She looked up into the sky and there was the beautiful moon. Only it looked different from before. When she had been a caterpillar, it had seemed enormous and had looked as if it was an extremely long way away. Now she was a moth it looked quite small and very close.
Funny that, she thought and flew up to the top of the greenhouse roof for a better look. And it was very close and instead of being cool and blue it was now warm and pale gold and it had a name and its name was 40Watts.
‘It’s even more beautiful close up,’ said Venus.
Every night she flew to the moon. Every night she flew round and round it and the amazing thing was that it never got smaller ever again. Venus knew then that Gilbert the cockroach had been wrong. All that stuff about the moon getting bigger and smaller had just been rubbish. The moon had been dying and she knew that by flying up to it she had made it well again. After all, if that wasn’t the case then why would she have woken up with a pair of wings?
Ethel’s Dreamtime
The long hot summer began to slip away. At first it was barely noticeable, no more than a slight fading of the trees and a softness in the grass as if nature was getting tired and wanted a rest. Plants that had stood tall and proud began to hang their heads and give up their seeds to the wind. Ethel the chicken felt tired too. Autumn was creeping into her bones and like the plants, she felt weary. Like them she had grown old and slow. She had seen it all before many times and now she just wanted to sleep.
‘You’re the oldest animal in the garden,’ said Arthur the rabbit. He had lived for twelve years and all his life Ethel had been there. Even back in his earliest memory she had been old.
‘In fact,’ he said, ‘you are probably the oldest chicken in the world.’
Ethel didn’t really understand what Arthur was talking about. She was a chicken and being old didn’t mean anything to her. Yesterday was just like last week only not so fuzzy round the edges. A few things remained in her memory. There was Eric the cockerel who had been so proud and strong and there was a picture in her mind from long ago of an old lady stroking her head. And she could remember a time when the grass had grown tall and the garden had become a jungle. They had been exciting days. All the other animals had thrived in those years and many new creatures had come to live in the garden, but Ethel had felt lonely. The house had been empty apart from rats and spiders. The windows had been dark every night and the doors had stayed locked and closed.
‘It all feels so lonely without anyone living here,’ she had said.
‘It’s peaceful,’ said the other animals, ‘and safe.’
‘I miss them,’ said the old chicken.
‘You just miss the food,’ said the others.
‘No,’ Ethel had said. ‘It’s not the food. It’s the talking. I miss the warm voices and the feeling of belonging to someone.’
‘Animals shouldn’t belong to anyone,’ said the others. ‘We’re wild animals, we should be free.’
‘I don’t want to be wild or free,’ Ethel had said. ‘I want to belong to someone.’
Nothing the other animals said had made any difference. She’d heard them tell her about all the terrible things that people did to animals but she had never seen any of it so it didn’t really mean anything. The only humans she had ever known had been kind and she had missed them.
‘It’s because I’m domesticated,’ she used to say sadly, without really knowing what it meant.
Then everything had changed. A family had come to live in the house and the loneliness had ended. The man had given her a smart new box to live in and the children had come to see her every day. Later on they gave her eggs to hatch and she had children again, four beautiful hens called Doris and a magnificent cockerel called DorisBoris. They had their grown-up feathers now and scratched and fussed around the garden all day. They had seen their own seasons and didn’t need her any more.
The children in the house were growing up too. Every day they brought her food and every day they tickled her behind the head. She sat in the thick warm straw in the dark end of the chicken hut and waited for them to come. Sometimes when the day was warm and the air buzzed with the hum of summer, one of the children would carry her up to the house and she would potter about in the flower beds while they sat on the steps reading books. But now winter was coming and the children stayed indoors.
‘I feel so tired,’ said the old chicken. ‘Even when I wake up, I feel tired.’
‘It’s getting old does that,’ said Arthur the rabbit. ‘I feel the same. You need to sleep more.’
‘That’s all I ever do anyway,’ said Ethel. ‘Sleep.’
But it wasn’t true. She sat still a lot but she found herself sleeping less and less. As the sun went down her children came back into the hut to roost. One by one they hopped up onto the perch and huddled together clucking and muttering to themselves until they fell asleep. It was a gentle friendly noise and the air smelt warm and comfortable but in her box at the other end of the hut Ethel sat staring through the window at the night sky. During the night the mice and rats would shuffle through the straw on the floor looking for scraps of food. Sometimes they would stop and talk to Ethel but most nights they were too busy and ignored her. On cloudless nights an owl would fly past, its shape outlined against the moon. Ethel saw the face on the moon and she watched the stars move silently over the world as they had done for millions and millions of years. And if there were no stars she stared into the darkness until morning.
It had become the same every night. Sleep had left her and it had left her tired. Sometimes in the warm afternoon sunshine she would nod off for a while but the slightest thing would wake her and that would be the end of it. But it was winter now and there was no sunshine warm enough for dreams.
‘I just don’t seem to be able to get warm any more,’ she said.
