Breaking Summer

Home. A place Pinball hadn’t stepped foot for months, years in fact, before this wonderful long-weekend visit to see his family.

A place that still held a deep, unmistakable familiarity. As if he’d never left it in the first place.

To him, home was Tomane, a small village set within the most rural of regions of western Bolstrovo. A village that more resembled a loose gathering of wooden cabins at the forest’s edge, rather than a fully-fledged settlement. 

A village where the dirt trail he strode along offered its only connection to the outside world; a country road leading to the ‘big’ small town of Osivska, located a bus ride away to the west.

Idyllic to some.

Desolate to others.

For the brown-striped, tan-furred cat, his walk had begun slow, steady and peaceful. Undeniably fitting for the sleepy Sunday evening that he was to be departing upon.

A cooling breeze heightened the calm of the world, brushing his whiskers and filling his lungs with the essence of summer.

His ears tracked the ruffling and swaying of nature as the twilight of sunset embraced the surrounding foothills and distant mountains.

What light remained insisted upon the towering trees of the forest, seeping in between their branches to ripple over the shoulder-high beeches of the Maleni-scaled woodland this trail meandered through.

Walking this trail away from his family home, bordered by these trees that felt more like thick tall grass, or a close-knit surrounding of shrubs, was something unremarkable at one time of Pinball’s life. Something he’d done with barely a thought countless times before.

But on this walk, with eyes tracing that little treeline, finding the small Maleni cabins half-hidden behind them on one side of the trail while Visoka-scaled homes stood high above on the other, he couldn’t escape its significance.

The village edge where he’d lived and grown hadn’t changed much in the years since he’d left home. Those differences that did exist, like a new paint colour on a cabin here, or the growing, falling or arrival of a tree there, would’ve been easily missed by an unfamiliar eye.

Ironically, it was these subtle differences that helped the cat to remember his village as it was when he was a youngster, and to be filled with warmth by the recollection of his childhood friends and all the experiences they’d shared.

Experiences that he’d taken away with him and held onto as treasured memories.

The dry dirt and gravel crunched and crackled under foot. Much as it did on those walks to where Pinball, his Maleni friends, and the other Visoka kids in the village caught the bus off to school.

Every morning, come rain or shine, he’d stand on the porch of his family’s cabin on one side of the trail, waiting for those friends of his to leave their little homes gathered a stone’s throw from one another almost directly opposite.

See, Pinball had a crucial job as the one to carry them along with him, from their home to the school gates, then back again at the end of the day. A role inherited from one of the older Visoka boys in the village after they graduated, and one the cat himself passed on a few years later, once he’d left school himself.

Being the village’s Longstrider, the unquestionably cool title that he and his friends had assigned to his role, was something he loved dearly. Even if some of their classmates from the ‘big town’ made fun of them for it.

Those kids from the big town weren’t laughing at them for too long, mind. Not after Pinball’s growth spurts during his teens.

Even with them numbering in the hundreds, if not thousands, those days truly were special. And those walks in a lot of ways were the bright spots of the school day.

On them, there was Pinball, the oldest, and the biggest of the group, of course, carrying with him Feliks, the small maned wolf, who preferred to travel along in a chest pocket.

Then there was Kalin, the smaller fox, who liked to ride in the carry compartment of his Visoka friend’s backpack.

Making up the party was Mira the mouse, the smallest and youngest of the group, who always felt safest while being held by the big cat himself.

The foursome’s walks together became something of an event in their village, with neighbours taking the time to wish them all a safe journey in the mornings, or to ask how their days had been in the afternoons.

Mr. Jausovec in particular had always made an effort in that regard, regularly greeting them outside his little cabin near theirs, or at the general store that he used to run the Maleni section of.

They carried on that way for years, Pinball the Longstrider, carrying and protecting his friends, all of them growing older together (admittedly, the cat grew on a somewhat larger scale than the others!).

Those days started with them as kids, and ultimately they ended with them practically grownups. A time that seemed to last for oh so long, but also a time that when looking back and reflecting on those halcyon days, passed by oh so quickly.

Those hazy thoughts about those blissful years slowly faded away, returning themselves to the depths of Pinball’s memories as the path below persisted with its rhythmic percussion.

A curve in the trail carried the cat to within viewing distance of the rocky creek that separated the village edge from the village proper, as well as the small wooden humpback footbridge that connected those areas together.

Songbirds filled the air with the sweet chorus of summer, sending Pinball’s mind away to retrieve more moments from his younger years at home.

That bridge… that creek…

So many long summer days spent there, revelling in the warmth and the peace.

There’d be whole days spent fishing, or simply hanging out with his friends, shooting the breeze and being grateful for the company.

Their creek always offered a safe place to chill. The sort that helped avoid and prevent Pinball and his friends from getting into too much trouble around the village.

Though it couldn’t always prevent that completely… Something the cat remembered only too well…

Right there on the footbridge…

—

“What are we wanting to do tomorrow?” Pinball asked from his sprawl atop the crest of the bridge's arch. “Hanging out here’s fun and all, but two days in a row? …I guess I’d like to do more. See more.”

A moment of silence befell the four teenage friends on the bridge, the remnants of another wonderfully warm, bold blue summer’s day slowly drifting into pastel pinks and soothing ambers.

Feliks was the first to react, idly shifting in place atop Pinball’s chest. The maned wolf hadn’t much to say aside from, “I haven’t thought that far ahead.”

“Pfft, that’s no help,” the cat quipped back, lifting his head just a touch to see Kalin and Mira half-buried by the cream fur of his bare stomach. “Is there nothing y’all wanna do at all?”

Kalin sat up first, but the cinnamon-furred fox could only offer a relaxed shrug of a shoulder.

“Mebbe catch the bus to the big town?” Mira suggested from her fuzzy shroud. “Not been there since the start of summer vacation.”

“I could go for that,” Pinball replied with a purr, a flick of his tail finding one of the guardrail’s support posts. “Haven’t been there since I went with my folks to get a new battery for my Normaliser… And it’s been a while since I’ve gotten to be the Longstrider.”

