By Diana Misby
Prologue
I’m Coal. I’m a bunny. Or a rabbit, whichever you prefer. I’m a female, Mini-Rex rabbit who lives in Toronto, Ohio. I live in a basement that’s unfinished, with cement walls and flooring. The newer part of this basement has wallpaper and drywall, which is good to snack on, according to Clover.
Clover is a black and white rabbit who seems to be a “mutt,” if you know what I mean. Her cage is up against the back of my cage, which means we have lots of bonding time. Or I just have time to tell her she’s being obnoxiously loud at night. She likes to whisper to me and Cottontail.
Cottontail is a New Zealand Red rabbit. She’s got to be at least seven pounds, so she’d be a good meat rabbit. But don’t tell that to her owner, Little Aunty. Little Aunty would not be happy to hear that. She’s very serious about Cottontail. Of course, Aunty Itchy, who owns Clover, is serious about not eating Clover. But every now and again, she’ll joke about eating rabbits. Especially when Clover starts chewing on what she shouldn’t. My mama just scolds me when I chew on what I’m not supposed to. If she ever jokes about eating rabbits, she whispers to me, “Not you, Coal-Bowl. I love you.” Sometimes she’ll whisper to me when I’m on her lap. She’ll lay her face on my back, and talk right into my ears. I don’t know how I feel about that. Her cheek is warm to my back, which is nice, but I’m always a tad nervous about getting smushed by her. I know that she’d never do it on purpose, but I always feel a bit of caution.
I call my mama “Haystack.” Really, the middle-sized owner of Clover, Aunty Itchy, nicknamed her that. My mama has a green hoodie, almost the color of the hay that we eat. I used to scratch at it, because I didn’t like how it wrinkled up. Aunty Itchy joked that I was trying to climb my “Haystack.” So that’s what I call my mama.
Aunty Itchy is called that because she lays her face on me, too. The only difference between her and Haystack is that her hair is nearly always unkempt. So when she lays on me, her hair tickles my face. And it always makes me itchy.
“Little Aunty” is pretty self-explanatory. She’s the smallest of all our owners, which is funny, since she owns the biggest bunny, Cottontail. She likes me, but not as much as Cottontail. I understand that. Haystack hardly ever goes in Cottontail’s area, because even she is scared of her. Cottontail loves people, and she’s a sweetheart to everybody, but Haystack is still a bit nervous around such a big bunny. However, Cottontail dislikes me (and every other bunny), greatly. I had a fight with her once, because Haystack and the Aunties weren’t watching us. I lost, but it’s only because she jumped on me first. I would’ve won. Even though I’m smaller. But what’s two or three pounds? I still would’ve won.
To be continued.
Get a cool leather bond diary.
Prologue (continued)
Clover is nicer…to me. See, Haystack dropped her, months ago, and ever since then, she’s been really nervous around people. I think it’s a facade, personally. She’s brave enough to behave badly, so surely she’s brave enough to be pet. She’s very rowdy, and very energetic. She’s a lot like Aunty Itchy, actually. Rather scatterbrained, lazy, and on the whole, rather disheveled and sensitive. To be honest, I’m rather lazy myself. However, that’s only because Haystack cleans everything; she’s the exact opposite of me. I clean nothing. Not even my own fur. She does that for me, too.
In contrast, Aunty Itchy cleans nothing, and leaves Clover to do everything. Not that Clover does anything. Mostly, she eats. And excretes, too. Nearly every morning, she pushes her litter box out of place. Sometimes, she’ll make a mess behind it, but sometimes the mess will be in it, where it’s supposed to be. It really depends on what mood she’s in.
Since Aunty Itchy never cleans or reprimands Clover (I forgot to explain that since Clover pretends to be sensitive, Aunty Itchy is quite loose in her Clover-restraining methods…), sometimes, Haystack is a bit harsh with her. It really depends on the atmosphere, the time of day, and how badly or decently Clover behaves. For instance, if Clover is being all cute, and showing that she wants to be pet, then Haystack will be on good terms with her. But if Clover is trying to break into my place, or out of her place, then Haystack is angry at her. When Haystack leaves to go upstairs, she says to Clover things like,
“See you, goon.”
