Fluff

I received this email form a close friend and thought it would make an interesting read....

Hey Jana,

I enjoyed hearing about your new blog, God's Waiting Room, when we spoke a couple of weeks ago. I said that I really liked the idea and we chatted about a few things but you mentioned that you'd love to hear more about this incident that happened to me some years ago. Well here's the story.

When I was young I talked mum and dad into buying me a Samoyed and we called it Sam. Now Sam was a lovely looking dog but he was always up to no good. He'd pull clean clothes off the line and play and roll around with them in the yard, and mum wasn't too happy about that. He'd dig holes in the back lawn and chew the garden hoses, and dad wasn't to happy about that. Well on it went, he was just always up to no good.

Our elderly next door neighbours, Mr and Mrs Wilson had a pure white rabbit. His name was Fluff and you guessed it, he had a very fluffy coat. Fluff was a very special and much loved rabbit and I'll explain why. The Wilsons kept Fluff simply to entertain their young grandchildren who used to play with it when they came over to visit their nan and grandpa. Mr Wilson would often let Fluff out of his cage and let him run around and eat in their enclosed backyard. I'd often stand up on the fence and Mr Wilson used to let him out for me to watch and he'd sometimes also lift me over and let me play with Fluff on the lawn. I'd hold him and cuddle him like any young kid would do to such a gorgeous rabbit.

One day, I was 12 or possibly 13 at the time, the Wilsons went away for the week-end. I was alone at home at the time doing some homework and I think mum and dad had gone out either to grandma's or possibly to the supermarket to do the weekly grocery shopping and I heard Sam repeatedly barking in the back yard. Eventually I got up and to have a look. Well I nearly died. My heart sunk down low into my chest and was beating so hard that my chest hurt. I cried my heart out as I watched dumb Sam running around our back yard, and yes you read ahead correctly, with Fluff dangling from his mouth. Sam had dug himself under the side fence and just brought Fluff over to our place to play with, I guess. But I could see that Fluff was in a very bad way as his pure white coat was now just covered in blood and dirt. I just starred out of the window with disbelief and saw all this happening before my own very eyes. Fluff was obviously dead and his body was just swinging lifelessly as Sam grasping it by the neck, swung it backwards and forwards as he played with it, I guess. Every now and then he'd drop Fluff on the ground and sit back with his tail swinging and hind up high, and his head and muzzle down low on the ground just eyeing Fluff laying on the ground just in front of him. He'd then pick Fluff up and run around the yard a bit more before dropping him on the ground and repeat this awful game that he was playing. I know that I cried my heart out and just shit myself something really terrible.

I just thought don't worry about being grounded Adam as your life had just come to a sudden end; I would soon be leaving God's waiting room. I ran out of the back door and screamed and yelled at Sam but he just thought that I wanted to join him in the fun I guess as he made me chase him around the backyard with Fluff in his mouth and me running after him with tears just pouring down my face trying to catch him. At a distance he would drop Fluff in front of him and repeat this ritual that I mentioned earlier as if to wait and see Fluff get up and run away but of course he didn't and then when I got close Sam would just pick Fluff up again and run off to another part of the yard. This went on for quite a while fortunately, in some ways, I was alone at home at the time but I do remember thinking that some help would have been handy. I eventually managed to grab Fluff by the end but Sam by then had picked him up by the other end and it almost turned into a tug of war. My heart was beating something terrible as I just new something awful was about to happen but then as if there was some divine intervention, Sam just let go for that split second ands I managed to raise lifeless Fluff up high above me in the air. Sam was determined to try to get him back off me but I managed to run into the house with him.

I really didn't know what to do and just kept thinking that any time now the Wilsons or mum and dad would return home. In a moment of desperation and panic, and with Sam at my feet and just staring at me the whole time I decided to wash the blood and dirt off Fluff's coat so I dunked him in luke-warm water in the laundry tub and scrubbed him with soap and water and after drying him with mum's hair dryer, I covered the body with Baby Powder. I then scaled the side fence and placed Fluff back in his cage. My plan was that this way it would seem that fluff simply died in his cage, well that was the plan. I then also gave Sam a bit of a wash as he was also covered in some blood. After this ordeal I returned to m y room and tried hard to finish my homework. Not long after mum and dad returned and I recall mum coming into my room and asking how I was going and I said something like oh don't worry mum, every thing's under control. We had dinner and it seemed that we just got on with life, but that was short lived.

A few days passed and mum mentioned that the Wilsons had returned so I knew it wouldn't be long before all hell would break lose but funnily more days passed and still nothing was mentioned so I thought that my plan had worked. In fact I felt proud of my ingenuity. It was late on the Tuesday or Wednesday the week after the incident we were just finishing dinner and the front door bell rang. Dad answered the door and I heard him say come on in Edna and Bert......the Wilsons had returned. I knew then that my time of reckoning had suddenly come. I sneaked out of the kitchen and hid in the coat closet but could hear mum and dad clearly chatting to the Wilsons now seated with them around the kitchen table. Mum and dad asked about the holiday that they had and the Wilsons said it was fantastic. They chatted for seemed eternity as I squatted in the dark closet petrified and trembling with fear of what was going to happen. I just waited for the moment that I would hear dad scream out my name "A D A M" at the top of his voice! But it didn't happen. Just a friendly low key chat but then I heard Edna say to mum, "you know Mary, a funny thing happened while we were away." "It sure is funny," added Mr Wilson. "And what was that" almost simultaneously mum and dad asked. "Well," replied Mrs Wilson. "On the Friday morning before we left Bert found Fluff dead in his cage and so he buried him in one of the back garden beds but the funny thing is that on the day after we returned we found Fluff back and just laying dead in his cage!"