Visions 2: So We've Been Told

[Beauregard]

Thanks Prawnie! Ok, new chapter! This one isn't quite so moody as the others..I found it quite confusing to write because a lot had to be said without actualyl saying much, and it ending up with (to me) a sort of whimsical air, so, sorry about that...but hopefully it can move the story on forward. Enjoy!

Chapter 6

"I love you," she said.

"I know."

Juice glasses chinked together and droplets of orange juice spattered onto the breakfast table. A yellow finger dipped into the juice and lifted to feminine lips. "Good," they said. "I need you to know that."

"Why?"

The couple were alone in the breakfast room that was hidden deep within a stone-built mansion on the outskirts of town. The mansion had once belonged to the girl's uncle, but now it was hers and she owned it - and everything in it. She owned the oak four-poster beds, the original oil-paintings, the clean windows overlooking parkland, and the antique breakfast table that was now growing stained with drops of orange juice. In fact, she owned the orange juice too. The only thing Skeeter Gross didn't own was her boyfriend, Clifford, who sat opposite her, drinking juice.

Sometimes she felt as if he owned her.

Skeeter removed a pair of red-rimmed glasses and began rubbing them against her black tank-top, cleaning the lenses so she could see more clearly without fuzzy smudges in her vision.

"No reason," she said, placing her glasses back on to blink at Clifford, her boyfriend, the purple humanoid with the cutest dreadlocks on earth.

"Ok." He bit into toast and a chunk of marmalade stuck to his lip. "But I did already know that, Skeets." He licked the marmalade clear, and smiled.

On second thoughts, it was that smile that owned her.

"Heh." She gulped orange juice, swilling the pith through her teeth. "Traditionally, this is where the man chimes in with an, 'I-love-you-too-angel-cakes' piece."

"Angel-cakes?" He raised an eyebrow.

"Or treacle-sponge, or honey-bunch, or chocolate-lips, or any other germ of endearment."

"Term," he said.

"It'll be a term of endangerment if you don't back up your marmalade-mouth with at least something from the sweet tray."

He pursed his lips. "Does it have to be food related, or can it just be romantically inclined?"

Skeeter scowled. "Forget it."

"No, really, what? It has to be off the pudding menu?"

"NO!" Skeeter yelled, standing up from the table in frustration. "No, Clifford, it does not have to be ala carte! It has to be you returning my love with an I-insert-heart-here-you!"

Clifford kicked back from the table and crossed his hands behind his head. "You know why I dodn't do that?"

"Let me guess, you lost the ability to love in high-school when your first girlfriend kicked you in the ala carte?"

Clifford laughed, probably not the right reaction. "No," he said. "It's just…why formula? Why tradition? If I repeat the words you say, it's not me, is it? It's you saying that you love you. Want that?"

She sulked and folded her arms over her chest. "I want something."

"If I have it, I'll give it. But I thought you already knew that I love you."

"So did I."

"And if you know something like that, why does it have to be said?"

"Because…it's nice to hear."

"Is it nice to hear, or nice to know? Because if someone has to say it all the time, do they know it? Are they sure?"

"Sure they're sure."

Clifford shrugged and wiped his mouth with a stiff napkin. "Alright. If you're sure."

"I'm sure."

He stood up, tucked his chair in and walked around the table in front of her. "You might like to hear it, Skeets. I like to show it." He kissed her and she began to change her mind. Maybe it was his kiss that owned her.

*****​

Uncle Deadly broke a muffin and crumbs bounced off the polished tabletop. Fozzie bit into the soft deliciousness and nodded at Rowlf. "It's good," he said.

"I'm glad."

So far, the entire conversation had revolved around compliments and acknowledgements and Rowlf was beginning to admit that he had no grasp on what was going on here. Apparently Deadly knew Fozzie, and Fozzie knew the Uncle, but they weren’t on talking terms. Or more than likely they had once been on talking terms and then Deadly had gone and done something stupid. Or maybe Fozzie had. He didn't know the bear well enough to comment.

He looked up at the clock hung above his cooker. It was shaped like a cat, and the tail worked as a pendulum. Uncle Deadly had bought it as a joke about ten years ago and Rowlf had given it place of honour, which was more than Deadly had done with the pink butterfly phone that Rowlf had given in exchange.

"Alright," Rowlf said. "In about thirty-six seconds I am going to ask what happened between you two, so enjoy the next thirty-five-ish seconds of silence."

