by Ramsey Isler
“Mm hm.”
“You’re the gift my dad left me?”
“Yes yes.”
“O...kay,” Sam said. “What am I supposed to do with you?”
“I’m here to help you,” the little fellow said. “That is what I was asked to do, and that is what I’m going to do. My word is my bond.”
“And you say you’re an elf?”
“Mm hm.”
Sam leaned back in her chair but didn’t let her weapon lose aim. “Prove it. Do something...elf-like.”
The boy giggled. It was an infectious laugh. Sam smiled, uncontrollably, and forced herself to frown when she realized it. “I’m serious,” she said.
Elf-boy said, “That is what’s wrong with you big people. Always so serious all the time. Oh well. I suppose it can’t be helped.” He took a step towards her.
Sam raised the barrel of her gun at his chest. “Don’t come any closer.”
“Or what?” The boy asked. “You’ll shoot? Go ahead. It won’t work anyway.”
“Do you want to die?” Sam said.
“Eventually,” the boy said. “I’ve always wondered what it would be like.”
“You’re going to find out real soon if you take one more step.”
“Oh? How about I take two then?” He took two playful hops forward, and he was in arm’s reach.
Sam wondered if it might be better just to get physical with him. After all, she definitely had a size advantage, and this little wisp of a boy didn’t look like he could put up much of a fight.
But then he made a swipe for the gun, and she had no choice. So she pulled the trigger.
She had aimed at the outside of his shoulder, hoping to scare him into leaving. But when she pulled the trigger, she wasn’t met with a thunderous bang and jolting recoil. Instead, the weapon belched out a cloud of sparkles and whistled like a toy train.
The boy in front of her laughed hysterically.
Sam’s eyes grew wide and her mouth fell open. “What...in the...”
“Guns are dangerous,” the lad said. “Your father never liked that you had one. No, he did not like it at all. I suspected you might get a little antsy in the pantsy, so I turned your gun into something much more entertaining.”
Sam’s surprise quickly shifted to anger. “You’re buying me a new gun.”
“I don’t have any money. But I can change it back to the way it was if you like.”
Sam snarled, and blew a hot gust of air out of her mouth. “Get out.”
“But you wanted me to do something elf-like.”
“Pulling a prank on my gun is not elf-like, okay?” Sam said. “It’s just annoying as hell.”
“That’s elf-like,” the boy said, and his smile returned.
Sam pointed to the door. “GET OUT!”
The elf-like intruder crossed his arms, and stood firm. “No! I’m not leaving until you’re convinced I am what I say I am.”
“GET OUT!” She hurled the useless gun at the boy’s head with all her strength. The boy dodged effortlessly, moving so fast and precisely that Sam barely caught the motion with her eyes. He stood there with an expression of grim determination and waited.
“Fine, you’re a damn elf okay?” Sam said. “Now get the hell out of my house.”
“No, I don’t believe you.”
Sam put her hands on her hips and said, “What do you want me to do then?”
Elf-boy narrowed his eyes, and stroked his chin in contemplation for a moment. Then he smiled again, that mischievous little smile, and said, “Look at your dog.”
“What?”
He pointed down at her feet and said, “Look at your dog.”
Sam looked to where she last saw Rupert, expecting him to still be cowering under the table. And he was, as she expected. But the boy was there with him. He was smiling, and holding Rupert in an affectionate hug around the dog’s thick neck.
“What in the...sh...” Sam turned back to the doorway where the boy had stood just half a second ago. But he wasn’t there. She turned back, and saw the boy still hugging her dog. Rupert looked to her with plaintive, horrified eyes.
“O...kay,” Sam said. “This just got real.”
* * *
It took a long while for Sam’s heart to stop trying to pound its way through her chest.
Rupert, to his credit, recovered much faster. Shortly after the elf released his grip around Rupert’s neck, the dog trotted off to his food bowl and munched away, sparing an occasional glance at Sam for some reason. Dog logic is sometimes inscrutable, but Sam figured he was trying to see if she was going to freak out.
But Sam was never one to let her emotions get in the way of reason and facts, and once she got over the fight or flight response that had temporarily frazzled her, she saw things quite clearly. She came to terms with the idea that she was, in fact, in the company of an elf.
It wasn’t that much of an ontological shock, really. Her father had talked about this kind of thing for most of his life, and even her own repressed memories pointed to this. The evidence was clear. All she had to do was accept it.
The only hard part was figuring out what to do next.
“My name is Piv,” the elf said. “Do you remember?”
“Yes.”
“You used to call me Piffy when you were littler,” Piv said. “You were such an adorable, rolly polly child.”
“Where did you come from?” Sam asked.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean...where did you come from. Where do elves come from?”
“I come from here,” Piv said.
“Here...where? Michigan?”
Piv nodded.
“How long have you been here?” Sam asked.
“A long time.”
“Yes, but how long is a long time.”
“Oh I don’t keep track,” Piv said. “But I was around long before the pale people showed up around here and changed everything.”
“That’s...fascinating,” Sam said as she recalled her high school history lessons on Michigan’s past. “That would make you hundreds of years old.”
