Sadly Never After//One

Sadly Never After//One

The rain was golden.

In fact, it wasn't even rain. Rather than pelt Vanderville and its inhabitants with condensed water vapor, the clouds had decided it was a good day for feathers. Golden ones, of course.

"Hm," said Nigel, holding out a hand to catch one of the glinting plumes. It was like standing in a snowstorm, only warmer. There was never any snow in the summer, after all. He twirled the feather between his thumb and forefinger. Yes, it was a feather all right. Nothing peculiar about it, save its origin. A glance upward confirmed that the clouds, too, were looking quite regular. Small tufts of down stuck to his eyelashes and tickled his nose. He sneezed and went on his way, feathers piling atop his short chocolate hair.

There were many ways in Vanderville. Old Way, New Way, Forest Way, the more exciting (but often disappointing) Sasquatch Sighting Way…but Nigel usually took his way, not that it had been named for him. Nigel's Way was one of the older streets in Vanderville and named for one of its famed founders, to whom our Nigel was of no relation whatsoever.

Nigel's Way was lined with a mishmash of tall, copper-roofed buildings which today shone gold instead of pasty green. They looked like scummy ponds dappled with afternoon sunlight, even though it was early morning. All over people were sticking their heads out of doorways and casement windows to investigate the strange weather.

"Oye, Nigel! What're you doin' out there?" Sacha Paper called from his third-floor window.

"Going to market!" Nigel called back.

"In this?"

"Why not?"

"It's rainin' feathers!"

"Last week it was raining shoes," Nigel said pointedly. "Next week it may well be cattle or somesort that hurts when it hits you, so I figured I would get the errands done now. You know how my Dad gets."

Sacha raised his eyebrows. "Golden feathers, Nige. Careful there," he said, and went back inside.

Well. Nigel shrugged to himself and continued along. Gold did not necessarily mean magic. Often, but not always. That was what Sacha was on about.

Then the sun came out. Oh, how the falling feathers sparkled.

And started turning people into frogs.

Nigel muttered mild curses to himself and helped a transformed Mrs. Pope out of her fruit basket. How boring. Frogs were so…old-fashioned. In any case, he seemed immune to it. Hopefully that would hold up; he would have a heck of a time carrying goods back with webbed feet.

By the time he reached the market, most people were returning to their normal selves, although some were quickly transitioning into an equally boring newt stage. Allergies, probably. Nigel adjusted the baskets on his back and glanced up at the Keeping Tower. The croissant-shaped weathervane was spinning like a gyroscope and emitting puffs of steam.

Well. That was to be expected.

Vanderville market was a happy place, for the most part. The majority of its wares were food and Vandervillians loved food. Just about everything and anything grew in soil touched by the Capricious River, granted it could survive the occasional shoe shower. Nigel's father, being something of a mechanical whiz and steam pioneer, was currently working on a retractable sheetmetal dome to protect their oranges and turnips when that happened.

Thus, Nigel was the one at market. He usually was, considering he and his father were the sole inhabitants of Promenade Farms, and his father was generally busy with his newest invention or was somehow indisposed because of one. Today it was the latter, as Dustin Promenade was getting used to working with four fingers on his left hand.

In any case, the market this morning was spilling over with every grain, fruit, vegetable, bean, and nut imaginable. Oh, and a few legumes of course. Potatoes. Everything that didn't quite fit into one category or the other. Nigel fluffed up to the Promenade family stall (fluffed being the word for when one must shuffle precariously across feathery ground) and began setting up as usual. Turnips on one left, oranges on the right, and strange genetic hybrids of the two at the center. There were only a few of these oddities which Dustin affectionately called "ornips" or "those damned root-fruits that keep attracting groundhogs to undermine my three-century-old orange orchard" and they were certainly not intentionally grown, but they were popular and they did sell for quite a price.

The Promenade's neighbor Mr. Newell waddled up first to the stall, and began speaking with a loud croak.

"…that was interesting. Sorry, boy, but I was a frog not ten minutes ago and I think the effects are still wearing off. You made it through the weather all right this morning?" He thumped his barrel-like chest with a heavy hand and eventually coughed up what looked like several blackflies. These he grimaced at before wiping on his already-stained pants.

"Always do, sir," replied Nigel. "Was it interesting, being a frog?"

