Pink Paint, Wrong Bucket

Pink Paint, Wrong Bucket

On a lazy afternoon, Guddu stood in the Backyard with her hands on her hips. "We need a giant pink sign," she told Unicorn. "Why? Because everything important needs one." Unicorn nodded and flicked his tail. A big white sheet hung between two posts, waiting.

"Paint is in the Garden Shed," said Guddu. Inside, two pink buckets sat side by side, exactly alike. Guddu asked Unicorn which was which. Unicorn shrugged. Guddu grabbed one by its handle, and Unicorn took the other, and they hurried out.

Guddu dipped her fattest brush and swished a great swoop across the sheet. Nothing pink appeared. Instead, bubbles puffed up and floated away, glittering. Unicorn sneezed and a bubble landed on his horn.

Guddu peered into the bucket. "Soap!" she said. "A hundred questions: who swapped them, how, and why is it so funny?" Unicorn pointed his nose at the Pink Bucket, still in the Garden Shed doorway, and then at the Bubble Bucket. Guddu thought carefully.

Guddu was in charge, so she decided. There was only one thing left to do with a bucket of bubbles and a bucket of paint, and it was a big idea.

Guddu dipped her brush in the Pink Bucket, then in the Bubble Bucket, and swirled. The sheet filled with bubbly pink letters that wobbled and shone. Unicorn blew on them, and they drifted off the cloth like pink balloons.

The bubbles floated over the whole fence, and the sign came out spotty and splendid. "It says nothing," Guddu said, laughing. "It says everything." Unicorn bowed, and a last bubble popped on his nose.

Then the tiny surprise: one bubble landed on the sheet and stuck, and dried into a perfect pink heart. Guddu hadn't painted it. She grinned and drew a small unicorn beside it.