mollyscribbles:

You know how there’s the occasional discussion about the children in the Harry Potter universe or what have you, wondering how they’d keep the magic stuff secret at an age when they have, y’know, zero filter?

this one time I was at the zoo, outside the coyote habitat, and this was the kind of zoo that gives the animals a ton of room so they were pretty hard to spot in the dense trees.  A couple kids were there, also looking, and the little girl spots them first.  I compliment her excellent eyesight.  And then her brother speaks up:
“My sister turns into a wolf at night.”

She turns, tiny and indignant, and responds without hesitation, “No I don’t, I turn into a fox.”

it has stuck with me for YEARS how offended she was about her brother misidentifying her species and I consider this evidence that secrecy is a nonissue with younger kids because it’s not that I don’t believe her, it’s that I have no idea what to do with that information if true.