Muses
Abby collapsed unceremoniously on the couch in the living room, her giant purse dropping to the floor. Sir Didymus, her toy poodle, sniffed at it and after confirming it was void of food, trotted away to lie in the chair. Without opening her eyes, the young authoress mumbled the words the silent household had been waiting to hear all day.
"I wish my muses would appear, right now."
"Don't sound so happy to see us." Merlin said sarcastically, making his way into the room.
"Good brother, do not torment the fair maiden. Dost thou not see she's weak?" Sir Didymus, the real one, said from his spot next to his namesake.
"She's fine." The wizard replied, sitting down in her father's chair. "She just needs to get up."
Abby was muttering something about old age and Sam Neil when he conjured up a tea cup balancing precariously on her knee. Abby snatched the tea cup as it was about to topple and took a large gulp. As she glanced around at her friends congregating, she could help but feel like something was missing.
"Why are there only two of you here?" she asked.
"How should I know? It's your mind. We don't pick the person, we just get picked." Merlin replied.
"Wait, wait. I'm here!" Kaye said, stumbling into the room. "My bad. I was trying to help this one out of some hot water." She jerked her thumb at the man standing behind her. Erik sheepishly edged into the room.
"My apologies." He said, bowing.
"Attacked by fan girls?"
"Maybe…"
"Erik that's the third time this week!" Abby huffed.
"I can't help it!" He protested.
Abby let out a groan and set her tea down on the trunk that served as the coffee table. She leaned back on the couch, making certain someone else could sit and covered her face with the pillow. Didymus, the fox, not the dog, came across the room to perch on the arm of the couch.
"What ails thee Lady Abby? What villain shall I seek? I swear on my valor as a knight, I'll rend him limb from limb. I'll-"
"Sir Didymus!" Merlin snapped. "Why not see if the child is being pursued by a villain before attacking?"
The young authoress, turned and faced the back of the couch, rotating the pillow to be under her head. Her day had gone horribly. After running errands with her parents all morning they'd decided to go out to dinner for "date night" and left her at home. The house was hot and stuffy from the afternoon's summer heat and to top it all off it was raining outside.
"If you don't intend to look at us, why did you call us?" Erik asked, leaning against the wall.
Kaye flopped down next to her friend. "Abby…? Bad day?"
"The worst!" she wailed. "I just need like five minutes of not speaking. You guys can do what you want. Don't touch the oven, Erik." A brief groan from the character in question. "And nobody open my bed room door. The other dogs are in there. We don't need another incident." She rolled over to look at Kaye.
"He seemed friendly enough!" Kaye said, holding up her hands.
"Until he tried to rip your wings off." Erik reminded.
"Yes well. You so valiantly jumped to the rescue!" she snapped.
"The only reason I didn't help is because Abby would have drawn and quartered me had I Punjabbed her dog!"
"Simba is a nice dog." Merlin offered.
"Yeah nice to you. Need I remind everyone what he tried to do to my mask?" Erik shuddered.
The character lapsed into silence watching their poor authoress in misery. Something had to be done. If she was miserable, she couldn't write anything. Or worse… lousy teen angst one shots! Before Abby could say poorly written monologue her muses had fled the room and scattered throughout the house. Too exhausted to even question, she simply buried her head in the pillow and went to sleep.
A half hour later, Abby sat up and rubbed her eyes. Someone had taken the liberty of tucking Penguin, her giant stuffed animal, in with her and tossed a blanket over their authoress. Holding Penguin, she padded into the dining room and blinked a few times at the sight before her.
"Sweet Caroline or Change…" she gasped.
Across the table were various desserts, a majority of which were based in chocolate, as well as two large pizzas. Her muses stood proudly at one side of the table, beaming at the look on her face.
"We thought you'd be hungry-" Kaye began.
"-so I conjured up some food-" Merlin added.
"-and a piano which I'll be playing after we eat." Erik finished.
"Don't forget me!" Sir Didymus said, leaping onto the table.
"Right and Didymus managed to clean up the table and the kitchen." Kaye said.
"Aww you guys didn't have to do this." Abby said, taking a seat at the table.
"Yeah we did." Kaye said, sitting next to her. "We were worried that you'd lose you will to write. Which could only lead to one thing…"
"Lousy teen angst one shots?" Abby prompted.
They all shuddered.
After a splendid meal and some good music, they settled in the living room to discuss Abby's next writing move.
"Well you're very backed up on Time of My Life." Erik said, his gloved fingers tapping the keys of the laptop.
"I know. I think I wrote myself into a corner." Abby responded, finishing off her bowl of ice cream. "We'll discuss ideas for that in a minute."
"And The Importance Of needs to be updated." Kaye reminded. "Your readers want to know what happened with Riley and Abby."
"Oh and you might want to add another installation of Cappie's Girl." Merlin added.
"Ugh. I'm swamped…" Abby sighed.
"Abby don't make me sick the sporks on you again. They're a little angry after you called them deformed spoons…"
"Alright! I'll see what I can do."
"Abby!" a voice called. "We're home."
Everyone jumped up.
"I wish my muses back to their stories, right now!" Abby whispered.
"Abby?" her mother began, coming into the room. "Why is there a half eaten chocolate cake on the kitchen counter?"
"Um…"