Goof #2 Cover Revealed

New Worlds Comics will be released. In the meantime, here’s a taste of the Goof #2 cover. Enjoy!

 

‘Oops’ is the key word here.

Goof #1 Cover Revealed

New Worlds Comics is launching next month. As we get closer, I’m going to release more and more information.

 

Here’s our first teaser, the cover of our first title, Goof:

 

Goofiest. Superhero. Ever.

‘Tickling Butterflies’ – Little Soldier Blue

Tickling Butterflies is an epic fantasy, containing 128 fairy tales that together create one huge story.

Here’s the story so far. The story continues:

 

Little Soldier Blue

(Containing the ghastly story of a perfect soldier.)

 

Little Soldier Blue hated the army. But it was also clear to him that he needed a job. It was clear to him because his parents had made it clear to him that he needed a job. His father, Big Soldier Blue, and his mother, Big Soldier Wife, both expected him to go into the army. Big Soldier Blue came from a long line of soldiers, and Big Soldier Wife came from a long line of soldier wives.

By a strange coincidence, on Little Soldier Blue’s eighteenth birthday, Prince Charming the Fifth rode into town and gathered all eighteen year olds and suggested they join the prince’s army. The prince offered money, and Little Soldier Blue accepted, even though he was not sure that it was the right job for him.

On the first day, all soldiers were given uniforms and a magic silver box.

All soldiers put their feelings inside the magic silver box. But Little Soldier Blue held on to his feelings and his box remained empty.

Prince Charming the Fifth did not rely on the boxes to gain his soldiers’ loyalty. During his trial of fire, he had conceived the perfect plan to gain his soldiers’ loyalty. The prince knew, as all royalty does, that the feeling of anger makes a person certain that he is right and equally certain that the person making him angry is wrong. The angrier the person, the more certain he is that he is right, and the more certain he is that the other person is wrong.

And so, the prince’s training consisted of making his soldiers angry.

With each passing day, Little Soldier Blue became angrier. With each passing day, all soldiers around him became angrier.

With each passing week, Little Soldier Blue became certain that he was right. With each passing week, all the soldiers around him were certain that they were right.

And during all that time, Prince Charming the Fifth was the angriest of them all, and therefore everyone agreed with him that he was right. His anger connected with everyone else’s. Everyone agreed with him that he should be king. The more right and more righteous and more angry the soldiers became, the more certain they were that King John the Ugly should be killed.

Within a month, Little Soldier blue was mighty angry, and he felt better about being in the army, and he knew that King John the Cute should die. And he was surrounded by soldiers who felt exactly the same feelings all the time.

Prince Charming the Fifth had also learned, during his trial of fire, that soldiers must care for their fellow soldiers before they cared for their families.

And so, at the end of every night, the soldiers played games in which one of them was being rescued by the others. And after a month, the soldiers felt as tight as a family. For the first time in his life, Little Soldier Blue felt that he had a family that approves of what and who he is, a family that understands him, a family that shares his anger. Little Soldier Blue was loyal to his new family and felt certain that he would willingly lay down his life for all his soldier friends.

The third lesson Prince Charming the Fifth had learned in his trial of fire, was that his army needed to be desperate for his approval. He wanted to make sure that his loyal army would be truly loyal, and wanted the soldiers to be loyal because they sought his approval.

And so for every day for an entire month, Prince Charming the Fifth made sure that he told each and every soldier three times that he was not good enough, and one time that he was getting slightly better. So it was for every soldier. So it was all the time.

In that way, Little Soldier Blue felt he was improving, but also felt that he was never good enough for Prince Charming the Fifth. And yet, with each good word from the prince, he became more loyal, and tried even harder to get the prince’s praise. He wanted Prince Charming the Fifth to tell him how good he was. After a month, it was the most important thing he wanted. It was equally as important as killing King John the Cute.

Little Soldier Blue knew that if he killed King John the Cute, the prince would tell him that he was a perfect soldier and would love him greatly.

And so, after three months of training, Little Soldier Blue became the perfect soldier. Then, to make Prince Charming the Fifth even happier, he opened his box, locked his emotions in it, then threw it away.

This has been the ghastly story containing exact details of how Little Soldier Blue became the perfect soldier. This has also been the unpleasant tale in which Shadowy Death stood silently and in the shadows, allowing Prince Charming the Fifth to create an impressive army.

 

(To be continued on Thursday…)

‘Tickling Butterflies’ – Death and the Minister

Tickling Butterflies is an epic fantasy, containing 128 fairy tales that together create one huge story.

