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It was a cold, nippy evening at the manor. It had snowed earlier that day, and the imaginary friends that had been playing in the slush had since come back inside, getting ready for bed.
Up in one of the upper rooms of the mansion, Mr. Herriman was finishing up some final paperwork. He dipped his feather pen back into its inkwell and stretched his old bones. He had been working on papers all day, not having much time to get outside the office. The old rabbit rubbed his eyes and looked towards the crackling fire he had lit that morning.
Its soft crackle was pulling him into a nap, which he was having a harder and harder time resisting.
“Just a quick nap couldn’t hurt too badly. “
He leaned back in his chair, and shuffled through old memories, learning towards the ones involving his dear creator. Eventually, he fell into a deep, deep sleep.
—————————-
Herriman opened his eyes with a deep feeling of life to him. He felt his new body, feeling every hair on his body with wonder and awe. He was brand new.
“Ahem!”
Herriman stopped his fur feeling and looked down. In front of him was a small little girl, with blonde curls and a pink dress with a pink bow. He didn’t know why, but he felt an intimate connection looking at the young girl.
“Uhm, hello!”
It was strange moving his mouth for the first time, it even hurt just a tiny bit.
“Hello, funny bunny!”
Almost immediately, the girl lunged towards him with a giant hug. He was scared for a moment, unfamiliar with the action but gently leaned down and hugged her back. The girl seemed to have a sudden realization of something.
“I gotta tell momma and poppa about you!”
The little girl grabbed his hand and began furiously tugging on it to go forwards, with not much luck due to the large bun’s immense weight. Herriman just walked in the direction she was pulling and they were off.
They passed many strange-looking hallways on their way to, well, Herriman didn’t completely know, but he knew the little girl wanted him to and that was enough reason for him. The halls twisted and turned and they went in directions that fumbled with the new rabbit’s new mind. Eventually, they came to a large looking room with strange colorful squares in them, along with two humans who bore a resemblance to the young girl. One was a tall man with brown hair and a grand mustache. He wore a tuxedo and a frown, with his eyes firmly dug into a newspaper with headlines Herriman found mundane. The other one was an elderly lady with a purple dress reading a book he couldn’t quite make out the title of. They eventually noticed the two standing there, and put down what they were reading to study the large bunny in front of them.
“Momma! Poppa! I finally did it! I imagined a friend!”
The two people, who Herriman assumed must be momma and poppa, briefly stared at each other, as if waiting for one to make the first move so they could act accordingly. Eventually, the “poppa” spoke up.
“Hm. isn't it a bit, well, late to have an imaginary friend at this point in time? You are eight years old. Most other children would’ve given up theirs by now.”
The little girl stared at her feet in embarrassment. Seemingly in an attempt to brighten the mood, the “momma” decided to speak.
“Well, what’s his name?”
The girl straightened her back and proudly replied:
“His name is Funny Bunny!”
The woman’s face grew furrowed while the man grew disappointed.
“Funny bunny you say.”
The man said with no amusement in his voice.
The woman decided to speak again:
“Couldn’t you have chosen a more serious name for him, Martha? Such as Oliver or maybe Cadman. When I made my imaginary friend, his name was Chester Roosevelt-”
The man butted in.
“Why would you have chosen such a silly name for your imaginary friend?? You know the behavior we enforce here-”
“Well, he’s MY imaginary friend, not some stupid monkey you made when you were 2!”
“Miss Martha foster don’t you talk back to me-”
Herriman looked over and saw the girl, who he now knew was named Martha, starting to cry. Panicking, he looked desperately around the room. His eyes locked on a weird statue of a critter that bore a striking resemblance to him. Underneath, there was an inscription that read “mountain hare”. That must be what he is, a hare. Let’s see here, hare, Harry, Harri, Cadman, Herriman-
“Uhm, if it’s not too much of an issue, I can be called Herriman, sir, and madame.”
The two stared at him. The man took a sigh.
“I suppose that will do. Welcome to the household, Mr.Herriman”
Herriman looked over at Martha and saw that she looked very disappointed with the sudden name change. His heart sank to the pit of his stomach, but he knew this was the best way this could’ve gone.
-----------------
A couple of hours later, Mr. Herriman was reading a book to Martha. Well, it was more like him reading out loud while Martha ignored him and played with two plushies who he thinks were either mortal enemies or lovers, he couldn’t tell. Eventually, Martha got bored of playing strange-dynamic with the two plushies and told him straight to his face:
“This is boring.”