“Is that a lot?” Piv asked.
“Yes,” Sam said. “It is. But how could you possibly manage to live that long? And what have you been doing for all those years?”
“So many questions!” Piv said, then he walked over to the kitchen counter and examined Sam’s spice rack. “I’m sure all the answers are in your father’s book.”
The book! That’s right!
Sam ran out of the kitchen, opened the basement door, and hurtled down the stairs so fast she almost sprained an ankle. She hit the light switch, and said, “Oh crap.”
The basement was packed to the walls with scores of boxes of all sizes. This was the sum total of her father’s life of rabid reading and writing; the massive collection Sam had moved from his place after he died. She had stored the whole lot here in her basement, but only now did she truly realize the full scale of it. There were at least a hundred boxes in the basement, and each was sealed thoroughly.
“Is the book somewhere in here?” said a voice from behind her.
Sam turned and found Piv staring at her. She hadn’t even heard him come down the stairs.
“I wish he’d never written that terrible thing,” Piv continued, and for the first time, Sam saw his face display some kind of sorrow. Or was it regret?
“Terrible?” Sam asked. “Why?”
“There are some things your kind should not know about my kind,” Piv said. “That book is full of those things.”
“Sounds like an interesting read,” Sam said. “Now I just need to find it. It would take me all night to get through this stuff though.” Then a thought struck her. She turned to Piv, and grinned.
“What? Why are you looking at me like that?” Piv said.
Sam said, “Just how fast can you move?”
* * *
Sam made some coffee while the elf got to work.
He said he’d be don
e as quickly as he could. Sam assumed that meant at least two hours, so she figured she’d need something to keep her awake and aware. The coffee brewed quickly. She added copious amounts of cream and sugar, then headed back downstairs to make sure the elf hadn’t given up.
Quite the contrary.
Piv had already parted the cardboard sea. There were dozens of boxes laid open. Their contents were arranged in neat little piles on the floor. She found Piv with his back turned to her. When he sensed her presence, he stood, smiled, and said, “I’m going to take a break for a bit.”
Something was odd. Or rather, odder than usual. Piv’s shirt was poking out at awkward angles. He kept his arms crossed in a sad attempt to hide it.
“What’s that you have there?” Sam said.
“What ever do you mean?” Piv said.
Sam reached out and poked whatever it was that was under the elf’s shirt. It was soft, and yet hard.
“Oh...this?” Piv said. “Just...a book.”
“Let me see it,” Sam said.
Piv, still wearing his smile, shrugged and pulled the journal from under shirt.
“That’s my father’s book,” Sam said
“Oh, is it?”
Sam walked up to her diminutive partner and grasped the book, but Piv wouldn’t let go. She tugged a couple of times and the elf held on with a look of fierce determination on his face even though his grip was slipping.
“Let go,” Sam finally said. Piv complied.
“Were you going to give it back to me?” Sam said as she turned the book over in her hands and inspected it for any damages.
“You asked me to find it, and I did,” Piv said. “You didn’t ask me to give it back to you.”
Sam sighed. “I swear this is like dealing with a demented lawyer. Go back to...wherever it is you go. I’ll call you when I need you.”
Piv stuck his tongue out at her, and then hopped into a nearby broom closet, slamming the door behind him.
“I said go away,” Sam yelled, “not hide in my closet.” She opened the door.
The elf wasn’t there.
Sam casually glanced over the interior of the closet. “I really need to figure out how he does that,” she muttered.
She went back upstairs, sat down at the kitchen table, and opened the old book. She almost wished she hadn’t. The yellowed pages were full of her father’s beautiful calligraphy. He had always revered the act of writing—he lovingly drew each letter as if it were a work of art.
And the pages—they even smelled like him. It wasn’t the “old man smell” he had often joked about in his later years, but the earthy, spicy cologne she remembered from her youth. She had always felt safe when that scent was around.
Some moisture welled in her eyes, but she kept the tears from falling. The momentary sense of loss was soon replaced by a warm feeling of joy. A smile appeared on her face—brought forth by all these wonderful reminders of the only man that had ever been a fixture in her life. She took a deep breath, flipped to page one, and began to read.
* * *
February 25th,
I found one yesterday.
We played the catching game for nearly five full days before I finally captured him in a cave near the lake. When I wrapped my arms around his slender body my heart nearly burst with joy, and relief. To actually touch something that few even believed existed—the stuff of legend and myth. Even I started to doubt that it would ever really happen.
He sits in front of me now, eating a bowl of vanilla pudding. He hums while he eats. It’s a merry tune that is quite unlike anything I’ve ever heard. I believe the remarkable little fellow can make more than one sound at a time with his humming. Though humans can only emit single notes, full chords are available to my new friend. I’m sure it is only the first of many things I will learn from him.
I still can’t believe that he is here, right in front of me. Decades of dreaming and reading and waiting finally paid off. They called me insane. Cuckoo. Mad. And perhaps, for a time, I really was in the clutches of madness; the “divinest sense” as Dickinson called it. But I am most assuredly sane now. The proof is in the pudding, or rather, the pudding is in the proof.
