Flamy the Dragonet

Chapter Three
The Dragonet Flamy

“Yes, I’m a dragon, a dragon… Don’t shine a light on me, it hurts the eyes.” Flamy testily confirmed, squinting.

“We didn’t know that dragons actually exist! We thought they’re fiction,” Olga was amazed.

“You yourself are fiction! Can say that about everyone. About you in the first place,” Flamy was indignant.

Pookar, with an apologetic smile, touched Falmy’s shiny scales with a finger. “Wow! Not fake! I thought you were stuffed. Good that we found you after all!”

Flamy irritably lashed himself on the side with his tail. “You didn’t find me at all because I wasn’t lost. I was sleeping in the trunk.”

“How long have you been sleeping here?” Olga asked.

“Not long. About ninety or a hundred years. Don’t remember exactly, I don’t have a calendar.”

“Oho-ho!” the bunnies were surprised. “That’s a very, very long time! You’re probably old?”

“I’m not old at all. I’m still young. I lost Mama. I cried a little bit, then got tired and went to sleep in the trunk. You haven’t seen my mama, by any chance?”

“What’s she like, your mama?”

“So very pretty! Like me, only bigger…”

“No, we haven’t met her. We’ve only seen dragons in pictures, how Dobrynya Nikitich^[2] defeated them,” Pookar declared.

“It’s all not true. He never defeated us. Grandpa told me this. Dobrynya came, saw Grandpa, scratched his head, apologized, and left.”

“Then where have all the dragons gone? Why don’t we meet them anywhere now?” Pookar tried to find out. He was standing closer to Flamy than the others were and examining him with suspicion.

“We hid. We hid a hundred years ago. Dragons can become invisible or change into different objects, but only when they’re already full-grown,” Flamy explained.

“But you can’t?”

“No, I can’t. I’m still young.”

“Nothing young about you! A hundred years!” Olga sniffed scornfully.

“Not my fault that we dragons take an awfully long time to grow up… I’m somewhat hungry. I haven’t eaten in a hundred years, and now I can eat anything,” Flamy said.

Sineus and Truvor started to tremble. “An-anything? Oh, mama!”

“We brought sandwiches. Would you like a sandwich, Flamy?” Olga asked.

“I would. But what is it?”

Olga laughed. She thought that everybody knew what a sandwich was. She pulled them out of the backpack and handed one to Flamy. The dragonet instantly swallowed it together with the wrapper. His face assumed a puzzled expression. “It seems that we don’t eat this rustling thing!”

“You haven’t tried unwrapping?” Pookar asked.

“Tasteless all the same.”

It was decided they would take the hungry dragon to the fridge in the kitchen. Flamy first squinted from the daylight, but soon grew accustomed and started to look around with interest. “Where are we? Whose burrow is this?”

“This is the hallway. It begins at the front door and ends at the kitchen,” the bunnies explained.

“Good thinking! Won’t get lost. Just go down the hall and sooner or later you get to the kitchen,” Flamy said gladly. He took a running start, flapped his wings, took off with difficulty, and opened the kitchen door with his head.

“See, this is the fridge,” the bunnies said. Usually everything was explained to them. Now they enjoyed feeling clever.

Flamy stretched his neck, grabbed the handle with his teeth, and the door clicked. The night before Masha and Mama went to the store and bought food for the entire week. What was not there! Milk, cheese, sausage, ham, oranges, a pot of diet soup for Mama, and a bottle of liqueur, which Papa drinks “for digestion.”

Flamy studied all this for a while and then asked, “Where’s the food? There are only some boxes and jars here!”

“The food is inside. First, wash your hands!” Olga ordered. She had not known Flamy for very long but was already giving him orders.

“Hands?” the dragon was surprised. “I have no hands! I only have feet, and a whole four of them!”

Olga pondered. “Well, okay! Wash your feet!” she said.

“What nonsense! Where is it seen that people wash their feet before meals? Maybe you’ll even say ears?” Pookar was outraged.

“It would be a good idea for some people to wash their ears, Pookar!” Olga said maliciously. Pookar stuck his tongue out at her.

“I want to eat! I want to eat!” Flamy grumbled.

Olga went to the refrigerator. “Soup?”

Flamy carefully licked the soup and shook his head.

“A chop, then? You should like chops.”

