It's raining frogs. Huddled under duvets reading two books at once, I was hiding from frostiness which has been hanging around ominously since this morning, when all of a sudden my name is called from the bottom of the stairs.

Kiwi!

I sandwich my head between the two pillows and bite down. I haven't had a brilliant day. Leave me alone.

Kiwi!

There is an audible note of panic. I pull my head out wearily. It can wait, I decide, and painfully tear out my hair grips from their clamourous grasp. One by one. Until:

Kiwi! Come now!

I go. It sounds urgent. And it is. My sister stands at the bottom of the stairs. Her face is contorted. Perhaps she is laughing.

I think, her voice trembles, I think there is a dead frog in the cellar.

She hiccups and sobs at the same time. I follow her down stairs, laughing bravely. A dead frog? No problem.

Another flight of stairs later, and I'm hesitating. A dead frog? Maybe it's lying there, rotting away merrily. I can't be doing with merrily rotting frogs tonight.

Perhaps it's one of those plastic ones...? I suggest hopefully. My sister shakes her head, and ushers me over. We move on tiptoes, as if a dead, merrily rotting frog could be awakened by loud stomping.

I was sitting here, she begins. I see the long leg of a dead frog. It looks real. The feet are webbed. The rest is hidden from view by the futon. I was sitting here, just doing my homework. Tapping my feet. I looked down, and it was THERE! We shudder simultaneously in revulsion. I can't tell just by looking at the leg whether it is rotting merrily or not. All of a sudden, I don't want to know.

My sister looks at me expectantly, with tears still rolling down her cheeks. I think quickly. Maybe I should pull out the frog and carry it upstairs to throw it away. But no. That would involve touching it, when I can't even pluck up the courage to move around the futon to view the frog in its entirety. Perhaps I should whisk away her homework files and carry them upstairs, so she no longer has to work with a dead frog at her feet. I decide to do this. A dead frog in the cellar demands a heroic act.

I tell her we will wait for our father to get back, and we run upstairs in a blind and irrational panic. Being dead, it's unlikely it'll hop up and chase us. This is not the film Seven. There will be no coughing, skeletal frogs coming back to life. We slam the door, bolt it shut, just in case.

Our father returns from wherever it is father's go when they are not needed to dispose of deceased animals. He doesn't believe us when we tell him at first. After ten minutes, he swallows hard, and picks up a dustpan and brush. We walk in an orderly procession, him at the front, me poking his back in encouragement, and my sister following closely behind. He whistles nervously to himself, and breathes "Corrr!" in amazement and horror once he is on the other side of the futon.

He has since fallen in love with the frog. He revealed it wasn't rotting merrily, but rather completely dried out. Like leather, he said, stroking it's bony, crisp back, eyes wide in fascination. He set it on the table, and crouched down to its level. It's beautiful! Look at the eyelids...

Sometime after I escape back to my duvets, he washed the frog and arranged it on a little white plate. It is waiting patiently next to the phone for Mami, who is not yet back from a nightclass.

I am disquieted by the fact that the frog seems to have been dead for such a long time, yet has only just been discovered. Has it been there, as my father claims it has, since Autumn? In which case, why has it not been heard croaking? Why has it dried out and not rotted? Has it been planted? If it has been dead for so long, why has it only just been found in its very very obvious hiding place, a spot on the carpet Mami must look at at least ten times a day? Are we being taken over by frogs? Is it raining frogs?

There is no doubt I will have frog nightmares tonight.