The young boy who lived in the upstairs bedroom was the only child of Mr. and Mrs. Percy. When asked if they would ever have any more children, the Percy’s would sharply reply with, “Heavens no! One child is quite enough.”
The boy in the upstairs bedroom was named C.K.
And C.K. had a secret.
It was a big secret. An epic secret. A secret with soft white fur, long whiskers, four scratchy feet, cute brown eyes, and a tiny wet nose.
“I’m so glad you came into my life, Mr. Mouse,” whispered C.K. as he sat cross-legged on his bed, hidden underneath his bed sheet. He was having a secret conversation with his new friend, even though it was well past his bedtime of 6:30 p.m.
“I don’t want anything bad happening to you, Mr. Mouse,” said C.K. “Please don’t ever die, okay? You’re the best friend—the only friend—I’ve ever had. I just couldn’t bear to lose you.”
squeak
C.K. was basically a good boy, but he had difficulty seeing because he was clinically blind. Nothing bad had happened to him to cause him to be blind. He was simply born this way. C.K. did not mind being blind, not one bit. Being blind gave him other talents, such as super-sensitive hearing, an overdeveloped sense of forgiveness, and the ability to see only the good in everyone, no matter how small.
“Are you hungry?” C.K. asked his new best friend.
squeak
“Oh my! I didn’t know you could communicate with humans? What a special mouse you are!”
squeak-squeak
At this early stage in their friendship, the tiny white mouse wasn’t actually communicating. Mr. Mouse was simply trying to wriggle his way out of C.K.’s hands. The tiny critter also loved his new blind friend, but downstairs his supper was waiting. And to a mouse (and to some humans), food always trumps friendship.
“Off you go, Mr. Mouse.” C.K. gently placed his new best friend on the bedroom floor. “You go get that cracker I left for you. Remember, it’s in the closet next to the front door. Go straight there. Don’t let anyone see you, okay?”
squeak
“I love you, Mr. Mouse!” C.K. waved goodbye in Mr. Mouse’s general direction. “Come back and visit me again tomorrow, okay? Goodnight!”
And that’s how it all started.
But that was just the beginning of their tumultuous friendship.
Two days later, C.K.’s new friend would have its cute little mouse-body mummified by poison that his very own mother put on a plate and placed in the closet, which unfortunately was where C.K. had trained Mr. Mouse to go if ever there was trouble. C.K. didn’t mean to assassinate his new friend, it just happened to turn out that way. He wanted to keep Mr. Mouse far away from Mrs. Percy, whose sole purpose in life (other than making the perfect cup of coffee each morning for her husband, and the perfect PB&J for her only child’s lunch) was to see every last mouse eradicated from the face of the earth. Mrs. Percy hated mice, passionately, enthusiastically, so deeply that she yearned to slaughter any mouse that would dare enter her clean house.
It was not a pretty sight.
Within seconds of eating the poison, Mr. Mouse’s furry coat began to lose all its hair. Then his eyes rolled back. His tongue shriveled up. The tiny mouse’s will to survive, his life ambition—his life-force—had been sucked dry because of the toxic pellets he’d been tricked into eating. When it was all over, his four tiny limbs were pointing up, stiff and lifeless.
Fortunately, Mr. Mouse had distant relatives that dated all the way back to ancient Egypt. And their spirits were angered by the foul treatment of one of their kind. They did not like the fact that one of their descendants was murdered by the lady who vacuumed the house every day in a perfect crisscross pattern with a big happy smile on her face.