Short Story Week 2018: Day Two -The Bridge and the Troll

"You know, I was thinking about it during your insomnia last night," Caris says. "I don't believe you're really shy on ideas, so much as taking an idea and fully developing it is the struggle."

She doesn't deserve the sneer I give her, but she's always been forgiving enough to overlook moments of human selfishness. "You mean, when writing gets hard, I lose interest."

"Have you ever heard a writer say they enjoyed the process of writing? They enjoy having written." She watches me carefully. Continuing when I don't respond. "Or they don't. I think it was Nathaniel Hawthorne who tried to destroy ever copy of his first book."

"This hasn't been that much of a problem for me in the past," I say.

"And what's changed for you?"

I shrug. "It's possible I'm just out of things to say."

"I don't think so. I think your relationship with writing has shifted focus. You're not having fun with it anymore."

"Do you think it's time to hang it up?"

"Well, I'd never go so far as that. Maybe you just need a return to basics. I mean, you've made yourself a list of short stories to tackle this week, but you're not really giving yourself room to just play. That's why writing has become work to you, you're pressuring yourself to 'produce'."

I sigh. "I don't know how I feel about my character being wiser than me."

"I'm not wiser than you sweetie, I just have a perspective that factors out a lot of the noise of reality."

"Okay then. If you were me, what would you write?"

Caris's whole being perks up. "A fable. You like fables- actually we both do. They're concise, they have a beginning, middle, and end, and they can pretty much involve any characters in any setting. Try this: go to fairy tales. Find a character-type that represents the way you feel right now. Then find one that represents the way I feel. Then put them together and see what happens."

"Well, this should be rich."

"Forget about quality. Make it sincere and the quality will take care of itself."

She grins at me as I glare at her. "And where did you get that chestnut from?"

"I'm a fictional character. How the hell should I know?"

The Bridge and the Troll

The province of Meadley was known throughout the land as one of the most pleasant caravan stops between Willow Fringe and Castle Sirois. In addition to the hills and pastures that could relax even the most unsettled soul, Meadley was home to some of the nation’s finest wool.  For many years, the province had flourished in the clothing trade, and it was unheard of for any traveler of coin or status to bypass visiting the humble land.

But alas, prosperity has as much a cycle as the seasons. And a few harsh bouts of weather had flooded the river separating Meadley from the main country; leaving in the end a single bridge connecting the two. And this bridge had become the home of a troll, who took most unkindly to the sound of hoofs and wagons overhead.

The smaller wagons stood no chance against the fury of the beast. The larger ones that made it to and from did so with an armed and armored escort, a practice which quickly became more costly and inconvenient than it was worth. And it took very little time for the citizens of Meadley to feel the strain of being cut off from the trade routes.

So one day the troll was gathered at the river’s edge under the bridge, waiting for a sizable fish to swim by when an odd thumping came from the beams above him.

“Who’s that tramping on my bridge?” the troll bellowed.

A young female voice called down, “I’m not tramping, and it’s not your bridge!”

“If it’s not tramping, what would you call it?”

“Walking!” The pounding of heavy steps sent a cloud of dust down on the troll’s head. “This is tramping!”

“Stop that! Or I’ll come up there and eat you!”

“Oh I’m sorry. Is my province’s need to continue living getting in the way of whatever you’re doing down there?”

“Tell you what,” said the troll. “You tell me where you live and I’ll come clog dance across your roof a few times and see how you take to it.”

“Well you see, my family was wise enough to choose a location other than an access road to make their home-“

“Did I NOT make it clear that I’m willing to climb up there and eat you?”

The rhythmic thumping continued, indifferent to the troll’s threat. “Who announces that they’re going to eat somebody? You don’t warn them, you just do it!”

“Are you wearing stones for shoes little human?”

“No, it’s a wheelbarrow. I apologize if that’s too LOUD for you!”

“You could wake the dead with that thing.” The troll grumbled.

“Get over it!” the lady snapped back. “You’ve left us no alternative!”

“Have your kind build another bridge then!”

“Listen troll!” The silhouette of her head appeared over the bridge’s edge. “It costs money to build a bridge, and we don’t have it! So this wheelbarrow is how it’s going to have to be! If you want to come up here and try me on for size, you’re welcome to it! Otherwise, suck it up!”

The troll was a little taken aback, and didn’t know how to respond until she was well gone. He turned his attention back to the river, but the fish didn’t hold his interest. He’d realized he’d never had a conversation with a human before, and he didn’t know what to think about the exchange.

The troll was so engaged in thought throughout the day that he completely lost track of time until he heard the sound of the young woman’s wheelbarrow approaching from the opposite direction.

“How now?” he called. “Have you acquired this money you so need?”

She stopped several yards away from the river. “Seriously? I haven’t even set foot on the bridge.”

“Trolls have very keen hearing.”

“So I noticed,” she said. “No, I didn’t do as well as I hoped. But I brought you something.”

The troll stared suspiciously as she lowered a basket on a rope from the bridge down to his level. “What’s this?”

“Meat pies.”

He sniffed the basket, unclear as to what poison even smelled like. “Why?”

“I thought you might like them. And it’s a peace offering. I’m going to have to be using this bridge quite a bit before I’m able to raise the funds to rebuild any of the others.”

“And why does this burden fall to you?”

“Somebody has to. You’ve frightened everyone in Meadley.”

“Why aren’t you frightened?”

“Who says I’m not?” She pulled the empty basket back up to the bridge and carefully pushed the wheelbarrow across the river, forewarning the troll that she would return the following day with another delivery of wool.

The morning came, and the troll awakened to the sound of her footsteps. He waited in amusement as she tapped softly on the bridge’s railing to announce her presence. “Good day, troll,” she said. “I have several bushels to carry across our bridge. Do you mind?”

Did he mind? The troll couldn’t grasp what he was hearing. Nobody had asked him before. “I suppose that would be all right,” he said.

“Very good.”

And that same rhythmic thumping that irritated him so began traveling across the planks of his bridge. He tried to ‘suck it up’ as she had suggested the previous day, but his troll nature became too conscious for him. “Human!” he shouted. “It occurs to me that if I were to come up there and move the wheelbarrow for you that you would more quickly be across the bridge and well on your way!”

“I daresay I shall not dispute you, good troll.”

Moments later the young woman found herself face to face with the most horrifying nightmare of teeth and claws she’d ever seen. She smiled. “My name is Celia.”

It started with that walk across the bridge, which turned into a walk through the woods to Willow Fringe. Humans have an innate hatred of trolls, and for this reason trolls rarely showed themselves by daylight for fear of being hunted. But the sight of a troll pushing a wheelbarrow while walking with a young woman was enough to stay the hands of those skilled with the blade. Suffice to say, Celia’s wares fared significantly better that morning than they had the previous day.