“It’s what??”
“Your reading is boring. Funny Bunny. Couldn’t you sing me a song or something”
“I’m not sure if I’m a good singer or not Martha….”
“Pleeeeeaseeeee?”
He knew he couldn’t resist those eyes. He sighed and put the book down, stood up, took a moment to think of some lyrics, then began singing:
“Hippity Hippity Hopity Hopity. My tail's quite fluffy my ears are quite floppity. I sing and I dance and you can't make me stoppity.”
He danced while singing, to the joy of his little girl. He felt great happiness that he was able to make her happy.
He went over to Martha and booped her nose
“Said funny bunny to sweet little girl”
She grinned and jumped onto Mr. Herriman and knocked him over with a big bear hug. The bunny began tickling the little girl and they began laughing up a storm. Peeping in through the crack in her door was her father, smiling at the new friend that his child had made
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It had been a couple of days now. Mr. Herriman and Martha were playing tag hide and seek throughout the large house. They hid in the strange hallways and the even stranger rooms, somehow still finding each other regardless. Eventually, Herriman couldn’t find her, no matter where he looked. He hopped into a large room and saw Martha peering behind an exotic house plant. He decided to playfully play dumb with her.
“Hmmmmm…. I wonder where Martha is!”
He could hear her giggles behind the plant.
He got into a dramatic pose he saw on one of momma’s books.
“Oh, woe is me, what will her parents think when they found out I lost their angel! They’ll punish me with no carrots for 40 days and 40 nights!”
He waddled on over to where she was hiding.
“Oh. what’s this?”
He brushed away the laves of the house plant and touched her nose.
He smiled.
“Boop! You’re it!”
The two started laughing as Herriman hopped away from her as fast as he could. He zig-zagged around the house while he laughed so hard his ribs hurt. While trying to follow him to tag him, Martha tripped. Herriman turned around and seemingly in slow motion watched as she knocked over a large and slightly gaudy vase and it crashed to the ground, splashing water to the ground and probably killing whatever kind of flowers were in it. The parents were a couple of rooms over, and they heard the loud crash and immediately started to come over. Martha motioned Herriman to come over to where she was standing. He did as such, and she immediately switched spots with him as the parents came over. She started pointing at him accusingly.
“Funny- I mean mister Herriman did it!”
“Oh he did, did he?”
The man stared Herriman down. He wanted to defend himself but he looked over to his girl and saw her staring him down with her puppy dog eyes, and he couldn’t resist. He swallowed and lied.
“Uhm, yes, yes I did sir foster.”
“Hmph.”
Poppa grabbed his ears and began dragging him to Martha’s bedroom, scolding him all the way through. When they got there, he threw the bunny in, and screamed at the top of his lungs:
“You will stay here for the rest of the night and you will get no supper!”
“Not even one carrot?”
“Of course not you stupid rabbit.”
He smashed the door closed, and Herriman lowered his head in shame. His stomach growled and he felt very very hungry.
“From now on, I will NEVER get in trouble again! I will always have! My! SUPPER!”
He punched the bed as he said his vow, which actually hurt pretty bad and he recoiled a bit in pain.
-----------
The next day, Herriman was on his tip-top behavior. He greeted the parents with the most respectful language he could muster, helped Martha’s father with everything he asked, including grabbing the newspaper with the neighbor’s dog outside. He loathed that dog, it would always chase him down and bite his ears.
Later, Herriman was patrolling the hallways, seeing if there was anything at all he could do to make sure he never got in trouble again. He shuttered at the thought of repeating last night, hungry and, well mostly just hungry as Martha was still there but it was still awful. He was hopping through the halls, in terrible fear of doing something wrong, he looked around every hope to make sure he didn’t accidentally trip and break something. While he patrolled, he caught Martha doodling on the bathroom walls in what looked to be, oh no. it was a permanent marker.
Herriman jumped over to her and snatched the marker out of her hand.
“Awwww, cmon funny bunny! I was just doodling!”
“Doodling is for paper in notebooks, not the walls!”
“Awww, when did you become no fun?”
She groaned.
“Listen, I just really don’t want to repeat last night. You seriously got me in big trouble, Martha!
