In one swift motion, she pulled away from me and sat up in bed.
"I like you," she said. "And I appreciate your company, but I'm not just going to fall into your arms. You have to know that."
I sighed. What a turnaround. Was love going to be as hard to maintain as everything else?
"I came all this way," I said. "You were waiting for a sad thing and I came. I'm your sad thing."
"I know that you're sad, but you are not the last sad creature in the universe. You might be the wrong sad thing for me."
"I can feel it. We're meant for each other, Fanny Fod."
"Gaston Glew, after so many years of feeling wrong in heart and broken in mind, why do you continue following your thoughts and feelings? I've been happy all my life and even I know better than to trust what I think and feel."
"See, right there. There's us being meant for each other. That's not something you would know about me from the short time we've known each other, and I know things I shouldn't know about you. It's unreal. You were calling to me through outer space. The telescopes in our minds were programmed to seek each other out."
"I don't have a telescope in my mind. My head is too flat."
"Okay, fine, anyway, I know I'm right," I said. "I never put trust in anyone, but I trust you already."
"You don't know me."
"I don't know anyone."
"Then it's a choice you've made to trust me, and it sounds to me like you've made a lot of bad decisions in your life. You're being rash."
"I escaped my destined fate to rot away with the rest of the pickles, didn't I?"
"That may have been your worst decision of all."
"There it is again. The psychic connection. You wouldn't make that judgment unless you knew me far beyond anything I've said. Exile was my best decision. I tried to fit in. I tried to be a good pickle. Now that I've experienced this other world, the most terrifying prospect is going back to Pickled Planet, to what I was before."
"What you were is what a part of you will always be."
"I thought you pancakes believed nothing is eternal."
"Most believe it, but I don't." She hesitated for a few breaths, then said, "Are you really happy here?"
"I'm happy. I'm happy and I'm speaking honestly."
"You're speaking honestly?"
"Yes," I said.
"You're speaking honestly?"
"Yes, I think so."
"Okay, if you're speaking honestly, why are you not out trimming the sun's mustache right now? Isn't that where you should be?"
"Oh, that," I said.
"It's okay. You can tell me. Do you also want to tell me if you had any special encounters with any pancakes yesterday? It's okay if you did. It's okay to tell me why you were naked when I shot you out of your balloon."
I cracked up inside. I felt a lot depended on my response. Either way I was doomed.
"Well?" she said.
I was out of space to breathe.
"No, no special encounters," I said.
Fanny pursed her peanut butter lips into a disappointed half-smile that was flecked with syrup. I felt bad about lying to her, but I had other things to worry about. My belly was grumbling. I was hungry. Her face looked so delectable, I wanted to eat her for breakfast. I wanted to flatten her on the bed and eat her.
"I have to go," she said. "Help yourself to anything. Go anywhere. But whatever you do, don't enter the dungeon."
*
Fanny left the castle to distribute beer around Pancake Island. I drifted back to sleep and slept in later than I had in my entire life. It was a more relaxing sleep than any I'd gotten on Pickled Planet. My sleep there was troubled, full of night tremors and voices telling me to do things in the dark, so I had to sleep with the lights on most nights, if I could fall asleep at all. Most nights I tossed and turned in fear of the faces detached from bodies that I thought were pressing against every window of the house. The faces were not trying to break into the house. They were trying to smother it. I laid awake, holding my breath and sweating brine, waiting for the heads to come for me. Some nights I couldn't take it. I locked myself in the bathroom and wrapped myself around the toilet and cried uncontrollably. I slammed my head against the toilet seat until I lost consciousness and stopped thinking about the faces. Blackouts were my only defense against the fear. Most nights, blacking out was the only way I could rest, and even then I sensed the smothering. My brain lost communication with the rest of my body and I sank through layer after layer of green sand.
And so waking in the morning, feeling alive and rested in someone else's bed, I sprang up, ran to the rooftop, and shouted to the world, "Peace be with you!"
I felt every atom burst in pancake peace and harmony. I wanted to bless everyone.