Soon Meadley had more than enough money to repair as many bridges as they desired, but by then the troll was a valued member of the community, and had moved into one of the spare barns near Celia’s family. Meadley entered into a new era of prosperity compounded by the fact that they were the first town to ever include a troll among its citizens. Celia was eventually named governor of Meadley, and she remained close friends with the troll for the rest of his days.

Caris can't stop smiling at me. "That was a sweet story. Am I to assume that you're the troll and I'm Celia?"

"Not exactly. It started off differently in my head, but I think I'm a bit happier with this one."

"That makes sense. I never imagined myself as so confrontational. Why do you think you're happier with this story?"

"I don't know. I can't say it's any better or worse than the one yesterday, but somehow this one just feels more..."

"Alive?"

I look into the empty space where only I can see Caris. "Yeah. That's it."

"That's a good feeling to close the evening on."

Short Story Week 2018: Day One -A Scoop of Mashed Potatoes On Top of a Manhole Cover

"You did the right thing calling me." Caris appears over my shoulder, carefully peering at the fruitless efforts of my blank screen. "What's going on sweetie?"

"I have really not been feeling creative lately," I tell her.

"Since March?"

I nod. "I thought it was the Seroquel at first. The Prozac-Seroquel combination really seemed to make me feel better, but then I noticed I didn't have that creative spark anymore. I thought it might come back when I went on the depression study because I had to switch out the Seroquel for Melatonin, but it's been three months and nothing's really happened."

"You still daydream."

I sip from the Styrofoam container full of caffeine and sugar that I've been drinking way too much of lately. "Yeah, but I don't feel motivated to really do anything with the thoughts. I'm just...not there anymore."

Caris sits on the desk next to my computer monitor. "Creativity." She smiles. "If I were to turn you into a fictional character, that would be your defining trait."

"It's not a very good trait for a character to have."

"Why do you say that?"

"Logistics. Creativity isn't tangible. Dancing is tangible. I can write a story about you dancing without my actually demonstrating my own ability to dance, or not to. But if I were to write a story about you being creative I would have to essentially be as creative as I'm claiming you are. Otherwise the audience views it at me telling, not showing."

"Well, don't you think you're creative?"

"I certainly try to be."

"What's more important to you? Being creative or feeling creative?"

"If I have to choose?" I glance up at her for the answer that I already know she's going to give me. "I guess I'd say feeling creative."

"And why is that?"

"Well, I was trying to imagine what the difference is. If I'm feeling creative then I'm probably actually being creative. If I'm not feeling it, how would I recognize it?"

"Interesting," Caris says. "Is it even possible for anybody to recognize creativity? Like, is there any sort of official criteria one could devise to unquestionably identify creativity, or is it purely on a system of intuition?"

"That's probably a question best left to people who program A.I.s. But it's definitely an intriguing thought exercise. Can you prove creativity exists?"

"I like this conversation," Caris giggles. "So why don't you try telling a story now?"

"Okay," I huff. "Let's see what happens."

A Scoop of Mashed Potatoes On Top of a Manhole Cover

Nobody had ever placed a scoop of mashed potatoes on top of a manhole cover before, and with understandably good reason. But there was a time, albeit briefly, that one could rattle off those words, in that order, with complete sobriety and no concern for any loss of social well-being. That period, like so many, has long since faded into nothing more than a footnote in history; but not without leaving a trace stain of its existence somewhere, waiting for rediscovery.

It began with the Olhauser exhibit at the Musee d’Meprise. And it ended with the notoriously inflexible critic Emile Michaud.

In his review of modern art, and artists, Michaud’s favorite phrase was, “Yes, but what does it mean?”. It was not his responsibility, at least in his authority, to have to search for a meaning which did not immediately present itself. Which is not to say that complexities of substance were beyond his scope. Far from it. He simply found himself to be the ideal template for measuring the spectrum of the superficial to the esoteric. If he didn’t ‘get it’ there was nothing worth getting to be gotten.

It was this mentality which became contagious to upcoming art connoisseurs, creating an environment for artists that was notably negative in reception. “Yes, but what does it mean?” became an unofficial mantra among those who recognized Michaud’s superior understanding of what separated art from non-art.

To a point, the question was fair. After all, meaning is as fundamental to expression as color or rhythm. But Michaud was particularly vocal about his displeasure with any response reminiscent of “It means whatever you want it to mean”. He equated it with meaning nothing, and many young artists preferred to give up their craft rather than endure what they felt to be a premature judgment.

Michaud’s pull within the art community was equally problematic for an established artist such as Olhauser, who rarely gave much thought to the meaning behind her work. She just did things. Things that came to her, for whatever reason. Occasionally these things resonated with an audience, who might be so inclined as to assign a meaning to them. If Olhauser ever had any interest in the accuracy of said meanings, she never bothered to let anyone know about it.

Her first name remained a mystery to the public as she was terribly reclusive. No known photographs of her existed, and the few people who had met her in the early throes of her career described her personality as flat and blank, almost like an unrealized canvas (a quote that made its way to an early newspaper article about her work). In the few years prior to the time period in question, a handful of Olhauser’s paintings and sculptures would make their way to the Musee d’Meprise with little fanfare, apart from the hostile comments from some of Michaud’s prospective protégés; Michaud himself had long since abandoned paying Olhauser any mind.

But that changed with the arrival of the piece titled A Scoop of Mashed Potatoes on Top of a Manhole Cover.

As far as anyone could tell, the piece was exactly what it claimed to be. The glass casing prevented any close inspection of the artwork, making it impossible to tell if the sculpture was wooden, marble, or an actual manhole cover with actual mashed potatoes on it. Within the first weekend in the exhibit people began talking about it. The inevitable question “Yes, but what does it mean?” made its way to the proceedings almost as fast as the attendees, but the outright dismissal that the words usually carried quickly fell away to reveal more of a piqued curiosity.

“It could be a statement on the way that our professional and personal lives are merging.” “Maybe it’s about vegetarianism.” “It could just be a commentary on the current state of the art world.” The explanations came pouring through the halls of the museum, and then out into the world until they reached the ears of Emile Michaud.

Their courier came in the form of a newspaper reporter who was covering the piece’s rising popularity. He phoned up Michaud and invited a response about Olhauser’s newest creation. Michaud, not being familiar with what had been going on, requested a brief synopsis. When he got it, his initial reaction was a sheer, almost numbing, disbelief. “Are you,” he said after a very long stretch of silence, “kidding me?”

The reporter wasn’t.

Michaud drew in an irritated breath and gave his on record response to the newspaper the way he would talk down to a child. “It is just a scoop of mashed potatoes on top of a manhole cover.”

“Yes,” replied the reporter. “But what does it mean?”

What does it mean, he thought? It means nothing. It was so obvious that he couldn’t understand why he’d even been asked. The question caught him so off guard that all he could do was hang up the phone. A few minutes later, when he was convinced this wasn’t some nightmare he was having, Michaud called Musee d’Meprise’s curator and demanded in no uncertain terms that the ‘piece’ be removed from the exhibit, as it belonged nowhere within three blocks of anything resembling an art museum.