Here’s the story so far. We are in the middle:

Death and the Minister

(Containing the fearsome story of Death and the minister.)

Once, during the time of King John the Cute’s journey to the Land of No Respect, Death returned to the king’s palace. Upon his last visit, he took King Charming the Fourth’s soul. Upon this visit, he headed for Minister Vazir’s room.

It was the middle of the night, and only Minister Vazir was awake.

Death entered his room, and Minister Vazir’s mouth fell open.

“I am Death,” said Death.

In spite of the fact that Minister Vazir had put all his fears in a box, what little specks of emotion remained of his fears caused his heart to race. “I am Minister Vazir,” he said. “Have you come for me?”

“Not today,” said Death. “I seek King John the Cute.”

“King John the Cute,” said Minister Vazir, trying to breathe steadily, “is on a quest at the Land of No Respect at the moment. Do you seek to claim his soul?”

“Not at present,” said Death. “I seek him in another matter.”

“Well… As I said…” Minister Vazir slowly regained his breath. “He is out for a few days at least. Why… Why… Why do you seek him?”

“I seek his help.”

“Why… Why… Why does Death seek the king’s help?”

Death hesitated for a minute and sixty one seconds. Then, deciding on telling the truth, he raised his amputated right arm. “A mysterious being has taken my arm. I can no longer claim anyone’s soul, while he can claim the souls of anyone he wishes.”

“You can… You can… You can no longer take anyone’s souls?” Minister Vazir could not take his eyes off the amputated arm.

“My arm is stolen. I cannot take souls. I must see the king.”

“Well… the king will be out for many days…”

“Very well, then,” Death said. “I shall wait for him.”

Minister Vazir considered the situation. “Perhaps it is best, Death, that while you wait, you will wait in my room, away from others’ eyes, so as not to create a panic.”

Death sat down on Minister Vazir’s chair. “I will await the king here.”

Minister Vazir considered the situation further. When he had told King John the Cute his story about how he had put his great fears in a silver box, he had promised the king that he would open the silver box and put his fears back in his body. But he had not done so since their conversation. Perhaps this was the perfect opportunity to do so? He would put back his fears in his body, and face his fear of Death, which surely must be the worst, without there ever being a danger of Death claiming his soul.

While Death waited, Minister Vazir opened the box and put his fears back in his body.

While Death waited, Minister Vazir felt his fears fully.

With Death in the room for fourteen days and fourteen nights, Minister Vazir learned to overcome his fears and to live with Death.

This has been the fearsome story of how Minister Vazir put his fears back in his body and learned to overcome them.

(To be continued on Tuesday…)

‘Tickling Butterflies’ – The Last Rule and Regulation

Tickling Butterflies is an epic fantasy, containing 128 fairy tales that together create one huge story. Here’s the story so far. We are in the middle:

 

The Last Rule and Regulation

(Containing the daring tale of an heroic escape from the Land of No Respect.)

 

Once upon a time, during his quest to save the Land of All Legends, King John the Cute had travelled to the mysterious Land of No Respect. There, he met a sad man in the mountains who told him great truths which had been gained at a terrible price.

That sad man’s name was Benjamin Miller, an orphan from another land. Once he had finished his tale, King John the Cute came to his feet.

“Surely your realize,” the king told Benjamin Miller, “that your story has not yet come to the end.”

“My story is over,” said Benjamin Miller. “It is simply that I cannot die.”

“Benjamin Miller, I am on a quest to find hidden truths about the Land of All Legends, to discover its secrets, and to save as many lives as possible. Perhaps I will save yours. I promise you here and now that I will do my best to help you find a way home.”

“There is no use,” said Benjamin Miller. “I have given up that hope centuries ago. Do not waste your time.”

“You have told me great things, to which I must give quite a lot of thought. But you have also given me hints as to where to proceed. If the Original Monster travels between my land and your original land, then we must find him. We must learn what he knows, we must learn the secrets of that other land, we must learn the secrets of the Original Monster, and we will use our knowledge to help you get back to your own land.”

“I have tried. For decades. The Original Monster is elusive beyond words.”

“I am the king. I have more resources than you have ever had.”

“You will not find him. You will not be able to bring me back to my world. The mirror has shown me the truth.”

“The mirror has shown you that someone is writing stories about you,” King John the Cute corrected him. “But it has not shown you that you will never return to your home.”

