Teenagers, as Zoey had been reminded of so abruptly, often times lacked tact. Or perhaps Christina had simply thought she was doing her brother a favor, or even looking out for him. It was hard to tell one way or another.
No sooner had the girl dropped the idea that Kit might like Zoey, her phone had rung and she excused herself from the truck to go gossip with some friend or another. She hadn't wondered far from the truck, so Zoey had heard minor snippets; enough to know that the greatest interest at that point to Christina was something that had happened at the mall earlier in the week.
She might have tried to make herself useful with unloading the truck but there hadn't been much point, the guys had figured out a chain effort of some sort, passing the boxes from the truck to each other until they were in the garage. And then Zoey drove the truck alone back to the storage facility for the next load in, where the others were waiting. And after the truck was unloaded again, she was free to return the rented box truck and go home.
Two days later, the little tidbit of potentially accurate information was still floating around in Zoey's head. She had no idea how or why Kit might entertain liking her, seeing as they barely saw each other and she made it a point to avoid conversation when working as much as possible.
Though, she supposed, some guys liked that dynamic. The 'hard to get'.
The phone screen in her lap lit up, and she half expected it to be a message from Kit. They hadn't really messaged each other since that first time, but Zoey sometimes found her life to be oddly on the nose about that. She looked, only found that it was the group chat with her friends.
Chrissy: Drinks at the bar?
Veronica: We're always there on friday. the crowd is feeling stale.
Samantha: how about pizza?
Zoey: Remember when we used to go to the movies all the time?
Veronica: What, when we were like ten? the snacks are so overpriced.
Samantha: I could bring my big bag.
Chrissy: I'm trying to find a date, not sit in the dark and watch other couples makeout.
Veronica: I'm telling you, make that CampFire profile like I told you. Plenty of men on there willing to meet up.
Chrissy: Yeah, to rattle my bones. I want romance Ver.
Zoey tossed her phone to the side and ignored the onslaught of messages as her friends bickered back and forth about what the best hangout would be for the evening. When they finally settled down she chanced a look to see if they had decided on anything. One of them mentioned a new outdoors tapas place that also served drinks, so the idea was for everyone to meet up in about an hour.
Tapas was better than bar food, at least, so Zoey got dressed in something comfortable and met her friends there. They were in the middle of eating and judging the cocktails they'd ordered when Chrissy shushed everyone and said, "Don't look now, but I think there's someone from the gym over there eyeballing one of us. I said don't look!"
"Oh no, he's definitely waving at us," Veronica said. "I don't know him. Who knows him?"
Zoey turned her head and stared in disbelief. Kit, and some men she recognized from two days before, were standing across the street and staring in their direction. They were obviously leaving a gym that she hadn't noticed before, their shirts stained with sweet and sports drinks in hand. Kit beamed at Zoey and waved a bit longer before his friends caught his attention again.
"Wait, that's the guy from work right?" Samantha asked. "The one in the company photo!"
"Yeah, that's him," Zoey admitted, offering a wave across the street when Kit finally looked back in her direction.
"Want to invite him over?" Chrissy asked. "Maybe his friends will join."
"Nah, they're already turning away," Veronica pointed out. "Well, he isn't. But they are."
An entirely too young squire sat in the stable with polish and polishing brush in hand. He had been tasked with maintenance of his knight's riding gear, and was trying to figure out how to go about all of it.
"He's polishing the floor more than that saddle," Ambriel noted.
"Indeed," Tabris agreed. "I tried inspiring him. I tried whispering. Even tried projecting myself. That poor boy is denser than a tree. Pretty sure I spooked the horses, though."
"I have to admit, I'm growing fond of his odd failings. You never see them failing anymore."
Tabris hated to admit it, but he, too, had grown fond of the young boy. Failure or not, with most tasks, his attempted solutions weren't exactly out of the realm of possibility. It was like the boy was thinking outside of the normal realm of imagination for those of his kind.
Even as he attempted to get the polish out of it's container to rub on the saddle, using his hand instead of the brush itself, he focused with a determination to see the task through. The difficult part was just getting all of the polish off his fingers before picking up the brush.
Zoey drank a milkshake while sitting at the drivers seat of a rented box truck. The day was supposed to be a straight forward, flat rate job, but had quickly devolved into something much more complicated.
Justin had received a call from a self storage facility about their unit 23C. The person renting the space had fallen six months behind on fees and the facility wanted to outsource the labor. After Zoey had gotten there she figured out why. The unit had been so packed with boxes she almost failed to open the rolling door. The only thing worse than the jam-packed space was finding out the contents of the unit.
Almost entirely books and a decent amount of magazines. Each box was incredibly heavy. The best that she could guess, the unit had either belonged to a small library or someone who had hoped to sell the books online. Everything needed to be packed and delivered to a second location where someone else was going to evaluate the books for sale online.
The idea that someone would buy out a storage unit of books in order to flip them for profits was amusing to Zoey. She knew people made livings doing weirder things, but she couldn't even begin to fathom how to figure out the worth of a book. Let alone having the space to store them all.
Calling Justin as soon as she saw the unit was the only logical thing to do, as they had been led to believe that the job could be accomplished in a single day with only one person. But there was no way that Zoey would have managed alone. Her boss showed up an hour later with the strongest men he could find on short notice and had disappeared into the facility's office to strong arm them into paying for a second rental truck and to cover the extra labor.
Zoey had tried to help but ultimately she had just gotten in the way with her slower movements as she struggled to not only lift but also carry the boxes. Instead it had fallen to her to keep Kit's younger sister company, as he had only been able to help by bringing her along. There was a diner next to the storage facility so the two of them had walked over to buy milkshakes and fries to eat in the truck.
The younger sister's name turned out to be Christina. She seemed friendly enough and was polite enough to thank Zoey for the milkshake, but she seemed to be a much more quiet individual than her brother was. She sat in the passenger seat and stared at her phone, not entirely dissimilar to what Zoey had been doing.
After a while, Christina finally broke the silence. "You're the girl in that picture, right?" she asked. "The one with the dust storm or whatever firing out of the garage?"
Zoey smiled at Christina's description of the events. "Yeah, that was me. Why?"
Christina shrugged. "My brother talks about you sometimes."
"Oh?"
"Mhhm. He-"
Whatever Christina was about to say was interrupted when Justin knocked on the window beside Zoey. She jumped from being startled, but laughed it off as she rolled the window down. "Sorry," Justin apologized. "I've got everything worked out. I'm going to take the other guys with me when they're done loading your truck to pick up another rental. Since you'd already got Christina keeping you company, hello Christina," Justin waved at the girl, "I'll have someone else tag along behind to start unloading. I can't believe they tried to pawn this off on one person. They told me a couple boxes!"
"That's hardly a couple boxes," Zoey agreed.
