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"I had an idea..."
The Tale of the Mad Wizard of Imbroglio
By Pukaq
Chapter 8
Hours later, mother looked in and saw that he was still crying and left us so that she could take care of the guests. Later, after the funeral feast was over, she checked in again. By then, dry wracking sobs came from Anniu that tired him out as I hummed a song mother had sung to comfort me when I was young and he eventually fell asleep. Mother then came and helped me clean him up as best we could without waking him, then we too retired for the night.
I don't know exactly what it was that woke me that night. I just remember waking up and looking around, trying to figure out what might have caused me to wake up. I heard a faint repetitive whispering. I checked Anniu's bed and he was missing and I couldn't tell where he was in my head. The sounds seemed to be coming from under my desk, though. I bent down to look and there was Anniu, curled into a ball murmuring something over and over again and rocking back and forth. Straining to hear, it sounded like, "...glioimbroglioimbroglioimbrog..."
I knelt down to peer into the darkness under the desk. His head was jerking back and forth. His eyes were looking everywhere. When he saw me, he tried to get further away from me than he already was, but there was nowhere else for him to go. Seeing me looking at him, the murmuring suddenly stopped.
"Are you real?" he whispered.
"Of course I am," I replied.
"Am I free?" he asked.
"Free to come on out from under there, Anniu."
And then the murmuring started up again, "imbroglioimbroglioimbro..." followed by the surprisingly out-of-place scent of outhouse. Never before, in all the many times Anniu had spent the night with us, nor in all the times I had spent the night at his house, had an accident of this nature occurred.
I woke my parents. I didn't know what else to do. They brought additional lights into my quarters to help me with Anniu, their obvious worry was easy to see on their faces. In the brighter light, we quickly pulled him out from under the desk despite his resistance and his murmuring became louder and more insistent until suddenly, in almost a different voice, he yelled, "Shut up!"
We all stopped then, stunned. The only one who had been uttering anything had been Anniu and it appeared to us that he had just told himself to shut up. Instantly, though, his crying started up again. "It wasn't me. It wasn't me. I'm sorry... I couldn't stop it. It needed to... It wasn't me. It wasn't me."
My head was pounding as his voice became more insistent and he grabbed me. "You have to believe me! It wasn't me! It needed to..."
"I know... I know... It's ok. Shhhhh," I said as I helped him clean up and put on fresh clothes. Gradually the tension left his body and I guided him back to his bed. Very quickly he was asleep again.
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