Benjamin Miller thought about that statement. “That is true,” he said, surprised.

“Come, let us leave the island together and return to the palace, where I can continue my quest.”

Benjamin Miller took a step back. “No, no. You do not understand. We can never leave this place.”

“Why?”

“Because of the last rule and regulation of the Land of No Respect. I have been here for centuries, and I have learned all the rules. And the twentieth and last rule and regulation states clearly that you will always achieve the opposite of what you really want. I wanted to leave, and so I have been here for all these years. Ochi wanted to kill the doctors, and so he was killed himself. That is how the Land of No Respect works, and its rules and regulations are magically enforced on this island.”

King John the Cute considered this statement for one minute and eleven seconds. Then he took a deep breath and exclaimed, “I am the king of the Land of All Legends, and I decree that the rules and regulations of the Land of No Respect will have no hold on me or my friends!”

The king’s voice echoed through the island. Through the glasses with the magnifying qualities, Benjamin Miller could see that everyone in town had stopped and looked around, searching for the source of the voice.

“Chariot!” King John the Cute’s voice boomed across the land. “Come to the top of the mountain! We must leave immediately!”

For a long minute, Benjamin Miller looked around, afraid that something might happen to stop their escape. But then a cloud peered in through the caves.

“At your service, my king,” said the cloud.

“Come,” said King John the Cute. The king took Benjamin Miller’s hand, and helped him climb aboard Chariot.

At the king’s orders, Chariot rose into the sky and quickly floated away in the direction of Capital City and the palace. Soon, the island of the Land of No Respect was a dot in the ocean. And soon after that it could no longer be seen over the horizon.

This has been the daring tale of an heroic escape from the Land of No Respect. This has also been the splendid story of the first time John the Cute, the boy from Bambooville, truly felt like a king.

 

(To be continued on Sunday…)

‘Tickling Butterflies’ – The Laughter Fashions

Tickling Butterflies is an epic fantasy, containing 128 fairy tales that together create one huge story. Here’s the story so far. We are in the middle:

 

The Laughter Fashions

(Containing the century-spanning tale of laughable fashions.)

 

Sadness struck me upon learning the truth, Benjamin Miller began the end of his story. My despair was deeper than it had ever been. I had no hope. Everything I had desired was gone. I would never see my parents. I would never return to my world. I had become another story in the Land of All Legends.

Upon exiting the Fun House Mirror wagon, I had enough strength to ask the guardian about where Sylvia had gone. But once he said he did not know, all strength left me.

The guardian brought me to the town. They looked at my despair and could not cope with someone who was extremely not funny and did not laugh at anything.

At the end of long discussions, they came up with a solution. They put me here in the mountain, and dug caves that, with the aid of glasses of magnifying qualities, looked into every part of the Land of No Respect. That way, sitting here, I could see everything that was going on on the island: so many funny things, so many ridiculous things, so many silly things. They hoped that with the centuries it would improve my mood.

I have been sitting here for almost five hundred and fifty years with sadness in my heart, and only the funny creatures of the Land of No Respect keeping my sadness slightly above great despair.

During all those years, every day that I have spent here, someone came and gave me food and water and slapped my face with five pies of whipped cream.

Over the centuries, I have seen creatures come and go, observed fashions appear with great excitement and disappear in disrepute. I have seen the island ruled by an incompetent police force that constantly bumped into each other. I have seen decades of ridiculous clothing fashions, meant to be funny rather than useful or appealing. I have seen decades in which the fashion was to make fun of anything that had just been said, simply by mimicking it. I have seen decades in which the style had been to throw things on one another. I have seen decades in which the fashion was to insult each other quietly and with clever words and to never touch. I have seen decades in which pooping was considered the greatest invention of modern times. I have seen decades upon decades of silliness, wackiness, zaniness, and ridiculousness. And that silliness, as much as it caused me pain, has also saved my sanity.

And that is the story of the happiest land in the Land of All Legends: the Land of No Respect. And it is also the story of the saddest man in the Land of All Legends: Benjamin Miller. And now, King John the Cute, you know my story in its entirety.

 

(To be continued on Tuesday…)

 

 

 

‘Tickling Butterflies’ – Benjamin Miller and the Magic Mirror

Tickling Butterflies is an epic fantasy, containing 128 fairy tales that together create one huge story. Here’s the story so far. We are about to go off the road:

 

Benjamin Miller and the Magic Mirror

(Containing a mirror-image tale of the previous story.)

