130. Careful What You Wish and a School of Big Fish

The Carnival of the Last Snows is such exhilarating fun that Heather and Thistle ended up bushed. They returned home snug and happy in a colourful little gypsy caravan, but what they didn’t know was that there was a stowaway aboard.

Little Kikicheeky is the son of a fierce witch and her shy woodwose husband. He has his father’s round face with full, pink cheeks but in all else he resembles his pencil thin, conflictive mother. Kikicheeky has the power to grant wishes, but only if they will disturb the wisher.

Heather was very tired. But instead of going to bed as soon as she got home, she began to shovel snow off Mr. Binky’s glass coffin. It had almost vanished under snow that did not cease to fall that night.

  

                        

“I wish I knew what you are thinking, Mr. Binky,” sighed Heather. “I hope you are dreaming pleasant and healing dreams.”

  

 Kikicheeky heard, and in a question of seconds Heather fell fast asleep in the snow she had shovelled into a mound next to Mr. Binky’s resting place.

And she had the same nightmare Mr. Binky was having.

                           

It wanted to be in verse, but it couldn’t do that properly because rhymes are difficult to control in dreams. It was about a school in an aquarium and its pupils.

Mr. Big Fish has inaugurated his school.

It is meant for the cream of the cream and the pick of the pick.

In a luxurious aquarium he is going to teach

Six fishies, three spiders, two green turtles

And a tiny little yellow chick.

The classroom is the clear turquoise of a fine summer´s day.

For the red coral desks and the black mussel shell blackboard

A mighty fine sum Mr. Fish had to pay.

All is going well for the six little fishies with silvery scales

Although two are conspicuously larger and the other four eye them with dread,

 There is nothing to fear.

 All had a plentiful breakfast when they jumped out of bed.

But the three spiders cannot concentrate 

And are clenching their teeth 

Because none are aquatic

And they all need to breathe.

Since their eight arms are strong

It does not take them long

To swim to the top of the tank,

But in so doing, the biggest one water did splash

On the green little turtles, who decide in a flash

They would like to be back on land for a while.

They think of the warm earth and at each other smile

With one thought in both minds.

Their interest in learning is not very great

So they follow the example of their arachnid mate.

  

None too happy with such insubordination

Mr. Fish decides this is the occasion

To prove who’s the boss in his classroom.

And so, he gets into a very rude fight

With the largest spider who knows she’s in the right

But has no idea how to reason things out

All she knows how to do is threaten and shout.

Mr. Fish soon is phoning his pupil’s mamá

Poor Mrs. Black Widow goes blah, blah, blah,

And with pitiful sobs and sighs

And big tears in her eight eyes

She begs Mr. Fish not to expel

Her rude little girl,

Because she doesn´t know what to do with her when she´s home in the web.

The other two spiders, piqued and offended,

Have left the school and off they have fended

For they heard Mr. Fish call the other of their species

A second class animal, beneath the rank of fishies.

Out on their own it doesn´t take them long to discover

They won´t die of hunger for their talent for spinning

Makes them aces at the complicated  art of breadwinning. 

The largest spider in particular acquires riches and fame,

Though years after her incident with Mr. Big Fish,

Upon any mention of his honorable name

She spits mosquitoes and cockroaches just the same

As the distant day their quarrel started.

But in time the little fishes have also come to be

Powerful makers of big money

And they applaud Mr. Fish as a most decisive factor

In their financial success.

The turtles would rather not argue.

Why should they bother?

Nobody ever listens to one or the other.

So they assent with a nod

When anyone says that Mr. Fish

Is wiser than Thoth, the Egyptian god.

And the little chick – What little chick?

Oh, he drowned the first day of school,

Though nobody noticed till it stank under his stool.

And since there was no one his poor little body to claim

And no one to sue Mr. Fish or to blame

The great teacher for the chick’s sad fate,

They transported him to a better world,

Which was to be found

Better in the science lab

Than underground.

There before his pupils Mr. Fish an autopsy performed.

And what do you know?

Some chose to become doctors due to that show.

And so the chick can continue to teach and inspire

His skeleton still hangs in the lab from a spire.

Heather awoke with a violent start and a scream. 

   

          

 “I have to save the chick!” she cried.

Thistle heard, and came out of her ideal home in a robe and galoshes and looking terrible because she needed to sleep but had insomnia.She was holding a mug of steaming hot chocolate milk she was sipping from.

“What do you mean by sleeping out here in the snow? Come inside my house. You’re damp and wet. I’ve made hot chocolate.”

“I had a dream about a little yellow chick...” began Heather.

“That must be because it will soon be Easter,” said Thistle.