The Key to Puck's Heart (chapter 3.1 * 01/12)

Puck jumped over the closed door into the passenger seat of Mercutio's sleek convertible. He was barely in his seat when Mercutio peeled away from the Summerdream manor.

Mercutio looked over the edge of his sunglasses. "Nice suit, dude."

"You too, Merc." Mercutio was wearing a white dress shirt lassoed by a loosely-knotted tie. A platinum chain secured his wallet to his loose cargos, which draped low enough on his hips to reveal brocade-patterned silk boxers. "Absolutely dressed up, for you anyways."

"Hey, it costs a lot of money and a hell of a lot of time to pull off a look like this. 'Totally don't care' meets 'Veronaville runway.'" As he pulled onto the highway, a gust of wind punched his hair over his face. Puck winced as Mercutio swerved and straddled two lanes while he shook his hair free.

Mercutio typically always had to pay attention that his shaggy black hair didn't cover his face like a curtain. He was skinny, wiry but sinewy, with lanky arms and legs. He had a round, pale face with heavy-lidded eyes that always looked closed.

"Damn!" Puck swore. He turned halfway around to look at the road disappearing behind them. "I got this flower thing for Hermia...."

"A corsage."

"Right, whatever. I forgot it--it's in the fridge. Think we can go back for it? Hermia'll kill me."

"I'm not turning around now. Besides, what Hermia doesn't know won't hurt her."

"Hermia told me to get it."

Mercutio grabbed Puck's shoulder jovially. "Ah, my friend the hopeless romantic. The exit for Bluewater Village is coming up, there's probably a flower store there if you want to stop."

"Nah, man, screw it. I don't remember what kind she wanted anyways. I'd probably be in more trouble if I brought the wrong kind than if I just don't bring one at all."

"Veronaville Academy's power couple, Summerdream and Capp. All the people in that family are crazy, you can do way better, bro. At least Ro has an excuse."

"And what's that?"

"He's sticky with love. Both Juliette and Hermia are pretty hot, but Hermia's cold to just about everyone but you." He paused. "Hot, cold, you get the idea. She must not like me because I'm a Monty."

"She doesn't like you because you're a jerk."

"Ah, I see. It's a good thing we're best friends, or I'd think you were ganging up on me."

Best friends, Puck thought. He slid lower on the seat and changed the radio station.

**********

There was some kindly magic at work in Pleasantview Park that day, the end of summer, just before the first of September. Half the park had been decked out for the wedding of Cassandra Goth to Don Lothario, an affair that had been discussed, dissected and debated for the better half of the social season. All was suffuse with white, as if nature itself had blessed them with its purity; even the guests somehow knew to sport themselves in their nonpareil whitest finery. The landscape was dreamy like gazing through snow-tinted glasses.

Blossoms from apple trees drifted to the grass like flakes of frost, while creamy silken petals caught the wind and floated like butterflies as they escaped the gnarled branches of cherry trees. Swans sailed around the lake and down the connecting brook with silent dignity under the arched eyes of stone-still herons, and in bamboo cages on the peak of the greensward a hundred doves cooed and patiently awaited their freedom. White sand was raked into calmness around moss-laden boulders in low rock gardens. Linen white lilies and orchids filled crystal vases on the many round tables set up for the guests. Unlit paper lanterns wove in and out of the trees. A great chalky white marquee tent dominated the park, three stories high with many triangular flags rippling in the wind, like a castle. Only timid, subtle shades of other colors were allowed amidst the white--creamy washed-out pinks, modest periwinkles, streaks of gold and rivulets of emerald.

**********

Titania and Oberon were sitting, under the shade of Titania's wide parasol. Her antique ivory bustle blossomed out like the bell of a huge foxglove flower; her bodice cinched tightly with sleeves puffed like the balloon of a dirigible. Her tea hat, a whirlpool of velvet, lace ribbon and ostrich feathers, sat jauntily cocked on her head. The profusion of flounces, ruffs, puffs and fringes would have overhwelmed a lesser woman, but Titania wore it with the grace of a second skin. Oberon, on the other hand, his suit more or less a copy of his son's, seemed as tame as a store-bought rabbit.