“I appreciate your concern,” recited the curator, “but this piece is bringing in the largest crowds the museum has seen in close to five years-“

“Yes! But what does it mean?” Michaud snapped without thinking.

The curator shrugged; Michaud could just feel him shrugging over the phone. “It doesn’t matter.”

He slammed the phone down so hard it bounced off his desk.

The next morning Michaud barreled through the doors of the museum. He’d nearly gone down there the evening before, but enough rationale had warned him that somebody would be killed if he didn’t give himself time to cool down. Unfortunately the newspaper had been delivered that morning, and the article contained the phrase “Emile Michaud doesn’t get it”, which put him in an even worse state of fury that he’d been in prior.

And it was in the museum that he saw the sight he’d been expecting, and it made him sick to his soul. People. Mindless people. In heavy discussion. About nothing.

There is a concept elitists refer to as ‘Apocryphal Innovation’. It’s when something devoid of any artistic merit happens to catch the attention of the masses, and thus becomes infused with value based on nothing more than popularity. As little as Michaud thought of the masses, and their fascination with waste, this was a new cultural low for them. And he was having none of it.

He shoved his way past the attendees and barged into the main office. The curator sat at his desk with his feet propped up, barely containing his amusement at the intrusion. “Come in Emile.”

“Two hundred dollars!”

“Seriously? You’re going this route?”

“Two hundred dollars, and I donate it to your trash bin! If that’s really iron you can hose it off and sell it for scrap.”

“Offer me 350.”

Michaud pulled out his wallet. “Done.”

“No.” The curator shifted to face Michaud directly. “This is insane and you know it.”

“Insane? That’s insanity out there! Do you have any idea what it’s doing to the reputation of the museum?”

“Yes, nothing,” the curator snickered. “But what will it do to your reputation when the peasants see you shelling out a few hundred dollars for something you view as valueless? Why does it get to you so much? People are having fun.”

“Yes, but what does it mean?”

The curator sighed. “And there it is. You really ought to have that phrase trademarked.” He walked over to the mini-bar in his office and poured two glasses of brandy, setting one in front of Michaud. “I don’t know. And at the end of the day I don’t really care enough to try figuring it out. I’m not in Olhauser’s head, and based on our scant exchanges it’s not a place I’m really inclined to visit. All I know is it probably means something to her, and it seems to mean something to the people out there. What more can a museum really hope for?”

Michaud ignored the brandy he’d been offered. “Where is she?”

The curator rubbed his forehead. “Emile, just let this one go.”

“I want to talk to her directly. You know how to get ahold of her.”

“You know what our rules are, right? We’re legally obligated to protect an artist’s privacy. If they don’t want to be found, we can’t give out information on them.”

“Yes, I’m fully aware of the policies your museum has instated.”

“Good.” The curator produced a card with an address from his desk and set it in front of Michaud. “She asked me to give you this.”

It was a guesthouse addition to a home that had been torn down so long ago there was no longer a trace of it amidst the overgrown brush. She greeted Michaud at the door before he could knock a second time.

“Come in, come in,” she smiled, ushering him into a dimly lit room; a single dying light bulb overhead. The place was packed with more metal shelves than it was ever meant for. Toolboxes and crates filled the gaps, while rusted hammers, saws, and cobwebs lined the walls. The tight space was a storage graveyard.

Michaud opened his mouth to speak, but Olhauser beat him to the sentence by one second. “You’re here about the Manhole piece,” she said. “It means exactly what you think it means.” She squeezed through the obstructions to a distorted door that separated the storage area from the rest of the building. “That’s not entirely true,” she grinned. “I want to show you something.”

She scurried into the open area of the guesthouse where she’d spent all of her recent days painting. Walls, floor and ceiling. All sides dripping with colors, swirls, and spackles of tints and hues. Patterns that flowed in and out of each other, like a spectral ocean.

“They’re back,” she announced as soon as Michaud joined her in her sanctuary.

“They, who?” were the words that formed in Michaud’s head, but they came from Olhauser’s mouth, as she didn’t have the patience to wait for him to ask. “Things. Voices. Ideas. A collage.” She guided him into the center of the room. “Isn’t it beautiful? A self-contained exhibit. I think I’m going to call it ‘Those Who Cannot See’.”

Again, Olhauser assigned dialogue to the perplexed look on Michaud’s face that couldn’t keep up with her. “Yes, but what does it mean? I never know. Sometimes it means something. Sometimes nothing. Sometimes the meaning comes later. Like ‘A Scoop of Mashed Potatoes On Top of a Manhole Cover.’ I didn’t know what it meant until now.”

“You know, I hear your voice in my head? ‘Yes, but what does it mean?’ Over and over. In my sleep. In my insomnia. I’ve been hearing it for a few years now. It’s gotten so loud that I couldn’t hear the collage. And then it stopped speaking to me altogether. And there was just me. I couldn’t see it anymore. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

She wasn’t making any sense. Michaud was beginning to suspect that it was a mistake to have come here. Olhauser moved behind him, setting her hand gently on his shoulder and pressing her cheek into his face.

“Creativity,” she whispered. “Linking two unrelated things together. Without creativity, they’re just two things that don’t belong together; like a scoop of mashed potatoes on top of a manhole cover. That’s all I am once your voice gets in my head. Those who cannot see resent those who can. And because you can’t be us, you turn us into you.”

Michaud eyed her defiantly. “I think you’re a lunatic.”

“No,” she said. “An artist. But I can see why you’d confuse the two.” Olhauser slid neatly in front of her primary critic, brandishing a heavy mallet that he hadn’t previously noticed her carrying. She winked as she raised it above his head.

“Oh,” he muttered. “I get it now.”

"Well that took a dark turn," says Caris.

I sigh as I replay the ending in my head, only half-satisfied with it. "Yeah, I couldn't think of another way out of it, except to turn it into a shaggy dog story, and I absolutely detest those."

"So do you think the curator was in on it?"

"I don't know. I don't think it really matters. If he was, he'd be the type to just let the plot unfold as it was going to. I imagine he sensed that Michaud going to visit Olhauser wasn't going to end well."

"What is it about this story that you're unsure of?"

I think for a minute. "The length kind of blew up a bit. And I really can't tell if it works or not. Is the ending a cheap shot from left field, or is it way too predictable?"

"I imagine it lands somewhere in the middle." Caris hops down from her perch. "Have you learned anything new from the experience?"

"Not that I can tell."

"Well, let's give it a little time to gestate and come back tomorrow for another one."

"Agreed," I say. "I'll see you tomorrow."

Editorial: Should Elsa Have a Girlfriend?

Now I'm just going to go ahead and spoil the end of this blog by saying that I'm not going to come out of it definitively answering the question yes or no. I think my leanings will be pretty apparent but I'm really here to explore the pros and cons rather than to lock my opinion into stone. So let's look at Elsa and see if it makes sense for her to start dating another woman.

