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Thomas and his disappearing day

One day Thomas woke up in a grumpy mood. The first thing he said was, “I don’t want to brush my teeth.” And suddenly, right before his eyes, his toothbrush disappeared! Thomas thought that was very strange, but he was happy he wouldn’t have to brush his teeth.

At breakfast Thomas whined about his porridge being cold and sticky. Suddenly Thomas’ porridge vanished too!

Thomas didn’t mind that his breakfast was gone. He simply got down from the table and went outside to play. Thomas’ friend Gordon came out to play too – but Gordon wanted to play fishing instead of tag, so Thomas groaned about his friend. “Gordon, you never want to play what I want to play,” he said. As quickly as you can blink your eye, Gordon was gone. Thomas just shrugged his shoulders and chased a butterfly around the yard instead.

By lunchtime Thomas was hungry and a little bit bored with playing butterfly tag. He went inside and said to his mother in a whiny voice, “I have nothing to do. And I am so hungry! A good mother would have my lunch made already, wouldn’t she?” Then in a flash, Thomas’ mother was gone too.

Finally Thomas was starting to get upset. If you remember, his porridge had disappeared, so he hadn’t had any breakfast, and he was now very hungry. Thomas searched the kitchen to see if he could find anything to eat. When he couldn’t reach the shelves in the pantry, he grumbled that the food had been stored too high up. Then Thomas looked in the fridge and muttered to himself that the fridge had no fun food in it. Suddenly the cupboards and fridge were empty of everything!

By now Thomas was thirsty as well as hungry, so he tried to get a drink. But before he could stop himself, he complained about how hard it was to reach the faucet. Suddenly the faucet was gone too and he couldn’t turn the water on at all.

“Oh no!” said Thomas. “All there’s left for me to do is play with my toys, but they are all so old and boring.” And as soon as he said that, all Thomas’ toys floated up and away out the window.

Then Thomas heard the house creaking and echoing. It seemed to say, “You should stop complaining.”
Feeling sorry for himself, Thomas said in his saddest voice, “Even the house is bothering me.” And before he could take back what he had said, the house was gone too.

Thomas found himself sitting on the lawn and began to cry. Soon his pet cat, Morris, came and rubbed up against him. “Silly cat,” said Thomas. “You want me to pet you? How selfish can you be? I have all these problems and you want attention. If only I could have a sensible pet instead.”

And what do you think happened next? That’s right. Thomas’ cat disappeared too.

When Thomas’ father came home for supper, he found a very lonely, hungry, thirsty, and uncomfortable little boy sitting in an empty yard.

“Thomas,” said his father, “where is our house, where is your mother, where is your cat and where is your friend Gordon? Mrs. Bates is looking for him.”

“Daddy,” said Thomas, “I’m so sorry for all my whining. All day whenever I complained, things just disappeared. From now on, I will try my best to be thankful for all I have instead of complaining.”

Then just as quickly as everything had gone, it reappeared. Thomas’ mother, his friend, his house, and his cat were all back again.

Never before had his home, family and friends looked so good to Thomas. And from that day on, Thomas hardly ever whined at all.