We All End Up The Remains Of The Day
The woods that lay only a stone’s throw from a village that few people had heard of, there was a voice breaking through the quiet, haunting ambience of such a setting late at night.
“…stupid, stupid,” muttered the owner of the voice as he picked his way through the undergrowth, having no thought about where he was going other than that he wanted to be as far away from his home as possible. “How could I - I mean, I did it fine this morning… Good Lord, what will she think of me?”
As may be obvious, Gustave Myros was not having a positive day. What he didn’t know was that it was about to get a lot worse.
To begin, though - what has already transpired?
It began, in fact, with a headache…
*
“Ugh…” Gustave groaned as he awoke, his eyes squeezed shut even as consciousness returned to him, in a vain attempt to get rid of the agonizing headache that was most inconsiderately assaulting him, as though someone had driven nails through his skull in his sleep. Utterly unfair, in his opinion, given that he hadn’t even drunk the tumbler of whiskey his father had offered him after the revelation that-
Instantly, his bright green eyes snapped open, regardless of head pains. Good Lord, that meant - oh Go
d - no - no - a thousand times no. There was no way on God’s green earth that he, Gustave Myros, was going to just roll over and marry a woman he had never met before; a woman who, if gossip were to be believed, had sent her other suitors crawling away on hands and knees, their legs given out from a swift and precise kick to the family jewels, as it were.
“This is bad,” the young man muttered to himself as he scrambled out of bed, wincing as his head continued to ache. It even felt heavier, as though the future was weighing down on every part of him. “This is really, really…”
The complaint trailed off as Gustave’s brain finally registered what his eyes were taking in. Namely, his arms.
More specifically, the fact that his arms were blue.
There was a pause as, slowly, Gustave turned his head to look into the full-length mirror that stood beside his wardrobe and took in the rest of his appearance.
Then, quite understandably, a high-pitched, girlish scream echoed around the house.
*
“I’m blue.”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Blue, Minion.”
“Well, it does suit you, Sir.”
“Really? That’s quite-but! But. I’m blue.”
“Sir, I think we’ve established…”
“Why am I blue, Minion? And-and-and why is my head swelling?”
“…Well, Sir, I’ve been thinking…”
“Well?”
“…Do you remember last summer, Sir?”
“What the hell does that have to do with anything?”
“Do you remember that - ah - um - the… uh… the… disagreement you had with the… um… lady who was telling fortunes?”
“You mean that charlatan hag I called out on her ridiculous attempt to part people from their money?”
“…That would be the one, Sir, yes.”
“Well, what does she have to do with anything?”
“She… did say she was going to curse you, Sir.”
“Oh for the… Minion! For the love of science, don’t tell me you think this is her doing! Or-or-or that… What? Miss Ritchi is supposed to be my true love?”
“I can’t say, Sir, but… Well… What other explanation is there?”
“A logical, scientific one, for starters!”
“Whatever you say, Sir.”
“…You could at least pretend to agree with me, Minion.”
“Sorry Sir. Um, but… What are you going to do about the wedding, then?”
“…Oh. Oh! Oh, Minion, this is perfect!”
“It… is, Sir?”
“Of course it is! This means I don’t have to marry her! I’m scott-free! Why the hell would she marry me, when I look like this? It’s a miracle!”
“Well… I suppose you could-“
“Excellent, Minion! Everything will go precisely according to plan.”
*
Everything did, in fact, go precisely to plan.
Lord and Lady Myros’s plan, that is.
Well, until the guests started screaming at the groom’s singular appearance, Miss Ritchi’s mother fainted and Gustave managed to mispronounce every over word of his vows until the vicar quite literally kicked him out of the church, not before Gustave had decided that, actually, he might like to marry Roxanne Ritchi after
all.
All in all, he wasn’t sure whether the day counted as a success or a failure, but he was leaning more towards
the latter.
*
Which brought him back to the here-and-now, walking through the woods contemplating how his life had gone from perfect to horrendous in the space of a day. Yesterday, he had been a young man looking forward to nothing more strenuous than working on his latest invention. Today, he wasn’t sure whether or not he was actually still engaged, was sure of the fact that he might actually be falling in love with Miss Ritchi and couldn’t even begin to guess what she thought of him.
Oh, and he was blue and his head was enormous.
Wonderful, then.
Sighing, he slumped down on the ground, staring at the protruding tree root beside him that looked oddly like a finger.
“Maybe I should just marry you and live here forever,” he grumbled. “It would be easier than going
back home.”