Before Justin even finished chatting with Zoey, the passenger side door opened and Kit climbed up inside while Christina moved into the middle of the seat. She offered the rest of her fries to Kit who started eating them. Whatever it was that Christina had wanted to say, she wasn't going to bring it up in front of Kit as she didn't resume speaking when they finally began driving off.
The house they delivered to sported a very sizable garage and detached sheds behind, where apparently they were to move the boxes to. Whoever lived there seemed to have a sizable internet business, as Zoey could see all sorts of things collected in organized stacks.
Zoey backed the truck up as close as she could to the garage, and resigned herself to the long wait it would be for them to unload. She didn't recognize the car they followed in or the workers themselves. When she wondered allowed as to who they were, Christina filled in the missing information. "They're friends of my brother. They work at the gym, I think, where he works out."
"Hey, weren't you going to say something earlier about your brother?"
"Hm? Oh, right. I was going to say he talks about you like he's got a crush on you or something. I just thought you should know, he's pretty oblivious to a lot of social cues. It's cool if you like him, I guess."
And as the two of them sat there, entwined in each others arms, all was calm in the night. The room was dark and perhaps a bit too warm, but they did not care. All they cared for was to smell each other's hair, touch each other's faces, breathe each other's air. Neither of them spoke, neither of them dared to breathe too loud, for fear of breaking the moment. It had been five years since they had been able to see each other, let alone touch, and all they wished for was a never-ending-moment. They each tried to forget that their moment would only last a few hours, that it would be years again before they would see each other. Life on the seas was funny like that. You might end up sailing together and have all the time, or you might truly be nothing more than two ships passing in the night.
Three days in a row working around Kit was a new record for Zoey. She glared at their boss as he called out their assignments in the driveway as he usually did during morning meet ups. She had spent all of five minutes the night before as they were wrapping up thinking that maybe Kit wasn't as annoying as she thought after all.
But then she'd overheard him having one final chat with Mimi about how he'd tried putting cereal in his coffee when he was in college to save time in the mornings. Mimi had laughed and asked him if he was trying to sleep late or study more but he admitted that he had only wanted more time at the gym.
Kit tagged along after Zoey as they made their way towards the garage again. Since neither of them was having any issues with coughing they were supposed to resume their tasks of cleaning and organizing. The safety glasses, face masks, and work gloves were still mandatory as no one seemed to have made much progress the day before.
"Hope you had your coffee," Kit joked as he started lugging the heavier boxes of wood scraps out and stacked them in the driveway.
"No, I was out of cereal."
"Oh, you heard that?" Kit laughed. "Not highly recommended, though sometimes I do wonder if there was a magical combination I missed. Oh, hey! This box is full of Christmas lights!"
Under Zoey's organizational direction they managed to clear out a large portion of the garage into several themed groups in the driveway. Wood scrap, power tools, lawn care, holiday decorations, recycling, garbage, old newspapers, and miscellaneous. There was more to be done but it was a good start. Among the workshop items there was even a functional shop-vac that they were able to use to help with the sawdust control.
"How many years do you think Richard spent working in here to accumulate this much saw dust?" Kit asked after the fifth time emptying the shop-vac.
"Who's Richard?"
"Mimi's husband."
Zoey had forgotten that Mimi's husband's name had been Richard. The older woman had spent the day telling them stories about him while they washed dishes and helped in the kitchen. Kit, she had noticed, was excellent at remembering all sorts of information about people.
"How do you always remember things like that?"
"Like what?"
"Richard's name, Sheryl's sick cat... I don't know. You always know so many things about people."
"Dunno," Kit shrugged. "I like when people are happy and people are happy when I remember important things about them. Maybe you just need to practice."
"Practice?"
Zoey snorted and continued sweeping the floor space they had cleared. It seemed like a moot point because as soon as they tackled the back half of the garage it was just going to get messy again. But it was better than having too much debris underfoot to cause tripping hazards.
Hours later when the sun was starting to set, the two of them sat down and started pulling their safety glasses and masks off. Lunch had been only a small salad because Zoey hadn't been all that hungry at the time but the idea of dinner had her excited.
When Kit reached for the safety glasses over his eyes he accidentally bumped his hand against his hat. When it knocked sideways his braid partially fell out. As he was fixing it back into place Zoey found that she couldn't help herself.
"You're like... the only person who actually wears their hat to work. And the whole time."
"This hat is my first line of defense!"
"Against what? Bright lights? The wind?"
"One time at a clean out a bunch of half melted taffy hidden in a closet fell into my hair. It took hours to get out."
Kit flexed his arms a little and then pretended to duck out of the way of an imaginary box of half melted taffy. He whipped the hat off his head and pretended to use it like a sword, complete with sound effects as he made whoosing sounds.
Zoey laughed at his antics and found herself wondering about how much a hair style or a hair cut could alter someone's appearance. As he finished his imaginary fight with a sticky enemy and put his hat back on, tucking the braid away, she also found that she wished he wouldn't.
Boo dropped a large handful of cornstarch onto the pile of focus enhancers and spell components on the table before her. She had read once that cornstarch worked as a great binding agent for both cooking and practice spell work. It had once been dismissed as nothing more that a bakery wizard's attempt to market his specialty blend to a larger audience but some three hundred years later he was finally able to prove it through a series of demonstrations. And ever since then Boo had been eager to see if it was the missing step to all of her most recent mishaps.
In a stubborn attempt to successfully summon literally anything, Boo had managed to accidentally create a syrup spewing, stingray shaped pancake creature, vaporize the entire water supply in her house including the very-expensive-to-replace Instant Spout water crystal that supplied all her water needs in home, and somehow turn all the grass in her yard bright purple. These were all separate incidents, of course, but that didn't make Boo feel any better about it.
"The fourth time is the real charm, right?" Boo asked no one since she lived alone.
As was it's habit, the sea pancake (as Boo had dubbed the creature), bubbled out a gleeful sound from it's perch in the corner. She wasn't sure if it had just gotten better about drooling syrup everywhere or if it had simply run out but regardless of the reason she was happy to no longer be wiping up sticky messes and fighting off ants on an hourly basis.
There was the incantation of a summoning spell before Boo held her breath. She counted to twenty seven as was the standard delay period for any potential backfires or delayed results before letting go of her breath. Holding her breath wasn't part of the counting process but she was too nervous to not do it. One time, when she reached twenty five while waiting for a 'long lasting scent charm' to settle the whole thing had just vaporized into a heated cloud of lavender perfume. She hadn't been able to smell anything else for an entire month.
When nothing happened Boo sighed and reached for the pile of cornstarch coated objects before her. She wasn't sure if the potency of certain components lessened during failed attempts or not. Perhaps the herbs had gone stale, or the energy focus needed to be recharged. All there was left to do was clean the table off for the evening so that dinner could be made and books could be furthered studied.
Grabbing at random objects on the table, Boo closed her fingers around things in the pile in an attempt to grab as many at once as possible so she could toss them into the trash. As she attempted to lift them from the table she found the objects impossible to lift. "Excuse me?" she asked the pile under her palm.
