2 "If on a summer's night a traveler"
One of the last things you're certain you remember is checking your watch; a small part of you did indeed want to know what time it was, but you were mostly trying to take your mind off your father grumbling about how long the valet was taking.
It is 11:43 p.m. You have been awake for over eighteen consecutive hours, and you are exhausted. You would have preferred that your father chose a different night to go to the theatre, but you know that when your father makes room in his schedule for you, that that is the only time he's willing and able to share with you, and to dispute this would be asking to be removed from his timetable altogether. Besides, you are still grateful that you're only a short drive from the big city, where you can witness such fine displays of live performance in person, and grateful that you were born to parents who were well-off enough to take you and cultured enough to want to - even if your father did occasionally indulge in cathartic behaviors below his dignity, but you ignore him by checking your watch as he embarrasses himself with public profanity.
The vehicle is delivered to your feet and the valet exits the driver's door. He wears a tired smile, one of someone who either believes or wants to believe that faking a positive attitude will eventually beget genuine happiness. He nods at your father and tries to win him over with a warm, soft smile.
"You didn't turn the engine off?" your father asks. "Is that your way of telling us to hurry up and get the hell out of here? Or are you just trying to waste my gas?"
"It's for your convenience, sir. Why turn the engine off and give you the keys when you'd just put them right back in and start her up again?"
"It's a car, buddy, not a woman. I paid you upfront, correct?"
"Yessir," the valet responds with a flourish that ends with a hand extended just a bit, palm to the sky. Perhaps he's asking for a tip, or maybe it's just the gesture people make when they mean to say of course.
"Very well, then." Your father scoots right past him and takes his place at the driver's seat and closes the door. The valet takes his leave without looking at any of you, so you don't get to see whether the smile is still on his face. Your mother has already walked to the opposite side of the SUV and taken her seat in the time it took for your father to make his point. "Get in the car, son," he chides.
You open the rear driver's side door and clamber in, trying to be quick about it so you can pose a question before your father drives off. "Sir, I'm really tired. Is it okay if I take a nap in the back seat?"
"You are in the back seat."
"He means the third row," your mother interjects.
"What, do you want to lay down? We'll be home in half an hour."
"The highway's under construction," your mother reminds him. She also seems tired, but not quite fatigued.
Your father makes some gestures of his own to make clear to everybody his newfound frustration. "Of course. How could I forget? We're paying for it!" He makes eye contact at you via the rear-view mirror. "Do what you want. But if I tell you to sit up straight and put your seatbelt on, you'd better do it."
You nod and climb back into the back row, jolted a bit as the SUV jerks forward, but if anything it helps you get over the ridge. You recline in the back seat and close your eyes. You think about the splendid performance you just witnessed, but after a few minutes it strikes you as painfully ironic that you had to fight through such a strong wave of fatigue during the show, and now you couldn't sleep when you wanted to because the thoughts of the show were just too entertaining. You instead try to think of all the ways that you'll enjoy the rest of your newly-inaugurated summer vacation, and before too long you are lulled off to sleep by the peaceful thoughts. The last thing you overhear through your closed eyes is more grumbling from your father, something about how much he detests taking surface streets out of the city, but he wouldn't be caught dead paying to drive on a toll road. That's the last thing that you're certain wasn't a dream.
-IllI-
You think you're aroused from your nap by the cool summer night's air breezing in through the open windows. You didn't remember whether they were open when you left the parking lot. But before you even fully open your eyes, you know that they're open now, with the unmistakable sound of the breeze not having any competition from your silent parents, the extinguished radio, and the absence of the engines of other cars on the road. The only tires you can hear strumming along the asphalt are your own, and you see no lights out the windows. This strikes you as odd, but you're not yet ready to investigate. You first consult your watch again.
If you did check your watch, you checked it at 12:02 a.m. It is now officially Saturday morning, and therefore the first calendar date of summer vacation. This realization stirs you, so you certainly won't be getting back to sleep. You think about how you're going to make this summer count, because you weren't sure what the future would bring. Today - yesterday, now, rather - was the last day of school for the year for all the public elementary and middle schools in the suburbs; that much you knew for certain. But if your parents had anything to say about it, you would not start Lemon Brook Middle School in the fall. You would be part of the first class of sixth-graders to attend the newly-expanded Sherwood Forest College Preparatory School. Once again, you were conflicted. You were grateful to have such an opportunity to better your long-term future, you were a bit hesitant to gamble your short-term happiness. You already didn't care for having to wake up at 5:30 each weekday morning for before-school piano lessons and leadership classes, but you weren't certain if you were being immature for wanting a carefree childhood at the expense of your adulthood. But you didn't want to wrestle with this much longer, so you sat up a bit in your seat and tried to get a feel for where exactly your father was driving.
In three directions, all that could be seen out the windows was darkness. Looking toward the front of the car, your parents are both staring straight ahead through the windshield. Your mother seems almost as enthralled by the strange environment as you are; your father just looks annoyed. He doesn't see you sit up in your seat; he has a bad habit of never checking his rear-view mirror if he doesn't have a pressing reason to do so. You don't tell either of them that you're awake now because you doubt that they'll find that information to be useful or interesting.
The headlights do little better at interpreting the world around you; they show the road ahead and not much else. You do note that your father is turning the steering wheel every so often. Perhaps the motion jostled you awake? Where would he be driving that's so winding?
The highway's under construction, you recall your mother saying. And you faintly remember Sir bitching and moaning about surface streets being a lesser evil than a toll road. Could he have…? No, he would never allow himself… would he? He'd think it beneath his dignity!
Sherwood Forest Road meanders through the eponymous wildwood that separated Nottingham, Delaware from its northern and northwestern suburbs. The quintessential Road Less Traveled, almost everybody in the Delmarva Peninsula knows it as a great shortcut to circumvent the oft-congested northbound highways, but few ever exercise that ability, as its reputation of being an underserved thoroughfare is a secondary product of its primary label of a dangerous piece of pavement.
You've lost count of all the reasons why people say Sherwood Forest Road is not a safe one to travel. Some have cynical rationales about it being a place where teenagers drive like jackasses to impress one another, or where swerving drunkards think they can avoid the cops patrolling the major highways. Others have grounded, mundane explanations, saying its curviness makes it prone to accidents, or its lack of streetlights making it a difficult drive even in the daytime when the trees form a canopy of shadow, or even its sheer isolation making it a bad place to have any sort of breakdown. But you personally were always fascinated by the ones who said that unsavory types prowled these wicked woods.
The stories don't quite go back as far as you can remember, but you do know the first time you heard them dated back closer to the beginning of your short life so far. They say that on this road, you need not fear being victimized by inner-city gangbangers or methed-out rednecks, nor the mafia nor some bored psychopaths, nor some cryptozoological creature or any such entities. The tales are always specific about a finite number of recurring characters - usually two, sometimes three, infrequently as many as five - preying on passerby in cars that are a little too opulent for their tastes. What exactly their M.O. is remains a mystery, but different versions of the story insist on filling in the blank in different ways. They're madmen living off the grid. Or they're militant anarchists. Or they're cultists in need of supplies. Or maybe some combination of the above. Some even say it's a grand scheme to give back to the poor of the city.