In just a minute.

First I think it's important to acknowledge why we're even having this conversation about a cartoon character when there are surely more pressing issues for us to verbally assault each other about (please cancel the Gambit film). I mean, how important is this? Well in practicality, not very, but practicality only makes up part of our species' identity. Emotionally, this is life or death.

Avoiding a full review of Frozen until another blog, the movie clearly left an impact, and Elsa proved to be the standout character for quite a lot of the adult audience. In my experience, most of the negativity towards the film comes from people who felt it should have been Elsa's story instead of Anna's. Quite an interesting curiosity, considering throughout the film's ten year development process Elsa spent much of it as the villain. But then Robert and Kristen Anderson-Lopez had to go and write "Let it Go", and boom! There went the villain.

The song answered the question, what is it like to be Elsa? What does it feel like to have something in you that you're afraid of? And why didn't Elsa's parents just ask the damn trolls to remove Elsa's magic as well if it was making her that unhappy? Elsa became a metaphor. Perhaps an ambiguous one, but so many of us see an uncomfortable part of ourselves in Elsa. The case has been made quite fluently that Elsa represents depression, and while I can totally get behind that, it's probably unfair for depression to hold the monopoly on her character. I'm sure any number of people see their mental illnesses reflected in her.

So we're going to put her on hold and chip off a fragment of the #GiveElsaaGirlfriend movement; i.e. the part without Elsa. The LGBT and Sometimes a Few Other Letters community has spent the most recent decade quite publically finding a voice. I had the luxury of being part of the Disney Company during the early 2000's when the societal transformation regarding gay acceptance really seemed to take root.

Gay days. I don't know if they still happen anymore but they were freaking amazing! One weekend in June was partitioned as a gay pride weekend throughout the resort and it was the single most energized and appreciative audience I ever experienced on property. The attendees all wore red shirts to identify as part of the community, and it's very likely that many of them were able to express their sexuality without judgment for the first time. No, Disney didn't organize it like so many ultra-conservative families insist but Disney also never did anything to discourage it either. Case in point, the green-eyed devil himself Michael Eisner addressed the complaints by shrugging them off saying, "They're paying customers". Gay days brought out a heroic moment in him; if that's not a magic trick I don't know what is.

So what we have here is a community that has been very underrepresented in our folktales (of which Disney is a dominant catalyst). And we have Elsa, an embraced yet not-fully-realized character who has a canon sequel coming out next year. Which brings us back to the topic on the table: should Elsa have a girlfriend?

Let me answer this first: should a Disney animated film present an LGBT princess? I say absolutely hell yes. The vast majority of Disney fans would cheer. Yes, Disney would lose a few Kim Davis's in the process, and screw them. The parks don't need the toxicity.

But why Elsa? Why aren't people demanding a lesbian princess from scratch? There's a couple of fairy tales we haven't tackled yet. Or as long as Disney is so remake happy, why not make a radical change to a classic character? It would take virtually no effort to translate Snow-White and Rose-Red into a same sex couple. And everybody loved bisexual Mulan on Once Upon a Time (I stopped watching. Did that resolve satisfactorily?). Is it just a case of convenient timing, or is there something about Elsa's alleged sexuality that makes sense? And not that it means anything, but why not #GiveElsaaWife; can we not commit?

So in terms of Frozen 2, what's the best course of action? Jennifer Lee has cryptically stated that she's been listening to a lot of the fan demands and ultimately she's going to take the story in the direction that the characters tell her to take it. Many fans are taking this as a positive sign, but there's a subtext they may very well be missing. Elsa's sexuality isn't up to the fan base, it's up to Elsa. And that's honestly the way it should be. Lee is an artist. She thinks like an artist. And her statement is spoken like an artist. No amount of signatures on any petitions is going to make something happen that wasn't already likely to happen. Let's also try to think like an artist and see what the options for Frozen 2 really are.


Option #1: Elsa's sexuality is irrelevant

You know, it's quite possible that Elsa might have as much focus in Frozen 2 as she did in the first movie. Just because they're making a sequel doesn't mean it's going to highlight Elsa. It could be about Anna again, relegating Elsa into a supporting position. I don't think this is very likely, but it is a possibility (kind of a discouraging one).

If they weren't going to focus on Elsa, I don't know why they'd bother doing the sequel. Well, money; duh-doi. But that's the kind of corporate decision we would have seen under Eisner's tenure, and the Bob Iger era has really worked its mouse-ears off to regain the dignity it lost. Anna's story honestly ran its course. Elsa is almost guaranteed to be the reason we're coming back to Arendelle.


Option #2: Elsa gets a female love interest

Elsa comes out as either gay or bisexual, the film neglects to mention the difference between the two, the adult fandom rejoices, and the company avoids 9 GB's of incoming e-mail correspondence whining about James Gunn, Song of the South, and family values of the 1950's.

This has a pretty good chance of happening, as Elsa's sexuality has not even been hinted at. She's shown no romantic interest in anybody, which makes her kind of a blank slate. The danger here is catering to the fan base, which I don't think Disney is going to do. Obviously there would be a story around the relationship that the studio believed in.


Option #3: Elsa gets a male love interest

Wow, I can actually feel the seething coming back through time from the film's premier. A few years ago I would have thought this would have been a guarantee. But the zeitgeist evolves. People like the fact that Disney has been getting away from the "Some day my Prince will come" mentality. They've been very vocal about it. If Disney were to go the conservative route I think they know they'd only stand to lose.

I obviously don't know how the high-ups of Disney feel about the current climate of social issues, but the board under Iger have at least demonstrated an understanding of their own company in a way the Eisner period did not. Disney currently dominates Hollywood, and even a blemish like Solo's performance isn't likely to overturn their throne, but they also know that they aren't invincible. Frozen 2 is probably a guaranteed hit but they know better than to get sloppy about it. I don't anticipate Elsa finding a man.


Option #4: Elsa's sexuality is left ambiguous

If I were betting on commission with someone else's money, this is what I'd put it on. I think there will be a new villainess. She'll be closer to the Ice Queen of the original story, and more reminiscent of the earlier drafts of Elsa. She and Elsa will feel a connection, and there will be a 'come to the dark side' lure but Elsa will ultimately resist. Whether or not the new character is redeemable is a coin toss right now.

It won't literally be a relationship. It will serve as a metaphor for one, inspiring countless M-rated fanart, but perhaps you've noticed by now that Disney doesn't really like addressing sexuality in their characters. Disney loves the deadly sins of pride and wrath. And greed is fairly safe for family entertainment. Lust? Not so much. I think Frollo was the only villain to ever demonstrate lust as a motivator, and even for him it was his B-arc. Disney favors the euphemism 'lovesick' over arousal. Based on that floor of eggshells, can you say for certain that ANY Disney character's sexuality has been confirmed?


