PALS

This is a story about a noisy crow, who lived in a quiet forest, full of quiet snow, and cute little critters, called fluffs.

The fluffs looked sweeter than kittens made of cotton candy, but underneath, they were as nasty as the fleas on a sewer rat. And no one brought out their nastiness more than the crow.

The crow couldn’t help having rusty feathers and a voice that could peel the warts off a toad’s butt – it’s how he was built. Which meant, the noisy crow was also a lonely crow. 

“I’ve been here a hundred and fifty-four years,” he said one night, sitting in his favorite tree, “and not one, single friend.”

The next morning, the crow was rattled awake by CLANGING and BANGING! While two grown-ups tinkered with a broken sleigh, their little girl built a snowman oozing with jolliness. She gave it two stone eyes and turned a carrot from her horse’s lunch bucket into a nose.

“Now all you need is a magic hat to make you be alive,” the girl said. “Then your name would be Rosy. And we’d be best friends!”

“The small ones are almost as dumb as the big ones,” mocked a fluff from its hiding spot. 

The crow, on the other hand, thought the girl was a genius! He knew magic hats were nothing more than story book baloney. “But,” he whispered giddily, “There is one thing that just might do the trick.”

The crow crashed through the woods like a cannon ball, until he reached a stone cabin tucked deep inside, where a silver-bearded, purple-cloaked wizard was puffing on a pipe. “THAT!” the crow sang. “That’s where the real magic lives.” He waited until the old fart dozed off, then snuck inside, plucked the pipe from the wizard’s boney fingers, and flew into the night.

(Up next . . . part 2 . . . obviously.)