It was the week before Thanksgiving when the snow first started falling. A lot more than the predicted 6-8 inches covered the Elmwood landscape overnight and, despite the current respite, there were little signs of a let-up as heavy, lumbering clouds continued to heave their way slowly over the Rocky Mountains. Another blizzard would soon be coming.
Any evidence of the fallen autumnal leaves that had covered everything in a damp mush was now buried under a sparkling white blanket. The only thing to escape the deep mounds of snow were the trees—dark, brittle sticks that stretched upwards, puncturing the dense, grey backdrop above. The myriad of fall colours that had kaleidoscoped the surrounding hills for the preceding weeks were now reduced to a mere black and white. The natural world no longer buzzed with any signs of life but lay still and quiet; a lethargic approach to the eventual slumber of the upcoming winter.
B-Jay wasn’t sure if his friends would be ready for another adventure, but he had brand new snow tyres fitted and was eager to try them out. He would drive to the cottonwood tree to see how the tyres felt and, if his friends were there, then so much the better.
His owner had shovelled the drive hours earlier, so there was no trouble exiting the garage, and the road ahead had been ploughed to keep the town accessible for the upcoming celebrations. It wasn’t late in the day, but the dense snow clouds blocked out the evening sun, so he turned on his lights as a precaution and proceeded along the drive.
It wasn’t too long before he found himself at the cottonwood tree, and he was overjoyed when he saw that his friends were there. It was a pleasant surprise and one which was most worthy of a few toots of his horn.
“Hi everyone!” he exclaimed as he pulled up. “How are you all on this fine snowy day?”
B-Jay didn’t mind the cold; he just turned his heater up to maximum and kept the windows tightly shut. Despite the freezing temperatures, he was feeling quite toasty.
“Hi B-Jay,” replied Zippo. “It is good to see you again. You chose a good night to turn up—everyone is here.”
“I see that,” said B-Jay, “but where is Digger Bo hiding? Don’t tell me it is too cold for him to tumble.”
“Oh no, he is in his burrow. He says he has something to show us. I am not sure if he meant for us to follow him into his burrow or if he is going to come back out; he just said he had a surprise and then disappeared very quickly.”
“If he doesn’t appear shortly, then we could always play a guessing game,” said Maxwell. “I do so love the games we play.”
“I am not sure how we will know who has the correct guess unless he does appear,” said Cressida, her tone impatient. “Maybe it would be a better idea to do Rock, Paper, Scissors to see who is going to go into that deep, dark, damp, dingy, black hole to find him.”
“Oh, I like the sound of that game!” said Maxwell the dog, pricking back his ears and cocking his head to the side. “But I don’t think it will work if there are five of us. If I choose Rock, Cressida chooses Paper, and B-Jay chooses Scissors, then there is nothing left for Aruna and Zippo to choose.”
Before anyone had a chance to laugh, Digger Bo exited the burrow with a majestic tumble, followed by a bounding white, baby rabbit. Everyone stopped talking for the next few minutes, unsure of what was going on. No one could have guessed that Digger Bo was going to surprise them with a rabbit, and they all stared at the figure before them, unsure of what to say. Maxwell started sniffing the rabbit, who sat there unperturbed, twitching its nose, its long ears sitting upright.
“Hands up if your guess involved the word rabbit,” said Cressida, breaking the silence.
“What have you been up to, Digger?” questioned Aruna the owl, from his perch in the tree above. “How do you come to possess a rabbit?”
“I found him,” replied Digger Bo innocently. “He wandered into my burrow when the snow started falling. I think he is lost.”
“Well, that could prove to be a problem,” B-Jay stated with concern. “I am not sure where the nearest Lost and Found department is in town and, even if I did, it is surely closed at this time of night. Even if it was earlier in the day, it might be that it has closed for Thanksgiving anyway. The earliest we could go there would be Monday, which means we have to think of something else.”
“I think you will find that the rabbit has a mother and father to look after it,” said Cressida with authority. “All animals have parents to care for them.”
“So where are they?” asked Zippo the ant, putting his hand up to his eyes as he scanned the horizon.
