A Valentine's Day Story - III

I told Arabella the results of our conversation the next day when she cornered me in the basketball court to sell me the tickets to the Valentine’s Day Party. It didn’t take long for it to be obvious that she didn’t like the plan of action proposed by Joshhound.

“Pashiella? What in the world does he see in Pashiella?”

“I have no idea.”

“That stuck-up little **** [here she uttered an expletive that might be suitable on pornographic forums, but not elsewhere]. What could he possibly see in her? Rita is so much prettier and suitable and perfect for him. Don’t you think so, Jormund?”

I was taught that if you can’t say something good about someone, it’s best not to say anything at all. Following that most excellent tenet, I maintained a stoic silence.

“Well, anyway, so he will be trying to give her a card tomorrow, will he? I’ll see about that, I will. You’re my date for tomorrow’s party, by the way. Don’t let me find out you’ve been asking anyone else.” And here she gave me a sinister smile and walked away.

* * * *

February in Midgard is a wonderfully mild time of the year. Valentine’s Day is invariably a cool, breezy day of the kind that puts a song on your lips and a spring in your stride. This year was no different - when morning broke, I had no idea of the momentous events that were to follow.

It started with Joshhound accosting me excitedly during the morning recess, his face a glowing picture of pride and happiness...

“Jormund! I did it, man! I dropped it into her bag!”

“Err…ok…congrats, I guess.”

“I’m da man!”

“For dropping a card into a girl’s bag while she wasn’t in the classroom?”

“Yes.”

“Ah.”

During the lunch recess, however, it was a quite different Joshhound that one got to see. To say he was upset would’ve been understating the case, but he wasn’t quite in tears either.

“Something the matter?”
“Well she’s still ignoring me. Doesn’t even acknowledge receiving the card. I tried to catch her eye during Computers Class, but she gave me the same stare of sweet innocence that she does every time.”

What he meant, was that she had looked at him with the same sort of disdainful expression with which she looked at everyone else while her own mind as poring over devious methods for squeezing an extra mark out of the Civics section of the Social Studies Paper. I caught Arabella’s eye as she passed from behind Joshhound, and she gave me a sly wink, whose import I had no idea of – at the time.

The dam broke about ten minutes after classes were over. I was returning from a tiring PE class when I noticed Joshhound sitting on the first bench of his row sobbing hot tears, while a couple of his friends tried to comfort him.

“What’s the matter?” I asked, strolling into the class.

“She….she….,”he began, and then stopped.

“Come to the shop,” I said, dismissing his friends with a ‘I’ll talk to him’ and leading him out by the arm.

Once there, he burst into even more copious tears and unintelligible conversation. It struck me that he was rather Gollum-like in his own way. Finally I borrowed a glass of water from Shree, the chap who ran the shop, and threw it on his face. He seemed to have come to his senses, because he punched me rather hard on the face. Rubbing my sore cheek, I asked him to explain why the hell he was blubbering.

“She chucked my card in the dustbin,” he said through teary eyes, “in two pieces, man. There was one card. And she chucked it into the dustbin. In two pieces. She didn’t tear along the fold either. She tore across the cute purple heart with the pink teddy bear in it. Can you imagine that, Jormund? She did, she did!”

“Oh you poor chickadee!”

No, it wasn’t me. I do not express myself with words like chickadee addressed to guys with faces like chimps (or any other species of fauna). Arabella had crept up on us from behind and was patting Joshhound’s head sympathetically as she said the above sentence.

“Arabella?” he said, turning around with an expression of surprise, “how did you…?”

“Oh you poor parakeet! I saw her throw your card in the dustbin! I felt so indignant! Is that the way to treat a missive of true love? Oh it was terrible. You deserve better, you do!”

He sobbed a little and buried his face in his hand. Arabella motioned to me to follow her and said, bending down to speak in a soft voice in Joshhound’s ears “We’ll be right back, okay? You stay right here. I’ve to go see someone in the school office about today’s party. You’re coming, aren’t you? It starts in a half-hour.”

“Do I look in any shape to come to a Valentine Party?” he asked – and I thought he had a point there.

“Oh Jormund and I shall have you all cheered up in no time,” she said blithely, and stepped out. When we’d reached inside the school gates, she dragged me to the side and burst into laughter.

“Did you see his face? Such a sap!” she said when the attack of the funnies had subsided.

“Er...yes – what are you getting at?” I asked.

“I did it!”

“What did you do?”

“The card, silly! I tore it and put it in the dustbin!”

“How?”

“Oh I came in before her and took it out of her bag. The idiot had just dropped it on top of the open flap.”

I stared at her, aghast. The Code of the Elvers frowns on women who stoop to purloining Valentine Cards from other women’s bags. But then my eyes chanced on her figure and I thought the Code of the Elvers could take a hike.

“Why?” I asked instead.

“You ass! I can’t let him deliver sappy love-cards to Pashiella when he should be delivering them to Rita! So I intercepted it and destroyed it in such a way that he couldn’t miss seeing it! God I’m brilliant!”

I shuddered.

“And the best part is,” she continued, “Now we shall both console him and get him to fall in love with Rita. Simple ain’t it?”

“Good God! You’re a menace to society! Arabella, you can’t manipulate things like that!”

“I just did,” she said, pouting, “and if you don’t like it, you jolly well can forget about my going to the Bryan Adams concert with you!”

I sighed and apologized resignedly. There didn’t seem to be much else to do.

We walked back towards the shop slowly. We were standing outside it when I fingered my pocked and realised that I was carrying the house keys with me. The problem with that was that if I didn’t go home and leave the keys with the neighbours, the Queen Tigress would be left locked out until Papa Jormund arrived home from the hunt. This would, naturally make the Queen Tigress very angry. Only an Elver with a serious death wish would risk making the Queen Tigress angry. Remedial action would clearly be required.

“I say, Arabella, old thing, I need to go home and drop off the keys!”

“What? But what about the Party?”

“I’ll be back by then. Ok, a bit late, but I’ll be back don’t worry.”

“Must you go?”

“Seriously, I must. You go work on Joshhound,” I said, turning and setting off at a brisk pace. When I turned the corner, I saw her sitting next to him, uttering words of sympathy.