Pertwee Chronicles

Queen Anne Dollhouse

Bank Holiday

Toast

Belly-dancing to Metallica

Cigarillos in the Fireplace

Cigarillos in the Fireplace

This story is for ABCGirl, who said, "Wink."

Some might say that the Pertwees’ visit with Tamar and Zev had been a failure. After Tamar and Zev arrived from the City, they had proceeded to make snide comments about the furniture and the state of the pantry. Dinner was abysmal, and afterward, when Miss Virginia attempted to entertain her half-siblings with a rendition of “Black, Black, Black is the Colour of My True Love’s Hair” played upon the pianoforte, Zev had the effrontery to suggest that Miss Virginia’s playing was a bit wooden. Then, Tamar accidentally set fire to the house with her cigarillos. Even though she later claimed that sitting by the chimney meant the smoke wouldn’t get into the rest of the house, when Tamar was done with her cigarillos, she threw them into the fireplace and left the main living room. However, she had neglected to check to see if the chimney was actually working. By the time the fire trucks arrived, the whole east wing of the house was a smoldering mess of cloth and particle-board.

A few days later, Mr. Pertwee said to Mrs. Pertwee, “Don’t you worry, we’ll have this house rebuilt again in a wink and a jiffy.”

Mrs. Pertwee gave her husband a wan smile. “Perhaps now we can build some stairs to the upper floors,” she said.

Meanwhile, Tamar and Zev were scrubbing down the walls. Tristan and Virginia (who had begged that their older half-siblings stop calling them “Master” and “Miss,” as it sounded terribly affected) were repainting the grille. There was no talk of disparaging the furniture, for much of it was ruined, and the family had to use sleeping bags. The family had rapidly devoured the remaining food in the cupboards, and friends from across the way brought covered dishes filled with hot dinners and chilled desserts.

“I’m sorry about the pianoforte,” Tamar said to Tristan as they washed the dishes in the stream.

“It’s no problem at all,” Tristan said. “Virginia hated the pianoforte. She’d always wanted to play bagpipes, but Dad said that they were not good for playing indoors.”

“I’ll send her a set after I return to the City,” Tamar said.

Some might say that the Pertwees’ visit with Tamar and Zev had been a failure. However, Virginia said that for the loss of the pianoforte and the gain of a set of bagpipes, the whole ordeal had been worth it. Mr. and Mrs. Pertwee begged to differ. While the restoration of the house had indeed brought about a few improvements, the maintenance of a large house in which the pipes rarely worked and the electricity was erratic at best had begun to dull their appreciation of the country life.

It was about that time that the Pertwees began to talk of going abroad.

Belly-dancing to Metallica

Here is a wild new chapter in the burgeoning chronicles of the Pertwee family. Since I haven't gotten any new words from my readers in the last while (hem, hem), I have had to resort to crafty devices. I went to each of your blogs, and plucked the first word from the title of your latest post. If you didn't have a title, I chose the first interesting noun. The words I found:

New
Creature
Nobody
Rock
Stand
Signs
Bellydancing
Trip
Joke
Mini
Metallica
Another
September
Think
Hetero
Alignment

It was an old joke that Tamar liked belly-dancing to Metallica. Whenever she rode in Zev’s multi-striped Mini, Tamar would stand on the seat, poke her head up through the sun-roof, and undulate to the songs of Zev’s rock and roll cassette tapes. Zev could not convince her that car-dancing was dangerous. "It’s not as if you can actually speed in this contraption,” Tamar pointed out. “I’m as safe as houses."

Zev and Tamar lived in the City, but every so often, they had to take the obligatory trip to the countryside to visit their mother and step-family. They dreaded it. Sometimes Tamar tried to wiggle out of the outing. “I think the stars are too far out of alignment to make the trek,” she joked. “Maybe we shouldn’t go this weekend.”

“We’ve put off the trip three times since September,” Zev pointed out.

“You’re right,” Tamar said. “Let’s get it over with.”

Tamar packed a lunch that she hoped would last them through a good part of the first day. Ever since her mother had married Mr. Pertwee, she no longer made the succulent curries for which she was so famous in the City. Tamar’s mouth watered at the memory of the last vegetable korma her mother had made the night before the Pertwee’s simple wedding ceremony at the courthouse. There were no bells, whistles or anything to distinguish the ceremony from any other hetero-union Tamar had attended since her university days. Still, the party afterward was what she remembered best: the steaming spinach and garlic naan appetizers, the tender cubes of lamb simmered with tamarind sauce, the slices of mango laid out upon china plates like shimmering orange fishes. The vanilla cake was light, not very sweet, but brushed with cardamom icing in swirls that melted upon the tongue.