"Do you see him, sitting over there? He shouldn't be alone, not on a day like this," said Titania, gesturing with her champagne flute at Mortimer Goth. The father of the bride was sitting on a stone bench in a spotlessly crisp tuxedo; he was listlessly poking the cracks of the stone path with his cane. "Maybe I should go talk to him...."

Oberon sighed. "Why torture yourself? You know you shouldn't--or rather, you can't. There are so many things you need to put from your mind today. Just play the blandly kind guest, enjoy the champagne, maybe we'll dance a few times to the string quartet. Truthfully, I'm sorry you had to come at all. Actually, you didn't need to come."

"Please, let's put this argument in the past--again." She ran her finger across the edge of the champagne flute and listened to the tone. "I deserve to have this day, I've earned it, Oberon. I've been patient for so long."

"Yes, my dear, I know." Oberon stood and offered his hand to Titania. "Come on, I see Paul and Jenny over there. They're relatively the most normal people apt to be a part of this grand occasion. Let's go say hi."

**********

Jenny Smith was dabbing her husband's lapel with a napkin when Titania and Oberon greeted them. Jenny beamed at them, then returned to grimace at her husband.

"We haven't been here ten minutes and he's already dropped a deviled egg on his brand new tuxedo. Husbands can never be left alone, right Titania?"

"Please be excusing me and my unfortunate appearance," said Pollination Tech #9 apologetically. His nostrils flared in and out vexedly. "The gravity of this planet I am still endeavoring to understand. Besides, it was a stuffed mushroom."

"What will people think if they see that I, the maid of honor, am walking arm in arm with a slob?" She tried to rub the now invisible stain with her finger, dipped in champagne, then gave up.

"My wife, birth queen of my children, they will think of you as being a gaseous nebula among all the other dwarf stars today. I am being sure you have nothing to be worried for."

Jenny smiled and kissed her husband's pear-green skin; he blushed, but his lips curved up into a wide crescent smile. "You're always reminding me why I fell in love with you, my extraterrestrial poet. Titania, does Oberon serenade you with such romantic sonnets?"

Titania and Oberon exchanged glances. "Certainly I'm not the wordsmith your husband is, Jenny," said Oberon. "But I try."

Jenny raised her glass. "To poetry, and to happy marriages," she toasted. "Hear, hear!" The four clinked their glasses.

"Look, over there," said Titania. "That looks like Darren Dreamer."

Darren was sitting at a table, not-quite-surreptitiously nipping from a flask that he kept in his coat pocket. His head rested forlornly in his hand, propped up by his elbow on the table. He sighed, and the party guests moved about him.

"That he is here is to me truly un-understandable!" said #9. "Does he not know the concept of a courtesy invitation?"

"I'm sure," said Titania, turning her eyes to Oberon stiffly," that he merely wants a chance to be with, if only from afar, those who are important to him."

"I'm sure you're totally right," Oberon returned her look. "But we can't let him make a fool of himself--he could ruin the entire wedding."

"Ah, but love is more powerful than twin endurium sub-light engines. That Darren Dreamer has his heart bound to one he forlornly cannot possess is truly miserable yet worthy of many rhyming couplets."

Jenny kissed her husband. "You see, Titania, what did I tell you?"

Oberon put his glass on the table. "I think we should go and make a preemptive intervention with Darren. You'll help me out, Paul?"

#9 blinked his saucer-like black eyes. "Yes, of course my friend of friends. However, I was seeing the General Grunt some time ago at the shrimp cocktail table! I am much wishing to avoid him--keeping Darren Dreamer in uneventful drunkenness would be totally worth not a penny if I ruin the wedding myself with a confrontation! For beating up the General is something on this beautiful day of days that I wish to avoid!"