| The Chinchilla The rustling of paper and the crisp sound of it being torn drifted into the windowless room that was barely three paces by four. An irregular grid that clicked metallically when touched textured the floor and walls. Finally the paper around the room was torn into so that bits of colored paper floated through the air landing on a card next to the cage reading �Happy Birthday!� �Mommy, what is it?� came a high bell-like chime of a little girl�s voice. The metallic clicks stopped, and a soothing, laughing voice answered the small voice, �Well open it, you already opened everything else.� A shriek of joy and the frenzy of paper being torn flooded the cage with light to reveal the animal within. The little girl gripped the edge of the table, resting her chin on it as she peered at the over sized mouse like creature that resembled a bunny with a mouse�s head. The creature stood in the middle of the cage, only its paws moving franticly as it stared at them intensely. A slight frown crossed the little girls face as she stepped back from the table, slowly turning to confront her parents who were sitting cozily next to each other. Their beaming smiles faltered at their daughters frown and the mother glided off the couch to face her child. �What�s the matter Sally, don�t you like it?� her voice remained smooth but the laughter was gone. Her little frown deepening, Sally glanced back at the ball of fur in the cage before staring at her mother, �What is it?� Heaving a slight sigh of relief her mother smiled, �Sally, it�s a chinchilla.� �A chin...chill�a?� Sally said fumbling over the word, only making it through with the help of her mother. Still frowning, Sally ignored her mother as she fussed over her blonde hair fixing the ribbons in it, watching the chinchilla, still frowning. �We thought it was time we got you a pet, Pumpkin. It�s only right that you name your own pet. We know it wasn�t the pet you were expecting but you�ll be the only one to have a chinchilla.� The deep voice of her father floated over from the couch deep yet gentle, as he joined his wife, making the perfect picture of a stereotypical family living in the suburbs with the mother and father standing cozily holding each other and the one child standing in front of them as if posed for a family portrait. The only thing that did not fit was the gray-furred chinchilla who stared at the three, as if studying them, all the while fidgeting furiously, his hands working his paws, as if he were dry washing them. Sally spared one glance for her father before staring at the chinchilla, still frowning, her lips set in a fine line. �Butter Cup,� she paused then nodded to herself as if listening to something no one else could hear, �Mrs. Butter Cup shall be your name.� Hesitating Sally shook her head and smiled a gleeful turn of lips before she grabbed the new porcelain doll she had gotten as one of her presents before bounding off to her room, leaving Mrs. Butter Cup, who was very much a mister, to stare at her parents still dry washing his paws. Night had swallowed the house and everything had fallen silent. An occasional car would pass by disturbing the relative quiet of the house. The only light was a haze of soft orange light from a small night light that cast the silhouettes of the many porcelain dolls that Sally collected against the wall so that it appeared the room was filled with elegantly dressed ladies sitting on a series of platforms that was the iron rod shelf they sat on. Two silhouettes stood out from the rest, one was the silhouette of the new porcelain doll Sally had gotten today named Suzann, the other was Mrs. Butter Cup who moved around his cage working at each bar as if trying to get out. Suzann had been propped up against a picture frame her painted face set in the permanent pout the doll makers have given her and with a smack the picture frame fell from the constant movements of Mrs. Butter Cup wiggling the desk enough so that the tab in the back collapsed on it dropping her against the cage. Slowly Suzanna slid against the cage falling forward catching the latch just right so the door popped open and left her teetering on the edge of the desk. Mrs. Butter Cup had frozen and stared at the open cage in disbelief at his good luck and slowly slinked over to the open cage poking his mousy head out too look around as if the cage had been a prison, and he was catching his first glimpse of the outside world in many years of confinement. Sitting back on his hands, he automatically resumed fidgeting, a habit he had even before becoming a chinchilla. In his past life he had been a small nervous man, some even said he was paranoid. He had a reason for his paranoia, always worried he left one clue too many and the possibility that he would be caught too close to a body or worse yet be caught with his weapon in hand still reveling in the kill. Slowly Mrs. Butter Cup stretched out his front paws bounding slightly forward, just enough to be out of the cage. Nervously he glanced around the room, eyeing the sleeping girl who was tucked in bed as he moved over to the still teetering Suzann. Hesitantly he reached out, touching the dolls face before snatching his paw back rubbing them together. Glancing at the girl again, a shudder went through him and with a slight twitch of his lips he pushed the teetering Suzann to fall over the edge face first before leaping off the desk himself. The doll shattered on impact as Mrs. Butter Cup landed with more grace then he