Caramel was a Poopie Fluffy. At least, that’s what other Fluffies called her. It hurt her every single time they said it. And it really upset her because she knew she wasn’t “Poopie” she was just “bwown.” And “bwown” was her favourite colour!
Her hoomin mummah Natalie tried to break her negative association with the colour brown. Brown was the colour of a lot of nice things. Brown was the colour of chocolate, peanuts, fudge, her favourite foods. It was the colour of leaves falling from the trees in “Faww”, it was the colour of taking a nap by the fireplace on a cosy evening in her mummah’s wooden housie. It was the colour of animals too! Brown was a natural horsie colour, her mummah said that horsies are the ancestors of Fluffies!
Most of all, it was the colour of her favourite thing in the world: dirt. You could grow so many important things in dirt! Grassies came from dirt, trees and forests for Fluffy nesties came from dirt! The acorns, chestnuts and pinecones (which were also brown) that she collected in her special treasure box came from dirt and could be planted in the dirt to make more trees!
Caramel loved helping her mummah work in the garden! Mummah told her to dig holes so she could put seeds in them! And from those seeds came the prettiest flowers in the world, and also veggy-tabbles that she helped Mummah to pick for nummie time! And get this, Mummah told her a secret… Tomatoes came from dirt… And tomatoes were used to make SKETTI.
So really dirt was the most important thing in the world to a Fluffy. Their lives revolved around the things that came from dirt. Really, everyfluffy should have wanted to be friends with Caramel because of that! But no… Fluffies were dummehs. Fluffies didn’t care about dirt. They didn’t know who amazingly special dirt was. All she was to them was a Poopie.
“DUMMEH POOPIE!”
Caramel was just trying to enjoy her lunch at daycare when her lunchbox was rudely kicked away from her.
“Oh hai Doug…” Caramel sighed.
Doug was a red pointy Fluffy in her daycare class. And he was also a Smarty. And because of that, no surprise to anybody, he hated her guts. Because she was a Poopie.
“Whewe poopies, dummeh Poopie? Dummeh Poopie Mawe nu desewve nice nummies, onwy num poopies!”
Caramel scrunched her nose in disgust. Why did she have to eat poopies? What a waste of perfectly good fertiliser for dirt!
“Cawamew nu num poopies, Mummah gib Cawamew veggy-tabble nummies fwom da gawden.” Caramel responded.
Doug promptly turned around and gave her sorry-poopies right in the face. Ew ew EWWWW! It tasted so bad she wanted to make sickie wawa all over the place.
“HUUU HUUUUUU HUUUUUU!” Caramel sobbed, trying to get the yuckie poopies off her snout. Her friend Soprano, gasped at the audacity and puffed her cheeks. Blueberry’s eyes went wide and she covered her ears, already anticipating what was about to happen next. “Aw biscuits!”
“TEACHER, DOUG BUWWYING CAWAMEW AGAIN!” came Soprano’s exceptionally loud voice.
Caramel inwardly thanked the purple wingie fluffy as the nice teacher lady stomped over to them. Doug stuck his tongue out at her.
“Doug! What did I say about being mean to Caramel?! Say sorry!”
“Dummeh Poopie!” Doug shouted.
Doug squealed and writhed as Nice Teacher Lady picked him up. “That’s it, no play time for you! You can spend the rest of the afternoon in the Sorry Box!” Doug huffed and stomped, kicking the sides of the sorry box in tantrum.
“Oh dear, poor Caramel…” Nice Teacher Lady said softly. “Lets get you cleaned up.”
Nice Teacher Lady took her over to the cleaning area and started wiping Caramel’s face with a cloth. She filled a pet bowl with wawa and placed it in front of her.
“Why don’t you drink some water to wash the taste away?”
“Otay…Huu…” Caramel whimpered, doing as she was told.
A loud “SCREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!” shattered the relative peace, scaring the crap out of Nice Teacher Lady and sending her racing over to the poor Fluffy that screed.
“Pip pip, cheewio, wots all dis den?!” Sir Reginald Fluffington The Third gasped, looking up from his fancy bowl of the fanciest kibble, as he adjusted his fancy napkin and fancy monocle.
Right next to him, Blueberry had had an accident. She had slipped on some fancy kibble that had fallen from Sir Reginald Fluffington The Third’s fancy bowl and had somehow scraped her leg against his fancy knife and fork that he was using.
“Am Bwuebewwy otay?!” Sky yelled, running over and trying to give her huggies to make everything better.
“HUU HUUUU, OWIES!” Blueberry cried, hugging her favourite Bingo Heeler plushie for comfort.
“GOOD HEAVENS, BOO BOO JUICE!” Sir Reginald Fluffington The Third screamed, as he promptly fainted but in a gentlemanly way.
Nice Teacher Lady ran over with the first aid kid. “There, there Blueberry! It’s just a cut!”
Caramel wandered over. She titled her head in curiosity. She never saw boo boo juice before…it was the same colour as Doug’s fluff… Hmmm…
Nice Teacher Lady put a pink plaster with a heart on it over Blueberry’s cut, and in moments it was like nothing that ever happened. In fact, Blueberry was now admiring her new plaster.
“Wowee! Pwetty!” Sky cheered.
