While spending hours over the last few weeks mowing my large grassy field, then spending more hours picking up the dried grass, I occasionally saw mice running away at break neck speed, then disappearing under the blackberry bushes. Thinking about the fleeing mice and my love of alliteration, I decided to see what I could do with a field mouse story. Enjoy.
Freddie Field Mouse was not a common mouse. He was first and foremost a fanciful fellow. But, he was also fearless and ferocious. He had nary a frown on his face nor fear in his four little feet. Instead, he had a favorite feathered fedora he always wore, and friends with which to frolic.There were two flopping frogs, three friendly field mice, and a four-day-old fawn named Fawn. They were his best friends, his forever friends.
They frolicked at Flip-flop In The Frisbee (which they found in the phlox). They fearlessly played Fight the Football (which the farmer's family had lost in the fesque), not a game for the faint of heart. But their favorite game was Fake-out the Furry Feline. Her name was Flower, but they called her, in very unfriendly voices, 'Fraidy-cat. She didn't really fear frogs, fawns, and field mice. She was just a phenomenal actress who liked playing their frivolous game. Flower was usually found napping on the front walk, next to the four-leaf-clover.
It seems wherever Freddie went and whatever Freddie did, his friends were with him. Being fleet of foot, ferocious, and flamboyant, Freddie led them into the field, into the forest, and even up to the farmhouse to frighten 'Fraidy-Cat. They were family and they had fun. But, deep down inside they feared being found by either the farming family, the feral feline who was not a 'fraidy-cat, or the flying foes--the hawks, the owls, and the eagles.
Then came that fateful day, the Fifth of Friday I think it was. Freddie Field Mouse, the two floppy frogs, and his three little field mice friends were playing Flip-flop In The Frisbee. Fawn had recently moved it from the phlox to the tall, tall fescue. But today, fawn napped by her mother's flank in the forest while Freddie and the rest of her friends flip-flop as free as they pleased. The grass was so tall, they no longer feared being found.
Fawn's mother heard it first. Her ears fluttered. Her eyes flashed. Her tail flicked. Then, in a flash, off she flew with Fawn following after. Finally, hidden by the ferns and the firs, fawn stopped to face the fescue, her friends, and the foe. She feared her friends' fate.
Within seconds, Freddie and his five friends heard it too. It sounded fierce, and it made the field shake. Then they saw it. From across the field came a red, ferocious, fiendish machine--the mower his father had always warned him about. Only this wasn't the fairy tale he had fancied it to be. It was fact, not fable; and it was coming toward him and his friends.
Frantic and frightened, they fidgeted, squeaked and croaked in falsetto voices, then froze. They couldn't fathom what the approaching force meant. Freddy Field Mouse was no longer very fearless, ferocious, or flamboyant. His fingers fiddled with his feathered fedora, his fear-less feet shook, and his forehead furrowed as he figured and figured how to fend for them. What was it to be--fight or flight?
Unknown to Freddie and his frozen-in-the-grass, hiding-in-the-ferns friends, someone else was also focusing on the fearsome, fiendish, machine and figuring what to do. There, lying by the four-leaf-clover, was Flower the 'fraidy-cat feline! Her furry tail flinched as she also figured and figured. She must not falter. She must not fail. She must find her fun-loving friends and free them.
Finally, full of faith in her plan to fight, she forced herself onto her feet and flew into the field. Faster and faster, nothing fazing her, forgetting all fear, she flashed through the fescue toward the red, fiendish, mowing machine. Closer and close the fiend came toward the place her friends had been frolicking. Focusing on her fantastic plan, she forced herself in front of the mower.
Silence followed.
The ferocious mower stopped. The fierce earthshaking stopped. The funny-hatted, female farmer yelled. "Foolish Flower, you frightened me. What a fiasco. This could have been fatal!"
As she fetched Flower and scratched the feline's furry ears, Flower said just one thing. "Meow!"
Upon translating "Meow" from Felinese to Field-mousian, Freddie flipped his feathered fedora back onto his now frown-less forehead and forcefully yelled, "Flee! Flee to the ferns in the forest!"
In the flutter of an eyelash, two floppy frogs, three frantic mice, and Freddie Field Mouse fled to the forest, and the ferns, and the firs, and their friend, Fawn.
The friends still play Flip-flop In The Frisbee. Fawn moved it from the fescue to the ferns. They no longer frolic at Fight The Football, not since the farmer's family found it in the fescue. They play a different game now, one they just formed and called Find Flower In The Ferns. It's named for Flower, who is no longer taunted as 'Fraidy-cat, but fondly called Ferociously Fear-less Feline instead.
Flower, now fancied-up in Freddie's feathered fedora, and hiding in the ferns, is their new Forever-Best-Friend.
A friend,
Jan
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