Dawn had crashed much into Kermit's own inconvenience. Light slithered through the amateur curtains, a fox lurking in the grasses before biting into the neck of its next, flushed, victim. Kermit merely stared, as the light blinded his ghastly eyes. The frog had tussled with his sense of inquietude, only to match in a losing battle. He often wondered why he attempted the sport of slumber at all, as his wake was always there to bicker against it. The tears Robin had shed the previous night still stained Kermit's consciousness, which had only maintained his streak in staring at a dead ceiling, watching as the moon's shadows scampered along the paint in a perished daydream.
After flushing down three cups of caffeinated tea, and an extra black coffee to give some age of stab at his sense of sleep, Kermit performed a petty grooming before disturbing his grumbling nephew into wear.
Before Robin could hardly enter the kitchen, his hasty cereal had already been prepared for him. As the young frog seated himself for the meal, his uncle clapped a small cup in front of him. Robin begged quizzical, peering over the edge of the container. "What's that?"
His uncle, in question, couldn't help but to spoil a smile. "Vitamins."
"I don't see why I need them, though."
"Good grief, just take the darn thing."
The engine depleted, much like Kermit's own will. The moment he swung open the door, nature salted his smell. Trees danced with a still wind, caressing the early morning lights, as shimmering rain residue cried to the ground below. The puddles that formed under those trees deposited the frog's grimace back against him. The heat weighed heavy.
His dread was vanquished, as the frog witnessed Robin puzzling around mud paste and strange shards of the sun's rainbow, written within the concrete. Kermit chuckled, finding the irony in a frog's deliverance in avoiding anything remotely damp. But then another idea struck him; Robin was an honest metropolitan, having never experienced the ways of the marshes he had born from. Kermit didn't know whether this was a step forward, or a crevice he'd indented within the pride of his ancestors.
As the pairing approached the front doors, the young child was awestruck; the sun brazed against the decayed theater sign, burrowing itself into the creaking bricks that sank into the devastation of the earth. It were as if two worlds clashed, a historian digging for scrolls its writers had thrown to trash decades before. Kermit would have ingrained the moment into the memories he would visit on his dying day, if he hadn't caught a glimpse of a dog approaching.
Rowlf perked at the sight, his mundane gaze sparking to life. "Well, hey there." He beamed a grin that could cleanse parasites from a wound. The canine's fur had been fractured by the thick after-rain that hugged against him, shattering under a rising sun's rays. Much like the rainbow puddle that teased Kermit with a fable hope.
He felt Robin shimmy against his legs, shielding himself from the violent views of a stranger. Kermit rubbed his nephew, moving himself away as a covering shadow Robin had declared he was. Rowlf struck to stone, snapping his attention to the small frog. "I'll be. . ."
His ears slipped back, as the old dog's fervent gaze corked its screws from rusting. The dawning warmth of the early morn casted its dusting nostalgia across Rowlf's catered memories. Robin returned back an alien countenance.
"Last I saw of this little man, he was barely a growing tadpole." Kermit chuckled at the comment, remembering Rowlf's first, and only, encounter back a few years. It may have been the most scorching aspect of Kermit's life, blacker than the shadows shown on the first television. The frog had been a fresh man from the swamp, still configuring how exactly not to run across a street on a driving green light, or what value and importance money had on society as a whole. The amphibian had come of age as a young, marriageable, suitor, yet still used his fingers to count to five, a sudden normality a country boy was never taught when young.
Yet, those years had also been the first big hits Kermit experienced, taking on any actor roles he could possibly muster at his age–and intelligence. After long, hopeless, efforts, and angry letters from his father to come back to the marshes where a frog belonged, Kermit finally had his first gig. A show titled "Sam and Friends." However, said show had about as much name as Kermit had money, and for a long while, Kermit lived mostly in homeless shelters, or the basements of restaurants that he'd janitor for hardly a penny an hour.
Another young man, by the privileged name of Henson, seemed cooped in the same scenarios, yet offered Kermit a chance the frog didn't ever think possible. Thus, his true career commenced under a new set of stage lights.