"Pancake love for all!"
Restful sleep had also invigorated my curiosity, which was perfect because Fanny was out and I had the entire zucchini castle to explore. The starting point was obvious. I'd have to check out the dungeon and see the Cuddlywumpus for myself. It was true that Fanny Fod had kicked me out of her castle after the Cuddlywumpus started howling during our initial encounter, but maybe sleeping together counted as a rite of passage that granted me permission to witness the wonders of the mysterious Cuddlywumpus.
I giggled like a little pancake as I ran back into the castle and took the spiral staircase down to the kitchen. On the counter, Fanny Fod had left me two bottles of beer and a plate of peanut butter pancakes made from her smile. I did a shimmy dance across the kitchen, surprising even myself. It felt good to wake up somewhere you belonged. Even breathing was a pleasant, exciting activity. I popped open a beer, took a sip, ate two pancakes, and rubbed my belly. This was the ultimate breakfast. If every breakfast were a nation, no breakfast in the history of breakfasts could lay a finger on this one. It was a utopian breakfast.
I ate another pancake, rubbed my belly, and polished off the first beer. It was very resourceful of Fanny to use only ingredients from her own body. It was resourceful and she did it well.
I patted my stuffed belly and did a sluggish shimmy. I decided to name this one. I named it The Great and Beautiful Breakfast Empire. I thought maybe I would show it to Fanny Fod when she got home as a thank you for breakfast.
I heard the Cuddlywumpus snuffling behind the dungeon door and decided I should have a look. Fanny never mentioned when she might return. I put my ear to the door. There was a soft, ruffling sound. It sounded like the Cuddlywumpus was right behind the door and I had startled it. "Excuse me," I said, knocking. "May I come in?"
The Cuddlywumpus did not reply. I slowly reached for the doorknob until my hand grasped its green handle. I held my hand there for a while before turning it. Although I failed to see how a pancake as kind and generous and beautiful as Fanny Fod could keep a dangerous pet around, there was the off chance.
Pickles used to keep sad and dangerous pets all the time, not because they had any use for sad and dangerous pets. In our part of the universe, rubber monsters fell out of the sky rather often. When pickles encountered these monsters, they did not know what to do with them, so they put them in soggy boxes and called them pets. They took the rubber monsters home and made them into pets because they did not know what else to do with them, and sometimes the rubber monsters became sad and dangerous pets.
The Cuddlywumpus sounded sad the first day. I felt pretty certain it would not be one of those pets that was sad and dangerous, though. This was a happy place, after all. Now that I was happy there was nothing to fear.
I swung open the dungeon door.
A tentacle whipped around my waist and yanked me into the air. The tentacle laid me down on a floor made of bacon vultures. The tentacle recoiled from me. I was dizzy and nauseated. I puked up the utopian breakfast.
I looked up at the Cuddlywumpus. It was a giant shagpuff, hunched over and covered in furry tentacles. Each tentacle ended in an ear. Looking closely, I saw a mouth inside every ear and a hand inside every mouth. Its face w
as flat as a pancake's and blank except for two black button eyes. When the Cuddlywumpus cried out yesterday, it must have cried out from the mouths inside the ears on the tips of the tentacles. The Cuddlywumpus was hooked up to colorful machines. Pulsing green hoses ran from the Cuddlywumpus to the machines. They were either pumping something into the Cuddlywumpus or pumping something out.
The Cuddlywumpus mewed. It blinked its eyes at me as I approached the machines.
"Don't worry, I won't hurt you," I said. "I just want to know why Fanny keeps you locked away down here. You must be very important for her to keep you secret from everyone."
The Cuddlywumpus snuffled. It slapped its tentacles against the floor out of nervousness. To inspect the machines, I had to turn my back on the Cuddlywumpus. The beast appeared to be gentle enough. Timid, even.
The machines possessed no monitors, no gauges, no buttons or levers. I reached out to touch one and my hand passed right through. The machines were blocks of color that possessed the physical immateriality of vapors exhaled from mouths on chilly evenings.
