Lupin

Bobby Marchant sat under the table in a sulk.
“I hate the virus,” she thought, “I miss my friends, my new baby brother does nothing but cry and we are all stuck indoors except Daddy. It makes me sad.”  She hugged her knees to her chest and felt very sorry for herself.

“Good-bye, Bobby,” said her father. He knelt to give her a kiss on the top of her head. Bobby was so upset she could not speak. Her father got up and went to the front door door. “You will be careful?” said Bobby’s mother anxiously, “You have your mask?”  He nodded and smiled at his family. “Someone’s got to drive the ambulances, look after people. Sooner, we start, Sandra, the sooner it will stop.”  He waved his goodbyes. Sandra and Bobby heard his car start up and drive away. It was pouring with rain.

Sandra peered under the tablecloth at Bobby.

‘We could practise your reading now and start the online class.’ She said.

Bobby stared at her. ‘I am not coming out until we can go back to school and see people’ ‘Fine,’ said her mother crossly, ‘I’ll ring up the prime minister and tell him to do it now, then shall I?’ Then she added, “Arden is coming today to help out – she joined our bubble now.’ Bobby scowled.

There was a loud knock at the front door.

Bobby Marchant peeked out from under the table as Arden stood in the doorway.  Her hair was short and red.  It stood up in spikes.

Arden wore a short green dress, green tights and red shoes under a long black coat. She carried a small black bag, which had smoke pouring from it. Stranger than that however, at her feet sat a large and very beautiful rabbit.

‘Don’t worry,’ said Arden, ‘It’s house trained.’

She whistled to her rabbit to follow her. ‘Don’t chew anything,’ she told it.  The rabbit blinked and hopped in.  Bobby clearly heard it say,’

I don’t chew,’ it said firmly,’ I occasionally nibble.’

Bobby came out from under the table

‘How come you talk?’ she asked the rabbit.

‘Bobby,’ said her mum, ‘Don’t be silly, everybody knows rabbits can’t speak.’

‘But’ started Bobby.

‘Bobby,’ said Arden, ‘Meet Lupin, better known as That Rabbit, Lupin meet Bobby.’

‘Pleased to meet you,’ said Lupin, ‘I’m famous among rabbits you know and have my own website.’  He fluffed up his fur and looked very satisfied with himself.

‘He is a very vain rabbit,’ said Arden ‘and shouldn’t really be encouraged.’

‘He ought to be in a hutch,’ said Bobby’s mum.

At this point Lupin bristled all over and smoke started to pour from Arden’s handbag, but then the baby started to cry. Sandra picked him up and rocked him bur he did not stop.  ‘I wasn’t aware,’ said the rabbit, ‘that there was a baby in the house.  If I had known such a thing I would not have come.’ Lupin covered his ears with his paws.

Bobby’s mum put the baby down on a changing mat. “He has a nappy rash and won’t stop crying.” Bobby looked anxiously at her brother. Was nappy rash a virus too? she wondered.  ‘Oh Yuk! how horrid!’ exclaimed the rabbit.  “Good thing we can’t catch it either. Really, really don’t like babies,’ he continued ‘nasty, sticky, loud things,’ but while he was saying this, the rabbit hopped up and placed his paw on the rash.

The baby stopped crying, subsided into hiccups and then fell fast asleep.

Arden gave the rabbit a hard stare, who sat down and started to wash his face in an innocent fashion and then lay stretched out along the skirting board. Bobby began to think this was a most interesting day.  Arden said to Bobby – ‘We should read together.’ ‘Great,’ said Sandra, ‘I must go to the study and start on a peer review about protein spikes in viruses. It makes very exciting reading’

Bobby looked worried. ‘I’m not very good at reading’ she whispered. Arden smiled. We’ll read from a book that hasn’t been written yet,’ she said, ‘then no one will know if you are right or wrong.’

Arden knelt by the fire and stared into the glowing wood. In the firelight, her green dress shimmered, her hair flickered. ‘Every thousand years,’ she began slowly as if the story was coming from a long way away and Bobby could see the words spelt out by the flames. ‘Every thousand years, as everyone knows who lives long enough, the weather blows up big storms.  Sometimes it snows and sometimes it freezes and the birds fall dying out of the trees with cold.  But this time it chose to rain.

For most of its life, the brook had run lazily through the meadows and under the bridges, through the town that had grown up around it.  In early summer, it would ripple past the ducks and their ducklings. If you were very quiet and very lucky and if you got up extremely early in the morning… you may look in and catch a glimpse of one of the water babies swimming through the green reeds. Fish would hang in its gentle current, plucking flies from the air.  Children would paddle through its clear waters while the adults set out picnics along the banks. Usually, as I said, the brook was a well-behaved and entirely predictable babble of water.

But as the millennium died it started to rain.  To begin with, it was just a nuisance, a quick shower causing people to run helter skelter to their cars or fumble for umbrellas that the wind then tore inside out.

