Flickertail & Paint Hide William TheTurkey

"Paint, I need your help." Flickertail, the llama emailed Paint, the horse. "It's less than two weeks until Thanksgiving and we need to find a good place to hide William, the turkey. The meteorologist on the Weather Channel is predicting snow by the end of the week and I want to get him hidden before then. It'll be too easy to track him in the snow."

"Is it cold in the barn? You know how I hate the cold. I always get a hoarse throat when it's cold and damp."

"Well, I'm sure a Texas Rose like you will feel the cold a lot more than I do."

"I'll ask Norma if I can borrow a space heater."

"Better make it two. The barn's a big space."

Paint arrived with only one space heater. "Norma said she might need one for herself."

"Maybe I can borrow another one from Mary for you."

"Better not tell her I'm here to hide William or she'll let me freeze."

"Do you have any good ideas for hiding William?"

"Maybe we could disguise him."

"As what?"

"How about a hamster?"

"His tail's too big for that."

"The AFLAC duck?"

"You quack me up. Seriously, I don't think he could fake a waddle."

"The Geiko Gecko?"

"Well, he does believe in being green but even he isn't green enough for that."

"I guess we'd better forget about disguising him."

Flickertail wiggled his long, banana shaped ears in thought. "Last year, we hid him in the tunnel between the barn and the basement of the house. The year before, we hid him in the concealed room in the house. We can't use those again now that Mary and Tom know about them."

"Does G.G. eat turkey?"

"Alice feeds her cat food with turkey in it, why?"

"That won't work then. I was thinking he could hide there."

"If G.G. didn't eat him, Alice probably would."

"I know. We can hide him in the hen house. He can pretend to be a rooster."

"He doesn't crow. He gobbles, but that does give me an idea." Flickertail opened a bag filled with llama wool and dyed it a brilliant shade of blue. "Help me knit this so it will fit over William's head and body. We need to hide his wattle."

Paint was perplexed but Flickertail seemed to know what he was doing so she went along with his plan.

"Now, we need about five or six matching pompoms and white pipe cleaners for a crest."

"Oh, I get it, now."

"It's the only fowl I could think of that has a tail bigger than William's."

They worked on the tail all through the night. When they had finished, William tried on his new disguise.

"I love it." William strutted around proud as a peacock. "Thank you both. I can't tell you how much I appreciate your keeping me safe every Thanksgiving. At least this year I can hide in plain sight."

Thanksgiving came. Mary's and Tom's family arrived. About a half hour later everyone left. "Where'd everyone go?" Flickertail asked the house dogs, Cookie and Coco.

"They decided to go out to eat this year. No leftovers for us," Cookie said sadly.