the break-in

Seville pawed at the door. Grabbing the doorknob between both front paws, he tried to twist it open but to no avail.  "Awww... MOUSES!  Peep has gone and locked my office door."  He sat back on his haunches, debating what to do next.

"Peep #1 is out in the garden," Seville's brother, Rushton, informed him. "Why don't you just go ask her to open up the door?"

"Nah, that won't work," muttered Seville.  "I'm thinking there's some reason I'm not supposed to be in the office by myself."

"Probably has something to do with your occasional spraying issues," suggested Rushy.

Seville glared at Rushton.  "You pee on a peep ONE time and ya never hear the end of it."

"Only the once?" questioned Rushton.  "I'm pretty sure it was at least twice."

"Nope, just the once.  Well just the once for Peep #1.  I might have peed on Peep #2 too but I'm pretty sure I only peed once per peep.  These things happen.  They can't be helped.  But my point is, peeps never let these things go.  If Nissy were here, he would say MOUSES!"

"Yup," Rushton nodded in agreement, "Nissy would say MOUSES! to that, for sure."

The two cats sat in silence, staring at the locked office door.

Several minutes passed before Rushton finally spoke up.  "Well what are you going to do?  Today's Sunday and you have a blog post to write."

"I know...  I know..." muttered Seville.  "Wait, I do know!  I'll pick the lock.  Should be easy enough. Peeps do it on television all the time.  I need a hairpin or something, I think.  Would you happen to have a hairpin on paw, Rushy?"

Rushton rolled his eyes.  "I may be a long-haired kitty but I most definitely do not use hairpins."

"No matter.  I see something else I can use."  Reaching over to his brother, Seville plucked a long, white whisker. "This will work nicely," he smiled.

"Ouch!" Rushton cried.  "For mousin' out loud...  That hurt!  I'm getting out of here before you pull out any more of my whiskers.  You had better watch out or I'll go tell the peep what you're doing."

"Tell if you like, Rushy, but having given me that whisker makes you an accomplice.  You had better keep that in mind."

"I didn't give you anything.  You STOLE that...  Awww...  MOUSES!" and with that, Rushton headed into the kitchen to look for a snack.

Seville beamed when he heard the locking mechanism on the office door make a welcoming click. The doorknob turned easily now and he pushed open the door.  "Now to get to work," and he trotted over to the desk.  Once turned on, the computer hummed to life.

"Whatcha doing?" Mason asked after running into the office and plunking her tail down next to Seville.  "Rushy said you were starting work on your blog post."

Seville glanced over at his sister, Mason.  Noticing that she appeared to be out of breath he asked, "Better question is, what were you doing?  You're panting."

"I was outside in the garden, supervising Peep #1.  She's digging up primroses for the animal shelter plant sale," answered Mason.

"The peep is selling off the primroses?  Nissy's primroses?  MOUSES!"

"Just the extras.  I was very careful to allow her to dig up only the extras.  The ones we don't need."  Mason began to wash a paw but between licks, added, "Besides, the sale is still two weeks away.  If she digs up any of the wrong ones, we can just plant them back in the garden when she's not looking."

Seville nodded in agreement.  "Yeah, we've done that before.  Drives the peep crazy."

"I think you mean crazier," giggled Mason, emphasising the 'er' at the end of the word.  She began to work on washing her other front paw before asking, "What are you going to blog about?"

"Not sure yet.  Hmmm....  Password!  Blogger wants a password?  MOUSES!"

"Nissy was very pro passwords," Mason informed Seville.  "Surely you knew that."

"Someone looking for a password?" Anderson asked, strutting into the office, flipping his floofy tail this way and that.  "Nissy lock you out of the blog?"

"Looking that way."  Seville typed in MOUSES! only to find that it wasn't correct.  "MOUSES!"

"Try nip," suggested Anderson.

"Or niphead," offered Mason.

"How about cheesynippizza?" offered Andy.

Seville typed in FursibsDriveYouCrazy but alas, that didn't work either.

"Why not just go and ask Peep #1?" suggested Mason.  "I'm pretty sure she knows all the passwords Nissy used."

"No....  She doesn't know I'm here in the office," explained Seville, rubbing his temple with a paw.

"Oh yeah," nodded Mason.  "It's because of your spraying issues, isn't it?"

Seville rolled his eyes to the sky.  "I've said it before and I'll say it again.  You pee on a peep once...."

"Two peeps, once each," Mason quickly added.

"...and you never hear the end of it.  Peeps just never let these things go."

"Unlike Seville," Anderson whispered in Mason's ear, "who thinks nothing of letting go when peeing on peeps."

"MOUSES!" cried Seville.

Feeling a presence standing behind them, all three cats turned slowly to find Peep #1 standing there, hands on hips and looking rather displeased.  They all spun their heads back to face the computer screen in unison, donning the most innocent-looking expressions possible.


"My little blogmeister," said the peep.  "Nissy's Blogger password was my little blogmeister, no spaces."

Seville typed in the suggested password and the blog opened at last.  "I'm in!  Thanks Peepers.  You're a peep.  And I mean that only in the most nicest of ways."

"I know you do," said Peep #1, giving Seville a kiss on the back of his head.  "Just don't spray anything in here, okay?  No spraying allowed."

"I only..." began Seville before stopping himself short.

Sometimes it was better to just let things go, he thought to himself.  Arguing with the peep about the difference between peeing once on each of two peeps and peeing on one peep, twice, could wait for another day.  Maybe he could blog about it sometime. Yup, definitely a good blog post idea but not for today.  Today he would blog about....

MOUSES!