Excerpt: Saratoga Tales

The teacher surveyed the room, preparing to select the next tale – teller. His attention settled on an intertwined couple hidden in a corner, who (seemed to pay) paid no attention to their surroundings, so focused on themselves were they. This couple was well known for displaying their affection in public, so madly were they attracted to each other. Their faces were rarely visible, merely the backs of their heads and their interwoven arms, clutching each other tightly. Friends had long ago glued their names together to form a seamless composite, imitating their flawless imitation of those limpets that cling without pause or fail to the sides of rocks under the abuse of the cruel waves. The girl of the couple always showed her sense of style in impeccably fitted jeans and endearing jackets. Her hair began the day combed into a shining ponytail, often let loose by her boyfriend during their embraces. Whenever he slipped off her ponytail holder, she pulled away from him just long enough to expertly return her hair to its pristine condition. Indeed, she was an expert in the area of rapid hair styling. Her boyfriend looked like most high school boys, with baggy jeans and a loose tee – shirt until the weather dictated an equally baggy sweatshirt. Cut to less than an inch from his scalp, his hair greatly resembled that of a fuzzy dog, and was much petted by his friends, particularly his girlfriend. He spoke seldom, preferring to let life pass by and only joining in when it particularly interested him. It was at this couple that the teacher directed his next remarks.
“Perhaps one of you would care to tell a story?” he asked, pointedly suggesting that they detach their lip lock and become a part of the group.
“Can we tell it together? It’s something we have a lot of fun doing once in a while, when we’re bored. It can be quite amusing, or just a little different.”
“Ah, certainly.” Anything, he thought, to keep them apart.
Here begins the PDAing couple’s tale:

The girl started off, her mellow tones sparked with humor. “Once, long ago in a town far away,”
“there lived a man named Bob.”
“Bob subsisted on dewdrops and the new tips of Douglass Fir needles. He –“
“had retired from humanity on the occasion of his forty fifth birthday, determined to”
“grow old and grey in peaceful isolation. For many years, his peace was disturbed by nothing besides the occasional”
“telephone man or lost traveler. He cheerfully helped everyone who stopped by, not minding the contact that came perhaps once or twice a year.”
“One cool spring day, Bob sat out in his front yard, resting on a moss – covered old car and creating an elaborate”
“origami statue, the likes of which decorated his house, some nearly as tall as he was. He kept an entire room filled with paper, ready for molding into whatever inspired him.”
“But we digress.” The girl smiled at her boyfriend. “That day, he was working on a life – size fox, adjusting its whiskers, when suddenly, from behind him sprang a voice.”
“’Hey, old man, what’s up?’”
“He jumped. “What? Who are you, and what are you doing here?”
“Name’s Joanie. I’m here ‘cause I feel like it. Got a problem?”
“Nooo, I guess not. Um..”
“Watcha doing?”
“I – I’m folding a statue of a fox.”
“Joanie poked at the statue, putting a dent in its carefully crafted side.”
“Hey! Watch it! Now I’ll have to redo the whole thing.”
“So?”
Their audience laughed as the couple got into the story, small body movements accompanying their words. The room rolled with laughter as the boy raised his eyebrows, mimicking the little girl he was voicing. He winked at them, and continued.
“It’s not like you’ve got anything else to do, right?”
“I’ve got lots to do!”
“Like what?”
“Like, like making this, ah, finding wood to build a fire so I can have my dinner, getting my dinner ready, enjoying the evening, something I am currently having a little trouble with!”
“Joanie shrugged. ‘Why not?’”
“You’re not letting me! If you’d bug off, or at least be quiet, that might help.”
“You’re assuming I want to be helpful.”
“Well, don’t you?”
“Nope.”
“He scowled at her, beginning to deconstruct his fox. He carefully smoothed each piece of paper, placing them
“gently in a stack, keeping the basic folds and those pieces that were not squashed. Joanie watched and occasionally stuck out a finger as if to try and
“interfere, perhaps by crushing the fragile stack. Bob batted away her hand each time, keeping his creation from further destruction.”
