This story takes place between the events which unfold in 'Sort of Dead' and 'Sort of Deadly' respectively.
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Cody was having a bad day.
But then had you asked him how he felt on the day World War II ended he would have said the day was too windy for his taste, even though he hadn't even been a twinkle in his grandfather's eye yet.
The only memory of the only genuinely good day of Cody's life was that of his fourth birthday party, when a magician had performed all sorts of magics to the delight and amazement of young Cody. The miracle-man fetched pink butterflies out of thin air and turned his nose into a claw amongst other things.
Once Cody found out that magic wasn't real he became the grumpy person he was the day this story began.
Had you asked him how he felt on the day when his father got him the brand-new bike he had wanted for so long he would have snarled 'That's none of your business' into your face and then spat on it for good measure.
By the way, he still pedalled that bike to the {Undisclosed} grocery store of {Undisclosed} each day because he is the kind of man that collects bucketloads of coupons so he never actually has to spend any money.
Seriously. His basement is filled with buckets, and these buckets are filled with coupons.
Cody's bike is rust-eaten, the chain a stuttering rope of metal, the wheels sad and deflated. Oiling and cleaning the thing would take time — and since 'time is money' is a popular saying, and it is a universal fact that popular sayings are always 100% bang on the point, Cody decided he'd rather not spend time (and, consequently, money) doing any of that maintenance stuff.
Plus, he mused, antiques sell for hefty prices. Maybe his rusty bike would pull a millionaire out of him someday like the magician had pulled out bunnies from his hat.
Basically, you (yes, you the reader) should be glad you don't know Cody personally.
But I do, seeing as I'm the narrator of this little story, and I find him entirely too disagreeable. Like a wet blanket.
He's the kind of man that curses the wind for blowing in the opposite direction to his bike.
As he was doing presently, riding to the {Undisclosed} grocery store, having a bad day like he did every day.
Cody shoved aside a toddler and a kitten and an elderly gentleman out of his way because the brakes on his bike were not functional.
To stop the bike in front of the grocery store's entrance he smashed it into a car, and blamed the car's driver for not watching where he was going.
Cody grunted and grumbled and growled and gnarled his way to the line in front of the cashier with a brown bag full of baguettes and coupons (where he got these coupons even I don't know, and what he would do with those baguettes alone is an added mystery).
What a bad day, he had the thought that he thought all day, every day, just because the line at the store happened to be a little longer than usual.
When a woman carrying a foetus in the bump of her belly asked him whether he could hold her place in the line he snarled this word at her and made it sound like ten: 'NoOoOoOoOo.'
('No' is what he really said, for any of my readers who have an IQ slightly below average.)
(I'm sorry about what I said in the bracket above. It appears telling people about Cody is turning me into a Cody myself.)
Anyway, at last Cody reached the apex of the line and was having his baguettes billed, internally complaining about how long the cashier was taking even though the poor guy had only just started billing his baguettes — when he saw a young girl burst into the grocery store like her feet had wings.
Cody would have shouted at her and asked her to keep it down, but he was too busy figuring out what it was the young girl was trying to accomplish exactly.
She seemed to be aimlessly waving her arms around, tongue lolling out of her mouth like a beagle's, darting between aisles while Cody's batty little eyes followed her.
It's like she learnt how to walk last week, Cody thought, and, miraculously, chuckled.
(As a matter of fact, the girl had learnt how to walk the week before.)
Maybe she's chasing spirits, he thought next, and chuckled harder.
(What he didn't know was that the girl had until not long ago been a spirit herself.)
Then he stamped his jaw tight shut, because two chuckles in a row sounded too agreeable for his taste.
He paid the cashier with coupons — how, is the mystery — and hobbled out of the store on legs of lead.
He was about to mount his antique bike when the mad young girl from the store smashed into his torso.
'Watch where you're going!' Cody yelled at her as his baguettes flew out of their brown bag, along with several of his precious coupons.
(The car driver he had yelled the same thing at earlier witnessed this affray and started snickering uncontrollably.)
The mad young girl barely reached up to his chest. She had very large eyes and a glow about herself. 'Sssorry,' she chirped in a voice that would make flowers bloom. 'I wass jusst chassing it!'
'Chasing what?' Cody roared, adding: 'Never you mind, bugger off!'
'Bugger,' the girl repeated, giggling like it was the funniest word invented. 'Any-hoo, I was chassing thiss.'
The girl opened her palm and a pink butterfly flapped out of it.
Cody flinched, recoiled. He was certain pink butterflies didn't exist, not natural ones at least. He remembered the magician from the one good memory of his childhood and the butterflies he had produced. The sneer vanished from his forehead, leaving behind only its grim shadow.
'What's your name, gurrl?' he asked her.
'Gurrl,' the girl mimicked, giggling harder. 'You sound like Rassie!'
