Nick x
Christmas 2021
In the centre of an old village was an old hill, and on top of the old hill was an old house, and in that old house lived a mouse named Tattletail.
Tattletail had lived with his family in the wainscotting of the old house for as long as anybody could remember, but because no-one knew he lived there, no-one knew just how long that really was. Even Tattletail himself was unsure; he just knew it had been for a very, very long time. Long enough for families to come and families to go, and children to grow up.
Tattletail wondered sometimes if there was magic in the house, as he never seemed to grow older. But maybe that was just the way of mice. Maybe some mice aged quicker than others.
Tattletail was so called because he had the tattiest tail you ever did see on a mouse! It was long and thin like a mouse's tail should be, but then it burst out into lots of tiny hairs at the end, like the head of a daisy or a used paintbrush.
He was never quite sure how his tail had gotten so bristly but he was happy with it because it meant the other mice in his family knew his name.
"There goes old Tattletail!" they would say as he scuttered around the wainscotting. "I wonder what he's up to?"
He was usually up to mouseish things. Some evenings, he scuttled around to get cheese dropped on the floor at dinnertime, and his family would chumble it for their tea.
Some nights, he skittered and warmed his paws by the fireplace, careful not to get too close.
And some days, he scurried round the bedrooms in hope of finding pieces of cotton and cloth, so he could make blankets and pillows for his family.
It was a busy life being a mouse, and a quiet one. He kept him and his family hidden from the humans in the house, as humans tended not to care for sharing their rooms with mice, even though the mice were not trying to do anybody any harm.
A while ago, a mean man had lived in the house and one day caught sight of Tattletail's tattly tail as he dived into a hole in the floorboards. The mean man had then gone into the village and returned with a bitter cat called Mouser. Mouser had tried for ages to catch poor Tattletail and swallow him whole, but Tattletail was too quick and too clever to be caught.
The mean man and Mouser had left a while ago and a few more families had come and gone since. Tattletail did not know their names, just as the humans did not know his. A lot of what they did seemed unusual to a mouse, but there was one thing the humans did that Tattletail adored.
Every year, when the sky went as dark as soil early in the evening, and the wind grew as pointed as pins, the humans would bring a tree into the house from outside.
Tattletail found that very funny: a tree in the house! What a strange sight!
But it was what happened next that Tattletail adored the most. The humans would start to decorate the tree with all sorts of things: balls that hung down and spun, chocolate flattened and wrapped in shiny foil, long colourful strings that were draped across the branches, and best of all was a pointy crown which they put on the very top.
They then weaved rows of pretty lights through the branches, which twinkled at night and made the room glow, and under the tree were packages wrapped in unusual paper. These were called presents and early one morning every year, the humans would look happy and smile when they exchanged the presents and saw what was under the paper.
Tattletail learned that this time of year was called Christmas; that the paper was wrapping paper; that the tree was actually a Christmas Tree; and that the special day was called Christmas Day.
He learned that the balls on the tree were called baubles; the chocolate was round because they were chocolate coins; the long shiny foil like a feather boa was called tinsel; and the crown on top was actually a star.
Tattletail thought that this was magnificent. He waited every year for the Christmas Tree to arrive and he would gather the other mice at night to watch it sparkle with him.
"This is the prettiest tree yet!" Grandma Mouse would always say.
"Do you think the tinsel is tickly?" the children would always ask.
"I wonder what a Christmas Tree tastes like?" Mummy Mouse would always ponder.
But they always just stood and watched it instead of finding out, warmed by the fire, and they were always sad when Christmas was over and the Christmas Tree went away.
"I miss the tree when they take it away every year," said Grandpa Mouse.
Tattletail missed it, too. He wished he could have a tree of his very own and celebrate Christmas Day just like the humans did! And one year, he decided to do just that.
A new family of humans moved into the house, just as the nights grew dark and Christmas Day approached. They rushed around as busy as bumblebees, unpacking boxes and decorating bedrooms. Tattletail kept out of sight and watched them. They did not have a cat like Mouser and they did not notice the mice in the wainscotting, which was a relief.
They did have a child though.
