Okay, okay. Candy gave into the request. It was soft and the candy and eggs would be supported without moving around so much. “We have to make sure the inside is lined in each basket.
“Great! Because this shredded carrot is something we can make easily on our conveyor belt.” Big Bunny hopped over toward her, standing on his haunches and nestling her chin. “Candy, you’ve been amazing. Will you come back tonight again with me?”
“Yes, but there is still something missing.” Candy looked at the basket. The eggs were great. The candy worked. The only thing missing was something saying who it was from. “Talking bunnies have to be the most magical thing I’ve ever seen, and I’m no child.” Candy touched the basket. “You should let them know. Kids know magic, but intellectual bunnies? What did you say they used to call your great ancestor?”
“Many different things. One of them that stuck the most was Easter Bunny.”
“Then the Easter Bunny. Big Bunny, that should be your brand, Easter Bunny. The talking bunny who hops around delivering baskets to good boys and girls.” Candy smiled, it was coming together better now.
Big Bunny tilted his head, making his floppy ear flop over his left eye. “How do we do that? Leave a note?”
“No, leave a calling card. Leave a mystery inside the basket somehow related to rabbits.”
“Hmm. Hey, last time we were at the store, they had chocolate animals.” Big Bunny hopped up and down. “The biggest piece of candy, make it similar? Maybe chicks too if we can find any.”
“And wolves?” Candy said it just to rile him up. He acted like he wanted to represent everything, but she doubted wolves would be in the package. “Bunnies and chicks. Let’s go stock up.”
Big Bunny headed toward his usual basket. He couldn’t normally go into a store, but Candy had always taken him anyhow in a giant picnic basket with a cover that opened on both sides. Come to think of it? Candy looked around her apartment. She had all kinds of things for Big Bunny. “Big Bunny?”
Big Bunny shoved his nose out of the basket. It twitched. “Yep?”
Candy picked up the basket. “Do you think I am obsessed with you?” He stuck his head most of the way out of the basket. “I’ve got bedding near every window. I sleep with you at night. I don’t give you regular food, I prepare every meal you eat.” She fidgeted her fingers. “Cotton thought I was obsessed. Am I crazy?”
“See? You are already having problems. Ditch him and come with me.” Big Bunny winked at her and hid himself back in his basket. “Store. Grab as many as you can and let’s head back to the hole. I’ll give you the directions this time.”
“Good because you kidnapping me in a truck didn’t sit well,” Candy said as she headed out the door.
She cared for her bunny. She wasn’t obsessed. She wasn’t.
* * *
Candy was so tempted to buy every animal. They even had a giraffe in their chocolate collection. She packed all the rabbits in on the other side of the picnic basket, along with some chicks. She saw the wolves, but knew better. There was something about wolves that Big Bunny truly hated.
“Candy.”
Oh no. Darren Manner walked over toward her. She hid the last piece of chocolate away. “Darren.”
“Your mom told me you kissed a Vegan.” Darren wrapped his arm around her. Candy heard a low growl from her basket. She patted the top to make him hush up. “So?”
“Yes, Posh pushed me. You saw it.” Candy pushed him aside. “Remember, your new fiancé?”
“Oh, that. Well, I don’t know. A ring is a ring.” Darren followed her to the register. “I still really like you more, and I’d like to help out with your Sweet problem.”
“I’m sure.”
“Are you really going to be with a Vegan?” Darren chuckled at her. “I can overcome it. I am Spice, and that is way more powerful than Vegan.”
Once again, Candy patted her growling basket. “Cotton has treated me fine. He’s even offered to marry me if we hit it off first.”
“What?” Darren’s smile wiped clean off his face. “Your momma didn’t tell me that.”
“Momma doesn’t know everything.” Candy took the pieces of chocolate out of the basket and set them on the counter. “He may be Vegan, but he is much sweeter than you.”
Darren grabbed his chest like she stabbed his heart. “Ouch. But hey, I bet he can’t give you the riches I can. I was willing to settle for forty percent. You would be going for ten percent of Sweet Meats to over sixty percent.”
