A whole for a mole
Jasper was a mole, a small velvety mole, his fur was not as dark as the others, he was twilight to their midnights and they never let him forget it. Moles aren’t exactly sociable in the first place but when you grow up being called the velvetine ghost and having your worms nicked off of your plate you tend to seek out the solace of alone time.
So it was with Jasper, one day he left the burrow, mainly to find somewhere to cry as he’d been nipped by Ruskin who had been the biggest of the spring pups and then the git had eaten all the worms Jasper’s Mum had found for him. Jasper hated being small.
Of course he should have said goodbye to his mum or something and he felt sad that she would have worried and feared the worst but in the end he was happier away from the other moles. He found a nice whole in the base of a tree with a little set of rooms between the roots. It was very cosy in winter when he mostly slept curled up in a nest of leaves. A little family of mice lived just over the bank and they were very welcoming and brought him over nuts and the like, he didn’t really eat that sort of thing but it was the thought that counted.
He would take the little ones for explores along the river bank and that was when he saw it, a great silver mole, so pale and sleek. He trembled at the sight, it was the only mole he’d ever seen that was paler than him, if he was twilight then this was the dawn!
At first he was too timid to call to the strange mole but as the days past he got closer and closer, eventually he became aware that the other mole knew he was there. He dug up a bumper load of worms after a rain shower and waited, the large mole sauntered over to him, would it just take his worms?
‘They look good,’ he said and Jasper nodded.
‘Would you like some?’ he asked in awe and felt and a pleasure when the other creature began to eat.
When he had finished he squinted at Jasper and Jasper felt worried. ‘I have been looking for a young mole by the name of Jasper?’
‘Oh that’s me!’ Jasper cried.
‘I had to go away to help with the Lawn Provision, you know of the war with the humans?’ (Jasper didn’t but didn’t want to admit that so nodded) ‘Then when I come home I find your mother in a dreadful state thinking you are dead and stuff.’ Jasper snuffled his nose into the leaf litter suddenly he wanted to see his mum very much.
‘The other moles… they kept taking my worms and they are all so much bigger than me!’ he wailed.
The Mole tutted, ‘not anymore your not, you have inherited some of my build, though your colouring is more your mother’s, you were small as you were an autumn baby – the only pup your mum had and you ran away!’
Tears began to leak from Jasper’s eyes and he felt really bad.
‘Are you coming home?’
‘Yes… Dad?’
The older mole smiled and nodded and then turned away to head off.
‘Hang on I need to say goodbye to the mice and the frog and old Owl.’
‘I’ll be here waiting.’
Japser ran off excited for what seemed like the first time in his life he couldn’t wait to get home and see his Mum!
Posted: Thursday, August 1st, 2013 @ 2:59 pm
Categories: Flash Fiction.
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