I remember my niece best as a child: red hair, faded blue eyes, skinny arms and legs; her movements so fast and agile that I called her Rabbit. She was a rare soul. This became apparent when, at four years old, she entertained her parents by gently guiding their old cat, Charlie, towards their neighbor’s timid puppy. Her small hands coaxed them closer until they sniffed each other tentatively, her face brightening with a hopeful smile. But after that greeting, the cat lashed out with a paw, leaving behind a bloody cut and a whimpering dog.
“Why did Charlie do that?” A weeping Rabbit said, running into her father’s arms. I was sitting on my sister and brother-in-law’s patio when the incident occurred. We were basking in the sun, eating watermelon, spitting the seeds into plastic cups.
“They’re different animals,” her father replied.
Rabbit squirmed out of his arms and gave him a look, part amused, part annoyed. “Silly daddy,” she replied, “You don’t need to be the same to be friends,” before anyone could disagree with her, she ran off to the large meadow that bordered the patio. Her yellow dress flapped in the wind, as she wobbled along into the grassy field on her Mary Janes.
#
Eventually, as Rabbit matured, her parents became less amused by her opinions. Over the years, time had worn their ideologies down to a dull nub of practicality. And although they had protested Vietnam in the sixties, now, twenty years later, they found themselves protesting again. Not in front of the White House with signs, but in their bed, with the blankets over their heads, trying to avoid their child’s stern gaze. I remember witnessing one exchange in my sister’s kitchen when Rabbit was six, involving a sparrow she found on her way back from school.
“But she wants to stay.” Rabbit said.
“Honey, the bird probably hit a window. Right now, it doesn’t know what it wants. It’s a wild thing.” Her mother replied.
Rabbit crossed her arms. “She needs us.” My sister looked at me, mouthing the word “help.”
They had placed the sparrow in a shoebox with cotton balls for a bed. I watched my niece pick up a plastic spoon and scoop some water from a cup before gently nudging the sparrow’s beak with the tip. The bird rocked back and forth with the motion.
I put my hand on my niece’s small shoulder. “I’m sorry, Rabbit. She’s already gone.”
That night, we held a funeral. Rabbit had planned all the details. She wore a brightly flowered dress, serenading us with a song she composed about a sparrow. After placing a colorful crayon drawing of a bird in the sky over the corpse like a ceremonial blanket, she buried the shoebox with a green plastic shovel putting the dirt in a pail. I stood with her parents as we all drank glasses of wine, clinking them in a mock toast to that unknowable bird.
#
Although her ideas started with animals as she grew, so did her scope, eventually encompassing people and government. She ran for student body president in high school. I was drafted to make signs, cringing at the paint I spilled on my alligator loafers. Still, I was gratified when she won.
Rabbit began her term encouraging students to participate in community service, helping those less fortunate. When her classmates volunteered at the local shelters and soup kitchens, she understood what it was to effect change. Her bedroom walls became adorned not with posters of pop stars, but with revolutionary leaders and thinkers from history. She devoured books on philosophy, politics, and human rights, engaging in heated debates with anyone who dared to challenge her ideals.
My sister would try to educate Rabbit on the implausibility of some of her solutions, but social constructs and capitalism were meant for someone less selfless. To my sweet niece, her mother’s words made as much sense as the aerodynamics of the bumblebee. This dynamic continued for years. Her parents explained, they doted, they loved, they protested. They had birthed not a child, but something neither of them had expected. She was a non-conformist, a socialist, perhaps a communist, surely a rebel. Most of all, she was a reflection of how they used to be themselves when the world was simpler, when morals were like pretty armor protecting your soul from the dark abyss of apathy.
But then, to everyone’s relief, Rabbit went to college. After that, I saw very little of her. She would come back for holidays, flying into the airport an hour away where her parents would pick her up. “What do you do at the college in California?” I asked her over Thanksgiving dinner when she was a sophomore. She had shaved all her hair off. The red stubbled head looking like a small fiery bowling ball.
“Uncle, we object.”
“But to what?” I asked.
“To poverty, to commercialism, to anarchy, to order, to war. To everything we don’t understand.”
I envied her passion for what she didn’t understand. Even at fifty-five, I still didn’t understand. Rabbit, prone to extremes, needed to be reined in, but that was my sister and her husband’s problem—until suddenly, it became mine.
#
“Rabbit, there’s been a terrible accident. I’m afraid they’re gone.” I told her over the phone.
“On the Alaskan cruise?” She sobbed.
“On the iceberg.”