The dragon took a bite and grimaced. “No, I don’t want chops.”

In the next three minutes, it was revealed that Flamy ate neither bread, potatoes, sausage, nor hot dogs. However, Pookar liked most of all that Flamy did not like jam.

“Wait, I’ll see what else I can find!” Olga said and went to the kitchen cupboard.

Pookar took advantage of her absence and decided to play a prank. “I know what dragons like. Try mustard, Flamy! It’s very tasty! You just have to swallow a lot quickly.”

“Don’t, don’t!” the bunnies wanted to shout but did not have time.

The hungry dragonet instantly licked all the mustard out of the jar. However, instead of jumping to the ceiling, as Pookar expected, Flamy licked his lips contentedly and let out a jet of flame from his nose.

“Wow! I couldn’t do it earlier. Yummy! Perhaps, I’d be able to have some more!” he exclaimed.

“Why does it smell burnt in here? Did you light a match? I’ll give it to you!” Olga asked the bunnies severely when she returned.

“Not us! It’s Flamy! Pookar fed him mustard and he breathed fire right away! Flamy also didn’t know that he can.”

“Yeah! It’s me! Isn’t it great?” Flamy boasted.

Olga saw an empty mustard jar and started to advance menacingly toward Pookar. He instantly hid behind Flamy.

“You don’t understand, doll! He liked it. All dragons eat mustard.”

“It’s true, it’s true! And even red pepper in pods. Because we breathe fire,” Flamy confirmed.

“You’re lucky, Pookaroid, or else I’d give you a licking as mustard dessert!” Olga stopped chasing Pookar.

Realizing this, Pookar looked out bravely from behind the dragon. “Well, assuming it’s still unknown who would beat up whom,” he declared.

Flamy and his new friends moved from the kitchen to the room and played indoor Olympic games. The bunnies Sineus and Truvor excelled in jumping. They could easily jump over Flamy. Pookar did not jump so well but somersaulted remarkably. His round body was created ideally for somersaults. Flamy flew around the kitchen like an awkward, heavy bee and almost broke the lamp.

The doll Olga was afraid of staining her new dress and just clapped her hands and laughed, watching the others having fun. She suddenly remembered that Mama and Papa would soon return from work. The adults would scold Masha for scattering the toys, so they had to tidy up the room.

Flamy hesitated a little and asked, “Can I live with you in the room? It’s boring alone in the closet!”

Pookar and Olga looked at each other and agreed. “Of course, you can. Only be careful. Nobody must see you,” said Olga.

“Why?” Flamy asked.

“Because!” Pookar interrupted. “If they see you, they’ll take you away to the zoo, detain you with your head in a test tube and study you. People – they’re like that.”

“Are we telling Masha about Flamy?” the bunnies asked together.

Pookar shook his head. “Not yet. Though big in appearance, she’s but a girl, and you can expect anything from them.”

The doll Olga did not like any attack on girls. “But we can’t tell a lie! It’s not good to lie,” she objected.

“Who’s lying? To lie is to say something that isn’t. But when you don’t talk about what is, it’s a CON-SPI-RA-CY.”

“Then it’s clear. It’s quite another matter. Then we won’t tell anyone,” the bunnies promised. They liked difficult words more than they understood their meaning.

“Hurray!” Flamy shouted. “I’ll live in the room! When someone comes, I’ll hide. Right?”

“Uh-huh,” Pookar assured him.

Chapter Four
About What Every Little Dragonet Can Do

In the evening on the green carpet in front of the dollhouse, Olga gathered all the toys to celebrate the resettlement of the dragonet Flamy to the room. Olga was bustling about in the kitchen. Sineus and Truvor were helpers; they carried spoons, forks, bowls of jam, cookies and pickles, cans of fish for the cat Muffin, and jars of mustard for Flamy.

Meanwhile, Muffin was teaching Flamy good manners. She found him funny but a little uncouth, and immediately got busy with his education.

“How do you walk? You stomp like a rhino! Should walk like this… Feet move softly and carefully!” Muffin strolled gracefully along the rug.

“Ne-uh. If I walk like that, then what about my fearsome dragon huff? All dragons huff. They can’t do it differently,” Flamy grumbled.

“You’re as stubborn as a rhino!” Rhino was the only wild beast known to Muffin. She once saw a picture of it in a children’s book and remembered it very well. Since then, it had become her source of negative examples for life. “Walk like a rhino,” “stupid like a rhino,” “drink milk like a rhino,” the cat repeated incessantly.

