A Companionship Of Sorts

• Holly Perkuhn, Grade 9
• Short Story
• 2017

It was raining heavily when Mrs. Smith and her two children entered the town pet store, a shoebox clutched between her two shivering hands. Onlookers may have seen the box and assumed she was bringing in some strange, small creature, but that was a far from the truth as the moon is to the Earth.
Mrs. Smith was looking to acquire a rabbit, for companionship; it was not to keep herself or her children entertained, however. The prospective rabbit was to keep something much smaller company.
The very reason for the impromptu trip had occurred only hours before, when Mr. Smith was ploughing a once-dry paddock. It was normal for all manner of small creatures and critters to dart affront the tractor, trying to escape the harsh roar of machinery. It was not, however, common for the animal to halt in the center of the path, unable to move from something akin to fear.
It was never discovered why the young hare had crossed paths with Mr. Smith at that exact moment – perhaps it had strayed from its mother; perhaps its mother had perished on the farm.
All that had been known was that the creature was alone, and the winter was to be a long one.
The fateful crossing of paths had left Mr. Smith with a frightened hare kitten in his tractor, and Mrs. Smith listening to the idle chatter of the pet shop owner, clutching her sons hand whilst he leant eagerly over the rabbit enclosure. Most of the rabbits jumped languidly around, nibbling at each other’s perky ears and fluffy feat, whilst a few were sprawled drowsily along a – along another rabbit!
Four or five slept silently, chests rising and falling rhythmically, whilst another lay still beneath their heads, unmoving save for occasional twitch of the ears. The eldest of the two children – a chubby child with pigtails – craned her neck over the pile of rabbits, examining them with wide eyes.
“I think it’s dead,” she exclaimed seriously, eyes wide as she struggled to fit her hand through the small hole in the fiberglass roof.
“It’s not dead, it’s just pretending to be a mattress!” The son, still too short to peer fully into the enclosure, had resorted to jumping up and down excitedly, catching glimpses of the furry creatures briefly. The family did not own anything as small as a rabbit – except the small, black chihuahua, but her temperament was anything but small. A rabbit, along with the hare, would be a good addition to the family.
Seeing the ‘mattress’ rabbit, as her youngest had called it, Mrs. Smith was immediately drawn to the creature. Perhaps it had enough maternal instinct, even as a kitten, to look after something as traumatized as the hare. And it was such a pretty colour! Palomino – though that was not the correct name for the white-ginger shade of its thick fur.
Not five minutes later, the Smith family left the pet shop, bunny in hand.