We'd known each other more than 25 years ago. I was a college student. She was a stunningly beautiful high school senior. There had been some definite mutual electricity... but we were both with other people at the time, and by the time our respective romances of the time had crashed and burned, her family had moved out of state.
I thought about her often... but I had no idea how to get in touch with her.
Life moved on.
I thought about her from time to time. Back in the mid nineties, when I finally got on this "internet" thing, I tried googling her name in a dozen search engines. No dice. Maybe she was married, and had changed her name. Maybe she wasn't online.
I got married. Later, I got divorced.
And it was on Facebook that I saw her name. She was replying to something a mutual friend had said. I about broke a finger getting in touch with her. She immediately remembered me, to my amazement. She was amazed that I remembered her. I even remembered her stuffed toy's name (Edgar Allen Hippo. How many high school girls make literary jokes about their stuffed animals?) And we began an email correspondence. We talked a lot, online. Weirdly enough, we had a remarkable amount in common, even after all these years.
And we became friends, again.
And then... I sent her some mouselings. Hey, why not? Mouselings are cute. And I like to paint them. And I thought a cute little handpainted thing would be a nice personal gesture.
She about melted.
I've said it before, and I will say it again: Mouselings are utter catnip for women, guys. You wanna draw the chicks like an all-night shoe sale? Forget the space marines, buy Mouselings. I am firmly convinced that Gene Van Horne must have to hold the chicks off with a torch and pitchfork just to get from his front door to the car in the morning.
Our relationship progressed. I started having real feelings for her. Well, I'd had real feelings for her since about 1986, actually, but... well... you know, you aren't SUPPOSED to find yourself attracted to someone you only talk to online, you know... but...
We talked about actually getting together in the flesh. This was exciting. It was also terrifying. Man, last time I saw her, I was buff as could be and had shoulder length hair. Now I'm a bald middle aged school teacher with a spare tire that could fit on a tractor. Did I really wanna do this? She said she didn't care. She'd seen my pictures in my Facebook profile. She knew what I looked like. And she still wanted to see me again. So we made plans. We live in different states, so yes, there was some planning involved.
As the time came closer, I felt like I needed to take her something. Flowers or something, you know? What could I take her that wouldn't, you know, be too cliched, or too MUCH, or ... hell, what was I going to give her?
Zombies.
In the course of our conversations, it turned out she liked zombie movies. Who'd have thought? I like them myself, but I know better than to take a date to one. She said she'd LOVE to be taken on a date to a zombie movie, which did a lot to convince me that this woman was right for a bizarre depraved reprobate like myself in the first place. And who brings ZOMBIES to a first date? Truly, a stroke of weirdness AND originality. And if she couldn't handle weirdness and originality, then truly, she and I were NOT meant to be.
But what to get her? Zombie movie DVD? Zombie toy? Stuffed zombie?
Zombie Mouselings.
I remembered that Reaper'd done a zombie mouseling set a few years back, for the artists' get together. No WAY would she have zombie mouselings! It was a no brainer (if I can be excused the gawdawful pun). But.... they'd been limited edition, though, and not for sale through conventional means. But... but it was TOO PERFECT A GIFT! I HAD to lay hands on a set! Crap! Wherethehell was I going to find a set of limited edition zombie mouseling minis that hadn't been in production for a year or more?
And that was when I got in touch with Obi-Wan Kenobi*. "Help me, Obi-Wan," I said. "You're my only hope."
*No, I am not going to reveal his real name. He did me a hell of a favor on short notice, and the last form of repayment this fine, splendid, and salt of the earth person deserves is half the friggin' world calling him up on the horn to bug him about out of production minis. Develop your OWN black market sources.
And Obi-Wan used the Force, and hooked me up with a set of Zombie Mouselings. Quickly, I set to with paint and brush, and sticking closely to Michael Proctor's most excellent example from the Inspiration Gallery. I'd wondered like hell how to point up the fact that the two Zombies were in fact Zombies, instead of ordinary gray mice, and his "green glowing eyes" trick, as seen in the Inspiration Gallery, was pure genius. Gladly would I steal Michael's idea and take full credit for it from my sweetheart... If, in fact, she WAS my sweetheart. Remember, I hadn't seen her in 25 years. My brush hand MIGHT have been a little shaky.
We met a month later.
I will spare you all, dear friends and readers, most of the corn syrup. Most of it.
Me? I'd aged. Her? She'd matured. She was still stunningly beautiful. And she looked at me like a deer looks at a speeding eighteen wheeler on the highway. And I stood there with my mouth hanging open. Truly, I had learned confidence, suavity and style in the quarter century since we'd last laid eyes on each other.
We sat. We talked. And she said to me, "You are still so handsome."
And then I think she kissed me. I don't know. I might have kissed her. Someone sure's hell kissed someone. And I'm pretty sure I was there for it. Some of my neurons are STILL tingling.
A couple days later or so, I emerged from the pink fog long enough to remember the mouselings. "I... brought you something," I said, and brought out the little wrapped package. She glowed for a moment. How do they do that? Men don't do that. At least, no men that I've ever known could actually emit light. But she did. And she opened the package, and carefully unwrapped the tiny, tissue wrapped parcels... and looked at the first zombie mouseling, with his undead glowing green eyes. And then she looked up at me with her mouth open.
Oh, ghod, I'd blown it. Whatthehell was I THINKING, zombie mouselings for a hopeful romantic reunion? What kind of a moron WAS I? Oh, &%$#@....
She unwrapped the rest of the mouselings, and looked at them with an expression I couldn't read. She almost looked like she was about to cry, for a moment. And then, she looked at me, and said, "I brought you something, too." She dipped into her bag, and handed ME a parcel. I looked at her. She didn't seem offended. She didn't seem put off. She seemed... weirdly... hopeful.
So I opened the package. Two blisters of Zombie Mouselings.
I looked back up at her with my mouth hanging open again. She looked to be on the verge of tears. "You'd said you loved the zombie mouselings, but that they were limited edition, and you didn't get to the artists' convention... so I went online... and I found this guy who resells stuff online... and I was... going to ask you to paint ME a set..."
And she looked back down at her handpainted mouselings with their glowing green undead eyes.
I've changed my Facebook status from "Divorced" to "In a relationship."
We've managed to get together a few times since then, and barely a day passes that we don't at LEAST do a little chat... or texting... or emailing back and forth from work. And we spin dreams, and fantasize, and even plan for the future a little.
So... anyone going to ReaperCon who doesn't want their pirate mouseling? Please let me know; she's really hot to get one of THOSE, too. Ghod knows what she might do if I bring her a painted one...
Mouselings.
Gene, I'm quite sure this is your fault, somehow...