Now please, could you go play in your room while I clean up your, let’s just say “spill” you had here.”
She rolled her eyes and left the room while giving a big raspberry to Herriman on her way out.
“Hmph”
Herriman didn’t like being the boring imaginary friend, it made him feel bad. But if he wanted to keep on Martha’s parent’s good side, he needed to be the boring imaginary friend. He wasn’t gonna be it ALL the time, just around the parents. But that can be dealt with later.
Herriman closed the bathroom door. He can’t let poppa especially see this mess. He grabbed the bleach that was tucked inside the bathroom cabinet and started scrubbing with the brush nearby. It wasn’t coming out. Herriman was panicking a bit. He NEEDED to get this ink out. He started grabbing every seemingly cleaner in the drawer and mixing it together sloppily. Unknown to him, fumes were starting to fume out from his franken-cleaner. He didn’t care, he just needed to get this stain out of the walls.
“Oh finally, its coming out-”
Herriman started coughing furiously.
“Ugh, not sure what iv miyxed toeeegether in this mixyture”
He was starting to severely slur his words. His vision was becoming extremely hazy and his breathing heavy.
“Iytzz….aylmzost… owtttt”
His arms and legs went limp and he fell to the ground. He looked up, and he started hallucinating poppa looming over him.
“Owhhh, poyppaaaa, zlease forzive sme”
“You dumb rabbit, you did this one, didn’t you? Two in a row.”
He did a limp begging movement with his hands, but they just fell to the ground again.
“Plezee syirrrl, pzlease firgyve meeee”
“Oh please. You’re getting food privileges revoked for 2 whole days. That’ll teach you to disobey.”
“nYOOOOOOOOOOOWWW”
Herriman then proceeded to blackout.
----------
Herriman woke up in what appeared to be a hospital.
He looked around and saw Martha on the bed with him.
“Oh, you’re finally awake!”
“Martha!” he grabbed his head
“Augh! Dear god my head!”
“Makes sense why your head hurts. Doctor’s say you got high off fumes from your cleaner concoction. They say you’re gonna have to stay here for a day or two with how bad it was. You could’ve died funny bunny!”
“I could have died?!”
He was shocked for a moment, realizing how stupid he was to mix all those chemicals together. But then he saw the perfect opportunity for some humor.
“Oh no I’m dyyyyyiiiinnnnggggg’
He dropped onto his bed in a fake dead pose.
“Bleh!”
“Nooooo!!! Funny bunny!”
“I’m so dead, skeletons are jealous bleh bleh bleh!”
“Noooo! Now I have to find a place to hold your funeral!”
He opened one eye.
“Can it be at a carrot farm? I wanna be dug with my favorite things on earth. Besides you.” he sat up and booped Martha.
The two went into a laughing fit, though Herriman had to take a couple of moments to breathe before laughing.
----------
It had been a couple months since herriman’s creation. He had fit himself quite nicely into the family at this point, and the parents had semi gotten used to his and Martha’s antics. Poppa was still very much disappointed in him even existing, but he never did say it out loud. however you could easily tell how he felt, as he acted very cold whenever Mr herriman spoke to him. Herriman usually tried to avoid Poppa due to this, and when he had to speak to him talked extremely formally, and used the wording of a English professor. He sorta enjoyed talking like that if he was going to be honest, so he would use it even when poppa wasn’t around. It got a bit on the family’s nerves, but they couldn’t do much about it.
One night, sometime in November, herriman got extremely hungry. It didn’t make much sense to him, as he had eaten just fine the day before. He also had some kind of extreme craving for carrots. He got up from the makeshift bed that Martha had made for him to sleep. It was pretty much a large dog bed, and it gave him cramps in his neck, but he appreciated it nonetheless.
He stealthily and quietly headed to the kitchen. Well, as stealthy and quiet as a 6 foot large rabbit can be. He got lost for about an half hour in the long, dark tangling hallways of the house, but eventually he reached the kitchen. He opened the fridge, and found the stash of carrots the parents begrudgingly got for him. He immediately started chowing down, loudly crunching on the delights.
So loud in fact, that the hungry rabbit didn’t notice poppa come into the kitchen and turn on the lights. He tapped on herriman’s shoulder and he screamed as he snapped behind him to see Poppa standing behind him, looking very very mad.
“Mister herriman!”
