Note: This story is not in my usual continuity, but was written for Wendip Week 2021 for the prompt "Lost Key."
Locks and Socks
The Pines twins were five. This was long, long ago,
On a cold winter day—but there was no snow,
Not down in Piedmont, but there fell a cold spray
From clouds hanging dull, low, and dark gray
And it looked like they'd have no fun on that day.
"Oh me! Oh my! Oh, woe, woe, woe, woe!"
Said Mabel, whose usual outlook was so
Upbeat and cheerful that her brother Dipper
Asked, "What's the matter?" sounding quite chipper.
"Are you mad? Are you nuts?" his sister demanded.
"We can't play outside! I don't think I can stand it!"
"Cheer up," Dipper said. "We can still play inside,
Games like Parcheesi or seek-and-go-hide,
Or watch TV cartoons, or find our own nook,
And sit there and go through a great picture book!"
"What?" Mabel cried. "Tish tosh! That's absurd!
I guess I must face it—my brobro's a nerd!"
"I have an idea," said Dipper to her. "You'll see!
Days ago, out with Mom, I found an old key—
A mysterious key! Who knows what it unlocks?
I hid it away in the drawer with my socks!"
(That, children, is when a poet pulls out the stop
And gives to his reader a neat title drop!)
"That sounds like a bore," Mabel complained.
"I'd rather have weevils boring into my brain!"
"Don't be like that. I'd like to suggest,"
Said Dipper, "that we go on a quest!"
The rain fell harder. It was just forty degrees!
Eight degrees lower, and that rain would freeze!
It was heavy-coat-weather, too chill for a sweater,
But Mabel could think of no plan any better,
So the twins found the lock—an old-fashioned thing,
All alone, by itself, with no friends on a ring.
It was too fat and long to fit the Pines doors,
Or my doors or their doors, or any of yores.
But Mabel perked up. She said, "Eureka!
This is a magic key. We have to seek a
Magical gateway that this key might fit—
Let's go to the bathroom and we'll look for it!"
Dipper was scared of germs. Look in the toilet?
He supposed he could take the key later and boil it,
So he went along when his sister wound
Tissue paper round her head, round and around,
Her resemblance to mummies was rather disturbing,
But Mabel explained, "See? This is a turban!
Give me the key. Hey, I'm Mystic Mabel!
We'll unlock the future if I'm anyhow able!"
They turned out the lights. In there it was dark!
No glimmer or glow, no gleam, and no spark!
Holding the key, Mabel chanted a chant,
"Abra-ca-presto! Vootie! Ali-ka-zant!
With this magic key, now will I unlock
Both of our futures, prepare for a shock!
Magica-poozis, mystaca-dee!
O spirits, reveal our future to me!"
"I don't know about this," her brother objected.
"Magic can be much worse than you've suspected!"
But Mabel shushed him with a shush-shush-shush-shush!
"The mirror is glowing, Dip! Be quiet now! Hush!
Mirror, I command you, by Merlin's beard hairy,
Show us the person that Dipper will marry!"
Dipper felt hot. He felt cold. He saw then with his surprised eyes
That something glowed faintly and it seemed to rise
Up in the mirror there over the sink—
At first it was purple, and then it was pink,
And then sort of greenish, and then very slow,
It turned into a picture and started to glow!
Her hair was so flowing, so red and so long,
Her eyes were deep green and sweet as a song,
Her nose tip-tilted, and there on each cheek
Were clusters of freckles. The face made him weak!
The smile was kind, but laid-back and lazy,
And Dipper asked Mabel, "Am I going crazy?
Who's that?" "Who knows?" asked his smug sister.
"Mirror, you've done Dipper. It's my turn now, Mister!
Now show me my husband-to-be,"
And then Mabel reached over and she tapped the key
On the mirror, and the image changed, lo!
A nerdy guy wearing glasses became the whole show!
"Bring her back! Bring the girl back!" poor Dipper pleaded,
But alack and alas, his pleas went unheeded.
"Agh!" Mabel said. "Take it away! I'm surrounded by dorks!
Dip, put this key back with your socks and your shorts!"
(I tried hard to rhyme it, but sometimes you can't
Do better than find a rhyme that is slant.
The effort is bitter and at times it sickens one,
'Less first name is Emily, last name is Dickinson.)
Mabel switched on the light. They looked all around,
But somehow and some way that key couldn't be found!
And some way and some how the light faded away,
And when it came back outside was a clear day.
Both Pines twins blinked, uncertain and fuddled,
And each thought somehow their minds had been muddled.
They blinked and they stared, knocked all in a heap.
They gazed at each other. "Did we just go to sleep?
Did we dream the whole thing?" asked sister and brother.
Who can say? I cannot. Nor could each or the other.
But one thing was sure—that key'd simply vanished!
Perhaps it was magic, and it had been banished
To that realm where magical things go when they're gone.
Mabel said "Good riddance." Dip said, "Come on!
That girl was so beautiful!" She said, "Good for you!
But my guy was geeky, a nerd through and through!"
In the years after they sometimes forgot
Whether the whole key business happened or not.
Sometimes it seemed real, sometimes just a dream,
Sometimes it seemed foggy, sometimes it just seemed.
But one thing is sure, years and years further on,
Dipper really glimpsed Wendy, and his heart was gone!
He felt that he knew her—had seen her, somewhere,
Somehow and some way, some here or some there.
And when she promised him something, his heart did a flip,
'Cause with a smile she zipped up her lip,
And then—could it be? What did Dip see?
With a flick of her fingers, she tossed out—
The key.
The End
(Not approved by Standards and Practices or Dr. Seuss)