“Investigating a murder, ma’am. Blue Moon Kentucky. Know anything? A-bout it?”
“My Son!” she cried upon seeing him beam in on a ray of light. “Come back to me.”
“No ma’am. Not your Son. Or your Sun for that matter if that’s what you meant. Despite the beam and ray thing going on here beneath me.” But then he thought again. Clue!
Barry De Boy wakes up, immediately googles “Elvis Esley”. Or was it Isley?
(to be continued)
“I’m going to rub than d-mn coffin right out of the painting, that’s what I’m going to do, hmm-mm-mm.”
“Paw?”
Andy twirls away from the flawed painting Uncle Herbert gave him as a wedding gift for his first marriage and toward his son from that marriage, trying to block his vision of what he was doing to it with his body as best as possible.
“Opie, what’re you doing out of bed?” Andy says in a harsher tone than normal, which of course Opie, being the sensitive child he is, picks up on. Something’s wrong, he senses.
“I-I just wanted some milk. And maybe cookies (!)” Should have been a laugh track there, Barry De Boy thinks from the couch, also understanding something’s wrong.
“Milk milk milk, okay okay okay,” Andy says while rushing over to corral his son and herd him toward the kitchen. “And then right straight back to bed. Do you realize what time it is?”
—–
After making sure Opie is good and tucked in again, Andy returns to the painting. But his rubbing has made the child’s coffin even *more* visible to his complete exasperation, uncovering additional layers of paint. “What the–” he says while staring at it, and then instinctively glances over his shoulder to make sure Opie didn’t come back down again. “That’s it that’s it, wedding gift or no, this painting’s got to *go*,” and he grabs it with both hands, intending to take it out to the squad car parked in the driveway and dispose of it in the dumpster behind Floyd’s first thing in the morning, before he even goes into the office. He’s just that determined — suddenly — to be done with the thing. Uncle Herbert hadn’t visited in months after all. But Aunt Bee, he thinks. Herbert was her favorite brother. She’ll notice, she’ll be upset; won’t let off until he puts the painting he gave us back up above the mantelpiece, pheh.
There’s another way, he realizes. Who can change a painting but a *painter*. “Barry De Boy,” he says aloud, probably to the camera.
“Barry De Boy??” Barry utters too. He looks down at the red tie, wakes up.
(to be continued)
Newt found himself even happier than he suspected, overjoyed even. Bimbo had texted their treehouse and said she’d be a couple of days late to arrive in Nawt Vaya, perhaps even a couple of years. Fink would keep using the attic computer for his virtual needs, Newt knew.
And he was right about the giraffe instead being an elephant (!) — my bad, he thinks. I’ll pay closer attention to what he says from now on and not immediately rule out such seemingly nonsensical, *surrealist* statements, ha.
But the primmy geometric tiger behind the spindly legged elephant here and also the similarly prim laden Dali Park beside Starbuccaneers below was now gone. He’d made his point, I suppose.
Which reminds me: time to go get my 2 daily 4 shot lattes, ho.
(to be continued)
Later while Wendy went to the SL Marketplace to buy a new dress with unruined stripes, Barry perused various algorithmic offerings on his Youtube premium subscription service. Soon a video about a particular painting shown in the 60s classic sitcom “The Andy Griffith Show” popped up and he couldn’t resist. Turns out… well: Dali again. Let’s listen in. Fake dialog here we’re talking about, but still seems to fit. 🙂
“*Child’s coffin*??” Andy exudes.
“That’s right Andy,” says Barney, standing proud before him after pointing it out. “Read it in a magazine over at Floyd’s. I’ll help you with things like this, Andy, keep you up to date on all the modern trends. Yup (he sniffs in satisfaction about knowing something the seemingly all knowing sheriff of this here small NC town on the far edge of modernity doesn’t). Artist by the name of Da Lee found it hidden under layers of paint. Child’s coffin, Andy,” he repeats. “Turns out that couple wasn’t grieving for lost crops in that field but something *bigger*.”
Barry wonders where the laugh track was on this episode then realizes the obvious. He looks down to see a glowing tie: dream again.