"I thought you died!" Fozzie blurted over the table at Deadly. So much for silence.

Deadly laughed. "And I thought you'd be dead by now."

"I thought you got shot."

"I thought you disappeared."

"You made me lose my best friend."

"You made me lose my dignity when you allowed a human to shoot me in the chest."

"Time's up!" Rowlf exclaimed, bursting neatly into the conversation before it could spiral into a full-blown mud-slinging championship. "What happened with you two?"

It was like this, they said, and told him exactly what it was like. One spun the story against humanity, one twisted it against creatures of the night. One adjusted the details to suit his purposes, the other laid himself bare. One pointed clawed fingers and whispered about pain, the other clasped and unclasped his hands and murmured about cold. One lost a battle, one lost a friend. One was shot. One couldn't hold on to the hand of a human's life. One stumbled from the scene, clutching a scaled hand over black blood that ran into the torn fabric of his jacket, while the other stumbled from the scene, clutching a furred hand over his heart, afraid that it would break. They both left the scene, alone.

"That was how you got shot?" Rowlf asked.

Uncle Deadly stroked the burnt edges of a bullet-hole that had ripped through his jacket that night. "One of the times," he said. "Yes."

"Well, how did you…you know…how?" Fozzie asked

"…live?" Deadly suggested, ending the question on his behalf. "Somewhat simple. I refused to die."

Rowlf gave him a sceptical glance and helped himself to another of the muffins.

"Dr Rowlf helped," Deadly added quietly.

"Doctor?" Fozzie turned to Rowlf.

"In spirit," Rowlf said, dotting crumbs off the table with his thumb. "I'm not practising." He resisted a little joke on that subject. "But I've been around. Seen a lot of cures." He sucked the crumbs off his thumb before continuing. "He was hurt pretty bad. What happened to you?"

"I…left," Fozzie said.

"And your friend?"

"He left too."

"Then who do you have left?"

Fozzie shrugged. "Me?"

Rowlf smiled. "Correct."

Uncle Deadly's face changed so subtly that only Rowlf noticed the softening of Deadly's ridged, snout-like nose, and the glinting of something behind the creatures always dark eyes.

*****​

Fozzie adjusted his hat in front of a mirror on the wall of the room Rowlf had leant him. Rowlf was being kind, he thought, really kind, and that didn't match up with the fact that he was friends with a fiend. There had to be some explanation! Perhaps Rowlf didn't know Deadly the way that Fozzie did…or maybe the truth was that Fozzie didn't know Deadly the way that Rowlf did.

Fozzie slung his black scarf around his neck, and tipped his head to check the reflection. Nice.

"I bet it really kills you," Uncle Deadly whispered in his ear, wispy nose hair brushing against Fozzie's neck as he stepped up and gazed into the mirror from behind the bear's head.

Later, Fozzie would find it ironic that it was a creature named Deadly who scared him half to death by appearing so suddenly, but right now he was just scared. "What?" He fought the urge to turn around.

"Knowing that you couldn't hold on." Deadly touched Fozzie's shoulder. His touch was cold, even through fur.

Fozzie tugged at the end of his scarf. "I've learned to live with it."

"Have you?"

Fozzie shut his eyes.

"What would you do if you could go back, eh, to that night? Would you hold tighter? Could you?"

Fozzie tightened his scarf, yanking it hard. "The chicken never gets to cross back," he said. "She stays on the other side. Just right there on the other side."

"Knock, knock," Uncle Deadly said.

"Who's there?"

"Harvey Hospital Towers."

Fozzie swung around at him. "Are you making a joke?"

"You missed your cue. The line is 'Harvey Hospital Towers, who?'."

Fozzie said it, and Uncle Deadly continued. "Harvey Hospital Towers has news for you."

"What news?" Fozzie asked, suddenly curious that this was becoming more than a joke.

"Nicky Holiday."

"What about him?"

"He's not dead."

"What!?"

*****​

Rowlf stood with his feet together on a balcony overlooking the town. Tall apartment buildings blocked the morning skyline, but beyond them clouds parted and shifted to reveal cracks of golden sunlight. Morning was come, Spring was coming. Soon those yellow flowers that humans knew as weeds would begin their annual struggle to emerge from cracks in the sidewalk.

