Pocket Pegasus

by Susan Stafford

  “I’ll be fine, Mom. There’s a good movie on tonight and I’m gonna make a huge bowl of popcorn and snuggle with Maxi.”

  By seven o’clock, her parents were packed up and ready to head out to work. Laura waved goodbye at the front steps as they pulled out of the driveway. She closed the door firmly and locked it, then headed upstairs to email Krissy again with the less-than-awesome news about the stable job.

  It was very hot. Laura threw open a window and more sultry, humid air wafted in, driven by a slight breeze. She logged onto MSN to see if Krissy was online…yes! The next hour flew by as the pair chatted about everything and nothing.

  Laura and Krissy had been close friends since grade two when Laura was the new kid at school and Krissy had taken pity on her. They had embarked on many adventures together, gotten into trouble a time or two, swapped clothes, shared a case of chicken pox and more than a couple of flu viruses. Krissy’s birthday was only three days after Laura’s, and they liked to pretend they were sisters.

  With a bit of time to kill before her movie started, Laura puttered in her room, dusting and rearranging her models and deciding which mare would occupy the place of honour beside Flash in the window. She chose a Lipizzaner performing the distinctive Spanish walk, neck arched and right foreleg stepping boldly ahead. She thought they made a handsome couple.

  Running her index finger along the top of the row of books in the bookcase, Laura pulled out one of her mythology and legends volumes and flipped to the section on Pegasus. She knew the story by heart, but always enjoyed reading about fantasy and myths, dragons, unicorns, and other fabulous creatures.

  As the story went, Pegasus was the magnificent winged horse that was the offspring of the Gorgon Medusa and Poseidon, ruler of the sea. When the Greek hero, Perseus, cut off Medusa’s head of snakes, Pegasus was born. The goddess Athena was the first to catch Pegasus. She presented another warrior, Bellerophon, with a golden bridle with which he was able to ride Pegasus. Together, the pair slew the monster Chimera, but when Bellerophon attempted to ride Pegasus to Mount Olympus to visit the gods, he was thrown off. The job of Pegasus from that point on was to bring thunderbolts to Zeus. His name, in fact, is thought to have come from the Luwian word for lightning, pihassas. It was said that wherever Pegasus’ hoof struck the earth, a spring would burst forth.

  According to some stories, Pegasus took a wife later in life, and the pair began a family which became the origin of all winged horses. When he died, Pegasus rose to the heavens, where he became a constellation of stars.

  Several hours later, movie viewed and popcorn eaten, Laura decided to turn in. Upstairs, with the windows open and the curtains wafting gently in the breeze, she heard thunder rumbling in the distance. This did not bother her much. While she used to be terrified of storms, her dad had patiently sat with her on the window bench, storm after storm, pointing out the different types and colours of the lightning, teaching her to count between the flash and the thunder to estimate the distance of the strike. She learned to appreciate the pinkish cloud-to-cloud illumination of summer heat lightning, and had once even smelled the pungent ozone smell seared into the air following a particularly close strike.

  Not a scared little kid anymore, now Laura would simply listen to her little MP3 player if the racket from a storm kept her awake. This particular squall was approaching very fast. She popped in her earbuds, pulled a light sheet over her and closed her eyes.

  Maxine, who had been curled up among the throw pillows on the window seat, stood, yawned and did her best Hallowe’en cat stretch. Lightning dramatically backlit the feline’s form. Laura saw this apparition through half-closed eyes and smiled. It would have almost been creepy, except for the fact that Maxi was kind of overweight – well, really overweight – which ruined the whole effect. Laura giggled and closed her eyes.

  The fat cat, moving to take her place on the quilt at the foot of Laura’s bed, jumped less than gracefully to the floor. The effort sent a pillow skidding backward into Flash and his girlfriend -du-jour. The Lipizzaner teetered and then settled back onto her dainty hooves. Flash tipped to the side, leaning precariously against the window frame like a tiny drunken fairy.

  The storm raged outside. Trees in the town square were whipped by the wind, and flashes of lightning illuminated the pelting rain.