Wendy opens the door to the small cottage, startling him awake from his afternoon nap. “What do you think?” she said, twirling around in place to show the purchased dress off.
“I think… we need a TV.”
“And a bed!” Wendy added. She was feeling frisky again, their checkered, unaligned past be damned. Start anew; forget the old. Rebirth.
What’s going on here? artist Barry De Boy w/ glowing red tie wondered about the meeting in the wee woods. Pirate treasure? he picked up. Islets of Langerhans?
He then notices it moving toward the group from between the legs of the nearby elephant giraffe. Dali Tiger. Was he dreaming? He must be dreaming. But in pinching himself he doesn’t wake up. Finished with the legs, the dream tiger was upon him, AAHHHHH!
With a start, Barry, sans tie now, woke up on the couch in his new Jeolla rental perched atop a scenic cliff. Wendy, still in a pure white dress instead of her usual striped one, was already kind of awake on a nearby chair, having sort of observed him through the night. She’d been summoned but had arrived late. Barry was already asleep by the time she showed up. She didn’t think it wise to rouse him. She wanted to see what would happen. Would he put the tie on again? Would he have one of those Dali dreams?
Turns out it was so.
“Sir?” (pause) “Sir?”
“Oh yes, young Fink,” distracted Newt finally acknowledges his presence at the door to his study. “How’s it going? Everything alright with the computer upstairs and all?” He didn’t look at Fink Humann, kept staring at the screen of his own computer.
“Yes, fine sir,” said Fink. “It’s just that it’s 7 o’clock. Time for me to leave. I’m saying goodbye is all. Like, er, like I do every time I come over here… at this time.”
Newt checks his watch not on his arm, gives a little start. “Oh dear, didn’t realize it was so late. Better wrap this up. Well, er, thank you, Fink, for telling me the time and the lateness of it all. And I suppose I’ll see you again… tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow is a big day, sir.”
“Please, Fink. You can stop calling me sir. You’ve come over, what is it, almost every day for the past 2 weeks?”
“Except that Sunday when Jack and I went plane flying, yes.”
“We’re friends now,” emphasized Newt from his chair. “Come over here, actually — I know it’s getting late and you need to get back to the treehouse but I — I want your opinion on this. I’m serious. Here.” And Newt waved him over, which he complied with. “What do you see?” he asked as Fink Humann also stared at the monitor with him.
“That’s er, your wife,” said Fink, seeing her image dominating the screen. Fink knew this was Wheeler now and not another form of their precious Princess Pinky Gumm. Wheeler herself told them that during a visit the other day to their treehouse.
“No, *behind* her. What do you see on the wall over there?”
“Um, JEO — GEOT,” he read on the poster. “Jeogeot,” he combined.
“Very good. The continent we’re now on.”
“Jeo-geot,” Fink repeated. “Jeogeot,” he collaged again.
“Yes,” said Newt. “Fine and dandy. But what else is there?”
“Um… people.”
“People, yes. And…”
“Dinos.”
“Dinosaurs, right. Aannd…”
“Um, an elephant?”
*Elephant*? Newt thinks. Does young Fink here not know what a giraffe is?? But then Newt realized Fink had inadvertently given him the answer to the riddle he’d been pondering so deeply about all this afternoon and early into the evening. The phone rang on his table. Wheeler obviously, Newt thought without checking the number.
“Thank you again, Fink. We’ll be talking soon.” He pats him on his shoulder to signal their time was done.
“But not tomorrow,” Fink says while walking out of the study, making Newt realize that tomorrow was the day mechanical contraption Bimbo was suppose to arrive from Fink and Jack’s native Oooo. Fink might not be coming around as much after that, and perhaps not at all. He’d miss the lad if so. Perhaps there was another way, hmm. He finally answers the phone that’s been ringing all this time.
“Where *are* you?” Wheeler emits.
Where are *you*? Newt wanted to say in return but knew it didn’t matter. Could be anywhere in the world… or nowhere. He’d find her whatever. Just up the stairs from down. “Be right there,” he said not into the phone but in the air all around.
Dali Park.
Tall matches tall, as tall as need be.
The (Dali) Tiger that got away.
