On The Hunt for Pierogies

The dusk of the solstice shone over Eternia, bands of bright pink to violet and deep indigo stretching across the horizon, painting the world like a watercolor wash. Moonie winked down at her keep as the night drew to a close, and the markets bustled delightedly beneath her within the darkness that would continue to wane in the coming days. The tree of life was alive with voices. A constant murmur—though it was more of a roar—of exchange, laughter, conversation and song. It came and went like the sound of waves crashing on the shoreline, but it was always loud, and always present. It made it difficult for Mel to think as she sauntered through the streets.

She was out to burn her money, one thing was for certain. The food this time of year was always spectacular. The owl felt her leather wallet inside her coat pocket while she scanned the stalls, snugzi and pompi of all shapes and sizes and walks of life filtering past her en masse, enjoying the vast array of cuisines and whatever little party trinkets that often came with such enormous celebrations as these. The new year brought cheer and hope for the months ahead, that it would be better than the last, that there were many wonderful memories in store. It was something worth celebrating for sure, she thought. At the very least, the whole community surrounding the tree seemed to try their very hardest to sell the idea.

Just a pace behind her was her Bonnie, trailing her slow path like a particularly nervous duckling. She threw a glance way up over her shoulder to catch him wringing all four of his paws. He didn’t really like going out during holidays, especially when there were this many people.

“How are you holding up back there?” Mel called to him above the crash of conversation. When he didn’t immediately respond, she stopped in her tracks to let him bump into her. Considering she was about a head or two shorter than the length of his leg, it wasn’t exactly a wise decision, but, sometimes, with a husband so high up above the world, these sacrifices were necessary. He nearly tripped over her, and Mel stumbled forward two steps too far.

Thankfully, she was able to catch herself, and turned again to see him stoop down to her, his bright saffron eyes wide and creased with embarrassment.

“I’m sorry.” She was just barely able to make out his words over the noise. “I didn’t know you had stopped.”

Mel gently tugged his sleeve. “It’s okay. I wanted to get your attention. Are you still doing alright?”

His bells jingled when he nodded.

“Okay.” She patted his elbow. “C’mon. Let’s find something to eat.”

Beau rose his voice. “What?”

She gripped his sleeve again, this time to pull him down closer as she spoke. He had to get down on one knee so that he wouldn’t fall over at this height. “I heard Linus was hosting a stall. Maybe we can go find him and get something to eat.”

“Oh!”

Then, she released him, but as he went to stand, she took hold of his paw and started leading him along that way, which forced him to walk while leaning over at an awkward angle, making sort of a similar shape to a greenstick fracture. “Are you sure we’ll be able to find him out here?” Beau said, still trying to keep his voice clear. “It’s pretty packed.”

“If we don’t see him, we can just get something somewhere else. There’s lots of options. Maybe we’ll stumble into someone else that we know.”

“You aren’t making this any easier for me.”

One of the reasons Beau did not like going out during these events was because of the noise, but the main reason it warded him away was because of just how much he stood out. He could not help being the size of a small tree, and it wasn’t as though there weren’t other snugzi his size, but there also weren’t a lot of them, so a good portion of the crowd that filtered forward and behind the pair were much closer to Melody’s height in comparison. Mel, however, relished somewhat in the idea of having a humorously obvious keepsake to tug around at her whim.

She ignored him, and kept walking, and she eventually let go of his paw so that he wouldn’t hurt his back bending over for however long it took her to find something of interest. Truthfully, much of the stalls lining the streets were very enticing, smells and sights and sounds, bright lights, flashy signs, small crowds bunching up and down the sides of the road to see the way some vendors turned the craft into a show. It was less that there wasn’t something she especially liked, and more that the sheer amount of everything made it much more difficult to choose. Lanterns swayed in the soft evening wind, bespeckling the streets on tall poles or off the awnings of stalls. Her gaze flickered from lantern to lantern down the length of the street till she thought she might have caught sight of a familiar shape. Mel quickened her pace. Her loyal shadow followed.

