An Uninvited Guest
You’ve all heard about how fluffies are treated in the US, so what about the rest of the world?
I can’t say too much about the rest of the world to be honest, I’ve not seen it, I do know that the Russians love fluffies and are treated like valued members of the family compared to how we treat them as pests and toys.
I live here in England in a ramshackle seaside town up north.
If you guys like Morrissey, it’s “seaside town they forgot to close down” from Everyday is like Sunday (allegedly)
So, how are fluffies treated in England?
You all know about how far the Yanks, the Americans take it.
You’ve seen the amount of fluffy specific toys you can get, the serious amount of fast food you can pump out just from using these things as meat, and then the abuse.
And the stuff you can get for that.
My god, how far they take it too
Here in my town, fluffies are often sold as prizes at the fairground. It used to be that they’d be pinned by their ears against a wall, but that stopped when it became too messy and now they just keep them in cages at the back of a stall.
There’s also a fluffy specific retail company called Fluffco (owned by Costco) and you can buy fluffies by the bulk, so it suits you as well as food and other items.
There’s also fluffy boutiques for more fancier types (and they’re popular with the zoomers and those that have money).
And let’s not forget traditional pet shops……they have to keep them separate from live animals……
But how are they treated?
To simply put it……if you want one, you’ll keep one and take care of it as you would a poodle.
They’re very popular with young families and that they’re great substitutes for pets.
Abuse is uncommon but not unheard of and generally frowned upon and seen as a waste. It’s not something the average guy would contemplate here. Abusing something you spent money on?! Just why?
But fluffies are still seen as irritants, especially the unwanted ones.
There aren’t as many Adoption centres for fluffies to be handed in to here as in the US.
If you really want one, as they say a fluffy is for (it’s) lifetime and not just for Christmas…
And a lot of the times the unwanted fluffies are taken to secluded areas or places like parks and left there and abandoned.
It’s a similar problem to America.
Except for one exception.
The wet and wild British weather is an enemy of all fluffies.
It’s as bad as winter to fluffies…. fluffies are indoor pets and aren’t built for outdoor weather.
The cold and grey days, and days were it just rains every hour and heavily too.
Fluffies hate this and are often seen running for cover, any cover, their programming means they fear water and know its bad for them.
Heavy rain is known to drown a fluffy just from downfall, and can sweep away foals easily as well as fluffies.
Fluffies can be often found taking shelter under bus stops and bushes and trees, as well as hiding in alleys and in wooded areas.
They can sometimes, not often but sometimes, be found hiding under cover of shop window covers. They’re often shooed away with a broom or a boot.
The British attitude to fluffies is that the loved ones, the cute and clean, are kept at home. Or in your garden if it’s nice out and not pissing down.
Which isn’t often.
Warm and comfortable with a steady supply of food and a clean litter box.
For some reason, fluffies on the streets are seen as more irritating than domestics and become more irritating once they’re out on the streets.
Some says it’s their voice, mannerisms, that palpable desperation they convey that is rewarded with indifference and contempt.
It might well just be the stigma of being unwanted….
In fact most of the time, we don’t go out of our way to kill them.
We ignore them, leave them to their own devices, they usually find ways to die without our intervention.
Starvation, collisions with traffic and infections from injuries and poisons kill them off without our help.
“Mistuh can fwaffy hav nummies fo babbehs?” is often greeted with “oh do fuck off creature.”
And then a swift kick if required.
But there’s a distinct difference between domestics and ferals.
The ferals truly are filthy, shit coated and smelly.
And their young are everywhere to the point you could unintentionally step on one and then it’s mother gets in your way.
There’s a joke that we say, “you’re never more than 3ft away from a shitrat and it’s brood” and that’s mostly true.
The weather kills off most of them and admittedly it’s pretty uncommon to see herds walking down the street like in the US.
I pondered all of this after I read an article on my phone.
No one buys paper.
Tomorrows chip paper as my Nan used to say but no one wants ink all over their chips!
What’s the point in newspapers now?
The article talked about the British success of dealing with feral fluffies was more circumstance and luck than actual intervention and action and that the indifference towards ferals was unhelpful in controlling outbreaks and disease control.
