Mabel stormed into Crafty Corner, her neon-green sneakers squeaking like disgruntled raccoons. She’d spent three nights hunched over a spreadsheet, calculating yarn requirements for her magnum opus: a 20-foot-tall yarn ball shaped like a cat. “I need 10,000 yards,” she announced, slapping a blueprint onto the counter. The owner, a man with a mustache that curled like a question mark, squinted. “That’s not a cat. That’s a fluff grenade.” Mabel ignored him, pacing the aisles like a caged ferret. She stole skeins from every shelf—teal, magenta, butter-yellow—tucking them into her duffel until it bulged like a overfed octopus. By dawn, she’d rigged a pulley system using bicycle chains and dental floss, hoisting the yarn ball into the town square. It wobbled, then settled into a lopsided purr. The townsfolk gathered, murmuring. “It’s… sentient,” whispered Mrs. Peabody, petting a tuft that twitched like a kitten’s tail. Mabel grinned, tying the final knot with her teeth. The next day, the yarn cat had grown a second head. And a tail. And a suspiciously human-like face. “I’m not done yet,” she said, eyeing the local library’s bookshelf. The mustache man sighed, handing her a receipt for 15,000 yards. “Just don’t make a dog this time.”