“You carried us all here, though.” The mouse cocked her head. “And to the store yesterday.”

“That don’t count. Gotta go take the bus someplace to be Longstriding.”

“I don’t reckon there’s rules ‘round it,” Kalin said. “I say you’re the Longstrider whenever, wherever.”

“Plus you can make rules,” Mira added, emerging from Pinball’s fur to crawl up towards his chest. “Rules you think make sense.”

“I don’t think that’s right.” The big cat scratched the side of his snout, watching his friends for a reaction that didn’t come. “The ones who were the Longstrider before me never did that. It’s too important.”

“Bet they did.”

“Nuh.”

The little mouse came to a stop close to where Feliks still laid, less covered by fur, but no less insistent as she said, “How would you know?”

“Because…” Pinball hesitated, but ultimately waved away the budding disagreement. “Just do.”

Quiet returned to the bridge, with only the trickling creek and chirping birds offering company to ears.

And when Feliks did bring the conversation back, Pinball was glad for him to move it away from his role in the group.

“If we’re going to the big town…” The maned wolf rolled onto his stomach to meet eyes with his Visoka friend. “We could go see that Cosmic Gate movie that just came out?”

The big cat’s ears perked up high. It was all he could do not to sit up fast and send his friends tumbling into his lap. “I’m down!”

“Ditto,” Kalin called.

“Uhm…” Mira rose into a solemn kneel beside Feliks. “I was kinda hoping we could go to Astro Burger? Haven’t been there since forever.”

“Why not both?” Feliks replied, grinning. “The themes’ll fit, no?”

That suggestion didn’t brighten her any. “Don’t think I’ve got the money for both… And I don’t get more pocket money ‘til next week.”

“I’ll help pay,” Pinball said without hesitation. “Still got some money saved from when I helped Mrs. Kamen repaint the bakery.”

“I’ll help, too,” Kalin echoed with a toothy smirk. “I didn’t get asked to paint, but I got a little saved, too.”

“You’d have struggled with the brushes,” Pinball replied, sitting up on his elbows to better tease the hand-sized fox on his stomach. “And the walls… and most everything else.”

“That’s what smaller brushes are for, cat,” Kalin shot back. “Plus I’d have gotten into the tight spots way better.”

Pinball had a freeze, struggling to think up a good, fun comeback, aside from simply flumping a hand onto his little friend and pressing him into his belly.

He’d not get a chance to do that, mind. Not after he spotted what they’d all been waiting at the bridge for. “Someone’s coming!”

“Who?” the fox asked with a jolt.

“Can’t see…” Pinball rushed to gather his friends from the furry slope of his chest and stomach. “They’re Maleni.”

“Looks like Mr. Jausovec,” Feliks confirmed as he also found himself swept into his large friend’s hands. “Riding home with groceries or something.”

As fast but as carefully as he could, Pinball moved the trio over to the base of the nearest guardrail support. One by one, he helped them down beside the Maleni section of the bridge; effectively a plank-sized version running alongside the full-sized crossing.

Hands empty, Pinball sprang up onto his feet, rushing off the bridge with a parting call for his friends. “Act natural!”

“Probably more important you get yourself hidden, cat,” Feliks replied from beside that wooden support. “It’s not like you’re hard to spot.”

With one quick glance along the trail, enough to make out the badger riding his little red bicycle at its edge, Pinball dipped away towards the trickling creek and got himself hunkered down out of sight beneath the bridge.

That left his friends to chat away. Or at least, speak words that sounded enough like conversation while waiting for Mr. Jausovec to make it to them.

Sheltered by wooden planks and beams barely above his head, Pinball held his breath and kept as still as he possibly could, waiting for the crunching of tyres and ratcheting clicks to join the voices overhead.

He’d have to wait a matter of seconds at most, but still that proved time enough for a chuckle to emerge that he had to keep stifled.

But stifle that chuckle he did, and just a short time after, the clonking of Mr. Jausovec leaving the trail to ride onto the bridge met Pinball’s ears. The squealing of brakes followed, marking his neighbour’s coming to a halt.

“Good afternoon,” the badger called with his typical amiability, striking the smaller boards of the Maleni part of the bridge with a supporting step. “How’re you all doing today?”

“Good,” the three above blurted back in near unison.

Kalin, sounding less tense, then added, “Uh, we’re looking for Pinball. Have you seen him?”

A pause followed. The whole world seemed to go quiet.

The cat clenched his fists and kept himself equally silent, thankful for when Mr. Jausovec finally replied.

“No, no I haven’t…” The badger scoffed a fun chuckle. “And our Pinball’s not the easiest to miss, now, is he?”

Laughter burst forth: the most genuine his friends had sounded since Pinball had hidden himself away.

Feliks couldn’t help but bark out a cheerful further response. “Y’know, I was thinking the same thing just now.”

Pinball tried but failed to contain a grumble, tail tip lashing across the creek’s stony edge.

“Hmm.” Mr. Jausovec seemed to shift on his stationary bicycle. “Did any of you hear that–?”

“Uh, anyway,” Kalin clamoured. “Hopefully he’ll be around soon. We’ve all gotta be back home before sundown.”

“Well…” Their neighbour’s bike clacked and its brakes let a short squeal slip. “If I see Pinball, I’ll be sure to let him know you’re all looking for him.”

The trio all muttered their thanks in concert, falling into another silence that would’ve been awkward for anyone in the know of the group’s plotting.

As for Mr. Jausovec, he didn’t delay in resuming his crossing of the bridge’s Maleni-sized outer edge.

Pinball struggled to hold back a laugh in excited anticipation, hoping for that bicycle above to hurry its way overhead.

It ratcheted closer, closer.

Made contact with plank after finger-sized plank.

Until finally, Mr. Jausovec, so utterly oblivious, made it to where the cat lay crouched in wait.

In one swift movement, Pinball jumped out from cover and pounced.

Upwards.

He clamped his fingers to the very edge of the bridge.

Brought his snout level to, practically touching his neighbour on the other side of the Maleni-sized guardrail.

And yowled at the top of his lungs.

