Imaginary friend

He assumed that it was an imaginary friend made up by his daughter. She mentioned her after coming from school and talking about playing tea party, hopscotch and dress up with her. She said that they played hide and seek. How could she hide from somebody who she made up herself? He let it side and didn't take it that seriously.

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He thought that she made up that friend in order to keep her busy in her mind since something bad had happened lately. It was three weeks ago that they buried their small dog, a tiny brown puppy named Pippo. They never explained to her what had happened to him. Trying to rush to work led his father to drive his car over the poor creature. They thought that if she knew the truth, she would become too upset and so decided to lie to her. They told her that Pippo had run away and will return someday.

It seemed to him that the only way to keep her busy was to make up this friend. He did not like the idea, but at least it kept her quiet. For some time everything went well and she did not ask anything about Pippo anymore.

One afternoon, coming home from work, he saw his daughter sitting alone at her little tea set. She wore the princess dress and small crown which they bought her at Christmas. Her face looked upset.

Another name just came into her words. She said that a girl called Nora had told her that Pippo would never come home. Nora also told her that they had lied about him running away.

The father could not believe it at first because he had just entered the room.

He tried to calm her and asked her who this Nora was. She shouted at him that he knew her very well and that Nora had been her best friend ever since Pippo was taken away. Then she went upstairs and yelled, she was going to play with Nora.

He was shocked. His wife also worried about this strange behavior from their daughter. She told him that their daughter talked about Nora ever since she came back from school. She said it was clear that it should happen someday.

This night she did not want to come close to him at all. Not knowing what to say to her, he put her to bed, kissed her on her forehead and switched her night light on as usual. He spent the whole night trying to find the right words to explain to her what happened to Pippo. As always, he failed to do it. So he decided to tell her about it the next night.

Just before dawn, his wife woke him, shaking and shouting that their daughter was missing. The little girl was nowhere in her bed and nowhere in the house at all.

They found her kneeling in the backyard by Pippo's grave. She wore her pink pajamas. The father tried to carry her away, but she fought back hard. He saw that something terrible was going on there. The grave was torn open and Pippo's rotten body lay beside it. It was full of bones and worms were crawling all around it.

When the wife took the girl away and she became quiet enough to say something, all that she wanted to know was Why did Nora show it to me and not you?

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