“I share with my mom and my sister, it’s twenty percent each.”
“Still better than what he could give you.” Darren held his hands up. “Fine, I will tell you what. I’ve tasted Posh, fair is fair. Go get your Vegan boy. Then come back, I’ll marry you first, and then we’ll finally taste each other. Agreed?” Darren laid his hand way too close to the basket. He brought it up right away. “Ow!”
“Silly, Darren.” Candy picked up her groceries and stuffed them in the basket. “Baskets don’t bite.” She walked off before anyone else said a word.
* * *
“This was better.” Candy adjusted her rabbit ear as she made her way back down Bunny Hill’s hole. “See? You should have asked me last time instead of kidnapped me.”
“I was afraid you might reject me if you saw me as―”
Candy watched Big Bunny but he stopped. “What? Transform into a human? It shouldn’t be that big of a surprise, I suppose.”
“I didn’t say human. Just, something.”
Candy had expected to head down and see the same veggie conveyor belts working, but the other rabbits were nowhere to be seen. As she got closer through the holes, she could see why.
Somehow, they had duplicated her candy. Hundreds of baskets were being lined with special candies held by each bunny down one conveyor belt. “The hens?” She guessed.
“No, everyone has different powers. That is the result of my mother’s main power,” Big Bunny answered. “That is why we bought all the bars. She can duplicate each to their full extent.”
Along the wall there were already hundreds more baskets. “How many children are in the city?”
“We don’t do just the city.” Big Bunny winked at her as he touched her floppy ear. “We do the world.”
The world? The world?! “How?” She gestured toward the twenty rabbits around them. “You need a much bigger workforce.”
“That isn’t all the bunnies here,” Big Bunny said. “Not even one percent. Rabbits multiply like . . .well, rabbits. You haven’t even touched a full one percent of our little society here.”
Wow. Candy looked behind him as his mother came back around. He talked with her a little, and then his mother wrapped her arms around Candy.
“Carrot grass good, Candy of legend!”
Of course, he must have mentioned the carrot and cucumber sliced spaghetti. Carrot grass, good name for it. Candy felt her head being patted by his mother before she finally let go.
All night long, Candy helped boil eggs, and brushes were actually found for her size (okay, a little larger) to decorate them. Lying them in along with the baskets, others picked up on what she had done too. The cucumber and carrot shredding was easy to mimic with their old conveyor belts.
“Great job.” Big Bunny hopped over by her. “I’m proud of you, Candy.”
Candy tried to hide the strange blush. Her fur was white but she was afraid she might be turning red. For some reason, Big Bunny made her feel funnier the longer she was around him in that form. Rabbit to rabbit, it must have been something to do with that. Surely she didn’t really see him as anything more than her sweet pet.
Surely. “I would have been a hen.” She looked toward Big Bunny. “If I had been a creature, right?”
“Maybe. Maybe a duck. Who knows?” Big Bunny moved closer to her. She felt his warm, soft furry lip tickle against her floppy ear. “Although, I think you make a fine rabbit.”
A fine rabbit. She doubted rabbits should be get
ting that warm beneath their fur or it’d catch on fire.
“Are you okay, Candy?”
“Fine.” How warped was she? Cotton was right. She was obsessed with her rabbit. She might even be . . . “I-I really need to get out of here soon.”
“Sure, we can go home if you are ready.”
We. Yes. When she was human and he was just the cute little rabbit, she was much better off.
* * *
“Good morning, Cotton.” Candy welcomed him into Sweet Meats to his usual table. They’d been seeing each other for more than two weeks now, every night and every day at Sweet Meats. Cotton didn’t say whether marriage was on the table, but boy did Momma Sweet disagree with the thought.
“Back again?” Poured came over to the table too with a snicker. “Can’t you just go on a date instead of stalk my sister at work?”
Honestly. Cotton was a thousand times better than Darren. They even did the traditional dinner and a movie. He was always a gentleman. Although, he was often too much of a gentleman, almost afraid to show her who he really had been. She’d seen it a couple of times though, and the more they saw each other, the more his true self came out. “The usual?”