Rowlf allowed himself to think of Fozzie in the same way, as a growing plant, and himself as a gardener with watering can and glinting sheers. Roots needed water, wrong ideals needed cutting. Already, the bear was growing. It wouldn't be long.

But then, he didn't have long.

Rowlf heard the sliding doors to the balcony open and close. He spoke to the phantom without needed to turn. "He's not a pawn in your game plan, Deadly."

"I know." Deadly bounced forward on his toes. "And he's not a plant in your garden either, Rowlf."

"I know." Rowlf danced his fingers up the black metal railing of his balcony, as if the scraped paint were piano keys. "It's not my garden, anyway, it's his."

"It's not a game plan, either, it's a war."

"I know," Rowlf said.

"Hey, Rowlf?" Deadly placed one his hands over Rowlf's, closing his fingers and fading the imaginary piano music in the dog's head. "You do realise that your weakness will not make me change my plans out of compassion for your lost cause?"

Rowlf turned to him and met his eyes. "Oh yes. If you realise that your strength won't make me change mine."

Deadly's smile matched his name. "It's good to have you here, Rowlf. Good for balance." He leant against the railings and gazed down five floors to concrete. "We need balance."

"Yes, we do."

To be continued...

Coming next...talk about jobs, talk about injuries, and a meeting with a mysterious cameo from the Muppet's Take Manhatten...

 

[theprawncracker]

*WIDE EYES!!!!* OH MY GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH!!!! Uncle DEADLY!! He's so AWESOME Beau!!! I love love love love it!!!! It's so dark, so scary, so AWESOME!!! Rowlf is so...WOW! And Fozzie is killing me...And Uncle D.'s scarin' the un-living Uncle D. outta me! ...Wait...

But seriously (me? Serious? HA!) this chapter was phenomanal (doo do doo do doo) and I really can't wait for more so here:

MORE PLEASE!!!

EDIT: *slaps wrist* SKEETER AND CLIFFORD ARE AMAAAAAZING!! Beau they're so great in this! The perfect couple!! I LOVED it!!

 

[The Count]

Bo... This stuff just blows me away...
Skeeter and Clifford sharing somewhat of an intimate breakfast together... Nice contrast of the attitudes between both characters.

The main conversations in Rowlf's apartment...
That clock, MB reference!
And Nicky's still alive...
And Deadly's war is still going on...
And, well, and... More please!

This is getting great, just hope you remember to go back and tell us what happened with Camilla from the beginning of the story. We need some happiness and some further deeper explanations... So I say unto you...
More please!

 

[Beauregard]

Ok, I have to admit the clock wasn't a reference, I just thought it up. But what did you think I was refereing to? Is there a cat-clock in MB? Further explainations will arrive, but only as people figure things out...some hapiness, well, I can see that just around the corner for a certain few people...while it's a lot further away for others...

 

[The Count]

Well... Of course there was, that's why I spotted it as such. It was a blue cat shaped clock, with the clock face on it's tummy, a big smile on the cat face, and a curled tail swinging back and forth as the pendulum.
It can be seen in the episode called Around the Nursery in 80 Days where the babies and Nanny take a pretend round-world trip in imagination so she won't leave them alone on her real vacation trip.

 

[The Count]

Hmmm... Seeing as how we're on this campaign to get Bo to post more Muffins... Think I'll just slather him with some frigid frozen balls of fury to get Visions 2 updated as well.
*Gets Bo cold and wet, hopefully provoking him to post more story.

 

[Beauregard]

It is a very short chapter, I confess...but it just hit me, a writing-Vision's mood this evening and I had to write a bit, even just a little. So I have.

I found Skeeter hard to write for, because I wasn't sure that I understood her...plus with Visions, first I have to understand her, then I have to do a one-eighty on her, so I think this works but...we'll see.

Chapter 7

"And you are…?" the man asked from Miss Piggy's open doorway, pointing one dirty finger at Gonzo's face.

"He's…" Piggy began, then paused. Actually, she wasn't sure what he was. Her friend? Her roommate? The guy who had randomly slept on her floor? The guy who tried to feed her cat-food for breakfast out of the kindness of his little blue heart? "He's Gonzo," she said. It seemed enough.

The man's wide eyebrows sank over loose eyelids. "Heh," he said. "Why is he here?"

Great. He just had to go and ask that question. "Because…" Her flouncing voice began the answer and then failed halfway, ending flat. "Because," she began again and-

"Because she invited me here," Gonzo finished. "Who are you?"