It wasn’t Linus, but it was someone else she knew, and maybe she would know where he was. Saccha’s stall was decorated just as Mel thought it might be, bursting at the gills with blinking fairy lights, frilly yellow decals and lots of stickers. The custard-colored feline was making tanghulu in small batches, her brows wrinkled with focus while she spun skewers of strawberries in the hot sugar.

“Hey. You need any extra?” Mel reached out and waved high as she approached. It took Saccha a moment to realize anyone had said anything at all. When she saw Mel, her wrinkled brows raised.

“Hey!”

“I was gonna say you could use one of mine,” Mel joked while she came up to the front of the stall, gesturing to one of the tiny wild strawberries at the top of her blanki.

Saccha’s nose screwed up. “I feel like that constitutes as cannibalism,” she decided as she set her skewers in ice water. “Thanks for the thought, though.”

“How’s business?”

“Quick and spotty,” said Saccha. Behind Mel, Beau shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “Had a big cobweb of pompi just before you got here. Glad you missed it.” As she went on, she started on another set, probably to restock. “Find anything good to bite?”

“Actually, I was gonna ask if I could get something for this one.” Mel pointed her thumb towards her back.

Saccha proceeded to gesture towards the iced skewers. “Sure. Make your pick.”

Mel pointed at one that was all strawberries, and rifled through her pocket for her wallet as Saccha set her new skewers into the ice before she pulled it out and spun the water off of it. She grabbed five droplitz, then picked out two to hand to Saccha, in which they traded, and then Mel turned and stretched out the tanghulu for Beau to take. He appeared very bashful overall, and leaned down to gather the skewer up in his fingers with the delicacy of a spider. Mel smiled at him before she turned back to her friend. “Do you know where Linus is?”

“Uhhh…” Visibly, the citrus feline stopped to think. She held the countertop with her paws, and tapped her forefinger. Mel put her wallet away while she went on. “I think he’s farther down from me, more out and away from the tree. Less traffic, or something, he said. I can’t tell the difference, honestly. But Linus does Linus.” Saccha’s ice clinked inside her blanki while she shrugged. “He’s making takoyaki.”

Mel scratched the back of her ankle with her prosthesis as she echoed, “Takoyaki?”

“I know.”

“I thought for sure he’d make, like, shortbread cookies, or something.”

“I know!” Saccha’s paws went up. “He set up farther out so he could have more time between customers to make them, but I don’t think it’ll help.”

“Takoyaki is such a charisma street food, I feel like. I feel like, in general, you need to have charisma to do street food.” As she spoke, she became confused, feeling something change behind her, till she realized that the air shifting past her side was in the motion of Beau parking himself cross-legged on the sidewalk in the golden light of Saccha’s stall, jingling with every movement. She moved a step away to behold the enormous creature proper as he began to crunch down on his candy coated strawberries, his chunky tail swaying slightly. “You take up even more of the street that way, you know.”

Beau gave her round eyes as he chewed.

Saccha propped her elbow on the counter to hold her cheek in her paw. “You’re doing the mom thing.”

“Am I?”

A sly, teasing sort of grin smeared itself onto her soft yellow face. “Yeah. You gotta go.” 

Mel threw her head back and spoke exhaustedly. “But I like talking to you—u.”

“Get me some pierogies and then you can come back. I think there’s a guy selling them on the way to Linus’ stall. You can get yourself a few and then grab one for me after you say hi,” Saccha told her, then pushed herself up a bit to reach out and point vaguely in the direction they were now meant to go. “Over yonder.”

“Gotcha. I’ll stop cramping your style, then.” Mel turned to Beau and gently ushered him to stand, and he looked almost crestfallen, but he did so regardless, suddenly a million miles away as before, as he always was. She could somehow still hear him crunching above the hustle and bustle. “Thanks, Saccha. Good luck selling.”

“Good luck finding Linus!”