And, most importantly of all, I know his name.
Piv is what my new little friend calls himself. He even spelled it out for me so I could be certain. But he will not tell me whether that name was given to him upon his birth, or at some other time. I learned the power that elf names have from tales and guidebooks written centuries ago in Germanic, Norse, and Iroquois cultures, but no human story ever revealed exactly how the elves came upon those names. For now it remains a mystery.
“How did you know of the catching game?” Piv asked me between spoonfuls of pudding.
“The native tribes who once thrived in this land left behind stories about your kind,” I answered. “It took me many months of interviewing tribe elders to find out which stories were most likely to be true. The catching game tale was the most consistent one I found in my research, so I deduced it was probably correct.”
“It has been a very long time since someone has tried to catch me,” Piv said quietly.
“It’s been a very long time since people believed you were out there to be caught,” I said.
The elf finished the last bit of his treat and smiled. “What shall we do next, good sir?” he asked me with the mien of a young prince.
“Well,” I answered, “I was hoping to learn more about you. And please, call me Samuel.”
“Learn more about me?” Piv repeated.
“Well, yes. Things like...what you like to do, and what you like to eat, and how you learned English, and how old you are.”
“Why should I tell you all that?”
“Because I asked,” I said.
The elf smiled even wider, and revealed pointy eyeteeth that looked like they might be able to inflect some rather nasty puncture wounds. “You are a clever man,” he said. “But what if I don’t feel like telling you all those things?”
“I know your name,” I said to him.
Piv’s smile disappeared when I said that, and he responded gravely, “Yes, you do.”
“That means you have to do what I say.”
Piv shook his head. “I think the stories you heard might have gotten a little confused after all those years.”
“What do you mean?”
“I did give you my name, because honor required it. But that does not mean I’m your page boy. Having my name gives you the power to beckon me. The only thing I have to do is appear when you call me, and hear you out.”
“I see,” I told him. “Well then, that’s another very enlightening piece of information. I’ve already learned so much, and we’re just getting started.”
“You’re boring,” Piv said. He hopped down from the dining room table and looked around my home.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I suppose I am being a bit of a rude host. I did invite you here, after all. I should be entertaining you instead of interrogating.”
I placed a hand on each of his slender shoulders and led him into the living room.
“Why are you so touchy?” Piv asked as he wriggled out of my grip. “Touch touch touch.””
“Just...making sure that you’re really there, my friend,” I said.
“Of course I’m here,” Piv said and he patted his belly. “How else would you explain your missing pudding?”
“That is an astute point,” I said.
“Hey,” Piv said. He leaned closer to me.
“What?” I asked.
He whispered, “You’re. Still. Boring.”
I was frightfully taken aback. “Well...I’m somewhat embarrassed to say that I don’t have much for entertaining. I didn’t bring much with me—just some books and a few things.”
“What about the lovely little box that I found?” Piv said.
“Oh, right. The radio.”
“Ray-dee-oh?” Piv said in a voice that resembled a toddler trying to
pronounce his first words.
“Yes,” I said. “That’s what we call it. It’s a very useful tool, but very entertaining too.” I had to think for a moment to recall where I had put the damn thing, and then I remembered I had stuffed it into my canvas bag after Piv agreed to come back home with me. I retrieved the gadget and turned it back on. The grating sound of static interference filled the place, and Piv frowned. I turned the tuning knobs and found a lovely classical music station on the AM band, and Piv’s face transformed into a cherubic smile.
“Clever man,” Piv said. “You chose such a wonderful thing to tease me with. In the old days, people tried to bait us with things like meats and wooden toys. Some even tried beer. That was not wise. Not very wise at all.” I could tell from Piv’s expression that he was never going to be a beer drinker, so I made a mental note to cancel my plans to have a celebratory glass of ale with him.
“I read that your people are very curious about the tools that humans create,” I said. “There are stories from Iceland about elves even being able to control electronics from afar. I figured it might make good bait. Nothing else ever seemed to work.”
Piv hardly seemed to be paying attention to me. He was marveling at every nook, cranny, and crevice of the radio. He twiddled with the dials, and scanned through a few stations on the FM band. The static-filled music delighted him.
“You know,” I told him, “if you want, you can keep that.”
“Of course I can,” Piv said. “You gave it to me.”
“Did I?”
Piv nodded once, emphatically. “You left it in the forest with the intention of me finding it.”
“Yes, but I did not intend for you to keep it,” I said. “But you’re right. You don’t catch a fish and then demand your worm back.”
“Are there little people in there playing the music?” he asked.
“No. The music is broadcast from towers miles away from here.”
The elf squinted his eyes and muttered, “Broad...cast?”
“Yes,” I said. “It’s like...it’s like...hmm. Imagine there’s a light on top of a hill, and you’re at the bottom of the hill. The light is very far away, but you can still get information from it. For example, you can tell the color of the light, and its intensity, and if someone’s up there with the light, they can even send you a message in code that you both share.”