The part of all of this that worries you the most as you sit in the backseat of a luxury SUV that would seem ripe for the picking, is that the mythos of all of this checks out on its own logic. Whether one believed the story or not, one could not deny that every base was covered. The purported modern-day highwaymen only started their operations when the first Mayor Norman resigned to accept an elected seat in Congress and, through the dark magic of big-city politics, his unfathomably less-popular brother ascended to the former's position and held a firm grasp on the city ever since, all the while gaining a reputation of cozying up with the rich at the expense of the city's lower-class (and of the middle-class, for that matter); whoever these people were wandering the woods must have thought that tormenting the rich would be the best way to give John Norman the middle finger by proxy. And if that were the case, Sherwood Forest Road would be an excellent place to set up shop. The Delaware D.o.T. doesn't want to give up on the road that lost much of its traffic thanks to a whirlwind of rumors adding up over the decades, so despite its near-abandonment, the road is far from neglected - in fact, some say that the road is taken care of far too much per its volume of traffic carried, and cite this as another piece of evidence of corruption on the part of the John Norman mayorship. The strange product of all of this is that the road is used disproportionately by the upper class, who largely do not buy the stories of vigilantes nor any of the other rumors. To the wealthy, this road is a quaint, peaceful alternative to the highway, a smooth and well-maintained thoroughfare through the wilderness, one that they can cruise slowly while they take in nature, arriving late to their jobs where they're too powerful to be reprimanded, assuming they don't own the company altogether. Most others either heed the myriad of reasons not to take Sherwood Forest Road or simply think it's too remote or impractical to use regardless, though many overlap into both camps. The road is by no means exclusively frequented by the rich, but if somebody wants to go car-watching for something fancy, it would not be a bad idea to pull over on this road and set up a canvas chair, watching the oddly-high number of widely-unaffordable cars go by, driven by people who would not hesitate to call the rumors of class-conscious highwaymen - to put it politely - "poppycock."
Your parents are among that set. You've asked them before about whether they think the legends are real, and they've always told you that they're just that: legends. They cited the young age of the stories as proof that it must be something spread by children barely older than the legends themselves, and believed only by the same adults who are too gullible to really get ahead in life. Besides, if there have been outlaws lingering in the woods down the street from your house for the better part of a decade now, wouldn't they have been caught? How long can somebody really hide in plain sight this modern world? Oh, they're just that good? Your parents don't buy it. This world now has radio and forensics and the internet for Christ's sakes; nobody can escape the powers of technology for that long. Oh, so they're soo good that they've also been doing things other than highway robbery concurrent to all of this and haven't been caught doing those things either because they're escape artists and masters of disguise? Well like what? What other acts have they done, son? What have they done? Give me specific examples, son. What have these shitstains done? What? Stop being so stupid, son; it's unbecoming of you. This is all another reason you keep quiet as you squirm in the back seat.
As you look out the open window, your eyes adjusting to the scarce ambient moonlight seeping through the trees to finally be able to make out leaves and branches, you think about the one base-covering detail of the story that you never knew whether you believed or not. It concerned the fact that there were no high-profile cases of robbery if they've happened so consistently over the years. The explanation posits that it boils down to embarrassment: either the embarrassment of law enforcement for not being able to find these guys over the course of multiple years, and-or the embarrassment of the rich people who don't want to publicly admit that they'd been taken advantage of by what was supposed to be a fictional band of misfits. You're certain that if that happened to your dad, he would be as publicly angry as he'd ever been. Surely he would raise holy hell to high heaven, demanding justice for somebody of his stature. But then again, you can totally see such image-obsessed people not unlike your parents not wanting to reveal anything that might even slightly make their lives seem less than perfect, especially if it comes at the hands of a living legend. Social stigma has a funny way of working like that.
So you lay back down in the third-row bench seats, trying not to make a noise, because while you're sure that your parents will want nothing to do with you at this hour, you don't want to take the chance that they might, and that your quivering voice will betray the burgeoning sense of horror that is growing within your heart. Or would it be a burgeoning sense of terror? Oh, such verbal confusion would be a second thing your father would ridicule you for, exploding feverishly from the driver's seat as your mother plays the part of the disinterested referee.
Would it be even worse than what the bandits would do to you?
You close your eyes. You don't expect sleep to come. But you need to try.
You imagine things that give you comfort. You're at home. You're lying in your own bed. The room is as dark as it can be, but you can still perceive everything by the light of the moon, which sits patiently outside your window, keeping guard. Four walls around you swear to protect you from anybody who may wish to intrude, and the ceiling is too prideful to let your world crash down upon you. The only sound you can hear is your own breathing, the rustling of air hitting the surfaces right below your nose. The only thing you can feel are the blanket and bedsheets that sandwich your body. The only thing you can think is of what wonderful dreams you've had in that bed before, and what amazing sights you will see in all the nights coming forward. Nothing here can hurt you.
"Oh, Jesus, what are these bums doing in the road?"
Well that certainly gets your attention.
"Mark, slow down, they don't look like bums, they're too well-dressed."
You start to sit up, but you restrain yourself just a bit, lest the sound of fur swishing against the vinyl seats gives away your wakefulness.
"Did I ask for your opinion?"
You peek gently over the seats in front of you and out the windshield. You've found yourself on one of the few straight stretches along Sherwood Forest Road, running parallel to a small river to your left.
"Sometimes you need what you didn't ask for."
Ahead, you can vaguely see that the river hangs a right and goes under the road, disappearing in the darkness beyond.
"Give me one good reason to pull over."
And right at the other end of the bridge appears to be a figure, right where the cone of light from the SUV surrenders to the darkness. But it's only one figure.
"If they were actually bums, they'd probably be passed out drunk somewhere at this hour."
You're several feet behind your parents, so your eyes are running on delay of what they're seeing, but as you draw closer you can start to better make the figure out. You can see what your parents were talking about now: there are two people standing on the road's shoulder. But one is much smaller than the other, and both are dressed rather garishly, and you realize that at first the smaller one in front blended in with the one behind him. The larger one is holding up two large objects.
"That's not a good answer."
One of the objects is now clearly a gas can. The other just looks like a sort of box.
"Tell Steven you did some charity work and he can probably get you a tax write-off."
Is the other thing just a suitcase? Why would he be carrying a suitcase? But of course you could ask why are either of these creatures doing anything in that spot at this time of night, but your mind is not exactly operating at peak productivity at the moment.
"I refuse to believe that'll work, but - apparently - you have a vested interest in me giving these people what they want. Whatever it is they want."
The larger one is waving his occupied arms. The smaller one seems to be waving a cane, but he's facing off toward the woods.
"You wouldn't tip the valet. Time to make up for your karma."
The smaller one - a pig, maybe? - is wearing sunglasses. Why would he be wearing sunglasses at night? Oh. Oh. That explains the cane. And the direction he's facing. You can never let your father know how long it took you to piece that together. He's be ashamed.
"Wait, is that one guy in front blind or something?"
