[Diamond18]

Shishkebab and the Eight Legged Freaks (minus Shishkebab), the Coolest Pawns of Uncooliphaunt Around, Swingingest Jazz Band From Here to Harad, were really quite a good band. There was actually only two of them besides Shishkebab, but they had a real big band sound, due to the fact that they could each play four instruments.

The party-elves gradually dispersed at the suggestion of dancing, and that finally left Geppettuil alone. Vogonwë pounced on the moment, and as Charlotte Fuzzthorax hit a high note on the sax, he chomped down one last frog leg and nonchalantly tripped a maiden who was attempting to ask Geppettuil for a dance.

“Isn’t this a great party, son?” Geppettuil observed happily, tapping his foot as he watched the other Elves swing dancing where ancient trees had one spread their branches toward the sun. “I say, it’s one of the best I’ve ever thrown.”

“Dad, this is the only party you’ve ever thrown,” Vogonwë pointed out. “You started this party five hundred years ago and you haven’t stopped since. You never came to any of my archery contests or watched me win the Best Horse Mounter of the Third Age So Far Award, because you were too busy sucking down martinis and entertaining socialites. And it’s been the same group the whole time!” He waved his hand toward the dancers, who still had with them their five-hundred-year-old invitations and name tags.

While they were talking, Roomeal stepped up to the band and crooned in a low voice, “Let’s give a hand to Ms. Fuzzthorax and Ms. Fluffilegs for their excellent work.” While the dancers politely clapped, he gave each spider a hand, and as they happily sucked away at them, he picked up a guitar and said, “And now, ladies and gentlelves, let’s sloooooow dance.”

He began to sing,

A child arrived just the other day,
He came to the world in the usual way.
But there were invitations to write and party hats to buy,
He learned to talk while I was away;
And he was waxing poetical before I knew it,
And as he grew he'd say, "I'm gonna be like you, Dad,
You know I'm gonna be like you."

“Yes, aren’t they a blast?” Geppettuil replied absently to Vogonwë.

“Dad, don’t you get it? Out there, in the world, things change. Do you know how many lives of Men five hundred years is? Kingdoms rise and fall in that amount of time, and—”

“Vogonwë, Vogonwë, my hasty son, always you were so obsessed with the lives of mortals,” Geppettuil swirled the drink in glass languidly. “What does it matter what goes on outside the borders of our swinging party? We must do what we have always done, and that’s have a good time. Don’t concern yourself with Men and Dwarves and those other things so much.”

And the cat's in the cradle and the silver spoon
Little boy Brown and the Elf in the Moon.
"When ya gonna stop, Dad?" "I don't know when,
But we'll get together then,
You know we'll have a good talk then."

“Aha! And that’s another thing!” Vogonwë exclaimed. “You always said I was too obsessed with death and mortality and gravesites and the fleeting nature of human life, but you never said why! But now I know, the cat’s in the cradle—I mean, the cat’s out of the bag!”

He paused for deep effect, and declared, “I know that my mother was a mortal!”

In his surprise Geppettuil spit out his drink in a shower of spittle that landed upon Vogonwë’s face. “How, how did you know? I mean, how preposterous…”

“It was a bad hangover and a magic Salad Bowl,” Vogonwë said, “but it was enough to show me my true heritage. Were you or were you not married to one Darthana of Chippendale?”

“Well, you see, that’s a matter of debate,” Geppettuil demurred. “Some say it takes an official ceremony, others say all you need is love, and others don’t have much of an opinion but post anyway.” From there he went into a long thread about what constitutes a marriage.

Vogonwë finally cut him off and said, “Let me rephrase that: was she my mother?”

Geppettuil sighed. “Yes, yes she was. I only hid it from you because I knew that if you knew that you would chose a mortal life, and then both my not-wife and son would be dead and I, I would be forced to live out my life alone until my days are utterly spent. Or something.”

Well, he came home from wherever he’d been just the other day,
So much like a Man, l just had to say,
"Son, I lied to you, but it was for your own good,
"I didn’t want you to go the same way your mother did.”

“I haven’t been giving that much thought,” Vogonwë said, skirting the fate issue. “I just want to know this, Dad, how did Mother die?”

Whimsina Fluffilegs had finished her hand and picked up a violin, which she played sweetly to back up Roomeal’s singing.

Oh where have all the mothers gone, long time passing?
Oh where have all the mothers gone, long long time ago?

