The Bunday Evening Thumps

Good Evening, Everybun!

First thing in the morning, my hoomin waddles in half asleep and starts dispensing breakfast cookies. Everybun gets a half multivitamin digestive. It's easy now - take two cookies and break them in half. Something for urinary function support is next - same thing. Charlie, Gus, myself, and the foster girl, Rheya, get half a cookie. My hoomin shuffles back and forth through the house, trying to have a meaningful conversation with us before his coffea kicks in. It goes nowhere, but we get the plain old digestives. A whole cookie each this time!

I get my pellet refill and with a full mouf, try to size up the hoomin - could I weasel out another digestive from him?

I decide to loaf instead, and for a moment, tune into my mind-reading channel. It's an instant regret. My hoomin sits next to me, reading some miserable article from the international press. I like it better when he sticks to reading about regulations, weather, or anything else for those lesson plans. Then he picks up something and holds it in his lap, paying close attention. It's a small item, made up of lots and lots of paper. I don't recognize it at first.

I try to tune in closer. I'm picking up a sense of dread again. It's early 1940; somewhere in France, a town called Cambrai. Pilots, lots and lots of pilots waiting, anticipating something terrible, but none dare to say anything about it. The story will get worse before it gets better, so I change the frequency again and leave the mind-reading behind.

I watch the hoomin for a while longer and wait for Charlie to come over. She's the best at getting cookies out of the hoomin.

And sure enough, there's the sound of the bag getting opened. How in the world does she do it!?

Good Night, and Good Luck!
- Espresso