Milk Thief

Something is eating the milk!

Shrilled the good lady as she marched into the living room.

I winked at the little lady sitting across from me at the breakfast table.

I think she means drinking the milk, doesn't she? You don't eat milk...Silly Mummy.

Yes Daddy, silly Mummy!

We both chuckled at silly Mummy.

A shadow fell over me as I raised a bit of toast to my mouth. I looked up to see the good lady towering above me, eyes ablaze, an almost empty, leaky milk carton in her hand.

Something is EATING the milk and you had better fix it.

She hissed as if some giant menstruation had her in its purple handed grip.

She dumped the carton in front of me and flounced off to have a shower. I picked it up. Eating the milk indeed? I examined the carton. I wondered what could it be.

I had a momentary vision of some slavering beast shaking its matted hairy head from side to side as it wandered up and down our street until it found our morning milk delivery. Falling on it in a maddened frenzy and slurping it with its spiny carton-puncturing tongue like a porn star at a chocolate starfish.

Aha! There it was. There was a tiny hole at the bottom of the carton. Something had either pecked or nibbled at it.

I trotted upstairs to inform the good lady of the results of my detectivity. I caught her before she entered the shower. She seemed calmer, thankfully.

It's alright. I have gotten to the bottom of it all. Something has pecked or nibbled at the bottom of the carton. That's why the milk leaked out. Must be a bird or a squirrel or something?

The good lady fixed me with a gimlet eye.

Daddy. I don't think you quite understand. I know something is eating the milk. I want you, as the man of the house to stop it.

I could fashion some manner of container and make a sign for the milkman to put the milk in the container and see if that helps stop the creature?

The good lady huffed like a buffalo smelling something liony.

No Daddy, no containers. No boxes. Kill the thing. Kill it. Kill the milk eater. Kill it dead.

You want me to kill an animal. You? The woman who cried when I caught a mouse in a trap? The woman who got upset when I killed a moth?

She took a deep breath. I recognised that breath. It was the same one that I took when I was dealing with simpletons in work. Oh dear.

Three times this week the milk has been eaten. Three times Daddy bear. Three times is three times too many. It has to stop. You have to kill the thing.

Alright chick. If it's a fox will I gut it like a fish and skin it?

What, no. Don't skin the bloody thing?

Why not, I could make you a nice hat. Once I scraped the fleshy smeg off it and dried it. I think you have to piss on it as well to cure the skin but that's fine. I will figure it out.

Eww, no. I don't want to wear a dead animal you have pissed on?!?

If it's a mouse then, should I stamp it flat so its guts splurb out and burst? Leave the remains as a message to the other potential mousey milk thieves?

The good lady looked queasy.

Ugh, no. That's horrible!

I smiled and pulled my hands together in a clawing gesture in front of me.

What if it's a little birdy. Should I grab the little bastard birdy and...

I snapped my hands apart.

Rip its milk thieving head off!!!

She burped and turned quite pale.

Fine. Fashion your stupid box and make a sign then.

She stamped off into the bathroom.

I smiled and headed off downstairs, honour satisfied and bloodshed averted.