The UK having less fluffies was more from lack of demand for them compared to the US, ferals found our climate hard to acclimatise to and so harder to breed and stay alive.
They’re meant to be indoor toys right? no wonder they fuck up outdoors, they’re just not made for the rough and tumble of out there.
As for the British weather, well I can see why Di Maria didn’t stay long.
I don’t hate fluffies, and in fairness I have no real love for them either.
Maybe when I was in school, college but I left a few years ago and I’m just focused on working now, keeping a roof over my head so it were.
Maybe abuse yes or if they do something weird or cute.
Call it morbid curiosity, that’s probably why I don’t mind them.
I’ve seen some shit online to say the least.
I’d bought some supplies to take back and put in my garage.
My “empty” garage.
She finally moved out and took the car.
I miss the car already, it’s fucking freezing. And I hate public transport.
Maybe she should’ve dumped me next week.
In the garage, I had the camping stuff that I bought that I wanted to put away, ready for when I needed it.
I’d finally get outdoors again. I didn’t want to go to Bergamo or wherever it was she wanted to go.
We had a lot of arguments and the truth is I felt better without her.
We were a mismatch but we went through so much.
The day she left I blew a sigh of relief, I shed no tears and sat down with a drink.
That garage was the bane of my existence.
Her stuff, my stuff, family stuff, random crap that was left behind by the previous owners.
I could finally clear it out.
She never wanted to face doing it herself and I kept putting it off.
And the space was mostly taken by that car……surrounded by boxes and tables of various crap. Man I miss that car….
I got crisp boxes from the local shop and brought them back home, I’d be sorting the stuff too and making sure she got whatever crap back.
I opened the door to the garage and breathed it in.
It smelled awful, worse than crap.
I regretted that.
God knows where the smell was coming from.
It was like something had died and decomposed in there.
Still better than my uncle’s bathroom though….
I flicked the light switch and put the radio on. I used to be a metal kid but now I just put on Easy Listening radio. Smooth FM
What the hell happened to me?
That garage smelt awful and I was determined to find what that smell was.
There was nothing that I could work out that I kept in that garage that would smell that bad in there….something of hers?
I’ll get rid of it or whatever. Definitely rid….
Boxes upon boxes were moved.
Old bills and papers, water damaged by a leak, had to be moved.
I realised I let myself in for more work than I thought. There was so much crap just left and forgotten here…
I began to move some things that had been piled.
I picked up one box, full of old vinyls that were now definitely mine (and not hers) and I kicked a cardboard box and then-
“AAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGHHHHHH!!! Nu hewt nu hewt!!! Huhuhuhuhuhuhuhuhuuuuuuuuu”
A fluffy ran out from the box wailing.
The fuck?! How did that-
Two foals were still attached to its crotch tits and they were being scraped along the floor.
Fucking Hell. How did shitrats get in? Must’ve been from when the garage door opened
“Nu hewt nu hewt!!!”
The mare kept wailing it and “running” (for a fluffy) around the garage.
I looked in the box, two of its foals were broken.
One squished, it’s face contorted and it’s tongue sticking out, and the other broken from starvation or god knows what.
Popped like a blood bubble.
I heard these things are so easy to mess up!
And can only be handled with kid gloves.
I grimaced when I peeled the poor little popped fucker from the bottom.
I cringed at the squish.
Such messy toys these people like…
A foal was still intact inside the box. Chirp sounds could be heard from within.
They all looked like newborns.
I repositioned the box and made sure the chirper was comfortable.
Now to deal with the rest of the mess.
The two foals that had been dragged across the hard floor, one had been decapitated but the other was chirping.
It looked hurt and it was flailing its limbs wildly, a bone poking out of its leg.
I also found a pile of fluffy crap in the corner.
This explained the bad smell.
The smell had mixed in with the paint stripper that looked like it had been leaking.
My sense of smell is pretty gone by this point.
Probably should go to the doctors but what will they say and it’s not serious.
And then I walked over and found the foals’ mother.
She was cowering and quaking.