It didn't take long for Boo to figure out that she'd accidentally attached the objects and components to the table. Almost as though she'd glued them or magically fused them. There wasn't a single thing budging from the table and when Boo tried to give up and walk away her retreat was cut short when her hand refused to let go of the things she had grabbed. "Excuse meee?" Boo repeated, suddenly concerned.
With her free hand, sensing she might have missed something, Boo snatched up the box of cornstarch she'd bought just that morning and began reading the ingredients label and the directions for use. When she finished reading those she turned the box around in several directions to see if she'd missed anything else until she found the smallest fine print she could have imagined on a side panel.
Caution: Potential side effects of Herbert Hillside's Magical Cornstarch for spell binding and cooking include; reduction in appetite, stiffer than usual spell results related to robe maintenance, deflated muffins, and the potential to accidentally bind objects together. In the event you suspect any of these side effects to have occurred, please allow the suggested three hours for the cornstarch's effects to wear off. If after three hours the side effects do not lessen, consider a reversing spell, release charm, appetite enhancement roses, or Herbert Hillside's Releasing Greasing.
Boo tossed the box on the floor and began tugging her table as best as she could with one hand across the room, towards the pantry where her timing devices and snacks were kept. "Wanna play a game of fetch?" she asked, looking to the corner perch. Her sea pancake did an aerial flip of excitement before it swam through the air and picked up the cornstarch box from the floor. "Very funny," she snorted, before throwing it across the room.
The smell of green apple fragrance filled the air while Zoey, wearing bright yellow rubber gloves, worked her way through a pile of dishes. After the incident in the garage the day before, even though she and Kit had finished their shift in there, their boss Justin had thought it was best to switch them out of the dust filled air just in case. At first Zoey had been grateful because the garage was a mess of squirrel nests and heavy boxes, but five minutes inside had her wishing she could be knee deep in the wood scraps again.
The owner of the house they'd been hired to clean out was an adorable older woman, who's four middle aged children were spread out in various other rooms to help pack up the important stuff to set aside somewhere safer. "My my my," the woman kept saying every few minutes. "I'd nearly forgotten about this!" To which she would show an object to Kit who would take an interest and ask about it. Everytime Kit was distracted, Zoey found herself chancing a glance in his direction and staring at the hat he wore, imagining the hair underneath that she had recently seen and learned was actually rather long.
Zoey understood that something was going on with the woman to contribute to her hoarding. It had sounded as though the passing of her husband when their children were still in high school played a big part of it. But hearing that same phrase over and over again while she stared down at the pile of dishes that never seemed to end had Zoey clenching her jaw tight and staring at the soap suds in the sink as as she rinsed the one hundredth plate.
The dishes left behind were only a fraction of the original mess. The crew in there the day before had boxed and trashed the vast majority of them. The only thing that kept Zoey going was that Kit had to stay close at hand, helping to hand dry and put away the dishes. At one point he gently coaxed the woman, whom he fondly called Mimi at her insistence, to toss all her plastic takeout containers into the recycling can he'd brought in from the side yard.
Kit was so good at keeping Mimi on track and distracted with conversation that Zoey didn't have to participate much. She would occasionally thank Mimi when the woman tried to offer her one of ten beverage options from the fridge or would call for Kit's attention when he didn't notice the dishes waiting for him. She was on the verge of thinking her brain was going to melt with boredom when Zoey heard Mimi ask Kit something interesting.
"Are you dating anyone? Is it serious?" Mimi asked. "My granddaughter, you know the one in college I was telling you about earlier? She's a little younger than you, but mature. Real smart girl, real pretty smile. You two would be so lovely together! You should let me call her over, where's my cell phone?"
Zoey stood up a bit straighter as she realized that Kit's answer was more interesting to her than it should be for someone she couldn't stand no more than twenty four hours before. She stared at the plate in her hand extra hard, watched the suds as they rinsed away and disappeared down the drain.
"I'm sure Jenny is wonderful," Kit said, clearing his throat for a moment and turning his back to Mimi in order to pick up a few plates. He busied himself with putting them away before he followed up with, "It's very nice of you, but I'm not looking for anyone right now."
"Oh," Mimi said with interest. "So you are seeing someone? Tell me all about her, I feel like I've told you so much about my dear, late Richard and I haven't heard anything of your...?" Mimi trailed off in an attempt to prompt Kit into giving her some sort of details.
"I'm not seeing anyone," Kit answer. "Not anymore."
"Oh, a broken heart," Mimi fussed before she distracted herself with her own memories of her teen years, telling Kit stories of dates she went on in high school. In between remembered moments she asked Kit if chocolate would make him feel better while turning to her pantry and remarking, "I know there's a few boxes in here... Samples are the best way to go, you know. A little taste of everything."
Zoey glanced over her shoulder to see what Kit was doing only to find him standing closer to her than she realized. He stood there, quietly drying some glasses, and looked much happier than she might have expected. After the internet snooping she'd done the night before, as best as she could tell, he hadn't really been single all that long. And it had looked like his ex had been around for a long time.
"Life is a journey and all we can do is enjoy it," Kit beamed when Mimi paused long enough during her stories. "Smile because it happened, not because it's over. Am I right?" The cheeriness in his voice reminded Zoey, once again, that he was a very different person from herself. The last time she'd been in a breakup situation she had nearly eaten her own weight in ice cream and Krispy Kreme donuts. But Kit was bouncing around the kitchen like he was a delighted little grandchild visiting grandma for a holiday.
Mimi's cellphone began to vibrate on the table and she gasped with obvious glee. "Oh my, her ears must have been ringing! Jenny dear, is that you? Do a video call, there's someone I want you to meet!"
Zoey knew immediately what it was that Mimi was hoping to do and she felt a mixture of amusement and sudden jealousy. After a few protests Jenny relented to a video call while complaining that her hair was a mess, though Zoey doubted that it was. "Meet this wonderful man, Christopher," Mimi said as soon as the video was active. "Isn't he handsome? He's single, too!"
"Grandma!" Jenny exclaimed. "I'm so sorry, my grandmother is just trying to be nice. Mom! Mom can you hear me? Grandma is objectifying people again! Mom? Moooom!"
"What's all this?" The woman who joined them in the kitchen could only be Jenny's mother, Zoey assumed, as she looked over at the small crowd forming. Kit stood behind Mimi with a big, goofy smile on his face while he waved at the video that Mimi was hoisting up for all to see. "Mom, stop pestering Jenny! She had finals to study for." Sheryl poked her head through the doorway behind them all, curious what all the noise was about but kept her distance as a curious bystander.
"Oh, relax Sarah. I just want to make sure Jenny remembers to have fun! Christopher has been so polite today, I'm sure he'd take her on a proper date."
"Mom," Sarah protested, though she laughed a little. "You're supposed to be clearing out the cabinets. I'm sure Jenny can find her own dates."
