The Scarecrow

Once upon a time, there was a scarecrow. He was located in the middle of the corn field, swaying to and fro in the wind, scaring the crows away, so that the farmer's corn remain safe.

The best thing the scarecrow loved about being a scarecrow was the farmer's daughter. Everyday, the sweet girl would come skipping to the middle of the field to talk to the scarecrow. She would sit at his feet and tell him the happenings of the day, fiddle with the pieces of straw she plucked from him, squeal with delight when she saw a robin. When she had problems, he listened. When she was happy, he listened. When she was angry, he listened.

The scarecrow was filled with the farmer's daughter. He thought of nothing but her and whatever she talked to him during the day.

I want to be a real man! I want to marry her and listen to her everyday!

Out of nowhere, a fairy appeared and granted him his wish, but with a price- he couldn't talk, only listen.

The girl was overjoyed when she saw that her scarecrow had come to life. Gladly, she married him. But as the days turned to weeks and the weeks to months, the girl realised that a forever quiet husband was not what she wanted. She soon stopped talking to him. Their evenings were silent, the atmosphere chilly as a graveyard.

Overcome by grief, the scarecrow begged the fairy to return. He asked her to turn him back into a scarecrow again, so that his wife could feel free to find another man to get married to. Feeling sorry for him, she did.

As he was lying there on the ground, once more a pile a straw and old clothes, a careless farm boy came along and dropped a still smoking cigarette onto the scarecrow.

The scarecrow burst into flames and started to burn merrily. Finally, for the first time in it's life, it could produce sounds. The crackling of the fire eating at it's body was the first sound he could make.

As people ran around trying to put out the fire, he saw the farmer's daughter screaming and running towards him. He managed to crackle an "I Love You", before burning away into a pile of ash.