“He-hewwo mistuh…….b-be nyu……Daddeh? Fwaffy su……cowd……”
I make a movement with my foot and she lets out a yelp and runs again. I say run, it’s more like a slow waddle.
This time she runs towards her babbehs.
She stops in her tracks when she sees the broken ones.
“Huhuhuhuhuhuhuhu……. am bad……mummah “
It was crying? This was all it’s fucking fault.
I wanted this filthy thing out of my garage, I already had its shit to clean up and I’d flush the foals down the toilet.
She was a royal pain in the ass.
I flicked the switch for the garage door to open.
It was heavily pissing down with rain. It would be a bad night out tonight.
I’d chase the little bitch out and then shut it down.
I opened the garage door up enough for it so that she could run out but not enough to flood from the rain fall.
I didn’t want more to clean up than I had to.
I got the bitch out from the corner, honestly it wasn’t that hard.
She darted away from me, she had been farting and stunk out the place (I was glad she had no more shit in her but you never know with fluffies).
And then she stopped as soon as she saw the rain.
Right by the door.
She began to quiver and shake looking at all that rain. She was shouting that “sky wawas bad fo fwaffy”.
I stomped towards her and made myself look bigger. I heard that worked in scaring them away. I didn’t want to growl but I was tempted to.
I honestly thought saying “fuck off” would work.
She turned around slowly to me. She was crying and cowering.
“Pwee nu mistah…….sky wawa am bad fo babbehs…….onwy…….wittew…….pwee mistah nu…….wan go………nu wan hewt……….babbehs………wan huggies an giv…….babbehs……miwkies……….am bad mummah…….”
It was so quiet. It was shaking and crying and snivelling. It couldn’t look me in the eyes.
I don’t know why but my feet stayed firmly on the ground.
My intention was to deliver a swift kick from my size 8s and get rid of it.
I couldn’t do it at that moment.
“…okay fluffy. You can stay for tonight. But no longer than that!! It’s terrible weather outside now……”
The fluffy looked up to me, the look of fear completely wiped from its face, mouth open to express a smile.
Like it had completely forgotten I had chased it.
“Wiww be nyu daddeh?!”
My face remained stern, “No fluffy. No chance! I’m not your daddy. And don’t ever call me that. You’re staying one night only”
“O-Otay da-“
“I told you not to call me daddy!”
“O-o-o-tay……m-m-mis-tah”
“Good, I’m glad you understand”
The fluffy had moved back to her original position.
She had seen what was left of her brood.
Squished, damaged, the foal with a broken leg had expired.
She looked pretty sad, she was saying how much of a bad mummeh she was.
Why can’t these things talk properly?
Only one foal remained now and it was chirping.
She wouldn’t be able to play with them like this. But at least she had one to keep her company.
I picked up the remains of the foals, they had managed to leave behind gore and their shit as an extra chore for me.
These things were pretty disgusting, and I can see how they pass on diseases and why some just shoo them off.
I was exactly that delighted to deal with it.
An extra job.
Wow.
The foals went down the toilet and I had to flush twice.
The head came off one of them and I felt uncomfortable if it was looking up at me when I used the loo. I flushed a few times to make it go down.
The blood and shit was smeared against the bowl. I bleached the toilet twice and scrubbed hard. Even when they’re dead they’re such a pain to clean….
I began to tidy things up more quickly. The cleaning proper would have to wait for another day….
Stuff was rearranged to make space for the fluffy. I didn’t feel like tidying and getting rid of crap for now (except for the fluffy shit, which I got rid of promptly in a bin bag).
The fluffy cuddled her last remaining foal and had settled into a cardboard box, letting it suckle on her teat.
Why do these things have crotch-tits?
I began to wonder why they made these toys so animal-like, it was a pain in the ass for anyone.
A toy that you feed and need to pick up it’s crap and then give it attention all the time and play with it and care for it?!
Toys should go in a cupboard or on the shelf when you’re done with them.
Fluffies seemed to be just like tamagotchis but real.
Even my Nintendog wasn’t as high maintenance as these things!
Worrying if a child is going to make a mess is annoying let alone a bloody toy! And a toy that made a mess that was hard to clean?
Was it to teach kids responsibility?