Mr. Jausovec screamed out in terror, almost jumping out of both his fur and saddle.

The badger swerved and wobbled his way past Pinball, up and over the crest of the bridge.

A screech went out from his brakes.

He veered away.

Right towards the guardrail running between the Maleni and main parts of the bridge.

Somehow, he stopped from hitting it too hard, catching himself from tumbling right the way over the wooden rail and into a full-sized support post.

Pinball meanwhile stood there dumbstruck. “...Oops.”

“Stars above!” Mr. Jausovec snapped at the cat, snarling; a manner most unusual for the mellow older badger. “What in the world are you playing at?”

The four friends all stayed silent. Briefly.

Pinball let slip a laugh first.

The others followed close behind.

That served only to further annoy their neighbour. “You’re lucky I’ve got my Normaliser in! You almost gave me a heart attack.”

The big cat snickered. He wasn’t sure why.

“Why in the world did you do that?”

Pinball shrugged. “...Funny.”

“Funny!?” Mr. Jausovec struggled and fought his way off his bike, swiping a silver and white bundle of fur away from his eyes. “I should tell your parents.”

“No, don’t–”

“All of yours.”

The others all voiced their own pleas.

But the badger wasn’t finished there with his chiding.

“I don’t…” Mr. Jausovec glanced back towards his bicycle. Then again, holding his glare that second time. “Oh no…”

A shopping bag hung from the handlebar that’d struck the guardrail opposite.

…A bag visibly filled with and freely leaking ruby-red liquid.

“For the love of…” He turned to Pinball with his jaw clenched, looking as angry as the cat had ever seen him. “So much for my wine this evening.”

Only then did Pinball’s heart sink, realising what had happened and how he’d caused it. He squeezed his arm and started rubbing. “...Sorry.”

“Sorry isn’t good enough now, is it?”

He sneaked a peek at his friends at the other side of the bridge’s peak. Clearly they hadn’t a clue how to answer that, either.

“How are you going to make this right?”

Pinball peered down at the lazy flow of the creek. That didn’t help him feel any less under fire. “…I can pay for it? If… I’ve got enough money saved.”

Mr. Jausovec grunted. “No.”

Bemused, the cat braved a lift of his head. “No?”

The badger shook his head, tapping his chin as he mulled something over. A dry smile came with its conclusion. “I was going to pull the weeds and tend the trees in my yard tomorrow, but since I’ll be riding back into town for a new bottle, that’s not going to happen… Unless I get some help. From all of you.”

Pinball grimaced at the suggestion.

His friends did, too. But, really, what were they going to do? Say no?

That’d be a sure-fire way to have their parents coming down on them like a ton of bricks.

“Well?” Mr. Jausovec folded his arms. “What do you say?”

Reluctantly, Pinball nodded, finding his friends once more to mutter, “Guess we’ll be going into the big town the day after tomorrow…”

Neither a displeased Feliks nor a downcast Mira had much to say.

Kalin meanwhile managed a hearty snort and a disbelieving smirk. “Of course I get pulled into this and not repainting the store…”

—

Before he knew it, Pinball found himself back in the present. Over the bridge. Clear of the creek.

All alone.

The village centre had arrived into view, starting at the bottom of a short slope in the tree-bounded trail.

In just a few further strides, the cat left the village edge, the creek, and the bridge behind, descending towards the closest thing Tomane had to a busy spot.

Though not so much at sundown on a Sunday.

The village centre, as locals called it, wasn’t much more than a collection of Visoka-sized cabins set close enough to resemble a handful of short, thin, gravel-topped streets.

An even smaller handful of Maleni walkways, the majority without any kind of moving conveyor, ran along the bases of those single-storey buildings. A bundle of brightly-painted posts and beams supported them, offering both visibility and protection from stray steps and falling objects.

Not that any Maleni would have needed that as Pinball strolled on by, given how those gravel streets were all but empty, and only a handful of the cabins showed any signs of life.

As Pinball made his way down what constituted Tomane’s ‘main street’, crunching over the gravel, peering around at darkened windows and bolted doors, for the first time since arriving back, he needed to search for familiarity.

This street was once home to so many places he remembered in detail. The general store, of course, but also the post office, the grocer, plus the tavern, and the pharmacy.

Most importantly of all, it was where Mrs. Kamen had her bakery.

On so many occasions, at the weekends, and on the walks home from school, Pinball would stop in for a cookie or another sweet treat with his friends. And sometimes, usually on their birthdays, Mrs. Kamen would gladly give them out for free.

A fact Pinball recalled only too well, what with that one year he tried tricking a birthday treat out of the robin on both the second and twenty-second of the month.

Both the bakery and Mrs. Kamen were gone now, as was the pharmacy, the tavern, the grocer, and the post office.

Their cabins had been repainted and remodelled, turned from pillars of the community into barely recognisable homes.

Modern and immaculate.

Soulless and dispiriting.

Certainly, Pinball doubted they were the sort of places locals like him would’ve ever lived, and judging by the lifelessness behind oversized and oddly-shaped windows, he figured few others wished to, either.

Not everything was different, however. Some relics from the cat’s younger years did remain, cast adrift amid the sea change all around him.

The general store still stood, of course. Darkened, though, so late in the day as it was.

But there were the little things, too. No doubt trivial to some, but landmarks for others.

Like the front step of the store, for example. To most, it’d surely be nothing more than a plain wooden plank leading up to a normal wooden door in a regular wooden cabin.

But to Pinball, it was the place he’d sit to enjoy the bottle of soda or the bar of candy he’d bought with his pocket money.

Next to that step, level with the bottom of the door, the Maleni-sized entrance sat where a raised, railed path ended.

A path with space enough at that end for three particular Maleni to hang out along with their Visoka-sized friend, drinking their own sodas or munching their own candy.

After that came the shiny but equally lightless cabin next to the store, its bright blue window frames and silver cladding standing out like a sore thumb beside the far more humble, respectable neighbour.

It was this cabin that once played home to the village’s far less glittering pharmacy.