Kermit would never forget the lasting friendships he had blossomed during the show's airtime, as itself and its actors slowly grew to a steady point of recognition, suddenly being invited to talk shows to perform memorable skits so many children loved back in the 50's.
Despite the eternal marks the members permitted into Kermit's character, none had such the impact as Harry the Hipster did. They had been an inseparable match, a bond yielded into that of brotherhood, silently sworn loyalty that anchored their minds. Thinking of it now, Kermit could remember the musty scents that Harry blew from his pipette, sketching itself into birthmarks of the furniture, those polished sunglasses reflecting off a peace Kermit couldn't seem to witness in his own life.
Then Robin was born, marked as a sudden "orphan" in the absence of his parents, an egg too small to possibly ever hatch, granted it hadn't been the rumored "dwarf" or "dud" the family suggested it to be. Thus, when hatching season did come around, Robin had been so late to start that Kermit's relatives considered the illusive fetus to be dead. A dead egg, never given the chance at life. But Kermit always was a bitter soul, even through the eyes of his parents.
When Kermit returned to the marshes for the scheduled funerals for his lost sibling and in-law, the frog forked his hand into the nesting pond, cradling the smallest egg into the fits of his palm. Much to his apprehension, the unhatchling did have a few scrapes drawn onto its once smooth shelling, confirming the further hypothesis of a dead infant.
Kermit couldn't do it, this baby needed a chance, this child needed to give him the chance. This would be the closest thing Kermit could ever be to his departed sister, and he knew for a terrible fact that she would have given her child more time to evolve, despite the family's wishes. Kermit may have been shunned, he may have been exiled as the eldest son, he may have been hated for generations still in the making.
But good grief, he wasn't going to let this kid die with his parents. He needed, at most, a fair shot. A chance the rest of his family refused to give him. A chance Kermit was willing to sacrifice.
Thus, he filled a jar he had packaged with him, per planned, full of the pond water, and drifted the egg into it, locking the cap tighter than his staggering breaths.
When Kermit returned, he had been greeted with many solemn faces. Despite the fame and awards "Sam and Friends" had been able to obtain, the group wished to depart. The show still had been listed for low ratings, and many of the cast desired to find something bigger than themselves, or simply wished a more laid back livelihood that hadn't been involved with showbiz. Kermit had already been crushed under family conflict and intentions, he practically crumbled at the thought of not only losing his dream career, but every friend that mattered to him.
Being the guy he was, Harry had foreseen this, even through those thick, charred, glasses. As Kermit began packing for another move, the Hipster slipped his pipe from his lips, led out a final blow, and flipped the cigar into a nearby trash bin. "I know it's been tough on ya, Kerm. That's why I'm here, with a friend."
There before the frog, had been the piano stunting dog himself. As an odd greeting commenced, Harry gripped the frog by the hard shoulder, gleaming over his shining spectacles. "Rowlf here has been pullin' in commercials longer than I've known him for, and he's gotten pretty darn good at it too. If you're still up for it, my friend, maybe you two can work together. Pays well too, from what I hear."
The rest, had been merely history.
As time grew, Rowlf became well informed of Robin's presence, and the precious treasury it manifested into his uncle. When Kermit had found himself living off of Sesame Street, Rowlf paid an unspoken visit. "Little guy's finally hatched, huh?" The dog found himself smiling into the abyss of his thoughts, twirling a finger around the maturing tadpole, allowing it to chase his claw against the edges of the water bowl. Rowlf turned, only to grant a teasing glance. "What did I tell ya? You gotta start believing in miracles a little bit more, frogman." The amphibian couldn't help rolling his eyes, allowing the first smile playing on his lips since the shutdown of "Sam and Friends." The rolling sun streamed from the living room window, and casted magnificent shades of violets, reds, and greens.
A rainbow connection, indeed.
Kermit was slapped out of his thoughts, as Robin began tugging at his arm in a frenzy, a questioning scowl illuminating his features. Rowlf had misted without a trail. "Uncle Kermit?" The frog shook himself from a nostalgic trance, humoring off his mood. "Right, get inside." Robin grumbled, as he had been for the past few minutes of Kermit's fazing.