In Which I Meet a Polar Bear and a Bull-Headed Crumpet, but Other Than That Nothing Happens
Once upon a time, there was a little lizard with a hoot-owl shaped face and large, cat-like eyes. He lived inside my bathrobe pocket, and had become so comfortably established in his little home, that he had even set up a news stand just outside of his house. What he wrote about, I don’t know. The newspapers were too small for me to read, but I bought them weekly anyways so that he would have money for his Saturday ice cream cone.
I had just bought one such newspaper, thrown it in the fire after offering it to my cat (which was silly, because cats can’t read), and sat down for a cup of tea when a knock sounded on my door.
“Yes?” I called, stepping into my slippers and standing up. And then, I swear to you, a blimp burst through my door. Right through! I’m afraid I shall have to replace it.
The blimp sailed in and settled onto the sofa without even wiping its feet, and a ghostly figure emerged from it gracefully. I was quite frozen with fright. The apparition (whom I shall now refer to as She), crossed the carpet and took hold of my hand. Suddenly, and I couldn’t tell you how, we were standing in the middle of Stonehenge under a mess of party lights and streamers.
The streamers were all yellow (which I thought was odd), and draped from stone to stone in a crisscross pattern above our heads. There was even music. I don’t listen to the stuff of course, but it sounded a bit like that American pop rubbish. She had vanished quite completely, leaving me there to try to find a way home for myself. I asked several of the partygoers (who were mostly walking violins) how I might get back to Manchester, but they were very rude and none of them answered me. Finally I came to a polar bear wearing a bow tie whom I thought looked personable, and asked him.
“MANCHESTER, EH?” he bellowed through his mustache. “NOW WHAT WOULD A BLOKE LIKE YOURSELF WANT WITH MANCHESTER?” As I was sputtering for a reply, the polar bear slapped his knee and let out a loud guffaw, as if he found his remark very humorous. I did not, but I chuckled politely along with him.
“Yes, Manchester.” I told him. “You’ve heard of it?”
“HEARD OF IT? WHY MY DEAR FELLOW, I AM THE KING OF MANCHESTER!”
“Ah, I see.” I said, though really I did not.
The polar bear began lecturing me on the economy, simultaneously demonstrating a very bad Winston Churchill impression, which I found to be quite inconvenient given my dilemma.
However, at that very moment, all of the party lights went out all at once, sending the king of Manchester, and all of the violins, into a panic. I myself was quite glad for the reprieve and took the opportunity to stumble down the dark hill towards what I perceived to be a lit lamppost in the distant woods.
When I arrived at the light, out of breath and short one slipper, I caught sight of She. She hovered above the ground with a flighty, unconcerned smile on her indistinct face.
I suddenly became very angry. “Take me back home this instant and fix my door! Remove your blimp at once! Or I will- or I will...” She began to cry. I immediately regretted having shouted.
“Oh dear. Please forgive me. It’s because I didn’t get to finish my tea. That always makes me ornery.”
I thought, for a moment, that she had accepted my apology, for the smile returned to her face. Yet then she disappeared once again, and I was left to spend the night in the cold, dark forest wearing only one slipper. Just before I fell asleep, my little lizard clambered out from inside my bathrobe pocket and handed me an ice cream cone. The generous little fellow! I thanked him, and ate it all at once, which made me feel slightly better.
When I woke up, I miraculously found myself back in my sitting room. Oddly, my face was very wet. I glanced upwards and found that there was a thin, pale man bent over me, holding an upside-down vase over my head.
“Finally!” He threw the vase over his shoulder (it vanished into the air), and pulled me up onto my feet. I was bewildered of course, though very glad to be back in my own house again. At least, I thought to myself, he is not a mustached polar bear.
“Who are you?” I grunted, wiping the water off of my face with my sleeve.
“Who am I? Ha! Ha! Charles, you ridiculous chap. Stop joshing about and go change your clothes! Spit spot.”
I was again highly disgruntled. “My name is not Charles,” I said, harrumphing. I then went off to do as he had told me. As I was just sitting down to take a whiff of my smelling salts, the bothersome fellow barged in through the door (this makes two that shall need replacing).
“Hurry up will you, Charles?” He began to pace, snapping his fingers occasionally so that little pink puffs of smoke appeared in the air. Though annoyed, I decided that it was no use arguing with this bull-headed crumpet.
“Alright, where are we off to?” I asked.
“Nowhere. Just hurry up or we’ll be late.” He grabbed me by the coat sleeve and began dragging me ungraciously through the sitting room.
“And what is your name?” I asked him, as I bumped down the stairs after him.
“Hapgood. Honestly Charles!” He opened the door and dragged me out onto the sidewalk. It was quite warm out, and I began sweating profusely, but Hapgood had a hold of my sleeve, so I could not take my coat off. All the while we walked, Hapgood kept up an incessant stream of chatter.
“This body I found is great Charles. Know why? It’s got blue skin. That’s the best color for organ donations. Your job can be holding the lid of the box shut so they don’t escape. You know, they say: ‘lungs have wings,’ and it’s true. Just ask Mckinley. He’s got stories about that alright. But don’t try to help too much just yet. I want to watch me do it before you try. Spit spot Charles, dead bodies don’t just hang around now, do they?”
