Title: The Cerberus Dialogues 3/3
Fandom: Card Captor Sakura
Series: Faces of the Moon, or, Five Times Sakura Wasn't There
Summary: In an English boarding school in the fifties, a teacher packs her bags for the last time.
Characters: Keroberous (Mr Cerberus), Yue (Miss Moongrass), Yamazaki (Daisy Reeve), Chiharu (Margaret Reeve);
Warnings: Original characters, apologies for badness – I wanted to finish the dratted thing.
The Cerberus Dialogues 3/3
"It is not that I mind," I said. "It is the way of things. Releasing students like hawks into the dewy-mist-morning is a fierce delight, a rapture unparalleled, a something." I leaned back in my teachery chair, stretched, and set my patent-leather boots onto my desk. The classroom, empty of desks and edged with denuded bookshelves echoed plaintively.
"But I must confess a certain... feeling of loss." I plucked another roasted hazelnut from the bowl and cracked it between my teeth. "No young minds left to warp. No riotous showdowns every weekday and netball coaching on Saturday. No," here my eyebrow twitched, "no homework."
On the great red book on my desk was small, yellow Mr Cerberus, half couchant, half supine. "What will you do with the school closing? Find another position?"
I waved an airy hand, "I have sought out a little retirement bungalow on the coast. There is a garden. I believe I shall study croquet."
"You never wanted to, I don't know, keep one of the sproglets for yourself? Bring them along all special-like?" I could almost swear the little beast looked wistful and sad as he scanned the empty classroom. His tone grew honeyed: "If you picked the kids right, they'd be good for Christmases and birthdays until you died!"
It was tempting, but: "No, no," I said firmly, "I am far too old to change my ways. A teacher is all my existence, retired or otherwise. I shall go into the west, and diminish, and remain Evelyn Moongrass."
Mr Cerberus sat back on his haunches, shocked. "You've been reading... fantasy."
"Take that back! It was just a, er, turn of phrase," I replied sharply.
"Who are you talking to, Miss?"
It was one of the Reeve girls, walking slowly into the room with her old-fashioned skirt swirling around her knees. When did the girl get so tall? Or was it just that she stood very straight, holding her head like the braids wrapped around it were a crown?
"I have been driven into senility by the trauma induced by decades of students," I said placidly.
She dimpled in a smile, and walked to the desk, swinging her satchel. "We're going to Oxford," she said, "reading English. A full scholarship," she added cheerfully, "one for each of us, Miss. I think I'm going to be a writer.
"Daisy wants to be a book editor, or possibly an arctic explorer." Dimples formed again. "Not that you would be interested at all, Miss."
I wasn't.
However, crouched in an untidy heap on the opposite side of the book from the girl Mr Cerberus looked at me with begging eyes. It occurred to me that he must have been lonely, all these years talking only with my own sweet self. How bad could the disaster if the book be opened really be? I snorted, and shrugged, and moved a little, so that the girl (young woman) might approach it if she desired.
She did: stepping forward silently and caressing the cover. "We always wondered what was written in here. The Seventh Form was divided between the secrets of the universe and French novels, the risqué kind." Her solemn eyes met mine, refusing to be apologetic about this impudence. She fingered the clasp.
The door flew open and her sister clopped inside trailing eccentric ribbons. "Oh, hey Miss, glad we caught you before you vanished." She pounced on the book with glee, and I watched with a certain alarm as Mr Cerberus dangled precariously from the edge, still out of view, but only barely.
Daisy's eyes crescented upwards, "It is a little known fact," she said joyfully, "that this isn't a book, but a holder for some playing cards. You see, once upon a time there was a magician, like Prospero from the play only handsomer, and he had fifty-two spells that-"
Her sister clutched her by the collar and rolled her eyes. "Yes, yes, yes, but you're bothering Miss Moongrass. She hauled Daisy away, smiling gently. "Thanks for everything, Miss!"
And they were gone.
Not that I would miss them, or anything.
Cerberus Dialogues End
NOTES:
Oh, I looked up 'Evelyn' in a name dictionary, and it means 'light' or 'life', or possibly 'hazelnut'. Gotta love those foggy etymologies. The hazel tree can symbolise things like fertility and feminine wisdom, also poetic inspiration and wisdom in general. Coolness.
"I shall go into the west, and diminish, and remain..." From Galadriel's big speech in The Fellowship of the Ring.
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That concludes the four occupations described in Yue's telling: Cat, Codebreaker, Keeper of Books, and Cranky Teacher. I'll be putting in another Interlude, to wrap up some of the events of "Investigating Stillness" and then I should probably finish up with an Epilogue. It's been a blast, guys, thank you, all who read this.