Everything about the place had changed, save for the shape of the cabin itself; its gabled roof allowing it to be one of few cabins in Tomane with an upper floor.

Strange as it might sound, seeing that shape set against the reddening sky grabbed hold of Pinball, guiding him right the way back to the age of thirteen.

To a rainy November day, to be precise.

A week or so after he’d started wearing the Visoka-sized version of a Normaliser.

That aid had been prescribed by the doctor in Osivska to help with hearing issues that, as Pinball had always insisted, took far too long and far too many tests to diagnose.

The pharmacist in Tomane came into play after the fact, offering help with the ear infection his new Normaliser device had caused. A somewhat painful infection, and one that took a couple of rounds of medicine to fully clear up.

Nevertheless, all that initial irritation was a price well worth paying in exchange for being able to hear people clearly, and to not be accused of being ignorant or aloof after failing to respond to them. Something the cat remained grateful for, right the way through to the present day.

And what’s more, with his own Normaliser device fitted, Pinball always adored the idea that it made him just like Feliks, Kalin, and Mira with theirs.

Pinball’s landmark spotting guided him to the main street’s end, the deep, warming glow that rose from his stomach a welcome souvenir of his walk through the centre.

There did remain one final point of nostalgic interest before the close-knit cabins gave way to even closer-set trees. A well-known, perhaps even infamous, piece of infrastructure that connected those two places for those of a smaller stature moving around Tomane.

The hilly, mountainous nature of Bolstrovo’s west showed itself in no small part where the village centre met the trail to leave it. A steep downwards section gradually eased into a milder, winding decline towards the country road to Osivska.

Nothing excessively tricky for any Visoka negotiating the trail. But for Maleni, that steepness would’ve proved far too much to handle without something in place to ease it.

That something took the form of a well-crafted, wooden Maleni-sized walkway that ran beside the trail, complete with a rich green-coloured canopy roof that kept it in-keeping with its surroundings.

This walkway was one of the few in the village to include a moving belt that eased the burden on a Maleni’s legs, while its supports allowed users to face a far shallower slope in either direction.

As short as it might have been, that walkway truly stood as the pride of Tomane. An example of the lengths that Bolstrovans as a people went to ensure Maleni and Visoka lived on the levellest playing field possible.

So then, Pinball both understood and felt the upset of the village when a section of it got broken…

A memory that whisked him back to the summer that followed his high school graduation…

—

Anxiety grew with each stride Pinball took along the sun-dried trail to the village.

It was all he could do not to turn tail and run right back down the hill to the bus stop. Not that he had the money left to take a ride anywhere else.

Even if he did, where would he go? Back into the big town with his friends? That whole day there with them, he’d spent it dreading what was to come once they returned.

No, there was no running away from this. They all had to head home sometime.

And that time had ultimately come.

“What do y’all think?” Kalin muttered from the carry compartment at the top of the cat’s backpack. “Will anyone have noticed?”

“Of course they’ll have noticed,” Feliks replied from his seat in Pinball’s shirt pocket. “There’s a whole part of the walkway that’s flat now.”

Pinball grimaced, tail thrashing at the shrubs and Maleni-sized trees running alongside the trail. He peered over his shoulder at the fox, down at the maned wolf, then finally to Mira in his cupped hands just below.

All three of them looked at him with a knowing silence before he finally spoke up.

“We need to act like nothing happened. Just… walk home. Talk to… nobody.”

Mira’s face filled with doubt.

Clearly, the mouse had as much faith in that plan as he did.

“If we’re lucky,” Pinball continued. “Maybe we won’t see anyone on the way anyhow…”

A short walk further along the trail saw it start to steepen, steadily climbing and winding its way towards the village centre. A Visoka-sized treeline made it hard to see too far ahead of the next curve, even for a cat as tall as Pinball.

Soon enough, he began wishing he’d not been able to see at all.

A bend in the trail gave way to the steepest part of the climb… as well as the gathering around the Maleni walkway leading up the slope.

The mayor in his shirt and tie stood out from the rest of the crowd, gazing down and shaking his head at the wooden structure beside his feet.

Pinball couldn’t help himself. He’d seen the same sight the grey wolf had earlier in the day, but he simply had to take another look.

Perhaps a part of him hoped it wasn’t quite as he’d remembered.

A hope that would have been very much misplaced.

The green-sharded remains of the section of roofing that had buckled and collapsed were clear for all to see, scattered on and around a path of wooden planks that had been cracked and splintered. Suffering a similar fate, a part of the walkway’s once-moving conveyor belt sat exposed, visibly bowed and twisted, adding to the scene of carnage.

Those around the mayor, all folk from the village that Pinball recognised, stood near-silent as they took in the sight for themselves.

To a man, woman, and child, Maleni and Visoka alike, all looked crestfallen.

Among those Maleni that had gathered outside a Visoka’s grasp or pocket, he also spotted Mr. Jausovec in his work apron from the general store. The badger seemed the most interested of all in the broken woodwork littering the edge of the trail.

Pinball hesitated, slowing his walk to a creep without even realising it. 

Ordinarily, he’d have struggled to hear what the voices in the crowd were saying.

Luckily, or unluckily enough, his Normaliser aided him in picking up at least parts of a conversation.

“...We’ve enough planks at the store, absolutely,” Mr. Jausovec insisted, craning his neck up from just above ankle height. “Those can fix up the path enough until we can get contractors here for a proper repair.”

“And the belt?” the mayor snapped, diverting his downward gaze from the breakages to the badger. “What will we do with that?”

“The belt… I’m sorry to say, I think that’s beyond the capabilities of anyone in the village.”

The wolf scoffed hard. “There goes the rest of the budget…”

Mr. Jausovec was the first to spot Pinball and his friends as they edged closer, standing around eye-level with him at that moment thanks to the slope. A slow, deliberate shake of his head said all that needed to be said.

The cat’s heart and stomach alike started to sink.

And sank only faster once the mayor spotted him with narrowing eyes. “You four…”

Mayor Vukas. He’d never liked Pinball, as far as the cat could tell, and in return, Pinball had never much liked him, either.