Was it really just that they were cuddly and always happy?
I couldn’t ever be that happy all the time. Neither can they from the looks of it….
The joy of owning a pet without the commitment or responsibility of them being real?
Who knows, she could enjoy her hours here until the rain went off.
I was cooking tonight, I deserved something I enjoyed.
But I had to use food up.
I had veggie mince in the fridge which needed to be used by the end of the day.
A bag of mushrooms okay, I can cook with this. I had potatoes in, mash them, carrots, peas, onions. I made a vegetarian shepherds pie.
I’m a dab hand in the kitchen you know. But this is probably the only thing I can cook well….
It took about an hour and a half to prepare and cook it like I wanted.
I made quite a lot.
Enough for two people.
Why do I keep doing that?
I left it on the side and washed up and put some telly on.
Then my phone.
Then back to telly.
Then phone.
I still wasn’t hungry enough to eat the rest of it. I was pretty full.
I hate wasting food….having no money most of the time makes you appreciate every last bit…
I decided I wanted to see what the fluffy was up to.
I took a plate in and some shepherds pie.
At least someone would enjoy it.
And it was cool to the touch, perfect for eating.
The fluffy was very happy to see me.
“Nice mistah hab….nummies fo fwaffy?!”
“…yes I do. Eat it all and don’t let it go to waste”
“Tank oo mistah!! Mummeh make miwkies fo wastest babbeh”
“…okay.”
I placed the plate down, it was a pretty big amount.
Big enough for a human stomach.
The fluffy ate at it sloppily.
“Hey!! Don’t make a mess. Take your time eating! Slow fucking down! Are you a pig?!”
The fluffy paused, “Otay mistah. Fwaffy am no piggie Munstah. Am sowwy fwaffy eat nummies tu stop tummy hewties an miwkies fo babbeh”.
She began to eat again, but slower and less sloppily. I cleaned up by her plate. She’d ate most of it in seconds that took me minutes to eat.
“Tank oo mistah. Fwaffy Wub nummies”
“I’m glad you enjoyed your meal.”
The garage was pretty cold and I could see the fluffy shake up again.
I went back into the house and found a few old pillows and Andrea’s old blankets.
She hadn’t wanted them and were kept with the boiler.
They were warm to the touch and hadn’t been used in a while.
I made sure the fluffy was comfortable and made the box a lot more warm for her to sleep with her foal.
The pillow could prop her up and keep her warm and supported for milking her child.
I then realised that these toys shit everywhere.
I began to question myself and my decision…….
There was no way I was letting her into the house.
My landlord would kill me. And then my body would be evicted.
I gathered up some old newspaper and cardboard and put it on the floor in the corner where she had previously crapped….I couldn’t think of anywhere better
“This will be where you go Poopies. Don’t make any poopies ANYWHERE just make them here.”
“…Otay daddeh. Wiww make good poopies fo-“
“Don’t call me daddy! I told you I’m not your daddy!”
The fluffy looked seriously down, “am sowwy mistah. Wan be gud fo-“
I interrupted her before she could make the same mistake again, talk about dumb
“Look it’s okay to call me mister. I don’t want to be your daddy. You just got food and shelter for tonight for your foal. That doesn’t make me your daddy. Just have a good sleep, make sure there’s no bad poopies from you or your baby and we will get along nicely okay?”
“…Otay……mi-mistah”
“…That’s a good girl.”
I flicked the old lamp on and it provided a dull light but enough to illuminate the room.
The room was dark without the light on or light shining through the slit of a window.
It would be enough for the fluffy to sleep comfortably and know where the newspaper pad was.
I hoped.
I looked at her nestle into the bedding I made before I left the room.
She looked more like something that you picked from the shop now as opposed to something tossed in the street.
Except she needed to be cleaned up to look exactly like those things.
She began to snore and I knew she was away. They really do have no problems sleeping anywhere and anyway.
It was getting late and I needed to get my head down too. I’d have to clean up after her in the morning.
“Wub…wu-b…dad…deh”
So they sleep talk too?
Figures.
The weather didn’t look good for tomorrow either, talking about local flooding on the news too.