The Little People

THIS SHORT STORY WAS WRITTEN BY MARIA ALEAH G. TABOCLAON.

THE elves came to stay with us when I was nine. They were noisy creatures and we would hear them stomping on an old crib on the ceiling. We heard them from morning till night. They kept us awake at night.

One night, when it was particularly unbearable, Papa mustered enough courage and called out. "Excuse me!" he said. "Our family would like to sleep, please? Resume your banging tomorrow!" Of course, we had tried restraining him for we didn't know how the elves would react to such audacity.

We got the shock of our lives when silence suddenly filled the house--no more banging, no more stomping from the elves. Papa turned to us smugly. Sheepishly, we turned in for the night, thankful for the respite.

When dawn came, the smug look on Papa's face the night before turned into anger for shortly before six, the banging started again, and louder this time! We got up and tried speaking to the elves but got no response. The banging continued all day and into the night, and stopped at the same hour--eleven o'clock. And at exactly six a.m. the next day, it started again.

What could our poor family do?

Papa tried to call an albularyo to get rid of our unwelcome housemates but the woman was booked till the end of the week. Meanwhile, the elves had become our alarm clock. When they start their noise, we would get up and do our errands. Papa would start cooking, I would start setting the table, Mama would sweep. The whole house--my older sister and my cousin would water the plants, and my brother would start coloring his books. (We really didn't expect him to work, he was only four.)

After a week, we got hold of the albularyo. She spent the night in our house and by morning, she told us to never bother her again. The elves had already made themselves a part of our life, she said. Prax, the leader of the elves, had spoken to her and had told her that his family had no plans of moving out. They liked things as they were.

We eventually settled down to a comfortable coexistence with the elves. They woke us up at six, they let us sleep at eleven, and in return for the alarm service we would leave food on the table. By morning, the food would be gone and the table cleaned.

All in all, it was a very good relationship.

After three weeks--the first week of May--I met Prax, the leader and oldest in the clan, and I met him literally by accident. I was climbing the mango tree in our yard when one of its branches broke. I fell and broke my ankle. The pain was so great that I just sat there numb, staring at my ankle which had begun to turn blue. I could not move or cry out. I went to sleep to forget the pain. My last conscious thought was that the ground was too cold to sleep on.

I woke to a hand touching my foot. It belonged to someone--something nonhuman, for his hand radiated warmth that seemed to penetrate to my bones. His hand was small, wrinkled and felt like dried prunes.

Although I was curious, I kept my eyes closed. I imagined a hideously deformed face, with long and sharp teeth. Would he disappear when I open my eyes? Or would he devour me? I pretended to be asleep.

After several minutes, I could pretend no longer; I was too curious to remain still. When I opened my eyes, the horrible sight that I expected was not there. Instead, there was this old, wrinkled creature, even shorter than I was although I was the smallest in my class. He wore overalls unlike any clothing I knew of. Its texture was a mixture of green leaves and earth. It clung to his skin and writhed with a life of its own. Its color continually changed from deep to light green, to dark to light brown, and to green again. It was fascinating to look at. I felt a sense of awe and respect towards the elf.

He was good with his hands. My ankle already felt better. He was massaging it with an ointment that smelled nice. Before I could stop myself, I sniffed deeply, bringing the healing aroma of the ointment deep into my lungs. Detecting my movement, the elf turned to me and smiled kindly. Although I didn't see his mouth moving, I could hear him talking.

"Don't be afraid," he said. His voice was so soothing that I had to fight my urge to snuggle and sleep in his small arms.

I shook my head slightly. What was I supposed to say? Hello, elf? How are you? I could not. I didn't even know if I was supposed to call him that or just say Tabi or Apo.

As if knowing what I was thinking, the elf smiled again. "You call our kind dwendes or elves, no?" I nodded. "I actually don't mind if you call me an elf, but please call me Prax."