Option #5: Elsa is asexual

I have a personal bias in favor of this approach because I'm asexual. It's amazing that this is my 232nd blog post and the topic hasn't come up one single time; you'd almost get the impression that I'm uncomfortable discussing it. I can tell you from personal experience that being asexual and aromantic are two very different things, but Disney really isn't the animation studio to explain the distinction. Thus, if Elsa were asexual it would be conveyed through her also being aromantic.

Why does Elsa have to have any sort of romantic attachment? She obviously made it through puberty without ever wanting to connect with anyone. I know she's not the most infallible example of asexuality as she was clearly dealing with her own demons for 21 years, but why didn't Merida get these petitions?

One of the things that made Elsa so special in the Princess lineup was that she didn't need a man to complete her (a common criticism for princesses of yore which isn't always fair but is worth discussing). Wouldn't we be undoing some of her character by insisting that she needs a woman to complete her instead?

Like I said, I have a bias, and a few loose emotional nerves. We absolutely need LBGT characters; LGBT superheroes, LGBT Timelords, LGBT princesses, and we need them until we're finally to the point that the acronym prefix is superfluous. But at the same time I can't help feeling that the wave of wokeness sometimes pushes for people to be something they aren't (Bert and Ernie would have been the worst example of a married couple as they were literally created to have nothing in common).

I guess what I'm saying in so many words is, leave Elsa alone. Let her figure out who she is, let her tell Jennifer Lee, let Jennifer Lee tell you what Elsa said, and learn to accept whatever that is. If Elsa's sexuality happens to be what you wanted it to be, then please know that it had nothing to do with you or your tweets or petitions. But statistically, she's probably not going to be what you want her to be. It's not going to detract away from her character or make her any less of who she is. Whatever is revealed about her just makes her more Elsa. So don't get attached to your own expectation unless you're prepared to #LetitGo.

Disney's 100 Acre Woods: An Appraisal for Eeyore

As I was growing up, I liked Winnie the Pooh and his street gang, but I don't remember ever going through a phase of being deeply into them like I was with the Fraggles or Peanuts. Sure, I thought Eeyore rocked, but who wouldn't? Mostly I just thought of the characters as that thing that came on after Donald Duck Presents in the early years of The Disney Channel.

But that changed in 2001. As I've flaunted a few times before on this blog, I had the privilege of inhabiting about a dozen or so of Disney's characters in the Orlando theme parks. At first I got measured as Tigger, which was a character I hated playing because I never will have the physical stamina necessary to convince paying customers that I enjoy non-stop jumping. But after the first couple of months I went in for to be remeasured. I wore sweatpants (in August) so the manager couldn't see that I was slightly bending my knees. If I could drop my height from 5'10" to 5'9 & 1/2" it would open up the possibility of me playing Eeyore. It worked even better than I expected. I got measured at 5'9" which meant I was hardcore Eeyore and Tigger was somebody else's problem.

I loved being Eeyore. The Tweedle costume was lighter, and certainly more versatile and fun, but Eeyore was my guy. In general, I think the Tweedles are who I'd like to be, but Eeyore is who I am. Pessimism? Check. Snark? You got it. My hair even started graying when I was 21. It was meant to be. And hell, this was even before I'd been diagnosed with chronic depression (which I finally realized I'd been dealing with since adolescence). Yeah, Eeyore's awesome.

So with a personal attachment to the old grey donkey, and a couple of overlapping memories, let's have a look at the relationship Disney has with this odd cast of characters. I'm going to look primarily at the theatrical releases, with a couple of additions that seem to fit the overall flow of the franchise.


The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (1977)

If you don't already know, this was a "package film" compiled from previously released shorts: Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree (1966), Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day (1968), and Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too (1974). Additional wraparound segments were animated, as well as a semi-conclusion with Christopher Robin going off to school.

Okay, first let's address the Heffalump in the room. My GOD, this movie is slow! Even at a paltry 74 minutes it feels we're never going to get going. I hear that the Disney version is pretty faithful to the source material, which may very well include the pacing. Classic literature is slow. There was no television in 1926 when the first book came out. When people sat down with a book, they expected to stay there for quite a while. Today, not so much.

The general rule for storytelling today is, if it doesn't reveal character or advance the plot then cut it. This rule is flawed in the sense that some sequences are just too entertaining to cut, but imagine applying the technique to this movie. What the hell would you have left after the opening song?

So there's an admitted tedium that one would only be willing to tolerate from the first outing. Essentially we're being introduced to the characters. Not a lot of depth happens, and no real development. It's just 74 minutes of stuff kind of happening. It's fine for what it is, but I suspect one reason I didn't get attached to these characters when I was in the right age bracket was because this film didn't capture me. I didn't want to spend any more time in the hundred acre woods than I already had. I'd gotten my takeaways, and that was all I was going to get.

What are the takeaways? Now we're talking. One, my sympathies were with Rabbit. Even though he was abrasive, he had every right to want to be left alone, and it was frustrating to see that nobody could take the freaking hint. Two, the music is vintage Sherman Brothers. The melodies get stuck in your head whether you want them there or not. Most of the ones in the Honey Tree segment are lullabies that make me want to beat somebody up, but Blustery Day fares much better. "Heffalumps and Woozles" is the apex with a good old fashioned Disney acid sequence. Sure, it's practically plagiarizing "Pink Elephants on Parade" from Dumbo, but there's something intriguing about Pooh's fearlessness in his own nightmare, and it's a catchier song.

In the end, we're left with the realization that Christopher Robin may be the party's host, but he's also the most expendable character. It's all about the animals. And at this time, they're better in doses than full blown surplus. This will change soon. For now, it's not a bad film. But the parts are significantly greater than the whole.


Winnie the Pooh and a Day for Eeyore (1983)

This is a 25 minute short featuring two stories that spotlight my buddy. A couple of things started happening here. Pooh's adventures, which may or may not even be happening to his character, almost always occur without an antagonist. The conflict comes out of the personality dynamics among the ensemble who likely has not chosen to live together.

Tigger was the breakout character of the first film, and he almost instantly locked horns with Rabbit. This short establishes him as the polar opposite of Eeyore, and the chemistry between them is really interesting. Tigger bounces Eeyore like he does everyone, and Eeyore winds up helplessly floating in the creek as a result. When Tigger denies that it was anything but an accident, Eeyore holds his ground. Not out of spite, or the chance to scold old stripey like Rabbit would do, but because it's the simple truth. The donkey may not be the dominant personality, but it doesn't mean he's a weak character. And at the end of the short, Tigger gets frustrated by the fact that the characters are playing a game that he's not good at. It's Eeyore who knows how to cheer him up.

