by Ruth Quayle
My name is Mabel Chase.
Some people say I’m a sweety heart.
Not everyone agrees.
Sometimes life isn’t even fair.
Like for instance I don’t have one single pet in my whole life.
This is not a good situation because I am keener on pets than most people are.
I know one hundred breeds of dog and I am up-to-date on the life cycle of a guinea pig.
Pets are better than sleepovers and ice cream.
Pets are my favourite subject of conversation.
Mum and Dad say I am too young for a pet of my own.
They say I am not responsible enough.
When they say this I scream and shout rude things.
Then Dad says, “That’s what I’m talking about,” and sends me to my room and also he gives Mum a look over my head that he thinks I can’t notice but I can.
I am a noticing sort of girl.
I tell my mum and dad that actually they don’t know what they’re talking about.
I shout that quite a few people my age have a pet of their own.
I shout that lots of people at my school have two pets.
Florence Carter has so many pets she can’t even count them up on two hands.
She says it would take her three weeks to count them.
Florence Carter lives on a farm in the real countryside.
On farms you have so many pets you don’t even notice them.
Florence Carter has too many animals.
For example, inside her kitchen, Florence Carter has got two dogs and four cats and three hamsters.
Inside her bedroom, Florence Carter has a ferret.
Florence Carter thinks a ferret is an everyday sort of pet when anyone could tell her that ferrets are rare.
Florence Carter is quite a spoilt girl.
Florence Carter has chickens that roam free all day long until it gets dark.
At dark, Florence Carter has her own special job of putting the chickens away so they won’t get eaten by a fox.
Florence Carter doesn’t like getting the chickens in.
Florence Carter moans about chickens from morning till night.
Florence Carter takes chickens for granted.
But even Florence Carter is not as spoilt as my sister Meg.
That’s because yesterday my sister Meg got a true-life rabbit for her birthday.
This is the whole tragedy of my life. Anyone can tell that I am the rabbit-y one in this family.
I have rabbit wallpaper and rabbits on my bed and I have a rabbit alarm clock, too.
Everybody knows that I am keener on pets than anybody else in this house.
Mum and Dad know that I am the one who really needs a pet.
Meg’s new rabbit is called Henry and he has silky fur and a wooffly nose.
Henry is just my type of rabbit.
When Meg opened Henry’s cage she made a squealing sound.
I thought, Henry is quite scared of that squealing.
When Meg picked Henry up she squeezed him tightly.
I thought, Henry does not look at all comfortable with Meg.
When Meg looked at Henry she couldn’t stop giggling.
I thought, it is quite rude of Meg to laugh at a poor little bunny rabbit on his first day in a new house.
If I had a new rabbit for my birthday, I would not laugh at my rabbit.
If I had had a brand-new rabbit of my own I would keep an eye on it all day long without stopping.
But my sister Meg only spent the morning keeping an eye on Henry.
After breakfast Meg went to the shops with Dad to spend her birthday money.
She just whizzled out of the front door and waved goodbye.
She had forgotten that she even owned a true-life rabbit of her own.
When I looked out of the window, I saw that sister of mine skip on top of the pavement.
I saw her smiling at Dad.
I saw her jangle her purse full of birthday money.
I thought, it is unkind of Meg to buy even more presents when she has already been given a real-life rabbit.
I tried to tell Mum about Meg being unkind but Mum was digging the garden and listening to the radio.
Mum told me I shouldn’t moan about people when it’s their birthday.
Mum said I was the one being unkind. “Mabel,” said Mum.
“Be a good girl this morning and then we can all eat Meg’s birthday lunch when Meg comes back from the shops.
“Meg deserves to have a fun day and she deserves to have a lovely birthday lunch, too.”
I thought, what about me?
I thought, I deserve to have a lovely day too.
I said some rude things in my quiet voice that Mum can’t hear, except sometimes mums hear more than you think.
Then I crept over to look at Meg’s birthday lunch which was all laid out on the table.
There were all Meg’s favourite things and there were some of my best things too.
There were party rings and sausage rolls and salt and vinegar chippy sticks.
There was jelly and cheese twists.
There was birthday cake with pink frosty icing.
I didn’t even take one chippy stick.
I thought, I am such a good girl.
I thought, I am not the one who is spoilt around here.
I left the birthday lunch all neatly on the table where it belonged and I went to have a look at Henry.
Henry was in his hutch and he did not look happy.
I thought, SOMEONE should be keeping an eye on that rabbit.
I could tell in almost less than a minisecond that Meg was not looking after her rabbit properly.
The only food Henry had was one droopy lettuce leaf.
I thought, that is quite measly of Meg.
I thought, Meg is STARVING that rabbit.
So I had to give Henry a proper lunch.