Those mutual hostilities had been strong enough when the wolf was Mr. Jausovec’s sneering, uptight Visoka equivalent at the store. But since his head-swelling appointment as mayor the year previous, that hostility had only heightened.

Something all too clear in his snarl as he said, “Why am I not surprised to see you here?”

“We live here,” Feliks retorted, voice rumbling enough for Pinball to feel it in his chest.

That succeeded in winning a growl from the wolf at the nearing top of the slope. “They do say criminals return to the scene of the crime…”

“Criminals?” Pinball posed with barely a mutter. “What does that mean?”

“Have you seen what’s become of the walkway?” The mayor threw an arm down towards it. “That’s certainly how I’d refer to whoever’s responsible.”

“It wasn’t me,” he insisted, almost without thought. Those final few steps up the slope were the hardest of all. “It… could’ve been anybody.”

“Oh?” The wolf’s amber eyes locked to Pinball’s. “This footprint here looks suspiciously like one of yours.”

The cat tore himself away from eye contact, staring directly forward above and beyond upright grey ears.

He needed a comeback, an alibi, something… But he didn’t have one.

Those gears in that brain of his just refused to turn quick enough, what with his guilt and fear weighing down on them, and him, only further.

Fortunately, he needn’t rely on himself alone.

“How can you even tell that’s a footprint, never mind Pinball’s?” Kalin rallied back over his friend's shoulder. “Looks like nothing more than a bunch of busted up wood to me.”

“That’s not gonna help,” Feliks mumbled, running a hand through his long mane of headfur.

Mayor Vukas scoffed. “Oh, trust me, I know.” His eyes narrowed further. “I’ve seen plenty of what he’s broken under steps or otherwise to spot the hallmarks.”

Pinball felt trapped at the peak of that slope. Out of options and nowhere to go, even as the trail opened up to reveal the starts of the village centre.

The guilt had got to him. He wanted to give in and admit the truth.

Mira, however, beat him to it.

“Why’re you always so mean to him?” she asked, forceful for her typically soft-spoken fashion.

The mayor ignored the mouse riding in cupped hands, accusing eyes only for Pinball.

Backed by the glares of their Maleni and Visoka neighbours alike, the wolf simply pressed the issue further. 

“Just admit it! Gods know your name’s on just about everything that goes wrong around here.”

“Huh?” Pinball recoiled from how those sharp words cut. “What do you mean by that?”

“You’ve been a menace for as long as I’ve known you, is what!”

“Hey now,” Mr. Jausovec called up from the ground. “Let’s calm it down–”

“Drop the act.” The mayor stomped forward, forcing the cat into a shaky step of retreat down the slope. “Tell me this was you. Now!”

“He’s only a boy, Nev,” the Maleni badger stormed. “Go easy on him.”

“He’s eighteen. He’s a man now.”

“I don’t–”

“If you don’t tell me,” the mayor snapped with a growl that overtook Mr. Jausovec’s efforts at diplomacy. “You’d best believe you and your friends will regret it.” A sharp finger point only intensified his show of ferocity. “Your parents will be the least of your worries.”

Pinball stepped back again, concerned by both the wolf ahead, and the steepness of the trail behind.

He’d heard everything levelled at him, processed it as best he could.

Still, the only reply he could offer up was a hushed repetition. “...What do you mean?”

The mayor’s grey muzzle creased up tight. “The police would be very interested to know about a Maleni walkway being vandalised by a local Visoka.”

“But… I didn’t vandalise it.”

“So you did break it.”

“Yeah–No, but…” The stressed, struggling gears within Pinball’s head finally ground to a halt. There was nothing left to say except to come clean. “It was an accident.”

To most people, in most cases, speaking the truth would have come with a sense of relief. The idea that what they were hiding would be a weight lifted from their shoulders.

But right there, right then, Pinball knew far better than to be content or at ease. Especially when it came to Mayor Vukas.

A cautiousness proved well-founded once the wolf resumed his snarled onslaught.

“Oh, it’s always an accident with you, isn’t it.” He shook his head and threw up his hands in disdained disbelief. “You just can’t help but lie.”

“I’m not lying,” Pinball mumbled, ears pinning back. “I–”

“What about those Maleni trees you tore up near the creek last year?”

“...We were playing around. I… kicked them while running. On accident–”

“Then there’s the time you broke half our stock in the store’s Maleni section.”

“No, that– I hit something with my tail and when I reached to stop it falling I knocked the next aisle’s shelves over and then… everything else fell over, too. On accident.”

The mayor folded his arms, his glare as unforgiving as ever, as the next exhibit in his case moved closer to home: the wolf’s home. “What about the front wall of my garden?”

Pinball had to cast his mind back.

Back before the trees and the store, back before Mr. Jausovec and his little red bicycle on the bridge, and back before the day he first got the aid to his hearing from his Normaliser.

Twelve years old. Messing around with his friends on a cloudy autumn day at the edge of the village.

He remembered a round of truth or dare. And he remembered choosing the latter.

Feliks challenged him to leap up onto the garden wall of the mayor’s house.

Before the mayor was the mayor.

Once up there, Pinball was to wail at the top of his voice, directly towards the cabin’s front window.

The cat never got the chance to do that, though.

Not before a rock in the wall dislodged.

And took with it another.

Then another.

Before he knew it, Pinball was leaping off the crumbling wall, landing just in time to see a section wider than the front gate fall into rubble.

The sensible response was to run away, of course.

But not before a grey wolf would spot and snarl at him from that front window…

“The wall…” Back on the trail, Pinball needed to look away, finding the tops of the Maleni beech trees swaying in a breeze threatening to become a wind. He knew what he was about to say would be greeted poorly, but truth was truth. “That really was on accid–”

“On accident!” The mayor interjected, nodding with tangible sarcasm. “Of course it was.”

“Sir,” Feliks said with a quiet tension, back firmly up against Pinball’s chest. “Today really was an accident. Honest.”

The wolf growled.

The cat stayed quiet.

Those rustling trees couldn’t offer any more help than Feliks.

“Insist that all you want,” the mayor muttered with a gravel tongue. “It’d take more than an accident to smash through this walkway’s support beams.”