So they set off once more, back through the throng of different smells and sounds of toys and things. She spied someone with a bubble wand, and wished for a moment that she could have one for all the walking she was going to do this evening. Realistically, she would probably have Beau carry her at some point, since she was bound to feel weary of her prosthesis being suctioned to her leg. The tanghulu seemed to pacify him for the moment. Mel figured she’d have to stop every few stalls so he wouldn’t complain. The candy was already three fourths of the way gone the next time she looked back at him.

“Is that helping?” she asked.

Beau nodded as he bit into his last strawberry, pronounced by the distinct crunch the sugar made under his teeth.

“Let me know if you see anything you like.” If he were able to, he would probably grab one thing from each stall. The feline wasn’t exactly picky, and not exactly scant with his food. Really, that was most of the reason she was out to spend; if she were able to persuade Beau to go anywhere during the holiday season, it usually meant enticing him with festive foods—not that she minded. She enjoyed humoring him that way. Regardless of telling him so, she knew, in a way, that he would not ask, but she wanted to try and give him the option anyhow.

They continued walking for a while, keeping to the right and farther out from the tree as Saccha had instructed, and Beau didn’t say a word, and Mel sort of wished that he would, because they passed a great deal of especially exciting foods, like fairy floss, bananacue and funnel cake. For a moment, she thought she smelled pulled pork, and for the first time having since come out to peruse the stalls, Mel’s mouth watered.

Thankfully, it wasn’t long before she caught sight of a sign sporting the treasure of her mission.

It was a hanging sign at the top of a stall that read Pierogies, 2 droplitz/6pc., 4 droplitz/12pc., and underneath that was a small selection of different fillings. It was a good thing it was so high up, otherwise she might not have seen it above the froth of the crowd. She came up to the rickety looking stall just as a pair of snugzi and pompi left the stand with their own basket of fresh dumplings. However, once in view of the vendor, she stopped, and Beau bumped into her much more softly than before.

The snugzi running the stand was certainly something. She almost wasn’t sure if it was really a snugzi at all. The golden sylk trim assured her, though it wasn’t that comforting. Snugzi came in all sorts of shapes and sizes, so it wasn’t really her place to judge, truthfully, and she did feel a bit bad for being so taken aback. But the way its blanki almost pulsed suddenly soured her appetite.

Glinting in the lantern-lit street was its red, bloodied, fleshy and wrinkled hide, oozing and slightly twitching with each motion as it worked to make the dough. Mel couldn’t help staring at its tag. Just… a raw steak, bleeding down the side of its head. When it turned towards the back of the stall, she was horrified for a heartbeat to be bestowed with the sight of an enormous maw, grinning hard with three or four sets of sharp yellow teeth. What was Saccha thinking…?!

When the snugzi finally turned towards her to give her its attention, it folded its gloved hands, a myriad of tongues and teeth curling around its raw, glistering wrists, and she was surprised to notice a tiny pink bunny perched on its shoulder, seemingly sound asleep. She decided it would be better not to question the situation altogether. Mel reached behind her to grip Beau’s pant leg, who felt stiff and unmoving.

“Can I get a twelve piece of the potato cheese filling?” She finally managed to find the words. She’d been entranced somewhat by the gradual realization of just how suspect this stall really was. It looked like it’d been cobbled together with paperclips and glue. The wood was old and rotted, formed into planks and held in place with dubiously-aimed nails. The grooves in each plank ran deep, unusually so, and they appeared to be warped with moisture. The surface of each weltered in massive ups and downs to where Mel wasn’t sure how they maintained any stability for the fort at all. The equipment was clean, at least, but visibly aged, and the bowls at the front of the stall for each filling were charmlessly decorated with dying flowers. The tarp overtop the whole menagerie wasn’t doing it any favors. Though fresh-cooked pierogies were fragrant in the warm air that wafted through the stall, she could pick up on the acrid stench of viscera just underneath it.