But Henry did not like party rings, or sausage rolls, or salt and vinegar chippy sticks.
He wouldn’t eat jelly or cheese twists.
He would not go near Meg’s birthday cake, not even the pink frosty icing.
I thought, Henry is quite a waste-y rabbit and Mum does not like waste one tiny bit.
I thought, Mum would want me to do something about all this waste.
So I invited my friends over for a feast. It was quite a bit fun.
But the thing about my friends is they are messy.
I tried to tell my friends to eat nicely but would they listen? No they would not.
Rebecca dropped biscuit and cake crumbs on the floor.
Laura-Orla crunched up crisps in her hand and threw them everywhere.
Dave was spilly. I was just about to start clearing up all their naughty mess when I remembered Henry.
I thought, SOMEONE should be cleaning that rabbit’s hutch.
I thought, Meg is neglecting that rabbit of hers.
So I went to the cupboard under the sink and I got out the green fluffy duster that Dad says is just for cleaning and NOT for playing with, and I used it to clean Henry’s hutch.
This was quite a smelly job because rabbits do a lot of poos.
Luckily, just in time, I remembered that the green fluffy duster is actually a broomstick and everyone knows that broomsticks are too precious to be covered in rabbit poo.
But just when I was about to put that broomstick safely back in the cupboard under the sink, it whisked me up into the sky.
I flew to the top of a rainbow and slid all the way down. I landed in the fluffy white clouds.
I whizzed through the air at 153 miles per hour.
But then I remembered Henry.
I thought, that rabbit is lonely.
So I took Henry out of his hutch.
But Henry was a bit too wriggly and he was not very good at being stroked either.
So I very carefully put Henry safely in the toy box.
Only this woke up Elwyn and Bilbo.
They wanted to play the jungle game and, the thing is, they made me join in too.
We swung through trees.
We read stories in hammocks.
We found the waterhole.
I was just getting my breath back when Meg and Dad came home from the shops.
Meg raced into the kitchen and opened Henry’s hutch.
Then she looked all around her, put her hands over her face and turned to me.
“Mabel,” she said all wobbly.
“HENRY HAS ESCAPED. HE’S HAD A RIOT IN THE KITCHEN. AND HE’S RUINED MY WHOLE ENTIRE BIRTHDAY LUNCH.”
I did not say anything.
I thought, what a naughty rabbit.
Meg looked everywhere for that naughty rabbit.
Mum and Dad turned the house upside down.
I searched too because I wanted to be a good, helpful girl like Mum said I should be.
I found Henry in the toy box.
Everyone was pleased with me.
They said, “Three cheers for Mabel” and “What a good girl”.
They said, “Mabel, you’re magnificent.”
It was a bit like MY birthday.
Meg put Henry back in his hutch.
She locked the door very carefully.
Then she gave me a hug.
“Mabel,” she said.
“Seeing as you were the one who found him, would you like to share Henry with me?”
I looked at Henry’s silky fur and wooffly nose.
“That is very kind of you, Meg,” I said, “but, Meg, I have slightly gone off rabbits.
“They are a bit too naughty.
“These days I’m more keen on a different type of pet.”
“But, Mabel,” said Meg.
“I thought you loved rabbits?”
“I do like rabbits,” I said.
“Just not as much as snakes.”
People in my class are always losing their teeth.
Elsa Kavinsky has lost one tooth on the top and two teeth on the bottom.
Torin Ray has lost so many teeth he can’t bite an apple and his voice is all mushy.
Torin Ray is always asking, “How many teeth have you lost?”
And before I can even answer he says, “I’ve lost five.”
Torin Ray is very keen on the tooth fairy.
But I don’t know why he is so keen on someone that sneaks into his room while he is asleep and takes teeth from under his pillow without asking.
That is called being a burglar and burglars are meaner than dentists.
My sister Meg says the tooth fairy is not a burglar because she leaves money under your pillow.
But I don’t need money. I have £1.73 already and that is a lot.
I am not planning on losing any teeth. My teeth are good at chewing and smiling and, also, they’re quite good at gleaming.
My teeth are FINE. I am not keen on the tooth fairy.
But then last Sunday at breakfast, something bad happened. I bit into a piece of toast and my front tooth went all wobbly.
I did not scrinch or scream or make a fuss.
I did not tell Mum.
I did not tell Dad.
I did not even tell my sister Meg.
I was calm in a crisis.
Being calm in a crisis is a grown-up thing to do.
Being calm in a crisis is what Dad was when he accidentally shut Meg’s finger in the car door and drove her to hospital without crashing.
But being calm in a crisis is not as easy as it looks.
Especially when you have a wobbly tooth and you are not keen on the tooth fairy.
I stopped nibbling my toast and made a huffy sound and looked at the ceiling.
