Pursuing sewing as a hobby never crossed Kenny's mind, far too busy caught in the midst of making it his source of income. But then again, that seemed to be the trend with all his fellow entrepreneurs; The baker never let the yeast rise in his own home, Wendy did her best to avoid candles at all costs when out of her shop, and Kenny could only hope that Clyde wasn't sitting in his room peining out a slab of steel. But upon finishing what work could be done for his orders for the day while Karen and his mother attempted to finish their batch of decorated clothing, he'd found himself having a good deal of enjoyment tracing out a pattern for little Sarah Peterson's new cat.
Ken considered himself an artist by no means, much more adept to the simplistic lines of a shirt than anything else. But over time with learning more intricate designs to expand his market, he'd found a bit more fluidity in his talents than he'd realized was possible. By no means was this creation going to be anatomically accurate, something obvious even in the flattened image scripted upon his parchment, but it was going to be as good as he could possibly make it in the time allotted.
While he was considered a master of the cloth, he couldn't deny there was something exhilarating about dragging his horsehair brush up a flattened piece of tiretain, watching a thin line of grease seep into the fabric and guide the path of his shears. He couldn't help but wonder where the enjoyment spawned from, perhaps from the immediate result. Painting was done one stroke at a time, but each pass of the brush held some meaning into the picture, brought it all together. The same could be said of his stitches, but no one but himself appreciated a finely hemmed sleeve, a delicately performed operation on a ruined dress. No one would turn their clothes inside out and run down the seamline, complimenting and nodding to themselves as they murmured words of praise for his artisanal feat as they would a colorful painting of the distant mountains. It was a quietly appreciated craft, met only with pure, unbridled joy when faced with an order suiting a festive occasion, and even then it was more just polite thanks than it was the same level of excitement he himself experienced when finally completing a rough-going project. But Kenny was just fine with that, not needing the extra attention brought upon himself. He was content enough with merely doing his job and doing it right than he was someone revering him as though he were a wizard of his fabrics, though asking anyone in his family or his friends, they'd swear that such a statement could hold water.
The tailor hummed, fingers fiddling with a cut off side of the cat's tail, glancing towards the nearly completed project plopped down on his table in front of him. It'd taken him hours of nonstop finagling to get it to sit correctly, built perfectly for a little girl who liked to take it with her as she ventured out to play. His tiretain would hold well in the elements, demonstrated constantly by the clothing he sold of the same material. It was cheap and his most well-stocked asset, people opting more often than not for price rather than quality of material. He certainly was no fan of being tied down to it, trying to talk people up towards pure linen or cotton for both breathing room and aesthetic, so he wouldn't have to line the innards of their tunics with another material to make it feel like less burlap and more like clothing. But, as Levick taught him, sometimes people just need the bare essentials, a motto that Kenny had lived by all his life, but he didn't like the idea of everyone being tied down to the same philosophy.
His creation rested, plopped down lazily as it waited for him to finally complete him, stuffed full of discounted wool roving from the farmers on the outskirts of town. Not suitable enough to send off to the drapers and the spinsters, he'd been handed a nice full half pound for a mere price of one livatt, and made his way back into the shop with Kevin joking that he should plaster the excess onto sleeves and call them fur-lined. A good full handfuls were now safely secured within the cat, plush and staring at him with large glass-beaded eyes and nose, dyed by dipping them into his inkwell and allowing them to dry in the windowsill from the heat of the sun. Stuart had been infuriated with the notion of 'wasting' fabric and time on a free present for a sad little girl, nearly ending with the two of them screaming at each other before Kevin managed to usher their father out back to check on their dyes from the day before.
Why Stuart continued to do this to him, Kenny would never know. For all his father knew, the most expensive yard of pure, smooth silk was the same price as his rough-and-ready tiretain, so he had absolutely no right to question Kenny on the financial matters. But he knew deep down that all the knowledge he had was moot in the man's eyes. Kenny owned the shop, but Stuart owned the family. There was no by-passing that disaster no matter how he prayed.
"Ya almost done, Hon?" his mother's voice brought him out of his concentration as he tried to line up the two sides of his pattern to stitch them together.
He shot his head over and blinked, seeing the girls packing up their threads and covering their work for the day to prevent all the insect activity that they could. "Um, not too much longer," he shrugged, slipping undyed cotton thread up through the tiretain to link them at last. "Just gotta sew, stuff, and attach the tail."
Karen stalked over, leaning down beside him and staring at the cat, cocking her head at it and a tiny grin slipping onto her face. "It's cute," she declared. "You should make more of 'em. Sell 'em to kids in a stand."