'Who's that?' Cody barked again, adding: 'Never you mind, tell me your name!'
'Es,' said the girl, grinning the widest grin Cody had ever seen. He also noticed the girl hissed every 's' sound she uttered — as you (yes, you the reader) too must have noticed by now, below-average IQ or not — except when it came to the sound of her own name.
'What kind of a name's that?' Cody questioned roughly, while his eyes grew misty, zeroed in at a distance on the pink butterfly making its escape, seemingly skate-boarding on one of his coupons.
'Names have kinds?' (Just put a hiss on all the 's' sounds by yourselves. Or don't. I'm too lazy.)
'Well, of course names have kinds! Long names, short names, English names, Russian names, evil names, annoying names, stupid names like yours which have no meaning!'
'My name isn't stoo-pid!' said Es firmly. 'Mirryamoo gave me that name!'
Cody deduced the girl must either be an orphan or an imbecile. Or else she would have exclaimed 'My father gave me that name!' or 'My mother gave me that name!' or 'My uncle/aunty gave me that name!'
Hence he felt a momentary stab of pity for her. (Or perhaps he just wanted to extract the trick of materializing butterflies out of thin air from her.)
'What's your name? Mister Frownyface?'
'None of your business.'
'Mister Frownyfacibiziness it is!'
'Where do you live?' Cody asked her.
'With Marry-wee-wee.'
Yeah, she's not all up there. 'And where does this Marry character live?'
'With me! Duh!' The girl rolled her eyes like he was the stupid one, and that made him very angry indeed.
So Cody decided he would have a word with girl's caretakers, that Mirryamoo or Marry-wee-wee character or whoever.
'Do you know the way to where you live? Wherever this Marry is?'
'Duh! I'm not dumb! I play chess! Bumble-Bee says that's not dumb, and she's the most enkylopedic person ever!'
'Do you mean encyclopedic?' Cody asked.
'I mean enkylopedic!' Es swelled up her cheeks like blowfish.
'But you do know the way?' Cody reaffirmed, just to be sure.
'Yepsee-daisy! Is that yours?' She pointed at his bike.
'Yeah, why?'
'WHOA! It looks so . . . balderdash!'
'That's not a . . . never you mind, get on the seat. We're going to have to share it, I don't have a pillion.'
So the mad young girl called Es plopped herself down on the tiny, uncomfortable terrain of the seat that was left for her. After all, Cody thought, why should I sacrifice any of my space for her?
But the girl's weight at his back felt weirdly right. Equitable. Even the bike seemed to think so, and without its standard creaking and croaking the pedal turned and the wheels squeaked and they set off.
His brown bag and baguettes and coupons were left forgotten. The woman with a human being growing in her belly for whom Cody had rudely refused to save a spot on the line gathered some of those coupons since she was to be a single mother short on money. One of those coupons happened to be a lottery ticket, which happened to have a lucky number stamped in it, which happened to win her enough for her to buy herself some nice property in {Undisclosed}. She thanked whomever had left those coupons behind for her. Surely they were an angel.
Anyway, wind whipped around Cody and his little passenger as he plunged through the lanes of {Undisclosed} almost vengefully. After all, he thought, why should I waste my time giving her a lesson? Better get this over with quick.
'Right turn here, Mister Frownyfacibiziness!' Es chirped, clutching onto Cody's stomach.
Normally he would have complained about several things here: the way she clutched onto him, the name she called him, the ecstatic voice she used. But presently he twisted the handle and swerved the bike right, drifting it across the road while vehicles honked and skidded to a halt.
The girl's hair rose to fly in a banner behind her, and sunlight caught in the banner made it seem like happy rainbows lived in every strand of her hair.
Cody bore an expression completely alien to himself. He looked how Bruce Wayne would look like if he smiled with his Batman cowl and costume still on.
'Left here! Lefty lefty leeeeft!'
Swerve, drift, skid.
They weaved their way around the city, Cody taking directions from the girl bouncing on the seat. He leaned forward in the seat so she could have more space to sit. Eventually he found he had stopped taking directions from Es and was just racing and pedaling aimlessly, hooting and whistling like he were a teenager.
The pink butterflies joined them. Flies, yes. Plural. At first two of them, then five, then a dozen, flitting just ahead of the bike like a mirage.
In a frenzy Cody drove after the flirtatious little mothballs, Es hissing encouragement stapled to his tummy.
He felt . . . happy wouldn't be the right word. Wouldn't do it justice.
Alive, I suppose, will have to do. Yes. Cody felt alive.
His bike, on the other hand, felt quite the opposite. It sputtered and resigned in a desolate lane beside a desolate looking park, grinding to a halt whereas Cody's heart thumped in his throat, a weird Joker smile plastered across his face. The butterflies poofed and vanished in front of his eyes. Maybe they'd never been there.