“She drowned in the kitchen sink,” Geppettuil sighed. “She splashed some water on the floor, slipped in the puddle, fell, struck her chin on the edge of the counter in the process, and was knocked unconscious. There she lay with her face in the water, and I…I was off buying crackers and cheese for my next party.”

Here he started to sob, and downed the rest of his drink. “Be a good son and get me some more alcohol from the bar, Voggy?”

“What would you like?”

“I don’t care, as long as it’s strong…” Then, on second thought, he sniffed and said, “Make it a ‘Mudwater.”

As he walked away it occurred to me,
He wasn’t gonna be like me, no, he wasn’t gonna be like me, he was gonna choose the fate of his Mommy.
And the cat's in the cradle and the silver spoon,
Little boy Brown and the Elf in the Moon. "When you gonna decide, Son?"
"I don't know when, But then you’ll never see me again, Dad, you’ll never see me again."

Just about every Elf in the glade was crying by the end of Roomeal’s song, and Geppettuil was blubbering to beat the band. Vogonwë left him to drown himself in his sorrows, and Roomeal left the stage to assume his duty behind the bar.

“You want a drink, Voggy?” he asked.

“I gave up strong drink a few days ago,” Vogonwë said. “A bad experience with an experimental medicine.”

“That’s too bad,” Roomeal said, mixing him up a Double ‘Mudwater Gargleblaster Surprise. “So what are you going to do now, Voggy?”

“Would you stop calling me that? It’s so not poetic.”

“Sorry.”

“Well, since I looked into the Salad Bowl of Saladriel, which shows things that were, things that are, and things that are bizarre, I’ve been considering going to Chippendale to meet the other half of my heritage,” Vogonwë told him. “But first, I have to rejoin my friends. The last time I saw my true love she was rolling down a hill.”

Absently he accepted the drink and took a swig. “See, I think she may need rescuing, and if O Lando finds her before me, I don’t know what I’ll do, because—”

But, alas, he did not finish his sentence, for the Double ‘Mudwater Gargleblaster Surprise hit him, and hit him hard. He slipped from the barstool and lay on the ground in a heap, kind of like when a curtain falls off the rod and piles itself on the ground in a mass of fabric that will surely need ironing later.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

An hour later, he awoke with a clearer mind, and knew what he must do. Geppettuil, who had drunk several ‘Mudwaters during his son’s period of unconsciousness, was now dancing in a half-crazed manner to the music of the she-Pawns. Vogonwë, fearing more delay, purloined some of the party food for Merisuwyniel’s meal, and filched a flask of DMGS for Earnur, for he knew him to be a connoisseur of all things intoxicating, and also since he could vaguely remember having drained some of the poor mortal’s drink in Topfloorien.

With these items he made his way back to the camp in a stunningly easy fashion, and very fashionably too, in his spiffy Elven-attire. When he arrived he found Pimpi fast asleep, a smile spread across her by now well described face. He tried various methods of arousing her, and she may very well have been aroused in her dreaming, but still she dreamt.

It finally occurred to him to pour a little ‘Mudwater Surprise into her mouth, for that liquid is rather remarkable in its ability to knock out the conscious and awaken the sleeping.

She did awake, and said dreamily, “Oh Vogonwë, I was having the most wooooonderful dream…I was at a feast, and I feasted and feasted and feasted on foods that were yeasted and greaséd. I fed on who-pudding, and rare who-roast beast, and I never thought that I’d cease!”

“That nice—”

“And you were there, Vogonwë, and you were reciting the most beautiful poem I have ever heard, though now I can’t remember what the words were…”

“That’s a shame—”

“And then, for a little while I dreamt that I was galloping across the plains of Rofoo, wrapped up in a snug blanket in my mother’s arms, while my father guided the reigns of noble Lopitoff, who was still in one piece, though he was whinnying his head off…”

“That’s wonderful, darling. I’ve been having one of the worst days of my life, and that’s saying a lot for an Elf, you know. I can’t quite say if it was the worst, but it came very close, and it isn’t even over yet… Well, anyway, when we were separated by the Fangirls, I—”

But Pimpiowyn had fallen back asleep again, and was oblivious to his complaints. He sighed, and for a moment considered pouring out his troubles in a lengthy diatribe to the horses. But he opted against it, as it just wouldn't have been the same.

[ February 21, 2003: Message edited by: Diamond18 ]