‘That’s old age too,’ said Arthur. ‘Your heart gets slow. Your blood gets thin and stands still.’
‘I don’t think I want any of that,’ said Ethel.
‘Any of what?’ asked Arthur.
‘Old age.’
‘Well, it isn’t something you can decide about,’ said Arthur. ‘It just happens.’
‘What, even if you don’t want it to,’ said Ethel.
‘Yes, of course,’ said Arthur.
‘Who told you that?’ said Ethel.
‘My father,’ said Arthur.
‘Is that what happened to him?’ said Ethel. ‘Did he get old age?’
‘Yes.’
‘And is it like that for everyone?’
‘I think so,’ said Arthur.
‘You mean, I’m going to be tired and cold forever?’ said Ethel.
‘I don’t know,’ said Arthur irritably. He was tired too and he didn’t feel like talking about it.
Ethel sat silently in the door to the hut. She wanted to ask Arthur about his father. If he still had old age and if he found it difficult to sleep but Arthur limped off into the bushes. Perhaps she should go and talk to Arthur’s father. Perhaps he could tell her what was going to happen.
She sat there staring into space and her thoughts all faded away. Daydreaming, that’s what her mother had called it.
‘Stop daydreaming,’ she’d said, when Ethel had been young and feeling all lazy in the sunshine.
‘Why?’ Ethel had asked. Her mother had never had a really good answer for that, but it had left Ethel with a feeling that sitting around doing nothing was wrong and all her life she had felt a bit guilty about doing it. Now she didn’t care. Now, as she let her thoughts drift away, they really did drift away and her head became completely empty and her eyes grew lazy until everything was a blur. The sweet emptiness made up for the lack of sleep. She felt as if she could sit there forever.
‘Come on, out of the way,’ shouted a voice in her ear. ‘Move over, some of us have got work to do.’
It was one of her daughters, pushing past her. Ethel fell over and the younger hen ran into the hut and laid an egg.
‘There’s no need to rush,’ said Ethel, struggling to her feet and fluffing out her feathers. ‘There’s more to life than laying eggs.’
‘No there isn’t,’ said her daughter.
‘Of course there is,’ said Ethel. ‘What about sunsets and the smell of the rain on the grass? What about daydreaming?’
‘Daydreaming, daydreaming?’ said her daughter. ‘What a waste of time.’
‘What about flowers and talking to your friends? What about bacon rind?’ said Ethel.
‘You’re going soft in the head,’ said the young hen. ‘You’re just saying that because you can’t lay eggs any more.’
‘No I’m not,’ said Ethel, but she wasn’t really sure.
‘You’re just saying that because you’re old and useless,’ said the young hen and crashed off into the bushes.
Ethel stood staring at the floor. Maybe her daughter was right, maybe that was what life was all about, just laying eggs. The old hen climbed down from the shed and shuffled through the long grass to the pond. That was where she always went when she was feeling low.
She ignored the rabbits under the tall trees. Other animals called out good mornings as she went by but she didn’t notice any of them. She dragged her feet in the earth, looked out across the canal and sighed deeply. When she reached the pond she walked in up to her knees and stood ankle deep in the mud. She stood there for hours staring at her her own reflection in the water.
‘Do you think I’m old and useless?’ she said to the reflection, but it said nothing.
The little creatures wriggled between her toes, as they always did, and, as always when she was miserable, she didn’t notice them. Old thoughts came into her head and she remembered the feeling she had had many years ago. It was loneliness.
It was different this time. The loneliness she had felt before had been because there had been no one to love her. Now she had that. The children came every day. Wherever she was in the garden, they came and found her and carried her back to the hut and fed her. The loneliness she felt now was deep inside, a sadness for the years gone by, a dull pain for all the things she would never see again.
One of the toads came and stood beside her. He sat down in the water and looked up at Ethel.
‘Beautiful, isn’t it?’ he said.
‘What?’ said Ethel.
‘All this,’ said the toad.
‘All what?’ said Ethel.
‘This,’ said the toad, ‘The water, the mud, all this.’
‘It’s horrible,’ said Ethel. ‘I only come here when I’m depressed.’
‘Ooh, someone got out of the nest on the wrong side this morning, didn’t they?’ said the toad.
‘Don’t be stupid, warty,’ said Ethel. ‘There’s only one way to get out of my nest.’
‘What do you know? You’re just a useless old chicken,’ said the toad and disappeared into the water.
Ethel felt worse than ever. She couldn’t even be miserable in peace. She went and sat on the compost heap, but it was no better. As soon as she sank into the warm slimy cabbage leaves on the top, three slugs wriggled out and started telling jokes about chickens crossing roads. Ethel ate them but it didn’t make her feel any better.
She walked round the edge of the lawn until she reached the back of the house. It was deserted. The French windows were open and there was music coming from inside the room but there was so sign of anyone. Even Rosie the dog was nowhere to be seen.