"Oh," Mimi exclaimed. "I almost forgot to ask. Are you actually gay Jenny? You know your brother just informed me last week that he's gay. They say that kind of thing runs in the family. Zoey over here at the sink is cute, too! She's a hard worker, I bet she could help you study."
Zoey found a phone being shoved in her face all of a sudden, catching her off guard. She wasn't sure if she should be flattered that Mimi had called her cute, or curious what it was about her that made Mimi think she was both single and into women. "Uh," Zoey said, seeing a frazzled girl sitting on her dorm bed with her hand over her face and the sounds of other girls in the background giggling. "I'm not into girls, but good luck with your studying!"
The phone was out of her face just as quickly as it had appeared, leaving Zoey wondering when exactly a cleaning job had turned into speed dating. As Sarah wrangled the phone away from Mimi, Kit leaned on the counter next to Zoey and took a plate directly from her rather than the stack she'd been building. "They're adorable," he said, watching them. "It must be nice to a grandmother. Do you think she has those cute little aprons anywhere? I'd wear a cute little apron."
Two of our employees have redefined the term 'dust bath'! Don't worry, everyone was unharmed and they finished out the job with smiles on their faces!!
Zoey stared at the image she had seen earlier in the day in person, newly posted online. After a long, hot shower she had laid down in bed only to find several notices on her phone. She and Kit had been tagged in the picture so when others started liking or leaving comments she was alerted.
One of her friends had messaged her privately to say, "I hope he helped you get cleaned up afterwards," with a winking emoji. At first Zoey hated the implication of Kit helping her do anything. Then she looked at the picture again with Kit's braid fully on display though she was still unaware with his hat pressed against her face. The Zoey in the picture still thought he had short hair and an annoying face full of sharp angles.
The Zoey looking at the picture knew differently. The few moments she had seen his hair had changed her opinion of his face briefly. Kit had looked a little softer, a little friendlier. Until the hat had gone back on and he was the same, annoying faced himbo he had always been.
Curious, she tapped on Kit in the picture so that his name popped up. Christopher Benson, it read, before redirecting her to his profile page. Zoey couldn't begin to guess how anyone got the name Kit from Christopher. She wasn't sure what it was, either, that she was looking for but the fact that his entire page was marked as private and required her to send a friend request to see anything stopped the search pretty quickly.
After a few minutes of browsing through the company's photos though, Zoey realized she didn't pay attention to her coworkers all that often. They joked that she was a loner sometimes but she didn't think much of it until she saw just how many photos there were of everyone hanging out together at work and on their days off, tagged between their personal profiles and the company page.
For some of them it made sense as there were some married couples and siblings who worked together. But Justin, the owner of the clean out company, appeared in quite a few of the pictures. As did Kit and some of the others. And when he wasn't working it looked as though Kit didn't bother with hats. Zoey wasn't sure how she had never noticed until she paid attention to the dates of the pictures. Many of the ones with Kit were taken before she had started working as a cleaner. The group photos at someone's backyard party were the same weekend she'd gone on a camping trip with some friends.
Seeing Kit with his hair down, hair that was obviously well cared for, and in his regular clothes changed his look entirely. He didn't remind Zoey of an obnoxious frat boy anymore but more like that one actor who played a viking on tv caught by paparazzi. Modernly rugged.
As soon as Zoey thought it she realized how cheesy it seemed. But it was an accurate description. The only reason she'd thought of it was because she had seen an article just like that before taking her shower. Viking King Star Caught Downtown with Super Model Date it had been titled. Drawn in by the clickbait, Zoey had scrolled through the photos that alternated between the actor's on screen character and him on a possible date with a woman who's face was blocked from view until almost the end.
An alert popped up at the top of Zoey's screen that made her heart skip a beat in panic. As though she'd be caught snooping. New friend request from Christopher Benson. Zoey stared at the notification for a few seconds and wondered why it was that he had sent it in the first place. They had worked together a few times before but neither of them had ever sent a request.
Curiosity got the better of Zoey. She accepted the friend request and went to look at his profile. At first there was nothing but the generic posts of random statements, shared photos, and interactions with other people. It was quickly obvious that Kit enjoyed spending time with his sister who was not much older than sixteen or seventeen. Being able to see his profile meant that she could see that he was twenty eight, making Zoey wonder about the age gap between him and his sister.
Aside from the sister postings, a few months back on his page was evidence of a girlfriend despite his profile having him listed as single. If he had been dating someone previously that might explain why he hadn't sent a friend request. If the dates were any indication, the last time they had worked together had been a few months before the breakup.
Zoey could only imagine what her friends might say if she were to tell them about his friend request. They would demand to see more about his life and then they'd probably declare him as someone with 'golden retriever vibes' or 'ultra himbo'. And then they would resume badgering her to invite him out so that they could flirt with him, joke about meeting his mother, and then wonder if he wanted children.
For the second time an alert startled Zoey. New message from Christopher Benson.
Hey. I'm sure you already know because you've been working the clean outs for a little while now, but I wanted to remind you to take it easy in the morning when you wake up in case my hat wasn't enough to save you. The sawdust all over those shelves that broke was a lot. More than we usually deal with.
As Zoey was reading his message he added in a quick follow up.
Also, sorry about shoving my hat in your face.
If it were anyone else from work Zoey might be annoyed. But her short experiences with Kit had taught her that, at the very least, the guy was genuinely concerned about others. And often times too busy being distracted by innocent things to be busy man-splaining. Their coworker Sheryl, the woman who had taken the picture of them in the dust cloud, had a cat. The only reason Zoey knew that Sheryl had a cat was because she had heard Kit ask Sheryl that morning how the cat's health was doing. From a bought of sickness the cat had experienced several months before, which had been the last time they had seen each other. It was the kind of thoughtful conversation that Zoey was bad at participating in that had always seemed to come naturally to Kit. One of the many reasons she was so often annoyed by him.
If your hat can hide all that hair, I'm probably fine, Zoey sent back. But thank you. At least it didn't smell bad.
I didn't even think of that! Kit answered.
Zoey wondered about going to sleep and set her phone aside for a moment so she could turn out the bedroom light. As she was climbing in bed again her phone lit up with a, "New message from Christopher Benson," and she felt a spark of excitement. As soon as she felt that spark of excitement she realized that the idea of Kit was suddenly much less agitating than usual.
Kit, with his legs slightly spread and arms crossed over his chest, stared as though he was deep in thought. Zoey, a clipboard in hand and a pen clenched in her teeth, flipped through papers looking for the security code for the panel on the left side of the two car garage before them. Their boss paired them together anytime he could get away with it because he thought they were an 'opposites attract' kind of duo. Luckily for Zoey, her schedule didn't line up with Kit's very often.
"I bet it's mostly newspapers," he mused. "Maybe magazines. Old kids toys. What do you think?"