Then again, maybe he's just be projecting his own embarrassment. The character up front is certainly a pig, although a strangely-shaped one, and the one in the back is some sort of brown bear. You better understand your parents' confusion: their clothes convey the fashion sense of a beggar but the spending power of a baron. On the hand, the pig has a straw hat that clashes with his smart outfit and the bear in the back is sporting one of those tacky moustache-and-wig combos that fell out of style with the elite decades ago, but on the other hand, the both of them seem to be wearing white gloves. You realize you really are close when you can make out even these fine details.
"If you're not going to pull over, at least slow down at let me talk to them from inside the car."
Something goes off in your brain and you start actually feeling glad that you're drawing closer - with every passing millisecond your father has less and less of an opportunity to stop the car at a reasonable distance, and eventually that chance will be zero percent, and then these strange figures will literally and figuratively be in your past.
"No, no, I'm not gonna do that…" your father grumbles. "...Is he still asleep?"
Your heart jumps at this, and you drop back down onto the bench seat, out of their line of sight. You even close your eyes, just for good measure. In a moment of silence, you can feel your mother turning her head around to look at you, and you wonder if she can just sort of sense that you're awake with the magical, superhero-like Mom-powers that in your youth you genuinely believed she had.
"Yeah."
Your mother is fallible after all, but so is your father's sense of judgment. You can feel the car lose speed and sway right, and it gives a little as the brakes are applied. The sound of tires on the road changes to the distinct baritone squeal of a car on a small concrete bridge, and this soon gives way to the melody of rubber running over rumble strips at the edge of the driving surface.
"If he was awake, then we'd keep driving because he'd probably freak out and think they were the Forest Bandits or… whatever the hell." You curse that this is the one time your father listens to your mother. "I'm doing this for you. And your conscious."
"Thank you. You'll probably feel better about yourself after this, too."
The tire rub slows to nothing, and you lurch a little on the seat as the car loses all of its momentum.
"You stay here."
"I can take care of myself, Mark. I know where to aim if things get bad."
Seatbelts click and slurp themselves back into their holders. Two consecutive sounds of car doors opening, and then two consecutive sounds of car doors being shut, with some faint rustling of bodies in between. A set of footsteps on gravel on one side, and a set of footsteps on asphalt on the other. You're alone in the vehicle. The only thing you didn't hear was the doors being locked.
"How's it going?" Your father's voice is the first of many things you hear through the open windows. You wish that the voice's proximity would give you comfort, but knowing that it only draws the entities nearer, you also wish it was coming from farther away.
"Oh, Reginald, have some good samaritans finally stopped to help us in our plight?" The first of the two unfamiliar voices has a couple of strange elements to it, and while neither of the elements alone would be enough to amplify your fear, the two strange details combined simply confuse you. It seems that the existence of such a voice in nature would be somehow incongruous, and this only adds to your confusion in discerning whether or not this is all a dream.
The first thing you note is that this entity clearly speaks with a British accent - but what would a Brit be doing in this part of the country? Nottingham, Delaware might be metropolitan, but it isn't quite cosmopolitan, and it would never have struck you that an Anglo expatriate would choose to come here; surely the name being shared with a medium-large city in England wouldn't have been enough of a reason for any Englishman to decide to relocate here when New York and Philadelphia and Washington were a short jaunt away. But a few instantaneous moments later, your brain also registers that this voice almost sounds… inauthentic. In the passing nanoseconds, you arrive at the deduction that this voice - whether this is the case or not - certainly sounds like a man with a lower voice trying to put on a higher voice. This could all have been wrong, of course, and maybe his natural voice just did have a timbre to it that seemed to resonate high after coming from a low place, but the peculiar scratchy, breathiness to it was like no voice you'd heard recently. Which of the figures could have been the bearer of this voice? It couldn't have been the bear, trying to sound less threatening, could it have been?
"Why, I do believe that they may be, Mister G." Oh, no. No, no, no, that was the bear's voice this time. If the vocabulary didn't give it away, the auditory quality of the voice sure did. It wasn't the most aggressive voice in the world, but it certainly wouldn't have come from a pig. Jeez, if all dads yell at their kids, you would hate to be this guy's son. But there is a bit of calmness that the voice gives you, in that it sounds much more real. This character either wasn't putting on (or couldn't put on) a fake voice. This one is distinctly American, and you think you detect hints of the slightest of Southern twangs.
"We can be if you don't give me any reason to regret this," your father asserts himself. "If I start to get the feeling that you're going to screw us over in any capacity, I'm-" A moment of pensive thought to get the right words out. "I'm not going to spoil what I have in mind." You cannot decide if your father's decision to outright tell them that he has a hand he's waiting to show them is brave or foolish, but you think a better expenditure of your thoughts would be trying to figure out what defense mechanism he was referring to. If he's hiding a weapon somewhere in the car, it would certainly be news to you.
"Oh, you'll have to forgive my husband," your mother interjects, refusing to take a back seat in this affair, "He has a little too much of a healthy distrust of strangers."
Some polite laughter that must be from the two new faces is followed by a bit of a monologue from the pig: "Oh, it's quite understandable, madam; I'd not be certain I'd trust some fellows like ourselves either, stumbling along the roadside in the dead of night. But I assure you, we pose no threat to you nor your well-being; there is little we would gain from it. I can swear an oath on my family name that my intentions are noble - or at least as noble as one's can be when one finds oneself a beggar in a moment of desperation."
"And what family name would that be?"
"Glutton, sir. Glenjamin Glutton." A brief moment of near-silence with come faint rustling suggests your father hesitantly accepted a handshake.
"Mark," your father spits, and then, "von Bartonschmeer."
"A pleasure to meet you, sir."
"Gretchen," your mother adds.
"Miz Gretchen, how dearly I wish my eyes could help me confirm it, but you do sound like a lovely lady." This confirms to you that the blind pig is the Englishman; but as you start to get more of a sample size of this man's speaking habits, you start to consider that perhaps his accent is not as strong as you previously thought, certainly still distinguishable but also fading in and out just a slight bit, as though he'd been in the States for awhile and started to pick up some of the local verbal traits. "And this is the gentleman who I once called my servant but now struggle to call anything but a friend."
"Reginald Chutney, but you can call me Reggie. Nice to meet ya."
"Chutney? What, are you from India?"
An awkward silence. You imagine your mother rolling her eyes, the pig looking confused, the bear looking down upon your father with a face that clearly is trying its hardest to remain classy, and your father not feeling an ounce of shame. If anything, the outburst may have been specifically designed to take his and everybody else's minds off of his shame for not having a servant of his own.
"Oh, you know how it goes, similar etymologies," the pig clarifies, not sounding the least bit thrown-off by your father's comment. "Surely someone as educated as yourself may recall how all but the most far-Eastern languages of the Eurasian continent derived from the original Proto-Indo-European. Or at least… Reginald did note that you drive a vehicle of someone quite well-read. Did you say your surname was van or von Bartonschmeer?"
"Von," your father sounds like he's boasting. "In Germany, you're not even allowed to have the von in your last name unless you can prove you're from a noble lineage."
"My thoughts exactly! Tell me, was my friend's assessment correct?"