"Oh?" he smirked. "And just which of us is going to be running the stand? We're all pretty immovable at this point, Kare."
Her face twisted into a small, thoughtful pout. "Well, Kevin only has t' step away every few hours to stir the dyes," she shrugged. "And he's ok with customers. Maybe he could do it."
"I'm not leaving Pops alone with my dyes," he muttered, continuing to stitch down the line. "'Member what happened when Kev got sick and had t' stay home a few days? When Pops fucked up a batch of mezereon? Because who wouldn't only half read brasilwood and spend three days boiling basil and wonder why it wasn't coming out fucking purple?" He said bitterly, shaking his head at the reminder of eight yards of fabric completely ruined.
Karen nodded sympathetically, shifting her weight. "Well… at least it all smelled good?" she winced.
He snorted, the scowl finally leaving his face as he elbowed her lightly. "You n' your bright side ways."
Carol shook her head, finishing covering the materials on the wall and walking towards the both of them, glancing between the stuffed pet and her son. "She's right, though. Ya did good."
Kenny cleared his throat, ducking his head down and feeling the beginnings of dusky pink settling on his cheekbones. "Thanks," he mumbled.
She chuckled, patting his head softly. "You gonna finish up?"
He nodded, "Yeah, she's gonna stop by and get him 'fore long. I told her to come over when the shop closed."
Karen grabbed another stool and drug it beside him, plopping down and smiling brightly at their mother. "I'll wait with him."
Carol rolled her eyes amusedly. "All right. The boys are headin' home after they pick up the bread, so we'll meet you there. Try to get there for dinner, huh?"
Kenny nodded, "We'll try. See ya, Ma."
"Be good," she said, giving a small wave and making her way out of the shop.
The kids watched after her, continuing to stare out the window into the beginnings of the evening and both heaving long sighs before glancing back at each other and smirking. "Why'd you offer t' make a cat?" Karen asked quietly. "You ain't ever made a stuffed animal before."
He shrugged, turning his attention back to the task at hand. "Just seemed like the right thing to do, ya know?" He paused, wincing a bit, "And I may have been a little too drunk t' know what I was signin' up for." Karen's face dropped a bit and he looked back at her guiltily, "I promise, it wasn't like him."
"I know, I know," she raised her hands a bit in defense. "You aren't that stupid."
"Well, maybe not in the same way," he chuckled. "She was just so sad lookin', ya know? Had to do somethin'." She hummed softly, turning her attention back to watching him stitch so fluently. Kenny sighed through his nose, mind retreating into the misty haze once more, but not finding his usual contentment in his daydreaming. No, instead he found himself mentally facing down the multiple-appendaged creature from the night prior. He still couldn't seem to shake himself out of the memory, finding it a little too clarified to be mere drunken delusion. However, he wasn't sure if he wanted it to be or not, truth be told. This wasn't a creature that Meryl's book had mentioned, not one that nearly stood his height, someone that looked human in the mottled moonlight until those new limbs spread out as naturally as his own arms. Trying to dissect the memory of the silhouette had done him no favors thus far, remembering nothing but thin, lean limbs and careful, calculated movements as they'd sorted through the cart.
Kenny frowned deeply at that particular reminder. Who steals from a child's toy cart? Someone with kids of their own? Someone who just enjoyed the thrill of taking what didn't belong to them? And what could something that clearly wasn't a mere person want to do with any of the cheap wares, let alone something as simple as a stuffed cat? He shook his head. It just raised far too many questions, and he had no idea how to start looking at it all. And it just posed another query, remembering quite vividly the rich, crisp music that'd settled itself so beautifully in his ears, recalling it even as he'd sobered and awoken in the light of dawn. Had the creature somehow made the sound? How? And why would it do something so wonderful but then turn around and be nothing more than a conniving thief?
He sighed. This was far too complicated for a simple tailor to have to figure out, and he knew well enough that asking anyone of the possibilities wouldn't exactly end well for him. Last thing he needed was for the business to suffer because word got out that he was insane or something of that nature.
His needle made contact with the tip of the tail before a knock came at the front of the shop, Karen and Kenny both whirling around to see a group of young faces at the window staring at them curiously. He smirked. They were a little early, but hopefully Sarah wouldn't mind waiting too much longer. He waved them inside, the six of them piling in one by one. "Hey there, Kiddos," he greeted.
"Hello, Kenny," a small chorus sprang as the last kid shut the door behind them.