Working with Kit was always a test of her patience. He was strong enough to power through the heavier lifting that she struggled with and more than willing to do it. He liked to joke that it saved him from a visit to the gym. But he also had a habit of getting distracted with the things they found and didn't always work through in a coordinated method. Like a child with wonder lust, Kit wanted to know the story of every object. And that made him slow at times.
She hadn't known how to describe him at first when talking about work with friends. One of them pointed out that he seemed like the perfect example of a 'himbo'. After that her single friends started asking her to invite him out so they could meet him but Zoey refused. Working with him was challenging enough. It didn't help that some of them had seen her tagged online in a company group photo once, after they'd finished a particularly difficult clean out. She didn't think he was nearly as attractive as her friends did.
"1-6-0-7-3," Zoey read out loud, taking the pen from her mouth and sticking it in the clipboard's little clamp. Kit went to the panel and punched in the code. It seemed to work because the unit peeped a familiar tone of 'code accepted'. But to no one's surprise the door refused to open. As was the case at most hoarder properties with garages.
When the door failed to lift Kit set about trying to raise it manually, carefully taking hold of the handle at the bottom and slowly pulling upward. Zoey set her clipboard aside and pulled work gloves from her back pocket. As she slipped them on Kit got the door up about halfway before it caught and stopped moving.
"Wanna go under?" he asked, holding the door in place. "It's a pretty lightweight door, I can hold it awhile."
'Going under' was a bit of a stretch. A solid wall of cardboard boxes and random objects were packed tightly together on the other side. Zoey's best option was to pull what she could loose and set it in the driveway before looking for the jam. Ten minutes later and she had made a short stack of boxes under the door that were sturdy enough to hold it in place. From what she peeked inside the boxes, they were loaded with pieces of scrap wood. "Might have been a workshop. Look out for sharp saw blades," she warned Kit.
"I'm guessing the door inside from the kitchen isn't an option?" Kit asked.
"No. The owners said something inside the garage fell over a few years ago and they haven't been able to get in since."
The two of them took a moment to catch their breath and get something to drink. While Zoey tried her best to mind her own business, there were plenty of occasions where she couldn't help herself. Such as Kit drinking out of a hot pink, unicorn sticker encrusted, glittery water jug that looked like it was meant to survive a fall off a mountain.
"Nice water bottle," she noted.
"Yeah... My sister steals mine all the time, usually because she forgot to wash hers."
"Is your sister eight?"
"No," he laughed. "She's just really... extra."
Another time she had spied him wearing light blue socks with a rubber ducky pattern. She had not commented on the socks, but she had commented on the obvious face paint he had poorly washed off that had looked suspiciously like a set of butterfly wings. Those were the days that were the hardest to mind her own business, especially when his answers were things like, "I lost a bet with a five year old girl at the park."
After an hour of untangling three garden hoses, two extension cords, multiple folding chairs, and cardboard boxes loaded with more scrap wood, they were finally able to get the garage door open all the way. Kit looked ecstatic once they were able to get a better view of the chaos inside. The left side of the garage appeared to be shelving units loaded with stacks of newspapers. "What do you think they were building?" he asked.
"A fire hazard," Zoey retorted quietly.
As he did when his guesses were at least partially correct, Kit touched the brim of his hat and shifted it slightly as though he was greeting someone. Zoey always thought it was odd that he wore the hat as almost no one else on the team did unless it was too sunny or raining. Or there were mystery liquids dripping from the ceilings above them.
The work uniform was simple and everyone was supplied with one complimentary set; a pair of blue jeans, one grey shirt with the company logo on the back, one pair of steel toed boots, one snap back hat with the company logo, two pairs of work gloves, and one winter coat. Also with company logo. Employees were encouraged to purchase additional items but were also allowed to wear their own clothes, though the steel toed boots and work gloves were mandatory.
Zoey had learned quickly that injury was common when cleaning out hoarder properties, whether it was the home owner or the workers. At least two of their jobs had been the result of a client's trip to the hospital after stacks of belongings had fallen on them. She herself often went home with bruises and thought she remembered hearing that Kit had broken an arm once, years ago.
The shelving units of newspapers were covered in dust and while mostly made of wood, sported a few rusty screws sticking out of shelves that were slowly pulling away from their frame under the weight of their contents. On rare occasions Zoey was grateful that Justin, the company owner, made sure everyone was up to date on things like tetanus shots.
"Maybe we should get the dust masks out of the van," Zoey mused.
"Probably," Kit agreed, as he stepped a bit closer to Zoey in order to look over her shoulder. "What year do you think the oldest print is?"
He reached out and around her to grab one off the nearest shelf, only to startle some furred creatyre that neither of them had noticed. Squirrels, raccoons, and opossums were common inside of garages and whatever it was had been quietly waiting for them to leave until Kit startled it.
The scared creature scurried behind the stacks of newspapers in a panic, soon after joined by more scurrying. There was the sound of something falling over as a family of squirrels made their quick exit out a small hole at the top of the garage ceiling, no doubt part of some network of other small holes that would eventually get them outside.
Both of them knew all too well what could happen in that kind of situation and were already stepping away from the shelves. Being behind Zoey, Kit was able to step outside the garage door slightly faster and she felt his hand grab her arm. Before she could really process what was happening she felt herself being jerked outside.
Kit shoved his hat over Zoey's face. It startled her at first, the sudden rough fabric hitting her skin by a hand that she could feel but not see. Luckily for her the weather was pretty mild that day, so there was no sweat dampening the hat or making it smell weird. If anything, it smelled faintly of men's shampoo. Her instincts were to push his hand away because it was awkward but then she felt it.
The cloud of dust that came out of the garage, accompanied by the sounds of hundreds of newspapers falling as shelving collapsed, was so thick that Zoey could feel it on her arms as it passed by. She wished more than ever that they had brought the masks from the van in advance.
Despite the hat over her face, Zoey closed her eyes and tried to hold her breath. It wasn't until a few moments later when the sound of concerned voices greeted their ears that Kit finally took the hat away from her face. She looked at him immediately, wondering what it was he covered his face with if he'd sacrificed his hat to her. She saw him standing there with his shirt collar pulled up and tucked over his face, his arm covered in dust as though he'd thrown that over his face as well. They weren't more than a foot outside of the garage.
But what really caught Zoey's attention was Kit's hair. The few times she had been stuck with him he had been wearing the hat. It didn't matter how hot it was or how tight the spaces were he had to squeeze through. She had always assumed that he had short hair but as he stood there and asked, "Are you okay?" she saw long hair hiked up in a ponytail.
Kit's hair was long enough to indicate he'd been growing it for years. Zoey couldn't guess how long exactly because it was braided. Despite the length on top, the sides were buzzed short. It was also a nice shade of blondish brown, hints of red tones only evident as the sun hit his hair at certain angles.
Some of the other cleaners were standing by, one or two of them clapping and laughing but others clambering to know that they were okay. Justin especially was interested to know that they were unharmed before he finally relaxed enough to smile and laugh himself. They had heard the shelves collapsing inside the house and came running to check on them.