The man tipped his head back critically, revealing fleshy stubble-pricked neck skin that seemed to hang loose. "Landlord," he said. "And owner." He folded his arms over a cheap suit jacket that smelt of smoke.

"It's nice to meet you," Gonzo said, holding one hand out to shake.

"I'm Murray," the landlord stated, ignoring the hand and refusing to meet Gonzo's eyes. "Murray Plotski." He winked, but not at Gonzo, at Piggy. It was as if his name were some kind of in-joke or big secret.

Piggy didn't wink back. Instead she decided that this conversation was officially over.

"Well," she announced loudly, swinging herself between the short blue Gonzo and the tall dry-haired owner. "We should be going. Come, Gonzo."

She moved to go around the landlord in her doorway, and he shifted his foot. Not much, just enough that she had to step over it to exit her apartment. She moved to go out the other side of him and he uncrossed his arms, letting one hang down close to the doorframe. Piggy raised her eyes to glare at him as she studied the lesser of the two evils. Finally she lifted her purple high-heal over his over his scratched black shoe and her knee brushed for the briefest of seconds against his.

The man stepped backwards and Gonzo looked up to follow the swine out of her sanctuary. Glancing back at Murray, Gonzo grinned oblivious to the silent interchange between landlord and tenant. "I guess I'll, see you around."

The man nodded and smiled with a smile that stretched his soft flesh tight. "I'm sure you will."

*****​

Skeeter waited until Clifford had left the stately home for at least five minutes before dialling his cell phone from the house, holding the red telephone receiver in one hand and fiddling with the phone cord as she listened to the patient ringing at the other end.

There were hundreds of reasons why Clifford wouldn't pick up. Because he was driving his motorbike and there was no place to stop. Because he was wearing his gloves and couldn't handle the phone properly. Because he didn't hear it over the rushing wind and screeching traffic. Because he didn't love her.

His machine met her call with a neat, "Leave me a message," followed by a tone.

Skeeter wound the wire tighter around her index finger. "Hey baby. I wanted you to know that I love you, and I hope you have a great day, and I'll be waiting for you when you get back, and that you shouldn't worry about dinner because I'll put something together so just have a good day and I'll see you when you get home. I love you. Bye." She slammed the receiver down hard and almost twisting her finger off with the wire. "Ouch." That wasn't such a great idea. She lifted the receiver again to release her trapped digit.

He loved her, he did. She loved him.

She dialled his number again. "You know what, ignore the last message. It was strange. Creepy almost, yeah creepy. I'm smothering you. I shouldn't be smothering you. Have a good day. Don't call me back. Just get on with your things and stuff. Love you. Bye."

She hung up.

That wasn't much better was it?

She needed to get out of the house.

She had visited him every day when he was thrown into prison for three weeks after the big mass mess that was the real-estate deal with Nicky Holiday, ex-policeman, corrupt and evil. They'd gone with him to view the property the day the monsters attacked, hideous creatures of the night that flapped, scratched, and clawed their way over Nicky's men, leaving her screaming against a pile of rubble and Clifford thrown against the ground. She'd run for help, the police, real police. And they'd taken Clifford to jail.

She asked them why about a thousand times but they didn't explain because they didn't even have a good explanation.

When he came out he needed her. They came to live at her place outside the town and had late breakfasts whenever they could be bothered to get up at all. They were recovering, if not resting.

Skeeter dug her mobile phone from her bag and dialled out as she walked downstairs, sliding her arms into a water-proof coat. "Hey honey. Look. I'm not going to fool you. I'm tired of this. Me chasing you all the time. I need something from you that I am not getting. Alright? Can you call me, I need to talk to you. I'm taking a walk, I'll have my cell with me. Call me or something, Clifford, alright?" She pressed the red button, disconnecting herself from the answering machine.

She left the house and power-walked across the gravel entrance, through the massive gates, and around towards a small inner parkland woods where trees grew tightly knitted together in copses. Skeeter stared at her phone as she walked below branches that cut off the sunlight in strips as she moved along, as if the sun were flashing on and off like the little green light on her phone that told her she had no signal. Even if he was calling, Clifford couldn't get through. But that was ok, he wouldn't call.

She needed a man in her life who she didn’t want to touch the moment she saw him.