Dad asked, “Everything all right, Mabel?”
But I did not want Dad to see my tooth in case he noticed it was wobbly so I did not smile back at him.
Mum asked, “Aren’t you hungry, Mabel?”
And I shook my head, even though I was STARVING.
Then I got down from the table and stomped off.
I did not feel calm in a crisis.
I felt cross.
Mum, Dad and Meg looked at each other with their eyebrows up.
They thought I couldn’t notice but I could.
I am a noticing sort of person (even when I am stomping).
When I got to my bedroom I looked at my tooth in the mirror and I tried wobbling it with my fingers.
It got wobblier.
I thought, I will NOT let that tooth fairy get her hands on MY tooth.
I thought, something needs to be done about this wobbly tooth of mine.
I thought, dentists know more about teeth than tooth fairies, and dentists aren’t even burglars.
I thought, it’s a good job I’m a dentist in my spare time.
I got my white coat and my dentist mirror and then I sneaked to the playroom and got out the sticky tape that is just for wrapping presents and definitely NOT for wasting.
I thought, Dad says sticky tape sticks everything.
I thought, I’ll just use a little bit.
But sticky tape is not really tasty and, also, it sticks your fingers together instead of your teeth.
My fingers would not move.
I thought, this is an emergency.
I thought, SOMEONE should be keeping an eye on me.
I thought, where is that sister of mine?
I called out, “Meg!” in my loudest voice.
Meg came racing up the stairs and burst into the room, all flimmity.
“Mabel!” she said.
“What’s the matter?”
“The thing is,” I told Meg in my calm-in-a-crisis dentist voice. “I’ve had a dental injury.”
I held out my stuck-together fingers and told Meg what had happened.
“Mabel!” said Meg, all breathless.
“You’re not allowed to play with the sticky tape.”
“I know THAT,” I said, all calm in a crisis.
“I haven’t been PLAYING. I do not have time to PLAY.
“I am in the middle of a dentist operation.”
Then I stopped being calm in a crisis and got all hot and stampy.
I shouted, “Can you unstick me please?”
I thought, it’s a good job SOMEONE in this house has their wits about them.
I thought, I wish Meg would get a move on.
Meg took me to the bathroom and she carefully peeled the sticky tape off my fingers and washed my hands with soapy water.
“Mabel,” said Meg. “Have you got a wobbly tooth?”
I shook my head and said, “NO.”
I said, “I am not going to lose any teeth because I’m not keen on the tooth fairy and I don’t even need the money.”
“But Mabel,” said Meg. “When I lose a tooth, the tooth fairy gives me two shiny pounds.
“Think of all the things you could buy with two shiny pounds.
“You could buy stickers and sweets or you could even start saving up for a snake all of your own.”
I thought, I like stickers and I also love sweets and the main thing about me is that I am very keen on having a pet of my own, especially a snake.
I thought, maybe losing a tooth will be OK.
But then I pictured that burglar tooth fairy breaking into my bedroom and sneaking under my pillow and I thought: NO.
I am NOT losing a tooth.
All that week, I tried to hold my tooth in with my tongue and I stuck to food that was easy to chew, like yoghurt and banana.
But my tooth kept on getting wobblier and wobblier and wobblier.
Then at supper time, when it was sa
usages, my tooth got so wobbly it FELL OUT.
I thought, why do bad things always happen to me, Mabel Chase?
I put my falled-out tooth in my pocket and I did not tell one single person that it had come out.
Then I wrote a letter to the tooth fairy in fairy code.
Dear Tooth Fairy,
Please do not visit me in my bedroom at night when I am all by myself on my own.
Please leave the money on the windowsill.
Please go away.
Love from Mabel Chase
I wrote ‘Please’ and ‘Love from’ so the tooth fairy would think I was a nice, polite girl, even though I wasn’t feeling polite and I wasn’t in a very nice mood either.
That night, I put my falled-out tooth on the windowsill and I stuck the letter on my bedroom window.
I lay in the dark for a long time.
It got very quiet.
Soon it was so quiet, I could hear that tooth fairy flying through the night.
I could hear her breaking into other people’s houses.
I could hear her getting very close to my bedroom window.
I thought, that tooth fairy is a menace.
I thought, why have I been left here all by myself on my own?
I raced to Meg’s room and got into bed with her.
In the morning, Meg came with me to see if the tooth fairy had come.
But my falled-out tooth was still on the windowsill and there was no money either.
I thought, that’s what you get for writing a nice letter.
I thought, now I’ll be tired and grumpy and it’s not even my fault.
But Meg said, “I know what the problem is.
“The tooth fairy only comes if you put the tooth under your pillow.”
I told Meg that I couldn’t do that because I didn’t want to be burgled while I was all alone in my room.