  In one simultaneous, thunderous moment, lightning hit the rooster weather vane atop the Connors’ house. The huge surge of power swept across the rain-soaked roof, along the eaves and into the metal trim of the upstairs windows. Three hundred thousand volts entered the little porcelain Pegasus at the point where his head and chest rested against the frame. A hot silver glow spread across his body to the tips of his wings, then slowly faded.

  Laura woke with a yelp. She tossed the earbuds aside, heart pounding, and sat up, terrified. She could smell something strange, something hot and disturbingly foreign. Was something on fire? Had lightning hit a tree outside? Had lightning hit the house?

  She snapped out of her stupor and turned on her bedside lamp. Good, the power wasn’t out. But what was that odd smell?

  Downstairs, Laura found the answer. The cord to the old television set in the spare room was blackened and melted. She gingerly pulled the plug from the wall socket and dropped it to the floor. It was very hot. She ran her hand down the wall near the socket, but it seemed cool enough. She was pretty sure there were no flames smouldering inside. The same seemed true of the TV – now ex-TV.

  Satisfied that the house was in no immediate danger of going up in flames, the shaken girl continued her inspection.

  In the kitchen, it appeared that the microwave had suffered the same fate as the TV. Laura carefully unplugged the sticky black wire and laid it on the counter. Room by room, with Maxi trailing curiously behind her and complaining loudly, she checked all the appliances and found no more casualties. She glanced at the clock; her parents would be home in about an hour and a half. She decided to stay awake until they returned. She doubted she could get back to sleep anyway.

  Laura scooped up Maxi and carried her upstairs, then stopped abruptly. The computer! She hoped it had been spared from incineration. As she pushed the power button, she remembered with relief that they had wisely installed a surge protector just a couple of months earlier. She typed a quick message to Krissy, which made her feel a bit less alone, more connected to the outside world.

  Hey K:

  House was just hit by lightning

  (I think). Fried one of our TVs

  and the microwave was nuked.

  Scared the poop out of me!

  T@YL.

  L.

  As quickly as it had arrived, the storm moved off to terrorize some other community with its wrath. Back in bed, her jittery nerves calmed considerably, Laura fought to keep her eyes focused on the horsey teen novel she was reading. Slowly, slowly, her sleepy lids closed.

  CHAPTER 3

  “Nichew!”

  Laura’s eyes fluttered open. She lay motionless, heart pounding, still lying on her back with the open book on her chest. She listened…listened…

  “Nicheeeew!”

  It was a sneeze. A very tiny sneeze, like a mouse with allergies. She sat bolt upright. Maxi was still on the bed, but the feline’s gaze was focused intently on something by the window. Laura squinted. Something was missing. Flash! The white mare was still in her place on the window seat, but Flash was gone.

  Thinking the winged figurine had fallen off onto the floor – and shattered? She hoped not – Laura eased out of bed and tiptoed over to the window, careful not to step on any broken bits in her bare feet. The floor, however, was bare – no tiny ears or hooves or amputated wingtips. So where was he?

  Suddenly, one of the throw cushions moved. Once, then twice, it wobbled. Again, Laura was paralyzed with fear. To her horror, an elegant white nose appeared, followed by a slender alabaster feathered wing, which sprouted from between the brocade fabrics. The pillows parted and Flash stood to his full height and
slowly flapped his magnificent wings.

  He spoke. “Hello, Laura.”

  Laura shrieked and fell backward, running into the bedpost, hard, in her panic and haste to get to the doorway.

  “Oh, please don’t be frightened,” said the voice. “I’m so sorry I woke you, but it was all the cat hair in the cushions, you see… I’ve been needing to sneeze for years.”

  The voice, Flash’s voice, was pleasant and actually rather soothing, and a bit cultured. Like Niles Crane on those old Frasier reruns, was the odd comparison Laura’s racing mind spat out. She found her heart rate slowing somewhat as she watched from the doorway, absently rubbing the painful spot on her thigh that was surely going to bruise in a most spectacular way.