Sarah timidly stood at the front of the group, glancing up at him hopefully and he smiled. "I'm almost done," he promised. She grinned at him gratefully and he shrugged, "You guys can sit down if ya want, won't take too much longer." They all glanced at each other before slowly lowering themselves down onto the rough hardwood floor. He snorted to himself. Wasn't exactly what he meant but it worked, he supposed.
The group looked at the eldest impatiently and he cleared his throat, "Um, Kenny?"
"Yeah, Bud?" he replied, continuing to thread through, trying to pick up his pace in the slightest with such an attentive audience keeping their eyes glued on him.
"We got metal."
He paused, cocking his brow and looking down at him confusedly. "Metal? Whaddya mean?"
The child raised his own suspiciously. "You told us last night to put metal in the cart? So stuff wouldn't be stolen?" Kenny's face erupted in light color once again. Well. Apparently his memory wasn't quite as clear as he'd made it out to be. Apparently drunk him liked for him to spew superstitious warnings. But given the figure that he remembered so well, it didn't utterly shock him that he'd thought of telling them something like that.
"Oh really?" Karen smirked, glancing up at her older brother as he tried to bury himself into his work yet again, staunchly ignoring the amusement dancing in her dark eyes. "You told 'em about the metal, Kenny?" she pressed.
"Drop it," he murmured to her subtly and she stifled a small laugh.
The kids glanced around confusedly at the siblings. "Why'd we have t' get metal?" one girl finally pressed. "We haven't ever heard of that."
Kenny forced himself to shrug casually, "It's just a little superstition, that's all, Kids."
"But why?" Sarah pressed.
Kenny's head lolled back a bit, looking at his ceiling and taking a deep breath. So he wasn't an angry drunk, he was a talkative one. Good to know, he supposed.
"Fairies," Karen answered the question casually, Kenny locking up slightly before glancing down at her in bewilderment at the nonchalance in her tone.
"Fairies?" a boy repeated. "What's a fairy?"
She grinned, guiding Kenny's hand to keep working on his project. "A magic creature," she elaborated. "Has wings and is super little," she demonstrated with her hands.
'Not if last night was any indicator,' Ken thought tiredly as he rounded the tip of the tail and started down the opposite side.
Karen continued, "They can't touch metal or they die right away." She pointed to her big brother, "Kenny's been telling me stories 'bout 'em since I was smaller than you," she gestured to Sarah.
The children glanced at each other before looking back at the two of them, curiosity that only a child could harbor glistening deep in six pairs of eyes. "What kind of stories?" one urged.
Karen smirked deviously, flicking Kenny's arm. "Ken can tell it better than I can," she stated. Kenny looked at her with a small scowl and she smiled innocently, knowing well enough that any chance of her older brother staying angry at her was slim to none. "C'mon. I can finish that," she gestured to the tail.
He sighed wearily, scratching at his hair before reluctantly passing the fabric over to her eager hands. "Finish to the end, stuff it, and then you think you can sew it on 'im?" She nodded confidently and began to work, waving him along to address the captive listeners. He glanced at them and blinked before turning back to her. "What story am I tellin' here? Since you apparently call the shots," he drawled.
The girl chuckled, looking up thoughtfully. "The river one," she decided. "It was always my favorite," she added with a sheepish shrug.
He sighed, turning backwards in his stool and leaning against the table, looking at the kids again. "Are you sure you wanna hear this? I ain't very good at makin' up stories."
"We wanna," Sarah assured him, followed by a set of nods surrounding her in agreement.
Kenny looked up at the ceiling again, trying to recollect the story pieces from his youth. He'd made it up for Karen when she was out of commission for nearly a week with a strong flu when he was twelve, trying to do his best to keep her drinking tea and telling her dumb stories to get her through the endless torrent of coughing and sniveling. The story hadn't altered in all the times he'd told her, but he hadn't touched it in nearly seven years. He shook his head. If he missed any details, Karen would no doubt interject, she had a memory like no other when it came to his tales. "All right so," he began slowly. "Like Kare said, fairies use magic. Well… Once upon a time," he drawled, "there was a fairy that liked to be by a stream-"
"River," Karen corrected, Kenny looking at her dryly before turning back.
"River, my bad. She liked to be at the river. And she liked to dance. She'd only go to the river at night, because being out in the open where people could see her in sunlight was so dangerous. So she spent every night there, and she used her magic and her wings so she could dance on the water. She made it so every reflection of starlight was a pebble on the water that she could balance on so she could dance on it…" He paused, shaking his head at his younger self's imagination before pressing onwards. "She did this for a really long time. And then, one day, there was a cloud overhead, and it covered up the starlight as she was about to land on one of her pebbles. So she fell in, and the water soaked her wings so she couldn't get out. So she was trying to swim and screaming for help, hoping one of her fairy friends would hear her," he wriggled his fingers.