 

After Sylvia vanished from sight forever in the mirror, Benjamin Miller continued with his story, the view in the mirror changed. Since I was looking at the mirror, the Fun House Mirror had now decided to show me my own truth.

I saw a man sitting over a desk, writing in a notebook. The man was overweight and bald and old. His few hairs were brown, and his eyes were sharp green. He was writing words upon words on a yellow notebook. Already, the notebook was half filled with what must be the work of months and months.

I leaned in, and looked over his shoulder, careful not to touch the mirror and fall into it.

He was just finishing a sentence, and without trying to read, I saw my own name, ‘Benjamin Miller’. I began to read the sentence he had just finished writing. This was it:

“My name is Benjamin Miller,” began Benjamin Miller, “and I was not born in the Land of All Legends. I was born… somewhere else.

Suddenly, the man with the green eyes was tired. He put his pen aside, and leaned back. Then, with a gesture, he closed the notebook, turning back all the pages. This allowed me to see the first page. There it clearly said, in great big block letters:

TICKLING BUTTERFLIES

BY

GUY HASSON

And it was at that time, at that moment, that I understood the truth about myself.

I was born in another place, a three dimensional world that is not at all the Land of All Legends. I was born in a world where stories are told to children, but I ended up in a land where those stories lived and died. But now… after almost a hundred and fifty years in the Land of All Legends, I had become a story myself! I had become a story that someone else is telling! Someone in my world is writing stories about me! Parents in my world are telling stories about me to children, just as I was told stories about Snow White!

The image in the mirror vanished, and I fell to my knees.

I knew then that I would never find my way home. I knew it, clear as any truth, that I was bound to stay as a story in the Land of All Legends for the rest of my life. And I knew that since I could not die of old age, I would remain a story forever!

For a moment, Benjamin Miller coughed.

“Excuse me, King John the Cute. I must clear my throat.”

King John the Cute sat silently and waited until Benjamin Miller cleared his throat. In the meantime, thoughts of other lands, of stories, of writers, and of children listening to stories filled the king’s mind. Was this the secret of the Land of All Legends? Did King Charming the Fifth know about any of it? Was something coming over from this other land, causing great harm to the Land of All Legends? Was the other land the cause of the Land of All Legends’ sickness? Was King John the Cute part of a story written by someone who had never seen him? Was King John the Cute a two-dimensional character in a story? If he was, what did that mean?

King John the Cute had only begun to consider these things, when Benjamin Miller finished clearing his throat and began the end of his tale.

 

(To be continued on Sunday…)

‘Tickling Butterflies’ – Sylvia Fo and the Magic Mirror

Tickling Butterflies is an epic fantasy, containing 128 fairy tales that together create one huge story. Here’s the story so far. We are about to go off the road:

 

Sylvia Fo and the Magic Mirror

(Containing the reflective tale of a magic mirror.)

 

I chased Sylvia around the mountain, Benjamin Miller explained to King John the Cute. As Benjamin Miller told his tale, the king noticed that Benjamin Miller’s face, already filled with seven hundred years of sadness, became sadder.

I found Sylvia standing outside a wagon. Near the wagon was a strange man.

“I am the guardian of the Fun House Mirror,” the strange man was telling Sylvia.

“Does the Fun House Mirror provide a way out of the island?” Sylvia asked him, even as I slowly approached them.

“That depends on how you look at it,” answered the guardian. “The mirror changes the way you look at things. It shows you who you are, as others see you. It shows you how different you are. If you have a long nose, then it shows your long nose in a way that allows you to see it as others do.”

“What good is it?” I asked. By now, I was standing near Sylvia.

“It allows you to laugh at yourself,” the guardian said simply.

“Can it get me out of here?”

“That depends on how you look at it,” replied the guardian.

“Let’s see how I look at it, then.” Sylvia’s temper ran so hot, that she had no patience and no cool judgment.

She disappeared inside the wagon before I could suggest anything else.

Within two seconds, I heard her scream in dread.

I leapt into the wagon, and saw her standing next to a large mirror, holding her face in terror. “What is it, Sylvia? What did you see?”

“I am three dimensional,” she shouted. “While everyone in this land is two dimensional! I have depth! I’m a real person! Everyone around me is a character made of cardboard! That is what I saw! And that is the truth!”

I did not understand what she was saying.

“I can’t stand this place!” Sylvia began to run in a small circle around me. “This entire land is awful! This is a prison! This entire land is a prison!”

Then, surprisingly, she jumped into the mirror, and ran and ran until she disappeared from sight.