“Aw, come on. You’re not letting me have any fun.”
“Since when was it agreed that I’d let you have fun at my expense? I never even asked you to be here in the first place.”
“Joanie stuck out her tongue at him. ‘Better get used to me, I’ll be around for awhile.’”
“What? How long?”
“Until you get used to me, then I’ll leave when you most want me to stay.”
“In that case, I love having you here, please hang around.”
“Gladly.’ She grinned. ‘I’m not that stupid.’”
“Bob ignored her and put away his half – folded papers precisely stacked in their box,”
“stored on a high shelf, in the attic of his house, out of reach of the pest Joanie. He set up a fire, carefully settling the sticks into a criss – cross pattern to ensure maximum stability, and lit –“
“the kindling with a sure stroke of his waterproof match. Joanie watched, breaking in with infuriating remarks at each point when Bob needed the most of his concentration. He ignored her, determined
“to endure through her pestering, in hopes of ridding himself of her as soon as possible.”
“When he went to sleep, curled up with his ears plugged, Joanie filched a blanket from his cabinet and settled herself into a chair. She woke with the sun, leaning over Bob to check that his eyes were truly closed in sleep. She searched his cabinets, pulling out various materials, and proceeded to open each”
“and make breakfast. She left a little of everything after she had eaten, wafting the odors toward Bob.”
“He sat up, shaking himself awake in puzzlement. As he saw Joanie and the memories of the day before returned, he groaned.”
“there’s breakfast there. You so sure you want to complain right now?”
“Wha?”
“Breakfast. You know, like the stuff you eat in the morning so you don’t starve the rest of the day?”
“Right...’ He got up and munched down the food. ‘Thanks, I guess.”
“Joanie nodded. ‘Don’t expect that on a regular basis.”
“Seriously, now, how long are you staying? I’m sure you’ve got parents who would like to see you back.”
“Nope! They don’t want me, and they told me so.”
“Even if they say that, they don’t really mean it.”
“Welll, my mother threw a shoe at me and dad threatened to lock me in the shed if I came back within three months, so yeah. I think they aren’t too eager to see their daughter come back.”
“You intend to stay here the whole three months?”
“Maybe. Depends on how soon you get used to me.”
“He shrugged and climbed on a footstool to reach his little box of imagined fox. Pulling it down, he glanced at the girl. ‘You going to destroy it again today?’”
“Maybe.”
“He grunted and wandered outside, conscious of her eyes on his every move. She grinned and”
“followed him, perching on a rock barely two feet away from his accustomed seat. She flattened his fox again, and he barely restrained (himself) from slapping her as he once again disassembled the precisely pieced body. Day after day, she pestered and”
“irritated him with her endless queries and ceaseless demolition of his peaceful life. Once in a while, she would do something nice for him, shaking his concept of her as a little brat. Eventually, he adapted, as life must do to continue.”
“A few months after she had come, Joanie vanished without trace. Bob woke up relieved for a few days, then started”
“to worry. He looked for the little girl all around his territory, then ventured into the town below him to ask about her.”
“He didn’t want her back, just to know that she was safe.”
“Even the irritating need to have a place to go in times of trouble.”
“He minimized his search after a week, but never quite gave up. Every day he trekked down to town to inquire after the little girl no one had heard of but him. He didn’t find her,”
“she found him. A week and a day after she had left, Bob woke up to find her peering down at him, holding the box containing his unfinished origami fox.”
“He had not touched it since she had disappeared,”
“it seemed to have no joy without the threat of destruction.”
“I won’t crush it today.’ She smiled. ‘Heard you were worried about me.’”
“Just a little.”
“And that’s the end.”
“The end of the story, that is.”
“Life goes on after the last page.”
“We just don’t know the rest.”
The couple smiled in unison.