One of the girls cocked her head, "They can't swim?"
"Uh… not in this story anyway," he winced. "I haven't been able to ask one myself, so I can't say for sure." Karen chuckled and he flicked her arm lightly before sighing and continuing on. "So anyway. Screaming, drowning, lots of bad stuff," he waved dismissively. "Well there was a boy who heard her while he was trying to get home from the woods. So he ran over and fished her out of the water. She was scared of him, but grateful that he got her out of the river alive."
"Why was she scared?" a boy asked.
He shrugged, "Because humans are dangerous to them. We're a lot bigger and we have a lot of metal on us, so they just like to play it safe. So this fairy was scared, but he did save her and he didn't seem as though he wanted to hurt her. She stuck around a bit while her wings dried off, and she granted him the only gift that she could, and gave him the same magic to dance on the water. They waited for the clouds to clear and she kind of tugged his sleeve," he demonstrated with his own, "and led him out into the shallows of the river. He was scared until he started glowing the same color as her-"
"What color?" Sarah questioned.
Kenny looked over to Karen for the answer and she smirked, "She glowed yellow. Because that's my favorite color," she winked at him and he chuckled, ruffling her hair a bit.
"Right. Yellow. Anyway, she showed him how to balance on the stars, and how to find the reflections big enough for him to be able to dance as easily as she did. And it took him a little while, but soon it was almost like it was natural, and they danced on the river together," he gestured his hand out in a swooping motion dramatically. "But, the boy had some coins in his pocket and had forgotten. He stumbled and one fell out into the water. He picked it up and it brushed on the fairy's leg. It hurt her so much that she freaked out and flew back into the woods.
"He chased after her, apologizing and ya know, just feelin' awful that he accidently hurt her," he winced. "But she was long gone, so he went home."
"…That's it?" the eldest asked flatly.
"Hang on, hang on," Kenny raised his hand a bit. "Patience, Dude, I'm getting' there. It's been a few years okay? My story skills are a bit dusty." Karen shook her head, finishing sewing to the end of the cat tail and turning it right-side out, beginning to take fingerfuls of roving and press it into the fabric. "So he goes home all sad and whatnot," Ken continued. "But it starts being his tradition to go out to the river every night. Even though the fairy left, she didn't take the magic that she gave him, so he could still dance on the water. So he did, he practiced for years, just hoping one day that she would come back.
"He was a good enough dancer to go into the deeper, wider parts of the river, always careful to wait for cloudless nights to do so and saving the shallows for otherwise. Well one clear night, all those years later, the fairy was off dancing by herself at another section of the river. She knew that he was still waiting for her, but was just too afraid of the metal to go back and join him, even though she wanted to just because dancing with a partner is always better," he smirked. "But her leg was still a bit messed up from the coin he'd hit her with, so she was a little off-kilter. And on that night, she fell back into the water when her leg gave out, but because he was off dancing so far away from her, he didn't hear her and she drowned."
"That's awful," one of the kids murmured.
"Gets worse," Karen said casually.
Kenny snorted, "Yeah. When a fairy dies, the magic they had dies with them. So the boy was off dancing in deeper water and the magic wore off and he fell in, too, and he was too far into the river for anyone to hear him needing help. So he ended up drowning just the same…" He glanced at the devastation and the complete fascination over the kids' faces, smirking to himself at the clear memory of the exact same expression that had plastered Karen's own so many years ago. "But don't worry, there's a happy ending," he assured them.
They cocked their heads and he pointed out the window, "You know that purple streak we see in the sky every night?" They all nodded in confusion and he grinned, "That's the river that they made together. Because no metal was going to harm her now, so they could dance together again. So they've been dancing since they both died, and made themselves their own personal river and now they dance on the literal stars."
The eldest snorted, "That's lame."
"You're lame," Kenny pouted childishly. "So sue me I came up with it out of nowhere for my sick sister, it isn't going to be pure poetry." The other kids continued their wide-eyed stares however, Kenny glancing down and blinking at them. "Uh, yes?"
One bit their lip, "So… fairies are good?"
He shrugged, "I-I mean… depends on who you ask. Sometimes people think they're good, sometimes people think they only exist to ruin everything they touch and cause trouble… there's a lot of stories, Kid."
"Where did you hear them?" Sarah questioned.
Karen piped up, "There was an old man who used to live here in town before he died. He told me and Kenny all about 'em."