Nevertheless, the showers became more frequent and soon people began to forget when it had not rained.  The skies grew greyer and then blacker and bore down on the horizon.  Sheets of rain swept down on the town and burst down chimneys and through any open door.  All the water ran down the buildings and into the drains and the drains led down through the streets to the brook and gradually, slowly without anyone noticing at first the brook began to swell.

‘Oh Dear, Oh Dear!’ babbled the brook to itself and tried to breathe in.  The rain fell down hard on its surface and started to hit the fish and the water babies sheltering below. “OOUCH! OUCH! They cried and took shelter under the roots of the ragged robin and Angelica. Some of the very small babies started to sob which didn’t help matters at all. “Oh Dear!” whispered the brook again to itself “I think I am going to burst” and then very slowly one more drop of water fell and the brook did burst.  It spilled over the fields and hedges and around the legs of startled cattle and startled to hurtle towards the town centre like a runway train. ‘Oh No’ said the brook to itself. But it was no good for it wasn’t a brook any more it was flood and the Flood began to enjoy itself in a malicious kind of way.  It tore through the farmyard on the edge of the town and the water swept into the farmer’s barn and ruined his stock of straw and hay. ‘I’ve never been inside before, what fun!’ said the flood and it surged up the barn walls and pulled down the farmer’s tools which had been carefully hung up out of the way. The forks and spades spun round and round in the water as the flood run away with them. The Flood pushed through the barn doors, out the other side, and into some stables, where all the ponies shuddered with terror as the water came up to their knees.  The animals sweated and snorted and some tried to kick down the doors when, suddenly, in all the confusion a small kitten fell from a ledge where its mother had left it for safety and the Flood run away with that too. ‘Meow, Meow’, screamed the kitten, ‘Meow, Meow,’ screamed the little kitten’s brothers and sisters from the ledge. ‘Hold on tight to something.’

The kitten gasped and sunk down, down, down he went.  The Flood roared and laughed in his ears, his nose filled with water, his mouth filled with water until he thought his heart would burst.

Then he went limp and was swept away.  Luckily, the current caught him up and cast him into an old plastic bucket that the farmer used to throw his old gloves into at the end of the day.  The tiny   kitten lay in the bucket more dead than alive.  Then the handle of the bucket came down and smacked him on the nose! ‘Meow’ gasped the kitten who spluttered and coughed up the water.  Cough, Cough. But now he could breath and nestled on an old leather glove he wasn’t quite so cold.

‘Oh My!, Oh My!’ said the kitten he dragged himself to the edge of the bucket and looked over.  He couldn’t see his mother any more, he couldn’t see his brothers and sisters any more, he couldn’t see the barn any more.  In fact, the whole farm had entirely disappeared.  The kitten was, he realised, now completely alone.’

The thudding of rain against the window startled the listeners.  The fire was burning low.  ‘Oh Arden!’ said Bobby, ‘I hope this story has a happy ending or I will have nightmares.’  Lupin stirred and twitched his ears and the handbag seemed to hold its breath before huffing out a single solitary smoke ring.  Arden continued.

‘But the kitten knew nothing of this and could only gaze as the town centre swept towards him. The Flood gurgled and chortled.  ‘What fun I am having’ said the Flood, ‘What a wonderful whirl of water I am!’

Down it swept through the high street, past the television cameras and over the Wellington boots of a TV reporter who struggled to broadcast an interview about the sudden deluge and maintain social distancing.

By now the Flood was growing a little tired. It was still raining and the water had been running none stop for hours, had run inside and outside houses, upset the cattle, frightened the horses and made the farmer very cross.  It had been a wonderful day for the Flood and now it decided to settle in the town centre for some time. Consequently, it slowed down and lapped round people’s window sills trying to peer into their homes. It did some very bad things, leaking through electrical plugs and seeping in and out of drains.  The little town, which had once won an award for being the tidiest town, looked an utter mess.  But as the flood calmed down a little, the kitten realised that this was his only chance to escape.  He took a deep breath, let go of the leather glove that had sheltered him for so long, he began to paddle bravely towards the only bit of dry land he could see.  It was the hill that run up and out of the town.’

BANG went the front door. Mr. Marchant stood in front of them, dripping water onto the floor. ‘It’s raining cats and dogs out there!’ he exclaimed, ‘you would not believe it. Good thing ambulances are excellent on wet roads!”  He smiled at everyone. “You see, home safe and sound. I’ll just go shower and change my clothes”

Arden went to the door to check the weather. Then she jumped slightly. On the doorstep lay a very small and very wet kitten. She picked up the small creature and checked to see if it were alive.  A small damp purr greeted her effort.  Opening her bag, Arden pulled out a small cashmere scarf, wrapped the kitten in it, and handed the bundle to Bobby. ‘This is for you,’ she said.  She whistled to Lupin who hopped over to join her.  Waving goodbye to the astonished family, they stepped through the front door and were gone.

Written by Sarah Keen - all rights reserved