'Wee! Once more, pleeeaseeee!'
'The bike's given up, girl,' Cody panted, finding himself wanting to still drive the girl home — not to have sharp words with her parents but because she was an angel.
Yes, an angel. He saw it now, clear as dew can be seen on plants.
She was an angel, come to infuse life back into him. How she had done it, was as much of a mystery as how Cody managed to snag so many coupons.
'Don't worry,' Cody told the angel girl. 'I'll take you home, where is — '
'Oye! That you?'
Cody and Es both turned to find the source of this voice in a scrawny-looking boy with a prominent Adam's apple sitting all by himself on a bench of the desolate park. Even from this distance Cody could tell he had mismatched eyes, one green and the other blue.
The boy got up, waved his arms, jogged towards them. 'There you are!' said he to Es. 'Honestly, Es, how many times have I told you not to go running around by yourself?'
'Sowwy, Marrumpum,' said she, blinking her very large lashes at the boy. Then she gestured at Cody. 'This is Mister Frownyfacibiziness! He got me here like the wiiiiind!'
The boy turned to face Cody. 'Thanks, sir. I'm Marra. This is, uh . . . this is my friend. She's kind of soft in the head.'
'Am not!' Es pouted.
Marra continued like she hadn't spoken, although Cody noticed a pang of regret flash by in his eyes — he knew the look well; he sported it himself every time he looked into the mirror and saw a grumpy old fart in place of a man.
'. . . so yeah, she's new here and I'm sorry if she caused you any trouble,' Marra was saying.
Es hopped off the bike and looped her arm around Marra's waist like he were a magnet. Cody noted the color rising in the boy's cheek.
'Your bike seems in poor condition,' Marra observed. 'I could ring my Uncle, he can send someone down to pay for the damage — '
'Nah,' said Cody awkwardly. 'It's alright. I've pushed her way past her life expectancy anyway.'
'Uhm. Okay. I was just waiting for my friends — '
'Bumblebee and the Aarstar!' Es intervened, buzzing with what can only be described as perpetual excitement. Akin to a wasp whose nest has been attacked, or an overflowing lake of shiny quicksilver.
'Yes, them,' said Marra, allowing himself the thin sliver of a smile. 'You're welcome to stay with us. We mostly just fool around.'
'Yes! Yepsee! Yupsadoodle! Stay Mister Frownyface, pleeeeeaseee! Pleasy pleasy pleasy please!'
It was Cody's turn to blush. 'I'm afraid not,' said he. 'I've got work to do.' He in fact had nothing to do except sit on his couch and watch TV and sulk for hours. 'Some other day, perhaps. See you around.'
'Okay then.' Marra extended a slender arm.
Cody shook it. He was surprised at how the boy Marra, thin as a stick and ungifted in looks, conducted himself. Like he was an adult, like he had fended off far worse than embarrassing encounters with strangers.
Little did he know . . .
'Thanks, Es,' Cody said to the angel-girl. 'For, er . . . for . . . you know.'
Es frowned, the glow around her brighter than ever. 'I didn't do nuffink,' she sang. 'I just had fun!'
An hour later Marra and Es were joined in the park on the bench by three newcomers: a similarly scrawny-looking boy who wouldn't stop quipping, a girl with a red nest on her head, and a quadriplegic beagle.
Marra told these newcomers how a kind soul had dropped Es off safely to him, bless the man. Then they played blind man's buff, then Aar impersonated Missus Lizard Thinny (L.T) the school librarian like the true actor he was, then he got scolded by Bee for said impersonation, then they all started feeling hungry so collectively they retreated to Mr. Om's mansion for some applecake.
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The only reason Gaba was fat: he stole a lot of lunchboxes from the kids enrolled in the {Undisclosed} School of {Undisclosed}, and, because even bullies have a code, he had to consume all the meals that he stole.
He had dropped out of the {Undisclosed} School of {Undisclosed} now, however. How could he stay there after the tantrum that Marra's ghost had caused? That had seemed like a warning . . . if he stayed there, what else could happen . . .
And in the new school in which he had enrolled he wasn't the bully, rather the bullied.
You know, thanks to his huge gut.
So the Great And Big Abomination (GABA, for short) spent his nights crying into his pillow. His old jock friends and fellow bullies the Gabocks would be deeply disappointed in their former leader.
Anyway, this one afternoon Gaba was at the grocery store wearing a hoodie so none of the bullies at his new school would spot him and subsequently pick on him — when he saw a strangely familiar young girl burst into the grocery store like her feet had wings.
She seemed to be aimlessly waving her arms around, tongue lolling out of her mouth like a beagle's, darting between aisles while Gaba's batty little eyes followed her . . .
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The End.
It felt good writing about these characters again from a different approach.
What did you think of this story?
Anyway, stay safe, stay alive!
(. ❛ ᴗ ❛.)