Her name was Annie, and she looked very clever. Tattletail knew that if he was going to make a Christmas Tree and get some presents, he would have to be super careful.
He started to prepare one chilly night. He scampered around the kitchen and dining room of the old house and gathered all the morsels he could find. Tattletail did this every night across the week and soon had presents for everybody.
There were wheels from an old toy car for Grandma Mouse to go rollerskating on, some lovely thread off an old tablecloth for Grandpa Mouse to decorate his hat with, and some glass marbles which had rolled out of a net for the children to play with.
For Mummy Mouse, Tattletail had to be extra sneaky. He saw a bottle of red wine on its side, and a teaspoon abandoned on the floor close by. Tattletail dragged the teaspoon under the bottle and gathered tiny wine drops as they dripped from the bottle. He poured the drops into an old thimble he'd picked up years ago and bunged a bit of cork into the top. He found an old mascara wand in the bin and painted an M for Mummy on the cork. He then gathered up crumbs until he had made a breadcrumb pie. He hoped Mummy Mouse would like the meal.
Tattletail found some old envelopes in the recycling bin to use for wrapping paper and he put all of this in a secret part of the wainscotting, hidden from his family but also hidden from Annie.
Unlike most humans, she noticed when things disappeared.
"Have you seen the tablecloth?" she said one dinnertime. "The end looks like it's been nibbled off!"
Tattletail's ears pricked and his heart beat fast. He had nearly been caught! He was going to have to be even more careful when preparing his tree.
First thing's first, thought Tattletail. I need some branches for my tree.
He went out late one night and used his paws to scrape at the bark at the bottom of the tree. He peeled off a long, thick slice and took it back home.
The next morning, Annie looked at the Christmas Tree and frowned. She was sure the bark looked thinner than it had done the night before! How weird!
That night, Tattletail shook the Christmas Tree until lots of bright green and bright-scented pine needles fell down. He gathered them up carefully, making sure not to prick his paws, and took them back to his secret hole. He picked some sticky tack off a notice hanging on the fridge in the kitchen, and used this to attach the pine needles to the bark.
The next morning, Annie went to the kitchen and saw a shopping list on the floor. She was certain she had stuck it onto the fridge with sticky tack, but there was none on it now.
Odder still, the floor under the Christmas Tree looked empty and clean, and she was sure it had been covered in pine needles when she had gone to bed the night before. How unusual!
That night, Tattletail was busier than ever before.
He nibbled off tiny bits of tinsel to use for his own tree. He rolled up balls of tin foil to use for baubles. He did not want to take any of the lights away, but he found some glitter in a craft box in a bedroom, and sprinkled some on his tree until it shimmered.
The next morning, Annie found that her arts and craft box had been knocked and there was glitter and string everywhere! She tidied it up but felt very confused: she was positive the box had been on her shelf, not on the floor. How bizarre!
That night, Tattletail looked at his Christmas Tree. It was not as tall and as well-decorated as the one in the humans' living room, but he had made it with love and it showed. He knew that it was not quite finished though. He still had to get the most important part of the Christmas Tree: a star for the top!
He set out as the clocks chimed for midnight, looking for the perfect thing to use as a star.
There was a drawing pin, which shone in the moonlight, but that looked too sharp. There was an old sequin from a sewing box, which was lovely and golden, but it was shaped like a circle, not a star.
Tattletail found lots of things. They were all nice and pretty, but none of them were as pretty as the star on top of the humans' Christmas Tree. Tattletail had all but given up, when he saw the perfect thing. There on the floor under the tree were lots of Christmas presents, and on top of one of them was a tiny silver bow.
It was beautiful! The box had several bows stuck onto its sides, but the one on the top was the smallest and nicest of them all.
Surely the humans would not notice or mind if one of the bows was gone, would they? Tattletail knew it was a bit cheeky of him, but he so desperately wanted a star for his tree and this would be the next best thing!
He skipped over to the Christmas present and gently plucked the bow from the box. He stuck it onto his back and was about to run back to the wainscotting when…
"Got you!" shouted Annie.
