Nino the Little Firefighter · Pompon Is Scared of the Nee-Naw · story for a child afraid of loud noises

A bedtime story for children. Tomorrow is the village festival in Bellhill, and the fire station is going to parade with Big Red, lights flashing and siren blaring. Everyone is thrilled, except one: Pompon, the station's dog, who slips all the way to the bottom of his boot the moment he hears the word siren. His ears flatten, his nose trembles, and he refuses to come out.

Because Big Red's real siren, the one that wails, hurts his ears. A dog hears much farther and much louder than we do: what sounds just a little loud to us becomes, for him, a wall of noise. And tomorrow, that wall is going to sweep through the whole village for a whole hour.

They try petting him and giving him treats: Pompon takes the treat, and goes straight back into his boot. They try ear protectors: he shakes his head until they fall off, and hides even further away. So everyone falls quiet, and Nino asks the question no one had thought to ask. What if it wasn't up to Pompon to get used to the noise, but up to the noise to adapt to Pompon? With Marco, he turns the volume down, rounds off the sound, slows the rhythm, until they get a soft little nee-naw, closer to a lullaby than an alarm.

As the story unfolds, your child understands that you never force a frightened heart, and that you can change the world around someone instead of asking them to be braver. This is also the episode that tells the story of the birth of Bellhill's famous soft nee-naw, the very one you hear in every other story in the collection.

The next day, Pompon marches at the front, ears held high, proud as can be, to the sound of the very nee-naw he himself inspired. And that evening, back at the fire station, the boots line up from the biggest to the smallest, while Pompon curls up at the bottom of his, this time without trembling.

No one tells Pompon he's overreacting, and no one asks him to be a big brave dog. They listen to him, they search, they try something else: this way of taking a fear seriously instead of playing it down is the whole spirit of Tilibou bedtime stories. And all the while, outside, the new soft nee-naw crosses the whole village without waking a single baby.

A screen-free firefighter story for children from age 3, perfect to enjoy warm and cozy at bedtime, in the car, or before a nap. As always with Tilibou, the ending stays soft and quiet, without music, so your child can drift off to sleep without waking anyone up. 🚒

👉 All the Tilibou bedtime stories at tilibou.com

💡 Tip: to listen to one world back-to-back, choose its season (Noisette, Léo, Cassie, Marin, Tom the Pirate, Nino the Little Firefighter, or the Christmas, Halloween and School seasons).

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