This is where we're starting to see signs of the layers that make the franchise have lasting appeal. Tigger isn't just hyper, he has an emotional spectrum. Eeyore isn't just gloomy, he has a heroic quality. Rabbit isn't just bitchy, he's also protective. After a bout of selfishness with the honey (jeez, hunny) that Pooh meant as a birthday gift for Eeyore, he gets creative with the empty pot. And Piglet, hoo boy, here's a thesis in the making. Courage doesn't mean you aren't afraid, it means you can still act when you're terrified. Piglet thinks a balloon will make Eeyore happy, but it bursts on the way to delivery. He still follows through in the intent, fully aware that it might make the situation worse, but the little pink guy pulls a victory out of a defeat, and the results are touching.

This is a bite sized taste of what's to come. It's the right length; not too much, not too heavy. We're getting there. But first, a detour to home video.


Pooh's Grand Adventure: The Search for Christopher Robin (1997)

Good grief, Meat Loaf doesn't use titles this long! The animals made many, many appearances throughout the years, and it might actually be impossible to compile a full museum of the franchise. So where do you draw the line? I'm going with an estimated intention from the Disney studios. I figure that if they're going to sink the money into the project to put it on the big screen then they're treating it as their own version of canon.

But this direct-to-video story feels like it holds somewhat of a higher significance to the overall arc than say...well, hell, most of the crap that Disney put on video during Michael Eisner's unending foresight. Word has it, this video was meant to conclude the whole series, dealing with that horrible rite of passage when six year old (looking about eleven) Christopher Robin has to go to school. That may not sound like a huge deal to American audiences, but if the 2017 film Goodbye Christopher Robin is anything to go by (or every single appearance of the British school system in their culture) it seems pretty soul crushing.

So what we have is our first full length story in A.A. Milne's world. As you might expect the threats are mostly shadows and tricks of the mind, but our goal is to explore the characters not kill them. And being on video as opposed to cinema, there's a certain under-the-radar quality that allows for a few risks you wouldn't ordinarily see. Tigger's defining trait is overconfidence, and this is one of the rare times you see self-doubt creep into him. The usually I'm-down-to-my-last-f**k-to-give Eeyore has moments where he seems genuinely terrified. Pooh and Rabbit both show a higher level of empathy than we typically see from them. And the crowning moment is Piglet's. He's gone from one nightmare sequence of a journey through a briar patch to Alfred Hitchcock's The Butterflies, before landing gently in a hope spot, and then comes the perceived growl of the dreaded Skullosaurus. Instead of the immediate scurrying and stammering we've come to expect from him, he simply looks up at Pooh with and almost Stepford smile's denial and a forcibly cheerful "What's that?"

The pacing is very different. Dialogue, story, and even the animation comes at a faster pace than the classic era. Disney knows the 1997 attention span isn't what it was twenty years prior. In a way it's almost jarring because there are times when it doesn't feel like the hundred acre woods, but you can tell the series is in transformation. Wit is beginning to bloom. It's not to say the Milne stories didn't have wit, it's what they're remembered for; but try to imagine Monty Python performing a Marx Brothers script, something is inherently untranslatable. Disney is making the characters its own, and this is a taste of what's to come.


The Tigger Movie (2000)

I totally avoided this movie when it came out. I assumed it was for an audience that wasn't me, and I don't mean age bracket. I simply don't connect with his character. A lot of people do. Around this time period, old stripey's merchandise was outselling that of every other Disney character. Last I heard, the top five went Tigger, Pooh, Mickey, Goofy, Eeyore, and somewhere Donald Duck was being forcibly removed from the studio lot.

But this was also the year I started working for Disney, and by summer of 2001 I was a character performer, which meant water cooler talk was always about House of Mouse episodes (you probably think I'm joking, you sad casualty of the age of not believing). My co-workers (jeez, cast members) raved about this movie. I was expecting to hear descriptions like 'charming' and 'touching'. I wasn't expecting 'intense' and 'heart-breaking'. What the hell had I missed while re-watching Toy Story 2 for the nineteenth time?

Something really well done, that's what. You always know going into these things that whatever upsets the status quo at the beginning is going to be resolved by the end in a way that restores balance. The Sherman Brothers established in 1968 that there was only one Tigger, and not even Steven Moffat would be able to find a loophole in the doctrine; so clearly Tigger isn't going to be finding his own kind (Muppets from Space already demonstrated why that plot sucks anyway). But it's the emotions that happen on the way back to square one which give the film its teeth.

Over the years we've seen these characters go from one note archetypes to three dimensional personalities, but it's in The Tigger Movie where the emotional complexities fully erupt, and it makes sense that it would happen with Tigger in the driver's seat. Pooh is the star of the franchise because his motivations propel him at the right speed for stories to happen. Without the bear, Rabbit, Piglet, Eeyore, Owl, and the marsupials might never even be made aware of each other because they all tend to stay in their safe zones. Pooh is nosy and invasive. Tigger is also invasive but he doesn't stick around after the peace has been disrupted, which is why Pooh is the overall star, not him.

But in this case, Tigger is the story. Unlike the normally harmless adventures Pooh instigates involving mess up/clean up, Tigger forces everybody out of their safe zones. In doing so we learn things about them that we didn't know before that permanently change our perceptions about them. We see how intuitive Pooh is, how reliable Rabbit is, and how freaking hilarious Eeyore is (depressed people gravitate to comedy). We see Kanga out dominate Owl in a single glance which speaks more about who she is than her whole history of appearances thus far (but the blog is young).

But it's Roo who becomes the breakout star, with his admiration of Tigger being the heart of the film. It's also his purest intentions that create the central problem, as well as resolve it. Good story telling. Definitely see this film. If it doesn't tug at your heart strings at least once then you're a heartless bastard and I don't like you very much.


Piglet's Big Movie (2003)

Even with Tigger's movie being a resounding financial success, turning the spotlight on Piglet seems like an odd gamble. At a 46 million dollar price tag with a 62 million return the film wasn't a flop, but I doubt it was the hit that Disney was banking on. On the one hand the film makes sense, as John Fielder was the only original cast member still performing his character (although Paul Winchell probably had some strong feelings about that tidbit). There were plenty of Milne stories to pull from in order to make another feature, and centering them around one character has a certain legitimacy.

The problem though is Piglet isn't the superstar Tigger is. People like Piglet, but I don't think anybody really aspires to be him like they do with Tigger. The built in audience isn't quite as big. But I guess the original plan was to give all of the primary cast their own stories before reuniting them in a mega-crossover where they defeat Loki. So, ambitious, if a little ahead of the times.

I saw it in the theater, along with seven other people. Only two of them were children, and all they did was run up and down the aisles for 75 minutes. It may not be the best sample size to answer the question of who the hell the movie was for, but as the unforgiving adult critic that I am I found it genuinely delightful.

The animation was gorgeous, probably where most of the budget went. The Carly Simon soundtrack wasn't quite Sherman Brothers, but it came close enough. And the same balance of innocence and wit that The Tigger Movie tapped into was on full display. We went back to the anthology of stories formula with a wraparound of the non-Piglet characters tracking down li'l pinky to express their appreciation for him. Somehow it incorporates a life threatening waterfall into the climax, but these things have to happen.

