Hawk: A Blessing In Disguise

• Amber Harris, Grade 9
• Short Story
• 2022

Pudgy stood at the large door of his human’s house, waiting to be let out. He crowed his rooster crow, and finally his human, bleary eyed because she had just woken up, opened the door.
“What would I do without my fluffy alarm clock? Now Pudgy, you go see your hen, Floofila, while I get ready for work.” But Pudgy didn’t hear her. He was already running around in circles around the hen house.
“Floooofiiiiiilaaaaa!” Finally, a big, fat, fluffy hen walked out. Pudgy thought, not for the first time, that Floofila would really be the best wife a rooster could have.
The two spent the day together, as they had done since they were chicks. Every now and then Pudgy called Floofila over to share a nice beetle or a worm he had found. The only problem was, that today Pudgy was having terrible luck. He would spot a nice, juicy worm and call Floofila over, only to find that the second she came, the worm managed to bury itself in the ground.
“Pudgy, don’t tease me! There are no worms here. I was about to have a dirt bath, but now Henrietta has taken my favourite spot!” Floofila exclaimed.
“No, I wasn’t teasing you! The worm buried itself in the ground when you came. I’m very sorry, it won’t happen again.” Pudgy said meekly.
He knew he had to make it up to Floofila. So, he decided that as soon as he even glimpsed a tasty morsel, he would call Floofila, to make sure it didn’t have time to run away. Suddenly, he glimpsed a worm. He shouted for Floofila, and she came rushing over… only to find it was a stick.
“Pudgy, I will not continuously come over here for no reason, wasting my time. I won’t be able to trust you anymore.” Just then, Pudgy spotted a hawk in the sky. Forgetting about his mistakes, he shouted:
“Hawk, HAWK!! GET IN THE HOUSE, FLOOFILA!!!” But Floofila didn’t believe him.
“Are you sure that isn’t a stray feather in the air? There hasn’t been a hawk here in ages.” All of a sudden, the hawk swooped, and started attacking Floofila hungrily. Floofila squawked, but she knew there was nothing she could do. Pudgy was not letting it happen. Without hesitation, he leaped onto the hawk and started attacking it furiously. The hawk, caught off guard, quickly flew away, never to return.
“Oh Pudgy, you saved my life! I’m so sorry I doubted you. You are such a brave hero.”
Pudgy knew that now was the moment he had been waiting for, for so long.
“Do you know why I saved you? Because I love you and would risk my life for you. So, Floofila, will you marry me?”
“Of course I will!”
So, they were married, and two weeks later, if you looked at the right time, you might see a fluffy hen and a fluffy rooster escaping the coop to go on their honeymoon.