292. Keep Breathing

 292. Keep Breathing

“Huff! Puff! Gasp! Pant, pant! Wheeze, wheeze, wheeze! Wheeeeeeew! Huff! Puff! Gasp! Pant, pant! Wheeze, wheeze, wheeze! Wheeeeeew! Huff! Puff! Gasp! Pant, pant! Wheeze, wheeze, wheeze!Pheeeeeeeeeew!  Wheeeeeeeeeew!”

In the middle of Minced Forest and through an avalanche of constant and deep breathing noises, Malcolfus was heard to shout, “What do you think you are doing publishing in an alien blog?”

“How dare you?” cried Leopold.

“It’s not even yours!” hissed Tiburtius.

“Hiss, hiss, wheeze!” went the noises. “Swiss, Swiss cheese!” it began to sound like the breathing noises were saying.

Little Dolphus was undaunted by the weird noises or the three indignant Leafy elders that had surrounded him to bawl him out.

“Arley won’t mind. Heather said he would even be pleased when I told her I wanted to continue with his blog. I told her about my plans for this blog before publishing.”

“Plans? This upstart actually has plans!” cried Leopold, sounding as astonished as he sounded indignant.

“Who is this chit to have plans of any kind?” asked Tiburtius even more outraged.

“I can do this. I can do what I have done. I’m an intellectual,” explained Dolphus.

“Now he has pretensions,” said Malcolfus. “Now, look here, Little Dolphus, we have put up with your wearing glasses, but-“

“That’s right! He wears glasses!” yelled Tiburtius, who has serious trouble with his eyesight though he needn’t  have it if he just would cede to visit the ophthalmologist Casimir. All he needed was glasses, just as Dolphus didn’t need glasses at all.

“Now, don’t interrupt me,” protested Malcolfus,”we´ve  put with your giving yourself airs, we have, Little Dolphus. But this is going too far! You’re not just  attracting attention to yourself. You’re-”

“I’m just giving the blog continuity,” said Little Dolphus, still undaunted.

“You don’t even know what you are doing! Your story is set…when? Some time in Autumn? The chapter before it was about something that happened right before Christmas. What kind of continuity is that?”

“Huff! Puff! Pant, pant! Gasp, gasp, gasp!”

“If you guys hadn’t confused Heather with the Predictit Pond and the Peek Creek see the future beforehand nonsense, and made her write ahead of time about things that haven’t happened even to this date, I wouldn’t have become confused either. All this I have written about will happen, sooner or later, if it hasn’t already. What do a few gaillardias about to freeze matter? They are as good as holly to illustrate a story.”

“Bees sleep in winter!” shouted Tiburtius. “They don’t lounge on flowers dying like La Traviata!”

“Camellias,” murmurred Dolphus. “They’re a lovely flower too. Ah, the Lady of the Camellias. I wish I had thought of that flower for the bed of the dying bee!”

“Pheeeew, wheeeew, sniff, sniff!”

“And on he goes!” snarled Tiburtius. "No remorse he shows!"

“There are all kinds of flowers in winter in fairyland. You just have to know where to find them! It so happens I do and I did!”

“Aren’t we getting all worked up about nothing? Too much ado for me, we are having here,” said Frankie, “and all about a silly story.”

“You shut up!” shouted Tiburtius. “This twerp can’t go about frightening everybody with ghost stories.”

“No,” said Frankie. “It’s the other way around. He can’t go about not  frightening anybody with his tiny ghost stories. He made me expect a fright and then he didn’t deliver. How could you think a dying bee could frighten anyone, Dolphie?”

“What are you saying? I found the story terrifying! I saw the cute illustrations and I read it to my grandkids” said Leopold, “because I thought it was harmless. And now the kids are traumatized! Hear them breathe!”

Yes, it was Leopold’s three grandkids who were sniffling and wheezing and panting and huffing and puffing and more.

“I read it to them, yes, and now they are scared to death of dying. They had no idea this could happen.They kept asking me why the bee died and how. And I said it died because it stopped breathing. I was at a loss for anything else to say. And now the kids are breathing and breathing obsessively so they won’t stop breathing and die. They are upsetting everyone that gets anywhere near them. Ah, the irritating noise they make! They are getting on everyone’s nerves!”

“Yes, that is true!” said Tiburtius. “They definitely are on my nerves.”

“But it can’t happen! Not to us. We aren’t mortals,” said Frankie, “and spirits never die.”

“Try explaining that to three terrified kids,” said Leopold. “They didn’t even know Death existed.”

“It is disagreeable, but we needn’t be afraid of it. Not us,” Said Frankie.

“Still, I can’t help feeling disturbed when I see a mortal creature dying,” said Malcolfus.

“They make faces! And they shiver and shake! And twist and writhe! And some sigh, and breathe strangely  and others even gasp and howl! It is horrible to behold!” cried Tiburtius.

“Call it sympathy or empathy, or what you will, but even those that just fall quietly asleep move me,” agreed Malcolfus.

“Nonsense!” said Dolphus. “It’s like a butterfly breaking out of a cocoon! That doesn’t bother anyone. The dead become ghosts immediately, so no real damage done there. To the mortals, I mean, not to the butterflies. Does it hurt butterflies tp break out of cocoons?”

“Mortal butterflies eventually die when out of the cocoon. And they become ghost butterflies and the barrier between the living and the dead prevents them from being able to act in the mortal world ever again,” said Malcolfus.

“Not entirely,” said Frankie.

“But yes effectively. They become someone else when they die, the someone they were before their mortal lives began. And that someone isn’t up to much.  Most dead mortals don’t even care about what happens in the mortal world once they are gone. They forget even themselves. Nothing seems to matter to them anymore. Most unmotivated most become when dead,” explained Malcolfus.

“They become forgetful. Only the truly crazy ones don’t forget,” said Leopold.

“Their time down there is up, and they have to respect that and exist quietly in the world of the spirit. Most do. They know the live ones will join them sooner or later. Why not just wait?” said Malcolfus.

“That’s enough speculating about mortals and their ways!” cried Tiburtius.

“Yes. We’ve bawled this pretentious fool out and he already knows how we feel about this. Let’s do something else.”

And the Leafy elders flew off to another part of Minced Forest, to go about other business of theirs, with Leopold’s three gandchildren ,who continued huffing and puffing and upseting others with their weird breathing.

“Is this weird breathing going to last forever?” Tibutius was heard to ask as he and the other elders and the kids flew away.

“Maybe,” answered Leopold, “though I hope they will get over it when they fall asleep, utterly bushed, tonight.”

“You haven’t said anything, Vinny,” said Frankie to his younger brother. “How do you feel about what Baby Dolphus has done?”

“I showed Pamela her story this morning. She wants to thank Dolphie for writing it. She means to send him honey this Christmas to show her gratitude.”

“Well, at least someone is happy,” said Frankie.

“I am too,” said undaunted Little Dolphus. 

“It’s Halloween. Let’s go frighten someone. Effectively this time,” said Frankie.

“I think I have frightened the elders effectively. Haven’t I?” asked Dolphus.

And he wrote all this down so you could read it here.By the way,  are you breathing right?