I reached for one of the ropes. Unlike the machines, the ropes were solid matter.
The Cuddlywumpus mewed again.
"Hold on, I only want to know whether something is going into you or out." I felt along the rope. "Hm . . . it's coming out of you." I looked at the Cuddlywumpus and scratched the top of my head. "What is coming out of you?"
The Cuddlywumpus averted its eyes.
I followed the algae-textured hose to the golden, immaterial machine connected up to it. I raised the hose to my mouth and chomped down.
I tasted maple syrup.
Maple syrup was being milked out of the Cuddlywumpus.
Where could all this maple syrup go?
The sea, I realized. Nowhere but the sea.
Something popped behind me. I spun around. The dungeon was filling with green balloons. They were identical to the balloons I'd seen Fanny release into the sky. The balloons floated through the dungeon darkness, vanishing. Wobbling, silent orbs. Like pickled spirits.
I circled the Cuddlywumpus to its backside and discovered that the balloons were emerging from the cuddlywumpus.
Above me, beyond vision, the balloons popped in a rat-tat sequence.
I remembered that Fanny Fod could come home at any time and I had no idea how long I'd been down there, so I patted a furry tentacle and left the dungeon, befuddled by my discovery.
*
I spaced out on the roof for the rest of the day. I looked up at some point and Fanny Fod was standing over me. Neither of us said anything. She wasn't really smiling, though she tried, and I knew I was trying, and failing, to smile as well.
"Did you have a good day?" I said.
"I've been home for a while," she said. "Have you enjoyed yourself?"
"Yes, thank you for breakfast this morning. It was the best breakfast I've ever had. I invented a shimmy in honor of it. Would you like to see?"
"The Cuddlywumpus is feeling unwell. I'm going down to the dungeon to stay with it awhile. I love the Cuddlywumpus so much. I can't stand to see it feel bad."
You don't love the Cuddlywumpus, I thought. Nobody would lock up something they love in a dungeon and then hook it to a bunch of machines to milk it of their goodness.
I retracted that thought. I couldn't think that way about Fanny. I knew she was only thinking of the greater good, if such a thing existed. I knew she was pure at heart and simply doing what she thought best, even if what was best to her seemed cruel and irrational.
"Would you like dinner in a while?" she said.
"Dinner would be fabulous."
A question formed on her peanut butter lips. She lowered her blueberry eyes. I sat up, my heart palpitating. My guts ached. Get it over with, I thought. Ask your question and crush me. You know I'm a bug. I'm not worthy of you, so end this quickly, gently. I will say I understand and politely return to my pickled plight.
"I'll be in the dungeon. Come inside in a while," she said. "Dinner will be waiting."
She left. I lay back and studied the green sky. I had done that. I was responsible for that. I had turned the sky green and killed a few pancakes, but even in my evil ways, I was better than these pancakes. I cared whether I was doing right or wrong. I deliberated every word and action. Happy pancakes cared as little about the moralistic value of their actions as sad pickles, perhaps even less.
*
Dinner was the same as the night before. It was only our second night together, but I got the impression that Fanny Fod could only make one thing. Granted, pancakes and maple beer were the best things ever. Even so, I wondered how long it would be before I would tire of the monotony. The best things must get old at some point. I might even start craving brine chowder, for the sole sake of variation.
It was weird. We were totally meant for each other and we'd had such a great time last night, but neither of us seemed to feel much like being around each other right now. A nervous energy charged the air. It was apparent that we both had things to say to each other.
"You haven't touched your pancakes," I said.
"I feel full."
"How's the Cuddlywumpus?"
"You know that no one can ever find out about the Cuddlywumpus, right?" she said.
I shrugged innocently. "The cuddly what? You mean the Nothing in the dungeon?"
She smiled.
"I'm serious," she said.
"So how's the Cuddlywumpus?"
"Why are you so interested in the Cuddlywumpus?"
