I know this is going to sound really peculiar, and you might already be tempted to stop reading, but I just have to tell you about the incredible dead guinea pig. No, please wait, please don't stop reading - this really takes the biscuit, or to be more accurate, this story really takes the biscuit-tin. And anyway, I need your help, you might be the only person in the world who has the answer, who can give me a clue as to what happened, because I can't work it out at all, it's a complete mystery to me. People don't believe me when I tell them, but it’s absolutely true - really, really true, honest injun, cross-my-heart. And it's so funny, in a warped-sense-of-humour way. Well it seems funny now, in fact I'm having a little chuckle again as I'm thinking about it. Sorry, I'm rambling, please wait - there, I've pulled myself together, it was an attack of hysteria, sorry. Mind you, at the time it didn't seem so funny. Well, just a bit funny. No, I can't tell a lie, I had to stifle hysterical laughter then. Am I callous or what? But seriously, this is a 'need-to-know' situation and I am hoping there's someone out there who can explain the phenomenon. That is, if you would call it a phenomenon, but what else could you call it, it was definitely spooky.
'It' happened the morning after the night before. The night before was the night the Guinea Pig looked like he might be in the early stages of popping-his-clogs. He definitely looked sick, sort of quiet and a bit curled-up-in-a-ball-ish. My daughter could tell something was wrong, she was beginning to look devastated, and I could see there was a ‘why-do-all-my-little-pets-die Mummy?’ look in her eye. She needed an answer that made sense. We were having a run of bad luck with pets at that time. The 'pets' problem began when I was desperate to console my daughter after my husband had walked out on us taking the family dog. I'd given him an ultimatum, "It's me or the dog" I barked. He chose the dog and went. My daughter was heart broken when he left - she loved that dog.
So began the quest. Find a pet, console the daughter. But I put my foot down - no more dogs, anything but a dog. Big mistake. My reasoning seemed, well - reasonable. "Mum works all day, you - daughter, at school all day. Little dog on his own all day – very cruel. No, No, No, - watch my lips....... NO DOG".
Fish seemed a good idea-ish, and a mouse about-the-house seemed acceptable. Or a budgie, coochy-coo, tweety-tweet. We tried them all. Not all together, mind you, one at a time. I'll not bore you with the details or we'll never get to the bit about the guinea pig. Suffice to say they were all given decent burials, and lie in marked graves in an appropriately beautiful part of the garden, which has been designated as The Pet Cemetery. I must get back to the night of the guinea pig.
Pig, imaginatively christened Piglet, was sick. My daughter was terribly upset and, to be honest, so was I. He lived in the shed, shared it with Cassie the rabbit, and they spent hours rolling about in fresh hay together, all snugly and cuddly in a very pleasant happy-pet sort of way. Daughter was happy with them both, so I was happy with all three of them. Life was good. Life was sweet. Life was uncomplicated. So, when Piglet looked sick my heart sank, I could detect that familiar ominous air of approaching doom. Was the momentary sweet-life about to end? We needed a plan to save-the-Piglet-pet. We prepared a large cardboard box indoors to be our Emergency Ward. The 'ward' was duly fitted-out my newest pillowcase for bedding.
"It has to be the pink quilted pillowcase Mummy, it's his favourite, and we have to make sure he is very comfortable tonight, because he'll be on his own until the morning. We have to be very good with Piglet to keep him well, because when we tried to look after Wiggly (Wiggly by the way was the mouse) he died, didn't he. So Piglet can have this pillowcase can't he?"
"Yes darling, of course he can".
So it was that Piglet was tucked up, safe, sound and ever-so-cosy for the night. Daughter and I carefully closed the drawing room door, and went to bed. Daughter slept like an angel, I tossed and turned and thrashed about all night demented at the thought of finding a deceased pig in the morning. I rehearsed the words of comfort I would have to say, and wondered how quickly we could get the traumatic scene over with. But I digress, are you still there? I hope you are because I'm getting to the mysterious bit.
Next morning daughter and I, hand in hand, entered the drawing room together to check the patient. Hardly daring to look we - er - looked. We saw no pig. The box was empty. Pig had gone, vanished, disappeared. Daughter and I looked at each other in disbelief. Surely he couldn't have climbed out of the box, far too weak. Somewhere in the back of my mind I wondered where the saying "pigs might fly" originated. But facts is facts, and a gone pig is a gone pig no matter how you look at it. Or don't look at it, if you catch my drift. I smiled down at the face which was just about to crumble into a screaming mass of hysterical six year-old noise.
