Chapter 5: You Taught Me That
Over the next few days, the Blue Wiggle traversed the road to recovery, while his friends rallied around him. His appetite slowly returned till it was back in full force. Jeff was kept busy cooking tasty, healthy food for their hungry blue mate. Murray took care of the welts on Anthony's back, alternating applications of aloe with poultices of baking soda, and changing the bandages as needed. Off and on, he would apply ice packs to reduce the swelling. He made sure to bring Anthony his medicine around the clock, even checking on him during the night. Under the Red Wiggle's solicitous care, the angry red swelling receded. Eventually, Anthony no longer needed bandaging, and was able to wear his blue skivvy once more. He got that bounce of energy back in his step, and even started smiling and joking around again.
Greg had been biding his time. Once Anthony had fully recuperated, came the day the Yellow Wiggle had been waiting for—and the Blue Wiggle had been dreading. As they sat around the dining room table, Murray let them all know what they'd already guessed. "Anthony's stings are all healed up," he announced. He grinned at the Blue Wiggle and declared, "Good as new," sounding quite pleased.
The Wiggles' drummer returned the smile, then looked around the table at each of his mates. "And I owe it all to you guys." He cleared his throat, then said with quiet sincerity, "Thank you for all you did for me. I don't know where I'd be without you."
The Red and Purple Wiggles, seated on either side of him, reached out and patted Anthony's shoulders.
"No worries, mate," Murray replied.
"Always happy to help," echoed Jeff.
Then Greg leaned forward with his elbows on the table. "So, you can take us to meet him now, right? This bully who's been giving you so much trouble." His tone was light, but belied by the wolfish gleam in his dark eyes.
Anthony looked up in dismay. "Um, er…" he stammered. It was clear he had no desire to go near his tormentor's house again.
Murray picked up on his unease. "Would it make you feel better if we asked Officer Beaples to come along?" he asked kindly. However, Anthony looked even more alarmed at that idea.
"Oh, no—the police don't need to get involved, do they?" he begged with wide eyes. "Hang on—no, I'll—I'll take you myself." Greg beamed at Anthony's words, although Anthony himself looked as though he wished he could eat them. Dragging his feet, the Blue Wiggle nonetheless led the way to the horizon from which he had made such explosive entrances to Wiggle House over the past few weeks. He led them down side streets and dingy back alleys.
"I've never seen this part of Wiggle Town before," Jeff remarked, staring around.
"Is this really the way back to Wiggle House?" Murray wondered. "How come we've never been here?"
"I took a shortcut one day," mumbled Anthony. "That's how I met him." He sighed. "After that, I avoided his house like the plague. But somehow, he kept finding me on my way back home. It was like he was hunting me down."
Greg made a noise of disgust in the back of his throat. "Well, now we're the ones coming for him," he noted with an almost savage satisfaction.
As the road turned the corner on the outskirts of town, it abruptly dropped downward into the earth. Soon they were walking with walls of earth on either side of them, placing them into shadow. It was almost walked slower and slower. His eyes were wide and afraid. Finally, he stopped in front of a rough dwelling dug into the side of a hill. A crude gate stood in front of it. Anthony licked dry lips. "This is it," he announced, barely above a whisper.
"Beauty," Greg replied grimly. He called out towards the rough door, "We're the Wiggles! You seem to know us, but we've never had the pleasure of meeting you." He paused. There was no answer from within. Then the Yellow Wiggle abandoned all pretense of politeness. The other Wiggles jumped in surprise as he thundered,"Get out here, you coward!"
His volume seemed to do the trick. The door in the side of the dugout opened, and a green warty face popped out. Murray let out a faint gasp. "A troll," he breathed to the others. The creature snarled at the sight of the foursome. Without warning, he rushed them with his head down. His horned head was lowered with malicious intent. As the thing got close to the Wiggles, Greg quickly stepped forward. He thrust one of his long legs out in the ground-scratching emu move. The troll tripped over his leg and sprawled in front of froze in fear. His mates instantly formed a tight knot around him with the Yellow Wiggle in front.
"G'day," the band's lead singer panted at the creature, "we're the Wiggles. I'm Greg."
"I'm Murray," the Red Wiggle introduced himself automatically with the greeting they'd used for years.
"I'm Jeff," the sleepy Wiggle joined in.
Anthony still hadn't found his voice, so Greg jerked his thumb at the Blue Wiggle and concluded, "and this is Anthony." His eyes narrowed. "You might not know his name. But we're told you've met before. And that you threatened us in order to blackmail him into letting you do all kinds of awful things to him." He waited as the troll pushed himself to his feet, glaring at him balefully. "Is that true?" the Yellow Wiggle challenged him.
The troll spat at his feet. "So what, if it is?" he taunted 's lip curled in contempt.
