“Put them back,” said the small man, dressed in all green.
I stood, holding the flowers in my dirty hand. He had caught me soil-handed.
“Put them back,” he said again, indicating the flower bed from where I took them.
The roots of the flowers dangled limply below my hand. I knelt down and placed the roots back in their pre-ordained divots. I patted the soil around the bottom.
“That’s better. Move along, Skippy,” the man said with a diminutive wave.
My day was not going well. You would think that meeting a unicorn would greatly improve your day. What you wouldn’t know is how much work a unicorn can be.
I was walking through the park for a leisurely walk. Then, through some trees, I saw a bright pink shape glowing radiantly. Thinking it was a flying saucer, I cursed myself for not having a video camera. The radiance floated through the trees before coming to a clearing, where it was clearly visible. My view started at the rear, moving its way up the torso of what appeared to be a radioactive horse. However, when I came to the head I was surprised to see a magnificent horn, a foot long.
Naturally I thought I was insane – or worse. I rubbed my eyes, but there remained a bright pink unicorn. I spun around, pinched myself, and shook my head; but there remained a bright pink unicorn. On the off-chance that such a magnificently absurd creature could talk, I spoke.
“Hi,” I said to the bright pink unicorn, feeling very dumb for having just talked to a bright pink unicorn.
It tilted its head, like puppies often do when considering something perplexing. Obviously I was a magnificently absurd thing for a unicorn to see.
“Hi,” said the unicorn. It seemed lost.
“You seem lost,” I said.
“I’m lost,” it said.
“How did you get here?”
“Well,” it
said in a clear but deliberate pace, like a character from a little kid’s TV
show, “I was walking through the
“Um,
well...,” I said, “Right.... Is this a
common occurrence in the
“Quite.” It replied.
“Then you should know how to go home.”
“Well, yeah I suppose, but it’s complicated. Can you help me?”
“Well...,” I had things to do, “I kind of have things to do....”
“Oh, no... I understand. I’ll just collect the Magic Purple Flowers myself.”
“Purple you say?” I said rubbing my chin in a semi-contemplative way.
“Why yes...do you happen to know where I can find some?” the unicorn asked.
“I just might.” I replied. I thought of my neighbor’s lawn and how his purple flowers vexed me so.
“Great!” the unicorn exclaimed. “But first we need to make the Pure Ring of Rytarniumn.”
“Right...” I said.
After gathering the requisite stones and jelly-donuts, the ring was complete. By now it was getting to be dusk. The sky was a bright orange and the clouds floated by in an obstinate purple. This perplexing purple reminded me of my neighbor’s flowers. I hated them so, how they shone on warm summer’s days with the dew of mid-morning. How they kissed the breeze in spring, daintily swaying to and fro, waving in casual gestures to the passersby. I hated them. They mocked me.
“So...need those flowers yet?” I asked the magical beast.
“Sure!” it said, scratching mystical symbols into the middle of the circle we had made on the ground.
I cursed the unicorn under my breath. I had been working all day to feed it and make Rings of Rytarniumn and whatever else it asked of me. Had it come to perform some sort of unicorn practical joke? Was I its non-magical slave? I put these thoughts aside, having replaced them with vivid visions of the vivisection of my neighbor’s flowers.
I ripped them out, one by one. Each stem a bleeding vein, the dirt the blood. I pulled and tugged, shredding the flowerbed into tiny purple pieces. I was Hercules ridding the world of Medusa one snake at a time. I was powerful and free. I openly giggled, then guffawed and soon was in a maniacal uproar. My evil laugh elicited a confused sound and the flip of a light switch inside the house. Drats.
He kicked me out of his property and I returned to the woods empty handed – save for the soil under my fingernails.
“What happened?” asked the unicorn.
“Shut up,” I said.
“Um...,” it said, looking down and not quite knowing what to do.
I kicked the rocks and various items placed in the circle on the ground. I squished the jelly donuts.
“Why did you do that?” asked the unicorn.
But I did not hear him, as I was already walking away. I had things to do.
“Move along, Skippy,” I said to him, with a diminutive wave.