She wanted love in her life that wasn't mutual. She had to have a person she could talk to without feeling guilty, that she could trust without being afraid, and that she could stand beside without needing to hold his hand.

She burst from the other end of the woods and startled a flock of crows that lifted off trees and streaked away through the thick air.

The green light turned on permanently. She had signal. She called Clifford and he didn't pick up. "Cliff. I'm sorry. I'm being stupid. Ignore me, alright? Don't even listen to your messages anymore from me, just delete them, ok? I say stupid things. I'm a stupid person. I'll be waiting for you when you get home. Love you. Bye."

She dropped the phone in her pocket and sat down heavily on the damp ground.

 

[The Count]

Awesomeness Bo! Hooray for the update. Loved the two scenes.
Piggy defying her landlord with Gonzo in toe.
And I rully liked how you developed Skeeter's mode of thinking through the various messages to Clifford, referencing and connecting to what happened at the end of Visions 1.
Post more when you can... Please!

 

[Beauregard]

Chapter 8

Clifford sat heavily behind his desk at Cliff Top Estates. He'd bought the business when he sold an old church his parents had left him, long before he ever met Skeeter.

Speaking of which, he had six messages from her already, collected just on the drive over here.

Clifford propped his bike helmet on the desk and dropped his mobile into the black waste-paper basket. He'd listen to the messages later, not right now. He needed some peace, away from that girl of his.

And she was his girl.

Clifford toed the waste-paper basket, knocking it onto it's side. Papers, sweet wrappers, and the mobile phone rolled out on the wooden floor and he ignored them.

Skeeter had become his responsibility the moment he fell in love with her. He'd wanted to protect her, from that moment, and he'd failed so many times. So often he'd let her down, she'd march away, yelling and hopping. Next day, week, month, she'd be back. He loved her, she loved him. That should be enough.

The phone rang and Clifford turned his back on it. Dreadlocks bounced off his shoulders.

He tipped his chair to rest his boots on the desk, propping one upon the other. Through his tinted glasses, the room was dark, heck, the entire world around him was dark, but Skeeter had become his light, something he could focus on and protect. Now she was fading. He needed to fix that light, before it went away.

The phone was still ringing when the feet of his chair hit the floor beside it and he snatched the mobile up, hitting connect. "Skeet?" he said.

"…so don't bother-" Skeeter said and stopped, mid sentence, cut off by his answering. "Hi Cliff." She sounded guilty, and at the same time almost afraid of him, as if the door to her room had been slammed open and she had been caught doing something she oughtn't.

"I'm on my way home," Clifford told her.

*****​

Bitterman Plaza was an enclosed shopping centre mall, lined with stores and sheltered from rain by a plastic dome that blotted sunlight into smudges on the street. Miss Piggy and Gonzo stepped over an empty, flapping shopping bag and continued a banter which had started the moment they left the Murray Hotel apartment building in order to search for jobs.

"Shopping is an art," Miss Piggy insisted.

"Is not," Gonzo parried. "Art is quite different."

"Oh, really. And vous know all about art."

"Yes. Yes, I am an artist, after all."

Piggy stopped so suddenly that Gonzo was forced to pull up short so as not to collide. "You paint?" Piggy asked. "Oh, please do not tell Moi you paint."

Gonzo tilted his head. "I don't paint," he said, "Traditionally, at least."

"Oh." Neither disapproval or relief, just, "Oh." Miss Piggy's eyes gave away nothing but a slight protective cover that seemed to drop in front of her usual shine. She realised she was still not moving, and hurried on up the street. "Paint smells," she said over her shoulder towards Gonzo. "It…er, smells."

"Aah." Gonzo hurried to catch up, passing passed shop-windows which flashed glares of diluted light off their wares. Expensive watches, pawned jewellery, twisted glass vases, green sequinned dresses, polished wood cabinets and white sugar on freshly-baked buns all flickered the glow back at the passers-by.

"How is shopping an art?" Gonzo asked, bringing them back to that. "I do not believe it."

Piggy stopped and stared. "Believe it," she growled.

"Heh." Gonzo's eyelids raised and lowered as he examined her face, wondering if he was getting anywhere in an effort to see beyond the make-up and rouge she extravagantly attempted to wear. "Show me," he said.

"Fine." She took a deep breath. "First there is the knowing of which are right shops to enter and which are those to be avoided. This shop, pour example, is tres fashionable and designer and warm and chic, but, is also tres tres expensive."