Herriman hid the carrot he was eating behind his back and smiled like a cartoon character
“Uhm, salutations master poppa! What bids you here in the kitchen on this fine night?”
“Don’t play the gentleman game with me rabbit. I see the bits of the carrots you were STEALING on your mustache, not to mention the carrot behind your back”
Herriman just stared back quietly.
“Go to your room now. You’ve lost carrot privileges for the week, you can eat what we’re eating you greedy rabbit”
Herriman somberly walked back to the room. When he did, he flopped back onto his bed so loud that it woke up Martha.
“Where’d you just come from funny bunny?”
“Got cravings for carrots, went to the kitchen to get some” he sighed
“And then poppa caught me and sent me back and revoked carrot privileges for a week”
He rolled over in his bed.
“What am I going to dooooo??”
Martha pondered for a moment.
“You must be having hibernation cravings!”
“Hm?”
“I heard about them from a cartoon once, your body is trying to get you ready for hibernation!”
“But I don’t hibernate, I’m an imaginary friend. And do rabbits even hibernate?”
“I don’t know funny bunny, I’m just guessing. Point being, you're gonna hibernate soon and we need to fill you up with!”
“I suppose I have been getting a bit drowsy as of late”
“There we go! Tomorrow we’re gonna get every veggie in the house and feed it to ya! Heheh”
“Are we sure that’s a good idea? Poppa got so mad at me earlier for stealing the carrots. Stealing every veggie in the house seems even worse”
“Nahhh, they’ll understand when I explain it to them”
“Alright then”
They then both proceeded to fall asleep, mostly because it was very early in the morning
—————
The next day, herriman tried sleeping extra late while Martha grabbed as many veggies as she could secretly from the fridge and garden. She even stole a couple from the neighbor’s garden for good measure. When she came back, she woke herriman up.
“Got the veggies! Time to chow down!”
He eyed the vegetables up and down. She really had gotten a lot.
“Hey uh Martha, I’m not sure if I can eat all that. I don’t wanna get sick from this”
“Oh cmon funny bunny, don’t you wanna have a nice hibernation? You gotta get all fat so you’ll be able to live through your hibernation.”
“Mhmmmmm fineeee”
He slowly began munching on the veggies. It took him a solid 15 minutes to even make a dent in it. About an hour in, he was halfway done and his stomach was starting to really hurt. He was about 80% done when he had to stop because he was groaning in agony.
“Why’d you stop??!”
“I can’t eat anyymoreeee.. I think I’m gonna puke Martha” he groaned while holding his stomach.
“On the bright side, you look a bit fatter.”
“That’s a good thing???”
“Yeah! Means you won’t die when you fall asleep for 3 months!”
“Three months????”
“Yeah! Now finish up your dinner so you can fall asleep!”
“Oh brother”
He tried to eat the remaining food, but at 90% he had to stop as he was unable to shove anymore food down his mouth. The parents, wondering where the two were for the past 2 hours, came into the room and found Martha trying to convince herriman to eat some more while he was on his stomach groaning like he had been stabbed.
“Now what in god’s green earth is happening here???” Poppa said enraged
“Uhhhhhhh, I needed to help mister herriman hibernate! So I brought every veggie we have to him to eat”
Herriman groaned in agreement.
The mom replied in equal anger:
“Imaginary friends don’t hibernate Martha! You just wasted all our food and made mister herriman sick!”
“Oh”
“‘Oh’ is right missy. Now I’m going to assume this was your idea as I’m pretty sure herriman actually learned his lesson from last night was it?”
Herriman looked at him with the best puppy eyes he could muster. She looked down at her feet.
“Yes it was”
“Hmph. You’re grounded for a week”
“Awwwww, but dadddyyyyyy”
“No buts, do you know how much vegetables cost? You probably wasted a good 80 dollars worth of produce. You get no tv, no books, no nothing”
“Awwwwwwwwwwww”
Herriman didn’t say much, he just groaned in pain from eating so many vegetables all at once. He was not gonna have a fun time later today.
—————————-
seemingly eons after the “vegetable incident” as it became known as, Martha slowly became an adult, got married, and had kids who also grew up. her parents moved out of the house so she could use it for a project she had started called “Foster’s home for imaginary friends”, where she gave housing to abandoned imaginary friends where they can stay until someone decides to take them as their imaginary friend. She had always felt pity for the imaginary friends she had seen making camp at places like the park, freezing to death in the rain and starving with no food. It came in handy too that herriman also was a savvy rulesleeper and was able to keep the entire house running smoothly. Even if back then it was maybe 10-15 imaginary friends staying in the house during the span of a year.
