Wednesday, 28 December 2016

WEDNESDAY WRITERS - THE LOOK

I hope every one had a wonderful few days celebrating and enjoying the Christmas period.  We had a busy time spending precious hours with family for three days and I have managed to find time to join in with 

WEDNESDAY WRITERS

Writing Prompt for Wednesday Stories 12/28/16


for this week's prompt.  we were given several pictures to choose from, we could use all or some of them as the prompt for our story.  I used just two pictures and went slightly over the word count. 


THE LOOK

There I was just minding my own business, happily gnawing away on one of my precious acorns when something caught my eye.  I pretended not to look and become inconspicuous but I wasn’t blending in very well with the white, cold snow. 

Those humans began stomping all over the snow making deep holes in the snow making it difficult for me to get home trying to dodge those snow drifts they made with their heavy booted feet.

I tried not to get involved but the female of the pair squatted down and looked me straight in the eyes.  I managed to stop gnawing for a few seconds as I tried to out stare her but it wasn’t going to work.  She was obviously one of those do-gooder humans who thought that us squirrels and other wildlife needed their help in these wintry conditions.

I tried to tell her that we’d been surviving these wintry conditions for many seasons without the help of human intervention and sometimes they came too close to us for comfort.  We weren’t doing anyone any harm and we’d organised ourselves well in advance and had a lovely cache of nuts stored and secreted away for times like these when the food was hard to find naturally.

I heard the couple talking some gibberish about taking photographs for posterity.  Well they probably thought I wouldn’t even know that word.  Little did they know that squirrels were very well informed about the modern age and technology; we are quite clever little creatures. 

I did really want my five minutes of fame and struck a pose with what I thought was quite a beguiling look, a sideways glance while bringing the nut up to my mouth and having a sneaky taste.  I fluffed out my tail so that it looked tall and proud and waited for them to capture the moment.  



There it was.  I will now be famous worldwide, such a shame they don’t actually know my name and I will just be one of many ‘cute animals in the snow’ pictures that will abound through the airwaves, reaching far and wide in to people’s homes and maybe even make it in to print on to Christmas cards.  Oh, the commercialisation of our species is a great debate for another time perhaps.

I was waiting for them to turn round and go back the way they had come or even carry on past me and forget all about me when, to my astonishment, the male called to his female.  As she turned round to look at him, her face lit up with such a beautiful smile that I was actually dumbstruck for a moment or two.  


The joy and love on her face is something that I, as a mere squirrel, will take back to my dray to my own beloved and try to make her look at me with such love instead of the harried look she often gives me as she struggles to keep our brood of youngsters warm.  I’ll bring her a handful of nuts that she can chomp on as she looks after our young kittens.

Word count:  524

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