"Oh, absolutely," your father brags. "The von Bartonschmeer line is top-of-the-line."
"I beg your pardon," your mother chimes in, "but how can we be of help to you two?" You're surprised your father hasn't asked this before just this moment.
"Gretch, mellow out, they're curious about the family history." You know that your mother will not protest this, as she knows as well as you do that your father loves having his ego stroked.
"Oh, and I do apologize for being inefficient with the time you've been gracious enough to share with me, but I must concede I find your lineage fascinating."
"Yeah, well, you must be pretty well-off yourself with duds like those. I wouldn't have stopped if I thought you were just some more bums crawling out of the woods, drunk off your rockers."
"Oh, do you like my outfit? I thank you. Without the aid of vision, I still feel assured that you are similarly dressed to kill." - Dressed to kill? Do Brits even say that? - "I suppose it is in our great fortune that Reginald and myself did run into a couple of similar status; after all, us wealthy folk need to stick together, these days especially! It seems that everybody wants to hold us responsible for their problems nowadays."
"Heh, you got that right," your father quips. "Hell, come to think of it - I don't remember if it's this road or somewhere else - but I know the kids these days - and, you know, the lazy adults who don't bother giving it critical thought - they say that there's place around here somewhere where some lowlifes go robbing rich people who pass through, and that they have been for years but somehow nobody's caught them yet, and they even say that they, like, give all their spoils to poor people, as if they'd know what to do with it."
"Huh. Is that so?" the pig sounds like it's his turn to feign politeness.
"Oh, you know how every place needs its own local legend. But - heh - if I wanted to walk into a trap, get my ass robbed and have my money wasted on poor people who won't help themselves, I - heh - I'd just vote Democrat! Heh, you with me?"
"Ah." He sounds like he would give your father an unimpressed look if he were able to make eye contact with him. "Well, I've always been of the opinion that those most fit to do so could become comfortably wealthy no matter what policies the administration may implement."
You think you hear a faint muttering from your father, as if he's trying to say "oh."
"But variety is the spice of life, as they say," the pig remarks, trying to fill the bitter silence, but it's no match for the crunching of gravel as your father is surely shifting awkwardly in place, trying and failing to contain his own embarrassment. You can just about feel him blush. But this pig proves himself to be merciful to your father and offers him a way out: "But tell me, Baron von Bartonschmeer, from whence have you made your fortune? My curiosity is piqued!" Honestly, it almost sounds like the pig is embarrassed that he embarrassed your father. But would such a character feel such a way?
"Oh, I, um, I'm a high-ranking executive in a company founded by my great-grandfather. Bioengineering and chemicals and such." And just like that, your father sounds like he's brimming with vanity all over again. Just a slight compliment and he's already put past this moment of being put in his place. You think that it must be frightening to be like him, and you're terrified by the idea that perhaps it's your destiny that you one day will be.
"Ah, a man of science, I see! Not too dissimilar from the path I've chosen."
"And what would that be, Mister Uh-er… um…"
"He already toldja, his name's Glenjamin Glutton," the bear interrupts with an air of annoyance so commonly associated with his kind.
"Oh, Reginald, you need not be so defensive of my honour," - you swear you can hear the pig use the letter u in honour - "It is, after all, an admittedly unusual name. But to answer your question, Baron, I deal in optical aids. Glasses and contact lenses and all that."
You share in the stunned silence. Are you certain that this quasi-posh English accent was coming from the blind guy?
"Really?" your mother can't help but ask. At the very least, she confirms your skepticism is valid. You wonder what she's been doing this whole time. You imagine she's been trying to politely look at whichever of the two chatterboxes was talking at a given moment, maybe occasionally glancing at the bear to grant him the dignity your father wouldn't give him, before eventually getting bored and looking at the ground and the woods, switching gazes in irregular intervals so as to seem like a real person but not switching so regularly as to seem mechanical. Your mother may be much less harsh than your father, but she's no doubt at least as self-conscious of how others view her.
"And how does that work?" asks your father.
"Oh, I could tell a grand tale about how every little thing fell perfectly in place. But that would be a story for another time. Let me say at least this much: ever since I was very young and I found out that other people could see, I was enthralled by the idea. That these people all around me had an extra sense that gave them another way to take in the world. And I will confess: for a time, for a long time, I was bitter. I wanted what they had. I didn't just want to see - I wanted to be normal. But then two things went off in my head at about the same time soon after my adolescence. Firstly, that there was little that they could do that I could not do. Perhaps it was easier for them, but I could still do it. I could still sense the exact dimensions of something; just give me a moment to feel it. I could still understand the distance something was from me; just be quiet so I can hear it. I could still perceive the beauty in the world; just let me have a chance to feel it, or hear it, or taste it, or smell it, or just let me linger by it and take it in with the senses that we all know we have but which they don't teach in primary school. If anything, over the years I've gathered that in some ways this is a blessing, for it has let me see the beauty in the world in ways that you seeing types - you normal types - have often overlooked.
"And that's about the time that I started to pity not only the seeing, but especially the ones who couldn't see well. Here they were with this gift, and yet they weren't even permitted to use it in its full functionality? What a cruel world! So I took it upon myself to help assuage the plight of these poor souls. If they wanted to see, I should want to let them see. So I started to do my research, and the rest, I suppose you can say, is history. Yes, I had my hiccoughs along the way - I'm sure you can imagine how difficult it is to find a textbook on optometry written in Braille - and I did need help on many occasions, and I did benefit from some lucky breaks. But I feel like I've used my one life on this Earth to make it a better place than I found it. And yes - heh - I did make a pretty penny along the way."
"You're a good man, Mister G." insists the possible Southerner.
"Oh, Reginald, that's not for you or I to decide; that's the place of the Lord to judge."
You can't get any sense of what your father is doing after hearing this. You can imagine him reacting in a few different and opposite ways. Maybe he's embarrassed again by this pig's casual recounting of how he turned an improbable good deed into an improbable good fortune. Maybe he's genuinely confused why somebody would want to be so helpful to complete strangers who would never and could never personally appreciate him back - and, by that token, maybe he's regretting pulling over now. Or maybe he's fuming that this stranger just went on a self-righteous monologue knowing full well that it's extremely unlikely that any given stranger he encounters would be brazen enough to punch a blind braggart in the face. All of this is assuming that your father even believed a word of it, which you know you shouldn't assume. If your father were to ask you if you believed it, you would try your best to decipher what his version of a correct answer would be, and tell that back to him. But you were sold. Then again, he could just have been a really good actor. The production from earlier certainly could have used a talent like him.
It was so moving, in fact, that you temporarily forget your fear that both of these figures are indeed just acting their part.
"I'm so sorry, Mister Glutton, but it's getting uncomfortably muggy out here," your mother says. You half-believe that she's half-sorry. "Is that a gas can I see?"
"Oh, yes, this has been such a riveting bit of banter that I for one have completely forgotten the task at hand! A thousand apologies; ah, er - Reginald! Why didn't you warn me that we were wasting these fine people's time?"
"I didn't want to interrupt, sir."
