Love Short Story – The red and purple mountains of Neverland
Photo credit: taliesin from morguefile.com
It was just another day in Neverland. The same sunlight, the same wind, the same trees, the same mountains that no one even noticed anymore. The same streets, the same markets, the same kids running around. And then, in an instant, everything changed.
Our protagonist, let us call him DooDoo, was walking along the road leading to the market. It had taken him abundant time to reach the conclusion that no matter how hard he tried, his problems just wouldn’t go away. His mother would still keep treating him like a kid, his father would always be firm that he was a buffoon, and his friends would always keep mocking him for his clumsiness.
And so, it was with exactly the opposite of hopefulness optimism (which are always the defining characteristics for at least one of the players in a love story) were so completely removed from him that he no longer saw the half filled glass, rather, he just contemplated suicide by dehydration.
And so, it was with a considerable amount of shock that he saw DeeDee, wearing a red hat on top of a red dress with red lipstick and red shoes, with red painted nails no less, staring at him without blinking an eye. Now, DeeDee was a well known character in her own right: she could look at the sun without closing her eyes for absurdly long periods of time, she would sit for hours on end without saying a word and then suddenly launch on a monologue on the benefits of an alien invasion and how it would protect the human species, and was also sometimes seen on the outskirts of Neverland, where it was rumoured (although it is the habit of society to spread rumors about pretty young maidens, especially when they have a penchant for the colour red) that she went to the rock lying at the absolute end of the mountain edge and sat there, making bird calls and, some even went so far as to say, calling the mountains beautiful.
Back to the marketplace, where our not-so-handsome hero was fumbling with the sudden influx of blood in his cheeks and ears (DeeDee also had the superpower of inducing the colour red in others whenever she wished to). His first reaction was to check his hair and ensure they were in their proper place (his mother made sure he never left the house without getting his hair combed with almond oil, a fact she was immensely proud of), next, he straightened his clothes and made sure that no saliva had found its way out of his mouth. When he found that even his nose had not betrayed him by running at this inappropriate time, he came to the absolutely unbelievable conclusion that, without a doubt, she was indeed looking at him, despite the fact that there was nothing wrong with him.
DooDoo, in a motion that was partly motivated by a desire to avoid scrutiny and partly by his father reproaching him for thinking that it was even possible that someone would notice him and not laugh, hurried to the flower stall nearby to buy a garland. However, as destiny had decided that he was not to be let off easy, in his hurry, he knocked over the stall, and, being in a state of a wandering asteroid without a definite address, fell down to the floor, bringing down with him, to such a great amazement of even the cows nearby that they stopped chewing for a ten seconds, not only the entirety of the stall but also the stall owner and his assorted collection deities on a nearby shelf.
The previously mentioned influx had, by now, made his entire face a bright crimson, that, coupled with the rolls of fat on his double chin, gave him a look of an alien from a planet populated entirely by bipedal tomatoes. The market had found a reason for a break from routine in this form of cookie-shaped destruction on two legs, and, as a result, was standing still, observing what happened next.
But now, DeeDee, in her red flip flops, made her way towards our fallen misshaped angel, and offered her hand, a gesture which was unanimously considered shocking, and at the same time, expected, from her. Reluctantly, DooDoo took her hand and stood up, managing to knock down the few remaining photos of deities that had somehow managed to escape his attention.
“Can’t you walk straight?” asked DeeDee, with just a hint of surprise and also some judgement in her voice.
“I was trying to, before I noticed you staring at me from over there,” replied our brave hero, not to be outdone in this battle of the weird.
“I was staring because…..because you are an idiot”, she said, and stomped away, leaving DooDoo wondering, with a mind that was not so secretly going red too, what just happened.
That night, when the trees were silent, when the mountains were but distant shadows, when the streets were empty save for barking dogs, DooDoo was lying awake in his bed, thinking about the incidents at the market, when he heard something thrown at the window. Jumping up, for he was extremely scared of being not able to get out of the house quickly enough in case of an earthquake, he went to the window, and with some relief, saw that everything was stable. But the sound? Opening the window, he saw a thin stick like figure standing in the shadows, a figure he realized immediately to be the same familiar one that had been the reason of his literal downfall earlier.
Seeing DooDoo come up to the window, DeeDee came out of the shadows, and, in a voice that was equal parts irritating and enchanting, said, as if it was the obvious thing to do, “Wanna come see the mountains?”
DooDoo, who previously held the firm belief that he was crazy, now slowly began to question the purple clad woman’s sanity. “Why? What is to see? They are the same as they were yesterday, and the day before….Why see them?” he asked.
“Because they aren’t the same. They change everyday, just like you and me,” she replied.
DooDoo decided to accompany her to the mountains, just so that he could make sense of the cryptic statement.
The road to the mountains was filled with tense silence, mixed with curious looks on both sides from both the parties. Finally, when they neared the rock at the edge, DeeDee stopped, pointed to the rock, and said, “Let’s sit there.”
DooDoo sat at the edge of the rock, in hopes of concealing the fact that, like many other things, he was terrified of heights. DeeDee, who seemed to know every inch of the rock like the back of her nose (for she spent more time picking her nose than doing anything else), moved confidently to the outer edge and sat down.
“So here we are. The mountains. Black sky. Owls. Shadows. Vertigo. What’s so special?” asked DooDoo.
“Why do you live?” asked DeeDee.
DooDoo by now was sure of the fact that DeeDee had completely lost it, and resented his decision to come there. Still, he replied, “To be made fun of. Also so that I can buy garlands.”
“That’s all?” asked a visibly surprised DeeDee. “You don’t look at the trees? The birds? The sun? The MOUNTAINS? Nothing?”
“No,” replied DooDoo.
DeeDee, without warning, grabbed him and kissed him. DooDoo, unable to comprehend this sudden movement, reacted by trying to push her away, and ended up giving her a bloody nose. DeeDee reeled back. DooDoo, dazed more by the motive for the kiss than by the kiss itself, was silent for a while. Suddenly, he looked at the mountains. They weren’t monotonous anymore. In fact, they were anything but monotonous. They were starting to look…..beautiful.
DeeDee said, “Now maybe you will see the beauty.”
And DooDoo did indeed saw the beauty. Only, it wasn’t the beauty of the mountains. It was the beauty of the woman, nay, girl, sitting next to him in the purple dress with purple earrings. Suddenly, he realised why she came there everyday. Suddenly, he realised why she insisted on picking her nose in front of the entire market. Suddenly, he realised why she was different. Suddenly, he realised, he wasn’t alone anymore in his world of weird.
And that, my friends, is how Neverland now has not one, but two, weirdoes going to the mountains and sitting on that rock instead of one. And why the mountains now don’t feel so alone anymore either.
–END–
