The last leaf of hope

Once, in a quiet mountain village where winters arrived early and stayed long, lived a girl named Tara. She had a spark in her eyes and dreams stitched into her soul. She believed the world could be kinder — until tragedy silenced her voice. Her father, the village gardener, died saving a bird trapped in a snowstorm. The villagers called it foolish. Tara called it love.

Since then, she stopped speaking.

Winter came again, fiercer than ever. Trees stood like skeletons, and people locked themselves indoors. One evening, Tara wandered into the old forest where she and her father used to plant saplings. The forest was dying now — choked by cold, forgotten by humans.

She sat under the oldest tree and whispered, for the first time in a year, “I miss you.”

Just then, something moved. A single green leaf — the last one in the entire forest — fluttered above her. It hadn’t fallen. Tara stared at it. That leaf, still alive in the heart of winter, looked like it was waiting.

Waiting… for someone to believe.

She ran back to the village, gathered the children, told them about the last leaf. Her silence had ended. Her voice returned not with anger, but with a story.

Together, they planted trees around the dying forest. Day by day, week by week, the green began to return.

The leaf stayed. It never fell.

Even today, people say that in the heart of that mountain forest, the last leaf still shines — a symbol of hope, courage, and a girl who believed that even in the coldest winters, love can bloom.