Yay! It's the weekend! Which means that I have had time to write a thing! (It's Emilalli. Probably. I guess a platonic friendship is not out of the question.)
Here you all go: Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!“Ewww,” said Emil to Lalli while picking up the discarded scout’s uniform. “Well, I sure am glad that Mikkel is the one doing the laundry! What did you do, roll around in troll guts? Wait – did you actually roll around in troll guts? How did that happen? Did you fight a troll? Are you okay?”
He looked up, hoping to verify this for himself – but Lalli, a very fast dresser, was long gone; probably asleep in the tank, by now. So, he was probably okay, then? Leaving Emil to focus on the ewww of it all. Troll gutsI Ugh.
***
“Eww!” said Emil to himself as he watched Lalli clean yet another deformed skull, blood and unidentified matter flying everywhere. While the Swedish ‘scientific’ stance on religion now seemed thoroughly foolish to him – finding actual evidence that magic was real was not even hard, anyone could do it, even a scientifically-untrained cleanser – he had to admit that religion was just weird. Eww.
***
“Ew!” Emil could not help exclaiming as Lalli vomited all over his boots. It wasn’t Lalli’s fault, of course: the sway of the boat had thrown off his otherwise excellent vomiting aim. And boots could be cleaned. Still, ew.
***
“Ewwww,” said Lalli to Emil. “Blueberry soup? Really?”
Emil, who had spent all morning working on this special dish, dyeing both his hands and even some of his hair in the process, was rather taken aback. “It’s an old family recipe!”
“Your family is weird. Blueberries? In soup? Also, I hate–”
“You hate blueberries, I know, but I thought what you really hated about them was the element of surprise: how they’re all different, and you never know what you’re going to get? Well, the soup doesn’t have that, does it? And it’s sweet, I put extra sugar in it, I really thought you might…”
Confronted by Lalli’s flat, unimpressed stare, Emil could not help trailing off. And, well… if he were perfectly honest with himself, he could not help feeling a little – just a little – resentful. He had tried so hard! He always tried so hard. And did he ever get any acknowledgement, any thanks? Well, yes, maybe two… no, three times. And he’d always said it was enough, but was it, really? Was it even worth it? Should he start reconsidering this whole, well, rela–
His racing, dark thoughts stopped dead as he saw Lalli pick up his spoon. And dip it in his bowl. And, even, consume its contents! And then, repeat this whole process, several times!
“Is the soup… okay?” Emil asked tentatively.
“Yes. Or, wait, no,” Lalli paused, spoon in mid air, and stared at its blueish contents in confusion. “It is not okay. It is very good. You did a very good job. I think…” He turned his bewildered gaze on Emil. “I think I should apologize for the times I said you were stupid. Some of them, anyway. You are not always stupid.”
It was Emil’s turn to be confused, by this sudden change of topic. “It’s… fine?” he said. “I don’t really mind the ‘stupids’. I know you use them as a sort of... punctuation.”
“But they are incorrect. I don’t want to say incorrect things.” Lalli put down the spoon, his expression serious. “Emil. You have fixed blueberries. You are some sort of genius.”
Emil felt his face assume a loopy grin, all his earlier doubts fading away. At times like this, it was definitely worth it.
This story went in a very different direction than I intended it to... The first version ended with Emil annoyed. And now I seem to have convinced Lalli not to use 'stupid' to describe Emil quite as often, which isn't necessarily a good thing. Sigh.
