Text by Joseph Pleass

The rabbit lay dying in the corner of its cage.
“Can we have this one, Daddy?”
I couldn’t understand why she wanted the thing, it was clearly almost dead. It couldn’t have had
more than two hours left in it. Besides, even if it weren’t dying, it wasn’t a beautiful rabbit.
“There’s lots of other animals here, don’t you want any of those?”
“No, I’ve looked at all the animals and I want this one.”
I couldn’t argue, she had seen every animal in the shop. I didn’t mind though, I liked to watch
her look at them– I liked the way she wouldn’t ask questions. Most other kids her age, they
constantly ask what everything is and you end up making up answers for them. She just looked
and asked ‘What’s your name?’ or ‘What are you eating?’– just fifteen minutes earlier she was
talking at the aquariums. The fish followed her fingers across the glass and spread like fireworks
when she left.
“How about the fish you liked?”
“I want this one.” She gets on to her toes and pushes her face into the cage. It doesn’t flinch, it
just keeps staring out into the pet shop floor. I want to see how sick it is, so I put my fingers
through the wire. My fingers are fat and dirty and barely make it half an inch through the grill. I
think– ‘these must look like disgusting fat carrots to you’ or ‘you must see fingers all day poking
in to your cage, and I bet these are the ugliest’. The rabbit just lays there.
“Honey, I don’t think you want this rabbi-“
“I do!”
“Look, this rabbit it’s going… it’s not got long… It-“
“It’s dying.”
“Well, yeah.”
“I know.”
“Well, its going to be a waste of money if it just dies isn’t it-“
“It’s not a waste of money because I love it.”
She could’ve meant it I guess, the way she looked at that rabbit was the same way she looked
at everything else to me. She looks at everything for a long time, and from below. I never see
things from below anymore; I’m too tall and everything is placed right under my nose. I open up
my wallet and there is enough money to buy the rabbit with.
“What are you going to call it?”
“It doesn’t have a name.”
“Well, you have to name it? It’s your pet.”
“Why? It’s going to die soon anyway.”
We buy the rabbit, and she carries it to the car. She rides the whole way home stroking it on her
lap, singing songs at the radio.