As we walked, I noticed that Hapgood’s shoes made very loud clicks on the sidewalk. The repeated ‘click clack, click clack’ became quite annoying. I cast an irritated glance down at the polka dotted shoes, and noticed that they were high heels. No wonder they were so loud. I wiped the sweat from my forehead and tried to keep up.
At length, we turned down an alleyway and entered a dingy little shop with a sign hanging on the door that read ‘closed.’ I hesitated, but Hapgood pulled me in after him, and finally let go of my sleeve. There was indeed a blue body lying in an unattractive fashion on the floor. Hapgood pulled out a knife and a small wooden chest from his left shoe.
“Just hold the box, alright Charles?”
Taking advantage of my release, I bolted out of the shop. I hailed a taxi, dreadfully relieved to get away from that Hapgood chap.
When I arrived home, my door was still smashed in, but someone had removed the blimp from the sofa. There was also a note lying on the table by my cold tea: “Next Stonehenge dinner party Friday, 11:00”
Still feeling rather disoriented, I took a bath and changed into my bathrobe (only a little damp on the sleeve), and made myself a fresh cup of tea. The lizard crawled out of my bathrobe pocket and handed me a newspaper (no doubt to pay for another ice cream cone, since he had given me his). I fished out a penny from the dish on the table for him, and threw the newspaper into the fire. It would have been ridiculous for me to save it for the cat, as cats can't read.
Sliver
Patchwork hills of blankets and pillows covered the dipping surface of the trampoline. A canopy of knotted sheets hung over us, with a sliver of the starry sky visible through a wide slit. It was still, and quiet, except for the crickets. Our phones illuminated our faces at intervals as we took (highly flattering) pictures to commemorate the moment. We whispered until I finally fell asleep, and even then you kept on whispering with each other.
I dreamt that I was in a huge, white, marble building, with a lake of golden glitter in the center that shimmered and undulated like water. I fell in, and hid in a cupboard that looked very familiar, then crawled through a tunnel to my grandma’s house where we watched I Love Lucy. You were all there, I remember, and we were eating burnt popcorn too. But we were sad because a ghost we had disturbed told us that I had to leave.
And then I woke up, and you were all still asleep, and the sky was still dark. And the crickets were still chirping. I closed my eyes again and fell back down the hole, and you were still there when I woke up the second time.
Arilia’s Character Sheet
Full name: Arilia Lee Brown
Date of Birth: February 3rd, 2001
Age: 17
Eye Color: I guess they’re sort of a smeary green- more like pond algea than emerald.
Hair: Straight, dark brown, and a tad frizzy. It’s a little past shoulder-length right now. I might cut it though.
Favorite food: Aunt Becca’s raisin sweet rolls.
Favorite book: The Agatha Christie collection Murder at the Manor is amazing! I really love Harry Potter too though.
Strangest memory: Haha, well. So I was walking back home from my friend’s house one time, and I took the shortcut through the woods behind the neighbor’s back yard. It was kind of dark out, so I didn’t see this massive hole that had been dug out. And I fell right in. I was ok, but it was too tall for me to climb out of. So I had to spend one damp, muddy night down there in the dark. That was fun. Around dawn I woke up to the sound of cracking sticks and heavy breathing. There was a lot of rustling too, like something large was being dragged on the ground. When I yelled out for help, this boy came over and just peered down at me for like a whole minute. “This hole isn’t for you,” he said. “It’s for the horse.” He snickered and helped me out. I watched from behind a tree as he lowered this dead horse down into the pit. He set it down in there so that it was standing up, with it’s head sticking out, and buried it just like that. The boy’s name is Shawn I think. He’s kind of wierd, but I go over there sometimes and we climb trees and stuff. Anyways, that was probably my strangest memory. That or the noodle incident.
Favorite word: Oose
What’s in your pockets? Everything. Took me forever to go through security in the airport.
Favorite pastime: Spray painting “graffiti.” (Quotes because I always ask first, so it’s not technically graffiti)
Best day ever: Probably that time in the summer when Maisy came over and we created an imaginary land. The idea was that, since we both hate research, we can just make our stories take place in our imaginary land, and that way we’ll already have all the details figured out. We made hot cocoa and popcorn, went exploring in the woods, and then she and I and my brother watched The Phantom of the Opera. The really good version with Charles Dance.
Dear A.
You said yourself that hiding in your coat
is like your own little world of security.
I don’t mind if you hide there,
but I want you to feel secure without
having to.
Your eyebrows almost touch, and
your glasses take up most of your face,
and I think you’re just brilliant.
We know something too:
God’s not dead.
And I’m so proud you’re
asking your principal
to let you sing a Christian song
on talent night.
The anatomy of a smile
Honesty is what I really want.
Complete openness and knowing what you really, truly think. I want to know your feelings and thoughts. I don't want you to be polite.
It is a wonderful thing.
I want to be honest like that with you too.
I want to smile and have you know what is behind it.