That was the last good meal Tamar had ever had at her mother’s house. What had happened then seemed to turn her mother into some sort of new creature that only served pre-made food from boxes. It was not that Tamar expected her mother to continue cooking the way she had before, but Tamar missed the warmth of their old dwelling. Their step-siblings, Tristan and Virginia, were of the good-enough sort, but already the signs of country living were showing strain upon the kids.

“We should take Tristan and Virginia back with us,” Tamar said suddenly.

“What?” Zev asked. “Are you crazy?”

“Yes,” Tamar said. “But that is beside the point. We are in the position to do a good deed. After the weekend, we will take the Pertwee kids back with us to the City for a few days. Perhaps they will remember what it is like to be alive, once they stop moping around that wretched dollhouse of a dwelling.”

“That ‘wretched dollhouse’ is quite stunning,” Zev said. “Have you noticed the detail of the architecture?”

“There are no stairs,” Tamar said with a contemptuous wave of her hand. “What is a house without stairs?”

Tamar plunked the picnic hamper into the back seat of the Mini, opened the sunroof, and stood up. “Drive on, Zev!” she said, as the beginning notes of "For Whom the Bell Tolls" began to throb. “This time, we’re on a mission.”

Toast: a short story

ABCGirl, here is your story about toast. I had written it a week or two ago (I've lost track), but put it aside because it seemed a bit more melancholy than my usual stories. Bede said, "Post it anyway." While this bit is technically a Pertwee family story, it touches upon a part of the family not mentioned before: the two older children Mrs. Pertwee had with her deceased first husband, Mr. Linden.

Toast

“I’ve asked Tamar and Zev to come home for the week-end,” Mrs. Pertwee said as she polished a gold-plated dish with the hem of her dress.

Mr. Pertwee sighed. “They don’t like it here,” he said. “Sometimes I don’t think they even like me.”

“That’s not true,” Mrs. Pertwee replied. “It’s just that they’ve always been city children, even when they were little.”

“The last time they were here, they complained about the lack of running water and cooking implements, even the lack of a television,” Mr Pertwee sputtered.

“Tamar is a journalist,” Mrs. Pertwee said. “She cannot fathom how anyone can be so removed from the daily news.”

“I have my Old Country Gazette,” Mr. Pertwee said, shaking the newsprint in front of him.

“How old is that particular periodical?” Mrs. Pertwee asked.

Mr. Pertwee looked at the date and laughed. “I get your point. But still, Tamar criticizes everything, and Zev inevitably follows her lead.”

“Zev just wants to cook for us, and gets frustrated that there is no gas range.”

“The last time he was here, he complained about the toaster! We don’t even have a toaster,” Mr. Pertwee pointed out.

“Precisely,” Mrs. Pertwee said. "We’ve gotten used to the lack of electrical outlets, but Zev doesn’t understand how we can eat on a daily basis what he calls ‘raw toast.'"

Mr. Pertwee sniffed. “When they come to visit, your children must learn to forage as we country people do,” he said. “Really, who needs fresh toast when there are scads of Weetabix boxes and Marmite jars for the finding?”

“Don’t forget zwieback,” Mrs. Pertwee said, proffering a newly opened box. Mr. Pertwee took a piece of zwieback out of the box and nibbled on it. He made a face.

“I do miss the scent of buttered toast in our home,” Mr. Pertwee finally admitted. “Whenever I smell buttered toast, I think of a warm, safe place.”

“In the country, buttered toast is hard to come by,” Mrs. Pertwee said.

Bank Holiday

This story is for Bede, who gave me the word "shore," and LHH, who wanted another tale about the Pertwee family.


Miss Virginia said she wanted to go to the ocean.

Mr. Pertwee was afraid of water ever since he had fallen into a whirlpool. He shivered when he remembered the rush of the tide pulling him down toward a grim cave from which there could be no return. Somehow, he had managed to grasp the slippery edge of the cave and hang on while the whirlpool raged. When the rushing of the water calmed down, he was stuck in the mouth of the cave for a better part of an hour. After he was rescued, the local papers reported that Mr. Pertwee had kept his dignity throughout the entire affair. Mr. Pertwee was pleased by all of the attention, but periodically he recalled the pull of the tide, and felt a queasiness that no amount of ginger tea could soothe. Nonetheless, when Miss Virginia said that she wanted to go to the ocean, Mr. Pertwee practiced his relaxation breathing exercises before saying, “Of course, my dear. We’ll visit the shore during the next Bank Holiday.”