"Trendy and pricey, huh?" Gonzo said, countering her faux French with down-to-earth English.

Piggy paused, "Exactly," and continued, "So...we just nip across this street and glide ourselves into this shop." She guided him by the elbow into a glitzy shop of glass-shelving and shiny shoes. "It's neat, it's close, and if we later waltz into Shoppero Uno, we can borrow one of their bags."

"You waltz?"

Piggy pardoned his interruption with a glance that told him to stay out of her way if she ever did waltz. "Then there is the choosing and selection of boots, shoes, or, for something more casual and house-y, green fuzzy green flipper slippers."

"Flippers aren’t exactly my style," Gonzo told her.

"Oh, but vou'd look good in flippers." She eyed him up and down.

Gonzo waved his hand towards the shelf of shoes. "You were saying?"

"Oh, oh, right. Shoes. This shoe, see? Too dark. This? Too light. And, the heels on these boots are far too …"

"Chunky?" Gonzo suggested.

"…classic," Piggy exhaled, flipping from exhilarated to tired in a moment.

"So its all about the look, not the fit?"

"Gonzo," she said and the exaggeration in her voice was back. "Vous know nothing about women and shoes. If they don't fit, we make them fit." She fiddled with a pair of sparkling clear heels and pursed her mouth into a pout. "This pair, on the other hand, tres fantastique."

Gonzo took one of the heels from her, weighed it in his hand, and placed it back down. "I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder," he said.

Piggy turned to notice him watching her face. "Mmhmm."

"Well, if beauty is art," Gonzo said, shrugging. "You win."

"Pardon?"

"Shopping is an art."

"Oh!" Her face brightened. "Oh, of course I win!" She absently fingered the glass slipper once more and they walked out of the store together.

"But we probably should start for jobs before we do any more shopping for shopping," Gonzo said.

"Well, vous are an artist." She giggled. Gonzo smiled.

*****​

Rowlf the Dog rested his head against the plastic glass of the apartment window and watched his old friend depart. On the busy street below, Uncle Deadly padded along the sidewalk, glanced up at Rowlf, and waved a clawed hand. Rowlf shut his eyes to fend away a feeling of dread and when he opened them again, Deadly had disappeared from view.

Rowlf crossed the room to a drinks' cabernet, applied Scotch to a glass and the glass to his lips. He sighed and squeaked one finger around the rim off the glass. He was tired today.

The sound of a sniffle directed his attention towards the bathroom and Rowlf's round eyes slid into triangles as he glanced back at the front window, silently accusing his old friend Deadly of causing the current crisis he was evidently about to face.

"Fozzie?" he called and the sniffling stopped. Rowlf set his drink down on a coffee table and knocked on the bathroom door.

There was a sound of something bumping against the edge of the bath and tissue papers being thrown into a bin then Fozzie called out from inside, "You can come in."

Rowlf cracked the door open to find a fallen bear sitting cross-legged on the floor with his back against the side of the bath. Fozzie shifted his feet from in front of the door and Rowlf pushed it further open. He noted the bin overflowing with nose-wiped tissues. "You wanna talk about it?" Rowlf asked.

Fozzie nodded, but didn't get up, so Rowlf lowered himself to sit beside him on the floor, leaning against the doorpost. "Alright. Where do you want to start? At the beginning, or at the end?"

"Can I really just start at either?" Fozzie asked.

"Sure. Everything runs in circles," Rowlf said. "The beginning of one thing is the end of something else. You can even start in the middle if you care to."

Fozzie almost grinned, but didn't. "I think I will do that."

"Start in the middle?"

"Yeah."

"Okay."

He did. "I told you-…about Mr Holiday, Nicky. He was the policeman who…he fell…from my hands…paws…it was raining, and, he fell. He just, I couldn't…" Fozzie reached up and yanked tissue from the roll and the paper unrolled rapidly, folding over itself in a flood of soft fabric as Fozzie pushed back a flood of soft tears, knowing that if he let them come they would choke him from telling the story. "When I felt my hand empty, hanging there in the black air like a foot when it takes one too many steps up the stairs and plops down on the landing…that was just how my heart felt too. Gone."

Rowlf reached towards Fozzie's hand that lay open and empty, palm up beside him on the floor, then pulled back.

"I ran away and stayed away from everything for a while," Fozzie said. "I was…it was a stupid thing. I'd should have stayed."

