WHITE CHICKEN

(A tale for ladies dreaming of an overseas prince)

The dung heap on the farm, rich in delicacies: bugs, worms, flies, and bugs, exuded a stupefying aroma of gastronomic possibilities. The chickens regularly came here to feast on natural protein products. Today, too, the chickens swarmed melanchologically, pecking at their prey.

The red rooster stood regally at the top and looking around the harem, sadly noted that the white hen never became part of him, did not become his favorite wife. Of course, he could force her into an alliance, but there would be no pleasure. It is not a bargain. He reasoned, "We must wait for her to come and lie down at his feet, humbled by her pride.  And then, here at the dung heap in front of the harem, I'll declare her my beloved wife, perform the marriage ceremony, trample her passionately. 

And the white hen will sit in the henhouse. "No, I will never marry a red-headed rooster.  To spend my life at the dung heap?  Is that the kind of miserable fate my carcass deserves?" - So thought the white hen, standing on the bank of the pond, stretching her neck and examining her image in the mirror-like surface. - "My beauty is worth more, I will wait for my prince, and I will marry him to the envy of the other hens that grovel before the ginger rooster.  Well, if the rooster were white, like me, or even black - we would look good, but a ginger rooster? - No, no, and no."

The white chicken in the owner's fence was struggling to squeeze through a small gap in the boards, and, overcoming thickets of nettles and burdocks, came to the pond. Other hens, fat and lazy, on the one hand could not squeeze through the gap, and on the other - hereditary hydrophobia (fear of water) forced hens to avoid water bodies. And only the white hen, not like the others, fearlessly made trips to the pond, caressing the imagination with rosy dreams of a prince.

One day, the white hen was very lucky: she found a big fat worm under a tall burdock.  The white hen decided to wash the worm in the water from the bits of earth, but disaster struck, the pebble on which she was standing staggered, the hen was frightened, with a fright "kud-ah-ah", the worm fell into the water and began, slowly wriggling, to sink to the bottom.

A mirror carp swam by, quite by accident, saw the kingfisher, took aim, ducked, and, in an instant, swallowed the worm. The white hen, watching the act of aggression in the clear water, was at first taken aback by such impudence, and then cried out, cackling, tears flowing in streams, flowing into the pond.

 The mirror carp poked its head out of the water, said a polite hello, and asked the hen not to cry:

- Why are you crying?  The water in the pond has become salty, and we carp can't live in salt water.

- How not to cry? - indignantly clucked the white hen, - I accidentally dropped such a delicious worm, and you, and you ... you ate it. - And the white hen cried even harder.

The mirror carp became ashamed, very ashamed, he waved his tail guiltily, and dived to the bottom. But not a minute later he came up again, with a huge fat worm, and handed it to the white hen.

- Here, take it, but don't cry, please.

The white hen instantly stopped crying, as she was quite hungry, and began to peck the worm with appetite. The worm was surprisingly tasty, tastier than all the worms that the white hen pecked in the owner's yard.  That's how they got acquainted, became friends. The white hen now came to the pond every day, and the mirror carp treated them to the traditional worm.

Some time passed and their friendship, growing stronger day by day, turned into true love. Yes, they fell in love with each other. They had so much in common: they loved big, fat worms more than anything else in the world. The white hen would run to the pond early in the morning and only late in the evening, when her eyes themselves began to close, she would return to the master's yard, to the henhouse, sleeping like a dead girl until dawn, only to run back to the pond to her favorite mirror carp with the first rays of the sun.

So the day went on from day to day.  The whole harem was jealous of the white hen and that is why they said that the mirror carp was not a pair at all, that he would cheat and leave her, and different disgusting things that only silly hens can do, picking at the manure heap from morning till night. They are not capable of big feelings. But the white hen and the mirror carp fell even more deeply in love with each other, and, to spite everyone, they soon decided to get married. All lovers sooner or later come to such a serious decision, or break up.

Ah, how much care, how much excitement, nothing can be missed, everything is so important! In this case, there are no trifles at all. The first wedding comes only once in a lifetime, there will never be another like it. Everything, absolutely everything should be provided for. True, no one ever manages to take everything into account if everything is for love. After all, love, like the beam of a magic flashlight, illuminates only what you want to see.

- And where shall we, my darling, live? - asked the white hen, looking at her image in the water. She became even more beautiful, as a bride should.

- Of course in the pond, where else?  - The mirror carp answered cheerfully," and continued, "I'll show you my Underwater Kingdom. You'll feel like a fish in water in it.

- But I can't live in a pond," the White hen protested, "I'm only a hen, and we chickens can't even swim properly. And then, where am I going to find a dung heap to dig in?

The mirror carp was saddened and thought hard. But what can you think of, if you are used to living in water, and your bride on a roost? He felt ashamed that he could not do anything for their happiness. He looked at the White Hen with his beautiful and sad eyes for the last time, wanted to say something, but just opened and closed his mouth a few times, sighed, said nothing, and dived deep and deep to the bottom of the pond, hid his head in the mud, so that no one saw him and did not disturb him with silly questions. True, his back and tail were clearly visible to other fish, but they delicately swam by, knowing that the Mirror Carp was not up to them now.

And the White Hen, crying and disheveled, returned to the master's yard, to the manure heap, and never went to the pond again. They say she married the Red Rooster, and is even happy.

So that's the end of the fairy tale, if you are going to get married.

 © Pavel Barabash