It was already the end of February and winter was slowly coming to an end. Still, frost would appear on grass in the morning and puddles on the sidewalk froze over.
No leaves were on the trees yet and the lawn was without a trace of fresh green. Spring wasn’t ready to come yet, proper snow was nowhere to be seen, but frost decorated nature all around. Once in a while, icicles would appear on windowsills and the frozen outlines of jack frost on windows. It looked beautiful. Pretty, frosty paintings on glass, like in a fairytale. Who’d painted them? Who kept on hiding the grass beneath its frozen blanket? It was Freezy the Imp.
A crystal-white magical man. He looked as if he was covered in silver snowflakes, and his blue eyes shone brightly far into the distance. He always appeared at the end of February and kept nature concealed under a frosty cover. Every day, he flew above the landscape and blow frost onto nature so that it could rest a little longer. So that it would wait for spring to come at the right time.
One morning as Freezy the Imp flew around as usual, blowing frost onto everything, someone surprised him. A small girl. She was sitting on the ground, leaning against a tree. Frosty flew over to her cautiously and greeted her: “Hi, little girl, what are you doing here alone? Why are you sitting on the ground? It’s still freezing out here. Your bottom will freeze and you will catch a cold.” Surprised, the girl instantly jumped up. She stared at the small silvery man and couldn’t understand that he was speaking to her.
“Well, don’t look at me like that. You don’t have to be afraid. I am Freezy the Imp. I make sure that nature rests calmly in February under a thin cover of frost before the time comes for spring. But what are you doing here?” the Imp continued.
The girl stood for a moment. She watched him until she realized that he was a good Imp. Finally, she dared explain everything to him. “You see, I don’t feel like going to school. I’m dawdling, walking this way and that so that I don’t have to go in, so that I miss as much school as possible.” “That can happen to anyone. Even the best students sometimes don’t feel like going to school. Why did it happen to you today, and why today?” Freezy the Imp kept asking.
At first the girl hesitated. She didn’t want to tell Freezy anything. Then she started talking: “This one boy goes to my school. He’s a lot older. He’s not nice to us younger kids. He laughs at the smaller ones, which is why I don’t want to go there.”
“Oh, so that’s what it is. Alright. We’ll think of something. Come on, I will escort you to school today and along the way, we’ll plan what to do next,” the imp said and they both headed towards the school. When the arrived in front of the building, the silvery man told the girl to call over all her friends. Soon, five children were standing in front of the imp. They all stared at him in disbelief.
The imp flew around them to explain who he was, how he’d met their friend, and how he’d arrived all the way to the school gates. “Don’t worry, children. Show the mean boy that you don’t care if he laughs at you. That it doesn’t make you feel bad. There’s more of you than him. He’s on his own. You’ll see that he will stop if you show him that you’re not afraid and it doesn’t matter to you. He’ll understand that it’s silly. Don’t forget that I will be with you. I’ll watch you from a distance. I’ll give you courage.” Then the imp flew high above the children to keep an eye on them and waited.
All the friends stepped into the school building together. After a little while, a bigger boy appeared next to them. He was telling them something, pointing his finger at them, laughing. But all the smaller children stood next to one another and the turned to him to say: “We don’t care if you laugh at us. What you’re saying isn’t true anyway. We don’t care that we’re small. One day, we’ll grow taller. And we will be together. We’re friends and there’s more of us. You’re on your own. And if you keep on laughing at everyone like this, you’ll always be on your own. And that’s much worse.”
The boy stood there, taken aback. What the children told him made him almost sad. He knew that they were right. Freezy the Imp saw it from above, blew at the ground, created a small patch of ice, and pushed the boy towards the children on it. At the same time, he whispered into the wind: “Apologize to them.” The big boy slid all the way to the children. He gave them a sincere apology. He didn’t know who’d told him to do that, but he did obey the voice. From then on, the big boy was friends with the smaller children. He didn’t laugh at anyone anymore. And Freezy the Imp? Not only did he watch over the resting nature, he also watched over the children so that they would treat each other nice and become friends.