"Oh, Reginald, need I remind you? Always interrupt me if I need to be interrupted; I am but a man. And don't call me 'sir' in front of friends; it makes me feel like such a tyrant."
"Sure thing, Glenji."
"Now that's more like it! Ah, but, um, yes yes yes, the matter of our current predicament. It appears that old Reginald here, silly old bear, he forgot to refill the limousine with petr- forgot to refill the tank, as it were," - you wonder if your father picked up on the fact that the Englishman clearly just switched to more transatlantic vocabulary to dumb it down for him, but you would never say a word to him about it - "and now we're walking against traffic to try to garner the attention of someone who might be so kind as to assist us."
"The limo's further up the road; we've been walking for about a half an hour."
"Farther, Reginald, farther. Yet another reason I wish I had known you as a schoolmate. I could have used the companionship, and you could have used the education!"
There's a lull in the conversation as the pig and the bear exchange hushed oh, you chuckles that certainly match the narrative that they're not-quite-equal friends.
"Well as nice as it was to meet you, I'm afraid I'm gonna have to disappoint you, because we don't have any siphon tubes or anything like that." Your father seems genuinely conflicted about helping them now, or about whether he even can.
"And, um, with all the due respect, Mister, uh, Reginald, I don't think we can give the both of you a ride to a gas station. Or… anywhere, for that matter. If you catch my drift..."
"Oh, ma'am, among my people, that's a compliment, I assure you." Reginald really doesn't sound like he's hiding even an ounce of offense; he still has not given you one iota of doubt about his genuinity. Unfortunately that makes his dynamic with the pig all the more confusing.
"Oh, we're well aware that the logistics of this dilemma are not the most convenient," - something about the pig's sentence structure there makes you wonder if that's quite right - "but we were hoping more along the lines of you folks taking me with the can and meeting me back at the limo with the, er, gasoline, while Reginald can walk back. Heaven knows he could use the exercise."
"Now that's something only he can say to me." Really, the only thing close to a red flag you're getting from the bear is that he seems far too comfortable in his subservient role. Even this is more of a yellow flag than a red one; you've heard of such people before, but have you actually ever met one?
"In fact, we'll even repay you upfront for your kindness. Reginald, would you please?"
"Sir, yes, sir." This comes with a sarcastic sneer that sounds more like he's playing with the concept of subordination, like a smartass in the army might say to piss off his drill sergeant even though both parties know the soldier is using all the right words. Perhaps the one called Reginald has some reservations about his position after all, but he swallows them and tells himself that he's working for a pretty nice guy and things could be much worse for him. You can't quite put it into words, but this is the first time he breaks his immersion with you.
"Reggie, what did the man say about using that word?" your father interrogates a little too aggressively; it's still clearly playful ribbing, but it couldn't be called a successful delivery of a joke. But before he can feel embarrassed: "Oh, what is that?"
"I ask that you indulge me in partaking some of this fine Grecian wine; I would feel so incomplete if I were not to see you happy before you saw me on my way."
"Oh, it's Greek?" Your mother cannot resist. "I've heard great things about Greek wine, but I've never gotten around to trying it."
"Well, there was one time when we had dinner in Athens, but the restaurant had a French bottle she really loved, and she couldn't pass up on one of her favorites."
"Oh, shush. Besides, you can't have any, you have to drive."
"Oh, but one glass surely won't hurt!" the pig insists. "If I must beg for help, I might as well beg for companionship while I'm at it!"
"Yeah, Gretch, it can't hurt too much."
"I only wish we had a table to enjoy it at on this fine summer's night."
"I don't think it's quite summer yet, Glenji. Calendar-wise." The bear is correct.
"Ah, Reggie, that's the smarts I knew you had in you!"
You hear the suitcase the bear carried being set down and glassware clinking as it's being taken out. You hear a cork pop and the beginning of merrymaking.
"Wait, Mister Glutton, aren't you going to have some?"
"Who, me? Oh, no. I'll be the designated driver!"
Three voices laugh at varying degrees of heartiness.
You really aren't sure this isn't a dream. You thought your mother would put up more of a fight than this instead of allowing your father to drink with strangers at the side of the road in the dead of night. Is her judgment still maligned from the drinks she had hours ago at the show? Or is her love of wine more severe than you knew? Your father would absolutely be the kind of person to have a glass of alcohol in public, proceed to drive a motor vehicle, and all the while not care what law enforcement might think… but would he be the kind of person who is so easily won over by (admittedly charismatic) strangers? Actually, back up: would he ever have pulled over in the first place? Perhaps your parents just act differently when they don't think you're awake and listening; perhaps that takes the form of embracing being a lush and revelling in phony compliments when they think you're none the wiser.
And these strangers: can these guys be real? Do such people exist? The fear makes you want to stay alert, hanging on every little minute detail you can pick up for any signs of foul play. But the confusion exhausts your mind and makes you want to go back to sleep. Therefore your body forces an inconvenient compromise and you're just laying there in a sort of coma: your brain is practically overheating from vigilance, but your body is too beat to move a muscle. The only part of your body you can control just a little bit would be your eyelids, which you can manipulate to open or close when you see fit, but which are drifting open and shut on their own accord anyway, and you let them bungee you in and out of a state of rest. Your eyes aren't helping too much, because all they can see is the fuzziest details of the inside of the SUV as illuminated by the scant light originating from the moon and then reflecting ever so slightly off of not-very-reflective surfaces outside to enter the cabin. You pick up the discussion outside the window, but your brain records it only in fragments as you fade in and out. Fragments such as this:
"So what play were you seeing?"
"Honey, what was it called?"
"As You Like It."
"Oh, Shakespeare! Marvellous! I'm sorry, but I need to ask: were they speaking with English accents?"
"Uh… not really, no."
"Oh, damn them! What lazy actors, making a mockery of the craft! I would be their personal vocal coach if they would let me!"
"But wait, Glenji, didn't you tell me something-something about how the modern English accent didn't exist before, like, two-three hundred years ago? I specifically remember you saying that some, I dunno, linguistic experts even said that Shakespeare sounds better with an American accent."
"Oh, Reginald, don't give away my people's deepest, darkest secret!"
"Actually, yeah, I think I remember hearing that somewhere, too."
"Oh, now the secret's out!"
"Sorry, Glenji, but you told me to interrupt you."
"That I did. Yes. But it really is a struggle, being a man of art and a man of history, and being a man of two homelands that I love dearly, when these conflicting worlds that I inhabit don't always see eye-to-eye."
It actually does sound like a nice conversation to take part in, but surely your father would never allow it; if anything, you showing up would end the conversation immediately as your embarrassed father shoves you into the car and abandons the two strange gentlemen at the side of the road for fear of facing their judgment. You still can't decide if you fear your father's wrath more than you fear the mystery of these strangers. But if he were to be so embarrassed by you, then fuck it, let these people show their true colors and betray him. As long as they leave you and your mom out of it, you could be fine with such a turn of events. As long as you don't wind up like him.