"Eh," said Mr. Newell, "not as interesting as that time I got turned into a pair of ladies' underwear."

"Ah," said Nigel, who at fifteen knew plenty on the subject of girls' undergarments but was still uncomfortable when adults brought it up in his presence. He thought, after all, that older folks were better off keeping their underthings on.

Mr. Newell chuckled and said, "But that's another story! I'll take double the usual, my good boy, since last week I was unfortunately knocked unconscious by a large pair of galoshes and couldn't make it."

Nigel studiously went about fulfilling Mr. Newell's order, which today would consist of three oranges and sixteen turnips. He was the only customer who preferred the turnips, good as the Promenades grew them, but not the only one who usually ordered in halves. On any regular, un-doubled day, Mr. Newell only took an orange and a half. Nigel kept a specially sharpened knife in his belt just for that purpose.

Of course, that knife could also be used for other things, but Nigel rarely thought of them.

As he handed Mr. Newell his order, a commotion erupted on the other side of the market. From the look of things, one of the Vandervillians-turned-newts had been stepped upon, and the newt's wife was very upset. They seemed to be arguing over whether a lost tail would equate to a lost something else once he returned to his human shape.

"Gonna be one of those days," sighed Mr. Newell. "Take care, Nigel!"

Taking care of things was something Nigel was very good at. He was, as they said, a very good boy, if a little strange and uninteresting. Nigel had at first been insulted by the "uninteresting" part, only to later ascribe it to his tendency to silence. He had interesting things to say, he just rarely bothered to say them, probably because they usually fell into the "strange" category. It was a cycle of sorts.

The rest of the morning was fairly normal, at least by Vanderville standards. Then she appeared.

Nigel was sweeping feathers into a pile at the side of his stall when an unfamiliar shadow fell across his path. Upon looking up, he found himself nose-to-nose with a young woman and her stern amber eyes. Slightly startled, he took a step back.

"Er. Can I help you?"

"Maybe," said the stranger. She was about Nigel's height, which is to say not very tall, and had rather large bosoms. That was the first thing he noticed. Next were her garments, which looked to have been made from the skin of a wolf. Its head, teeth and all, was perched on her golden curls like a hood. Nigel shuffled back a little further.

"Well, um, if you're looking for oranges or turnips or some combination of the two—"

"I'm looking for an inventor," the girl said, interrupting him. She put her hands on her hips, which beneath the wolf-pelt coat were covered only by a short red skirt. It was not a pleasant color of red and Nigel suspected he knew what it had been dyed with. She had nice legs, though.

Now, this was one of those times where the path of life suddenly veered off in two very opposite directions, and one word could decide which path would be taken: the clear, sunny one through fields of daisies or the one that led into a dark, dank, and foggy wood.

For Nigel, it was a few words and a natural tendency towards goodwill that led him astray.

"My father is an inventor. Dustin Promenade? Is that who you're looking for?"

The wolf-girl's eyes lit up and a smile curled across her creamy face. "Yes," she said. "That's exactly who I'm looking for. Your father, you say? I didn't know he had a son."

"That's me," said Nigel, as of yet unaware of the mistake he had made. "My name's Nigel. And you are?"

"Goose."

"Pardon?"

She pursed her lips. "My name is Goose. Is there something funny about that?" she said with a dangerously narrow squint.

"Oh no, of course not. I expect you would like to see my father right away. Just let me close up shop and we'll be on our way," said Nigel.

He worked as quickly as possible, not wanting to keep the formidable and beautiful Goose waiting. Luckily he had sold out of everything save one of the ornips. After the shoe storm, everyone was in need of some citrus and spice. He shouldered his empty baskets and handed the lumpy orange object to Goose, who eyed it as one might eye the questionable contents of cat vomit on a pile of clean sheets.

"What is this?"

"It's good. Have you travelled far? I'm sure you're hungry," said Nigel politely.

Goose sniffed the ornip and turned it in her plump fingers as they walked. "Starved. You haven't got any meat?"

This time Nigel didn't even say "pardon." He simply stared at her in horror.

With a wicked laugh, Goose patted him on the shoulder and said, "Sorry, I've been out in the woods for too long. I'd forgotten that regular society…frowns upon the consumption of flesh." She bit heartily into the ornip and made such a face as one does when pleasantly, though reluctantly, surprised.