Mrs. Pertwee and Master Tristan packed plenty of sandwiches for the trip. Mrs. Pertwee always worried that people weren’t getting enough to eat, and Master Tristan seemed to have a hollow leg when it came to food. No matter how often Mrs. Pertwee plied him with oatmeal biscuits and Branston pickle sandwiches, Master Tristan refused to gain any weight. “He burns off all the energy by toppling off the roof,” Mr. Pertewee said, and while this was probably true, Mrs. Pertwee continued to worry about her son’s health. A holiday by the ocean shore might be just the thing to put roses in Master Tristan’s cheeks. Master Tristan said that he didn’t want roses in his cheeks. Roses were for girls, not boys. Miss Virginia was furious, and jumped up and down upon her brother’s head until Master Tristan admitted that roses weren’t for girls either.

When the Pertwees arrived at the ocean, the tide was out. Miss Virginia cried because there was no water, but Master Tristan pointed out the bits of shell and dried coral that decorated the beach, and Miss Virgina cheered up slightly. While the children stacked coral, shells and stones into formations that vaguely resembled the ones found on Easter Island, Mrs. Pertwee set out the food for the picnic and reminded the children to wear sunscreen. Mr. Pertwee paced up and down the beach, but when Mrs. Pertwee asked him if he were nervous about the tide returning, he said, "Tush, tush, my dear. I was simply looking for mermaids."

The Pertwees spent a pleasantly uneventful day at the shore. Much to Miss Virgiinia’s disappointment (and Mr. Pertwee’s secret relief), the tide stayed so low that no one got their feet wet. "Perhaps, when we go home, you can listen to the ocean through a seashell,” Mr. Pertwee offered, but Miss Virginia scoffed, and said that everyone knew that the sound of the sea was only the rushing of the air through the whorls of the shell. Instead, Miss Virginia brought home from the shore a smooth, round stone, and kept it by her pillow. At night, she pressed it against her cheek and dreamed of tall ships sailing upon rough waters.

Queen Anne Dollhouse

Today's post is for Tony, who asked for a story with this title.

The Pertwee family had hunted for houses for months. They had looked at everything from the suspiciously bright Fischer houses to the plain but solid hinged-roof wooden structures. Many of the houses they viewed had rickety staircases while other houses had no stairs at all. In order to travel between the stories, one had to climb out from the window of one room into another window on a different level.


A "suspiciously bright" Fischer house

The Pertwees finally settled upon a Queen Anne Victorian house in pink with blue trim, simply because Miss Virginia and Master Tristan wanted their bedrooms to be in the turret. At first, the children quarreled over who would get to sleep in the top room, but when it was discovered that one could access the room only by climbing up the sides of the house, Miss Virginia decided she would rather sleep on the wrap-around porch. That way, she could hear the rain at night.


"Miss Virginia and Master Tristan wanted their bedrooms to be in the turret"


The children settled into their new home without much adjustment, but it was harder for the adults to cope. Mrs. Pertwee was appalled at the lack of windowpanes. She said she thought she could sew some curtains, but she would have to do everything by hand, as she could not find an outlet into which to plug her sewing machine. Sometimes the house appeared to have electricity, but the source was a mystery. Mr. Pertwee joked that hands from the sky came down to switch the lights on before they woke. Mrs. Pertwee was not amused. Mr. Pertwee thought she was overreacting until he tried to open his top dresser drawer and discovered that the handles were simply painted on. Mr. Pertwee had the wear the same clothes as he had worn the day before. He was most put out.

While the house lacked basic functionality, it was a great place to have a party. People from other districts agreed that if one wanted to attend a soiree to remember, the Pertwee residence was the place to visit. True, one had to make frequent ice-runs to another neighborhood in order to keep the champagne from getting warm, and in the house, there was nary a water-closet to be found. The guests piled into the living room, onto the porch, and the more adventurous ones attempted to balance themselves on the pointy tip of the turret. They inevitably fell off, but since the ground was soft, the guests rarely suffered more than the occasional ripped hem or scraped knee. Mrs. Pertwee admitted that for all of the apparent safety hazards, the house was a good place in which to raise children. Mr. Pertwee concurred, though in private he wistfully thought back to the days when he could open his dresser drawer in the morning and find a clean, pressed shirt.