You find your fear subsiding as time keeps ticking by, and as suspicious as you find it that these people are keeping your parents at the side of your car for no immediately-constructive reason, you can't reconcile that anxiety with the fact that it seems like it's been well over an hour and these strangers haven't done anything yet. As your nerve backs down, the voices outside quieten, and thus ends the first act of the dream.
-IllI-
"They just left the doors unlocked?" asks a newly-familiar voice. "Okay, works for me."
The cabin lights have come on, and the open-door ding is dinging. You turn your head to the right, and despite two rows of seats obscuring your view, you can still make out a very large figure placing somebody in the passenger seat. The carrier is being strangely gentle with their subject. You even hear the zipping and clicking of the seatbelt. "There ya go, nice and snug." Between the voice and the size, you feel you can reasonably deduce that this is the bear putting one of your parents in the seat.
He walks away from the door without closing it at first, then comes back to shut it. The dinging ceases.
"I know we're coming back to there, Rob, I just wanted that noise to stop." You have no idea who this Rob person is, but if they're doing what you think they're doing, he has a very fitting name. "You need help with that?" you hear through the open window, and it brings your attention to a faint struggling sound.
"Nmgyeh," gasps a voice that doesn't seem quite as familiar, but is still not completely alien. The struggling had now ended. "Now I get why pigs are fat; if I had to breathe through a nose like that, I wouldn't be able to do any cardio exercise, either." Except he says it more like eitheh; is this a different Brit or the same one? How many could there be in Southern Delaware at once?
"Or here's a crazy thought: maybe that's just a genetic thing that some species have?" There's a shuffle and a faint grunt, as though the bear is picking something off the ground and finding it to be just the faintest of physical burdens. Meanwhile, you don't dare move a muscle; you hardly dare to breathe lest they hear you through the open windows. "Survival traits from their primitive ancestors and such?"
"Oh, Johnny," says the Brit playfully, "I can't imagine what you could be talking about."
"Well then, I guess you aren't as smart of a fox as I thought you were." The voice is similarly layered with friendly vitriol, and it sounds like it's making his way around the back of the vehicle - wait, he might be able to see you! But then again, the lights aren't on right now. But then again, they will be when he opens another door. But then again, he has no reason to look into the back seat. But then again, he had no reason to be so gentle with your parents, either. But then again...
And what was this about a fox? Was this the third voice? And what happened to the pig? Now I get why pigs are fat, if I had to breathe through a nose like that… The fox wouldn't have, what, shown up out of nowhere and knocked the pig out with his bear friend standing right there, assumed his spot in the dynamic duo, and then made a witty remark about pig noses apropos of nothing, would he have? If not, the next logical option would be…
"Well, I'm not exactly using my education, now am I?" You knew that pig looked unnaturally lumpy. But it didn't click that such characters would have that level of dedication. That was one hell of a ruse. Whoever made that for him should be employed by the Nottingham Shakespeare Theatre Company; they could seriously use that person's talents.
You're so distracted by trying to put the pieces together that you run out of time to decide if you should risk making a noise in order to move yourself to a better hiding spot. The driver's side door opens and the cabin is bathed with light. You can see just over the ridge of the bench seat in front of you that the bear is putting your father behind the wheel and buckling him up.
"I gotta say," the bear grunts as he sets your father up, "for a first try, that worked quite well."
"Oh, I agree wholeheartedly," says the one called Rob. "It took a little longer than I would have liked, but all's well that ends well."
"And props to this guy here for just straight-up telling us that he wouldn't have stopped if we weren't rich people. Perfect. Take away any regrets I might have about this right off the bat." The door shuts and it is dark again. "I can't believe people like that actually exist."
You take your chance and slide off the seats and down to the narrow strip of foot-space between the rows. Neither of them notice your shape shifting amid the darkness. You pray you don't come to regret it, but you somehow feel that it doesn't matter.
"I told you to believe me: rich people only trust other rich people." The voices sound more distant and a bit muffled now that you're on the floor, but you can still make out every syllable and sentence. "They don't always trust other rich people, because they know themselves well, and they know they'd gladly screw another rich person to get richer. But the only people they would ever trust…"
"...Are filthy goddamn rich. And before I forget: that whole bit about being a blind guy who made eye contacts… Rob, I'm telling ya, you shoulda taken up acting, too."
"Well something much more important was calling me, now, wouldn't you agree, Johnny?"
"Yeah, I'd say so!"
"But it really is a shame he won't remember any of it. He really could do with being taken down a peg. Do you think he even caught the subtle little jabs I threw at him?"
"Oh, well like you said, it doesn't matter now. I kind of feel bad for the lady, though."
"I'm mostly with you on that; she definitely seems like she's trapped in a loveless marriage to some arsehole, but then again… it's not our parents' time. She could divorce him if she wanted." A gasp. "Oh, but what if she couldn't!? This man may be more evil than we could ever know, Little John!"
Did the Brit just call the American Little John? The American was the bear, right? And you're certain there's only two people here, right? You're confused again. You just want to wake up.
"Hey, Robin, should we head out before... I dunno... before too long?" The Brit's full name is Robin? Not Robert, but Robin? As in robbing? This just keeps getting more fantastic; surely you're dreaming all of this. "I just feel like we're pushing our luck standing here out in the open without our weapons." Did he just say weapons? Yeah, you're pretty sure you're awake now.
"I'm going to say yes to that, mostly because I don't want any reason to put that blasted mask back on. You get the trunk; I'll take the dashboard. Then we can get out of here."
Oh. Oh, shit.
You try to think of all the ways the bear can see you wherever you might be. From his high vantage point, he can probably see you over the seat, no problem, even if you are on the floor and not on the bench. You want to squeeze yourself under the seat, but if he's going to do a really thorough job of looting, he'll probably see right under the bench and find you in the gap. You think your best option is to squeeze under the second-row seats; that might minimize the chances of contact. He'd have to look at exactly the right angle to see you there. But can you fit?
The trunk pops open, and the passenger's side door soon after. The cabin is bright and the bell is ringing. You hear the glove compartment pop open and a paw leafing through vehicle documents to find something good. In the other direction, you hear someone effortlessly lift anything of even slight value from the cargo bed and place it on the ground.
"You want a bicycle?"
"Can you carry it?"
"Is this even a question?"
More rustling.
"Interesting. They had a can of pepper spray up here, but they didn't take it with them."
"How about an empty cooler and, uh… one of those air pumps you plug into a car's power slot?"
"I'm sure somebody can use it."
"Sounds good to me… hey, I can carry a bunch of this shit in the cooler!"
"Now you're using your head, Johnny!"
You hear a pop from the rear.
"What's that sound?"
"I'm trying to get the spare-tire compartment open. Maybe they have an emergency cash-stash in here."
"What, and they would trust that it wouldn't get stolen by a mechanic or someone like that?"
You hear the lid slide off. "You know what? Hold that thought. A friend of my dad's planted money in his car specifically as a trap for mechanics and people like that to run off with it. To sue them. The son of a bitch took pictures before he put it in the shop so he could prove it was there. Nobody ever fell for it, but he couldn't have been the only one to try that. He couldn't have been..." The bear is now trying to wiggle out the spare tire. "And it also doubled as emergency cash."
