YOU Get A Big Banana, and YOU Get A Big Banana, and YOU Get A Big Banana! [closed post]

[summerdude]

"Okay, just another minute," Magnus says.

It's a hot day out, so holding Galahad's hand is a sweaty affair... and Magnus's current use of his alf seidr isn't making matters any more comfortable. The grass is tickling at Magnus's back -- his shirt has ridden up while he lies, spread-eagle, in the middle of the lawn. Galahad is always so smart about his clothes, Magnus bets he's not getting the grass itches at all.

But he can put all that aside. Grass tickles are good tickles, and the heat of the sun is -- to Magnus -- always more refreshing than it is annoying. There's a trickle of sweat at the side of his neck, but even though it's hot out it's not really a temperature extreme, so as usual he feels regular about it.

All his attention is on the plants around them. Feverfew and milkweed, black-eyed susan and queen anne's lace, aster and boneset and flowering spurge and yarrow and tickseed and teasel and wild thyme and forget-me-nots and poppies and and and -- well. He's not sure what else is in the mix. He's been trying to get better at plant identification with Claudius's guidance, but the package he found earlier that morning only said FIELD SEEDS. He's doing his best! Right now, his 'best' is less focused on identification and more focused on growing them to flower, high enough that some of them are providing shade to both him and Galahad, in a very neat outline of the grass they've politely crushed between the two of them.

Eventually, he's done all he can without overtaxing the plants. "There," he tells Galahad. "Summer snow angels, check."

Comments

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad looks up at the wild teasel, with its alien spiky heads and rings of purple flowers, the lace lacelike yarrow, the nodding ruffled petals of the poppies, blood-red and ruched as if Kade had made them on his sewing machine. He can feel the sweat trickling down his back, and it's not a good feeling, but he can tolerate it, especially now that he's lying down with Magnus.

He reaches into his messenger bag for a handkerchief and finds the napkin Evil Twin Magnus threw at him before he left, as if it should mean something to him. Galahad frowns at it for a moment and then takes it out.

"Your Evil Twin--"

[summerdude]

"What about him?" Magnus asks, immediately wary. There's a gap in the plants between them, but not enough of one for him to see clearly what Galahad is doing. "Did you figure out how he messed with your mind?" Magnus wants to know, so he can avoid doing the same.

[onthewillowsthere]

"No. He left something. What is this?"

[summerdude]

Magnus props himself up on his elbow, pushing some dwarf goldenrod aside to see better, and then gapes. "That's the Big Banana!" he exclaims, reaching over to take it and run his fingers over the weave of the edges of the handkerchief. "That's the boat my dad gave me to sail to Niflheim! He gave you our boat?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"Yes." He doesn't mention the way Evil Twin Magnus did it, as if he were throwing something at Galahad dismissively; it seems like talking about the ways in which the Evil Twin was bad makes Magnus weird. Instead, he utters a deeply Lan Wangji-esque, "Explain."

[summerdude]

"It's a Frey-boat? You can carry them in your pockets when you're not using them to sail around, it's this whole thing." Magnus runs his thumb over the weave again. Of his Evil Twin's gifts, the locket is definitely more meaningful to him, because he loves and misses his mom so much, but he's been feeling a nostalgic blend of annoyed and fond toward his dad ever since Frey's visit (which he maybe should eventually mention to anyone besides Alex?), and this is, like, the one concrete physical thing his dad has ever given him, so... "I'm not surprised it held up so long because they're really strong, but I'm also kind of surprised it held up so long. Dude," he adds, straightening more so that he can meet Galahad's gaze with a serious look. "It's so good you didn't get this wet, like, inside."

[onthewillowsthere]

"Because it would have turned into a boat."

[summerdude]

"Yeah, can you imagine? That would really have messed up Claudius's vanity. Far more than Dro ever could." Presumably this is the one specific area in which Drosera has been rigorously trained.

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad spares a thought for Claudius' reaction should a boat spring into being in their room and its prow crush the vanity. In spite of himself, he thinks he would like to see Claudius truly angry, to know what sort of things he would say -- Claudius can be so clever and caustic about the things that annoy him, and this, presumably, would truly put his skills to the test. But the disorder would not be worth it.

"Dro doesn't steal things anymore," he informs Magnus. Off the vanity, that is. She still steals things from everywhere else.

[summerdude]

"She's learning to pick her battles," Magnus says, proud as anything.

[onthewillowsthere]

Claudius is very good at scolding. "Do you think she's a Talking Animal?"

[summerdude]

"How do you mean?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"Susan said that in Narnia there are ordinary animals and Talking Animals. I think she's a Talking Animal, even though I can't understand her, because she talks to us."

[summerdude]

"Wait," says Magnus, thoroughly derailed from the question by this latest revelation. "Susan is from Narnia?!"

[onthewillowsthere]

"Yes. You know about it?"

[summerdude]

"Yeah, there are all these really boring books. It's all, like, uncomfortable christian symbolism and weird orientalist vibes. Mom read me a couple of them as bedtime stories when I was really little. I guess the swordfighting mouse was cool?" Or is Magnus thinking about Redwall? "And the wolves were kind of scary." But this could just be hindsight, now that Magnus is generally anti-wolf. "But mostly she gave up on that series pretty quickly because neither of us were feeling it."

[onthewillowsthere]

Uncomfortable Christian symbolism seems right, given how God used and then failed Susan. The revelation that there is a series of books involved isn't startling, since Galahad knows about Claudius' play. "Reepicheep," he says.

[summerdude]

"Reepicheep?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"The mouse."

[summerdude]

"Oh," says Magnus, shrugging. "That does ring a bell, I guess. I think he became a pirate or something."

[onthewillowsthere]

"After she left?" because Susan would certainly have mentioned that.

[summerdude]

Magnus shrugs. "I... don't remember."

[onthewillowsthere]

That's fine. Galahad doesn't want to know too much -- it doesn't feel right, like prying. Susan is always forthcoming with him; he doesn't need to ask Magnus to tell things she can choose to say herself. "Do you think Drosera is a Talking Animal?" he asks again, to get them back on track.

[summerdude]

"If I remember right," which is doubtful, "she might be, but she's definitely not like the Narnia ones."

[onthewillowsthere]

He accepts this information with only mild disappointment. "How is she different?"