Pinball wanted to argue… But what would have been the point?

Other than to have delayed delivery of the words that cut the deepest yet. “For someone as big as you, you really do have a lot of growing up to do.”

A short spark of irritation sent his tail flicking through the fear, lasting long enough for him to say, “No matter if you believe me or not… breaking this here walkway was an accident.”

“I’ve–”

“And it was just me! I’m the one that tripped and stomped the walkway on our way to the bus stop. Don’t blame my friends.”

The mayor lost the sharpness in his eyes and the edge to his sneer. Pinball’s honest insistence had disarmed the fullness of his rage.

Not that it’d stop the wolf lashing his tongue in spite. “I’ll be telling your parents what you’ve done. And I’ll expect you to help fix this mess.”

“But–”

“It’s that, or they’ll be the ones to pay the costs.” He snorted, revelling in a broad smirk. “I’m sure they’d thank you greatly for that.”

Pinball sighed, head drooping as low as it would go. He hadn’t a choice to make. “...Okay.”

Holding that spiteful smirk in cruel triumph, Mayor Vukas swaggered away towards the village.

The rest of the gathering that had formed made similar tracks, dispersing to leave Pinball and his friends to deal with the fallout.

“How am I gonna help?” The cat complained. “I dunno how to build things… Fix things.”

“I’ll help,” Feliks said after barely a pause.

“I dunno how to build stuff either,” Kalin added, rubbing his chocolate-brown snout behind Pinball’s shoulder. “But I’ll help all the same.”

“Me, too,” Mira stated from within her large friend’s grasp, quieter but no less earnest than the others. “I’ll do whatever’s needed.”

Someone on the ground cleared their throat with purpose.

It’s then they all realised that Mr. Jausovec hadn’t left with the rest of the crowd.

And when Pinball saw the sheer confidence in his neighbour’s glare from beside the broken walkway. As if he were the Visoka peering down at Pinball the Maleni.

“You know, the mayor’s right,” the badger said, silver fur glittering among white in the sun as he craned his neck further. “These days, walkways and their coverings are supposed to be built to withstand a misstep from even the biggest Visoka.”

“But it was a misstep, promise!” Pinball replied, crouching down with no shortage of frustration. “I jumped a log at the top of the slope but when I landed I tripped, lost balance, and–”

From below an overhanging knee, he silenced the big cat with just the casual raise of a finger. “Now, I’m just a weekend handyman, and this is all… quite wrecked, but… I certainly don’t see anything here resembling reinforced support beams or the like.”

Pinball fell silent. His mental gears were typically steady in their turning, but soon enough, after processing what had been said, he managed to reply, “But I left it how it was after I broke it…”

“Damn,” Kalin said, drawing a lift of the cat’s curious ears. “There never were any.”

Mr. Jausovec nodded firmly. “It seems this walkway was long overdue an important upgrade.”

Mira shifted to get a good view of the ground from Pinball’s palms. “Why didn’t you tell the mayor that, sir?”

“I figured he’d take the news better without an audience…” The badger rubbed his chin in quiet thought. “I’ll have to break the news to Neven on my way back to the store.”

The four friends revelled in that revelation, spreading their smiles and risking the start of a celebration.

Their neighbour put an end to that before it could barely begin. “I’m going to expect you all to be here to work first thing tomorrow.”

“Why?” Pinball asked with one ear fully perked. “You said it needed to be upgraded… no?”

“Of course, but we can’t leave it like this.” Mr. Jausovec gestured an arm towards the broken wood of the walkway. “I doubt anyone will be along to do the work properly until next week at the earliest.”

“So…” Feliks hesitated to ask the question that followed. “What do we do?”

“We clear up the mess. We put in temporary boards at the base for people to walk on while the belt is out of action.”

Pinball frowned, still struggling to follow the conversation. “We?”

“Yes, we.” The badger snorted, folding his arms with a warm smile. “I would’ve hoped you’d know by now that I’m a touch more reasonable than Mayor Vukas…”

That warmth radiated to the cream-furred muzzle hovering above. Pinball couldn’t help but purr out loud before offering his heartiest, “Thank you, sir.”

With that, Mr. Jausovec started off towards the unbroken section of the walkway heading towards the village. But not before leaving the friends with one final comment.

“Oh, Pinball, my boy. You’ll have to ask your father to borrow his tools. I doubt mine will be the right size for you…”

—

Despite the circumstances, despite how deeply Mayor Vukas’ words cut at and drove their way into him, that callous inquisition laid the foundation for the pleasant, prized memory that was helping to clear and mend the walkway.

Just as the afternoon spent tending to Mr. Jausovec’s garden following the incident on the footbridge proved to be.

As Pinball descended the sloping trail, passing the fully-functioning belt and upgraded woodwork, he recalled the time spent working with his friends and their neighbour, basking in the sugary sweet sensation that accompanied it.

He appreciated Kalin, Feliks and Mira so much for having his back and joining him in his penance.

What’s more, he was truly grateful to Mr. Jausovec for attempting to stand up to the mayor for him, as well as for offering his own help with those initial, makeshift repairs.

And of course, the way the badger pranked him into bringing Visoka-sized tools to fix a Maleni-sized walkway still made him chuckle.

Nonetheless, after the workers arrived to fully fix everything, Pinball and his friends made double sure to spend the rest of that summer fooling around at the creek, or at the very least, far away from the village centre…

With the steep slope of the trail easing into a gentle, winding decline through colourful summer flowers, Pinball’s thoughts shifted closer towards his old friends. Friends that existed far more vividly in his memories than in the present.

He would have loved to see them all again during that visit home, but none of them had remained in the village. Like him, they’d ventured off to find their way in the world, and like him, Pinball hoped they all still thought of him.

By all accounts, Kalin and Mira had moved way out east, somewhere in or around the capital, Sturanja. As for Feliks, he’d emigrated north across the channel to Vodaskal as of a couple of years prior.

Pinball had last seen the little maned wolf during a previous visit home a few years before.

As for the others… it’d been even longer still.

