Flamy the Dragonet. Dmitrii Emets

was writing a poem, which he intended on reading at the festive dinner. The poem was awfully stubborn and did not want to be written. Pookar was chewing on a pencil and suffering.

      “Give me a rhyme for the word ‘ground’!” He nudged Olga in the side.

      “Leave me alone. Don’t you see I’m busy?” The doll was spreading jam on bread.

      “No, you’re not… I am. Spreading jam on bread is nothing like creating verses.”

      “Then create them in silence. Or else you’ll be left without sandwiches,” the doll Olga talked back.

      When the preparations were finished, everyone was invited to the table. The bunnies sat on small stools with carved legs, Olga sat on an armchair, Pookar climbed onto the cat’s back, and Flamy placed his heavy head on the edge of the table.

      Everyone glanced around the table, wondering where to begin. The dragonet looked fondly at the jar of mustard. Sineus and Truvor shyly treated each other to carrots. The cat Muffin dreamily sniffed the can of fish as if smelling a rose.

      “Please wait! I’ve finished the poem!” Pookar shouted suddenly.

      He struck a pose, stretched out his right arm, cleared his throat, ran his fingers through his messy red hair, and began to wail in anguish,

      “Cats walked along the ground,

      Their legs moving,

      Cockroaches were all around,

      In manna kasha bathing.”

      The toys clapped their hands. “Not bad! Not bad at all. A good poem. Well done!”

      Pookar looked down modestly. “I dedicate my quatrain to the dragonet Flamy.”

      Flamy was moved. “Really? Very nice of you. Would you read it once more, as I wasn’t listening the first time. I didn’t know that the poem was dedicated to me,” he admitted.

      “Then why did you praise me?” Pookar asked sullenly. “Okay, listen!”

      “Cats walked along the ground,

      Their legs moving,

      Cockroaches were all around,

      In manna kasha bathing.”

      Pookar repeated the quatrain three more times, and each time it seemed to him all the more successful. “I read and I weep! I can’t even believe that I wrote it,” he said.

      Pookar’s poem was to everyone’s liking. Muffin liked that Pookar mentioned cats. The bunnies liked that everything rhymed and, most importantly, no one was eaten or killed. Olga alone was dissatisfied with the cockroaches. It seemed to her unhygienic.

      “Let’s eat! No need to put it off! Long live cabbage and carrot pies!” the bunnies shouted.

      “What a wonderful day! Today I woke up, today a great poem was dedicated to me, and I’ve found friends!” Flamy exclaimed, dipping his long forked tongue into the mustard.

      “We’re also glad that we found you and you’ve become our friend!” Olga assured him.

      “And we’re even more glad that you don’t eat jam,” Pookar added, licking the spoon.

      The meal was barely over and the dishes put away when everyone heard a key in the lock and voices in the hallway.

      “It’s the people! Hide, quick!” they shouted to Flamy. He darted around the room, searching for somewhere to hide. He was fussing so that he knocked over a chair and made a lot of noise.

      “What fell in the room?” Mama asked in the hallway.

      “The cat probably broke something again. I’ll take a look,” Papa replied.

      The door handle started to turn. The bunnies clung to each other in fright and closed their eyes. Olga stayed still and pretended to be an ordinary doll in a white lace dress with a little pocket on the apron and a big blue bow. A doll that said “Ma-ma!” when she was turned upside down. However, before the door opened, Pookar all the same pulled the blanket from the bed and threw it on Flamy at least to hide the dragon somehow.

      Papa came into the room and looked around. “It looks like the cat. She jumped on the back of a chair and knocked it over!” he said.

      “Meow! Meow!” Muffin rubbed against his leg. In the presence of people Muffin uttered only “meow!” because she was certain that far from everyone was worthy of acquaintance with a talking cat.

      Mama came into the room. She immediately noticed the blanket on the floor. It even seemed to her that something was moving under it. “Oh! There’s something there!” she exclaimed.

      Pookar half opened one eye and saw the blanket lift a little at the edge. He closed his eyes, imagining what would happen now. Shouts, surprise, fright, and then someone would come from the zoo and take Flamy away. “There’s no one there! Just the blanket lying about… It only seemed so to you,” Pookar heard.

      “But I saw! There was something there!”

      “You’re tired from work, my dear. Time to take a vacation or, perhaps… quit it altogether, this work…”

      “Yes, but you know…” the voices began to move away.

      Mama and Papa went out, continuing their adult, uninteresting conversation. The toys breathed a sigh of relief.

      “The danger’s over! But where’s Flamy? Where did he go?”

      Pookar and the bunnies went around the room, looking through all the cracks. Flamy had seemingly vanished into thin air. Pookar even rummaged in his pockets just in case and Olga looked into the teacups. Flamy was nowhere.

      “What if we dreamt him up?” Sineus suggested.

      “Exactly! Otherwise, where would he have gone to?” Truvor agreed.

      Olga and Pookar only made a helpless gesture. They could not understand anything. Ringing laughter was unexpectedly heard from above. The toys raised their heads and saw nothing. Just a most ordinary ceiling. But what was that? Where did the other chandelier come from? Were there really two? In fact, there were two chandeliers, like twins, on the ceiling.

      “Hello, hello! You don’t recognize me?” the second chandelier said cheerfully. It tumbled onto the floor but did not break; instead, it turned into a beaming dragon.

      “I didn’t know that I can do all these tricks. Only where didn’t you search! Even in your pockets! Ha-ha! Thought you dreamt me up?”

      “But how did you do that?”

      “I transformed!” Flamy uttered with difficulty through his laughter. “Became invisible and then changed. Listen, if I can, it means I’m already grown! I grew while sleeping in the trunk.”

      “Crazy! I would like that!” Pookar said enviously.

      “Pookar, you don’t have such talent and don’t try,” Olga laughed.

      Chapter Five

      A Very Difficult Old Geezer

      Masha’s parents often went visiting on weekends and she stayed home alone. They considered her old enough to occupy herself independently one night a week. However, everyone knows how boring a long, long night is when there is no one else around, all homework is done, and all cartoon recordings have already been watched eighty times. Of course, you could read a book, but who is going to read when no one sees this and praises you?

      One such Saturday Masha was sitting in the armchair and petting Muffin. The cat was purring sleepily. Masha was bored and did not know what she could occupy herself with. She almost started to cry from idleness, when she suddenly heard scurrying under the bed and Pookar (who do you think?) ran out from under there. Olga, her head covered with a dishcloth, was pursuing him.

      “Bad Pookar! Why did you add laundry detergent to my kasha? I’ve been spewing soap bubbles for an hour already!” Olga shouted.

      Here