had previously in his last life. Mrs. Butter Cup, he thought bitterly to himself, never the less he would not have the name for long so he could deal with it. Slowly he worked his way to the shattered pieces of the doll, listening for the girl or her parents, careful not to wake them. Silence lay over the house. Slowly he worked his way through the pieces of porcelain, feeling the edges of each piece, leaving those that were dull or too small where they were and collecting pieces that were sharper and bigger then his paw. When he returned to the pile he had collected he found one piece that he could hold well enough between the pitiful excuses for his fingers, gripped between his two paws. Carefully, Mrs. Butter Cup gripped the porcelain in his mouth before bounding across the room, with one great spring of his back legs he jumped on the foot of the bed staring up at the lump of blankets that formed the sleeping Sally. She fit the victims he had chosen in his past life well enough for him. Her hair was the right color of yellow, though she was a tad bit too young for his usual tastes, and to top the baby fat still on her she was plump for her age telling tales of being pampered. Carefully he worked his way up to her and froze as her eyes caught his. They were wide with fright and she sat up looking around the room franticly pausing on the shattered doll and the porcelain in his mouth. �Mrs. Butter Cup?� her voice pierced the quiet, quivering with fear. Removing the porcelain piece from his mouth, Mrs. Butter Cup moved closer, carefully, and slowly so as not to frighten her. Slowly Sally reached out and touched Mrs. Butter Cup who sniffed her hand curiously tickling his whiskers with her fingers. With this the fear on her face faded slowly, as if reassured and taken over by his cute bunny like quality, reaching out with both hands picking up Mrs. Butter Cup who still held the broken porcelain. Pulling his soft warm body against her front, Sally cuddled Mrs. Butter Cup. �How did you get out Mrs. Butter Cup, and you should not be playing with broken stuff.� Her voice had regained its laughter as she tried to take the broken porcelain from his small paws. Before she could he sliced her out stretched fingers. With a start Sally jerked her hand back and looked at it, eyes going wide as blood welled out of the cut on her fingers, dropping Mrs. Butter Cup in the process. Tears streamed down her face silently as her eyes remained wide, staring at the blood as if she had never seen it before or as if it wasn�t real. Her mouth trembled as it opened and closed as if she was trying to make some sort of sound but unable to override the shock that had taken over. It was no wonder that she couldn�t pull out of the shock, having been a papered girl, sheltered all her life. Placing his make-shift weapon in his mouth Mrs. Butter Cup leaped, pushing Sally�s small frame over. She tumbled to the floor. Finally her shock was over and she started whimpering, trying to crawl away. Before she could, Mrs. Butter Cup sliced the back of her ankle before darting in front of her. Letting out a scream Sally tumbled back leaving a half bloody hand print on the wood floor, a trickle of blood from her ankle. Footsteps walked past the door and paused, hearing the whimpering. �Sally babes, go back to sleep it was just a nightmare. Go back to sleep darling.� Her mother�s voice drifted through the door as her footsteps faded away, which was a routine for the most part for her. Before Sally could yell for help or get away Mrs. Butter Cup launched himself, clawing and slicing her face, moving to the next slice before the one before had even started to bleed. Her face becoming crisscrossed with lines of blood, no two cuts alike in depth or length. As soon as he had finished with her face, now a mask of blood, he attacked her wrists digging the porcelain into her skin as far as he could in his present body. Stabbing as much as slicing, cuts appeared on her legs from the porcelain, still shattered on the floor. Screaming a high pitched mewling sound as if she were some sort of animal about to die, flailing her arms, knocking Mrs. Butter Cup away, she fell backwards while trying to stand sending her shelf of dolls teetering. One by one they came crashing down. Each of them shattering sending pieces in every direction. Porcelain embedded itself into her skin and cuts, making new wounds. Franticly Mrs. Butter Cup scurried around trying to avoid the flying pieces, finally springing back onto the desk and into his cage pulling the door shut behind him. The hurried foot-falls of Sally�s parents could be heard down the hall, faintly over the pain filled shrieks of their daughter. Sally blindly crawled across the floor. Porcelain cut her hands and knees with her every move, covering the floor in bloody prints that disappeared among the pools seeping from her wrists and the spray of drops from other wounds. The door flew open just as Sally crawled next to it. The door slammed into her knocking her back onto the carnage of shattered arms, legs, and painted faces. With a shriek Sally�s mother fainted, collapsing in the door way. Her father darted from sight for a phone leaving his daughter to lay in a bloody heap as he called for help. No one took notice of the ball of fur that was Mrs. Butter Cup, still clenching a piece of bloody porcelain, or the slow sinuous way he lapped at the blood while calmly watching the girl bleed out, like he had watched so many other girls die before. |