The Figaddys and the Selfish Hare

by Rinya Singh

Woofarolowooowow!” “all right ,all right, I’m awake !” groaned Mr Figaddy ,pushing the STOP button on his alarm-clock. He quickly changed from his night suite and put on his shirt, pants and tie, dashed downstairs, grabbed one dogcake ,looked at his watch, sighed, glanced at his wife and said, “Phew! I thought we were late for Mr MacHare ’s party!”

Mr MacHare was the most selfish hare in whole of DomesAnima, where only the domestic animals and very few wild animals lived on the planet of Anima and the only planet in the Universe where the animals lived and ate just like the people on Earth.. Every day , all the adults and a few kids would wake up at 4:30 am precisely, run to MacHare’s mansion, then they would clip his nails, wash his fur, paint it with “Harry Hare’s special creme caramel non-toxic paint, everywhere except the white splotch on his tummy ,comb his ears and fluffy cottontail. This was an everyday routine. All detested him because of him being so mean to them. But Bronto, his son, loved his father. Bronto was just like his father in every aspect. Today ,however was Bronto’s Birthday . Everyone had to come. And if they didn’t , MacHare would kidnap all the family’s children and threatened them “If you want to see them again ,you have to give me free bacon and eggs for a month!” So they all had to come for the sake of their children.

“Oh dear! Relax!”said Mrs Figaddy cheerfully “Anyway, the party’s at 10:00 and it’s only 9:30!”she said.

“You’re right!”cried Mr Figaddy “I looked at my clock, and forgot it is 50 minutes fast .It showed me that it was 10:20!”, he said.

“Oh no !”said Mrs Figaddy. “I completely forgot! MacHare told us to be there 15 mins early to do …. well, you know what I mean.” She groaned “I meant to make lots of Browtreller cakes , Ben’s favourite and loads of Berrylicious cakes too. They‘re Bell’s favourite.” Ben was the boy of the twin pups . Bell was short for Bellinda! Bell was the girl. “Oh yes .it’s their birthday tomorrow!” cried Mr Figaddy.

“Oh no!” cried Mrs Figaddy.

“What is it?” cried Mr Figaddy in alarm. “Quick, it’s 9:40! It takes 10mins to get to the MacHare mansion. So get the car ready, I’ll call the kids, OK?”

“OK!”cried Mr Figaddy who was already outside and getting the car ready .Soon the pups and Mrs.Figaddy jumped into the car and sped off.

When they got to MacHare’s mansion,they rushed inside and saw that all the village residents were already doing all the things they did every morning,only much before the time as usual.The pups and Mr. and Mrs.Figaddy headed towards Bronto’s side and were met by a disapproving Mr. and Mrs. Swish and their ten cygnets and the frowning faces told them that they were not enjoying what they were doing.As they were not allowed to talk to anyone,they just nodded and got to work.They carefully smothered special Harry Hare’s Hair Shampoo.They washed his fluffy white tail and did the routine chores.When they had finished ,it was just five minutes left for the party to begin,so MacHare told them to go home to change into fancy clothes and accessories.

Ben,groaned as he had been saving his best clothes for his and his twin sister,Belinda’s birthday the next day.

“Anyway “, he thought, “I expect that Mom will wash it for me tomorrow”.

“Ben! Hurry up!” cried Mrs.Figaddy. “You’ll be left behind” Ben looked around him and found to his surprise that except Bronto and MacHare,no one was there.He ran to his family who was waiting at the door.At home, Belinda asked her mom if she could wash their party clothes after Bronto’s party.Mrs.Figaddy agreed.

After Bronto’s party ,Mr.Figaddy played with his five year old pups. Mrs.Figaddy joined them after she had made cakes for the pups birthday which and washed all of the family’s party clothes in the washing machine.They all played football,dodge ball,cricket,soccer and rugby.When they had finished playing all the games at least ten times it was very late at night so they all had a dogcake each and went to bed,all tired and happy.

It was a small village in which only ten families lived with some single animals as well.Everyone was invited but only two families could make it ,Mr. and Mrs.Swish and Mr.an Mrs.Wolf alongwith the singles- Miss Badger and Mr.Beaver.Mrs.Figaddy plans a surprise for the pups and requests her friends to give in their presents a day before so that she could put her plan into action.Everyone happily agreed.
The next day,Mr. and Mrs.Figaddy woke up at 02:00 am to put all the presents for their son and daughter around their beds as a birthday surprise in the morning.When they finished doing this,they went to bed .At day break,Mrs.Figaddy woke up Mr.Figaddy and told him to creep into the twins bedroom,stand in front of the pups bunk bed,tap them both on their shoulders and when they wake up, to shout , “SURPRISE” while she would switch on the lights.

“But what if they wake up before I tap them?” asked Mr.Figaddy.