It's been a while, but these are the takeaways I can remember. Rabbit may have shined in the previous film as the responsible adult character, but here is where Disney figured out how to make him funny. There's a bit of a chronological plot hole regarding who moved to the hundred acre woods first, Tigger or the kangaroos. Pooh is absolutely fearless once he's made up his mind. And it's established that not even Christopher Robin gave a shit about Owl.

But the thing that stood out the most was Kanga, strangely enough. In the flashback where she and her child have just moved into the area, Rabbit gets an overdose of patriotism and plots to separate mother and child, using Piglet as a thinly disguised decoy 'Roo'. Kanga sees through the charade, but decides to entertain herself by playing along. What follows is the most passive-aggressive version of psychological torture you're ever going to see inflicted on one stuffed animal from another.

This is one Disney mom with a dark side. She knows she's expected to maintain a disposition of sweetness; most Disney moms don't make it through one film, much less three. But think about Lady Tremaine. She spent all of Cinderella's life trying to break her and the best she could get was a few minutes of tears. Kanga practically gives Piglet a heart attack through nothing more than motherly affection. That's badass.

*Is there any truth to the rumor that the animators storyboarded an alternate ending to this segment, where Pooh and company later found Rabbit's stuffed head on a wooden stick with a note safety pinned through his ears that read "DON EFER FCUK WTH MY SUN!"? Well, that sure sounds made up. And in my time working for the company, I certainly was in no position to speak definitively on what the animation studio did. It would be a real pity if that needlessly turned into an urban legend. Can you imagine how much traffic my blog would have to withstand?


Pooh's Heffalump Movie (2005)

 Now is the ideal time to try this phrase on: oh bother. I guess it works if you think of it as several layers of censorship. Well, okay then. This movie was obviously a cash grab. It has a certified fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes which makes me want to kick a small child's teddy bear, but since I usually feel like that anyway let me try to be a bit fairer.

There's a clear target audience here, and it ain't me. It's the age represented on screen by Roo. The title should have been Roo's Heffalump Movie, but Disney wanted to pretend that the other characters were in it. One third of the spotlight is on Roo. A second third is on Lumpy the Heffalump, who is essentially also Roo. And the remaining third is divvied up among everybody else, which summarizes why I feel this movie is a massive misstep.

On its own, it's not a bad story, and the egregiously obvious message isn't a bad one to drill into the heads of children, and hopefully some voters for this year's mid-terms. But there's only enough going on for about a 20 minute short film, and they stretch it out over three times the necessary length; which means more time with Lumpy, and my God is he annoying! Maybe not Fievel annoying...but you can't help wonder if the kid's mom might not be trying that hard to find him.

I'll admit, I probably wouldn't feel this strongly about an ultimately harmless film if it had been a purely isolated story, or released straight to DVD where it could be conveniently ignored. The problem I have is it completes an unofficial trilogy (the Nikita Hopkins as Roo trilogy perhaps?). Either that or it derails the energy we had of movies that focus on Pooh's side characters. Gone are Conversations with Owl, Rabbit has a Meltdown, and Gopher's Underground Hustle. I actually had a cute idea for an Eeyore movie, which involves the animators forgetting to put him in it.

But returning to this lovely bit of irrelevancy, I just don't have anything nice to say. Kids of a narrow window of an age bracket seem to enjoy it. I didn't. I paid real money for a ticket to see this movie in the theater (for character research purposes), and some small part of my inner child has been in a bad mood ever since.


Winnie the Pooh (2011)

What is it about family films in the 2010's? I'm always wary of words like 'flawless' but if Megamind, The Lego Movie, and Muppets Most Wanted have any flaws, I can't tell you what they are (and believe me, I've looked). Maybe its Pixar's influence? Right around the time that the cracks in the studio's quality started showing, it's neighbors may have gotten their crap together. I don't know. But if this genre of entertainment has a high-roller's club, Winnie the Pooh waddles right through the door.

The only real downsides I can find are the short length and the fact that much of this territory has been previously covered; Pooh wants honey, Eeyore loses his tail, Christopher Robin goes to school, Owl creates a problem out of a misunderstanding. But the repetitiveness honestly doesn't matter because the elements are put together so perfectly to tell a single story.

What story is that, you're obligated to ask? In a word, Eeyore's. This is as close to an Eeyore movie as we're ever going to get, with good (if unfortunate) reason. Eeyore doesn't make for a viable protagonist. I hate saying it, but he doesn't have a protagonist's necessary drive or aspiration. At his most ambitious, he can only hope things will be slightly less unpleasant than he believes they'll wind up being. So instead, we explore the world through his eyes from Pooh's eyes, a character who has a clearly defines drive and aspiration, albeit a simple one. He wants honey. What follows is Pooh and the terrible, horrible, no good, very Eeyore day in not getting what he wants. The results are emotional gold.

Every character gets their emotional moments, although previously foregrounded players like Tigger, Piglet, and Roo receive fewer than you'd expect. Owl is surprisingly more important of a presence than usual, and even gets a slight touch of growth (which may or may not stick). He has actual awareness that he doesn't know as much as he'd like to believe, as well as a humiliating moment where he realizes that his pride created the bulk of the problems. But as any writer will tell you, flaws are the alphabet of character.

At the end of the day, this menagerie isn't about finding true love or defeating a villain, it's about childhood. More accurately, it's about the world through a child's eyes. When you're a child, the world is simpler. There are whole adventures to be had in cardboard boxes, and hours of enjoyment projecting your voice into a desk fan. As adults, our worlds and our minds become highly complicated, often to the point of clutter.

It's films like Winnie the Pooh which remind us that there's a certain wisdom which comes from pure emotions, a side of humanity that stays relatively unchanged as we age. We may experience joy and sadness for different reasons as adults than we do as children, and we may also mentally stifle them into somewhat less dominant influencers on our choices, but emotions essentially carry the same taste for adults as they do for children. And too often we forget to check in with that wisdom our feelings possess.

It's understandable. As children, much like Pooh and friends, we aren't aware of such a thing as wisdom. Therefore we couldn't possibly recognize it in ourselves. The more we interact with the world, the more emphasis is placed on intelligence, which is a similar yet fundamentally different ability score. Quite a lot of professional therapy involves getting at that inner wisdom which is being drowned out by an overabundance of adulthood. And maybe that's why I find myself returning to the hundred acre woods whenever the opportunity arises. I don't have kids, and I have no intention of obtaining any. But having been a child, it sometimes helps me process the world by viewing it through the eyes of the little guy who used to curl up inside pillow cases and spin around flag poles for no reason other than it just felt like the thing to do. And even though the bear, the pig, and my main donkey aren't the characters of my own childhood, they've become the close friends of my inner child. And that by itself is enough reason to spend a little time with them. Doing nothing.

