Just Beyond the Very, Very Far North

by Dan Bar-el

  “I can’t,” C.C. admitted. “But without a doubt, without a subatomic fraction of a doubt, it’s not magic.”

  The owl and the musk ox had to agree to disagree, or at least, that is what Handsome told himself, and the whole group returned to the other side of the river, silent and deep in thought.

  “What if…?” said Duane, suddenly. “What if she isn’t bonkers?”

  “Interesting theory,” Handsome responded sagely. “Go on.”

  “Well… she’s all alone in the burrow while Major Puff is away on migration. Perhaps she is sad and lonely. And if she is sad and lonely, then—”

  “I think I see where you are going with this,” Handsome interrupted, his voice getting markedly excited. “If she is sad and lonely, then what she needs is—”

  “A party!” Magic screamed.

  “Indeed!” shouted Handsome. “You snatched the word right out of my mouth!”

  The word Duane was about to say was “hug.” Twitch might just need a hug, not a party. But good luck trying to tell his two friends that.

  “Duaney-Duane (poke, poke), that was a brilliant idea,” said Magic. “We’ll sing songs, and play games, and pull tricks on one another! Probably play tricks more than the songs and other stuff.”

  “And I shall prepare a tray of delicious delights,” said Handsome. “Watercress sandwiches, scones and jam, macarons for those so inclined—all served with aplomb.”

  Duane and C.C. stood silently, watching Magic and Handsome work themselves up into a frenzy of party planning. In all issues of a social nature, C.C. remained bewildered and felt out of her depth. As for Duane, he wasn’t thrilled by the idea of a party as much as you might have imagined, despite it involving food. Having encountered aplomb at his first afternoon tea party hosted by Handsome a while back, he was somewhat underwhelmed by its taste.

  “Invitations must be made and sent out at once,” Handsome insisted. “Shall this be a formal affair or costumed?”

  “Let’s tell some that it’s formal and others that it’s costumed. That way no one will know who made a mistake!”

  “Ho-ho! Wickedly clever. Well done. Next topic—decorations.”

  Duane and C.C. turned and looked at each other. C.C. shrugged her shoulder feathers and flew home. Duane followed her example and headed home too. Magic and Handsome were too involved in their arrangements to notice either’s absence.

  Back in his cave, Duane’s thoughts were still on Twitch. He was genuinely worried about her. For as long as he had known Twitch, she was always ready to lend a paw or make an occasion more special with a nibble, and she never asked or expected something in return. Whether Twitch was presently just sad or whether she was deeply troubled, it seemed to Duane that the least he could be was understanding.

  So the next morning, he returned to the meadow. He hoped to have a chat and to offer comfort, but this time, instead of finding Twitch hop-stomping, he found her engaged in something equally bizarre. The arctic hare was going around the meadow and pulling out all the colored flowers she could find. Each time she did so, another incantation followed.

  Pull-snap. “Feel just awful, but for the greater good.” Pull-snap. “Feel just awful, but for the greater good.” Pull-snap. “Feel awful, woozy with the guilt, just saying, but for the greater good.”

  Over and over, Twitch repeated this rite, filling her front paws with colored flowers. When she could hold no more, she hopped over to the stomped-down circles of grass and began spreading the flowers over them. Then back to the flowers for more pull-snapping and regrets. Duane could not make heads or tails of it, but rather than avoid Twitch, as Handsome, Magic, and C.C. had been doing, Duane let his heart guide him closer.

  Pull-snap. “Feel just awful, but—”

  “Hello, Twitch,” Duane said, drawing her attention. He followed his greeting with a warm smile, but in return, Twitch gave him a look he’d seen from her only once before, back when they first met. It was a serious look that said, in no uncertain terms, that she was not to be trifled with.

  “Hello, Duane, nice to see you up and about, no time for chatting, work to be done, goodbye.”

  And with that, he was dismissed. Duane meekly turned to leave, but his heart spun him around again. “May I help you with your work?”

  Twitch hesitated before answering. Her eyes darted back and forth as she weighed the pros and cons. “Thank you for the offer, lots of work, could use the help, four paws better than two and time being of the essence—but! No talking, Duane, no chatting about storms or casual comments about drowning, my nerves can’t handle it. Understood?”

