Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters.
Author's Note: This is a thank you fic, for the reviews, favorites and followings, but most especially for your contributions in reaching a thousand views this month. So enjoy and feel free to let me know what you think.
A Thousand Smiles
1956
"Dad!" Abe called hoarsely from his room, the soft sound awakening the intended recipient. Henry climbed out of bed, careful not to wake the blissfully slumbering Abigail, and made his way to abe's room. "Dad..." a groan emanated from the bed. He'd been brought home from school sick two days earlier.
"What's the matter, Abraham?" Henry asked, putting a hand to his son's hot forehead.
"My stomach hurts, and i'm really cold, and my throat's sore." Abe said, describing his symptoms with the ease of a doctor's son.
"Let's see what we can do about that." Henry got a cartagen to add another layer for the boy; then gave Abe another spoonful of cough syrup, the taste of which earned a facial scrunch of disgust. Sitting on the bed, he began to tuck Abe snuggly in. "Better?"
"My stomach still hurts." Abe whined, clutching the area in question.
1788
"Henry, are you alright?" His mother asked with concern of her son, shivering from illness.
"No. My stomach hurts and I don't feel well."
"I have the perfect remedy for that. It's guaranteed to make you feel better, and all you have to do is smile one thousand times."
"But what is there to smile about?" He asked.
"Well, how about this? You were just a baby and your great aunt Margaret was holding you. She was talking and you were playing with a lock of her hair. With a good tug the entire wig slid off her head." She recalled, unsuccessfully restraining a laugh.
"Is that why great aunt Margaret doesn't like me?" He asked, grinning himself and already feeling better.
"Yes, I should think so." Her laugh finally escaping in full.
"I think I have the perfect cure. It's a game called One Thousand Smiles. Would you like to play?" He knew Abe's love of games would draw him in.
"How do you play?" The boy's interest gained.
"The players recall amusing memories until they've smiled a thousand times. I'll start us off. You were four and the three of us had gone on a picnic. There was a toad, in which you had taken quite the interest, and were trying to capture. In an attempt to escape, it jumped into a pond; however this proved futile, as you proceeded to jump in right after it." Henry, already smiling, watched as Abe's expression went from sickly to a smile; likely recalling the muck of a pond in the way only small boys can. "Your turn."
Abraham thought for a moment before his eyes lit up. "Last week when you came in and stepped on my jacks in your barefeet! And you fell in your face, holding your foot." Henry did not this particular instance amusing; but Abe obviously did, and the boy boy's glee caused him to grin. "Your turn!"
"Let's see. How about this one? They first time you got a note from your teacher for me. The only reason I found out about it was that the teacher's daughter got sick. I found the note in my copy of Crime and Punishment, the next day." Abe provided a guilty half smile which broadened at his father's look of amusement.
"When I got in trouble for arguing with my history teacher and you had to come in for a conference with her. I could hear you correcting her history until she couldn't reply, while listening through the door. She was absolutely furious about it the next day in class."
"We were still living in London at time, you weren't yet a year old. I'd taken you to the park, for a walk, when a butterfly flew past us. At the very sight of it you began wailing at the top of your tiny lungs."
In response Abe pouted."I was never afraid of a butterfly."
"I assure you it was quite amusing." Henry continued. Abe relented and cracked a smile.
"Two summers ago when you left me in England." Henry gave him a slightly annoyed look at the reappearance of this subject, which quickly disappeared. "Well English food is disgusting. How did you eat that stuff? I would feed what I couldn't eat to the dog under the table."
"Here's one. When you were smaller, you would tell little stories with animal crackers, acting out the stories using the crackers."
"I got a kite stuck in a tree, and it wouldn't come out. Then you climbed the tree to get it and brought it back down. You almost fell out reaching for it." Henry smiled at the delight that his son found in his near death.
"One day you were chasing a squirrel in Central Park. Suddenly it stopped running away, turned around to face you. It then attacked you. New York squirrels are much bolder than London, like just about everything else."
"I never did like squirrels."
"That's probably why."
"Here's one. You were going to be late coming home so I thought I would make you some for when you came home. I'd never made tea but I'd watched you do it, so I did the best I could. I put in the tea leaves and the water and put it on the stove. When it whistled, I tuned it down until you came home. Then I brought a cup in for you. You didn't like it." He said, half accusingly half jokingly.
"It was over-brewed, tasted burnt, and had bits of tea leaf floating in it." Henry explained, apologetically.
After several more hours of continued storytelling another, sweeter, laugh joined their own from the doorway. Abigail stood watching the two boys on the bed. "Come join the game, Mom!" Abe called to her.
"What game would that be?" Abe quickly described the fundamentals. "I've got a great one. After we met, a couple of days later, your father finally worked up the nerve to ask me out on a date. We went to a lovely little restaurant. However, it turned disastrous when there was a fire in the kitchen. After escorting me safety out, your father went back in. He come out with the semi-conscious cook on one arm and a basket in the other. In the basket was: a bottle of wine, two wine glasses, a loaf of bread, a knife, half a wheel of cheese, and a table cloth. We had dinner on the sidewalk that night, the fiery glow of the restaurant down the street a ways." Abigail smiled, remembering the romantic meal, and Abe smiled at the idea of his father going into a burning building and coming out with a rescued man. "Wasn't that a nice evening, Hen-" she began, turning to look at her silent husband to find him asleep. When Abigail had joined the game, taking his place, he had fallen to the whims of sleep deprivation, which youth had spared Abe from. Having followed his mother's attention, Abe smothered his laugh. in a louder voice, she added. "Or the time he slept through my story!" On the last word she nudged Henry hard enough to wake him with a jolt.
"What?" He asked, still in a haze and very confused, as his wife and son laughed.
"How are you feeling this morning, honey?" Abigail asked her son, placing a hand on his much cooler head.
"I'm hungry." He stated.
She smiled, whatever Henry had done seemed to have worked, his condition seemed much improved. "That's good. I'll go fix you something for breakfast."
Once she left, abe looked to his tired-looking father. "Thanks, Dad!"
He smiled in acknowledgement. "Forever at your service, Abraham." He said standing, and giving a small bow as he spoke.