The Carousel: Next Game

Zelphina pulled the bar’s door open and maneuvered through the mostly male patronage. A lot of eyes in her direction, but a predominant respectfulness among the ensemble. She received smiles, which she only returned with a polite nod. And the one gentleman who offered to buy her a drink was wise enough to accept her declaration that she was meeting someone at face value.

She spotted him at the pool table, testing out the physics of the game. Demons were naturally drawn to games, but they never played an opponent unless they were confident they would win, and skilled at pretending like they wouldn’t. His skill was not where he wished it to be, hence the round of solitaire.

Zelphina set her palms down on the edge of the table, across from where he was setting up his shot. Smack. The cue ball hopped into a backspin, arcing around the ball in the way and sinking the one he was aiming for. “I call next game.”

He smirked, only glancing up as high as the writing across her chest. “Your highness,” he sneered, “Is the creature dead?”

“I wouldn’t be standing here if it weren’t.”

He rechalked the tip of his cue stick. “I meant the human female you travel with.”

“You wouldn’t be standing here if she were.”

He snickered. “Are we really going to do this around all of these simians?”

“It’s up to you if we do this at all. I’m here to talk.”

“How celestial of you.” He struck the cue ball again, clacking it into a pair of stripes, only sinking the first one. His eye twitched at the miscalculation.

“I don’t believe you revealed your name before you left us to die.”

“Correct. Zel, was it?”

“Zelphina,” she said without hesitation. “Of Lotus.”

“Oh, you’re one of Theridae’s.”

“She’s my great aunt by contract only. I’m a first generation.”

“Any kids?”

“No.” The word came out of Zelphina’s mouth with so much punctuation she drew him into an eye-contact that he’d been actively avoiding. The cue ball bounced at a wide angle as he missed his shot.

He set his stick against the table and calmly reloaded the triangular rack. “Lotesians have the reputation of a cold wrath.”

“We had a merciful side. Our Maetria didn’t outlive her species by behaving like one of them.”

He removed the rack and rolled the cue ball to her, relinquishing the opening shot. “After her highness.”

“Stop calling me that,” said Zelphina. She struck the tip of her stick against the cue, scattering the numbered spheres across the table. None made their way into the pockets.

“With your reputation, I would have expected a more impressive break than that.”

“I’m not here to win,” she explained. “I’m here to talk.”

“I can listen for a game,” he said, stepping up to the table and dropping the twelve into the side pocket.

“If you won’t reveal a name, can you tell me where you came from?”

One careful shot; the nine and the thirteen sank in sequence. “I see no reason to reveal anything about myself.” His next shot struck the fourteen, which bounced a few times in the corner but refused to obey his will.

“Then I’ll keep it simple,” said Zelphina. “A Lotesian founder came through the rift. If you have any desire for any purpose beyond mere existence, now is the opening.”

“Are you trying to rebuild your kingdom on this primitive rock?”

“I don’t care what she does. I’m only making the offer she’s asked me to make.”

He leaned against the wall, waiting for Zelphina to take her shot. “And what offer is that?”

“I just made you the offer. Join her, or don’t.”

“And the benefits and penalties?”

Zelphina smacked the cue ball with little attentiveness, sending it bouncing around the table without progressing the game. “Do you have something else to attend to?” She slid a business card out of her back pocket and set it on the edge. “She’s using ‘Molly’ as her moniker. How long do you think you can survive on your own?”

He gave her a snide glance and fired the cue ball off the table right at Zelphina’s nose. She pulled it out of the air without flinching. “Good reflexes,” he said.

“Scratch,” she muttered, wiping the ball clean before setting it back on the table. “The only people coming for you are going to be hunting you. There’s not a better offer. And there’s no commitment beyond a conversation. Do the wise thing. Make the call.” She sent the cue ball over to the pocket to retrieve the fourteen from its convenient dunking.

He read the card without touching it. “If I say no?”

“Then consider yourself warned. That human body you’re inhabiting is a victim. I hope he was a horrible person, because one thing ‘Molly’ and I share is a soft spot for innocent blood. The wrath of Lotesians only begins in the cold.”

Two careful shots later and ten and the fifteen were no longer in play. “So you garrison your own kind,” he grinned.

“I have no kind. I have purpose.”

He set aim on the damned fourteen again. “Which is?”

“This fragile world cannot protect itself from us. It is our responsibility to do so in its stead or destroy ourselves.”

At those words he began laughing so hard he accidentally hit the cue ball into the corner pocket. “That has got to be the most hilarious statement I’ve ever heard. How do you figure it is our responsibility to self destruct?”

“The ‘creature’ I travel with is Caris. This is her world. You and I stand upon it because she trusted in something greater than her, or us.”

“And what do you propose I owe her for this moment of foolishness?”

Zelphina stepped into his personal space and leaned in as close as she could without touching him. “Nothing.”

Nothing is the most uncomfortable topic for a demon. Cause and effect, action and consequence, purchase and price, all concepts the world of darkness survives upon. But nothing is not the same as darkness. Darkness is something. Nothing is the absence of everything, including darkness. And with the power to invoke an unease in the most comfortable of demonic presences, a well-timed use of the word is enough to give any cognitive demon pause for thought.

The offer of something for nothing is an alarm. Demons prone to the lure of transaction dare to dream of making a deal where they gain something for nothing, but only those who are skilled in the art of subtext are able to concoct such a deal. As such, it is unheard of to be openly offered one.

In this case, the demon with the pool cue had been prepared to hear whatever cost the one called Zelphina would suggest he owed her for the boon he did not ask for, as it would be a fair argument. But she claimed he owed nothing, after what he perceived to be an insistence of gifting. “What do you mean, ‘nothing’?”

“I should think it self explanatory,” said Zelphina.

“Then why bring it up?”

Zelphina carefully placed the cue ball where she wanted it. “Do you know what the one commonality among every demonic being is?”

“I’m sure any answer I provide will be insufficient to you.”

“It’s a desire for freedom, but a complete lack of comprehension as to what freedom feels like. We only know we crave it. We never know when we have it.”

“And your point?”

“Our existence on this world is a gift. Regardless of how we feel about it, this gift is what freedom feels like. The demons of Lotus were the only ones, to my extensive knowledge, who figured this out before they damned themselves irreparably to a new master.”

“And where is your beloved Lotus now?”

“You’re missing the point.” Zelphina tapped the business card with her pool stick. “That phone call costs you nothing. It’s in your nature to make the wrong choice. Learn to listen to the nature of someone who can make the right one.”

“I’m four balls ahead,” he smirked. “In the interest of...interest, why don’t you show me just how much you’ve been holding yourself back.”

Zelphina rubbed the tip of her stick with chalk. “I can win this game in six shots.”

“Four. You do that, I call Molly. You take your fifth shot, I walk.”

“Agreed,” said Zelphina. She did it in three.