The Abyssal Desert - Appetizer
Treats of Favorite Dishes
You’re snacking on In Different Color, a fairy tale.
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Time baked until crispy and gold…
Tom sprawled atop the plodding cowsowhorse. His belly and cheek sagged like comforter and pillow over the bumpy mattress of the beast’s back. With effort, he heaved up one cumbersome eyelid. His eye, foggy steel, roamed lazily around its socket. It settled on the statuary shape of Mr. Grey, walking steady at his side.
In a cracked whisper, from between chapped lips, Tom asked, “Your favorite dish?”
Mr. Grey turned his head; a slow turn, like the hand of a ticker in desperate need of winding. His eyes, murky grey, regarded Tom from below his own half-mast lids. He said, “You mean food, I take? Rather than serveware.”
Tom blinked his open eye slowly, as if nodding. “Which has the greatest flavor? The finest texture? The best aroma?”
Mr. Grey brought a thumb and finger to his chin for a musing pinch. He stumbled on a rock in the sand, and instead smacked his cheek. He dropped his hand, shrugged, and said, “A major question. One best not answered lightly. Let me consider. What would be your dish?”
Tom dropped his lid. Mr. Grey moved his head through a slow turn forward. Silence fell; not awkward, just tired. The cowsowhorse trudged through wet sand and plodded over wet rock. Mr. Grey stumbled beside it. Together, they left two sets of prints - pencil-pushers’ and pig’s - behind them on the Abyssal Desert.
Tom spoke with closed eyes. “There’s an argument for worms. The gummy species, with the sour veneer. The way they tingle the tongue! And with a dense chew; like a mouth workout, pleasantly aching the jaw.”
“You make it sound like battle. Like fighting Woe Worms.” Mr. Grey tried keeping his words light. But his voice faded at the end. He stared ahead.
Beyond their cowsowhorse’s personal bubble, the sea floor stretched rugged and bright. The bubble membrane, the watery warping, and the Sun Fish’s baking rays made a triple haze on the plain. Mr. Grey’s vision, and thoughts, swam. He wool-gathered on a flat stone shelf directly ahead. One of many stone shelves. He counted mushy steps.
“But then there’s bonbons,” Tom went on, still with shut eyes. He sighed mournfully. “That rich chocolate coating; the sweet seductress, with special-dark eyes, and the milk-pale arms and legs. And that’s the surface, only the facade. They’ve got mystery insides! You just never know. Ganache or nougat? Fudge, brittle, or caramel? A vanilla splash? Doubled chocolate? Bonbons are like treasure chests, with secret treasure.”
They reached the large stone slab. Mr. Grey had lost track of his step count. He gratefully pulled his shoes from the sticky sand. Their cowsowhorse, with its bubble, scuttled like a ladybug over the stone’s glossy, wet surface. “Where’s Honeydew now?” Mr. Grey asked suddenly. “I hope she’s okay. What do you think she’s eating?”
“More dishes than us,” said Tom. With another strain, he lifted his lid. He studied Mr. Grey with the steel eye. “What’s her favorite?”
“Again, you mean food? Not plates and glasses?”
“Again, I mean food.”
“Well, I’m not quite sure. I can ask her about it - and tell her my dish - when I’m by her side.”
Tom closed the eye. “It’s probably different. From your dish, I mean.”
“We won’t know till we meet up. Ours could be the same. So could yours and hers.”
“No, mine’s different. That’s a certainty.” Tom sighed. He turned his head the other way, to give his other pale cheek an equal share of baking light. He went on, “Maybe licorice is mine. There’s something to it; pulling the strings off, untangling the ruby rope, sticky with sugar. You can make a bowl, and slurp it down like noodles.”
Mr. Grey forced his lids wide, trying to stay wakeful. Far beyond their little bubble, a school of regular salmon swam; streaking through the sea-sky like shooting stars. Mr. Grey said, “You know something, Tom; it’s not so much what we share. Honeydew and me. We just get along. She and I and now you too. After everything, we’re still together. Through Toscamo and the koi; back in the prison, and The Lost City. We just make a splendid team. Honeydew and I…”
A dizzy wave struck Mr. Grey. He walked sideways, and leaned at a good angle against the cowsowhorse. He kept moving forward. Tom turned his cheek back to look at Mr. Grey with his open eye. Mr. Grey said, “What do you think, Tom?”
Tom brought a heavy, flaking hand from where it dangled, and stroked his long whiskers. He said, “I think Candy bars. Just so much variety. Have you decided?”
Mr. Grey sighed, heavily, through his nose. He said, “I do like a nice cream bean.”
This has been In Different Color, a fairy tale.
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