The phone receiver vibrated with her cries of grief. My niece was melting just like the glacier that her parents had stood on, and there was little I could do. She asked for the details in a stunned whisper. I told her what the captain told me: They were last seen yesterday holding hands, watching whales, before falling into the frozen ocean along with an enormous slab of ice, lost forever.
“On their anniversary,” she said.
“Yes Rabbit. I’m so sorry, but you need to come home now. I’ve booked a plane ticket for you.”
#
I met her at the airport. We hugged trying to contain the grief. Then I drove us both back to her parents’ house. Our relatives joined us; most still lived nearby.
Rabbit was obsessed with the details of the funeral. Who to invite, what to wear. Where to hold the ceremony. “It should be a park, or some other place full of beauty and joy, a celebration of their lives, not their deaths. We should sing and play the music they loved,” she declared. Nobody said anything. There wasn’t anything to say. Her father was an accountant, part of the rotary club, and her mother a homemaker on the school board.
“No, Rabbit. Please. This isn’t some dead bird’s funeral. That’s you, not them.”
She remained quiet for a long time, then slowly nodded. So, the relatives and I decided on a conventional funeral. On a bright sunny day, we buried two empty coffins. After the funeral, we ate frozen dinners at my house, while waiting for the world to end. When it didn’t, I drove Rabbit to the airport. “Are you going to be alright?” I asked her.
“I’ll never see them again. I would have liked to watch them grow old.” She began to cry. I held her until it was time to board.
Seeing her leave, I marveled that it had only been two days since she arrived. It seemed a lifetime ago.
#
Rabbit didn’t return until after she graduated, preferring to crash at friends’ houses for the holidays rather than come back to the bleakness of an empty home. When she arrived, it was with a fiancé.
She insisted on being married on her birthday, which fell on a Saturday. But with short notice, all the wedding halls in our small New England town were filled that day. Rather than move the date or go to another town, she and her fiancé booked the funeral home for the wedding. It was a scandal; the protesting cries that rose in the family could be heard beyond the walls of the house or the line of the phone. I could not talk her out of it, but as the patriarch of the family, I felt it was my responsibility. “Rabbit, we love you, but this isn’t right.”
She only pointed a wagging finger at me and said, “Uncle, tell our relatives that’s them, and this is me. It’s my day, they can come or not; that’s their decision… and yours.”
“But Rabbit, your parents’ funeral was there.”.
She smiled. “I know. It will be like they are attending.”
I understood then that was her plan the whole time. She was only looking for some excuse to hold it there. “Oh Rabbit, you can’t get them back that way.”
“Perhaps. But I wasn’t there for them at their end. Is it so wrong to want them there for my beginning?”
I felt it was my duty to my sister- and brother-in-law to imagine what they would have wanted for her. It wasn’t this. So, I petitioned the groom. “You must argue for a more traditional venue,” I begged.
The groom would not argue.
“Argue? Why would I argue with her? It’s pointless. She is like a breeze that blows the leaves around. We are all leaves to her. You cannot stop a breeze, only enjoy the ride,” he said.
Rabbit had met him at university. He was the son of Californian farmers, majoring in landscape architecture, a fancy way of saying he wanted to plant gardens and make parks. She was majoring in political science, a fancy way of saying she wanted to work in government. She wanted to change the world. He wanted to change the landscape. They were a perfect match.
I was frustrated by the situation, and over coffee with Rabbit sarcastically remarked, “What color will you wear for your wedding dress, black?” She looked at me, intrigued, considering the idea. That was when I realized my mistake. In a momentary bit of amnesia, I had forgotten my niece. She would give me no more quarter than she gave her parents. Had she not been trouble since birth when I held her in my arms as she spit up on my jacket’s lapel? She would wear black.
“You see me, uncle,” she said.
“No, I do not,” I replied peevishly.
She put her thin fingers around my face staring into me. Her eyes were a boundless blue horizon. “Yes, you do. And that’s why I want you to walk me down the aisle.”
“The aisle? Me?”
“Who else?”
If it had been any other venue I would have been honored. “You would make me a party to something I disagree with.” I protested.
She grinned, “Wouldn’t it be more of a scandal if I walked alone?”
I turned to her maid of honor, Isabella, for help. She only smiled, listening patiently. Isabella and Rabbit had been friends since they were five. I had seen them play dress-up, catch frogs, eat cotton candy at the fair—screaming together at the ickiness of boys while wearing matching boo-boo band-aids. Then, as they got older, they laughed when boys tried to kiss them, and cried when they wouldn’t. They had been through it all together: periods, bad haircuts, sports teams. All of it. Isabella herself had only just married a singer she met on vacation in Jamaica. Her advice to me was simple. “Don’t worry, be happy.”
