joegoda | A bit of writing...

One twinkly bright morning, with the very last of the shiniest stars peeking through the breakfast kitchen window, one of the smallest and thinnest starbeams fell upon the coffee in a hot cup. It bounced upon the ripples and smattered and shattered itself against the rim, which tossed the starbeam high into the air, where it flared briefly before winking away. As it flicked to the next place it went, which was a place where it was not a starbeam, it giggle and it laughed.

This dance did not go unknown by the person standing at the table. He briefly laughed himself, at the interplay of light and shadow, at the merrymaking of an errant beam of star. He chuckled at the reaction of the cup of coffee, which looked, for all the world, disgruntled at the impolite intrusion. The coffee in the cup paid no mind whatsoever, and just chalked it up to 'one of those things'.

The person at the table shook his newspaper and went back to reading. Same old news, same old people, same old place. He gently folded the paper on its crease and placed it on the table. "Nothing ever really happens here," he grumbled and sighed. His voice was a deep bass, not quite a profundo, but most definitely a commanding barrel roll of a voice, tumbling down the steep hill of his chin and spill across the field of his chest to fall onto the floor, bouncing and rebounding against the walls, the ceiling, making the windows vibrate with the bass notes, and finally, finally, escaping out the open door into the rest of the small house. To say his voice carried would be an understatement. Worse, it would be criminal, it should be a felony, it could be called murdering the language, so small was the phrase to encompass the depth and breadth of the tenor of his voice.

His front foot stamped the ground in irritation. It was an unconscious act, something that he did not because he recognized he was irritated, but because his foot recognized that he was irritated, but didn't really want to bother his mind with it. His foot was irritated at the sameness of the place. Birth rate was normal, which meant very few births. Crime was pretty much non-existent, which happens when all the people are well fed and fairly happy.

Oh, granted there was the occasional scuffle between two males over who was supposed to be standing where, and the every so often word exchange between competitor quilters over which style to use; Ralli, Sashiko, Trapunto, or just old fashioned toss it together and see how it turns out quilting.

Sometimes it would just be nice if something odd would happen. Something out of the ordinary. Something that the elected mayor of a town would officiate over. There was that interesting group that came by about three years ago. Musicians, travelers, armed, possibly dangerous. Now that was something. They lay over in the town and played and drank and ate and played some more. It was an event!

And it was three years ago.

He sighed again, and his front foot pawed the ground. His rear foot stamped in agreement, and his mind ignored both of them.

"Petey!" A feminine version of his, not quite as deep, but exactly as flowing and a bit more fluty, drifted in from the front room. "Peety! Are you in the kitchen?"

"Yes, mother." Peter, mayor of Underhill, Pete to his friends, Petey to his mother, and Mister Mayor to everyone else, called over his shoulder. He stared out the window at the garden of flowers. Time to be weeding. "I'm still in the kitchen. I'm just about done, though." He coughed, once. "Did you need something?"

A woman's face, deeply lined around equine nose and mouth, poked itself around the doorframe. Delicately boned, with a wide flat brow, almond shaped green eyes under tildes of eyebrows, and long flowing hair the color of deep mahogany shot with silver, pulled back behind pointed ears.

"Could you start some of that green mint tea brewing?" A tiny cough erupted behind long and fragile looking fingers. "I think the damp is getting to me, again."

"Yes mother." Peter moved to the wide cook top of the large wood burner and took the white porcelain tea kettle it's place at the back. It was decorated with tiny purple flowers, his mother's favorite. The little wooden knob on the top of the kettle was also a purple, so it didn't feel left out of the motif. There was a coiled wire handle looping across the top, with a wooden grip, so the holder wouldn't find their hand permanently marked with the straight line of a burning hot wire handle.

"Would you like a little mosstamp in it?" he asked over his shoulder. "It'll help you perk up."

"Oh, that would be lovely," his mother said. "Thank you very much."

"You're welcome."

Peter reached into the herb cupboard to the left of big wood burner and pulled a small pinch of darkly greenish fuzz from a small canister. He sniffed it, inhaling it's pungent dark earth scent through broad nostrils that flared. Mosstamp was a slightly addictive narcotic, a stimulant, which relieved pain, created a mild euphoria, and was regarded as not exactly welcome among the more polite members of Underhill. Well, it was his mother, after all. Arthritis was not a joyous thing, and if it took away her pain and helped her smile through her days, so be it. He crumbled it into dark tea and took it to his mother.

She stood by a large bay window, which was open to the morning breeze. She accepted the tea and gently sipped it, being careful to blow on it before she supt. The wispy tendrils of steam wafted gently away from her and out the window to mingle with the already damp and dewed air. The years and lines melted away with early morning aches and she, once again, became the woman Peter remembered from his boyhood.

"You're good boy, Petey," she said. "And a good man." Turning her head from the green and misty view, she gave her son an appraising look. "And, I would imagine, quite bored with all of this."

Peter tried to hide his surprise, but then he stopped. He wasn't even sure why he was surprised. His mother seemed to know ever thing that went through his mind. Such is the way with mothers; they seem to have a sixth sense about their children. It could be attributed to being gifted with mind reading, or it could simply be that they raised 'em, so they knew 'em better.

"Oh, now, there's no need to pretend." The old woman nodded as she admired the reds and yellow peaking up at her from her garden. "I've been watching you for a very long time, you know." She laughed gently. "Since you were born, I'd say."

"Now, mother," he began, gently placing a hand on her flank. She reached her own hand back and placed it over his. She turned and leveled her brown eyes at his.

"Don't you now mother me, Peter." She smiled gently. "Don't you think I know that you long to get out of this little place? Mayor or not, you want for something..." She paused. "Bigger, I guess. More adventurous." She turned back to her garden. "Your father was like that, so it would be foolish to assume you would be any different."

An uncomfortable silence descended. His mother broke it first.

"You know, when you're out at your meetings and such, I've been having company." A smaller, more brief pause, the sort of pause a mouse would take to snatch a cheese, the sort of pause that is used for the inhaling of a breath. "Male company."

"What?" Peter was now truly surprised. "Who?"

"Mister Hanson, the shoer." She turned completely from the window, her brown hair flowing like a small river as she turned. She had a shy and mischievous smile on her face and her eyes were shining. Perhaps it was the mosstamp. Perhaps it was... not. "He seems to like me quite a bit."

"Hmm." Peter hummed. This may become either an opportunity or a quandary. Mister Hanson, though not a wealthy person, was a well liked person. Peter, himself, liked him. The quandary would be that Mister Hanson was not a young man, either. They would be two old people, together. Wait a moment! Was Peter already thinking about the two of them... you know. Living together.

"He's asked me to move in with him." His mother answered the question that was obviously running across his face.

Well, that certainly answered that. So, the quandary would be "But, mother! You're both..." he stopped, letting the thought fade like the morning mist outside.

"We're what?" she asked. "We're mature?" She stamped a foot and wandered outside to the garden. Peter followed. "We're old, you mean." She crossed her arms over her breasts. "That may be true, Mister Mayor, but we're certainly not dead. I could tell you stories..."

"Please don't." Peter said, hands raised in protest.

His mother laughed, a musical sound that brought the birds down from the trees. "Oh, don't you worry. I won't regale your young ears with the tales of out of breath lovers."

"Mother!"

She laughed even more. She let the wind blow her hair around before she continued. "So, you see, there's not much of a problem here. The only problem I see that you have is that you are Mayor. And if you are going to go on wild adventures, you will have to address that won't you?"