Seeing my astonished look, Prax laughed. His laugh sounded like the whistling of wind through the trees and a bit like the breaking of the waves on the seashore. I thought it nice and longed to hear more. And I wanted to know more about his kind. Did they have children? Wives? Did they play games like patintero? Habulan?

But Prax was not in the mood to chat. He told me that I should have been more careful. I could have been seriously hurt.

I nodded absently, thinking that I liked his clothes, his laugh, and his voice. He reminded me of my grandfather who had died a long time ago.

I closed my eyes, letting Prax's healing massage lull me to sleep. Thirty minutes later when I woke up, the elf was gone. Only the lingering fragrance of his balm remained.

When Mama and Papa arrived, I told them what had happened. It was really frustrating seeing their reactions. They became pale, then collapsed on the sofa. I had to douse them with water before they revived. Why couldn't they be like other people and be glad that I had been befriended by a supernatural being? I had told them about my first encounter with a real elf, and they fainted on the spot! I sulked for the rest of the evening.

Mama told me to never, never talk to elves again. Or did I forget the countless tales of elves taking people to their kingdom after killing them? I just shrugged. After all, the elf had saved my life!

I thought no more of it and, indeed, began to enjoy the banging and stomping on our ceiling. I almost wished to be hurt again just so I could see Prax. But nothing happened and I passed the rest of my summer days dreaming about playing with elves.

I met my second elf in school. I was in Grade 3, a transferee to a new public school that had a haunted classroom. My classmates related tales about dwendes, white ladies, and kapres in our school. I believed their stories readily.

I tried to tell them about Prax but since they were skeptical, I decided to let them be. As it was, I was excluded from their games.

In the classroom, I chose the seat I felt was the most haunted, the one farthest away from the teacher's table. Nobody wanted to sit near me. Behind me was a picture of the president. Without the company of my classmates, I expected elves to make their presence felt. So I waited.

By the third month in class, it happened. We had a very difficult math exam. Our teacher left us and went to gossip outside and all around me my classmates were openly copying each other's work. I looked at their papers from my seat, hoping that their scribbles would mean something to me but the answers to the blasted long divisions eluded me. I looked at the ceiling, trying to see if my brain would work better if my head was tilted a certain angle. It did not. I looked to my right, nothing there. And finally, I looked down and saw this tiny little elf, smaller than Prax by as much as six inches, sitting on the bag in front of me tap-tapping his foot impatiently.

"What took you so long to notice? I've been here for hours!" he said.

What gall! Did he really think that his race would excuse his bad manners? I ignored him and frowned at my test paper. What was 3996 divided by 6?

Immediately, he apologized and told me that his name was Bat. He had seen me play outside and thought that I was beautiful, sensitive, and romantic. Did I want him to help me in my test?

Me beautiful? I enthusiastically agreed to let him answer the test. I showed him my paper, and he snorted. "For us elves, this is elementary!" he said. I wanted to tell him that to us humans, these problems are also elementary, third-grade in fact, but I changed my mind.

Bat and I became friends. He helped me with my homework and gave me little things such as colored pencils and stationery that were the craze in school. He cautioned me strongly against telling my parents of my friendship with him. After all, he said, some people might not understand our relationship. They might forbid us from seeing each other.

I thought nothing of it and kept silent about my friendship with Bat. I enjoyed his company, for he was very thoughtful. He was a good friend and I thought we would be friends forever.

The time came, though, when he declared that he loved me. He wanted me to go with him to his kingdom and be his princess. I refused, of course. For God's sake, I was only nine! I didn't know how to cook or do the laundry or do the other things that wives are expected to do. And he was an elf! Short as I was, he only came up to my knees. What a ridiculous picture we would surely make. He pleaded with me for days but out of spite I told him that I had already confided to my parents, and that they were very angry. It was not true, but Bat didn't know that. He got angry and launched into diatribes about promises being made and broken. Then he vanished.

[To read more of THE LITTLE PEOPLE, please visit http://sushidog.com/bpss/stories/little_people.htm.]