#
Of course, it rained on their wedding day. The weatherman on Channel Two, staring at the Doppler radar, declared it a viral thunderstorm, showers breaking out everywhere. The funeral home sent a hearse to pick her up from my house, door to door, so she wouldn’t get wet. The driver carried a big golf umbrella, using it to shield her while we all watched. Later, I drove some of the other relatives over to the funeral home. It was in an old Victorian house. My eyes strained to see as the windshield wipers worked to keep up with the downpour.
When we arrived, I looked around at all the people—relatives, friends—all sitting with stunned faces, except a few sophisticates amused by the audacity of the location. None of the guests knew whether to dress for the wedding or the place. It was autumn, so most of the attendees settled on wearing the muted colors of dying leaves. Several of the women in the pews cried, but whether with joy or sadness was a coin flip. The place was stately enough, the wooden beams serious, the room so large that it swallowed all fifty attendees. For a moment, even I forgot the true purpose of that sobering grandeur.
As she requested, I walked her down the aisle. One of the gravediggers, who moonlighted as a preacher in a revival tent on weekends, officiated. Rabbit was beautiful that day, not just her wedding day, but her birthday. Black was her color. The dress hugged her form perfectly. Her red hair came down around her shoulders—not as she had originally planned, or as style might dictate, but as nature had made her, in all her exquisite glory. At that moment, I knew I would never see a work of art I would appreciate more.
The groom wore white. A startling, ghost-like, next-world white. Thankfully, there was a single black rose in his lapel, like a beacon in a blizzard, or he might have disappeared. He was shorter than Rabbit, with a thin mustache and an angular face made up of geometric shapes. His
smile was sweet. He gazed at his bride as if she were a lush garden, he longed to spend the rest of his life caring for.
In their vows, they spoke about life, love, and the renewal of the planet. But all I saw was the spot where we had put her parents’ coffins, and the book at the entryway for the mourners.
When the service ended, we all filed out, and I couldn’t help but glance at the pages of the condolence book on the stand. All the guests had reflexively signed it without a thought as to its true purpose. I should have been appalled—the idea of mistaking death for life. Rabbit would love it. And then I thought of her parents and how they would have longed to see her married. For a moment I pictured their faces proudly looking on. I realized Rabbit was right; this was the only way they could be here. With a smile, I picked up the pen and wrote down their names in the book, and mine below.
Image by Акимхан Бозтай from Pixabay – Large open book on a black background
literally stories 
Evan
I’m glad to see your story up today. Should seem strange that a person who remains a child at heart should understand death best. Then again we buy into this existence, which, when you look at it, cooly from a distance–should not be. We depend on a giant fire way up in the sky for everything, and the strange looking creatures we are have built in standards for what is and is not right, and for ugliness and beauty. It’s some sort of practical joke. Well done.
Leila
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Thank you so much, Leila! I’m glad the story resonated with you. Your reflection on the complexities of existence and our perceptions of life and death is truly thought-provoking. I appreciate your kind words and insights.
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Sad and joyful, hopeful and hopeless – all in one package I felt. Thank goodness for the people who refuse to fit in. I wish I had the courage to be one of them. I enjoyed this very much. Thank you – Diane
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Thank you very much Diane! I’m glad the story resonated with you on so many emotional levels. Your words mean a lot, and I appreciate you sharing your thoughts. It’s always encouraging to hear when a story touches someone in different ways. Wishing you the courage to embrace whatever path brings you joy and fulfillment.
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Beautiful piece. I really felt like I knew the characters and your descriptions and metaphors of grief were so vivid. I am a father to a young family, and familiar with that hopeful energy that my children have, much like the young Rabbit in this story. This made me think about how, either through trying to be funny or because I think it’s the right thing to do, cut their musings and ideas down to make way for practicalities or facts.
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Thank you so much for your kind words, Alex. It’s heartening to hear that the portrayal of grief and young Rabbit’s hopeful energy struck a chord with you, especially as a father to a young family. Your insight into balancing children’s musings and ideas with practicalities is something many can relate to. Wishing you and your family continued happiness and connection amidst life’s journey.
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Evan.
This is a really wonderful bitter-sweet narrative of what life so often is — a bittersweet narrative. The irrepressible Rabbit comes roaring off the page in all her unassuming glory. We have all, in our long lives, known a Rabbit. They say that when life gives you lemons, make lemonade, and that’s what she does her whole life through. I had to laugh aloud when the venue for her wedding — the funeral home — sent a hearse to pick her up in order to avoid the rain. One can only anticipate with glee Rabbit’s own children and grandchildren, if they arrive. This is a really thoughtful, poignant, feel-good story, Evan, as we’ve come to expect from your redoubtable quill pen. Thank you!
