Wicked Wicked Sense Of Humor

As requested, I will write the short story about the mouse in the tub.

I was nine years old going on twelve. We had moved many times by that age and each place we lived was rural, never in a city. I grew up around nature. Sitting for hours watching ants work and beginning to understand how strong and industrious they are. I did not destroy animals or their habitats; there was something in me that connected more to the animals and insects than to humans.

For instance, when I was two my mother walked around the building to see me with a branch and I was playing with some black widows. Gently. She tells me that she removed me from the vicinity of my little black play friends and would find me with some more in another place. I played with bugs and crickets and anything that moved. Funny, because when I became an adult I learned to dislike spiders.

Enough of the background. You get the picture. So, when I was nine we lived in a country setting on three and a half acres. My brother and I walked every single inch of that property and found so many things to do there. For me, it was finding pets. Mice were easy for me to catch, I took good care of them and then let them go.

One mouse became a favorite, and I didn't want to let him go. I carried him around in my pocket or sometimes put tissue in the bottom of a bandaid can and he would sit in there. I didn't shut the lid and he didn't run away.

Without going into the relationship I had with my mother, I was not very close to her. I think it would be fair to say that I enjoyed doing things that upset her. Can you imagine having a kid that actually liked to irritate you?

One afternoon I was carrying my little mouse in the bandaid can through the house to my bedroom and I could hear the bath water running. I knew it had to be my mother because my father was not home, again, and my brother was outside. Like Flip Wilson, the devil made me do it! I turned away from the door to my room, marched to the bathroom, threw open the door which in itself startled my mother, and I dumped the mouse into the tub. She screamed and jumped up at the same time. I grabbed my mouse who was swimming around and I took off. I ran and ran. The truth is that I had the picture of my mother standing, nude, screaming, trying to talk, and it was funny. Maybe I was born with a warped sense of humor, but to this day when I bring up that picture, I can laugh. See what a wicked person I am? Now you know the truth.

Note: Mouse photo found on Google.