The Owl and the Mouse

The Owl and the Mouse

Night crept over the forest. The wheezing of the cicadas died. The ghostly sound of tree frogs filled the air. They sounded like spirits singing laments. The sound died away with a ghostly whisper. In the distance, the raucous call of the bullfrogs and the whistled trilling of the screech owls could be heard.

On the leaf littered floor, oblivious to the sounds, a mouse peeped out of its hole. The mouse struggled, for a moment, with its small balk; its back legs moved like two pistons. Pop smash the mouse flew out of its hole and landed with a loud crash onto the ground. The mouse was white with two small black eyes. Its small nose twitched with the night smells. It got up and started searching for food.

It looked like a white ghost hovering on the forest floor, but it did not sound like one. It crashed through leaves making as much noise as it could. An owl hovering above the forest canopy heard it. The owl swooped down on its silent wings. It saw the little white mouse on the ground and rushed towards it. The mouse looked up and saw it, but made no move to run. In fact, the mouse did not seem afraid.

The owl was startled by the mouse’s blasé indifference. Before the owl hit the mouse, it lifted up its wings and perched on a stick near the mouse. It flapped its wings at the mouse and made aggressive sounds. The mouse was still indifferent. “Run little mouse,” said the owl, “I will kill you with one bite.” For the first time the mouse looked up at the owl.

In its squeaky high-pitched voice it said, “No you won’t. Everyone is a winner and if I make this night a good one it will be good.” The mouse’s face screwed up with concentration. “Make it a great night or not the choice is yours,” it said with the air of reciting something that it had heard a million times, “see, you cannot eat me because I say so.” The mouse’s statements were so absurd and its voice so annoying that the owl swooped down. It grabbed the mouse and swallowed it in one bite.

It sat where the mouse had been for a moment and spit up the mouse’s fur and bone. “There are always losers and no matter what you do there will always be bad days,” the owl said to no one in particular, “it is a law of nature.” It laughed to itself and flew away silently into the night.