I wrote this to coincide with rain1940's lovely TS picture on deviantART "That Stupid Cat".
Where could she be?
"Jessie?" Woody called.
No reply.
"Jessie?" Buzz tried instead.
Still nothing.
The two toys glanced at each other with confused looks, and Buzz shrugged a little. Woody ran his hand over his chin, thinking to himself.
"Let's see. Bonnie took her out of the room this afternoon after she came back from day-care. If I was a little girl…."
Buzz coughed and tried to hold back a laugh, and Woody shot him a annoyed look.
"Grow up."
"Sorry." Buzz coughed again and pulled his face straight, trying to look innocent. "I don't know what came over me." He looked up to the ceiling.
"As I was saying…" Woody drawled, returning to his thoughts. "If I was Bonnie, where would I take a cowgirl doll?"
"Somewhere she wouldn't be disturbed?" Buzz commented. "There are only a few places Bonnie would take Jessie for girly time out."
"That rules out the garden. But someplace else she'd have enough space to play." Woody nodded.
"Living room is also out, too many people coming and going." Buzz thought for another moment. "Perhaps…." he said… "Bonnie's parents bedroom?"
Woody shook his head this time. "Nah. I think maybe the kitchen. Normally quiet in there this time of the day."
Buzz turned to his friend. "Are you crazy? She wouldn't take a toy doll downstairs for girly time."
"You're forgetting the big kitchen table. She could be drawing down there." Woody argued, and Buzz glared, knowing Woody had a point.
"Fine, Sheriff. You take the downstairs. I'll search around the perimeter up here."
"Jessie?" Buzz called softly a few minutes later, creeping into Bonnie's parents room. "You back here?"
Nothing moved or responded. Buzz crept over to the bed, the valance sheet falling down around it, obscuring anything that might be under the bed. He peered left and right, but still saw nothing. Feeling it safe to proceed with his mission, he turned right and tiptoed around the end of the bed.
His gaze was caught by the light reflecting off a small shiny surface. Curiously, Buzz went closer to what he now realised was a round object, and touched it with a finger. It rolled from him merely a millimetre and then rolled back again.
Buzz scratched his head and frowned a bit. What on earth was it?
"Buzz?"
His attention was diverted from his discovery by the noise. "Jessie?"
"Buzz. I'm over here." He turned his head to the left. Jessie was sitting on the ground, leaning against the nightstand, waving a little at him.
"Hey, cowgirl." He started towards her. "What you doing dow-argh!"
Picking himself up off the floor, Buzz turned to see another incriminating round object that had tripped him up in his mission to get to the redhead's side. "What are these things?" He asked suspiciously, giving it a bit of a kick. The item responded in kind, rolling away a little bit and then became still.
"They're marbles." Jessie said, between giggles.
"Marbles? What are they doing all over the floor?"
"Oh, Bonnie was playing in here earlier. She was trying to see how close she could get them to go to the dresser. I was essentially her opponent, but I don't throw as well as she does." Jessie gave a little grin.
"Oh." Buzz nodded, abstaining from punching the air. Woody had been so wrong. "Well everything seems fine here, little miss. How about I take you back to Bonnie's room until she goes to bed in a few hours?"
"Well…" Jessie got up. "I don't know about that. How about.." she looked at Buzz flirtatiously. "How about we just stay here?"
Buzz swallowed. "W…won't someone hear us?"
"Not if we're really quiet…and we remain out of sight…" Jessie smiled and bit her bottom lip. Buzz felt his knees buckle as she lifted the valance on the side of the bed.
Woody crept along the skirting board, ready to drop and play 'toy' if anyone happened to walk past. From the kitchen, he heard the clatter of a pencil and he grinned triumphantly. Buzz was wrong after all. Oh, he'd be rubbing that space toy's nose in it all evening now. He scrambled over to the door leading into the big airy kitchen and peeked inside.
There, sitting on one of the big dining chairs, was Bonnie. Her back was half turned to Woody, and she was bent over the table with a fierce look of concentration in her eyes, her tongue sticking out a little as she scribbled on something in front of her.
"Momma?" Woody shrunk back as Bonnie spoke. A pair of feet could be heard on the other side of the kitchen, out of sight.
"Yes sweetie?" He heard Mrs Anderson say.
"Can I have a cookie?"
"After dinner, sugarplum," Mrs Anderson said gently, walking across to pick up the fallen colouring pencil, and glanced at the area in front of the child. "What are you drawing?"
"I'mma drawing…..uh…I draw cookie!" Bonnie said proudly, looking up at last and grabbing the paper in front of her. From his angle, Woody could see the brown round shape on the paper and he sighed, covering his eyes with one hand.
Hopefully Buzz was having more luck than he was.
"I don't know we should have done this," Jessie whispered to Buzz, looking around. His spacesuit had started to glow in the half darkness under the bed.
"What do you mean?" Buzz asked softly, taking Jessie's hand.
"It reminds me of when I was at Emily's." Jessie's voice dropped and her lip started to quiver.
"You still think about that?" Buzz asked.
"Every single day. Being under here….its like being abandoned."
"But you're not abandoned any longer." Buzz pointed out. He took her other hand into his free one and pulled her closer to him. "Perhaps.."
"Perhaps….what?" Jessie asked.
"Perhaps we should make the underside of the bed more…appealing," Buzz suggested with a little smile, kissing her cheek.
"Oh….? Oh…" Jessie smiled back as his lips landed on her cheek. "I like that idea."
"I'm glad," Buzz whispered, as they sank down onto the floor.
"One minute…" Jessie stopped him just as he was about to take her back into his arms, removing her hat. She pulled the yellow ribbon out of her hair and shook it loose. She looked back at Buzz just as the CLUNK of his wings springing open sounded.
"You're so…" It was a thought Buzz didn't care to finish as he pushed the cowgirl doll back onto the hard wood floor. He cradled the back of her head and neck with one hand as he closed her eyes and they began to kiss again.
They were so caught up in each other for several minutes, that only the soft creak of someone walking on the floorboards made them break apart.
"Buzz." Jessie hissed, sensing something nearby. "What's that?"
"Shhh." Buzz kept his voice down, and peered around. He didn't see anything, there were no shadows on the floor, nothing. As they both lay there, straining their ears, a light scrabbling sounded, and then a strange high pitched yowl.
There was a dull rolling type noise and something whisked under the bed next to them. In the light that Buzz's blinking wing tips and green glow afforded, both toys saw it was one of the marbles Bonnie had been playing with.
"How did that mov-" Jessie asked curiously, lifting her head, and Buzz turned back to look down at her. In the next instant his head whipped back round as something else smacked down on the floor, whisking the valance sheet back and forth in it's temper.
Buzz felt Jessie cling to him, and he knew his own face showed, quite frankly, his own fright. They both stared at the intruder, which was obviously trying to reach the marble that had interrupted them initially.
"Keep quiet," Jessie whispered in Buzz's ear. "It's only Fritz."
With a start, Buzz realised she was right. Bonnies' cat was so interfering. It's orange fluffy paw, now moving around mere inches from them, would often bat at anything it could reach, including Woody and Jessie's pull strings and would often tear the addable parts off Mr and Mrs Potatohead.
Eventually, the tabby gave up with its enemy and the paw withdrew from sight. They heard the pad of paws on the floorboards as the cat walked around, and then the light thud as it jumped up on top of the bed above them.
"Well, Mr Space Commander. I certainly have a different memory about being under a bed now, don't I?" Jessie giggled, planting a soft kiss on Buzz's cheek.
