A Bad Egg for Easter | By Philip Chong Wan Ning
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| Illustration by Carmen & Lin Zhenming. |
“Where do you think you’re going?”
“A walk.”
“Can’t you stay for—”
“No,” I said before slamming the door.
The crisp Friday night wind brushed against my face as I tread down the cold concrete sidewalk lacing the neighbourhood. I heaved a sigh of relief. Finally, I thought, a week of suffering leads up to this half an hour.
It has become a bit of a routine of mine to take an evening walk every Friday night for two reasons: a) I do not like my family’s company and b) I like to test this strange phenomenon that has been occurring recently. Item a) is quite self-explanatory so here is b): Every Friday at 9pm, my life becomes a blur and I do not know what happens, but by the time I have gained consciousness, it would be the next day. So far, nothing out of the ordinary has happened; I’ve only gained a few knee bruises, and those were the exciting days.
I took my usual stroll. Not too far from my house, but far enough to drown out the rambunctious noise of my mother tending to my playful siblings. The sound of dried leaves crunching underneath my footsteps grew prominent as I progressed into the more silent parts of the neighbourhood.
8:57pm, I looked left and right to see some of my neighbours walking home from our local church.
8:58pm, I saw families decorating their houses with painted eggs and colourful streamers.
8:59pm, I just remembered: it’s Good Friday. Gosh, another reason to stay cooped up in my room for the weekend. I strongly do not like celeb—
9:00pm, and I blacked out.
***
The warm sun rays of Saturday morning peeked through my bedroom blinds as I shuffled lazily to turn off my blaring alarm clock. The house was eerily silent; almost too quiet for a house of three children and two dogs. Secretly hoping my whole family had left for a church event without me, I got up enthusiastically. As I extended my hand to turn my bedroom door knob, I noticed something wrapped in thin aluminum in my hands. I must have been too excited to have the whole house to myself for once, I guessed.
I unwrapped the item only to quickly scrunch it back up: it was no doubt chocolate, and not just any chocolate, but the cheap Easter chocolate my mother would buy in bulk this time of the year. I walked down the stairs grumpily, determined to tell her my loathing for the cheap factory-made choc—
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| Photo by Tsang Ching Nam. |
“Good morning” said a voice.
“Ma, for the last time: stop feeding me these disgusting—”
Hold on. That wasn’t my mother’s voice.
I hastily rubbed my eyes and, lo and behold, before me on my dining room chair, sitting on a stack of dictionaries, was a fluffy coffee-brown rabbit, with a comically large blue plaid bow tied around its white tuft of a neck: the very idea of an Easter Bunny manifested in this overgrown rat.
“What’s going on?”
The bunny looked at me with its beady dark eyes. “Oh, I believe this must be quite a shock to you. Hello, I am the Easter Bunny. I know, I should’ve knocked first, but I need your help.”
“No, what I need YOU to do is to go back to whichever porcelain mug you hopped out of,” I said, pulling up a frying pan in self-defense.
“Hah. Funny, I like funny. Listen, I went out with my friends last night from the farm and maybe, just maaaybe had a bit too much carrot juice and kinda lost my way—” I had a feeling “carrot juice” was an implication for another beverage. I am not eight. “—anyways, I need you to help me buy a bus ticket back by tomorrow or the missus will kill me.”
“Why can’t you just buy it yourself?” I asked before he showed me his paws. “…Right.”
I hesitated. Why should I help him? I thought. Here, before me, was a talking bunny whom I have never met, and he has the audacity to ask for favors! I do not even believe in Easter—
“I will give you back your family.” The bunny’s voice suddenly dropped an octave lower, almost threatening.
I felt my heart sink. Did he just take my family? The same silence that I so very much appreciated just ten minutes ago turned menacingly eerie. The empty room was suddenly filled with panic as the ticking of the wall clock grew louder. This was a race against time. What if my family was gone forever?
“Okay let’s go,” I responded hastily, clumsily reaching for my coat as my tummy let out a huge growl.
“May I offer you a nice egg in this trying time?” said the bunny.
“No, let’s leave now.” I was almost choking on my own words as I headed out.
“Alright then, follow me.” The bunny smirked, and it was the kind of smirk you give after blatantly lying to a gullible kid.
***
The town bus terminal was a bit more packed than usual, aside from the usual rush hour crowd. We saw families rushing in and out of the terminal, physically struggling with luggage big and small. The lines for the ticket booth would make the Loch Ness monster jealous.
“This way,” said the bunny, as he hopped away from the ticket booths. We walked a little over to a quiet nearby bookstore and straight to the children’s book aisle. He scanned through the colorful books before locking his eyes on a particularly large book.
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| Source: Adobe Stock. |
“That one,” he said, pointing his paws at a book titled Cars, Trucks, and Things That Go. Confused, I took the book and leafed through the pages. We carefully skimmed past fire trucks and bulldozers before reaching page 4.
“That’s it, that’s my ride!” he exclaimed, pointing excitedly at a big yellow bus.
