Why Some Bunnies Are Mean, Part 1

There once lived a rabbit named Yvonne. She was a very unusual rabbit, who lived in a hut in the woods all alone, far away from other rabbits. Well, not all other rabbits. A certain young rabbit named Angelica Cottontail had heard that Yvonne was a very wise rabbit. Angelica's parents and her many, many siblings always complained that she was a very unwise rabbit, so they wanted to send her to someone to teach her to be wise. 

Yvonne would have preferred to live alone in her hut surrounded only by books, but she decided she would have to deal with Angelica. Oh, and Savio. Savio was Yvonne's dog, and Savio loved her. One day Savio and Angelica were reading the newspaper. Suddenly Savio looked up with a sad puppy look and asked, "Yvonne, why are some animals so mean?"

"Because they want to be," said Yvonne.

"But why do they want to be?" asked Angelica. "Why can't they just be nice?"

"Well," said Yvonne, sitting back in her chair with the coffee that Savio had made (he was a very talented dog), "let me tell you a story."

"Yay! A story!" yelled Savio and Angelica, hopping around in happy little circles before settling down in front of Yvonne. They both stared intently with their adorable eyes, waiting for Yvonne to start her story.

"Once upon a time," began Yvonne, "there were two little rabbits, Daisy and Thistle, who were going to visit their cousins in the city. Neither of them had ever met their cousins before. They had never even been to the city. Their parents warned them that they would have to be very careful.

When they got to the house where their cousins lived, they saw that it was large, beautiful, and obviously expensive. Their cousins were quite famous and popular in that city. This fascinated Daisy, who said to her brother Thistle, 'When we meet them, I think I'll ask our cousins how they became so famous and successful!'

'I doubt they did anything worth doing,' said Thistle rather grumpily. He was a skeptical young rabbit. He stayed back a few feet while his sister enthusiastically hopped up to the front door and rang the bell. All of a sudden the massive doors swung open and out hopped seven very odd rabbits. At first there was a jumbled commotion among themselves about who was to go first, but soon one in particular ignored the other six and began to speak to their young guests, arguing that she was the best and the most qualified to do so. 

'My name is Sunflower,' she said, puffing her chest out. 'As you can see I'm the best of the bunch and you should probably just ignore all the other imbeciles.'

'What a snoot,' Thistle grumbled softly.

After that Sunflower went on for a bit, talking mostly about herself if she was not insulting the others, until--"

Here Yvonne paused abruptly and contemplatively. 

"What? Why'd you stop?" whined Savio. 

"I just remembered that I have some chores to do today," replied Yvonne.

"Like what?" asked Angelica.

"Well, I've got to hop around in circles twenty times while balancing plates on my head and eating salad in between reciting bits and pieces of the Song of Roland."

"Why?" both the dog and the young rabbit asked.

"Why not?" answered Yvonne. "Don't you have to do that?"

"No," they both replied, but Yvonne was already hopping out of the little hut to start her chores.

"We haven't even got to meet the other cousins yet," Angelica said. She and Savio both implored Yvonne to continue her story, using the old puppy eyes trick.

"I promise I'll finish the story tomorrow," said Yvonne. "But for now, I must balance plates and recite poetry."

​To be continued...