Caramel finished the rest of her lunch and found herself wandering over to the Sorry Box where Doug was imprisoned. The sulking Smarty flared at her.
“Cawamew hav biggest happies dat Dummeh Boo Boo Juice Fwuffy in Sowwy Box.” She said, slowly and deliberately.
“Wuh- DUMMEH POOPIE! AM NU BOO BOO JUICE FWUFFY!” Doug shouted.
“Dummeh Boo Boo Juice Stawwion nu desewve nice nummies, onwy num boo boo juice!”
“NU NUM BOO BOO JUICE!” Doug growled. What the heck was going on?! Did this Poopie have a screw loose?!
“Why nu? Doug am boo boo juice Fwuffy, so Doug num boo boo juice. Dat how dis wowks.” Caramel said in a sing song fashion.
“Nuuuu! Nu am boo boo juice Fwuffy! Am wed! Am wed!” Doug wailed, stomping his hoofsies.
“Nu, Doug am dummeh boo boo juice Fwuffy! Doug am boo boo juice cowour!” Caramel scoffed.
She ran over to where some of Blueberry’s blood had fallen and wiped it up with a napkin. Taking it back to the sorry box, she tossed it in.
“Cawamew bwought boo boo juice nummy fow boo boo juice Fwuffy! Num da boo boo juice, Dummeh!”
“NUUUHUUUUUHUUUU, AM WED, NU AM BOO BOO JUICE FWUFFY, NU WAN! NU WAN!” Doug cried, crumpling to the floor and hiding his head in his hoofsies.
“An dat how Cawamew feww wen Doug caww Cawamew a Poopie.” she said firmly.
“…Wuh…?” Doug snivelled.
“Cawamew nu am Poopie, Cawamew bwown, su nu num poopies! Doug nu am Boo Boo Juice Fwuffy, su nu num boo boo juice! Undewstand nao?”
Doug froze. … What did that mean.
“Wuh… Wuh am “bwown”?” Doug asked, genuinely confused.
“Bwown da cowour of poopies, yea, but bwown awso cowour of nice thingies like wood, an chocowate, and da diwt whewe twees and gwassies come fwom!” Caramel squealed.
Doug tilted his head. “… Twees and gwassies come fwom dirt?”
“Yea! An pwetty fwowews! Su manies pwetty fwowews!” Caramel said excitedly. “Wan kno secwet?”
She leaned forward, looking around to make sure that no other Fluffy could hear her. “Dirt am whewe tomato come fwom. Hoomins use tomato to make SKETTI.”
Doug’s brain practically exploded then and there. “WUUUUUUUUH?!”
“So nu am Poopie, am Dirtie! Dirtie good cowour! Wed good cowour too, wed cowour of stwawbewwies! Stwawbewwies come fwom diwt too!”
“… Doug wike stwawbewwies…”
“… So wai Doug nu wike Cawamew…? Cawamew nu be buwwy tu Doug…” Caramel asked sincerely.
Doug tried to think as hard as he could. It was like his entire worldview had been shattered. He had no idea that Poopie Fluffies weren’t Poopie…
“Mummah say dat Poopie Fwuffies am dummehs an ugwy an onwy desewve numming poopies…”
“Bu wai? Doug Boo Boo Juice, an nu num boo boo juice… So wai Cawamew num poopies?”
Doug opened his mouth to speak and then closed it again. He didn’t have a good answer for that…
“… Doug sowwy… Am bad Fwuffy…” Doug sniffed, tearing up. “Mummah say Poopies bad bu… Mummah dummeh! Mummah caww diwt Poopie, an Sketti come fwom diwt so mummah caww SKETTI POOPIE!” he gasped in complete horror.
It was a leap in logic, but Caramel didn’t mind.
“Wan pway with bwockies with Cawamew?” she asked hopefully.
“Bu sowwy box…”
“Cawamew get Nice Teacher Wady an say Doug say sowwy! Then Doug pway with Cawamew!” Caramel said excitedly.
Doug wagged his tail. “Otay!”
Caramel ran over to Nice Teacher Lady and pulled on her leg. “Escuse Cawamew, Nice Teacher Wady! Doug say sowwy! Cawamew wan pway with Doug!”
Nice Teacher Lady stared. “He did?!”
Caramel nodded, wagging her tail. “Cawamew teww Doug dat Cawamew am bwown, nu Poopie! Cawamew teww Doug about diwt!”
Nice Teacher Lady thought her ears needed checked. Doug the Smarty… said sorry to Caramel? And now she wanted to play with him?! What planet was she on?!
Caramel put on her best Please Face, a trick she learned from Blueberry that Blueberry learned from her favourite TV show Bluey.
“… Oh, all right. But if he’s mean to you again, he’s going back in the Sorry Box.”
“YAAAAAY!”
It was a sight to behold. All the Fluffies at the Daycare were gobsmacked when Doug was lifted out of the Sorry Box early. They were DOUBLY gobsmacked when Doug went to play with Caramel at the blocks.
“Cawamew gon ask Mummah if Doug can go see pwetty gawden! Cawamew wan Doug to plant seeds in da diwt to make pwetty fwowews!” Caramel trilled.
Doug’s eyes practically sparkled. He REALLY wanted to check out this dirt thing now!