Murray answered. "We're here to tell you to leave Anthony alone!" he cried.
The creature snorted. "Why should I?"
"Why, because you can't blackmail him anymore," Jeff replied, as though it were obvious. "We're here now. So you can't really threaten us anymore." He shrugged. "And if you can't threaten us, then you can't make Anthony do whatever you want anymore. He's free." Behind him, the Blue Wiggle's eyes widened with the dawning sun of comprehension. Now that their sleepy mate said it aloud, Anthony was starting to realize the truth. Jeff finished, "He doesn't have to be afraid of you anymore." He smirked and added, "He could even fight back." The troll blinked: it was clear he hadn't considered this fact. Then he shook his stubbly head as though to clear it. Huffing out his breath like an angry bull, he ran forward with sticklike arms outstretched. He was heading for Anthony through a gap between the other band members, his yellow eyes alight with malice. The Wiggles' drummer shrank back. Terrified, he held up hands to shield himself and squeezed his eyes shut.
But he wasn't alone this time. His mates were there by his side, to go to bat for him.
Or to war for him.
For just when the galloping troll came so close that they could smell his unpleasant odor, Greg slammed into him from the side. The creature flew head over claws in the other direction. "Don't you dare touch him!" Greg snarled. The dazed troll scrabbled to get up, but the Wiggles' lead singer was far from finished. He pounced on Anthony's tormentor like a wolf on downed prey. Hauling him into the air, he slammed the creature's body into a tree trunk. The thing went limp, although from fear or from the impact, it was hard to tell. The other band members looked on with wide eyes. Greg was normally quite easy-going. However, he had an unnerving tendency to transform from a teddy bear into a grizzly bear when his ire was aroused. The Yellow Wiggle held the hapless bully airborne against the tree so that they were at eye level. "We tried asking you nicely," he hissed. So saying, he hefted the troll in his grasp, pulled back, and slammed him into the tree trunk once more.
The Blue Wiggle flinched as the green creature howled before Greg's assault. This was the enemy who had terrorized Anthony for so long. He had thought that it would feel satisfying to see this bully get a taste of his own medicine. But on the contrary, Anthony felt an unexpected flash of pity for this being. As the Wiggles' lead singer threw the troll's limp form through the air and it crashed heavily to the grass, Anthony winced again. And to his own surprise, he found himself running forward. Greg was heading over to the creature to continue his attack, his face ugly. Anthony rushed to intercept his friend. "Greg? Greg!" he called. The aforementioned Wiggle was so intent on his mission of vengeance, that he didn't seem to hear. He got to his knees next to Anthony's tormentor. His hands went for the creature's neck. "No!" Anthony shouted louder. He reached the scene of the scuffle and heaved back on the lemon-colored shoulder. That got the Yellow Wiggle's attention. He turned to look at his friend questioningly. "Greg, stop!" the Blue Wiggle implored his mate. Greg's hands remained around the neck of the troll, although he hadn't done any damage yet. The bully was at the Yellow Wiggle's mercy. The hunter had become the prey.
"Why?" the lead singer wondered. He raised an eyebrow. "You want to have a go at him? Be my guest." Maintaining his hold on the creature, he scooted over so Anthony could move in, too. But instead of moving closer to his enemy's side, Anthony edged closer to that of his friend.
"No, that's not what I meant. I—I don't want to join you. I want you to stop," he explained. "Please. Let him go."
The Yellow Wiggle looked at him in disbelief. "Are you mad?" He shook his head. "You just want to let him go free?" He scowled down at the bully, who let out a pathetic whine. "After everything he's done to you? He deserves to get paid back!"
"Yes, I know," Anthony agreed with him. "I know he deserves it. And…part of me wants to get even," he confessed, sighing. "But look, that wouldn't solve anything. All it would do, is make you into the bully." He met his mate's eyes with a heartfelt stare, blue staring into brown. "You're better than that, Greg. You're a Wiggle! Don't be like him! Show him that we're big enough to forgive, without taking revenge."
Greg spoke. "You still have scars, inside and out, from what he did," he pointed out quietly. "He might never even feel sorry for bullying you. Are you sure you're ready to forgive him?"
The Blue Wiggle hesitated, weighing the question. He gave a single sheepish chuckle. "Heh. Well, maybe not yet," he admitted. "But I've got to try." The Yellow Wiggle shook his head slowly again, marveling. The remaining two Wiggles had sidled over during their conversation. Anthony looked around at them, smiling crookedly. "'Just because someone hurts you, doesn't give you the right to hurt them back,'" he quoted the Red Wiggle's adage from the previous Christmas. "Remember? You taught me that."
Murray smiled back and nodded, recalling the memory. "That's right, we did."