  Duane had no intention of bringing up such topics. Nonetheless, he nodded solemnly that he understood, but then he spoke anyway. “What about the incantation?”

  “The what?” Twitch asked.

  “You know—‘sorry about pulling you out, feel awful, for the greater good’—that thing?”

  Twitch suddenly appeared to relax. She gave Duane a small, affectionate smile. “Incantation is optional, but would be greatly appreciated, thank you, Duane, feel terrible, I do, about it all.”

  With that, the two friends spent the rest of the morning pull-snapping the colored flowers, making apologies, and filling in the three circular ruts. Duane did not ask Twitch even once what the end purpose was. He accepted that whatever it was for, it was important to her and he could see upon completion that Twitch looked noticeably relieved. He silently took his leave while she preoccupied herself with looking up at the sky.

  As I may have mentioned once or five times earlier in these stories, Duane was a polar bear in possession of a curious nature, which meant that by the time he reached the river, the not knowing what he helped Twitch complete got his thoughts churning. Is it some kind of game? he asked himself. No, Twitch was in too serious a mood for games. Wait! Perhaps it’s a garden. He’d seen a picture of a garden in one of C.C.’s old books. Like Twitch’s circles of flowers, the garden kept plants in an orderly fashion. Quickly, Duane dismissed that theory. Gardens are for growing plants. Twitch and I, with all our pull-snapping, were doing the opposite of growing them. Walking nimbly across the stepping stones of the river, Duane had another series of thoughts, equally as nimble. Twitch was looking up at the sky when I left. Why was she looking up? There was nothing there, not even clouds. Oh my, imagine if there were someone up there, looking down at Twitch and me doing what we were doing? Imagine what they would see. Then Duane stopped and tried to imagine what “they” would see. He couldn’t. There were limits to his nimbleness. But a new and important question came to him instead. What if whatever Twitch and I were doing was actually meant for someone to see from up there all along? And that was when Duane reached the other side of the river and found himself at a crossroads, so to speak. He could either head to the Shipwreck and ask C.C. to fly over and give him a report, or he could continue past his cave and walk up Baby Whaleback Hill, with its panoramic view, and see it for himself.

  You might think that the obvious choice would be the latter. After all, a firsthand account is generally better than a secondhand one. But some of you may remember that the last time Duane had gone up Baby Whaleback Hill, which really is more of a mountain than a hill, he did not have a great experience. There were some unpleasant bits involving sliding down the hill on a toboggan at a reckless speed, then launching up into the sky at a ridiculous height, followed by plummeting to a hard, unforgiving ground. So while Duane did want to go up and see for himself, at the same time, he was hesitant.

  But I won’t be tobogganing down Baby Whaleback Hill today, he reasoned. I will simply walk up the hill and return the same way. Unless I accidentally slip onto a toboggan that happens to be lying around, I should probably be fine.

  Convinced that the odds of surviving were in his favor, Duane made his way to the hill’s base and began the long hike up. The higher he went, the more of the Very, Very Far North he could take in. The more landmarks he saw and recognized, the less worried and m
ore happy he grew. He spotted his cave and Handsome’s field, he caught sight of the Shipwreck, and he saw the river in the distance. Beyond the river was the meadow. Within the meadow was the thing he helped Twitch complete. Even from far away, it was easy to spot. The three rings of multicolored flowers stood out from the rings of green grass. It was eye-catching. It was beautiful. But what is it? Duane still wondered.

  1O. A FRIEND OFFERS HELP IN TIME FOR THE MAJOR’S RETURN

  “I SEE THAT TWITCH has made a target.”

  The voice that spoke from behind Duane made him jump in surprise. He was so grateful that there weren’t any toboggans nearby to accidentally step on. When he caught his breath and his balance, he turned to discover Sun Girl and the Pack. “Hello, everyone,” he said. “Would you please repeat what you said that Twitch made?”

  “A target,” Sun Girl explained. “Something to aim for.”

  “Something to aim for…” Duane’s thoughts were churning again. Target. Seen from above. Twitch. Lonely and sad. Major Puff. Away on migration. He left late. He still hasn’t returned yet. Oh! She wanted to make sure he finds his way home. So… give him a target!