In my, Mummy-is-trying-her-best-even-if-she-is-in-a-hurry-and-has-100-jobs-to-do-in-the-next-hour-before-she-goes-to-work, soothing voice, I reassured,
"He can't possibly have gone very far. He just has tiny little legs, and he'd soon get tired. Let's look under the settee."
We looked everywhere, we tore the whole damn room apart. We pushed furniture around, looked under rugs, searched the insides of the curtain linings, and inside plant-pots. Then we started to look in unlikely places. Inside books, behind the clocks, behind picture frames There was no sign of pig. Now I was secretly beginning to panic. There was only one place left. In the wall, behind the gas fire. Perhaps he'd crawled in there and had dropped down amongst the central heating pipes and was dead or dying inside the walls. Imagined odour of putrid pig began to fill my nostrils. The walls would have to be pulled down, our home would be demolished. One house of rubble later a mummified Piglet would be carried from the wreckage. We'd be homeless. I struggled to pull myself together
"It's time for you to go to school,” I said, “lets get ready. Perhaps Piglet is having a little chuckle to himself watching us look for him. If we go out of the room he may just scamper back into his little bed to surprise us.”
Right.... that's got daughter off to school - now let's find the pigging pig! I methodically started to tidy up the room, replacing furniture to its usual place, when I found him. Or to be more accurate, I found what the pig had become. Cue scary music......this is where it gets spooky. I owned a heavy foot stool which had been pushed up against the wall during the search. When I pulled the stool back off the wall, there he was. There was Piglet....What horror. He was as flat as a pancake up against the wall. I mean completely, and totally FLAT. He was the shape and size of an old 12" vinyl record. And as stiff as a board. In fact, looked and felt like a furry Frisbee. Hurled across a field I am quite certain he could have been a Frisbee record breaker. He looked like a flat fur plate He was, of course as dead as a.........flat pig. He looked like I imagine a flat-pack-pig would look if you ordered one to self-assembly from MFI. And here's the mystery, he was crisp and dry. He wasn't at all squidgy or messy. How could that be? He was just like a giant fur crisp. I picked him up, gingerly at first I can tell you, with the tips of one forefinger and thumb, and sort of dangled him in front of my eyes, seeing is, after all, believing. I started to giggle. Sort of maniacal giggling at first, then a sort of embarrassed laughing. I don't know why I found it so funny, I still do now when I think about it. Any minute now I expected Piglet to reflate and pop back into shape and say something funny, give me a knowing wink and get on with the rest of his life. But of course he didn't.
Although I was relieved to find him, I wasn't sure how my daughter would deal with the situation, and facing her with this wafer-thin spread-eagled pig was a depressing thought. I decided honesty was the best policy, and I would let her see what had happened to Piglet. If she asked me how or why I would just tell the truth........"I just don't know"
To soften the blow, I decided to get Piglet 'laid-out' and ready for burial in the Pet Cemetery. The only box he could possibly fit into was a large square Cadbury's chocolate biscuit tin. And so it was, that he was laid to rest, on a beautiful pink pillowcase, inside the biscuit tin. His little legs pointing into each corner quite nicely. He looked quite cute I thought. I picked a few flowers from the garden and sprinkled them about, a nice touch.
Daughter came home from school, looked and saw. She was surprisingly calm. She shed a little tear and hardly remarked on his shape at all, except to say she wondered if he was flat now because all his breath had gone.
"Probably", I said, "Perhaps that's the way it is with guinea-pigs."
We walked in a silent procession down the garden path to the allotted plot, and said a few words. I braced myself for the recriminations from daughter. When the last of the soil had been replaced and burial was finally over, she looked up at me with large, round tearful eyes. "Mummy" she said, "Mummy, I'm so sad that Piglet died, he was my best friend in the whole world". I hope he is happy in heaven".
"I'm sure he'll be very happy in heaven darling". Then, with hardly pause for thought, "Mummy?". Mummy please can I have a dog now?"
She caught me at one of those fatal weak moments. I was obviously in a state of SHOCK (Suddenly Have to Overcompensate Child with Kindness) Although it was a totally irrational, crazy and probably a mind-bogglingly stupid thing to do, I did what I'd vowed I'd never do. I announced to daughter that we were headed for the nearest dogs' home.
Of course you know what happened when we arrived. We saw, we were captivated, we brought him home. He's a mongrel.....Cute little face, big eyes, waggy tail, snuffly nose, squeezy paws, the works.
A friend for life. His name is PAL. Peace At Last.
