The Toad Adventure

Only very few people have ever seen him. Many have heard of him and some just adore him from the cartoons, but basically he is for kids. They like this clumsy and criminal troll. Grown Ups buy the dolls made over his character and give it to their kids, but they don't buy the Toad-ashtrays, the booklets, etc. for themselves. No, he is not popular with grown-ups and why should he be, after all he is a menace in adult company.
When I saw him the first time I recognized him at once: This was Toad, but what was he doing in my brother's garden? Why did he stand next to the roses with an axe in his hand and why was he grinning at me? "Hello!" I shouted, "Who are you and what are you doing in that rose bed?" He just waved at me, then he swung his axe high in the air and let it fall to cut down my favorites in that garden: The roses!
The wonderful, perfect flowers fell like soldiers in World War I. I couldn't help myself, but gave out a "yelp" in disgust. "Toad, how could you?!!!!"
"Aha, now you know me, so you admit that now?"
"What do you mean," I said terrified when I saw him move over to the pear tree, another of my favourites in the garden. He didn't answer, but lifted the axe and gave the defenceless tree a blow that went into my mind and body as were it directed at me. "No-no, please, stop it, Toad," I cried.
"Do you know me or don't you know me?"
"I know you as a character in a cartoon and as a doll ..."
"What," he yelled, obviously disgusted at such a description, "what did you just say?"
"I know you ..."
" ... from a cartoon and as a doll?"
"Yes," I whispered, horrified at the thought of offending him.
"I never was a doll," he said and I dared not even look at the stitches where his doll body was sown together. Instead I gave a half-nod-half-shake of my spinning head that might mean anything.
"Do you admit that I have a good cause to come to see you now that you're grown-up?"
"Mjnah," I answered, again horrified at him for his fierce looks.
"You promised to be my wife when you grew up - and now you are just that: A grown-up, and very pretty, young lady ...."
"I never ..."
"Yes, you did and we even made a contract. If you look into your purse you'll find a copy of it."
"How did it get there?" I asked, quite bewildered.
"It flew into it when I told it to do so ... what else?"
With shaky fingers I opened my purse and took out a crumbled paper I didn't remember that I had seen before. It read: "I, Anna, hereby commit myself to marry Toad right now, only we wait to do so until I'm grown-up." The signature was mine from when I was 7 or 8 years old. I turned the paper and looked at a lot of photos that were glued to it. They made me blush because in all of them this much younger me was kissing Toad in the shape of a 12-13 years old boy.
"You cheated me!" I shouted, now enraged.
"Yes," he said in that special Toad-way that made grown-ups hate him and kids love him. "I did, didn't I? Well, I'm glad I did because you sure has grown into a most delectable, young lady."
"I can't marry a cartoon character. How would our kids look?"
The mentioning of kids made him look sheepish and rather naughty. "No!" I yelled, "that can't be legal. I was 5 or 6 years old."
"Seven," he said with a smile, "and it is - in Cartoon Country. Besides, you've misunderstood the sayings. We already ARE married. Your Teddy Pooh-Pooh saw to it ..."
"But he was a toy, not a human being. Besides, we aren't in Cartoon Country, we are in my world as a human being."
"Interesting," he said, suddenly looking very happy. "Well, then we had better hurry away from here, haven't we, dear wife?" That said, he jumped the 6-7 metres from the pear tree to the spot where I was standing. He swept me up into his arms and kissed me right on the kisser before we set off in the direction of the dark shadows. Somewhere over there I remembered what laid beyond those shadows and I couldn't help smiling and also laugh out at the memory. One thing was for sure, Toad had always been fun to be with and he had always made me laugh. Besides, in Cartoon Country I might easily get a divorce. Thinking this I happened to look down my arms and I understood the situation better because now I saw what I had seen in Toad: They were turning into dolls' arms, stitches and all. The same change was visible in my legs, stitches everywhere. I dared not think of how my new dolls' face looked ...

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