“Huh?”
“Look, I have to go. There’s a wedding that isn’t meant to be. I need to get the husband who’s still alive to the ceremony before…well, before she commits bigotry.”
“You mean bigamy?”
“Oh.” Fate giggled. “Yeah, that. Well, toodles!”
Fate disappeared, leaving Gaia more frustrated than ever. Then she decided even though it sounded ridiculous, she was going to try kissing a few frogs. She loved her adorable little coqui in the rain forest, so why not just start there?
Sitting on a damp rock in the middle of some dripping trees and pungent green foliage, she peeked around to be sure she was alone. Before long, one of her cute little coqui hopped up to her.
“Ribbit.”
“Hi there,” Mother Nature said sweetly. “Would you mind just hopping up onto my hand for a moment?”
The little frog happily jumped up onto her hand and allowed her to bring him up to eye level.
It didn’t look like a prince was in there, but oh well. She wouldn’t know if she didn’t try. She gave the little frog a kiss on the head.
Nothing happened.
I hope I don’t have to kiss him on the mouth. I may have invented my beautiful creatures and love every one of them, sort of, but kissing frogs on the nonexistent lips? I just don’t know…
“Ribbit.”
“Sure. You can go now.” She set her hand down next to the rock, and the little frog jumped off. With one more leap, he disappeared into the brush.
She sighed.What now? Fate did say I had to kiss a lot of frogs, right? Oh dear. This had better work.
“Come to me, little frogs. It’s your Mother who loves you.”
Many frogs came hopping over to her, and she rose and scanned the dozen or so that just showed up. Then she saw more and more hopping from a distance. “Oh brother,” she mumbled. “I’d better get started if I’m going to do this.” She picked up one frog after another, kissing each on its head. Nothing happened. Rinse, repeat. Nothing happened. What the heck? This wasn’t the way it was supposed to go, was it? How many is a lot of frogs? At last, she grew weary, and the frogs had all had their turn and hopped off happily.
“I have no idea what that was about.” Was Fate trying to be funny? Had she and Karma set up this little joke? It was too embarrassing to ask. She just knew that there was more behind it, but she hated to admit when she didn’t understand something. Well, it would have to wait. She had other things to do.
When the last of her stupid frogs departed, she looked around at her beautiful tropical forest. Deciding to take a short break from her usual routine of trying to fix everyone else’s problems, she strolled along the hillside, valuing some of her accomplishments.
It was time she took a few moments for herself. She never took an hour or even a few minutes just to witness and appreciate all her hard labor. Gazing over the landscape, she saw the cliff where she and Aaron had stood and admired her beautiful little heart-leaf plants. She strolled over there and gazed down over the mountainside, which was still covered with plants, but some of them looked like they had broken in half.
That was weird. She refused to believe it meant she had a broken heart, but who else could cause all that damage? “Must’ve been a rainstorm,” she mused. “Those are pretty sturdy little leaves, but nothing really does well when it’s bombarded with heavy rain.”
She couldn’t help thinking about Aaron as she gazed out over the plants. She didn’t understand why he would continue refusing her help when she could’ve cut through so many layers of red tape for him. It must be that stupid false pride thing she accidentally injected the male of the species with. She was trying to give them pride in their accomplishments. Instead, she seemed to give them pride to the point of being full of themselves.
This could have been one of Aaron’s finest accomplishments. She still wanted it to be, but she didn’t dare interfere with the proud American doctor. He would eventually find the things he was looking for if he really wanted to succeed. He said he had to find a place to analyze it, then test it, then document all the side effects he was fearing.
She really didn’t think there would be any if it was used in its most raw form. Her leaf could just be swirled in a cup of water, and he’d have exactly the right formula without adding anything to it. She recalled the same situation happening with other plants. Ancient people just chewed the leaf or root or dropped the leaf in their drinking water, but not modern man. They had to powder it and grind it and liquefy it and then do all kinds of things to preserve it. Why did they have to interfere with her expertise all the time?
She really couldn’t continue along this line of thinking. She would just get depressed. So she made up her mind to go talk to Fate about the next date, because she could do this. She could find a person or paranormal to enjoy companionship with. Maybe there was nothing else she could have except a partnership or friendship, but she still longed for a loving relationship. She didn’t need marriage. She would be hard-pressed to come up with a birth certificate. What would it say, anyway? Place of birth: the universe. Date: more than thirteen billion years ago, give or take a million.Yeah, that would go over well with a justice of the peace.
A little froggy leapt up to her feet. “Ribbit.”
She folded her arms and looked down at the little coqui. “You didn’t get your kiss on the head?”
“Ribbit.”
Well, just in case… What’s one more?She picked up the frog, kissed it on the head, placed it on the ground, and watched it hop away. “That really was a useless exercise.”
She needed an explanation for this. “Fate?” When her sister didn’t appear, she opened her mouth wider and bellowed “Fate!”