One day, herriman was taking a walk as part of his duties to help find imaginary friends to take in. It was a tiring job, but he did it nonetheless to keep that house running and that smile on madame foster(as Martha was now known as)‘s face. He peeked in the park, he peeked in the forest, he peeked everywhere he could think of. Eventually, he came to his favorite place to look for friends: dark random alleys. They usually like to hide in there for some reason, probably due to how you could avoid getting rained on depending on how long the roofs are, and how you could dig in trash for food.
Herriman began walking into the alley. It was especially creepy right now due to it being pretty early in the morning and the sun was just only now breaking into the sky. He looked around. No dice.
Until he saw a large figure’s shadow appear in front of him. Oh no.
Herriman hid underneath a box that was directly next to him. The figure looked like some kind of monster, with large hands and an even larger mouth. Herriman heard the squeaking of what sounded like tennis shoes come closer. Crap crap crap crap. He shut his eyes and rolled up into a ball as best he could. The figure seemingly noticed the box vibrating,walked towards it and gently pulled it off of Herriman.
This is it, this is how he would die.
“Uh, hello!”
It said in a very friendly sounding voice
Herriman opened his eyes. Oh thank heavens, it was just an imaginary friend. A very screwed up one however, he observed. There were scars on their head that looked pretty fresh, along with an extremely mangled arm that was black and blue. The imaginary friend noticed the staring.
“Oh, don’t worry about my arm. It’s a long story, I’m sorry”
“Nono, it’s fine. Say, you’re an imaginary friend, aren’t you, masteerrrr..?”
“Oh, my name is wilt”
“Master wilt, yes. I am the chairman of a particularly new establishment known as ‘Foster’s home for imaginary friends’. We would like you to stay there so you can get yourself adopted by a new kid.”
The friend looked away nervously.
“I’m sorry, but are you sure a kid would want an imaginary friend like me? I can’t even use my left arm anymore, it just doesn’t move”
“I see. No matter, we can get it amputated for free. Besides, I’m sure someone will want someone like you!”
“I’m sorry but you were literally just cowering in fear from my mere presence”
“It’s a dark alley, you never know what scoundrel will fill you with lead nowadays”
“Fair I suppose”
“Anyways, come along with me”
Herriman lead the new imaginary friend back to the manor. Once they got there, Wilt was flabbergasted with how large it was.
“I’m sorry, but I think we must be at the wrong house. You can’t be letting me stay HERE, are you?”
“Actually, this is in fact the correct location. Welcome to Foster’s home for imaginary friends, wilt”
He lead him inside to madame foster.
“Ohh madame foster! I found a new friend!”
She came running over.
“Oh my! What a tall one he is!”
The imaginary friend blushed a bit.
“I’m sorry but thank you, you’re too kind”
Herriman came closer to madame foster.
“Now, we’ll have to get his left arm amputated. It seems to just be a rotting piece of flesh at this point, he himself said it was unable to move anymore.”
“That shouldn’t be too much of an issue. I have connections with a good imaginary friend surgeon”
“Good good. I’ll find a room for him.”
Herriman guided him through the twisted halls he had long ago since memorized. He smiled at the astonishment the friend got from the place, reminiscing about when he first was created. Eventually, he lead him to a room with a very tall roof, perfect for the very tall imaginary friend. “I’m sorry, but this is for me??”
“Yes it is, master wilt”
“How much will it cost? I’m sorry, but I don’t have any money”
“Nothing at all”
“Wait, nothing??”
“Yes, this is a foster home. You can stay here as long as need be till you get a new owner”
The friend seemed to be in near tears of joy, he lowered to give him a hug until he realized he barely knew the person so he just lowered his arm for a handshake.
——————-
Herriman woke up with a jolt. There was some kind of whipped cream all over his face and hand, and he heard a familiar laugh running down the hallway. Herriman checked the time. 9:30 am. He growled.
“BLOOREGARD!!! COME BACK HERE!!”
He began hopping down the halls, when he nearly ran into madame foster.
“Morning funny bunny”
He checked to make sure nobody was looking and gave a big boop on the nose to her.
“Good morning Martha”