They didn't speak the whole rest of the way home, not out of awkwardness but, again, Nigel's tendency to silence. Stares and whispers surrounded them on all sides and from every street. He was not surprised, considering his companion's interesting appearance. That and the way she would pause now and then to make scary faces and growling noises at curious children.

Promenade Farms was not terribly far outside the city limits, and though the muddy pathway to the main house appeared to have been tarred and feathered (for no good reason, as it was a perfectly fine road most of the time), they made good time. The sun was still fairly high, slanting through the twisted branches of the ancient orange trees in beautiful bars of gold and black. Goose linked her arm through Nigel's and forced him to skip up the path to the house. She seemed in a rather good mood.

The main house was large and haphazardly built because of the way Dustin was constantly expanding his workspace. Originally it had been just big enough for a family of four, a picturesque cottage made of stone with a special second chimney. Today there were several new sections, most of them made of wood, some from metal, and of course the Glass Bubble, which was lit.

"Nice place ya got," Goose said as Nigel methodically flipped through his keys for the right one.

"It's all right," he replied, and let them in through the front door before something could come slinking out of the orchard and demand they purchase a household appliance. Dustin came up with enough of them on his own without the interference of travelling salesmen.

"Better than a shack in the woods. That's what I live in, you know."

"Ah."

"That'd be the Proliferate Woods, by the way."

"Ah," said Nigel in a very different tone. The Proliferate Woods were not a very nice place. He began to feel he had made a mistake by bringing Goose back to the house. What in the world did she have to do with his father, anyway?

"Not very articulate, are you?"

"Er."

"That's what I thought. So where's old Dusty?"

"I'll go get him," Nigel said. He patted the plushier of the two living room armchairs as an indication to take a seat and then dashed off.

Anyone else attempting to dash through the Promenade house would certainly meet an early, painful, and probably humiliating death. Nigel, however, had practice. He knew when to duck, when to jump, and when to do the Hokey Pokey, which incidentally lasted just as long as it took for the east wing chandelier to stop swinging after the opening of that room's door set it in deadly crystalline motion. He made it to the Glass Bubble in record time, according to his pocket watch.

Dustin, better known as Dusty (and of course Dad to Nigel), was standing on a raised platform in the Bubble and wearing a suit of rubber. Nigel arrived just as Dusty was simultaneously strapping on a metal helmet and flipping switches. Great poofs of steam arose from the generators that ringed the platform, fogging up the glass and charging the air with electricity.

Dusty noticed his son just as the first lightning bolt connected with his head, arced off, and turned a potted plant to charcoal. The pot itself transformed into a bowl of mashed potatoes.

"Hm," said Dusty as he turned off the steam generators. "That was interesting. What's the trouble, Nigel? Cat throw up on the clean sheets again?"

"Well, yes, but—but see, there's a girl here to see you, Dad."

"Ooh, a lady caller? I thought I told Miss Dee to come by on—"

"Says her name is Goose. Also, she looks about my age."

Dusty's face went blank and then began to twitch.

"Eh?"

"That's about what I thought when I saw her. You do know her, then?"

With a whirl and a clank, Dusty tossed aside his helmet and jumped down from the platform. He grabbed his son by the shoulders and stared at him very seriously, seemingly unaware that he was crushing Nigel's left foot with a heavy boot.

"Goose. Goose is here."

"Uh, yes."

"Blonde? Gold eyes? Dead wolf on her head?"

"That's the one."

"Ah," said Dusty (which was where Nigel had gotten the expression from, though he never noticed until now). "Ah. You need to run."

"What, me?" Nigel exclaimed. "But she wanted to see you!"

"Primarily. There are, however, complications, and very serious ones at that. I will stall her as long as possible while you make a run for it. Make sure you go through the woods and not into the turnip fields," said Dusty. He sighed and suddenly hugged Nigel ferociously. "You're a good boy, you'll be all right."

"Uh-huh," said Nigel. "Right then. Do I have time to get a few things from my room?"

"Only if you go out the window from there."

"Can do."

"Right, then! I'll hold her off." Dusty climbed back onto the platform, picked up the flower-pot-turned-bowl-of-mashed-potatoes, and struck a heroic pose. Rather, as heroic as one can be with helmet hair and an unsightly crotch bulge.

Nigel dashed and danced his way through the house again.