Bill Tope
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Bill, thank you so much for your thoughtful feedback. I’m delighted that you enjoyed Rabbit’s story and found it to be a poignant reflection of life’s true nature. It means a lot to hear that Rabbit’s irrepressible spirit resonated with you, and I’m glad her journey brought some laughter and warmth. Your kind words are truly appreciated, and I’m grateful for your support of my writing. Here’s to the unpredictable joys that life, and characters like Rabbit, bring us.
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Evan
Thanks for Rabbit.
I’m inclined toward Leila’s point about our unlikelihood as a species in an unintelligible universe. Wasn’t it Diogenes held up a plucked chicken to declare ‘behold Plato’s man’ — a ‘featherless biped’ — at a public gathering? I know it’s said he slept in an empty wine urn and would arrive as people were leaving civil events. Anything to be different. Like the narrator’s niece.
I think The Paralympics should be required watching, as should Pride Parades, Burning Man, and Mardi Gras.
Why we create, hold, and enforce our own conventional beliefs and rules about anything is insane.
Run Rabbit Run!
Gerry
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Gerry
Diogenes also used to go around with a lantern in the middle of the day, saying he was looking for a single honest (wise) person; and he claimed he never found one (including himself). He also mocked Alexander the Great straight to the face of the great leader. Alexander responded by saying, “If Alexander was not Alexander, he would want to be Diogenes.” Diogenes replied by saying he wanted to be Diogenes. Thanks for bringing up this fascinating philosopher-trickster who also referred to himself as the Dog Philosopher (claiming dogs were wiser than people)! It’s definitely relevant in the context of a youthful red-haired female who would stage her wedding at a funeral home and wear black instead of white.
Dale
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Gerry, thank you for your thoughtful reflections. I’m glad Rabbit’s story resonated with you. I agree with your musings on human uniqueness. It was my hope that Rabbit’s spirit embodies that same defiance in her own way. Here’s to celebrating life’s diversity and unpredictability!
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Evan
In a thought experiment kind of way, it’s worth noting in the context of your story that the German philosopher Nietzsche wrote that all the values that modern global civilization is built on are the exact reverse of what all the greatest thinkers of the human race tried to show as the true path at the dawn of modern civilization. From Buddha, Socrates, and Confucius, to Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad, all these and thousands of unknown names tried to show that the love of money, power and material things should be seen as the greatest sin, not the number one value. Everything else: war, possible nuclear war, climate change, environmental destruction, poverty, hunger, oppression, racism, violence of all kinds, follows from the fact that the most evil value of all is seen as the greatest good by the majority of the population in virtually every single major civilization on earth today, according to the philosopher Nietzsche. This is one reason why modern radicals like Jim Morrison of the Doors read Nietzsche as if he were their Bible.
Characters like Rabbit always get the worst of it because they don’t buy into the universal lie. At the same time, she gets to be herself, and live in a joyous way even in the midst of death and destruction. I admired how you created this trickster character with convincing accuracy. It seemed real, maybe one of the highest compliments that can be paid to a fictional narrative. Thanks for writing a piece that challenges the way most Americans (and people everywhere) see the world. Moses smashed the golden calf when he came down from the mountain with the Ten Commandments. The young Rabbits of the world, and there are very many of them around these days, know the truth of the world far better than all their solemn, judgmental, well-heeled elders. We all need to have enough, but none of us deserve too much. Simply being alive is the greatest gift. Thanks again.
Dale
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Dale,
Thank you so much for your heartfelt and insightful feedback. Your reflections on characters like Rabbit, who defy societal norms and embrace life’s complexities, are very interesting and appreciated. It’s rewarding to hear that the story challenged perspectives and resonated on such a meaningful level. I appreciate the depth of your engagement with the narrative. As you so beautifully expressed, cheers to embracing the joy of simply being alive!
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Dear Evan,
Thanks so much for responding to my comments on your story, and in such a full and meaningful way as well. It’s very deeply appreciated.
I live near a funeral home and every time I’ve gone by it since, I’ve thought of your story and your character. Probably can’t be a bigger compliment than this! Congrads again on the publication of this excellent short story.
Sincerely,
Dale
PS, The moment when Rabbit says she wishes she could have seen her parents grow old, but then goes on with her life anyway, as we all must, is profound and also resonates deeply. Thanks again.
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Rabbit is a complex character, a tribute to the writer. People who do all they can to be different can come across as phony and unlikable. Rabbit seems sincere. Another tribute to the writer.