“Don’t be naughty, goose. Not you, Coal-Bowl. You’re a good bunny! Clover’s bad.”
“You were bad today!”
Like I said, it all depends on what happens. But generally, Haystack is not on good terms with Clover. She’ll give her a tickle and move on. She always tries to pet Clover when she thinks I’m not looking. But I see her. Or, at least, I know that she will likely pet Clover each time she goes to feed me. But petting Cottontail is an occasional affair.
Haystack is afraid of Cottontail, since she’s so big. Two incidents have contributed to her fear:
1. The first incident started with us moving. We lived in the garage adjoining the basement for a while, but in the summertime, it got too hot for us to live there, since it wasn’t temperature-proof. So we got moved into the basement. That made us rather grumpy and jittery. So one day, soon after the move, Little Aunty and Aunty Itchy went to get their hair trimmed. Since they were gone, Haystack had to feed me, and Clover, and Cottontail. Of course, Cottontail wasn’t happy with this, but even so, after Haystack fed her, she tried to pet her. Cottontail was clearly trying to nip Haystack, but Haystack tried to go around her to pet her anyway. Long story short, Cottontail didn’t nip. She bit, and bit hard. The scar is gone now, but Haystack got a bad bite on her wrist that day.
2. The second incident was when it was wintertime, again, but we were still in the basement. It was too much of a hassle to move us back and forth. Everybody was pretty serene, so Haystack tried to pet Cottontail with Little Aunty right by her. However, the mistake haystack made this time, is that she chose to wear baggy pants. What difference does that make? Well, firstly, Cottontail may have detested that style. Secondly, rabbits like to chew. On everything that they aren’t supposed to. And Haystack’s pants were the perfect thing to gnaw on at the time…especially for a bored, seven-pound bunny who’s got nothing better to do. So Cottontail tried to chew Haystack’s pants, and since Haystack didn’t want to get bit accidentally, she was jumping around and screaming. Trying to get away from Cottontail, she caught the back pocket of her pants on a nail, and as she tripped out of Cottontail’s area, she ripped her pants.
Tip: Don’t wear baggy pants around a bored rabbit, who’s just waiting to explode…
Prologue (continued)
On the whole, though, I love Clover and Cottontail. I know that Haystack does, too. It’s just, I don’t know how long we’ll stay like this. It takes a lot of money to take care of three rabbits. And Haystack’s father has a low-paying job. Will he be able to get another job? Or get a higher paycheck? I guess that remains to be seen. Just like everything else…
Tuesday, June 9, 2026, 10:00 AM
Haystack set some weird things on my cage when she came to see me today. They look like what she wears on her legs. Pants, yes, but she calls them something else, too. It starts with a “J,” whatever she calls them.
They smell like her, but also like soap, or the chemicals in the soap. I stretched up tall to see what they were like. They were rough, and thick, and blue. The texture wasn’t like her hoodie, which is soft. When I sat back down, Haystack opened my cage. I pretended not to be interested in getting out, since she took so long to finally open the door. But apparently, she wasn’t as interested in me as she should’ve been, either. She opened the big wooden door at the back of my area, and took her weird blue things in the room behind it. They call that place “The Storage Room.” Clover got her foot stuck in a glue trap in there, so if I ever go in, I stay very near the door.
However, Haystack has no problem going deep in The Storage Room, and she stayed in there so long that I got bored of just sitting in my cage. I jumped out as soon as she came back, and looked up at her, hoping to be pet. She didn’t respond, so I decided to snack on the pellets I spilled earlier. After that, I said hi to Clover through the barrier that separates our two areas. It’s kind of like a tiny fence. But when I was sniffing Clover, I smelled something more appealing than her. I turned around, and Haystack was offering me some celery.
“This is breakfast, Coal,” she said, “We’re waiting on Dad’s paycheck to get you more pellets, baby.”
Sorry for Dad. Not for myself. Celery is much more interesting than everyday food-pellets. So I decided to savor the flavor. I licked my lips to show Haystack that I appreciated it, but I didn’t eat it. Not yet.
Common Graces 