As Zoey was prompted to look at someone's phone, an image of her and Kit standing in a cloud of dust as it settled on the ground around their feet, she glanced at him. Kit was tucking his braid under his hat again before dusting off his shirt and arms as best as he could.
"I wanna see," he said, when he noticed what was happening. With a large grin as though nothing had happened, he looked at the phone that Zoey handed him. "Can you send that to me, Sheryl?" he asked, handing it back to the middle aged woman. "Definitely belongs in the album of near misses. What is all of this? Sawdust? Look, you can see our outline on the ground!"
Two guardians sat upon the roof of a stable and watched as the sun set together, sitting in comfortable silence as they pondered what the following day might bring.
The majority of their day had been spent watching as a knight attempted to teach his newly acquired squire how to mount a horse both with and without a mounting block. The knight's intentions had been good, but he had failed to realize that the boy was simply too short and too weak in the arms to really manage well enough.
Tabris had watched alone for a while, Ambriel taking the time to nap and restore their energies after days of careful guidance. Tabris could not remember the last time they had taken a nap, considering their assignment was a boy who could almost never hear the sounds of guidance. Energy was rarely expended upon him.
As the sun dipped further under the horizon the two guardians were able to look down and spot a knight and a young boy who had recently figured out how to use a fence to help launch himself in the saddle. In a moment of triumph the boy had thrown his arms into the arm with a shout of glee which startled the horse into a panicked run.
The boy fell to the ground with a small puff of dust and laid still, no doubt the air knocked from his chest, for several moments until he stood once more. With wobbly legs he made to chase after the horse in order to try again.
Tabris could not help but smile at the boy's determination to never give up, even after he tripped and landed in a fairly fresh deposit of horse manure.
A young boy tugged at the reins of a horse with so much effort he was practically horizontal. The knight who owned the horse had gone inside the tavern to purchase room and food for the both of them. The horse, however, did not seem interested in letting a child lead him around and instead made it his mission to eat every single flower growing in the flower beds in front of the tavern.
Unknown to the boy was a crowd of guardians sitting about the various thatched roofs and chimneys circling the tavern.
"I bet he gives up," one guardian shouted.
"I bet the horse drags him," another one called.
"What is that stick sticking out of his pocket?"
"Look at the horse! He's eaten half the flowers already."
"Whose boy is that? No use hiding, we can all see the mark on him!"
Tabris covered their face with their hands momentarily to stifle a sigh before gliding down from their thatched perch to stand beside the flower beds. Their excitement to be around other guardians after following the boy through the wilds for so long was short lived. They made a snapping sound as close to the boy's ear as possible without touching.
"Oh, hard of hearing. That explains a lot," Ambriel mused from the chimney across the street. "They sometimes grow out of that with age. Remi, be a dear. You sometimes handle the beasts, do you not?"
Remi clapped their hands with excitement and whistled a short tune while gliding themselves to stand before the horse. The horse finally turned away from the flower beds in time for the boy to give one final tug, which sent him sprawling across the ground. Remi began walking off in the direction of the stables around the back of the tavern, the horse following closely behind while mildly dragging the boy who struggled to gain a footing without letting go of the reins.
"I called it, horse dragging boy! Who denied me? I heard at least one of you deny the chances. Someone owes me a small prayer or blessing, pay up."
Rather than allow the boy to drag through the dirt for very long, Tabris waved a hand through the air and added a bit of strength to his legs for just long enough to regain his footing. The other guardians began applauding for Remi as a show of encouragement for their helpful hand in the matter. The boy began to smile, suddenly looking as though he had accomplished a great feat in getting the horse away from the flower beds and around to the stables.
"I think everyone should have a bastard theyāre emotionally attached to. no fixing, just you watching your fav go absolutely off the rails and enjoying every second of it."
============================================
"Tabris."
"Ambriel."
Tabris had been sitting on the stone wall of a small foot bridge over a creek, their feet defying gravity and hovering in the air so that they could rest their elbows on their knees and in turn, their chin in their hands. They had not expected to cross paths with anyone that day, so when Ambriel glided over and took a seat beside it was welcomed company.
"What brings you?" Tabris asked, looking about until they spotted a figure on horseback further up the creek.
"My knight has heard rumor of dragons. Seeks glory or title or some land... I have forgotten which rumor has promised which rewards these days. He defeated a chimera, week before last. And you?"
Tabris sighed heavily and looked behind himself, turning at the waist partially in order to take a view at the creek below. "It would seem that today is for the fishes."
"That boy certainly knows this creek is far too shallow for fish," Ambriel said with a tone of disbelief. "Is that... a stick with string? Where is his hook?" Tabris heaved a heavy sigh once more. After the first five hours the guardian had begun to wonder how long it would be before the boy would catch on. "Ah, no matter. The majority of them are awfully silly, aren't they? Did you receive any instructions for this one, Tabris?"
Tabris shook their head, as they had received none.
"Very well, there's no reason we can't bring a little light to your duty then." Ambriel snapped their fingers and a slight ripple in the air that only the two of them could see began to slowly disperse until the knight began walking in their direction, following the creek. "A decade or two is all I can promise, though. You'll be on your own after that."
"That short?" Tabris asked, sitting up with at least a bit of relief in their eyes. "Ill fated?"
Ambriel nodded gravely followed by a look of admiration towards the knight as he and his horse continued approaching. "My only instruct was 'to be felled in battle'. No real clue what kind of battle, of course. I figured knighthood would set him on the right path."
Tabris watched as the boy, mistaking the knight for a bandit, attempted to attack the man with his stick and string. A smile spread across their face despite their best efforts to hide it.
Boo walked out the front door of her cottage with sturdy boots on, a sack in her hands, and determination in her heart. It had been a few days since she had collected the mail and while it was generally easy enough on sunny days, it was mildly raining that particular day. On days that it rained her mailbox had a habit of roosting somewhere more dry which made everything a bit more difficult.
One winter during a particularly bad snow storm Boo had received mail and wasn't entirely in the mood to bundle up and go get it. The postal workers were masters at making anti-weather bubbles around themselves so that they could continue delivering the mail without interruption. Her neighbors were usually able to construct some sort of barrier that would last them long enough to at least run to their mailboxes and back. But Boo had never even been able to make the anti-weather bubble appear.
So in a desperate attempt to summon her mail from the roadside box to her front door that winter Boo had stood with her front door open and attempted her summoning charm. At the last moment her egg laying chicken that she'd been keeping indoors through the bad weather had made a dash for the open door. Henrietta had been trying to escape the house all winter, unaware that a life in the snow was not nearly as fun as she seemed to think it might be.
In an explosion of feathers and metallic clangs the mailbox had almost entirely fused together with Henrietta. Chicken legs that were suddenly as tall as Boo's waist had gone running off into the snow storm with a mailbox for a body. The flag on the side of the mailbox still remained, but it had a few feathers sprouting from it.
