Flyaway Tales

by Stefano Amadei

  Since that big bang the moon came out and soon returned to its place in the sky, but since then never shows itself full if not for a few days a month.

  The pirate ship was back on the water and captain Spreadblood immediately gave the order to sail to the first safe port to spend the king’s gold. And once he set foot on land he, like all his crew, decided he’d had enough of sea adventures, and that it was time to retire from their raids.

  The king and his soldiers, after a long flight, landed on top of the highest tower of the castle and it took quite a while to get down from there. But the king took even longer to recover, after it was discovered that the pirates had stolen all his gold during his absence.

  The bride and groom and the priest ended in the churchyard, their marriage was celebrated without frills. Then, after the couple had left for their honeymoon, the guests, for fear of having other unpleasant encounters, went back to their homes and the priest reached the church at a brisk pace, this time without speaking to anyone.

  Even the king’s soldier, who was on leave, quickened his pace and soon came to his parents house in the country who were the humble peasants that we know.

  When he entered he asked, “Mom whose is that milk in that cup? You don’t have a cat, right?”

  “No dear. That milk was for a beautiful black cat that proved stupid and ungrateful and I’m sure he got what he deserved. Do me a favor, give the milk to the plants, will you? Certainly they will appreciate it more!”

  Badwinter was still trying to clean the cave from the last of the pitch when he saw Mammone ruefully return.

  “How thin you look! I must say, you are very skinny to have gone to Earth to overeat. Yes, I could say that you are thinner than when you left! Are you sure you’re well? Mammone cat, have you eaten enough?” said the devil grinning and showing his sharp teeth.

  Mammone swelled his black coat and hissed repeatedly. Then he went to his dark corner still trying to understand what had happened and, more importantly, why his belly felt so empty.

  NEVER BEEN DREAMED

  Emma closed the door leading to the roof of the apartment building where she lived and went out. She had never been up there even though she had always been curious about going. It would have been nice to be taller than everyone, finally grown up.

  As she set foot on the roof, she realized that something had changed. It was strange and she seemed to see things in a different perspective. Of course she had finally grown up. Like that, suddenly, just as all children would like it to happen. Even her clothes were different than usual, but Emma could not see them on her.

  “Take the words and hang them! Come on get moving!” To urge her on was a woman dressed in a dazzling white dress, so that Emma could not see her face. She was collecting from a basin of words and was hanging them on the washing line with clothespins. Emma gasped “What the...” she began.

  “Because you’ve never been dreamed of and I’ll explain that you’re new, but will not repeat it” interrupted the woman with the shining dress going for pieces and continuing to hang the words on the line. “First of all know that this is a dream, and in dreams there is not a moment to lose. Everyone is busy.”

  Emma looked around and saw many other people who were busy in the same activity, only that some of them hung pictures instead of words. Others, instead, took the baskets with images and words that had been removed from the line to empty them throwing everything off the roof. Emma saw below men and women picking them up, putting them in other baskets and bringing them back up again.

  “But you want to help me? Get the words in the basket and throw them here!” ordered the woman. Emma saw a basket with the symbol of recycling, but it was too small for the words in her basket. She went towards the words and these, shrank and disappeared into the trash.

  “But where did they go?”

  “Hold this, but don’t let it fall” and the woman gave her the word hot. Emma was just in time to place it on the ground: it was very hot. The words were what they meant. “You see...” said the woman “... these words are all those spoken or heard during the day. It is the same for the pictures.”

  “And why are you hanging them out?”

  “But my girl, to dry them of course. You’ve felt the word before, as it was hot? Now touch this” she said, handing the girl the word ice. To her surprise, Emma did not find it to be cold. “Words and pictures can be used and reused in dreams only. Look here!” She said taking two words that were already dry: Bread and Trumpet.

  They came closer and from the word Bread letters became unstuck and fixed to TRUMPET forming two new words Butter and TRUMPETED. Only now the first word was now slippery and the other began to play loudly.