“I am not sure that you will be able to see them from down there,” said B-Jay, “but nice try!”
“B-Jay is right,” said Maxwell, feeling confident that he had a good idea. “We should get Aruna to fly overhead to find them.”
“For once your suggestion is quite logical,” mentioned Cressida with surprise, “but there is one small flaw to your suggestion. The rabbit field is miles away and, even if Aruna was to fly there, he would not know which of the rabbits were this little one's parents.”
“Couldn’t he ask around?” said Digger Bo, joining in the discussion.
“That would seem prudent until you realise that they would disappear into the ground long before he got anywhere near enough to ask, not wishing to become his supper. Seeing as owls do indeed eat rabbits.”
“That might be a problem,” said B-Jay.
“Couldn’t he explain that we are all friends and friends help friends and don’t eat friends?” questioned Maxwell. “Wasn’t that how we solved the problem for our friend Hudson the Hop Toad?”
“Why don’t we just ask the rabbit where he lives?” said Cressida, pruning herself through the boredom of the current debate.
“I tried that already,” said Digger Bo. “I tried asking the rabbit its name, where it lives, and if it can tumble, but all it does is hop around all the time. I don’t think it understands me.”
“Maybe it is Canadian like Hudson was. We need Aruna to translate. Can you do that, Aruna?” continued Zippo.
“I doubt that the rabbit came all the way from Canada like Hudson did. It is more likely that he came from the rabbit fields near the farm over yonder,” said Aruna.
“So we don’t even know his name, let alone where he lives or who his parents are?” said Maxwell, rather concerned at the level of predicament before them.
“Well, if he hops around a lot, we could name him Hopscotch,” said Zippo, excited at trying to solve one of the dilemmas.
“Oh, I like that name,” said Maxwell. “That’s a good choice, but I vote that we call him Thumper.”
“I think you have been watching too much Bambi on Netflix,” said Cressida, suddenly joining in the conversation again. “I think he should be named Ludwig Gustav Clawhauser Fritz the 2nd.”
No one said anything immediately until Aruna decided to risk it by asking, “Why blah blah blah Fritz the 2nd? Why not the 1st?”
“My son was Ludwig the 1st,” responded Cressida, “so that wouldn’t make any sense.”
“Wait—what!” they all cried in unison. “You have a son?”
“How come we never knew this before now?” asked Digger Bo, who thought his surprise now paled in comparison to Cressida’s secret.
The rabbit sat there as they all continued to work through the cat’s revelation, oblivious to their comments.
“Well,” said Digger Bo after a few minutes, “as I found him, I get to name him. That is the rule of finding things.”
“I think you’ll find that happens with constellations and stuff. He is a living being,” said B-Jay. “I know this because my owner has Google and he tells me interesting stuff when we have passengers, or when he is on the phone. It is surprising the things I have learnt over the years. For example, we could ask Alexa for a good name for him.”
“Oh, that is another good name,” said Maxwell. “But isn’t Alexa a girl’s name? That wouldn’t work if it is.”
“Oh, for the love of marmite!” pleaded Cressida, unsure whether a dog could even pretend to be that silly in real life.
“Well, I have already chosen a name for him,” asserted Digger Bo loudly. “I name him Fred.”
“Okay,” said B-Jay, trying to get the situation back on track before it spiralled from the seriousness of the problem that faced them. “Now he has a name, what are we going to do with Fred?”
Aruna the wise Great Horned Owl spoke before Digger Bo had a chance to reply, seemingly knowing what the badger was about to say.
“Yes, we can call him Fred if it makes life easier, but just because you have given the rabbit a name does not mean you can keep him. He is a living creature and there is great responsibility in looking after something that is alive. It needs proper care, it needs food, constant attention, and many other things for its proper well-being until it grows into an adult and can look after itself.”
“Of course!” said Zippo loudly. “Aruna is right, we need to feed it—I mean Fred. He must be hungry. Aruna, do you know what rabbits eat?”
“That’s easy,” said Maxwell proudly. “Even I can answer that question. He eats rabbit food!”
“Genius,” chuckled Cressida to herself, pruning her paw.
“Thank you!” replied the dog proudly.