I was afraid to jump in after her. Later, I told the guardian what had happened and asked him where Sylvia was. He said he did not know. He said the mirror shows everyone his and her own truth, and leads a path to the realization of that truth.

Nonetheless, in the roughly five hundred and fifty years that have passed since, King John the Cute, I have never seen Sylvia Fo again. Not in all that time. I believe she is dead.

But that is not the whole story, King John the Cute, for once Sylvia had vanished from sight inside the mirror, the view in the mirror changed, and I saw the image in the mirror change to reflect my truth.

But I have to stop for a moment and breathe. I have not spoken so much in five hundred and fifty years.

Benjamin Miller paused to take a breath, and King John the Cute waited, his eyes aglow, ready to hear the end of the story.

 

(To be continued on Sunday…)

‘Tickling Butterflies’ – The Smarty Pants Competition

If you’re just joining us, here’s the story so far.

Tickling Butterflies is an epic fantasy, containing 128 fairy tales that together create one huge story. We are in the middle:

 

The Smarty Pants Competition

(Containing the laughable account of how laughter accounts for intelligence.)

 

Filled with sadness and pain, Benjamin Miller continued to tell his sad tale, Sylvia and I wanted to find a way out of the Land of No Respect.

We needed a boat, since the doctors had caused ours to sink.

In town, the whipped-creamed streets were filled with people. We noticed that the people who were alone seemed strange in some way. Some had long noses. Other had long necks. Other had big stomachs. Every man and woman who was single had some kind of feature that made him or her stand out among the rest.

But the couples, they were even stranger than the single people. Couples in the Land of No Respect seemed to be opposites. A man twice as tall as a building would be with a woman as short as a thimble. A man as fat as a house would be with a woman as thin as a candle. A man with a big head and small chest would be with a woman with a small head and a big chest.

Everywhere we looked, we saw couples that seemed complete opposites of each other. And everyone was headed in one direction, outside of town.

“What is going on?” I asked someone. “Where is everyone going?”

“We’re going to the theater,” he answered. “The Smarty Pants Competition is starting in thirty minutes.”

We asked him what he meant. Although he couldn’t believe that we had never heard of it, he told us the story of the Smarty Pants Competition.

“On the third day of the third week of every month,” he said, “we hold a competition for everyone in town to see who is the smartest one amongst us. We hold that competition in the theater. This is how it goes: We put three of our funniest people on stage. Each, in his turn, tells a very funny story. The audience laughs. Whoever laughs first the most times during all three funny stories is the winner of the Smarty Pants Competition and is declared the smartest person in town.”

“But why do you think laughing makes you smart?” asked Sylvia.

The man looked at Sylvia with utter disbelief. “Laughing does not make you smart,” he said. “Laughing first… Laughing first means you’re smart. Whoever laughs first understood the joke first. Whoever laughs second, understood the joke second, and so on. Whoever laughs last was the slowest to understand the joke.”

“Ah,” Sylvia said. She was beginning to understand. “But wait… this is a land of no respect. Does the winner get respect?”

“Oh, no,” the man said. “Once the competition is over and the winner feels good about himself, everyone comes up to him, and makes fun of how smart he is. That is the Land of No Respect!”

Sylvia’s body began to shake. “You’re all crazy! You are all horrible! This is a crazy and horrible place!”

Before I could put my hand on her shoulder, she began to run in the other direction: out of town and somewhere behind the mountain.

I climbed after her, as fast as I could, but she was running as if she was not running on whipped cream.

This has been the beginning of a disquieting story, King John the Cute, of Sylvia’s madness, a madness that would soon lead to tragedy.

 

(To be continued on Thursday…)

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‘Tickling Butterflies’ – The Tickle Tick

If you’re just joining us, here’s the story so far.

Tickling Butterflies is an epic fantasy, containing 128 fairy tales that together create one huge story. We are in the middle:

 

The Tickle Tick

(Containing the grave tale of a grieving duo and a Tickle Tick.)

 

We buried Ochi, Benjamin Miller continued his tale while King John the Cute listened in fascination, at the foot of the mountain. Sylvia and I stood over his grave. We had a lost a friend we had known for decades, and sadness had struck us deeply. It had all been so unnecessary, which made the sadness worse.

And yet, for all our sadness, we could not cry.

Sylvia was the first to suggest that perhaps we cannot cry because it wouldn’t be funny if we cried. Perhaps the rules and regulations of the Land of No Respect had already taken effect on us.