  “Words are fresh again, but they have been changed!” Emma concluded.

  “Exactly. And for images it works in the same way. Only when they dry they can mingle, get one inside the other to form new strange images. It is as a perfect theater where the scenes and objects are constantly moving. And that is why we throw everything down below. Only then can they mix up well, and we can effortlessly get new words and fresh images to dry them. Those that we don’t need or we have too many of can go into these recycle bins. You never know what might pop out to mix letters and colors. All that remains on the line is part of the dream, of what the dreamer remembers when they wake up.

  As long as these pictures are not dry” said the woman.

  “But who are you?” asked Emma.

  “I am the Dream Fairy, I am the one who holds the thread of your dream. When you forget a word while you are talking, I took that word because I needed it in a dream.”

  “Then you control the lives of those who dream?” asked Emma in disbelief.

  “No, I only put the forgotten words and phrases in order, in the memory of things, scents, the color of life that everyone chooses to have for themselves.”

  Emma looked up and saw the dark. Bare trees seemed proud to support a blanket of red clouds. The full moon, just above, hid secrets in the shadows of its craters.

  The Fairy offered Emma a chair. A small table appeared.

  “Everyone come, we will make a nice photo of Emma for her first dream!”

  Everyone stopped their frantic work and gathered around her.

  “What is your favorite game, Emma?” the woman asked.

  “Dominoes” said the girl firmly.

  On the table appeared so many black and white ivory tiles, arranged horizontally, one after the other like the keys of a piano. Emma touched them as if to play with them. Someone took a picture and the Fairy hung it on the line with a clothespin.

  Then, with everyone looking at her, Emma started playing against an invisible friend...

  The little girl woke up and ran to the big bed: “Mama, Mama, I dreamed I drew piano keys on the kitchen table. I played over there, but they were silent. And the neighbors came to hear. But I’m not really really sure, you know?”

  THE MIXTURE

  Hey Susanna help me! Mother has stopped on the landing to talk to the neighbor before picking up the mail!”

  “But Maurizio, Mom told us to be good, then she will give us a reward...”

  “She said that to me and to you, but not to the Mad Professor and his assistant Irma! Come, we must make the mixture!”

  The Mad Professor ran into the bathroom and opened the water tap allowing it to flow until it was hot enough, then put in the plug and filled the sink.

  Then he started to go back and forth from the kitchen with his sister, he frantically told her each time what he needed. The doors of the cabinets opened and slammed shut because of the rush and in the bathtub all sorts of ingredients appeared quickly and these were added to others taken right from the bathroom.

  Needless to say that all ended quickly in the sink, in order and the amounts that the Mad Professor seemed to know so well that he could not stop himself from happily singing a song.

  Fill with water all your sink,

  with the hot one
, needed ink,

  so than add so slowly slow,

  sort of mustard, than a blow

  Stir the mixture with a spoon

  (best Mum’s wood one)

  It's potion I want to make

  Brownie sugar I have to take,

  Than of salt I need a pinch

  Daddy after-shave, than a switch,

  oil, vinegar and a bow,

  some toothpaste here now!

  Mouthwash, detergent a bit less,

  three grains of rice, some pickles

  it became a little bit sticky,

  really now you can put in

  a bit of this and a bit of that,

  and continuously stir, what?

  A really real great mixture

  now it must work truly sure!

  “Can you smell that perfume Irma? Do you smell that?”

  “That stink you mean...” said the little girl fanning her hand under her wrinkled nose and sticking out her tongue in disgust.

  “It doesn’t stink, it is the scent of science!”

  They went on like this for a while, adding ingredients of any kind to the mixture. The Mad Professor knew that the experiment was conclusive, final, one for which he would become world famous.

  The water had now taken on a greenish color and it smelled like a rotting swamp.

  “Great sign, Irma! It’s time to try the potion and see if the mixture works!”

