The frog and the queen

© Alla Krasnova, 2022

ISBN 978-5-0059-1141-4

Created with Ridero smart publishing system

This story, this marvelous story with so much croaking meaning, began exactly from the moment Betsy caught a frog and placed it in a three-liter jar. And then for another three weeks she could not get enough of her, until she died, either from hunger, or from the cold, or from an unnatural habitat.

– How so? exclaimed Betsy. «Did I really kill this nasty but beautiful animal? Holy crap, it was better for her to stay there, in the swamp… But I wanted what was best. Frog, please accept my condolences on your passing. I’m sorry you died. You will forgive me, won’t you? – said Betsy and brought her sharp-nosed profile to the jar, peering at the frog’s body lying like a rag. It was bitter for her to realize that the frog left this mortal world just at the moment when they became friends, and Betsy had already come up with a name for her – Goo-goo.

Betsy wanted to atone for her guilt before the frog, and she decided to atone for her in a slightly strange way. She decided to bury the frog in a human way, so that at least posthumously it would not be offended by her. Betsy buried her in her finest gold-painted box, where she had previously kept her jewelry. The final resting place of her little Gu-gu was in the garden, near the house, under a peach tree. Betsy also arranged a magnificent farewell to another world with all the honors and attributes, that is, she drank to her health in that better life.

***

Betsy was considered a wealthy lady, because she counted her husband’s money, but she herself did not work. It just so happened that she did not like to work, not because she was lazy, but simply it was not hers. Well, as people say – «not mine.» A person always feels that it is his, and what is not his, to work – it was not her occupation of life, because she chose with her heart, and not with her mind, like many. Of course, she didn’t like living on her husband’s money either, but it was better than doing something other than her own, that is, working. But despite the fact that it was unpleasant for her to live on other people’s money, there was still a bonus in this matter: she lived in a country house alone, with the exception of housekeepers. Her husband occasionally visited her, mostly on weekends, and he worked in the city and lived there. But lately, he came to her less and less often, so Betsy devoted herself almost all the days to herself, she had no friends, so she found a friend in a frog that, by some unknown miracle, galloped to their site. The frog was the best friend, she never argued, she always listened to what Betsy told her, and only sometimes, as if by chance, croaked. In general, Betsy felt that Gu-gu understood her, it was a kinship of souls and mutual understanding at first sight. Betsy knew that she could tell Goo-go whatever she wanted, and she would never blather it to her friends, she would take all the secrets with her to the grave. And so it happened, carried away, only much earlier than Betsy expected. After burying Gugu, Betsy realized that her life was divided into before and after. But trouble does not come alone.