On nice days Henrietta could be found around the yard, 'pecking' at insects on the ground. Without a head and beak the motion was really just the legs squatting down and the 'body' bending forward to smash the closed covering against the ground a few times before moving on. Occasionally the covering would crack open to let out a Henrietta toned clucking noise or three.
The postal workers had come out after hours once to try and rectify the problem. They were experts at fixing pranks on mailboxes from children around town but after several hours they had all left stumped and defeated. It had taken them some time to figure out that all they needed to do was use magical luring chicken feed to get Henrietta by the road where they could stun her for a few seconds with a Halt Spell, shove the mail inside, and be on their way.
Boo wasn't so lucky. She couldn't afford to buy the special feed from the specialty charm store, and she certainly couldn't make it on her own. Nor could she make the Halt Spell work properly. The one time she had managed to actually fire it off, having knocked a vase from her mother's kitchen counter, the vase had remained halted in the air for months. Those who forgot about it were reminded when they knocked it with their knee on their way through the kitchen. It had finally finished falling in the middle of the night once, giving her mother quite the scare.
"Henrietta," Boo called out, wondering where her mailbox was hiding. The only way to get her mail on days that Henrietta didn't want to cooperate was to toss the sack over her 'body', flip her upside down while her legs kicked wildly until she thought the mail might have fallen out, and then release Henrietta.
Her mailbox was finally found, many minutes later, set up under some thick bushes that kept her mostly dry during the rain. Boo started to reach through with the sack, intent to trap quickly before Henrietta could decide to run off, when the sound of little peeps made her stop.
Out from under the flat metal bottom of the mailbox came two or three tiny mailboxes, each with chicken legs of their own and little flags with feathers sprouting out. All Boo could do was stare and wonder which of her neighbors owned a rooster-fused-mailbox, because she was pretty sure someone would have mentioned something as crazy as two fused fowls.
~~~
Check out Boo's Breakfast if you'd like to read more about Boo.
(I follow an account that posts concept art [among other things] and when I saw this today, I just knew that Boo and her chaotic magic deserved to have a quirky mailbox like this. I love the concept. Check out their account, there's some cool stuff over there.)
Flora, 1892 by Alphonse Mucha (Czech, 1860ā1939)
The original post where I found this painting (check them out if you want to see more like it)
When I was a child there was a story that my mother would sometimes tell me and my siblings before bed. She would tuck each of us in, kiss us on the foreheads, and then ask us which story we wanted to hear. "The Waiting Maiden," I would ask. It was rare that I had a preference at all so she was always happy to oblige.
The story is fairly simple. No one knows where the maiden has come from, how she got there, or how long she's been waiting. All anyone knows is that the maiden has simply always been. It's not easy to find her as her place in the forest is hidden down secret paths that are only revealed to those the forest trusts to never disturb her.
The maiden stands close to a small stone wall. My mother would change this part of the story frequently; sometimes the wall was all that remained of a church, remnants of a house, the entry way to a hidden garden, nothing but decoration. The large stone blocks of this small wall were carved into perfect squares to denote that careful craftsmanship had once been involved, lending value to whatever the wall belonged to.
My mother never really described the maiden. Sometimes she would mention that she was about the same height as the wall, other times she might mention that she was young. I always pictured her as being a little taller than average, in her early twenties, with long blonde hair. According to my mother she stood with her eyes closed, as though she was taking a nap while she waited, and wore the clothes of a nobleman's family. I never really knew what that meant as a child, until I was a little older and went with my father to deliver the sheep to the estate house which owned our farm.
One time my siblings and I were playing after supper with the meager light left before sundown. Someone had thrown a ball a little too hard and it had disappeared into the trees. As the oldest, it was my duty to find the ball and bring it back. As I bent to pick up the ball a glare of sunlight cut through some vines and bushes among the trees to blind me.
I remember, very vividly, raising a hand to block the glare from my eyes. As I did so an opening in the vines and the bushes that I had never noticed before was illuminated by the sunset in the distance. I remember thinking that it was strange because I was fairly familiar with that part of the trees behind our farm; the chickens were often hiding in the bushes and needed to be chased back to their roosts at night.
Curiosity got the better of me, the ball on the ground forgotten. The opening in the vines and bushes formed, loosely, a tunnel of plants and flowers. As I walked down the tunnel I saw the plants reaching up high and curving until they almost touched. I remember feeling a slight breeze that smelled sweet and like flowers but not quite.
The tunnel opened at the end to a very small clearing not much larger than our house. My eyes were drawn to the farthest side where a young woman stood against a very small wall, made of perfectly square stones. I knew her to be The Waiting Maiden right away, and she looked almost exactly as I imagined her to be. She stood as my mother described, was dressed in clothes that I didn't recognize yet, and looked as peaceful as the area felt.
At first I thought I was staring at a statue that was painted to appear real. I had seen one or two like that at the cemetery when my grandparents had passed and we went to the funerals. But they didn't look nearly as nice as she did. It took a few moments of staring to get brave enough to get closer, that's how real she looked.
Up close, if I stared real hard, I could see that she was breathing and not actually a statue at all. At the time I was only eight, and you would think finding a stranger in the woods who appeared to be sleeping while standing up like that would terrify me enough to make me run away. There were less concerning things around the farm that would send me running back then.
But no. I felt very comfortable there. I do remember thinking that the maiden looked lonely or maybe bored. It was hard to tell. Standing alone in the forest and waiting for so many years had to at least be boring, I remember thinking.
It was then I noticed her hands. Clutched together in front of herself, as though she was trying her hardest to keep them still. It was how my younger siblings clutched their hands when they were trying to follow directions from our mother and father to sit still, only unlike my siblings, the maiden seemed able to keep them that way. "Are you trying to behave?" I had asked her. Children are curious little creatures like that. Only a child would encounter the subject of a bedtime story and ask such an odd question.
She didn't answer, of course.
I might have stayed there a long time if it wasn't for the sunset. The light was fading quickly and I knew that if I wasn't home quickly with everyone else I would get in trouble. I was about to leave the clearing when I spotted a daisy near the edge of the tunnel, hidden from sight when I had entered but clearly visible as I was leaving. There was nothing in the story about The Waiting Maiden that led me to believe that anything was dangerous. It wasn't like the other stories my mother told, where you had to be careful about strange houses in the forest or accepting candy from strangers.
Again, children are curious little creatures. I will never know what made me do it but before I left I plucked that daisy from the ground and ran it back over to the maiden. I had just known that there was something special about that daisy because it was the only one in sight of the entire clearing. I set it down at the maiden's feet, careful not to touch her because I didn't want to disturb her, and ran from the clearing to go home.
No one believed me, of course, when I claimed to have found The Waiting Maiden in the forest behind our farm. My parents wrote it off as my imagination, and the next day when my siblings demanded to see the entrance I had found and I tried to show them, it was no where to be seen. I tried to find that entrance again every night for weeks, until I slowly began to forget where exactly it had been and it became harder and harder to remember.