What is he talking about beneath the cypresses in this wee woods of my Nawt Vaya Free State hillside parcel called Old Newtonia for now? Can’t quite make out the words.
Wait. I definitely heard something about pirates and a treasure map. Pretty sure of it.
Full circle, then.
—–
“It was the perfect balance, Wheeler. Our Collagesity should have been integrated into NWES City, lesser to bigger. Red yellow green blue but also orange as the 5th.
“We failed.”
“But now we have a way to redeem ourselves,” balanced Wheeler, wiser in worldly ways than ever. The Baker Family here is still strong. And now with a new home. A new CENTER.
Let the butterflies fly I suppose.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0046, 0211, Jeogeot, Nawt Vaya, NVFS, NWES Island^
“All comes from Old Grey and all will return. The illuminating light guides. The caboose is the last to disappear but the last to emerge. Black and White, Yin to Yang. Welcome.”
Lichen was getting tired of the joke; knew Fern was prone to such overkill. Often brevity for comedy was best. Good timing, Lichen knew. Fern needed to work on it.
“So you’ve explained the picture in *some* detail — can I call you Fern still?”
“*Original* Fern,” said the wee doll person still standing on the opposite corner of the picnic blanket from her, spread out between them like a quilted chessboard. Another board you’ll notice.
“And that’s, er, why you like to be called a *doll* person. Because you come from Doll.”
“Doll-*y*,” the little person emphasized. “I *am* a Dolly.” Silence for a while with this as Lichen absorbed. She tried to picture the picture he or she described (she had aspects of both sexes, Lichen observed). This one.
“Do you remember Phil? I called and called at the observing patio but no answer from the cat. This wasn’t Phil — Philip actually. Instead Philip lay at the bottom of this small pool in the ditch district of Kabusie, dead in his car after a visit to the bar. Drunk. Had the valuable pure bred cat with him that he bragged about to his girlfriend just earlier but somehow the cat survived. Standing on the container he or she came in by the shore. Maybe a mechanoid — still studying. Maybe that’s why the transfer couldn’t occur. Philip couldn’t become the cat just before dying because the cat had no inner soul to speak of. Working theory mind you. He had that power. We *all* know he had the power.”
“Fern,” said Lichen. “You’re an absolute trip!” Was this comedy at its purest, absurd statement after absurd statement? High entertainment at the least. “Good work,” she exclaimed, thinking all this was made up. It wasn’t; that’s the ultimate joke.
“Philip?”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0043, 0503, C2077, Corsica, Jeogeot, Kabusie, Nightsity, NWES Island^, Urqhart^
It was her 1/2 hour “lunch hour” and she decided to explore the sim, mainly remotely but with some direct teleports. She’d discovered Tigger Peak, currently covered up with false landscaping. And a larger club and bar in the ne corner of the sim — maybe she could get a job there to earn a living instead of working for Al the slave driver. Then, the last parcel she checked (she was going to be late getting back but who cares at this point, she thinks), the Land of the Cows. And she’d found their throne tucked away in the loft of a barn. Seeing no green dots indicating other residents nearby she dared to directly sit in it from her remote viewing spot.
She looked down and counted her white gloved fingers. 10 instead of 8. Good. She was still whole. Like proper milk, 5 percent instead of 2, or at least 4 to make the ratio come out correct. She’d held out her number challenge hand and someone grasped it. She was saved by the FILE, she knew. She had to keep abiding by the golden rule. But nobody said she had to keep working for *Al*. Heck, she could work here, with the cows, be a type of secret, inside agent uncovering their inner workings, including 4 stomachs we assume. But everyone knows that. Deeper secrets; beyond strange body workings. She could see into the soul of the cow, beyond the black and white, and peer deep into red, the ultimate unity. Like alchemy. But… where was the citrinitas? she wondered with this train of thought. The yellowing? The missing 4th? Ah… “Eureka!” she shouted, leaping out of the throne, attracting the attention of at least one other. Someone named Beckett, an expert on historical. An expert on all things missing in the now. Including himself.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0038, 0703, Nautilus, NORTH, Rank & File
Sunklands 