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David,
Thank you. It means a lot to hear that you found her portrayal genuine. I meant for Rabbit to be a pure soul, but that doesn’t always work. Your feedback is greatly appreciated!
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Love this story – Rabbit is a great character and the writing is prosaic, but this gives the story such gravity and feeling. I felt compelled from the start and am happy that Rabbit’s story ends on her terms, in her way. A very thoughtful, moving piece.
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Paul,
Thank you so much for reading! Your appreciation for the gravity and feeling in the story means a lot. It was important to me that Rabbit’s story reflect how resilience and independence can sometimes be a catalyst for changing views, and hopefully, the world. I’m grateful for your thoughtful feedback!
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A lovely skew of a piece! I have had friends like Rabbit & as her fiancé/husband says, they’re a force of nature. And the rest of us are all the bette for having them around.
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Steven,
Thank’s for reading! It’s wonderful to hear that you enjoyed the piece. So glad you have some Rabbits of your own. One of the reasons I wrote this piece is I wanted more Rabbits in my life. I appreciate your thoughtful comment!
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I enjoyed this story and Rabbit. I have a daughter who is a force of nature and remembered our own rescue turtles and bird funerals.
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Thank you so much! I’m delighted that you enjoyed the story and found a connection with Rabbit. It’s heartwarming to hear about your daughter and the memories of rescue turtles and bird funerals—they sound like wonderful adventures. Your comment brightened my day!
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Evan, Kudos on another masterpiece. Lovely, heart warming story written with skill, emotion and passion. Loved every word. You have a gift!
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Janet, thank you so much for reading, and your kind words! I’m delighted that you enjoyed the story and found it moving. Your encouragement means a lot to me. I appreciate your support!
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Hi Evan.
I like individuals. I also enjoy the quirky folks who are quirky because of character and not simply for the sake of it. I reckon that Rabbit was one of those genuine ones.
I’ve always reckoned that when it comes to Wedding and Funeral plans, apart from those involved, (Or left) no-one should comment. Let those folks do what they want and go along with it.
This is a brilliant character study and it was uplifting to read that the uncle, even though he thought he had a bead on her, finally did completely realise what she was all about.
Oh and two cracking lines that stood out for me:
‘You don’t need to be the same to be friends.’
‘Her mother’s words made as much sense as the aerodynamics of the bumblebee.’
It’s a testament to your work when I can say that I wish I could meet someone like your character!!
All the very best.
Hugh
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Hi Hugh,
Thank you so much for your thoughtful and kind words about Rabbit and the story. I’m glad you enjoyed the character study and found Rabbit’s authenticity refreshing. Your insights into the wedding and funeral perspectives resonate deeply with some of the themes explored in the piece. Those lines you highlighted are personal favorites of mine as well, and I’m thrilled they stood out to you. And Hugh if you haven’t met a Rabbit of your own yet I’m sure you will, and the nice thing is they tend to multiply.
Your support and appreciation mean a great deal to me. Wishing you the best as well!
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You are a true gentleman Evan!!!
Hugh
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In such a short story, Evan paints masterful imagery that envelops the reader into the prose and captures the heart and mind in such a precious way. All along, Rabbit was the teacher and guiding light with everyone and everything else her muse. It took her uncle many years to truly understand and appreciate Rabbit’s view of the world and to recognize that her soul never wavered. What a powerful and unadulterated view it is and we can only think about how such purity can be passed along to her children and grandchildren. Thank you Evan for sharing this and giving me pause as I guide my son throughout life.
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Jeff, Thank you so much for your deeply thoughtful words about the story. I’m glad that Rabbit’s journey meant something to you and provided a meaningful reflection on life’s lessons and purity of spirit. It’s touching to know that the story gave you pause and insights into guiding your son. Your appreciation and connection mean a lot to me. Wishing you and your family happiness on your own journeys.
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Nice ending, the touch of empathy, the narrator tells of Rabbit’s trying to find perfection in the world, the positive idealist…..kind of an intriguing tale for me about how she was able to be in the world despite its flaws and tragedies. She didn’t let it grind her down. The narrator seems to be pondering this, for it seemed she was “born this way,” in the words of Lady Gaga.
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Harrison, Thank you so much for reading! I’m glad you found the ending satisfying! It’s intriguing how her character resonated with you as someone who navigates life’s challenges without letting them overwhelm her. The comparison to being “born this way,” as Lady Gaga puts it, adds an interesting layer to Rabbit’s journey. Your insights into the narrator’s contemplation on Rabbit’s innate strength are much appreciated!
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