“It’s unclear why this Moscow cat is obsessed with the rhino. Muffy, watch you don’t marry a rhino! You would!” Pookar once remarked and immediately got one on the forehead for it. The cat Muffin’s foot might be soft, but it was painful.

At that moment, Pookar 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 Olga and Pookar noticed Masha and froze.

“You, you’re real! You can talk!” Masha exclaimed, beside herself with amazement. Then she paused in indecision. She did not know what to do: get angry that the toys did not reveal the secret to her sooner or be pleased that now she would always have someone to play with.

“Hello, Masha! How’s it going, how’re you growing?” Pookar shouted.

“Never met anyone in my life who could say so much nonsense in one minute! Oh!” Olga released a soap bubble.

Masha squatted down beside the arguing toys. “You’re funny. Now I can always play with you!”

“That’s for sure. And even right now. We’ll go ride the elevator! Up and down, up and down,” Pookar suggested.

Masha had her doubts. “I don’t know. They left the apartment to me. They said that I should look after the cat and not open the door to anyone.”

“Poor excuses! If you don’t want to play with us, then say so. You won’t be opening the door to anyone. How could you if you’re riding the elevator?”

“And the cat? How will I look after the cat?”

“We’ll bring the cat along. Enrich your distasteful life with new impressions!” Pookar declared.

Masha, the doll Olga, and Pookar left the apartment and summoned the elevator. Draping over Masha’s arm was the cat Muffin, who wished to keep her own scholarship secret and said only “meow!” and “sh-sh!”

Masha and the toys just rode the elevator at first, but they soon got bored and started to frolic. Pookar came up with ringing all the doorbells in a row and as soon as steps were heard in the hallway, springing into the elevator and riding off. They played this game for quite a long time. It was fun. When a door was opened and someone stuck his head out, the pranksters were already laughing in the elevator.

“What if someone finds out what we are doing here?” Masha asked.

Pookar contemptuously brushed this aside with his chubby hand. “Fiddlesticks-theatrics! Would the residents in indoor slippers chase us down the stairs?” He, however, did not take into account that in the world there was Pirozhkov.

Pookar jumped out of the elevator on the eighth floor and, after leaping atop the back of the cat Muffin, persistently rang several times at a metal door. In this apartment lived Peter Petrovich Pirozhkov. He was a terribly difficult old geezer. Masha only had to make a little bit of noise in her room, or the cat Muffin to drop some plate, and he would begin to bang on the heater. Pirozhkov banged long and hard, and then ran to complain to Masha’s parents that they would not let him rest “for time honestly earned.”

“What have you done! This is Pirozhkov’s apartment! Now he’ll catch us!” Masha was frightened.

“Have no fear. It’ll all be done on the sly, no cry,” Pookar calmed her.

The bell rang and Pirozhkov darted to the peephole. The peephole was Peter Petrovich’s favourite surveillance station. Even when they were not ringing his apartment but the neighbour’s, he would then spy on who and why. However, now he saw nothing through the peephole and realized that whoever was hiding behind the door was small. On running to the door and opening it, Pirozhkov managed to see someone’s legs running into the elevator, which quickly went up.

“Nasty neighbourhood kids being naughty. Well, I’ll fix them! I’ll be on the watch, catch them, and then take them to their parents!” Pirozhkov decided. He quickly ran up the stairs, catching up with the elevator. “Now I’ll show you! You’ll remember me until your discharge from the hospital, you little brats!” Pirozhkov shouted.

Masha was horrified and looked at Pookar reproachfully. Masha was a cautious girl and wished that they had not started all this.

However, Pookar did not seem in the least worried. “The game’s just beginning! Now we’ll have a race of old men in slippers in the opposite direction! On your mark! Get set! Go!” he said. He pressed the “Stop” button and sent the elevator down.

“How do you know what buttons to push?” Olga was surprised.

“I operate by scientific poke and prod. Press all the buttons in a row. Maybe some will work,” Pookar explained. He stopped the elevator on the eighth floor and started to ring Pirozhkov’s doorbell continuously.

Meanwhile, Pirozhkov, craftily lurking on the last floor, was waiting for the kids to get closer. He heard the doorbell of his apartment and realized that he had been taken in. Besides, he remembered that he had forgotten to close the door and did not even bring the key with him.