“I say we climb aboard B-Jay and go to a supermarket,” said Zippo.
“Have you ever seen an owl, a badger, an ant, and a dog shopping for rabbit food in Albertsons?” enquired Cressida mockingly.
“Cressida is right,” replied Aruna the wise owl, keeping a straight face. “We need to go to Petsmart.”
Cressida gave an approving grin at the owl’s clever retort and replied, “Touché!”
Maxwell stared at them more confused than ever, his tongue hanging to the side of his mouth as he furled his eyebrows.
“Ooooo, that reminds me of a joke!” said Zippo, spinning his baseball cap round and round in excitement, and before anyone could object, he began. “Two big, ferocious lions were pushing their shopping cart through Walmart when one turned to the other and said, ‘Is it me, or does it seem quiet in here today?’”
As he delivered the punchline, he struck a pose and looked at them all, waiting for the sound of raucous, uncontrolled laughter. Cressida chuckled to herself, trying to contain any sense of amusement. Everyone else just sat there waiting for the rest of the joke.
“So which one of us should we choose to care for Fred?” asked Digger Bo, more concerned at Fred’s well-being than the seemingly unfinished joke. “Well, firstly it needs a home. Secondly, it needs food. Food and shelter are the basic needs we should decide on first.”
“Well, there is one thing we might be overlooking,” mentioned Aruna. “It would seem that one of us has already been a parent and would understand best of all what is entailed with such a task. Looking after another living creature is one of the biggest responsibilities in life. It seems wise to me to let someone who has already experienced such a task to undertake it once more!”
As he finished the last of the sentence, his head spun around quickly as if distracted by something in the bushes to the side of the tree.
“I agree,” said B-Jay, along with Zippo, who was nodding his approval.
Before Maxwell could lend his support and Cressida could even realise that they were talking about her, such was her attention to her pruning, a figure came bounding out of the bushes.
“Where have you been, child? I have been looking for you everywhere. Your father is going crazy with worry. Well, what do you have to say for yourself, Jasmine?”
The baby rabbit leapt to its feet, bounding round and round, happy at her mother’s appearance even if it was scolding and angry.
“I’m sorry, Mum, but the snow came and I got lost, and I found a burrow to shelter in, and there was a badger who was nice and kind, and an amusing cat, and an owl, and an ant, a wonderful red Beetle car called B-Jay, and a rather strange dog, and I lost track of time!” replied the baby rabbit as her mother licked her face with concern and relief.
“She can talk?” said Zippo, amazed at the sound of her sudden speech.
“He’s a she?” said Digger Bo, feeling foolish.
“You are her mother?” said Cressida as a half-question, half-statement.
“Yes I am,” replied the mother rabbit, “and I guess I owe you my gratitude for keeping my daughter safe. Thank you, but we must be going now; we have a long way to travel home and there is more snow looming on the horizon. Here!” she said, handing them a carrot. “Please accept this gift with my gratitude. Goodbye!”
Before anyone could object, they were bounding away quickly in the distance.
“Well, I guess we can be pleased that ended positively, even if a little abruptly,” said Cressida as the others watched the silhouettes disappear from view.
Aruna the wise Great Horned Owl agreed.
“I am going to miss Fred!” said Digger Bo with a very sad voice.
“I don’t see how a carrot is a fair exchange,” said Maxwell, still confused by what happened.
They all laughed, relieved and also pleased that Jasmine would now be okay.
“I know,” said B-Jay, the ever-optimistic Beetle car. “We can end this unsettling adventure by building a snowman. And we can use the carrot for his nose.”
They all agreed this was a fantastic idea, and even the sad Digger Bo managed a tumble. He had never made a snowman before, so it really was the best distraction for his current sadness. When they had finished the snowman, B-Jay said his goodbyes. What another great adventure, he thought to himself as he drove away from his friends, heading homewards.
As he drove away, he didn’t hear Maxwell the dog, who had turned to Zippo saying, “So you never said what the lions bought from Walmart?”
“I will answer that question when we have our next adventure,” replied the ant, looking at the snowman. The snowman grinned back with a crooked smile.