That summer after high school would prove to be the last time the four friends were all living in Tomane. The last time that they would all be hanging out together, living as they had done in all the summers and all the years that preceded it.

If Pinball had known that at the time, then he would have treasured those warm, warming days as much as he treasured his memories of them.

He’d so enjoyed seeing his family, his home again. That much was indisputable.

But this return had served to remind him that his home would forever sit between two worlds, each as real and as tangible as the other.

For the rest of time, he would mourn and cherish the past.

And he would always live for and appreciate his present, embracing its constant reminder of how the events that preceded it had shaped him for the better…

Even if he’d forever begrudge it for chasing those wonderful childhood days away.

A melancholy-soaked shroud draped itself over the cat as he made it to where the trail straightened and flattened.

It wasn’t much further to the road that would take him away from the village. Exactly as it had so many times before, but seldom with the same heaviness weighing on his heart.

Pinball discovered another handful of Maleni cabins there, off beyond another thicket of little beech trees, arranged at the end of a tiny dirt footpath.

They weren’t there the last time he came to visit, and for sure, they didn’t appear the sort that were well-lived in.

More holiday homes for rent, no doubt.

Beyond the shoulder-height treeline, he could just about make out a couple of Maleni tourists standing outside one of the well-kept, richly-painted cabins.

A pair of canines, and Polcian most likely, judging by the way they gawked up at him as he strode on by.

Pinball posited that perhaps their secluded vacation in Bolstrovo, in a village away from where most Visoka lived, wasn’t quite as secluded as they expected. A thought that allowed him a fleeting grin through a gloom that he couldn’t quite understand…

…Until his friends revisited his thoughts one more time.

—

Trees Visoka and Maleni-sized alike swayed, their browning leaves bristling in the wind’s crispness. Heralds of a summer long departed.

Pinball stood crouched among them, accompanied by his three friends not far from where the trail met the road to Osivska.

With hands and shirt pocket empty, he had only a passengerless backpack to carry. A sensation that still sat wrong with the cat peering down past his knees to the ground.

“Are you really sure about this?” Kalin asked, snout dipped towards the handlebars of his bike. “Do you really have to go today?”

A cold gust blew at the fur of Pinball’s shins and started the bottoms of his shorts flapping. It couldn’t match the chill he felt while attempting to find words of response. “If I don’t go today… It’ll only mean I go tomorrow.”

“That’s fine,” the fox replied, joining his other friends at last in looking up from next to their bikes. “Go tomorrow.”

He grinned, but fought to keep it soft. “And if I do, you’ll say the same thing when we’re here again tomorrow.”

“I won’t…” Kalin’s head fell again. A defeated sigh was all he could muster.

Feliks and Mira stood beside him in comparable silence, nestled in the grassy gap between a brightly-painted, Maleni-sized rest shelter and the smaller trees their part of the trail ran through.

That shared stillness lasted as long as any other they’d shared before. Perhaps longer.

It took Feliks puffing out his chest and glaring up as forcefully as he could to ask, “Why do you need to go at all?”

A faint spectre of doubt clouded Pinball’s thoughts. Only for as long as it took him to reply and vanquish it. “It’s time…”

The maned wolf bared his teeth. “What d’ya mean it’s time?”

“I’m done with school, and… I’m not a kid anymore.”

“And what’s that gotta do with anything?”

‘For someone as big as you, you really do have a lot of growing up to do.’

The venom of the mayor’s words from the summer gone still coursed through Pinball’s thoughts. Only a matter of months had passed, but that was time enough for the cat to change his perspective, and his path along with it.

“I’ve always wanted to see more of the world,” he explained with a caution respectful of his downcast friends. “More than just Tomane, Osivska, this little part of Bolstrovo. I want to… do more. And now I’m old enough to.”

“You don’t have to leave to do that,” Feliks insisted past the breaking of his voice.

“You can go on vacation,” Kalin added where their friend had faltered. “See the world that way.”

Pinball smiled, reaching down to rub a finger between the maned wolf’s ears, then the fox’s right after. “But I want to live it.” Not to leave her out, the big cat reached to rub the ears of an ever-quiet, sorely solemn Mira. “And hey, I might go overseas, too. To Vodaskal, or Zolnia, or someplace else. See what’s to be seen there, too.”

Mira sniffed, idly, gently pushing up into her friend’s affections. “I wish we could come with you.”

“I do, too.”

Kalin reached up to pat the side of Pinball’s finger. “Maybe after you’re back and we’ve finished with high school, we can all go on a trip together one day.”

“That’d be fun.” He grinned at the hopeful fox, sharing in that bright, momentary flash of aspiration. “We’ll do that someday…”

—

But that someday never came.

Life, his travels, and so much more had always conspired to get in its way.

And with time moved on, and his friends along with it, chances were that someday never would come.

The trail crunched and crackled underfoot as it ever did. Pinball’s departing walk had taken him close to that fateful spot where he and his friends had shared their reluctant goodbyes.

That grassy gap remained, tucked between Maleni-sized beeches displaying their brilliant greens. The bigger trees around them stood equally verdant, with the colourful flowers and plants dusted between them helping to paint a picture-perfect scene.

All so far at odds with the dour shadow that lingered from that autumn of departure.

Pinball sucked in a wavering breath, battling to compose himself in much the same way he had all those years ago.

It was as if he was leaving for good all over again…

Had he really made the right choice that day?

The Maleni rest shelter remained alongside the grass Feliks, Kalin, and Mira had gathered on.

Still, its bright walls and roof stood strong, albeit certainly repainted and retreated during the time passed.

Anchored in both the past and present.

Its little bench appeared to be empty, with the dance of sunlight seeping through the leaves the only movement inside.

But to Pinball’s surprise, after a few more strides, he heard a voice.

“Is that our Pinball coming along the trail?”

His ears perked all the way up.

He knew that voice… Familiar, but different.

Time-worn.

A couple of steps further brought Pinball close enough to see the figure previously hidden by the side-wall of the shelter.

As well as a little old red bicycle resting against it.