“It’s about all I can afford,” Cotton teased. “Yep, five, twenty nine.”
“The most expensive way to get laid I’d ever seen,” Poured said as she left the table. Cotton and Candy both ignored her. Neither Momma Sweet, Darren or Poured were going to stop him being a customer.
“Do you think your sister will ever like me?” Cotton asked before Candy left with the order. Candy simply shrugged. She knew if she picked Cotton, Poured and Momma would be looking at tougher times.
Candy headed toward the back to get the water. Tonight she’d make up for it when he came over for a date. Although it was understandable that Momma and Poured were angry over Cotton choosing to try to marry her, she tried to understand Big Bunny.
From day one he hid from Cotton. He never stayed in the same room. For six months, Candy had raised Big Bunny alone, and she thought maybe he was scared Cotton would ruin everything. Maybe he was jealous Candy wouldn’t be able to show him the same amount of attention?
Or, maybe, Big Bunny being next to her as a real bunny was confusing him too. As much as she liked Cotton, she couldn’t stop thinking about Big Bunny’s idea too. There should be no way that she’d rather sit in a hole, work on a conveyor belt and make baskets every day. Yet, every time Big Bunny took her down that rabbit hole, he showed her more. He showed her deeper parts. He even showed her one of the ‘city’ dwellings where rabbits just like him had socialized and lived at.
Candy would bet about everything she owned that she’d already seen more than there was room on Big Bunny hill. The holes kept extending downward and upward into different hills.
She also learned how they protected themselves. When everyone knew Big Bunny was coming, it was easy to come through the holes. There were actual rabbit guards and hen guards though with massive steel (yes, steel) doors. Each hole inside the dwelling was guarded heavily so no chance hunter might try to stick poison or smoke down there to make anyone come out.
Although he shared so much though, he still held secrets. So many secrets. He refused to tell her his real name. He refused to tell her if he transformed to a human or what he looked like in his other form. Not even his hair color. He vowed it was to keep their relationship simple because knowing anything else would make it to awkward to keep him as a pet.
Somehow, she was beginning to doubt that same old excuse.
Realizing she was thinking about her bunny instead of serving Cotton again, she shook her head. She had to stop being ridiculous. Before she reached his table though, Cotton was standing next to it, side by side with Darren.
“This whole charade is getting annoying,” Darren said as he poked Cotton in the chest. “Just do Candy so I can marry her already. She is going to die soon if you don’t move it.”
Candy came out and broke the two of them up. “Cotton, your drink.” She sat it down but looked over at Darren. “You have no business here.”
“I do. You risk death if this dumb yahoo doesn’t either marry you or do you. So ask him!” Darren gestured to Cotton. “Are you going to marry her or not? She doesn’t have a whole month.”
Candy wanted to slug him right then and there. She had time left. She hadn’t felt weak at all. There was time before that stupid question had to be answered.
“Candy, is it me you want?” Cotton met her eye to eye. “I don’t want you to settle. Tell me there is no one else you’d want.”
Candy turned from his eye as she saw the vision of her bunny again. Gaw, what was wrong with her?! Cotton was the greatest. She did like him, it was just . . .something. Something was wrong about him.
“Candy doesn’t completely.” Poured saw the opportunity. “She can’t look you in the eye. She must like Darren more than she lets on.”
Oh no way, that wasn’t even funny. Candy glared at Poured. She would ruin everything.
“Candy?” Cotton questioned her again. “Look me in the eyes, and tell me you’d be happy with me.”
“I would.” She said it, but not to his eyes. She tried again, but her voice faltered. “I-I would.”
“No, Candy.” Cotton stood up. “You’re a nice girl. Sweetest one ever, but your heart has to be completely mine.”
No. No, no, no! “It is though, I do care.”
Cotton looked toward Poured and then at Candy. “Five days from now, I’ll come by your apartment, Candy. I may not have your heart, but I won’t leave you to Darren alone.” He gestured to Darren. “Her first time is mine, and most of her heart. You marry her and play straight, or she’ll take the entire company away.”