“That is quite true,” said a small voice.

We looked around, and saw a tiny black creature, smaller than a fly, stand on top of the stone we had put over Ochi’s grave.

“Who are you?” Sylvia said.

“I am the Tickle Tick,” said the Tickle Tick. “And you are quite right. You cannot cry for your friend right now, because your crying would not be funny. The rules and regulations of the Land of No Respect work on all who walk here. Still, perhaps I can help.”

“Help? How?” Sylvia asked.

“Like this.”

The Tickle Tick flew from the stone, landed on Sylvia’s neck, then slid down under her clothes. Suddenly, Sylvia began to laugh.

“Stop!” Sylvia laughed. “What are you doing!”

“I’m tickling you,” came the Tickle Tick’s voice from inside her shirt. “I’m making you feel better!”

“Stop!” Sylvia was rolling on the ground laughing. “Stop! I don’t want to feel better!”

“Everyone wants to feel better,” came the voice from inside her clothes.

Sylvia was laughing and laughing, rolling on the ground. “Stop! Stop! I don’t want to laugh!”

“Everyone wants to laugh,” the muffled voice said.

“I don’t want to laugh!” shouted Sylvia. “I want to cry!” And she shrieked so hard that the Tickle Tick stopped and climbed back out from under her clothes.

“What about you?” the Tickle Tick looked at me.

“Same as her,” I said.

“You two are very strange people,” said the Tickle Tick. “What do you truly want, then? How can I help you?”

“Maybe you know something about this place,” I said. “We don’t understand how such a place could exist.”

“Hmmmf,” said the Tickle Tick. “I do not know anything about how the magic of the place works, but I do know how this place came to be. Shall I tell you that story?”

“Sure,” I said.

“Yes, thanks,” said Sylvia, who was slowly sitting up.

“This is a story I have heard,” began the Tickle Tick, “from my father who heard it from his father, and so on all the way back to the first Tickle Tick that ever lived. And he heard this story from the island itself.”

Once upon a time, the Tickle Tick told the tale, all the funny and strange creatures in all the land and continents and seas decided that they wanted to live together, in one place. That way, they would be with their own kind, with people who knew how to laugh, who would laugh with them, but not people who laughed at them.

But all the places in all the Land of All Legends were already occupied. There were people living at every large patch of land. The exception was ten small islands in the Slapstick Ocean. The islands were relatively small, and they were all lonely, because all the creatures that had lived on them had moved to the land and to the Big Cities.

All ten islands volunteered to be the home for the funny creatures, but only one could be chosen.

To decide which island was the best one for the job, a competition began. All the creatures would spend one day on each of the islands, and see which island is best.

And so, on the first day of the competition, the creatures stepped upon the shores of the first island. There, they threw pies at each other, slapped, fell, tried to get all the creatures into one room, and generally had fun. Within two hours, the island was laughing so hard, that he was shaking, and all the creatures fell into the water.

On the second day, the creatures tried the second island. Within two hours, that island was also laughing so hard that he threw all creatures into the water.

And so it continued, with all islands. All ten islands laughed too hard, and so none of the islands could be suitable for the creatures to create the Land of No Respect.

Then the creatures noticed that there was another island, a rather small and shy island, with a tall mountain at the center of him, that no one had noticed. No one had noticed him, because the other islands had forgotten he was there. When he was young, they had always made fun of him and his mountain for being so different, that he had grown shy.

The funny creatures tried to live on that island. And although that island wanted to laugh, he knew how to hold his emotions and not to shake with laughter.

Sometimes, during certain days of the year that something makes the island almost lose control with laughter, the top of the mountain shakes back and forth. But that is not dangerous, that is just funny. And so it was declared that the eleventh island would be the island upon which the Land of No Respect would be built.

The remaining ten islands, angry and miffed, swam to another part of the ocean, leaving the island and the Land of No Respect alone in the middle of the Slapstick Ocean.

And so, once the island had become the Land of No Respect, the first Tickle Tick was born. My grandfathers have been tickling people since before you two were born.

And I am glad that although I have not made you happy with laughter, I have made you less sad, if only for a few minutes.

“Thank you for your story, little Tickle Tick,” Sylvia said.

“Yes. Thank you,” I said.

Sylvia and I looked at each other. We knew that we needed to find a way off the island. But at least we had learned that listening to stories, just like laughing, sometimes takes our sadness away, if only for a short while.

 

(To be continued on Tuesday…)

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