"Boy, it must be one strong hunch if you're willing to bring up your fa-"
"Jackpot!"
The rustling in the front stops. The door shuts and the fox runs to the back.
"This I've got to see." And shortly thereafter, from the back: "Johnny, my boy, you are on a roll tonight!"
"I mean, it ain't that much, but I'll take a solid stack of hundreds any day of the week."
You knew nothing of money hiding in the spare tire compartment. That seems like something your parents would have told you. You just want to wake up.
"And it even has the little paper binding! Did they steal this from a bank?"
"Maybe we aren't the only robbers out tonight, now are we?"
"Oh, Johnny, please don't kill the mood by using that word."
"Oh, I'm sorry, sir." They share a chuckle. The bear continues, "So would you say that this was a successful operation?"
"Oh, yes, I'd say we can start packing up now." The fox seems to be walking off as he says this.
The bear is humming some folksy tune to himself as he puts the tire back in and shoves the lid shut. The next thing you hear is a loud bump and a shout that borders on a growl. You don't even notice when you slip up and let out the faintest of squeals.
"SON OF A FUCKING- Wait, what was…?"
You feel a presence get closer. Your face is stuffed under the seat, facing the front, and all you can see as far as your periphery will go is dust, carpet, metal fasteners and shadows, but you can still somehow feel that there is an entity above and behind you.
"Ah-ha, well what have we here?" Nobody in their right mind could blame you for your poor judgment in this tense, unusual situation, wherein you completely forgot your tail was sticking out from under the bench and into the open light between the rows of seats.
"John! What's wrong? What was that noise?"
"I hit my head on the roof…" You feel a paw reach down under the second row of seats, grabbing you around the waist and ever so gently pulling back and extracting you into the light. You're paralyzed in both mind and body. "...and I think I scared the little one."
The only thing you think you can do is shut your eyes. It's not to shield them from any sudden light, as the bear is blocking most of it out anyway; it's mostly in hopes that it will make these monsters go away.
"Really. This whole time…"
"An hour of shooting the shit with the guy, and he doesn't mention once that he has a kid in the car. Did he even mention he had a kid? Did I miss something?"
"If you did, it slipped by me, too. Now that I think about it, the wife may have suggested they had a son, but I guess I thought she meant he was at home."
"Shows how important their son is to them that they wouldn't even-"
"Little John, I think you're just scaring him more."
"Oh, I'm not trying to." He grabs you by the waist again and picks you up, placing you on the seat. He lets go and you feel one of them start to stroke your head, but you can't tell which one is doing it. They're only gently touching the edge of your fur and you can't get a feel for how big their paw is. The stroking does not make you feel comforted, but it doesn't make you feel discomforted either; you're just sort of numb to it. "Don't worry, buddy. I'm a bear that cares."
"He's likely thinking, oh, sure, you want me to believe that!"
"Well I'll prove it to him!"
"Sh-sh-shh!" As earlier, the pig-fox pitches up his voice just a tinge, trying to seem more welcoming. "Hello there, young man. You needn't be afraid of us. We didn't hurt your parents, and we're not going to hurt you." You don't know whether you can believe them. But in a spot of desperation, you wish you could. "You've done nothing wrong."
"'Needn't'? You're not in the old country anymore, Rob."
"Johnny!" comes a stern whisper. The stroking stops.
"I'm just trying to do my part to make him feel more comfortable; I wouldn't listen to a strange adult who talked funny. Can I give it another try?"
"How about we take turns?"
"Sounds fair." The bear takes a deep breath, and then he makes his own attempt at sweetening his voice: "Hey, little guy. We're sorry we had to do what we did. But we promise we didn't hurt them. Not too bad." You feel a thick finger with a blunt claw tickle your cheek a few times.
"What my friend here means is that they'll be awake and fine in just a few hours." He seems a bit frustrated with his associate's choice of words, but you can respect the effort he's taking to hide it. "What we did was something we had to do. The law might not say so, but we know in our hearts that we needed to."
"And I know that sometimes I don't feel too good about what we do, but…"
"...sometimes, you have to make a tough decision."
"Be glad you're still a kid, kid. Being a grown-up means you have to make a lot of tough decisions."
"And while I am a bit afraid that the grown-ups in your life don't have the courtesy to tell you that, I… well, I…" the Brit trails off. "I'm sorry, young sir, but… could you open your eyes? We just want to make sure you're hearing us."
"We want to meet you!"
"Very well-put, John."
Thus begins a long series of mental curses. You curse your father for taking Sherwood Forest Road because he was too proud to take a toll road and too impatient to drive through construction. You curse the adults in your life who refused to believe the legends of the Forest were true. You curse the Delaware Department of Transportation for maintaining this road and not just swallowing their damned losses. You curse linear time itself for making it a statistical improbability that anybody's going to come along that road at that precise nocturnal minute and see these two characters harassing you, let alone stop and save you. But you decide that this whole thing might end sooner if you just do what they say. Or with any luck, you might wake up.
You open your eyes to a sideways view of the seat in front of you. You can see two figures in your periphery to your left, but you aren't ready to meet their gaze. You just keep looking forward.
"You see?" asks the fox. "Everything will be alright."
"And as long as you're a good guy, you're safe with us."
"You're a good guy, aren't you?"
"Rob, are we talking down to this kid?" the bear asks, quieter but you can still hear it clearly.
"You're never too old to be comforted, Johnny."
"I just mean - what species is this kid exactly? - for his size, how old would he be?"
"Well, that doesn't necessarily determine anything, now does it? I mean, I was always large for my age, you were small, so-"
"Enough."
"Oh. Of course."
Great, now these two monsters are fighting. You close your eyes again, to disappear and to avoid embarrassing them.
"Oh, now you've scared him again."
"I didn't do anything."
"Young man," the Englishman says again in his voice reserved for your ears only, "we haven't much time left. But we desperately want to tell you something-"
"-a little secret your parents won't tell you."
"Precisely! If you would please just grant us a moment of your attention, we can tell you something that will change your life-"
"-for the best!"
"-and we'll be on our way."
They aren't taking no for an answer.
It is indeed a fox, a red fox with a deep red coat and a pearly white muzzle melting from his snout. Something about his facial appearance just sort of agrees with the idea that he's British; something about his eyes, you think. The peanut-butter-brown bear is at once next to him and above him; his hat and wig and moustache are gone, and the hair on the back of his head seems to be glowing from the cabin light it's blocking out, almost like the silver lining on a cloud in front of the sun. Laying there on the bench seat, looking up at these warm faces looking down upon you, you feel like a baby in a crib, right at the moment when sapience first materializes in your mind, looking up at the adults admiring you from above, and although you can't put into words who they are, you somehow understand that they are looking out for you and want what's best for you.
"It's so nice to finally meet you, young one. My name is Robert, but my everybody calls me Robin. Robin Hood, of Loxley in South Yorkshire - that's in England, if you couldn't tell! And this is one of my closest friends in all the world; he's called Little John. He might be scary to bad people, but he can be a big soft teddy bear when he's your friend."
"But you can call us Johnny and Rob, because you're our friend now."