“Now, my eyes might not be as sharp as they once were…” Carefully, and with aid of a walking cane, the figure in the shelter heaved himself to his feet. “But I’d recognise that gait anywhere, even if it’s a little more rumbling than when he was a youngster.”

Pinball watched him stroll slowly and steadily out from undercover, the whites of their snout and scalp overtaken by silvers and greys that shimmered vividly in the day’s dying light. The blacks of their ears and their eye stripes, too, shone with a similar dusting.

All were joined by an equally bright, timeless smile.

“Mr. Jausovec,” Pinball said, half-gasping. “...Hello.”

“I heard you were back in the village,” the elder badger called upwards, almost shouting. “I do hope you've left it in one piece.”

Pinball beamed down at his old neighbour. “I’ve been careful.”

“Wonderful, wonderful!”

“Uhm…” Hiding how his teeth set from the volume of those words, he crouched himself into a kneel, finding all the politeness he could muster to remind them, “I have a Normaliser, sir. I can hear well now.”

“Ah, of course you can.” Mr. Jausovec slapped his forehead in realisation. “Apologies. I do forget these things… Isn’t technology wonderful these days?”

Pinball nodded, his smile spreading to match a long-forgotten glow sparking within him. “It’s good to see you again.”

“As it is you, my boy.” The badger stopped his approach beside the cat’s settled knee. “It’s been a good while.”

“...It has.”

“Your parents have told me all about your travels across the channel. Vodaskal, Zolnia. Karovia and…”

“Telva, too.”

“Yes, Telva, too.” Mr. Jausovec stood taller, chest out. As if… proud. “You’ve certainly been on the move these last few years.”

“It’s been… amazing, seeing new places, new ways of things. Living in them all has been great. But coming home is always wonderful, too.”

“Of that, I’m sure.”

“But the village…” Pinball took a moment to regard the hillside and the trail he’d just descended. “It’s changed since I was last here. A lot.”

“It really has,” Mr. Jausovec said begrudgingly. “Tomane certainly isn’t what it was… even a few years ago. The tourism push certainly hasn’t spared us.”

“So those are holiday homes in the centre.”

The badger slowly nodded. “Alas, you can’t stop progress.”

Pinball took a moment to think on that, and to ponder his old neighbour’s pursing of lips.

…Perhaps he wasn’t alone in longing for a past long-lost.

“But enough of that,” Mr. Jausovec declared with a quickfire smile and a loud clap of his hands. “I heard about your new job abroad from your parents. A new continent entirely, how exciting.”

“It is.” Pinball aimed to match his enthusiasm, slower than the badger to pull himself back to a positive present. “It’ll be something different, that’s for sure.”

“How long will you be over there for?”

“A while… At least a year, maybe?”

“Amazing, truly!” Mr. Jausovec’s gleam eased back into that aura of pride that Pinball struggled to comprehend. “Well, I wish the very best of luck to you, my boy.” He then pointed a passionate finger right up at the cat. “This will make you, just as all your travelling so far has done.”

“...Thank you.” Pinball smiled through the hurt of his impending departure. The realisation of just how long a year or longer truly was. “And I hope so.”

“Certainly, you were a wild cat and then some back in the day… but you’ve always been a pleasure to know.” The badger’s own smile softened. “I’m glad to have seen you before you leave again. Even if only for a moment.”

Hearing that allowed Pinball to cut through the growing gloom that came with each of those kind, candid words. He managed to grin, even as his eyes threatened to water. “Thank you very much… And I’m glad, too, sir.”

“Please.” Mr. Jausovec held up a hand. “You’re old enough and you’ve known me more than long enough now to call me Boro.”

“Thank you… Boro.”

The two of them shared a sweet silence together, basking in a moment that Pinball for certain would hope to remember forever.

A feather breeze kissed his cheek, passing on its way towards the road to Osivska narrowly in view.

The time had come for Pinball to leave. A fact that his old neighbour, his old friend, was reluctant to confirm.

“Looking at the time, I think your bus will be along for you shortly… So, I ought to let you go.”

Pinball opened his mouth to answer, but the right words for response never came.

Instead, he watched the badger shuffle back towards the shelter, relying on his cane for support.

It was then that the cat got a better look at the old bicycle waiting undercover, as well as the shopping bags hanging from its handles.

“Would you like some help, sir– I mean… Boro?”

“Hmm?”

“I’m certainly happy to carry you and your shopping back home. I have the time… The buses run once an hour, after all.”

“Thank you, but no.” The badger stopped and turned, beaming bright. “The exercise does these old legs of mine the world of good.”

“...Are you sure?”

“Absolutely.”

Pinball nodded, satisfied to leave him to go on his way. And to go on his own, too.

“Safe travels, my boy.”

“You, too… I’ll see you again soon.”

“I’m sure you will.” Boro raised and extended a hand. “And I’ll look forward to it.”

Pinball reacted in an instant, gladly reaching to offer a fingertip for him to grasp and shake.

He stayed crouched there for a moment beneath what remained of the early evening sun, only too happy to wait to see and wave his old friend off on his way back home.

Mr. Jausovec…

…Boro.

Pinball hadn’t expected to see him, but doing so offered a relief that he couldn’t quite fathom.

The badger… was a link to that past he thought lost.

A link to the memories he cherished so dearly.

But as he watched him cycle off along that Maleni part of the trail, he could remember, and he could accept his past, and his memories, as precisely that.

The country road stood in wait for him in the other direction, ready to whisk him away not to the present, but off towards his future.

One that he was excited to see.

Back up to his feet, Pinball restarted his stroll down the most final of final stretches of the widening dirt trail.

The asphalt road revealed more and more of itself with each and every step, gifting him one last memory of those days as the village Longstrider.

Excitement and uncertainty melded themselves together, spreading their way through the cat from his deepest thoughts to his striding feet.

A distant chugging of an approaching bus engine met his ears, proclaiming the imminent arrival of the next stage of his adventure.

The journey to Osivska would precede a train ride off to the coast.

And in the morning, Pinball would board a ship to embark upon a new page in his personal history, far away across the ocean…

In Polcia.