Ronald The Ragweed

Once upon a time, in an enchanted inner city park, there lived a little turquoise ragweed named Ronald. The park was the most tranquil place on Earth, so no one could hear him when he said:

“Brrrr-ruffle-ruffle!”

Every day, he looked all around him for a new friend, only to find the big shoes of the people who come to the park. When people were about to step on him, he hid very quickly through a hole in a stone wall.

“Brrr-ruffle-ruffle,” he shivered.

One day, it happened that a great storm had hit the park and left a few bits of rubbish scattered around. Ronald peered out of his hole. He had never seen so much rubbish in his life! Suddenly, he heard a low hissing noise from behind him.

“BRRRRRRRR-RUFFLE-RUFFLE!!” he screamed in fear.

Some of the rubbish in the park had come to life. “Hello, darling,” said a soft, kind voice before Ronald - an old baby bottle top with eyes and lips hopped towards him. “I’m Mrs Cutee,” she introduced. “My friends and I are new here. Mind if I introduce you to them?”

“BRRR-RUFFLE-RUFFLE!” squeaked Ronald excitedly.

Mrs Cutee proudly proceeded to introduce Ronald to all her friends:

Baby Cutee - her daughter.

“Bibby-babble-booble!”

Sidney Sizzle - a snake who cooks the most delicious food for everyone.

“Ssssss….”

The Packet Twins, Twix and Twirl.

“Crinkle.”

“Cronkle.”

And….eh? What are these? Ronald could see three strange, goofy creatures sitting on the bench before him.

“Ruffle?” he asked, confused. Mrs Cutee chuckled.

“Those are creatures you made with the most powerful tool in the world - your imagination. Ronald, meet Mari, Helen and Scott.”

“Ruffle,” greeted Ronald.

“Taki toki,” smiled Mari.

“Gloop gloop,” went Helen.

“Yip-yappy!” went Scott.

At last, Ronald was happy. He now had a whole group of friends to play with!

In fact, they spent the whole of the next week playing games together.

On Monday, they played hide and seek.

On Tuesday, a bandwagon passed through the nearby town, so Ronald and Mrs Cutee led everyone in a dance party.

On Wednesday, they played tag.

On Thursday, they played Blind Man’s Buff.

On Friday, they did a conga line around the circular row of benches.

On Saturday, they took turns telling each other funny and scary stories.

And on the final day, they all enjoyed a big feast of sausage rolls and beef stew from Sydney’s magic cooking pot, his Hobblepop.

But after the week was up, something terrible happened.

Harold, the local park keeper, was out on a weekly night shift, and while Ronald was sleeping, he picked up each of his new friends and carried them away to be recycled at the local recycling centre in his rubbish bag.

The next morning, Ronald awoke to look for his dear friends.

“Ruffle!” he called joyfully.

No response. He called louder.

“RUFFLE!”

Still no response.

Ronald was about to call again when something stuck in his throat.

It felt like…no, surely, it didn’t feel like…yes! It was! It was a sickness called ‘emotion’.

Ronald cried and cried and cried. He cried so hard his slimy ragweed tears didn’t wash off the pavement.

Just as his eyes were about to ache from the gargantuan amount of crying, something caught Ronald’s red eye. He went closer to the mysterious rectangular object to see what it really was.

Ronald pulled it out from under the bench near the stone wall with a heave and a ho. To his surprise, there was a box of crayons. There was no label, it had no brand, and it was surprisingly clean. No matter how many times Ronald tried to dirty it, it still stayed clean.

Ronald opened the lid and peered inside. There was a quartet of crayons in four different colours - blue, green, yellow and red. Tucked behind them was a mysterious pink glittery card.

Ronald pulled it out and read carefully:

“Something magical will happen when you’ve missed your friends so much.”

Upon reading it, Ronald decided to draw on the pavement tiles all the fun times he had with his friends. The more he drew, the more he realised something: the drawings still stayed shining like hidden gold and jewels on the wet pavement.

But why? He thought to himself. Thoughts were still circling around his ragweed brain about this mysterious magic even when he went to sleep in his hole.

That night, a huge storm raged violently.

It blew down dustbins.

It ripped branches off the trees.

It sent benches tumbling about like acrobats in the wind.

It sent more litter flying about like a cosmic firestorm.

When Ronald emerged from his hole the next morning, the drawings on the ground had vanished! To make things more puzzling, a funny noise called out to him.

“Bllllrp-bllllrp!”

Ronald looked around in confusion. Who made that noise? He wondered. Then he heard another funny noise.

“Binki-bayna!”

And another.

“Grumble rumble!”

And yet another.

“Mooksy-cooksy!”

When Ronald spun around to see where the noises were coming from, there was a whole crowd of litter people before him, cheering and making funny noises loudly.

Ronald knew what he had done. His imaginative hope and patience had brought more friends to the park, to make up for the ones he lost.

The leader of the group was a ginger flavoured chocolate bar wrapper named Gingo.

And what did he remind him?

“Always look to the rainbow on a cloudy day.

Your old friends are calling you to come and play!”

And so, even though he had lots of new friends, Ronald was never lonely again…

…because he could always look to the rainbow to remember them.

THE END.