The League of Berries & Laurels: Book the First - First Chapter (Pt. II)
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Trudging into the sunken living room, and continuing deeper still down an emotional well, a groggy twilight remains recalcitrant upon this face, once it too has settled on the drooly cushion, the body let go lifeless after its struggles to get here are through. About him he bids gossamers do his service, and compel retribution, however kindly, from the family often doing him ills, now all recollected in great detail. Like a youthful, unhappy personage of history, the white upholstery of the couch is as marble and a sarcophagus to him, looking a gentle monument, and his a mind more taken with the void than by Saturday morning’s cartoons. A portion of grapefruit left gutted at the breakfast nook digests as he lies on the couch. He scratches. He vents an angry exhalation. On the TV a wizard bids corporeal minions to fly upon their stings and fetch the objects needed for the hex he stirs. Doom awaits the subject of his avarice.
It could very well be any mundane going on in the house, but one will find rescue when the forces of boredom are almost too acute, and hope that it is, indeed, the unexpected appearance of a friend. From the couch leaps the good cheer, morose a moment before. What rationale brought J.J. to where in the hall frame he has appeared need not be asked. The cold shiver allowed in, which, though rapid in its run past Ulie’s nose, is as rapidly put to slumber in the home’s warmth, and should have been known for a portent of the right to free passage. Sacred to these nearest friends whose own homes are open to Ulie’s spontaneous arrivals, J.J. is one of many with claim to this right, but is the best loved, and the one most invigorating to now be seen. At a clip undiminished since the departure from his own front hall, then sufficiently attired to traverse the snows opened on, and interrupted nothing by the removal of all said equipage, labored with before departure, but shedded posthaste with his arrival, J.J. steps slackly forth to meet his friend in a single second’s hug. They both then stand a distance apart. Plans for the day are made once they have caught up on the items of life transpired since they parted ways when last the pair walked homeward from school.
Quickly though the buttoned shirt and pleated pants are remembered, and both are forlorn when the errand to Preston’s grandfather’s house ruins all their planning. Although, J.J. suggests, it be not as fun as crashing cars and similarly toy trains together, Preston’s grandpa is a hoot, and Preston says there would be no reason J.J. should not join.
Our story commences nothing less than in stride, while two friends, breathful, breathing shallow the cold air, take the paces on toward grandpa’s house. These same winter clothes to contain their shivering states had once been animated by older siblings, rushing onward, coming to enact some torment in the snow. Panicked, and tackled, Ulie and J.J. remember how their faces were washed in the freezing yield, or that armfuls of it were packed into spaces past the hood, and took up new meadow along the naked spine. Familial friendliness looks ever honored by those outside one’s brood, and not within. The distinct outer shells, vibrant, keeping them snug, sound of the swishing they once were pinned beneath. They have become their protection from the cold on a peaceful walk, and inspire, mysteriously, no sense of danger, smelling readily of dry cleaner. Without the warm perimeter of their chatter, the amplitudes of summer have been narrowed to branch by winter’s insightful whittling. Every article of the once scattered foyer they wear upon themselves, being the last of the siblings to leave the house, trailing at the extreme of sight behind their progress, until even the higher roof of that home reaches a point of vanishment.
“It is like I was saying yesterday, and I say it time and time again to them, if they are going to react like that every time I tell a joke, I am simply not going to tell jokes anymore.” The crocodile collar, pulled in bunches down from J.J.’s face, marks the difference in the household attires, J.J.’s well known to favor the fleecy, and Ulie’s woven and deep hued. Only their two countenances are exposed, and the gloves bestowed on J.J. for this walk are several sizes too big, owned, as they are, by a relative and rancher of the western states. The world they think to speak of is not on the scale of horizons past this cloister homes make along the lane, but only recall the textures of life they are tutored in, obedience, and grades.
“The anger was unbecoming of a person often claiming innate goodness is a virture, a teacher, at that, and one tasked with watching us for most of our waking day,” Ulie says of the incident.
“Truly, truly. That is a great point. Exactly.”
“What did your mom say when they had dragged you in to the office and made you explain what happened over the phone?”
“She said it was impolite to mention other’s skin conditions, but how was I supposed to know it is called pso-ri—, or s-s-something like that? But, when I call it her shedding, which resonated with no few people, the notion of pure and simple curiosity went heeded less than an assumption of wickedness. A tally against my name on the board is a mark of distinction when drawn by a hand angry and scaly as our teacher’s, a teacher reviled through the years of pupils who have seen her ways.”
“No way are you going to listen to them, are you, right? There is only so much to pass the time in class by. We saw her for what she truly is, and we cannot be cowed by the dragon, the scales, or the blind fury, not one of these, not all!” Listening to almost nothing, the pause discourages, J.J. looking the picture of piety and meek reflection, and meanwhile the vessel of greatest vacuity, the great lake, murmurs imperceptibly into the midst of their approaching chatter.
“No, no way, I cannot; the joke was hilarious, all thought, all looked agreed to that. Did you see the way everyone was laughing?”
“Did you see the way everyone was laughing? I was in tears I was in fits of laughter.” The anger of a teacher could not wrangle in the laughter of children, nor its many interminable tendrils, until an outburst of wrath took J.J. by the arm and into a corner, wherefore, J.J. looking terrified, the class quieted all at once. Shivering, Ulie says “Let’s take the route down the gully and make the steep climb up to grandpa’s streets. A way greater challenge presents itself down that way.”