Ethel clambered up the steps and looked in the doorway. It had been years since she’d been inside the house. She had forgotten all about it and now standing there, it all came flooding back. She had been young then, sometimes even laying more than one egg a day, and the old lady had been living there then. The room had been darker then and had smelt as old as the lady. Now it was bright and clean. In her youth Ethel had been inside sometimes. The old lady had given her cake crumbs and then carried her out into the garden again.
The old chicken walked into the room and stood in the middle of the carpet. It was soft and gentle like the grass in dreams. There was a fire dancng and sparkling in the grate and the air was warm and peaceful. Ethel stood there and felt the sleep she had wanted for so long begin to creep over her. She looked round for somewhere to settle down but there were no nests anywhere.
She walked into the hall where the air was even warmer. Something from above seemed to reach out for her. It led her towards the stairs and one by one it led her slowly up the stairs. Her legs ached and each stair seemed taller than the last but finally she reached the top and stood in a long field of green carpet. Across the hall was a half-open door. It was dark and as inviting as a summer night and whatever it was that had called her upstairs seemed to be there inside the cupboard. She looked round the edge of the door and there in the twilight was a nest of delicate blue blankets. Ethel settled down into it and closed her eyes. Pictures of home drifted through her head, golden days when Eric the cockerel had stood beside her, summer days that had seemed to last forever. And there he stood, as tall and proud as her memory, silhouetted against the darkness.
‘Eric, is that you?’ she said.
Invisible arms reached out and stroked her feathers. She felt herself as light as clouds and Ethel the chicken knew at last that it was time to sleep.
The Twelve Thousand Franks
Under the lawn where the cut grass gave way to the jungle of weeds and bushes was an ants’ nest. It had been there for as long as anyone could remember. It burrowed out in all directions, into the centre of the lawn itself and back into the dark tangle of fallen branches and dead leaves. Its tunnels were a never-ending bustle of activity. Twenty-four hours a day the ants were busy. Most other animals had time when they slept, but not the ants.
The mornings were worst. Living with thousands of other ants in such a small space was always noisy but at the start of the day the racket was deafening as the tunnels shook to the endless pounding of one hundred and forty-four thousand feet rushing off to work. Frank1942 didn’t know the exact number but one hundred and forty-four thousand seemed like a fair guess. Of course Frank786 had lost one of his legs in a jam sandwich and there were several Sandras with two extra feet, but life was too short to be that fussy. If there were a thousand more or twenty-three less it would hardly make any difference. The noise was deafening and Frank1942 had a splitting headache.
‘You’re pathetic,’ said anyone who would listen to him. ‘Ants don’t get headaches.’
‘Well, I’ve got one,’ said Frank1942.
‘It’s impossible,’ said Sandra12996. ‘You’re just pretending to get off work.
‘Maybe I’m different,’ said Frank1942. ‘Maybe I’ve evolved into a new super ant.’
‘What?’ said Sandra12996. ‘A wonderful new species that can get headaches?’
‘Well, it could happen,’ said Frank1942.
‘A new race of ants, exactly the same as ordinary ants but with headaches,’ laughed the others. ‘That’s brilliant.’
Frank1942 crept away down the tunnels to another part of the nest where he had never been before. No one understood him. He was different from all the others. He knew it, but no one else did. He knew there was more to life than rushing off to work all day following everyone else. He knew there were things like poetry and thinking. Frank1942 had never told anyone about his poetry. They wouldn’t understand, they’d just laugh at him. He tried to remember his best poems. They always cheered him up.
I wandered lonely as an ant
That floats on high over tall ant hill
When all at once I saw my mum
Squashed inside an old phone bill.
he sang, and
Jack and Jill went up the
ant hill
To fetch a big fat larva
Jack fell down and broke his seventh knee
And Jill creased up with laughter.
and
Three blind ants, three blind ants
See how they run, See how they run
Smack into the wall.
He was still working on the last one.
‘There must be more to life than this,’ he said, but no one was listening.
Hundreds of ants rushed past him as he wriggled his way through the crowd in the opposite direction. His head hurt so much that he couldn’t see properly. The faces of his thousands of brothers and sisters shoving past him became a blur until they all looked the same. He wanted to sit down and have a rest but there was nowhere to stop. The tunnels were filled with a wall to wall mass of busy insects.
At last, at five past nine, the rush began to ease off. Frank1942 staggered on until he could walk no further. The tunnels were almost deserted now, just a few stragglers running along to catch up with the rest.
‘Hurry up, hurry up, we’re late,’ they called as they ran by.
Frank1942 found a crack in the tunnel wall and crept into it. He found himself in a cool dark cave full of roots and although his head was still hurting he soon fell asleep. In his dreams all his aches and pains faded away. The air fell silent and the tunnels were deserted. In his dreams he was the last ant on earth.
He had never been outside, up above the tunnels in the big world. He was only a second-class worker and wasn’t allowed outside. But he had heard about it. He’d eavesdropped on the soldier ants talking about the sunshine and the trees and giant birds that could swallow you in one mouthful.
Wild Stories Page 17