Trailer Trashed: A Severely Fractured Fairy Tale

Trailer Trashed: A Severely Fractured Fairy Tale (1)

"Heya C.T., you're lookin' purty today," he hollered once he was close enough for me to hear. I winced. The twang was painful, particularly when coupled with him slapping a sweaty palm on my forearm and doubling over, panting and blowing like a rhinoceros that had run a triathlon.

"I'm assuming this is yours?" I shook the disc. Jimbo hissed at Ralph from underneath the trailer.

"Yup, Darlene brought over Bobbie and Benji and her newest, Dorothy Ann." Ralph took the Frisbee and patted me again, although I tried to get out of range. The steps were in the way, so I just had to put up with it. I felt myself assuming my usual expression around others, a blank, noncommittal frown, as I straightened and stuffed my hands into my front sweatshirt pocket.

Darlene was Ralph's younger daughter, somewhere in the middle of his five children. The only other daughter Ralph had was Mindy, who was thirty-eight and lived near the entrance to the park.

Mindy had three children of her own, none hers. She took in a lot of strays, including people-Susan, sixteen, Britney, twenty three, and Britney's six-year-old Eleanor.

Darlene, however, was the stereotype to match her father. She'd been on her high school cheerleading squad for exactly three weeks when she'd gotten pregnant after a fling with one of the sports players. The result? Bobbie and Benji. I have no idea who Dorothy Ann's father was.

I was less than enthusiastic about meeting the new baby, since Darlene had never really liked me.

Jimbo growled from under the trailer. I shushed her with a look. She scowled back.

"Come meet Dorothy. She's cuter 'an a button," Ralph continued, oblivious. "She was down with 'er mum earlier, with Mindy, an' she an' Eliner was playin' a game. They was havin' a great time, 'til Darlene brought 'em up 'ere to pick up the boys."

I valiantly kept my eyes from crossing. While I'm not socially awkward, I can be more sarcastic than a situation warrants, and this was one of those situations. If I didn't watch myself I would say something that I would not regret but would likely get me in trouble.

Luckily, the screeches of Bobbie and Benji fighting over something drew Ralph away before I had to say anything at all. He took off down the slope again at a chunky gallop, narrowly avoiding a face full of tree when he slid on the damp ground. I snickered to myself anyway; I was gifted with a fertile imagination and a sense of humor that allowed me to find immense merriment in a fat man face-planting into foliage.

I jangled the keys in my front pocket and Jimbo, sensing it was safe, slunk out from beneath our trailer and patted my shin, looking to be picked up. I bent.

"YAARGH!"

"Aagh!" I screamed as I lurched across the yard, legs flying over my head, with Jimbo surgically attached to my chest. With enough presence of mind to know squishing her wasn't good for the babies, I took the full impact on my back, my head thwacking against the moss and sending starbursts of white light off inside my brain. For a minute or two my vision was dotty and swimming and I thought I saw a horse, which was hilarious because I haven't seen a horse since I went to the zoo in fifth grade.

I would have laughed, if laughing hadn't felt like I was scooping my chest out with a serving spoon.

"Hail, lad, art thou harmed?"

"I'm a girl," I said instinctively, before I remembered that 1) no one talks like that, and 2) I'd just spoken to what was very likely a hallucination brought on by being severely concussed. Oh, and 3) that said hallucination was of a horse.

Jimbo sat on my chest, looking down at me with concern, then up at the horse with even greater concern.

That was when I figured out there was something on top of the horse, and it was getting off. With a thump, the thing on the horse stood on the ground and walked towards me, making some kind of squeaky metal-on-metal noise with every step. As my eyes started to clear, I saw the leaves falling, the pines swaying and dropping needles that twirled in a fierce gust that hadn't been there before.

The thing that had previously been on the horse crouched over me, all shining silver like a giant aluminum can.

"Prithee, where am I? I apologize for riding into you, but I saw you not 'til I heard thy cry."

My forehead and temples felt hot, but I forced myself over onto my stomach and then up, onto my hands and knees. Jimbo had hopped off the minute I moved and sat by my side, examining me with her eyes. "Maow?"

"Give me a second, Baby Girl," I mumbled. Okay, time to figure out what the hell had just happened. Sucking in a breath, I swung my head up.

WHACK!

The back of my skull connected with something, something that made those starbursts reappear, and before I knew it I crumpled into a moist, blank sea, like someone had pulled the curtains over my mind.

"...Lad? Come now, awaken! Linger no longer in sleep, I require thy aid!"

The thing's panicky voice rang in my ear. Blacking out wasn't abnormal, especially after receiving two exceptionally hard knocks on the head, but clawing my way back into consciousness involved a great deal of self-talk. I was scared half to death-was I bleeding? Was my head filling with blood? Was my brain drowning? Had I already died?

And then Jimbo climbed on my back and sat there.

Nope, not dead.

With that thought, I pushed my head up and glowered over my shoulder at my pregnant cat. "Get off," I snarled through a mouthful of dirt, leaves, and a pebble in my lip.

Jimbo just stared at me.

"Baby Girl."

With a swish of her tail, she jumped off my spine, belly swinging from side to side. How many kittens could she possibly be having? Were we talking Guinness Book of World Records?

Blinking hard, I checked where I was, then where the thing was. I folded my legs Indian-style underneath me and closed both hands over the kiwi-egg on the back of my head. It felt... huge, maybe an ostrich rather than a kiwi egg.

The thing was nursing its chin with a perplexed look on its face. 'It' was a 'he' in a suit of armor.

"Hail," he said, although he was obviously trying not to use his jaw too much.

Okay, maybe I was dead. Dead was better and less confusing than staring at a knight in shining armor whose white horse was eating the flowers in my mother's window box.