“Oh, you needn’t worry about that,dear! You see,I put special sleeping pills in their dogcakes yesterday.The pills are modified to make them wake up only when a the pup is tapped on the shoulder.So you see how it works?” explained Mrs.Figaddy.

“Yes,I do” , said Mr.Figaddy.

“Now creep in their room and do what I told you to do” whispered Mrs.Figaddy gently.
So Mr.Figaddy creeped silently towards the twin’s bunk bed and tapped them on their shoulders and waited till their eyes opened ,then both Mr.and Mrs.Figaddy shouted , “SURPRISE” .

Mrs.Figaddy said , “Happy birthday,you little cutie pies!”

“Thanks,mom!” cried Belinda in delight.

”Come on Bell,lets open all our presents”,cried Ben.

So they opened five presents each.All together ,Ben and Bell had twenty presents each.Mr. and Mrs. Swish ,the swans,gave them two presents each, Miss Badger gave them one present apiece while Mr.Beaver had been the most generous one and gave them four apiece, Mr.and Mrs.Wolf gave them three presents apiece.Mr.Hare hadn’t given them any but they didn’t care a bit because they too detested him.After having an excellent breakfast of fried eggs and bacon,they invited their friends over except MacHare whom nobody liked or wanted over.

No one expected this to happen but half way through the party,MacHare came bashing in,demanding to be the centre of attention.Everyone just laughed and pushed him out.He tried five more times but every time got pushed out again.So the last time when he tried,he came back panting as he had tried to run at the door to try and break it down.The children,though they hated him,were horrified as their parents kept pushing Mr.Machare out so many times.

So the last time seeing him flop down in exhaustion,the children rushed out in alarm as they thought he was hurt and might need help.The children were very kind hearted.Once they got there,they crouched down beside him and surprised MacHare by asking him,” Oh Mr.Hare,Mr.Hare, are you allright?”

He said, “Why,little kids,little kids….Oh! I mean….” He was not finished when the kids interrupted him and said, “Wad’ya mean ‘Why little kids,little kids….’ ?”

“Oh,you caught me…” sighed MacHare, “You see, I actually don’t want you to be my slaves.I only wanted to be one of the celebrities”.

“What? You wanted to be a celebrity?” the pups,the cygnets and the cubs all shouted together.

“Yes, after reading some of those celebrity magazines,I thought wow,it must be so cool to be a celebrity! All the glamour,lights,glitter and the wonderful lifestyle they all had,made me think that I too could get all that by making the village people my slaves.Huh! I’ll threaten them with kidnap of their children.I was young ,silly and foolish.It did work for quite a while though”,he sighed.

“Oh ! please come in and enjoy the party” coursed the children.

“Thank you,kids.I will join you”, said MacHare.

“But come in only when you hear us shout ‘ We present … the NEW Mr.MacHare!’ ,okay? That’ll be when we do our Big Birthday Speech.” Said Bell and Ben together.

“Got all that,Mr.MacHare?” asked one of Mrs.Wolf’s cute little cub named Sasha,shyly.

“Yes,yes, I do” said Mr.MacHare “ Oh and please don’t call me ‘Mr.MacHare’,do just call me Hare”.

“O.k then” said Sasha and everyone nodded.

“So,see ya Mr. ,I mean… Hare”,said Sara and Sash, yet another two of Mrs.Wolf’s cub.

“Yeath,see ya lather “ lisped one of Mrs. Swish’s six month old cygnet.

“Yep, see you later ,Hare” ,they all cried together.

Then the children returned to the party and had lots of fun.Soon it was time for Bell and Ben’s Big Birthday Speech.They first said thankyou to everyone for coming and giving them presents.Then they said,” We present …. a NEW Hare!” On hearing his name , Hare sprinted over to the Figaddy’s house and calmly walked into the hall and walked onto the stage that Mr.Beaver and Miss Badger had set up for the party.While he was walking ,he noticed that everyone was booing and hissing ,all except the kids,who were clapping wildly.he waved at them and said,” Hiya kiddies!”
All the adults were alarmed and appalled at how Mr.MacHare was behaving.They all started muttering and murmuring till Ben went and tapped the microphone and said,” Ahem” and everyone fell silent and felt rather ashamed of themselves as they realized that it was bad manners to talk when someone was coming on stage.

When Mr.Hare started speaking ,he began by saying that he was sorry because he had practically made all of them slaves to his son as well.He also told them how he had become selfish and how the celebrity magazines affected him.

When his speech finished,everyone forgave him and the Mayor and Mayoress , who were Mr.and Mrs.Figaddy, banned the celebrity magazines from the village.

Now Hare made lots of friends but his best friends were always the children.Everyone stayed at the Figaddy house till 10:59 pm.They all had a wonderful time.
After few days,Hare organized a camp and invited all the children of the village.

They all got along very well and played together .As now it was nearly the end of the holidays,most of them had come back from wherever they had gone for vaccation,they could now talk about where they had gone or how it had been around the campfire.