet falling on a palm leaf, slowly rolled across the waxy, vibrantly green leaf, until finally reaching the tip of a leaf, seemed to tickle. With a little flick from tension, the droplet flew into the air like a slingshot, like a firework. In a beautiful snapshot in time, her heart trembled.

Somewhere deep in Rosa's heart, there emerged a thin thread of bonding.