"Had he seen one?"
Kenny nodded affirmatively, "According to him he did."
The oldest raised his brow, "Do you believe him?"
The blonde opened his mouth a bit, furrowing his brow as he tried to piece together an answer. "Um… Yeah. Yeah I do, actually," he shrugged. "He had no reason to lie to us. He wanted to tell us what happened. Only kids understand this kind of stuff," he gestured at the lot of them.
One of the girls cocked her head, "Have you ever seen one?"
An image of the creature from the night prior flashed in his mind and he gulped, shifting on his stool and rolling his shoulders, trying to relieve some of the stress-tension. "I can't say for sure," he said slowly. "But… I might've. Can't prove it, though," he murmured a bit regretfully, feeling Karen staring at him before continuing to finish up attaching the tail to the cat.
Sarah tucked her hair behind her ear, staring at him sadly, "Why would a fairy take my kitty, though?"
He frowned sympathetically, "Maybe they needed a friend, too," he offered. "But they know they can't ask us for one of ours, so they just take it. Not very nice of them, no, but maybe they just don't trust us or don't understand us enough, ya know?"
She nodded slowly, "You think the metal will keep them out?"
Kenny nodded back, "I do. It's the one thing almost all the stories have in common. Just throw some scraps in with your toys, that'll keep 'em out, I guarantee it," he winked, getting a small smile out of her.
"I think we're done," Karen declared, tugging on the affixed tail a few times. Kenny turned back in his seat, inspecting her work and grinning at her.
"Good job, Kiddo," he praised, getting up to his feet. "Not done just yet, however." He walked to the edge of his table, snagging a pre-cut piece of red silk and snagging the cat from its resting position, carefully tying it a nice, taut bow, the color standing out starkly from the pale yellow of the tiretain and glinting softly in the fading natural light of the outside. He moved over and handed it down to Sarah, smiling at her face lighting up with pure joy at the new friend.
She got to her own feet, clutching it tightly in her little arms and smiling tearfully at him, "Thank you," she worked out, hugging him around his leg.
He grinned wider, patting her head lightly and watching her slowly unwind and go over to hug Karen as well. "It's not a problem," he assured her. "You just be careful with this one, all right?"
The girl nodded, "I will. Thank you," she repeated as the other kids got to their feet.
"Thanks for the story," the oldest nodded with a grin. "Dumb as it was."
Kenny pouted again, "You respect your elders, Kiddo."
He snorted, waving him off and beginning to herd the others out of the building. "Yeah yeah. Thanks for your help."
"Anytime," he nodded, giving them a small wave back as they bid farewell, shutting the door behind them and leaving him and Karen alone in silence.
Karen stared at her older brother as she carefully packed his needle into his pouch beside her on the table. "So… passin' on the stories, huh?"
"I was drunk as fuck," he reminded her dryly. "You're the one who pushed it."
She chuckled, shrugging sheepishly. "I couldn't help it. I love that story and haven't heard it in years."
He rolled his eyes amusedly, "I'll write it down for you, then. I can't believe you remember that tripe," he commented, helping her clean scrap fabric and roving from the table surface.
"It's what we spent most of our childhood talkin' about," she reminded him. "Hard t' forget when it was always there, ya know?" Kenny paused before nodding in agreement, taking a long breath through his nose. He never expected their escape from the realities of home to come slamming back into him like this, though. And he never thought he'd find himself doubting his own damn doubt of all things. "Do you still believe in that stuff?" She asked softly.
He shrugged, "I really don't know. What about you?"
She licked over her lips in thought, winding up thread to stash back onto the proper shelf. "I don't know either," she admitted. "It's nice to think about sometimes though, ya know? Try to think about somethin' else bein' nearby that isn't home? Just somethin' completely different… I don't know, it's just a nice thought now and then I suppose. Whether it's fairies or just some kind of animal we haven't seen before. At least it'd be different."
Kenny let the notion settle on him, letting himself linger in the idea that had plagued him for so long. A part of him hated that Karen felt the same, didn't want her to be as miserably stuck in a rut as he was. But to know that he wasn't alone in the yearning made it a bit easier to accept, to not feel as guilty as he had been the last several years for wanting to break free from the mold and find something new. He twisted his lips as he shoved the last of the roving fibers into the hide bag, glancing towards the silhouette of the trees far off in the background, blackened against a rose and gold sky. He sighed, nodding to himself. Revisiting a tale of the past renewed him in a sense, let him bathe in the sentiment he'd been trying to escape but had been unable to. Something was out there, and regardless of what it might be, he had to find out what.