  Why hadn’t she run downstairs and phoned for help? Laura wondered. But who ya gonna call, her brain taunted. Ghostbusters? The police? 9-1-1? She could just imagine how well that conversation would go…

  Hello, this is the 9-1-1 operator. What is the nature of your emergency?

  Well, there’s an eight-inch flying horse – talking flying horse – standing in my bedroom.

  Hmmm, I see… Perhaps you would be better off calling Animal Control, dear… Click.

  Laura inched forward to get a better look at the little feathered marvel. Flash – if that was really his name – reared up to his full height and flapped his wings luxuriously. He landed and snaked his neck one way, and then the other. Laura detected the tiniest pop as he cracked out his spine.

  “Ahhh, that feels much better. Now, I’m ready for some fun,” he said brightly.

  Cautiously, Laura perched on the edge of her bed. “Who are you? How did this happen? Where did you…”

  Flash launched himself off the window seat, flapped lazily across the room and landed gently on the bed beside Laura. “Well, I’m not exactly sure. The last thing I remember was being sent into battle against the evil wizard Malvenom during the War of Elysia. That was a long, long time ago – centuries, I suspect.” He cast a glance over his shoulder at his diminutive frame. “It appears I lost the fight.”

  Laura slowly put out her hand. “May I… May I touch you?” she asked shyly.

  “Of course!” came the immediate and enthusiastic reply. “In fact, I have a terrible itch behind my left wing. Could you?” Flash extended the wing in question and looked beseechingly at her. His eyes! They were piercing and golden, like those of an eagle.

  A little shakily, Laura touched his silvery coat, trailing her fingers along his back and dipping behind his near-side wing to gently scratch the offending itch.

  “Aaaaaah,” Flash sighed appreciatively.

  Laura’s hand strayed along the length of his wing. The feeling was hypnotizing, tantalizing. The sensation of muscle and feathers, strength and softness, was both strange and sensual.

  A light suddenly reflected off the window panes. Laura gasped. “It’s my parents! What am I going to tell them? Quick, you’d better hide.”

  “But why?” Flash protested.

  “Just do it. Please!” Laura begged. “I haven’t had time to figure out what to tell them about you – if I tell them.” The little winged equine scampered across the rumpled bed and wriggled under a pillow. Laura turned off the light and raced down the stairs to greet her parents.

  CeeCee, elegant in her black evening dress, and Tom, tall and handsome in his tuxedo, were surprised to see Laura still up at this hour. They listened intently to her tale of thunderstorms and smoking appliances. She did leave a few details out. There was no mention, for instance, of Flash’s reincarnation.

  Laura was still not sure how to broach the subject without sounding completely insane. She was beginning to feel rather protective of the little horse, and although she had never kept secrets from her parents before, this situation seemed somehow different.

  After giving her parents a quick kiss goodnight, Laura started to head back to her room, then changed her mind and detoured to the kitchen. She poked through the pantry, finally deciding on a handful of Cheerios, which she placed in a small plastic container and smuggled upstairs.

  “Flash? Flash?” she whispered as she closed her bedroom door. His elegant little head arose from the pile of pillows leaning against the headboard.

  “I brought you something to eat. I figured you might be hungry after all this time. I hope you like it. It’s the only thing I could think of in a pinch.” She placed the container on the bed.

  Flash bounded from his hiding place with unbridled glee. “I really am rather peckish. I haven’t eaten in, well, eons!” He sniffed the oaty little rings, bit a piece off one and chewed thoughtfully. “Oh, these are quite tasty!” he exclaimed, and tucked into the pile enthusiastically.

  When there was nothing left but crumbs, Laura padded quietly down the hall to the bathroom, where she rinsed out the container and filled it with cool, fresh water.

  Flash drank long and deeply. “That was lovely, thank you,” he said politely, wiping his muzzle on his foreleg when he was done.

  He circled a couple of times on the bed. Like a dog making a nest, Laura thought. Then he collapsed with a little whoomph and smoothed his wings back against his silky flanks.