  “No, Professor, no! Maurizio ... “

  But Irma didn’t have time to stop him. Maurizio had already removed the rubber gloves that mom used to wash the dishes and had sprinkled his face and arms with the stinky stew and now he was rubbing it into his hair as if it were the best gel.

  “We will end up in trouble...” murmured Susanna. “First they will not let us go play with our friends, then no television and you will have a bath every day for who knows how long...”

  “Irma, contain yourself! A little respect for science! Don’t you see? Don’t you see? It works! It works! It works! I’m a genius! I will win the Nobel Prize for Physics! Ah ah ah ah ah! It works!” Maurizio shouted as he continued to sprinkle his body, legs and clothes with the stuff.

  Then he took a towel and dried himself well.

  Susanna stared transfixed at the step that her brother, until recently, had used to conveniently reach the sink. It was empty.

  “Maurizio, where are you?” she stammered scared.

  “I’m here!” said the boy happily, “Just that you can’t see me, no one can! I’m invisible!”

  “It ... is ... amazing! But ... but ... but how will you get back to normal?” Susanna asked puzzled.

  “And who wants to get back to normal?” Maurizio answered.

  Susanna was not sure. She was also having fun, but underneath she was very scared.

  She didn’t like to be left there alone. Okay, Maurizio was still there with her in the same room, but the fact that she could not see him made her very uncomfortable.

  It was when he had decided to imitate the Mad Professor that Irma realized that the sink had gone. Then the hand towel lifted itself into the air and POUF! Disappeared too. “Maurizio? Have you dried your hands?” asked the frightened girl not knowing what to do.

  In response, however, the voice of the Mad Professor, seeing that he was now invisible, would not stop making the most outrageous plans. “I have to find a way to spend the time that separates me from prizes and fame. Somehow I’ll survive...” the boy thought out loud “... I’m not able to cook so I can sit next to mother, and when she is looking the other way, I’ll take away the soup from under her nose! Ha, ha, ha! As for school...”

  “Maurizio!” shouted his sister “Are you crazy? Don’t you see that your potion is only making trouble?”

  While she tried to convince her brother to do something to fix the mess Sun, their orange tabby stealthily went into the bathroom. With his tail straight he immediately ran towards Maurizio (or where he might be), rubbed against his trousers, then he jumped on the invisible sink and seemed to sniff the mixture.

  “Sun, but you see Maurizio, the sink and everything else!” Susanna just had time to exclaim when she heard a splash! And a miaooo!

  Sun had slipped into the potion and run away to hide somewhere he was so scared, soaked through and now he too was invisible.

  As a result, holes began to appear where the cat’s paws touched the floor through them you could see the neighbor, Mrs Maria, who was preparing lunch for her son, and was checking whether the water on the stove had decided to boil.

  And the worst thing of all was that the invisible patches were visibly expanding. The entire floor was becoming invisible!

  Oh, my!” Said Susanna, now in a panic and without any hope.

  “Irma, did you by any chance turn off the light?” asked Maurizio.

  “Never mind. And now even with the light on, I don’t see you the same...”

  “I can’t see anything, it’s all dark... I don’t understand it...”

  A loud meow interrupted the eminent scientist’s ruminations. Even Sun, used to being able to see in the dark, seemed to have the same problems with seeing and, terrified, began to run around bumping and flipping over (and what is worse breaking) everything in his path and becoming ever more scared every time he heard the sound of an ornament smash.

  Poor Sun!

  “Maurizio?...” Ventured Susanna “Maurizio, is everything alright? How are you feeling? Where are you?” said the little girl holding her hand out towards the place she had last heard her brother’s voice.

  Luckily for him she decided to try one last time.

  Little boys, you know, are not as smart as little girls, and sometimes they are so distracted that they get nervous.

  “Professor, do you hear me? It’s Irma! Professor!” She called out decisively from where the little boy’s disconnected words had come.

  “But of course! Of course, how stupid not to have thought of it before! Ha ha ha!” The Mad Professor laughed satisfied.

  “Are you sure you’re alright?”

