AN: This little one shot is set when Mona is 7 years old, so we'll actually get to see her react with her parents a little bit more than that one sentence her dad had in the first chapter! Yay! Instead of being in first person or Mona's perspective as it always is, this will be just plain narrated (I hope I pulled it off well…) And I have no idea how good this will be because I've never written for a 7 year old… but anyways, this one shot will explain why Mona is a vegetarian, which is nothing like how I became a vegetarian (but this is much cuter). Please read and review!
We Don't Eat Our Lab Partners
It had been a relatively important day at the Ryder's mansion. Important for a few reasons actually, considering Jonathan and Melanie Ryder had made some considerable success in their experiment at giving humans chicken DNA. Little Mona Ryder could've cared less about why or how her parents had succeeded, because today was her birthday, her 7th birthday to be exact. She was a big girl now, according to her parents. She liked the way "big girl" sounded but when she told Carolina about it her friend had only laughed and started using big and intimidating words like "responsibility" and "disappointment". Mona tried not to let it faze her, however. The 7 year old was determined to have a good day by sharing her parent's enthusiasm as well as reveling in her own. The girl's day was completely stellar until it was time for dinner with her parents and her governess, Jilliane Conrad.
"What's for dinner, Mamma?" Mona chirped in her high pitched little girl voice, climbing lithely into her chair at the dining table. She had always been a small child and though she sat up as tall as she could go, Mona was cut off at the neck as she sat in her chair.
"I made a special recipe for my birthday girl." The loving mother ruffled her daughter's hair as she passed her on the way to the kitchen. "It's a surprise!"
Mona gave a little scowl but was immediately filled with adrenalin. She had always loved surprises, especially ones from her parents because they always had the most interesting things Mona could ever imagine. The 7 year old sat on her hands, waiting impatiently for her parents and governess to come to the table for dinner. It was an agonizing 5 minutes for the hyperactive mind of the child, but her mother and father finally came to the table with a covered dish, Jilliane following closely behind.
"I got this recipe from my mother, Mona," Melanie Ryder explained, opening the lid to show golden brown pieces of chicken, seasoned perfectly and looking especially delectable in the dining room's dim lights. At least, to Mona's father and nanny the chicken looked delicious. Mona, on the contrary, was having a hard time keeping her long forgotten lunch down as the color drained from her face. Like the good parents they were, her mother and father reacted instantly.
"What's wrong, Mona?" her father asked, reaching over to feel her forehead. "Are you coming down with something?"
"Daddy, is that chicken?" she asked quietly, her small voice the only sound in the silent and confused room.
"Yes," he answered, furrowing his eyebrows, wondering where Mona was going with this. Mona used to love eating chicken, especially in the nugget form.
Tears welled up in the little girl's yellow-brown eyes that shocked all three of the adults in the room. Without warning Mona burst into tears, pitifully sobbing into the cream colored table cloth. Her mother was next to her in a heartbeat, gathering the girl into her arms without a second thought, cradling her against her neck as if she was 3 instead of 7.
"Mona, what's wrong?" her mother probed cautiously, her voice tender and soft. The crying girl sniffled into her mother's shoulder, moaning something that was unintelligible to everyone.
"Mona, my dear," her dad cooed, getting out of his chair to rub her back soothingly. "We can't hear you when you're crying."
The girl sat up in her mother's lap, propped up on the woman's knees. She wiped at her red eyes with a closed fist, hiccupping a bit with a little yelp. "I don't wanna eat the chicken, Momma," she sniffed in a pitiful voice.
"You don't have to," her mother smiled at her kindly. "But I thought you liked chicken, Mona."
The little girl shook her head violently, crossing her arms over her chest and adopting a stubborn look on her face. "No," was all she replied.
"What happened, kiddo?" Her father attempted to pry an answer from her. The 7 year old gave a little glare to him.
"I don't wanna eat the chicken 'cuz you guys told me that when we work with people we hafta be nice to them." The child's answer perplexed her parents and the adults shared a collective look of cluelessness.
"We don't know what you mean by that, Mona," Jilliane piped up, the words lilting strangely with her British accent.
"We don't eat our lab partners!" Mona cried out, tears beginning to stream down her face once more. It clicked for her parents then and they shared a knowing look of panic over their child's head before comforting her once more.
"This isn't the same chicken that we used in the experiment, Mona."
"It duzzn't matter, they were probably brother and sister chickens and now one of them is dead and the other one is probably really really sad because someone else is gonna eat them too, just like when you guys used cow NDA-"
"DNA," her father corrected helpfully but the girl didn't even pause to acknowledge it, continuing with her rant.
"-and when I wanted to go see the cow the week after Carolina told me it got sent to a mill!" The little girl, thankfully, didn't know exactly what a "mill" was, but she knew that hamburgers (though having "ham" in the name) were made from cows, showing the young girl that in order to eat at a fast food restaurant a cow had to give its life.
"So you don't want to eat anything that animals have to die for?" her mother asked. Mona nodded firmly, her jaw set now that her speech was over.
"That's called being a vegetarian, Mona," her father told her supportively. "When people don't eat red meat or poultry, and sometimes fish or eggs."
Mona's face scrunched up as she thought, her lips mouthing the word "vegetarian" without her knowing it, very slowly putting each syllable to memory. "Why wouldn't people eat fish?" she asked suddenly.
"Because they're living creatures, too," her mother responded.
"Nuh-uh," Mona argued, adopting a superior look on her young face, her tears now dry. "Fish don't have souls." Her parents couldn't help themselves as they burst into happy laughter at the girl's explanation. Mona, however, looked only thoroughly peeved at their reaction.
"Ok, Mona," her father finally said, recovering from the laughing fit first. "It's your choice to be a vegetarian."
"I know," the little girl said cheekily not even realizing how rude the response might've sounded had she been 5 or more years older. "I'm not gonna eat my friends cuz they help you guys with your work, and if I ate one of your lab assistants I don't think you guys would be very happy either." Mona hopped off her mother's lap then, heading to the kitchen to look for something else to eat, leaving the room behind her in a stunned silence.