So yeah, me and my brother fell on some hard times. We’re kinda on the small side for faery types, and it used to be that we had this good deal workin down on the docks, you know, kinda just kept an eye on ships while their crews went out to enjoy the pleasures of the port and all. And maybe captains what didn’t hire us had problems findin their ships the next day. It was a good gig.
Funny thing about that kinda work, though, you got just one ship that gets sunk and everybody gets all bent outta shape and stuff. (Lou wants me to tell ya that first it burned, then it sank, and I want Lou to shaddup and let me tell the story. Lou says we don’t always get what we want, and I told Lou he was gettin to wantin my fist in his face. Lou prudently decided to shaddup.)
Point bein, we was broke as a joke, so we snuck into this cobbler’s shop and hid out. (Lou’s remindin me that we was kinda chased into the cobbler’s shop and was hidin out there on account of some folks that wanted to see if eatin faeries is good for yas. Hint- we don’t know, and we didn’t wanna find out if you could survive travelin through the innards of a human type.)
Now we ain’t never been any great shakes at magic, but me and Lou, we gets by, mostly by turnin our hands to whatever task comes around and doin the best we can at it. Since we was layin low anyway, we started watchin about this leather workin business. And you know? It turned out that cause we was smaller, we could do pretty good work, a lot more dainty and delicate and whatnot.
We practiced on scraps we borrowed, since this cobbler guy was just about as freakin broke as we was. He was sellin every pair of shoes he made just as he made ‘em. And while me and Lou ain’t exactly the most admirable characters you’d ever meet, we wouldn’t steal from someone even broker than we were. It’s like bad karma and stuff.
This one night, we hears the cobbler tell his wife that that’s it, they’s out of money, they only got enough makings for one more pair of shoes and that’s it, they are gonna starve.
Well me and Lou couldn’t stand for that (especially considerin we were livin off their crumbs to start with and all, and if they starved, so was we), and doncha know the cobbler and his wife were so beside themselves that they didn’t put away none of his tools or nothin.
So me and Lou, we knew this was our chance, and we made the finest pair of shoes that hick town ever saw. And then we shined ‘em up real pretty and just hid and waited to see what happened next.
When mornin came, the cobbler got outta bed, and I tell yas, he was walkin like a man to his funeral when he headed to his workbench. And then he saw them shoes what me and Lou made the night before, and he got all excited and shook his wife awake. Guess they really liked the work we done, cause they kept turnin those shoes over and over in their hands like it was some kinda marvel.
Then they put ‘em out in the window and sure enough, they sold for more money than the cobbler had seen in weeks.
Now, that cobbler was a careful guy, and he didn’t go blow all his newfound wealth at once. He got a good meal for him and the missus, and then bought more makings for more shoes. And I think he got a little suspicious like, cause even though he left the leather layin on the bench just like before, he kept casting his eyes around behind him. Me and Lou felt a little bad about it, but didn’t come out til our hosts were snorin again.
We had us a tasty meal from the leftovers, then got ourselves settled down to work again. Lou, he hadda be a show off, he started using the scraps of leather we’d been practicin on to put these patterns on his shoes. I thought about stoppin my pair to give him a thrashin for wastin so much time, but I hadda admit, when he was all done, they was the prettiest shoes I’d ever seen, and I almost wanted to get Lou to make me a pair, too.
But he took so long that it was almost sunup when we was yawnin and puttin the last polish on, and we hadda hurry to duck outta sight.
The mornin went just the same, and again, the cobbler was smart, gettin some good food and more leather- and in a lot more colors this time. Lou was so excited he couldn’t hardly sleep for thinkin about what it was he’d do with that when he made the next pairs.
And, the best part, they left out a whole plate of cold ham and cheese and bread and cake, after loudly sayin to the room that they were too full to eats another bite, but maybe they’d want a midnight snack.
So’s, since we had good work and good food, we kept it up. And every day, all them’s shoes we’d made at night sold out! I mean, we was glad for it and all, but it was gettin harder and harder to finish up work before the cobbler and his wife was outta bed.
“Lou,” I said one night as I was stitchin a sole on, “this has been fun and all, but we ain’t makin no money, we’re just caught in the rat race.”
“Vinny, if there’s rat races, we oughta go! Cept.. we ain’t got nothin to bet with.”
Now, you know I love Lou like a brother, cause he is my brother, but there’s no one that’s ever gonna think he’s the brains of the outfit.
“That’s my point, Lou! Every night we work our fingers down to the nubs, but we don’t get no days off or money in our pockets. We just get another day of work.”
“But Vinny, we can’t go and leave ‘em now, they’d starve!”
“I don’t think that’s true, doncha notice that the old man is puttin some coin under the mattress every day? But look here, I think I gotta plan. We could wait up in the mornin, beg pardon for trespassin, and show ‘em how we been doin it so’s they could do it themselves!”
“I don’t know about that, Vin. Some people’s takes trespassin real serious like, and all this food we’s been eatin, well I ain’t sure I could outrun that cobbler’s wife if she decided to come after us with the griddle.”
Sometimes Lou’s got some good points, and after testin out my wings, I noticed I wasn’t even gettin offa the ground, fuggetabout runnin so we sat down and gave the whole idea another think.
Finally I clapped Lou on the shoulder. “Brother, look at what they did to us! We ain’t pickin no pockets in this shape. This was all a part of their ne-far-e-us scheme, doncha see?”
“No, Vin, I ain’t followin ya.”
I put down the shoe I was workin on and laid it all out for him. “They’s was just fattenin us up and lettin us earn our keep this way to keep us from a life of crime! They was tryin to make us go straight!”
Lou gasped. “Why them no good rat finks!”
“I’m tellin ya, Lou, we gotta get outta here before we turns into common house faeries. Maybe if we play it right, they’ll see the errors of their ways and send us off with some of that coin and we can do okay til we find a new business opportunity.”
And that’s how it was that at dawn we was sittin at the kitchen table, ready to have a real serious chat about right and wrong. I’ll tell ya, once I understood the whole sorry plan, I was real disappointed in that cobbler.
They didn’t look too surprised to see us, and when we laid out the whole deal for them, they was very agreeable about the situation. I guess they knew when the jig was up. I didn’t much have the heart to give ‘em the lecture they deserved when the missus started cryin and huggin on us, sayin we’d been so good to them. My stomach started turnin and we hurried and took our leave.
We was out in the street in these real spiffy little suits they’d had made up for us when Lou turned to me. “Say, Vin, can we go see the rat races now that we gots money to bet?”
I threw an arm around Lou’s shoulders. “Sure, buddy. Let’s go find us some work befittin men of our stature.”
And we did, but that’s another story.
Curiouser and Curiouser 