Eventually I moved on. Eventually I grew up a little bit more and bedtime stories were no longer a part of my nights. Eventually the memory was little more than fond recollections of childhood antics.
If you've heard as many bedtime stories as I have, you're probably thinking that I never saw the maiden again. But you're wrong. I saw her one other time when I was sixteen. I had not been on the farm that time but instead visiting my aunt. My uncle had fallen ill and my aunt needed help around her house with the children. They did not live on a farm, but rather in a small village where they made a lot of leather and yarn.
If you've ever been around tanneries then you already know. They can smell awful on the best of days, and absolutely unbearable on the worst. I wasn't used to being around that kind of smell and often had headaches during my time there. One night, when I needed a break from the smell, I walked off from the village and made for the trees in the distance. I was hopeful that getting far enough away would bring fresher air.
Once I was in the trees I did my best to take in the scents of the forest. The dead leaves on the ground, the leaves on the branches, the floral scents of the flowers growing around, the woody smell of the trees themselves. While I tried my best to rid my nose of the awful smells of the village I looked around and tried to remember the last time I'd really be in any sort of forest or bunch of trees. It had been years.
That's when a lone daisy caught my attention. As I stared at it I began to feel the pull of childhood memories. I walked to and squatted by the daisy, staring at it like I might have done as a child, as I tried to remember what there was about the flower that seemed so familiar. There weren't any stories I remembered about flowers in particular.
When I stood up again and looked back towards the village, intending to head back, I saw that same tunnel from when I was eight. The memory came back quickly and I began with a hurried determination to walk down the tunnel. It was shorter than I remembered it being, it felt like I had only taken ten steps before I'd found myself in the clearing.
The Waiting Maiden stood as I remembered her, across the clearing, in clothes that I had learned to recognize as expensive and luxurious. While I was older and taller, she was the same. At least she looked to be the same age, her hair the same length, her clothes looked no older or more worn than that first time.
Rather than standing with her hands clasped before her though, as I remembered, she stood with both hands at her cheek. Held between her fingers was a flowing growth of green leaves that resembled something like a large piece of fabric; perhaps a large shawl or ridiculously long scarf. She no longer looked bored or lonely but almost as though she was enjoying the feel of fine silks against her skin.
By her cheek and the bottom of the flowing leaves there grew a few daisies. When I dared to get closer and take a better look I could see the faintest of smiles. Like a child laying a flower at her feet, for reasons I will never understand, I smiled and remarked, "You liked the daisy?"
As before, of course, she did not respond.
I'm not sure how long I stood there. An ache in my legs told me that it had been a long time. There was something enthralling about seeing that tiny hint of a smile on her face and knowing that perhaps it was because I'd given her a flower as a child. By that point it was fully dark outside, the sun long gone. I might have stayed there and stared at her forever if I had not gotten a childlike urge to reach out and touch her face.
I was a mere moment away from touching her when, during a blink of my eyes, everything in the clearing disappeared. It was disorienting at first but eventually my senses came back to me and realized that I was on the edge of the forest, facing towards the village. Memories of my mother telling the story of The Waiting Maiden trickled back to me and I wondered if by trying to touch her face, the forest had decided I was about to disturb her.
That was, truly, the last time I ever saw the maiden. I have grown old, lived my life, had my own family, and told bedtime stories to my own children and their children. I have told the story of The Waiting Maiden but I have changed it slightly. I do not mention that I have met her, but I have added on that those allowed to visit should be careful to never disturb her if they wish to continue meeting her. I remain hopeful that I might be granted one last visit before I leave this earth and take walks through the forest frequently in hopes of doing so.
Olā Fleet Daddy Jack. The stories say he used to hide out by Haxel Station with his carrier, taking in the poor and the criminal. After a mishap between him and the port authorities at Haxel, he swore that heād run that place dry if it was the last thing he ever did. He slaved away at them bounty contracts to cover the fees that his visitors couldnāt afford until one day... Haxel started turning off their landing pads, one by one. It wasnāt long until a station that size ran itself bankrupt. Itās said that olā Fleet Daddy Jack could be heard hootinā and hollerinā for lightyears, he was so happy. No one really knows what happened to him after that. Other carrier owners had joined him slowly over the years, taking to his cause to destroy Haxel Station, slighted in their own ways. Once heād done what he came to do, why some say he just drifted off to find a new cause knowing those he left behind would take care of the pilots for him.
"Just light the candle... And a swish of the wand..."
Boo swished her wand over the flame of a candle, the heat warming her fingers for a brief moment. She closed her eyes, chanted a few words, and then looked to see if anything had happened.
Nothing had happened.
Feeling defeated after failing for the third time in a row, Boo blew out the candle. She set her wand aside and rubbed her hands over her face before taking a deep breath. The smell of pancakes filled her nose, a reminder that she was trying to also eat breakfast.
"Don't mix magic and meals," her grandmother used to warn her. Boo would always ask why, but she never got any answers. Her grandmother was mysterious like that. If you didn't want to follow her advice, hard earned over many years, then you should deal with the consequences.
Absently, Boo picked up her fork while reading over the spell book she'd been studying from. The fork caught nothing but plate and gave a mild screeching scrape that grated on Boo's ears and cut her thoughts off abruptly. She looked at the plate with confusion, because it was empty.
The sound of something falling to the floor from the kitchen startled Boo, making her drop the fork with a clatter. Heaving a sigh, she went to look and see if she could find the source of the noise. It wasn't uncommon for a squirrel or a bird to get inside through an open window, her wards to keep critters outside didn't always work well enough.
At first she didn't notice anything out of the ordinary. Her kitchen was loaded with all sorts of boxes, canisters, and bags filled with ingredients for her craft. The only obvious source of the disturbance was from a spice box laying on the floor, it's lid a short distance away and a pile of cinnamon spilling out.
It looked as though something had been rolling in the cinnamon. Boo was in the process of considering mice as the culprits when a tanned blur of a creature appeared and began rolling around in the cinnamon. A small dust cloud billowed upwards, the smell wafting through the room and until Boo felt like she might start coughing.
The creature appeared so quickly that it took Boo a moment to process what she was seeing. The creature looked like a combination of a pancake and a little stingray. She only knew what a stingray was because she'd seen a picture in a book and had decided that she wanted one in her home aquarium. It just happened to be the thing she was trying to conjure during breakfast.
The creature looked up from the cinnamon mess at Boo, it's little eyes wide and cheery, and burped syrup onto the floor. Her grandmother's words came back to mind, the memory of her voice a little stronger than usual.
"Don't mix magic and meals."
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Did you enjoy this story? You can find more from this particular character arch and more like it over on my blog.
This story was directly inspired by a sticker I saw online once, that was just too adorable. I am not affiliated with store/person/brand, I just like to give credit when I can for my inspirations. Plus, you can more accurately see what a pancake stingray might look like.