"Indeed you are. What are you called, young man?"
And you simply stare at them. Speaking does not seem like something you can do even if you wanted to.
"Uh, what the British guy means is, what's your name?"
A moment passes.
"I don't think lexicon is the issue here, Johnny. But listen…" the fox gives you his undivided attention. "We took some time to get to know your mother and father. And we're afraid that they might not be the best people in the world. That's why we had to do what we did to them."
"And we don't think that they think they're bad people, necessarily," the bear chimes in, "maybe they just don't know how to be good."
"That's quite right! But here's the good news, young sir: you don't have to be like them."
The two of them just gaze gently down upon you, almost fighting for your eye contact. You look into the eyes of the fox for just a moment, then the bear's, and then you split the difference and stare at the space between their pairs of eyes, hoping neither will be offended.
"You don't have to be like them," the fox continues. "You can be good. You can be a good guy. You don't have to take advantage of people to get ahead in the world; you can do it just by being a good person." He takes a deep breath. "You don't have to be like them."
"Sometimes we aren't even sure if we're the best we can be," the bear adds, "But we do our best and we try to get better. And all we can ask of you, kiddo, is that you understand that we're trying to be the best that we can be, and that you try to be the best you can be, too."
"I couldn't have said it better myself."
"Heh, this is why we're friends."
"And you're our friend, too, now, young man. As long as you always do what you truly believe is right, and care for your fellow man, and never make it harder for those who have it hard enough-"
"-then you'll be our friend."
"And if anybody should ever hate you for being our friend… well…"
"They'll have to answer to us."
"They won't be Little John's friend."
"Damn straight they won't."
They keep the smiles going and you have no idea what to do. You have no idea of what you can do. But it isn't them you fear anymore. What you fear is the confusion. What you fear is that you still can't tell if this is real.
"Now, we need you to do us a massive favor. Is that alright?"
"In exchange for being our friend."
"When your parents wake up, or when someone comes to see if you're alright… don't tell them about us. Just keep our friendship our little secret, alright? Until it's safe. Can you do that for us?"
You do nothing but breathe.
"Come now, my young friend," the fox implores you, "this is the first step to being a good person."
"You're our friend right?"
You have to say something. You don't know why exactly, but you feel like you have to. Maybe opening your eyes didn't get them to go away, and maybe this won't either; maybe this is just the next step in a series of trials and tribulations that these strangers will put you through before they leave you alone. But in the state you are in, nothing is being solved. Therefore something must change.
"Martin."
"Wh- what was that?"
"...Martin."
"Hey there, Martin."
"Master Martin. Martin von Bartonschmeer, yes? Pleasure to make your acquaintance."
"Hey, Martin, how old are you? Rob and I were wondering."
"..."
"You may be right, Little John; his voice- I think he's a bit older than we thought."
"Than you thought."
"Oh, hush, Johnny… Martin, my friend… can you keep us your little secret?"
"..."
"Martin?"
"Martin."
"What was that?"
"..."
"Maybe he's retarded."
"Oh, don't be so boorish, Johnny."
"I know you're thinking it, too."
"I'm sure he's just terrified. Courage and cowardice exist in all of us. I just think they're raging inside of him right now."
"And I'm with you on that, that's probably what's goin' on, but has the thought not crossed your mind?"
"..."
"Well… We didn't hurt you, Martin. Please don't hurt us."
"Do the right thing, Martin, I know you can do it."
"Maybe we'll see you again, Martin."
"Maybe we will. I hope we will."
They duck out and start to close the trunk lid, but the bear stops it halfway down.
"Hey, Rob, should we stick around until someone comes by to help him?"
"I would love to, Johnny, but what if the police get here first?"
The bear makes one strong guffaw, but then curtly opens the trunk all the way again and looks toward your huddled mass. "Just to clear the air, kid, not all cops are bad, but, uh, the high-ranking officials of all the police departments in this area, are pure fucking evil." He ducks his head back out and regards the fox. "Oh, don't give me that look. You know I have family that're-"
"I don't disagree, John, I just don't think you needed to clarify that."
"And you didn't need to pet the kid like a cockatoo. Didn't stop ya."
"It's called connecting, Little John."
"Well it's not too late to… y'know… dose him too if you think this all didn't go so well."
"No, no, I have faith in my methods… I'll tell you what: we'll keep watch after him, but… from afar."
"Alright, sounds like a plan."
"Splendid. Close the trunk and we'll stake out a spot. And send Martin my regards one last time."
The bear comes back to the trunk door and puts a paw on it. "G'night, Marty." Then the darkness returns.
-IllI-
You finally awaken.
The sun is bleeding through the sieves between eastern tree branches. You hear sounds. You can't tell what they are, but you can tell that they are hurried, not quite frantic yet but getting there. Bodies surround the SUV. Men in uniform; a few women in the mix, too. A few different uniforms. One type of uniform tends to your parents, who are beginning to murmur uncomfortably. Another type scour the area surrounding the vehicle, looking for clues to some great mystery. The last type of uniform is focused on you.
Everything is where it would have been if it happened as you thought it did. But you can't fathom that it would have. You can't imagine that your father would pull over and help complete strangers and your mother's behest. You can't imagine that your mother would fall victim to trickery as easily as your father. You can't imagine that there would be modern-day highwaymen wandering a shrouded wood on the off chance that they would come upon someone so easily buttered up by disingenuous flattery, at which point they would patiently wait upwards of an hour for their victims to fall under their spell, and then run off with all of the loot they could gather, physically leaving on their feet with their spoils carried literally under their arms, nothing more sophisticated than that - but not before taking a solid few minutes to stop everything and impart their own personal wisdom on a child whom they only know as the bloodkin of their enemy. Such characters would have to either be masters of their craft or wizards who could manipulate the cosmic forces of fortune itself. Or hell, they might be gods. But you can imagine that your parents simply act differently when they think you aren't aware; there are clearly elements about them that they do not trust you with, and their true selves may be on that list. And while you don't mean to stereotype, you can imagine that between a fox's charm and a bear's insistence, that combination could persuade anyone.
They ask you what happened. You tell them that you don't know whether it was all a dream.
-IllI-
If on a summer's night a traveler, outside the city of Nottingham, cavalier in attitude and vainglorious in disposition, should find himself approached by strangers who can tell wondrous tales and compel one to act against one's better judgment, he had best not be a rich man, lest he be stripped of all his possessions and all his dignity; but if a traveler should be a poor man, he need have no fear, for he and all those like him shall find themselves under the sworn protection of the Merry Men of Sherwood Forest.
Or so say the children.
*A.N.* Jeez, that wasn't supposed to be that long, but when you get rolling, sometimes you just can't stop. Anyway, if so far this has provoked any strong reactions in you - if you loved it, if you hated it, if it disoriented you on a spiritual level - let me know. I need to know what my writing does in people. And I know that this is doomed to be fated as the king of all niche crossovers, but if you want to spread the word, I will be indebted to you (hey, if I were good at self-promotion, I probably wouldn't have time to write this thing, now would I?). But as long as there's one person reading this insanity, I'll keep chugging. Peace and love. -Dobanochi