  “It’s logical! If I am invisible light goes around me and doesn’t even come into my eyes! And that’s why I can’t see! Sure... I could get used to it, or maybe I could invent some special kind of glasses... But now I think I’ll be forced to give up, at least for awhile...and at school I’ll have to take a voice recorder, you certainly can’t study from a book that I won’t be able to read... although I think, if they can no longer see me they’ll give my desk to somebody else, for sure... Irma, what is it? Don’t you see I’m very busy?”

  “But Professor, everything is disappearing: the sink, the cat... the apartment! If you don’t hurry the whole building will disappear! Do something!” Ordered Irma who meanwhile had climbed on a stool so as not to start disappearing as well.

  “Nonsense! I’ve got everything under control!” replied the Mad Professor, who continued, “Oh, alright! Almost everything has disappeared, you say, and in fact I still have to think of some small details...”

  The Mad Professor pulled a small bottle out of his pocket containing a yellowish liquid and poured it where the sink should have been.

  “The concentrated juice of twenty lemons, Irma! Remember this! It’s important to always have a little with you!” he said squeezing some into his eyes to speed up the process. Oh, Mama, how it stings, I hadn’t thought of that. He closed his eyes tight shut and his lips: he had to be strong, had to resist! For science!

  His hands were the first to become visible, then his clothes.

  Susanna ran to hug her brother: she was now much happier and calmer.

  Even the cat, Sun had come back to walk around, with his tail straight up, he wound around Maurizio’s legs, almost as though he was thanking him for bringing him back to normal.

  Now in the sink there was a harmless greenish mess that the Mad Professor saw for the last time before it ended up down the drain.

  The front door clicked open and mother came back home. Immediat
ely she put her hands to her head and began to shout shocked: “Children, are you alright? What on earth have you done! Maurizio, is this one of your messes?! Everything’s broken, everything’s wet... I cleaned everything yesterday...” said their mother sad and resigned.

  “It was the cat, Mom!” replied Susanna candidly, quickly trying to defend her brother.

  “Well, maybe he didn’t do it all by himself! Mom, my eyes are burning...” continued Maurizio rubbing his eyes and looking sweetly at his mother to make her a little sorry for him.

  Mom took a deep breath, counted to ten (though she would have to rely on a little more to really calm down) and then replied, “Come, I will make chamomile eye packs! You know children, don’t you, that you’re going to be punished?”

  Susanna looked at her brother with a look that said I told you, but he only arched his eyebrows. A mocking smile appeared on his face. It was just what he needed.

  With a little peace he would think about how to try to understand the language of animals...

  Where is Sun hiding?

  ALI AND THE SCRIBE

  On that day the streets were dustier than usual. Perhaps because it had been more than a month since it had rained, perhaps because a nagging warm breeze had sprung up that did nothing but carry the dust around that had been raised by the chariots and horses. Or maybe there was a different reason: to be seven years old and be chased by the other older boys changed how he saw the day a lot.

  “Ali, stop! If we catch you, you will see what we will do!”

  Five boys chased Ali, who did not want to be caught.

  After all he had only sneezed, by chance, when he had passed by the fishmonger’s exactly when the other boys, who had not been with him, were trying to steal an entire box of mackerel. The guards had not caught them by a hair. The fishmonger had accused Ali and also the petty thieves.

  The only thing he could do was to put wings to his feet.

  He was a very good runner and in fact had already put an entire alley between him and his pursuers. Around the corner he saw, on the side of the road, a huge red tent and decided to hide behind it to get rid of the lazybones who were chasing him. He was about to put his plan into action when he realized it was not a tent, but a cloak worn by the fattest person he had ever seen. It was the rich spice merchant Aziz Stuvir. He was always dressed very elegantly and now wore a red and white tunic under his cloak, had beautiful curled slippers and a hat with a feather. Ali saw the merchant hadn’t seen him, as intent as he was on dictating a long and boring business letter to a scribe that was right there at his desk.