The vendor tilted its head, and as it did so, Mel felt Beau draw closer to her. It did not reply, but it did start putting together her order. With tiny tongs, it filled a checkered paper basket one by one with fresh, hot, delicious-smelling pierogies, garnished with green herbs and cooked to a perfect golden-brown. It finished the basket with a condiment cup of sour cream, and Melody went for her wallet, but, once she pulled out her droplitz, Beau reached down to take them from her and pass them to the vendor himself.

The creature, though its mask obscured whatever expression it might have made, leaned away slightly in surprise. Then it took the money and let Beau have the basket, and it waved, but before Mel could really do anything about it, Beau started shooing her away from the stall, one part with his leg and one part with his lower arm. She was relieved to not have to behold the sight for much longer.

As they made distance from the half-beaten shack, much farther down the road thanks to Beau hurrying them both along, Mel tried to get him to slow down enough that they could talk. “What was that about?”

“I don’t know.” He had to keep his voice above the crowd when he didn’t bend down to see her. “I don’t think we should go back.”

“Poor Saccha. I guess we have to get her some takoyaki instead.”

Suddenly, Mel found herself overcome by the shadow of his presence, in which Beau had stopped to lean down and gather her in his free arms, lifting her up into the sky, careening through the air till she was settled up against his side, and she was made to sit perched on his lower arm and held closely by the upper, and she felt a little humbled by it. It was nice to be closer to his face, more so to not have to yell at each other to understand what either of them were saying.

“Pierogi?” He gestured the basket in his hand towards her.

After giving herself a second to recover from the faint calefaction in her cheeks, tentatively, she reached for one of the dumplings, wafting with soft steam still. She had to pick it up with just the tips of her claws to keep from burning her fingers. Gently, she blew on it, and caught one end of the fold on her front teeth, heat pooling up through the roots. Yikes!

The owl managed to get a nibble or two of just the dough, which was perfectly crunchy yet soft, salty, seasoned in such a way that it made her upset she couldn’t have just popped the whole thing into her mouth right then. She could feel her insides churn. “That’s really nice.”

“You’ve hardly eaten it.”

“I know, but that’s really nice.” She shook her pierogi at him, careful not to drop it while it balanced between her fingers, and Beau started off again, ambling slowly through the still-busy crowd. “How nice it is is unprecedented.”

While he walked, Mel continued to blow softly on it in the hopes that it would cool down any faster, and at some point she was able to take a bite off the corner with the tiniest amount of filling. Blessed with the deliciously savory flavor and feeling, she could not shake her hands out too hard lest she jostle her ride.

Soft, crunchy outside, creamy potato-cheese inside, seasoned with dill, chives and flake salt. Never had she been happier to get greasy fingers. “You gotta have one,” she insisted. “You have to. That was so worth it. That washes the stall outta my mind, just how good that is.” She ate the rest of the pierogi, and reached for the basket to grab another, promptly pressing it up to Beau’s face, who all at once reeled back as if offended to be interrupted from his walk. Then he realized what it was she had in front of him, and he used his teeth to take the dumpling from her.

Mel watched it disappear into the void as he chewed. Stars shone across his eyes.

As she reached for a third, he said quickly, “Please save a few for me.”

“Oh. Is that how it is?” While she had intended to eat it, simply to appease him, she passed it to him, and the celestial feline took it in his paw, bursting into a soft, simpering purr. Mel replaced what was meant to be her next pierogi as her kitty kept on chewing. Twelve pierogies meant there’d be six for each of them, and they were disappearing fast, and the thought of it made her nervous for just how delicious they were.

That was neither here nor there, since there was more than enough food to go around this time of year, as was the spirit of the celebration and what most everyone was out roaming the streets for. Culinary talent practically exploded from every corner of Eternia, from down on the ground to up in the treetop markets, and even some places in the sky islands. However, in spite of all that, Mel wasn’t confident that much of it could beat the masterpiece they’d just discovered.