Pirozhkov rushed down the stairs, shouting, “Now I’ll show you! You and your parents will be evicted, mark my words!”

While Pookar was ringing Pirozhkov’s doorbell, the elevator left. The pranksters quickly looked around to see where they could hide. A footfall along the stairs was approaching. It seemed that Pirozhkov was about to drop onto their heads. At the last minute Masha, Muffin, Pookar, and Olga managed to climb down a few steps and hid behind the garbage chute.

Pirozhkov, breathing hard, came running onto the landing and looked around. “Where did they go? I’ll find out who it is!” He hurried to his apartment to look out the window, waiting for the pranksters to go out the entrance.

Masha sighed with relief. “Phew, got away with it! Almost got caught! I won’t play this stupid game anymore!”

Pookar nodded agreement. “Fine, we won’t play this! We’ll play stretch.”

Before Masha could stop the up-to-mischief Pookar, he instantly pulled out of the garbage chute a piece of thick rope and firmly tied it to the handles of the two opposite doors – Pirozhkov’s apartment and the one across the landing. Both doors opened in, so when one started to pull in, the other door would slam shut.

“Now the fun begins!” Pookar exclaimed and rang both doorbells.

It is necessary to say that in the opposite apartment lived a saleslady of the supermarket dairy department by the name of Avdokhina. This was a wiry moustached female with a shrill voice, who could scream so loudly that even Pirozhkov was afraid of her. Avdokhina and Pirozhkov argued all the time and often spied on each other through the peepholes. They were so similar that they could not get along.

When Avdokhina heard the doorbell, she went to the door and abruptly pulled the handle towards herself. Shortly before that, she had heard Pirozhkov’s indignant voice on the stairs and now decided that he had come to swear. However, the door did not budge. The rope was hindering it.

“Is that so!” Avdokhina shouted and leaned hard on the handle. But she succeeded in opening the door only a very little. With this, she slammed shut the door of Pirozhkov, who was also trying to look out on to the landing.

“Aha, got caught! Holding the door on the outside! Now they won’t have time to escape!” Pirozhkov crowed. He dug his heels in the threshold and began to pull towards himself. Avdokhina felt the tension on the other side and, not to be outdone, leaned all her weight onto the door.

A game of tug of war had begun! Pookar stood in the middle between the neighbouring doors, too short to be seen through the peephole, and watched the scene with interest. Pirozhkov or Avdokhina had to pull with all their might so the door would open a little, but only a little because the rope was short.

“Well, keep it up! Now I have you!” Pirozhkov shouted loudly.

Avdokhina heard this cry and decided that her neighbour was the one who would not let her out of the apartment. “Oh, you scarecrow! Completely lost your mind! Now I’ll get you!” she shouted.

Pirozhkov recognized Avdokhina’s voice and blamed her for everything. He even vaguely suspected that it was Avdokhina who rode the elevator and teased him. “Now I’ll crush you, hooligan! Even a grown woman! Let go of the door now. I’ll tear you to pieces!” Pirozhkov yelled in a voice hoarse from indignation.

Pookar looked at Masha and quietly asked how she liked the new game. Masha shook her head and threatened him with a finger. However, she was glad that they were able to play a trick on Pirozhkov, who was always annoying her parents.

“Let go of the door immediately! I order you!” Pirozhkov yelled.

“Let go yourself!” Avdokhina screamed.

Attracted by the noise, the occupants of the other apartments started to look out. It was time to stop the game. Taking advantage of a short respite of both Avdokhina and Pirozhkov, who were quite exhausted from their exertion, Pookar untied the rope from the door handles, and together with Masha, the cat, and the doll Olga darted away to their own apartment.

There the little imps put their ears to the door and listened. It so happened that Avdokhina and Pirozhkov pulled the door at the same time, counting on a sudden charge to capture the opponent by surprise. They jumped out onto the landing and collided face to face. Each decided that he had caught the other at the scene of the crime.

What happened next, Masha did not manage to find out, because Mama and Papa had returned from visiting. She did not want her parents to find out that she had gone out of the apartment in their absence. All the same, they would not believe that it was not her but Pookar who had started everything. Parents do not understand a lot of things, and it is a pity. They were also children once.