She scooped Tattletail into her hand and picked him off the ground. She had woken up after hearing a noise in the night and crept downstairs, and there on the floor she had seen a small brown mouse, tampering with a Christmas present!
Tattletail squeaked and wiggled and eeped and jiggled but he could not get free. He was trapped! This was scarier than when Mouser had prowled the house. Mouser had never caught Tattletail, but Annie had grabbed him with no trouble at all! What was she going to do next?
Annie looked Tattletail straight in the eye. His fur was all standing on end, as bushy as his tatty tail. She wondered if she should call for her parents, or maybe she should find a vet or somebody similar down in the village.
But then she spotted the bow again. The mouse had carefully placed it right in the centre of his back. This was very peculiar!
"How strange!" said Annie to Tattletail. "What are you up to?"
Tattletail had been around long enough to learn how to speak human, but Annie had not been around long enough to learn how to speak mouse. He knew that he would have to show her what he had done and hope she did not pull his family out of the wainscotting and throw them all out of the house.
Guiltily, he handed back the bow with a trembling paw, then tugged and pulled until Annie set him down on the floor. He wiggled a bit and then ran over to the wainscotting and into the secret place. Annie carefully pulled back some loose wallpaper and peered inside.
"Wow!" she said.
Inside the secret hole was a magical sight. There was a tiny Christmas Tree covered in glitter, made from twigs and pine needles, and lots of presents in envelope wrapping paper. Tattletail stood by the tree, head in his paws, looking very ashamed of all the things he had taken.
Annie did not mind though. She knew that most of the things would have been thrown away or lost anyway, and the little brown mouse had clearly worked very hard to make the tiny Christmas scene. Annie looked at the Christmas Tree again and could see why Tattletail had wanted the bow.
"Here," she said to Tattletail, and she balanced the bow on the top of his tree. She looked the mouse in the eye again and said, "I will not tell anybody about this, but please do not take any more of my things!"
Tattletail nodded his head, grateful and sorry for the trouble he had caused. Annie gave his head a small stroke and gently put the wallpaper back in place.
Poor Tattletail! He had had such a fright that he immediately fell fast asleep and did not wake up until dinnertime the next day!
Soon it was Christmas Day, and Tattletail excitedly showed his family what he had done.
They loved the Christmas Tree and all the presents. Grandma Mouse went rollerskating right away and nearly crashed into the children's game of marbles, and everybody agreed that Grandpa Mouse looked very fancy with the new pink lacing on his hat.
Mummy Mouse loved her gift, too, and said that she would share her wine and breadcrumb pie with Tattletail that night.
"There is one more surprise though!" said Mummy Mouse. Tattletail was confused, and watched as his children dragged in an enormous package.
"We found it outside this morning when washing under the tap," explained Grandma Mouse.
"It looks like it may be for you!" said Grandpa Mouse.
Tattletail looked at the package and could see it had words written on it in neat handwriting: TO MY SECRET BROWN MOUSE FRIEND, LOVE FROM ANNIE X
All the mice worked together to open the package. Inside was the biggest wheel of cheese any of them had ever seen. There was enough for all of the family to eat for a whole year! It was such a lovely gift that Tattletail felt tears prick his big black eyes.
All the mice hugged each other and agreed that this was the very best Christmas Day ever, and that they would all be good and work hard to make next year's even better.
That night, they decided not to gather round the humans' Christmas Tree but to sit and watch Tattletail's instead, all apart from Tattletail himself, who could not resist taking a peak outside.
He popped his head out from the wainscotting and looked at the humans' Christmas Tree. All of the humans were gathered around it, but they looked very surprised. Someone had snuck out in the middle of the night and rearranged the lights so that they looked like a big heart with an A for Annie in the middle.
Everyone looked very confused and wondered who had done it: everyone apart from Annie! She turned around, smiled and waved to Tattletail, and then went to bed. Tattletail waved back to Annie, and then returned to his own family.
They all sat down and started to eat some of the wheel of cheese.
"Thank you, Annie!" said Tattletail, and he curled himself into a tiny ball and fell fast asleep.
The End
No comments:
Post a Comment