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Rabbit Story
by Barry Foy
Seattle, Washington
A couple of years ago, I went to visit a friend, carrying a new CD I thought we'd enjoy listening to together. I perched myself on a wooden chair in her living room, scrupulously avoiding contact with the cat lounging on the far-comfier couch.
After the music had been playing awhile, I spotted out of the corner of my eye a second cat creeping down the stairs. I made a mildly disapproving remark, the kind you might expect from someone with an allergy.
"But that's not a cat," my friend corrected me. "It's my daughter's rabbit."
I remembered something I had once heard. I asked her, "Aren't rabbits inclined, if you let them roam around the house unsupervised, to bite into electrical cords - and then...?"
"Yes," she said. "You have to keep an eye out."
That's when I made little joke. I told her that if she ever found herself with a zapped rabbit, she should call me right away. I'd come over and take it home and cook it for supper. We had a good laugh about that.
The rabbit wandered away. Shortly afterward my friend left the room in search of a pencil. Moments later, she reappeared with a spooky look on her face. I asked what was wrong, and she told me that the rabbit had just bitten into a lamp cord and electrocuted itself - exactly as I had described it. She had reached the scene just in time to see it kick its legs and die.
I ran to the next room to view the evidence for myself. There lay the inert animal, its two front teeth still sunk in the brown cord. Every few seconds the teeth were bridged by a tiny arc of electricity.
My friend and I looked at each other, a little giddy and disoriented. We weren't sure whether to be entertained by the situation or unnerved. When something finally had to be done, I grabbed a broom and knocked the slowly cooking rabbit clear of the cord.
For another little while we simply stood there and gawked at the corpse. Then my friend spoke up. Something had occurred to her.
"Do you realize," she said, "that you could have wished for anything?"
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"Back when you mentioned taking the rabbit home and cooking it for supper," she said, "back when you suggested that possibility. You could just as easily have wished for a million dollars, or anything else you wanted. And that's just what you would have gotten. It was that kind of moment, a moment in which any wish would have been granted."
There has never been any doubt in my mind that she was absolutely right.
by Barry Foy
Seattle, Washington
A couple of years ago, I went to visit a friend, carrying a new CD I thought we'd enjoy listening to together. I perched myself on a wooden chair in her living room, scrupulously avoiding contact with the cat lounging on the far-comfier couch.
After the music had been playing awhile, I spotted out of the corner of my eye a second cat creeping down the stairs. I made a mildly disapproving remark, the kind you might expect from someone with an allergy.
"But that's not a cat," my friend corrected me. "It's my daughter's rabbit."
I remembered something I had once heard. I asked her, "Aren't rabbits inclined, if you let them roam around the house unsupervised, to bite into electrical cords - and then...?"
"Yes," she said. "You have to keep an eye out."
That's when I made little joke. I told her that if she ever found herself with a zapped rabbit, she should call me right away. I'd come over and take it home and cook it for supper. We had a good laugh about that.
The rabbit wandered away. Shortly afterward my friend left the room in search of a pencil. Moments later, she reappeared with a spooky look on her face. I asked what was wrong, and she told me that the rabbit had just bitten into a lamp cord and electrocuted itself - exactly as I had described it. She had reached the scene just in time to see it kick its legs and die.
I ran to the next room to view the evidence for myself. There lay the inert animal, its two front teeth still sunk in the brown cord. Every few seconds the teeth were bridged by a tiny arc of electricity.
My friend and I looked at each other, a little giddy and disoriented. We weren't sure whether to be entertained by the situation or unnerved. When something finally had to be done, I grabbed a broom and knocked the slowly cooking rabbit clear of the cord.
For another little while we simply stood there and gawked at the corpse. Then my friend spoke up. Something had occurred to her.
"Do you realize," she said, "that you could have wished for anything?"
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"Back when you mentioned taking the rabbit home and cooking it for supper," she said, "back when you suggested that possibility. You could just as easily have wished for a million dollars, or anything else you wanted. And that's just what you would have gotten. It was that kind of moment, a moment in which any wish would have been granted."
There has never been any doubt in my mind that she was absolutely right.