  “It won’t work, though,” said Sun Girl, pulling Duane out of his musings. She and the Pack looked up and studied the sky. “Sea fog will be coming in soon. It will be thick. Major Puff won’t see the target the way it’s been built now.” The Pack nodded in agreement.

  Duane took in the gravity of the situation. All this time, Twitch had not been sad; she was just worried. But if Major Puff does return soon, the fog will hide the target and he won’t see it. He might get lost or maybe even injured. “Is there anything we can do?” the polar bear asked.

  Sun Girl came up to Duane and gently took his paw. “Yes, there is, but we’ll need to head south first toward the tree line to pick up some supplies.” Side by side, with the Pack in tow, the girl in the red parka and the polar bear made their way down Baby Whaleback Hill. Knowing that there was a plan of action, Duane felt reassured enough to change the subject and ask why Sun Girl and the Pack were atop Baby Whaleback Hill in the first place.

  “We were having a renaming ceremony,” Sun Girl explained.

  “We had a vote,” added seven of the eight members of the Pack in unison. “Baby Whaleback Hill is really more of a mountain, so that’s what we’re calling it now.”

  “Baby Whaleback Mountain is fitting,” agreed Duane, who considered himself an expert on giving names.

  The eighth member of the Pack, who was responsible for the original, not-so-fitting name, reluctantly agreed. And I, your narrator, will less reluctantly refer to it as Baby Whaleback Mountain from now on too.

  So at this point in the story, Duane is heading south to the tree line to pick up some supplies; Twitch is standing next to the target made of colored flowers, looking up at the sky and fretting about the Major and the weather; Handsome and Magic are busy planning a party that isn’t needed; and C.C. is on the Shipwreck, most likely already distracted with some new subject of inquiry. With all these characters so engaged, I believe our focus should shift now to Major Puff. After all, were it not for him and his long-awaited return, none of the events I’ve just described would have come to be. The Major would be back in the burrow, Twitch would be calm, and the grasses, plants, and flowers would have had an easier time of it, to say the least.

  Doubt me if you wish, but I tell you that Major Puff was just then on the last leg of his journey home. The trip was grueling, as it should be, considering the distance and the fact that it was a serious migration and not a frivolous holiday in any which way. But there had not been any catastrophic obstacles of the kind described vividly by C.C. What about his navigation, you might ask? Was Major Puff off course? Had he lost his bearings? No, certainly not. His navigation skills, by his own estimation, were nothing short of perfect. As evening approached, he knew exactly where the burrow was, straight ahead, as the crow—or in this case, the puffin—flies.

  But then the sea fog came in, as C.C. and Sun Girl predicted. It came in fast and it came in thick. It shuttered Major Puff’s view of the Very, Very Far North. It closed in around him like a cold, wet blanket. The Major was not so confident about his navigation skills anymore.

  “What dastardly trick is this?” he shouted at no one in particular since he was flying solo. “I have not but arrived at my objective when it is suddenly snatched out from under me!”

  I would be less than forthcoming if I didn’t mention that the Major briefly suspected this was some new tactic created by his foe, the great black-backed gull. He dismissed the idea quickly. Even great black-backed gulls wouldn’t stoop so low as to remove geography.

  The situation grew more dire with each passing minute. Concern mounted for the exhausted puffin as he flapped his tired, aching wings through the tangle of vapors, searching for a glimpse of a familiar landmark, like a river or a meadow, or any kind of mark, for that matter, like a target made of flowers, just saying. Major Puff flew blindly in circles. His heart told him he was close, but regrettably it couldn’t be any more precise. “Hang in there, Major!” the unflappable puffin rallied himself. “All we need is a sign. Just one sign.”

  Meanwhile, in the meadow also shrouded in fog, Twitch was in utter despair. She knew the target would be useless now. “What was I thinking?” she scolded herself aloud. “Flowers in a fog? Silly old hare.” She felt bad for the Major. She felt bad for all the flowers she had pull-snapped to no good purpose. But I hope that you, dear readers and listeners, will be more charitable. Twitch did the best she could do with what she had available. She didn’t just fret and worry. She did something, and that is worth acknowledging, even if the results were not up to the task.