“Great, well, I’ll see you around then, I’ll miss—” I said, before the bunny kicked me and I fell into the deep spiraling abyss of the book.
***
My surroundings were misty, almost like a faint fever dream. The place felt like the bus terminal, but something was off. As my vision readjusted to my new surroundings, I started to make out bits and pieces of the atmosphere. What was once the 2D caricatures materialized into life-sized vehicles, with their vibrant paint finishes almost blinding under the bright April sun.
“Wow,” I gasped, taking in every bit of my surroundings.
“Welcome to the Lands Beyond: Inter-Realm Transit.” The bunny grinned, guiding me to the ticket booth. “This is how a lot of us travel.”
“Us?”
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| Source; iStock |
“Yeah,” The bunny looked left and right quickly and pulled me in to whisper. “Do you see that lady there? That’s the world-renowned orthodontist, Miss Tooth Fairy.” He pointed at an antsy young lady holding a large rucksack. The bunny redirected my attention to the back. “And that man in red over there, you may recognize him as Santa. He only works one day a year and has his own ride, so he spends a lot of time just loitering around.”
Absolutely dumbfounded, I followed the bunny quietly to purchase his ticket. We were ordered to wait at Platform 6 bound for Hasenlochstadt.
We sat at Platform 6 waiting for his bus. Though the hustle and bustle of the fairytale platform was cacophonous, it did nigh on nothing to break the awkward silence between the bunny and I. A 15-minute stillness that felt like forever was finally broken by him.
“So, what’s your story?” he asked.
“My story?”
“Yeah, the whole angsty teen aesthetic.”
“Excuse you, ‘angsty teen aesthetic’?”
“Believe me, as a rabbit, I have 200 children and I think at least 13 of them turned out just like you.”
I was silent and felt attacked.
“I just…hate participating in holiday events,” I began. “I thought that Santa Claus, Leprechauns—even you, I thought you were all just cheap pseudo-traditions concocted by large corporate companies to sell products. I mean, shouldn’t Easter be about the resurrection of Jesus Christ? How is it even related to a rabbit that goes around giving eggs and chocolate?” I retorted, feeling weird to have finished a rant for once without being cut off. The Easter bunny simply nodded understandingly.
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| Source: The Spruce. |
“I see,” he said.
“So… you guys are actually real?”
“What are you? Eight?” the bunny laughed. “You’re just like Bunny #34, or #65, I cannot remember. Always so skeptical.”
I was quiet again.
“That’s good. It’s human nature to question things that cannot be so easily understood.” the bunny continued, eyeing the oncoming bus. “And while, yes, to some extent, people do use holidays as opportunities to expand their businesses, but our job here in reality has two goals: let the young ones believe and bring families together.”
The bus that was a tiny dot in the distance grew larger as it approached the platform.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I have a job tomorrow that requires me to travel to each and every shopping mall, house and church all around the world delivering colorful eggs and be featured in every storybook. Exhausting, right? But even then, I still cannot wait to go back to my burrow with my wife and all my children at the end of the day, and I’d do it again and again for years to come.”
The bunny’s big beady eyes were crystalline, almost as if he were tearing up. The bus halted, leaving a trail of steam in its wake. Mythical passengers both humanoid and creature started to board the large vehicle.
“Don’t be afraid to participate in holiday activities,” he added. “Engagements like these bring friends and families together, so it is important to play your part and show your relatives how much you care to involve yourself in these events. I don’t see why you shouldn’t have a little fun on the way.”
The bunny hopped onto the bus and the door closed shut. As I was leaving the platform, he stuck his head out of the window and called to me.
“Don’t forget to eat your chocolate before it melts!” He flashed a cheeky smile, and that was the last I heard from him as the loud engine revving filled the air and the bus slowly departed from the platform.
To my right, there was a large, cheerful sign board saying “Now Leaving The Lands Beyond: Inter-realm Transit. See you again!”, and beyond that, an exit shrouded in fog. As the mist lifted, the ever so familiar sound of people and vehicles grew louder and soon, I found myself back in my local bus terminal.
***
The journey up the road leading towards my house that day was a long one. The atmosphere and my every emotion felt a hue warmer. As the sweet flavor of cocoa lingered in my mouth, I opened my front door to be greeted by my family in the living room. My mother, who looked the most worried, rushed over to pull me into a warm embrace, followed by my little brother and little sister.
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| Source: Pond5. |
What was once a cold room which I despised lit up. It felt nice. It felt happy.
“Happy Easter, everyone,” I said.
From that day forth, my Friday night blackouts continue, though thankfully, nothing bizarre happens when I wake up the next day. I am quite relieved, especially now that I’m afraid of losing my family again. But every now and then, I would wake up on Saturday mornings and find myself secretly hoping to see that mischievous bunny smiling back at me.
Hasenlochstadt = “Hasenloch” meaning bunny hole and “stadt” meaning city in German. The tradition of the easter bunny was brought about by 1700s German immigrants who settled in America, bringing their tradition of an egg-laying bunny called “Osterhase”.
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