In spite of himself, Greg looked impressed. "And you learned the lesson well," he noted. "Better than I did, that's for sure."He sighed with chagrin and reluctantly withdrew his hands from the bullying troll. The creature looked up, hardly daring to believe his good fortune. "There's nothing I'd like better than to make you wish you'd never been born," Greg said to the thing, voice dark with loathing. "But if Anthony is willing to forgive you…how can I do any less?" He sat back on his heels and looked at the Wiggles' drummer. "I've just got one more thing to say to him," he announced. When Anthony opened his mouth to speak, Greg held up a placating hand to silence anticipated concerns. "No worries, mate—I won't hurt him, I promise." He set his jaw with purpose. "I just want to make sure he knows the score." He turned to the spread-eagled troll. Keeping his promise to Anthony, he didn't lay a hand on the creature. However, he made his meaning clear by the way he pushed his face down next to the troll's, eyes narrowed. "If you ever go anywhere near Anthony again," he hissed his threat directly into the bully's face, "no force in all of Wiggle World will be able to save you from me." The troll cringed and nodded, shielding his face with his claws.
Murray spoke up next. "And if you ever have a mind to come after Jeff while he's sleeping, you'll have me to contend with," he announced.
Jeff smiled up at the Red Wiggle and returned the favor. "And if you're ever mean to Murray, you'll be dealing with me," he added.
Anthony finished the band members' round robin. "And if you ever decide to bully Greg…" He paused, then laughed out loud at the thought. "Well, that would be a really bad idea," he concluded. He smiled modestly. "But just know that, for what it's worth, I wouldn't let you get away with it."
"It's worth more than you'd think," Jeff put in. He looked at the Blue Wiggle with an expression somewhere between respect and teasing. "He can be a Tasmanian devil, when he wants to be!" The three of them laughed good-naturedly at their blue friend, who looked sheepish again.
After a pause, Murray spoke, this time looking down at the troll at their feet. "We're the Wiggles." He gestured to their band's blue member, then continued, "And if you mess with one of us, you mess with all of us," he finished.
"Too right!" exclaimed his mates in agreement. The Red Wiggle looked down at Anthony's former tormentor pityingly. "You know, you could make friends, too," he pointed out. With a rather sad smile, he observed, "You don't have to live in a hole all by yourself. Making friends of your own, is certainly better than attacking someone just because you're jealous of the friends he has." Anthony blinked in realization. What his red mate said, made sense. Perhaps that was the reason this unpleasant creature had been so determined to make Anthony's life miserable? It was possible.
Then Greg cleared his throat. "And I'm sorry for hurting you," he apologized, albeit grudgingly. "Anthony made the better decision—to not take revenge. You could learn that lesson from him." The corner of his mouth quirked in a half-smile as he looked at his blue mate and admitted, "Just like I did."
"To have friends, you have to be kind," Jeff clarified for the creature, who likely didn't understand this basic concept. "Like, with a smile." He pulled his face into a wide grin to illustrate.
"Or a hug," added Murray. He reached out to the side, snatched Anthony, and pulled him into a tight embrace to demonstrate.
Greg finished by softly singing, "Or a gentle 'I'm sorry,' makes you feel okay." The troll regarded them warily. It was hard to tell if he was mulling over their words, or not.
"Think about it," Jeff offered.
"But now, it's time for us to head back to Wiggle House," Greg announced.
"Right!" his friends agreed. Well, two of them did, at least. Murray had forgotten to release Anthony. The Blue Wiggle remained within his bear hug, pinned against the guitarist's torso. His muffled voice floated from the vicinity of the Red Wiggle's chest, in which his face was buried. "Huh?" Murray asked, with a clueless stare at the reader. Jeff and Greg each followed suit. Their blue friend was completely unintelligible. He squirmed in Murray's arms. Then the drone of his voice came again, louder and more insistent. His words were still garbled, though.
"Perhaps you'd better let him go?" recommended Greg, looking amused. The guitarist nodded and relinquished his hold on the Blue Wiggle.
Anthony gulped in a breath of fresh air. "I said, 'You're squishing me!'" he informed them of what he'd been trying to communicate earlier. He looked as though he wanted to be angry with his red mate, but couldn't manage it. He put his hands on his hips and tried to frown, but ended up grinning broadly, instead.
Murray couldn't help laughing. "Sorry about that, mate," he said, still chuckling through his apology. "Are you all right?"
"Yes, I'm fine," the Blue Wiggle assured him. "In fact," he confessed, "I feel better than I've felt in a long time—thanks to you guys." The Wiggles' lead guitarist thumped Anthony on the shoulder.
Jeff pointed to the bright horizon. "Onward, to Wiggle House!" he declared. The others grinned, and together the foursome headed back home in the warm, bright noonday sun.
The bullying troll watched them depart. Slowly, he blinked. His face wore a thoughtful expression.
Perhaps the Wiggles had managed to convince him, after all?
The End