"Hey, you told me, the chicken never crosses back," Rowlf said.

"I know…but…I, anyway, I returned to the city, but never to my home at the construction site. I wanted to move forward…I tried to forget." He lifted his face to look at Rowlf and Rowlf distinctly noticed a single tear had dampened a line of fur from Fozzie's eye, past his nose, and down to his chin. "Turns out I was wrong. Nicky Holiday is alive. And now that hollow place I thought I'd hidden, it just came back."

Rowlf decided that a hand was what Fozzie needed right now, and pressed his paw onto Fozzie's open hand. "You don't have to be empty anymore," he said.

Fozzie's fingers tightened around Rowlf's paw as the tears came. "Thank you," he whispered.

*****​

The news report stated that the case commonly known as Rat vs. Fear, or Rizzo the Rat vs. Fear Factor, had taken an interesting turn when Rizzo hired a sleazy lawyer named Gags Beasly to assist him. Gags was most famous for defending Pepe the Prawn of whippo-hair-braider fame in the autumn trial, two months before Pepe escaped. This was followed by a perfunctory report that the hunt for escaped convict Pepe was still ongoing.

The television flashed off as Skeeter hit a button on the remote then, for good measure, tossed the remote away from her onto the floor as she closed her eyes and leaned her head back.

Clifford had returned home immediately, as promised, and had brought doughnuts and champagne. They'd started early on both, picking dough with their fingers and drinking bubbly from long clear glasses. Clifford had stopped on the way back to rent a black and white romance movie called, "Fantasie en Rose." Skeeter had highly disapproved and dug through their film cupboard for a war epic instead, but Clifford had caught her wrist and made her drop the gory movie back onto the shelf.

They sat stiffly, side-by-side on a red, high-backed leather sofa and watched Fantasie en Rose from beginning to end without comment and when it finished, Skeeter pulled her glasses off and rubbed them against her tank-top, removing any trace of tears.

Clifford leant across towards the TV and hit rewind. "Let's do it properly this time." He set it playing from the beginning and leant back through the opening credits, tipping his head over the top of the sofa to stretch his arms up and remove cricks in his neck.

He felt Skeeter pull herself closer as she gingerly rested the side of her head against his shoulder. Clifford gently lowered one arm around the back of her head so that it lay along the back of the sofa. He caught Skeeter's eyes on his face and returned her gaze for a long moment before pulling them back to the screen where a woman whose name, conveniently, was Rose stood on the edge of the Empire State Building with the wind whipping through her hair. At least there was no giant gorilla up there with her, Clifford thought softly with a faint glimmer of a smile.

He wriggled himself lower in his seat cushion, pushing his feet out in front of him on the carpet. He drooped his upper body sideways to lean against the side-wing of the sofa and Skeeter adjusted her head down to the crook of his elbow. She hooked her knees over the other end of the couch to be more comfortable and kicked off her shoes.

Clifford twisted to lie flat and Skeeter moved her head onto his chest. Cliff brushed his fingers gently against the ends of her hair and Skeeter twitched her head as if a fly had landed on her face, then realised it was Clifford's fingers and relaxed.

On the screen, the woman, Rose, walked into a gentleman's hotel room and accidentally knocked a vase of roses off of a shelf and over the floor. She knelt to scoop them up and pricked her finger. The man's polished boots appeared in front of her, then a hand offered Rose a pure white handkerchief to dap her finger on.

Rose's narration carried over the screen with an imitated French accent performed by a little known American actress. "I knew it. That very moment. Within a week, we'd have fallen in love."

Skeeter lifted her face toward Clifford. "Are we in love?" she asked simply.

Clifford wrapped his free arm around her waist and pulled her closer. "I think we are," he said. "Or something very similar."

That seemed to satisfy her and she said no more.

Later, the movie finished, turned into grey-fuzz, and then switched to the news on the television. Skeeter reached for the TV controls, gently so as not to disturb her sleeping companion, and switched it off. She lay back and closed her eyes. "We are in love," she murmured quietly.

"Mmmhmm," Clifford replied through a veil of sleep.

"Good." Slowly, Skeeter dipped into sleep, listening to his breathing.

To be continued...

 

[christyb]

I can't make it for a coupla weeks and look at what happens! He actually gets somewhere with this story! Hey Beau old buddy ol pal..could ya email this to me? Huh?