Cotton. Candy wanted to go after him, but she didn’t know what to say. Her voice failed her. Her eyes failed her. She liked Cotton, and she would have chosen him any day for marriage over Darren.
In five days, Cotton would take her and leave her to Darren. The thought pushed too hard now. Not this, not after all that time of getting to know him. She thought they had a great chance together. Why couldn’t she say she’d be happy with him? Why? She ran out the door with only one goal in mind.
* * *
Candy sniffled as she rushed into her home. She closed the door, seeking the furry companion she always had before. “Big Bunny.” Her body slid down the door, unable to even want to get up to look for him. He had always come to her front door.
She wasn’t mistaken as he hopped over to her. He moved into her lap and she touched his big floppy ears. They always made her feel a little better, but even that wouldn’t work today.
“Candy, what is it?” he asked as he stood on his haunches and twitched his nose at her.
“Cotton. I let him go.” Candy could barely open her eyes. “He was there for me. He was risking marriage. He was polite, funny . . .but something happened. I couldn’t say he was the one who made me happy.”
“Oh no.” Big Bunny hugged her tighter. “Now what?”
“Five days. He’ll give me back my dwindling power, and then it’s off to marry Darren.” Candy gulped. “I guess Sweet Meats is just an undeniable road I have to follow.”
“No, you don’t have too.” Big Bunny thumped his foot on her lightly. “Stay with me at Bunny Hill.”
It may have seemed at first that such a request was laughable. Being with Darren and ruling the company, or living underground with rabbits and chickens? More than once she had considered it, but every time something inside said it wouldn’t be right. She wasn’t a real bunny, she was a fake bunny. The white fur with blonde streaks, the floppy ears, the light hopping around the ground. She wished with all her heart that it felt right, but it didn’t.
Big Bunny was still just Big Bunny. He wasn’t a human. Maybe he turned human, but he never once confirmed it, and her relationship was becoming unhealthy with the rabbit. Her human self was getting further away each day.
She closed her eyes, sitting
up and feeling Big Bunny slide off her lap. That was it. That was the biggest problem. It was why she couldn’t give her heart to anyone else. It was a fact that she didn’t want to face. No one did such a thing. It was wrong, flat out wrong. Talking rabbit or not, she was sick in the head. Absolutely sick, but she knew the undeniable truth.
She couldn’t completely love Cotton because somehow she had also loved her bunny.
“Candy?”
“Sweet Meats is my future.” Candy sniffled again and got up off the floor. “Sweet Meats is my future.” She heard him hopping along beside her to her bedroom but she closed the door on him. He rubbed his paw against it, but she couldn’t let him in. He couldn’t be at the foot of her bed anymore. He couldn’t be curled up near her anymore.
“Come to Bunny Hill with me.”
“I am not a rabbit!” She yelled at him as she grabbed a pillow and threw it at the closed door. She didn’t hear his voice again after that. She stayed in her room for some time, trying to figure out when it happened. Why it happened.
When she changed into a rabbit? Sooner? Later? She had been obsessed with that rabbit ever since she saved him. Was it an unhealthy obsession that turned into love, or did it happen when he started changing her into his form?
When it got later, she opened the door. Unable to resolve her feelings, she could not let him starve. “Big Bunny, I’m sorry.” She called for him as she started to cut up some fresh carrots, but he never answered.
When she went looking for him, all she found was an open window.
* * *
“Cotton?” Lop-eared Matt said as he hopped over to him. “The product is almost in place. We’ll need to start getting magic distribution users on our first shipment. I just need your permission, Cotton.”
Cotton stared at the basket in front of him. It was a random basket out of thousands around them. A simple brown basket made a little extra special with a bow set in the middle. On the top were a few pieces of candy and four decorated boiled eggs. Below that was more candy that fell into the carrot spaghetti grass cushioning it. On the side, the large chocolate bunny had been duplicated as well as several smaller versions of chicks.
For Love of Mister Cotton Tail: An Apocalyptic Fairytale (Single) Page 5
