Harbinger of Rabbits

Gina gave a tight smile and set her teacup back into its saucer with a double clink and hid a wince. It was less firm than she’d have preferred. Confidence, that was key. She straightened her shoulders, grateful her back was to a wall, and tried to widen her expression into something welcoming. “It’s been a while since I’ve had anyone over. I’m afraid I’m out of practice.”

The words passed muster. Samantha tucked a nonexistent strand of hair behind one ear and re-crossed her legs. The duchess slant, of course, and her shoulders were already straight beneath the shell-pink cardigan and matching pearls. “The pandemic was hard upon us all.”

Gina covered her jolt with a sip of tea. “Yes…yes, of course.”

She didn’t relax for another hour, but the other woman had agreed Olivia could join her precious princesses twice a week, and that was what she needed. “Let the indoctrination begin,” she murmured to the photo on the wall, with a hand upon the tension in her lower back as she shut the door. No one needed to know the snapshot of a bearded man camping was stolen from the internet in an attempt to look normal. She rubbed her neck and stretched. “It’s a step toward trust, anyway.”

“What’s indoctrination, Mommy?” The voice broke through her reverie.

Her grin was real this time. The carpet rubbed across exposed knees as Gina knelt down and opened her arms for a hug. “Nothing, honey. Remember Samantha? She’s a little formal, that’s all.”

Stepford wives formal, but there’d be time enough for that conversation in a few years. She hoped. Besides, it might provide stability amongst all the moves.

Olivia wrinkled her nose and tossed her head, dropping her fuzzy school bag by the plastic desk and aiming straight for the miniature kitchen with its plastic food. “I’ll cook dinner!”

“Sounds delicious.” Gina put both hands on her neck this time, pressing to the point of pain. “We’ve been in this house a while. Do you like it here?”

“S’okay,” her daughter mumbled. Plastic pots and pans banged against each other. “Chicken! I miss the woods. And my pet chicken.”

They’d left the last house at a dead run, minutes ahead of the harbinger. Gina’s adrenaline spiked at the memory, and she sank back into the floral armchair. Sweat beaded her forehead.

Better Olivia never knew what happened to her beloved chicken. A cloud of white feathers and blood caught in frantic headlights, still drifting in the air, as tires squealed with a desperate crunch of gravel as rubber bit into pavement and the car slewed its burdens, screaming, into the night.

She’d thought they’d be safe if they couldn’t be found by humans. That rural Wisconsin would have offered protection.

Several deep breaths later, she rolled her arms in circles to ease the twitchiness that had been coming on for the past month. Perhaps deciding to trust in Samantha was a bad idea, but she could really use those extra hours at the diner.

“The bunny would be good as a pet,” Olivia said casually, and put plastic spaghetti onto a trash can lid serving in lieu of a plate. “All soft and furry. Do you think he’d let me pet him?”

“Bunny?” Gina went cold. A hand grasped the wall, and she hadn’t realized she’d gotten to her feet. “What bunny? Where is the bunny?”

“Come eat dinner, Mommy.”

Interminable minutes later, Gina had “mmmm’ed” her way through four plates of fake spaghetti. “I guess you’d better get potato peeling duty next.”

“Ew.” Olivia had giggled, and for just a fleeting moment, Gina could pretend all was right with the world, and that the juice she’d served her daughter with plastic food hadn’t been spiked with a sleeping agent.

Her world was still cold when she went into the closet. “Too good to last,” she whispered at the go-bag. Gina studied her phone’s security camera app. “Yep. He’s found us, the little…sniff.”

Habit made her self-censor.

On her doorstep crouched a rabbit, for all the world an adorable bundle of harmless fur. The bunny was innocence personified, even sniffing at one of Olivia’s scattered toys. A ridiculous phobia. Sandie, one of the other waitresses at the diner three houses back, had laughed, even put a stuffed plushie in her locker as a joke.

She knew better. She’d dealt with that twitching nose and whiskers, felt those punishing kicks, had the scars from those claws.

It had only taken a single instance of ignoring the harbinger to understand the doom that trailed behind. She didn’t need to wait until morning.

Sandie had, and look how that had ended.

Gina shouldered the pack and returned to the living room, where her daughter lay oblivious. Every movement was sluggish and frozen, driven by terror so deep it woke her screaming. The instinct to curl into the fetal position was overwhelming. Had it been just her, she might have given in by now. “Sorry, darling. I thought we’d escaped him here.”

She hoisted her daughter’s boneless weight into her arms and balanced the phone in her free hand. The app showed the back door was clear, and the path to the car. It wouldn’t be for long. She wished she’d cut the grass this weekend so she could be sure.

“Just run. Just run.” She set the phone on the low shelf, below where Olivia’s autumn jacket still hung, near outgrown. Phone and jacket would both remain here. The keys next to the phone, she’d keep until they could trade in for another beater, on the way to the next bolt hole. She twisted the keys in her hand until she found the silver one that read Chevrolet. “Get to the car and go.”

Sucking in rapid breaths, she felt the doorknob, near frozen under her sweating palm. “Go,” she repeated. “Just run.”

She was panting by the time she’d dashed the short distance to her car, an ancient station wagon with wood paneling. The keys had fumbled their way into the lock on the third try, a miracle she was properly grateful for. She’d lain Olivia on the front bench seat, still unconscious, and hadn’t bothered to remove the pack before starting the car. She’d stop in a few minutes. Safety would come with escape, not seatbelts.

The engine made an odd whirring noise.

“No. No!” Gina slammed a hand onto the steering wheel and swallowed, trying to steady her shaking hands. “Come on, come on.”

This time, the whir ended with a thump.

Gina looked up slowly, and met the rabbit’s malevolent gaze from where it sat, whiskers twitching, atop the hood of her ancient beater.

She yanked the keys from the ignition, then seized them from the floor. Her lips peeled back with a hiss. If her only weapon were her keys, she would take care of that rodent, once and for all.

Glass shattered.

A snarl escaped Gina’s throat.

Beside her, Olivia slept on.

***

This week, Becky Jones prompted me with, “The little rabbit was crouched on her doorstep.” Although this deserves far more attention to properly detail Gina’s terror, I couldn’t let the story be nearly as adorable as the suggestion implied. My prompt went to Leigh Kimmel, “I’m told this is the least human time of year.”

Check more out at MOTE, and please wear your seatbelt.