  “Twitch, was that your voice I heard?”

  “Yes, Duane,” replied Twitch, whose ears always worked much better than his. “And where are you?”

  I need not point out that an all-white arctic hare and an all-white polar bear do not make for ready identification in a thick fog.

  “I’m over here,” said Duane’s voice, but closer now. “I’ve brought some help.”

  “You brought some—oh, hello, Sun Girl.”

  I need also not point out that a young girl in a bright red parka does get seen easier. Sun Girl, along with Duane and the Pack, had arrived with the aforementioned help. It was loaded upon the sled they had all pulled over.

  “We saw your target from the top of Baby Whaleback Mountain,” Duane said, now close enough to be seen by Twitch. “Sun Girl has something that might be spotted better by Major Puff in the current weather conditions.”

  All the while that Duane was explaining, Sun Girl and the Pack unburdened the sled of a stack of small logs and branches that they scavenged from the tree line farther south. She directed the placement of all the wood pieces until they created the desired shape. In between, she stuffed twigs and bits of dried moss.

  Twitch was skeptical. “Not sure how these things will be seen any better from the sky than the poor flowers I pulled out. And it’s getting dark, to make things worse.”

  “Just wait,” said Duane. “It will be magical but… not magic,” he added, just in case C.C. was somewhere in the fog, listening.

  Sun Girl kneeled on the ground and took out of her pocket a piece of steel and a piece of flint. She struck the flint with the steel, close to the wood and dried moss. Sparks flew. Fire caught. Flames grew. And then with the help of the Pack, who gently blew on those fragile embers, they spread and spread and spread along the length of the wooden shape.

  “Ah,” said Twitch, both in understanding and in awe.

  “Indeed,” agreed Duane, who remembered his first encounter with fire when he met Sun Girl in a snow cave, where he found both shelter and warmth during a terrible blizzard.

  “Will it work, Duane?” asked Twitch. Her voice was filled with all the heavy emotions she’d been carrying since spring arrived; all the worry and fear and even love, which can sometimes be heavy too.

>   Duane knew he couldn’t promise something that was beyond his control, but like Twitch and her target of flowers, he worked with what was available: his optimism. “I hope so, Twitch. I really, really, really hope so.”

  Back up in the sky, Major Puff could not tell up from down in the menacing haze. He’d lost all bearings, and unlike Duane, hope for him was in diminished supply. He was so tired. His wings ached. The exertion was overwhelming. His energy was all but used up. If he should have landed then, and found himself somewhere on the Cold, Somewhat Slushy Ocean, whether in the sea or on an ice floe, he might simply perish on the spot. As a puffin of the military class, and a descendant of generations of heroic puffins whose hasty retreats from battles have long been heralded, the Major didn’t fear death. He’d imagined far worse demises than this one. What bothered him, as he continued to fly blindly in the fog, was a regret. It pierced his heart, and yet he wasn’t able to put it into words. It was a yearning, more powerful than his respect for honor and bravery. This feeling stayed with him the whole return trip to the Very, Very Far North. What was it? he asked himself, in what seemed to be his last moments, his wings too tired to flap now. What was it he so yearned for? And then… there it was below. A sign, burning through the mist. Not a target of flowers, too subtle for the current situation, but a large arrow aflame, pointing to his burrow. “Yes,” Major Puff whispered, as happy and relieved as Twitch would soon be. Willing his sore wings to stretch and spread, he glided down toward home.

  Several things then followed in succession, and it left many of the characters confused. In order to leave you less confused, I will relay the events simply as they happened.

  Major Puff swooped down onto the meadow, dramatically backlit by the burning arrow for all gathered to see. Twitch immediately gasped in shock and joy, while Duane sighed contently. But before either could say a word, Magic and Handsome suddenly burst out of the fog yelling, “Surprise!” Handsome was carrying a large tray of nibbles, Magic was holding what is often referred to as a “whoopee cushion” (feel free to consult with your parents for a detailed definition), and both of them were wearing bow ties and top hats. Major Puff assumed the party was in celebration of his return. Twitch marveled at how quickly the news of his arrival had traveled. Handsome and Magic, on the other hand, stood speechless and stunned, as if their surprise party had just inadvertently walked into another surprise party.