  “I have so many questions,” Laura began.

  “Ask away,” Flash invited. “But I may not have the answers to all of them.”

  For the next half hour, Laura and Flash quietly conversed in the dark bedroom. From what Flash could recollect, he had been encased in the porcelain figurine for several centuries, as the result of having been on the losing end of a battle with the evil wizard Malvenom. The powerful spell had frozen him in mid-attack: forelegs pawing the air, wings fully outstretched, neck arched, mane and tail flowing.

  “I remember him pointing a long, bony finger at me, then a bright flash, but the details of exactly how I ended up here are a little fuzzy. It seems my first owner found me in some British woods, the Devil’s Elbow Forest, I believe, while he was out hunting. He was a very wealthy, decent English gentleman, and I adorned his mantle until his death. I was sold at auction with the rest of his estate to an oddities dealer, then had several more homes via a few antique stores both in Europe and eventually here in North America. Some of my owners were nice, and some were rather eccentric. Then your mother purchased me. I was a steal, you know.”

  Flash snickered a horsey nicker snicker. “No one could ever guess my worth, as I had no identifying marks or artist’s signature, or even a date. To be quite honest, I was a bit worried when I saw that my new keeper was just a child – no offense. I thought it was the end of the road for me, that I would be smashed to pieces by accident, but your care has been exemplary.”

  Laura wasn’t sure what exemplary meant, but it sounded like a good thing, and she was pleased.

  “I resided quite happily in your window, until tonight, when there was a huge flash of light and a positively electrifying sensation.”

  Of course, Laura thought. The bolt of lightning that hit the house must have gone through him and somehow reversed the spell.

  “I think it was the lightning,” Laura said. “It’s been known to do some really strange things. Did you know that your chances of being struck are about one in three million?”

  While Flash was mulling that figure over, Laura suddenly yawned. Much to her surprise, she found she was quite exhausted. “I have to get some sleep now, Flash. Do you mind if I call you Flash?”

  “Not at all, Mistress Laura,” he insisted. “But I’ve been asleep for centuries. I want to do something.”

  “Tomorrow. I promise we’ll have fun tomorrow. And just call me Laura. But now, sleep.”

  Flash settled in between the two pillows at the head of the bed. Moments later, his gentle snoring filled the air.

  CHAPTER 4

  Laura awoke to a morning chorus of birds chattering in the trees outside her windows. For a moment, the events of the night before seemed like a distant dream, then her head rolled to the left and she realized that the impossible was in
fact very real. And it was sitting on its haunches, looking at her.

  “Good morning,” Flash greeted her, bright-eyed.

  Laura desperately needed a plan. What was she going to do with her little flying companion? Should she tell her parents? Should she tell anybody?

  She hurriedly made her bed while Flash flapped lazily around the room, exploring. He settled on the bookshelf with the rest of the models, tipping over the end one and causing the rest to topple like a row of dominoes. “So sorry,” he apologized, head hanging.

  As Laura moved to set the models upright, there was a soft knock on her door.

  “Hey, what’s going on in there?”

  Laura froze. It was her mother. She looked at Flash in panic as the door handle turned.

  “Good morning, honey. What’s all the racket?”

  Laura turned to face her mother. “I, uh, just knocked over some of my models by accident.”

  Looking back at her bookcase, she was grateful to see Flash, frozen motionless in his familiar rearing pose, looking very statue-like. He winked at Laura. Hiding a smile, Laura continued to hurriedly straighten the models, then ushered her mom out the door.

  “I’m starved. What’s for breakfast?”

  With a full tummy and a pocketful of Cheerios, Laura trotted upstairs to see if Flash was hungry. He was pacing unhappily in the window.

  “What’s wrong?” Laura asked, concerned.

  “I, um, would really like to go outside. Actually, I really need to go outside, if you catch my meaning.”

  Laura was about to argue that such a thing was impossible when she realized that he needed to answer “the call of nature,” as her dad always referred to it.