"Because I want to know this thing you love. I want to turn your love for the Cuddlywumpus inside out."
"I can't do this."
"Do what?"
"You were in the dungeon," she said. "While I was gone, you went down in the dungeon to see the Cuddlywumpus despite me specifically telling you not to do that. I told you that you were free to roam, but that if you cracked open the dungeon door even the slightest crack, you would not be welcome here. I threatened to kick you out. And you went and opened that door. You opened that door and you infected the Cuddlywumpus with your . . . well, you infected the Cuddlywumpus with yourself. So now I can't trust you in my castle."
I wanted to demand answers of my own. What was she doing keeping the poor thing locked up, milking it for all it was worth? Couldn't she at least provide the Cuddlywumpus a sunny room higher in the castle? But I was in no position to question her. She'd brought up her grievances first. Besides, this was her castle. Also, this was Pancake Island, not Pickled Planet. Arguing was probably taboo.
"Can you explain yourself?" she said.
I was festering. All my life, pickles had demanded explanations from me for the things I did. It was dangerous to try to explain what shouldn't be. It was better to be silent and let them think what they wanted.
"Well?" she said.
"Can we enjoy our dinner and talk afterward?" I said.
She lowered her head and picked up her glass and concerned herself with the beer. I took that as an affirmative. I had time to let my disjointed thoughts coagulate. Meanwhile, I turned my body over to my taste buds and gorged myself on pancakes and beer.
After dinner, Fanny and I went straight to bed. She did not check up on the Cuddlywumpus. She did not even speak its name. Fanny walked up the stairs in front of me, but I crawled into the big bed first. Like the night before, we gravitated toward the center. We wrapped our arms around each other. We wrapped our legs together. We could not have possibly been any closer. It was another greatest moment for me, but I felt that maybe it was not as great for her. Between the time I awoke and the time I noticed Fanny standing over me on the roof, something had changed. We were no longer the same pickle and pancake we had been the night before.
"I can't do this," she whispered.
She drifted off in my arms. No goodnight, no peanut butter kiss.
I fell into a dream about the faces. They tried to smother the zucchini castle. You will succeed, I said to them in the dream. You evil ones
will succeed.
I did not want it to be true. I did not want the evil faces to succeed, because if they ever smothered me in my dreams, I would be lost forever. And now I had more than a dream to lose. I had Fanny Fod.
THE PICKLED APOCALYPSE
I awoke in shambles.
Fanny Fod writhed on the floor in a tangle of crepe blankets. Her blueberry eyes wobbled in their sockets. She was having a seizure.
"Fanny!" I said.
I took my skull in my hands. Shouting hurt my brain.
My right fingers met a wetness that was neither syrup nor brine. I jerked my hand away and looked at it. My hand was covered in green blood. Oh my, what had I done? I felt around my head and my fingertips fell into a hole clawed into the back of my skull. As I slept, I'd tried digging a hole to my brain. Why had I done this? What compelled me to tear away my own head? Now that I'd registered it, the wound hurt. Bad. The wound had not hurt before I noticed it.
I put my own pain aside and went to help her. Being soft and round and flat, her body absorbed most of the impact that could potentially result in severe brain trauma, a severed tongue, etc. I decided there was not much for me to do and waited for the fit to take its full course. I sat down beside her quaking body. How did I let this happen? I was unaware that epilepsy was contagious. I pinched myself so as not to retreat back into my own pain.
After a while, she scaled back down from the sulfuric peaks of convulsion. She said that everything glowed.
"I want to be covered in light," she said. "I want to stand in the sun."
"Are you okay to walk? I'll carry you to the roof if you want."
"Don't worry about me. I feel spectacular. Yes, let's go to the rooftop." She looked at me, confused. "Your skull is bleeding. Why is your skull bleeding?"
"I woke up and found it that way. I don't know what happened. It's okay. My skull will feel better when we're in the light."
"Does it hurt?"
"It hurts."
"I'm sorry."
The Pickled Apocalypse of Pancake Island Page 5
