“Boy-howdy, Eligh! Yer skills with that keyboard are unbelievable!” The mayor declared, rapping on the big bear’s shoulder.
Was he, though? This felt average to him, even Brigid being able to type up a message in faster time on the tiny keyboard of a phone screen. He’d just chalk it up to the mayor’s endearing, simple nature.
To Eligh's amazement, the local government in Brickhedge was incredibly minimal, and the office was sparsely decorated. Two sets of bar seats on either side of the entrance, a Coca-Cola machine on one side and Pepsi on the other. Some well-kept house plants stood sentry at the doorway. When he’d accepted the open position of ‘Town Planner’, he expected to be working alongside a team of educated beasts, but instead, he got this humorously small government building, a receptionist and the mayor, plus two empty offices.
That was it: that and a quick glimpse of a cute wolf in the main hall.
Since then, duties had fallen upon the bear similarly to how the rain had fallen upon the town these past two weeks: In a nonstop torrent!
“Eligh, my boy, I can’t thank you enough for all that you’ve done for the great town of Brickhedge!” The mayor’s enthusiasm was hilarious. All the grizzly had done was install a VPN and simple malware and virus detection software…
“It’s really nothing, mayor. Your IT guy should have had this stuff installed on all of the computers in the office since the very beginning.” Eligh winced, knowing what the response was going to be.
There was a brief pause before, “Eh, an ‘IT Guy’?” The horses’ expression was one of equal confusion and wonderment. How on earth did this town function at this level?
“Yeah, don’t you have someone to come in here every so often to work on your equipment? The upper government of the state should have hired one.”
Mayor Filbert took his seat at the desk, marveling at how he could browse the Yahoo! Webpage now with hardly an ad in sight, thanks to the VPN’s advertisement-blocking measures. “The only beast to come here and look at’er computers—“ He pronounced it ‘Calm-pooter’—“Was the tech dude from Best Buy that we ordered’er from.
Eligh was a calm beast. No, calmer than calm. In reality, he was an anxiety-plagued, depressive volcano who took enough daily medication to tranquillize the World Serpent. As much as he wanted to feel agitation from everything he’d learned since taking office, all that swept over him was a soothing sensation, like a calm spring-time breeze just after 5pm.
His response came out as such: “In that case, may I request that we hire an IT Guy that can do regular maintenance on our equipment? No offence, Mr. Mayor, but—“
“Call me Filb.” The mayor injected, single-keying his entry into the search field.
“…Filb, we have a lot of electronics with sensitive material on them here that needs to be looked after on a regular basis.”
The Google homepage appeared on the screen. The mayor had searched Yahoo! For Google. “That is an excellent idea, Eligh. I must say, every single day that you are here, the office just gets better and better. Maybe I won’t have to sit out the next mayor’s conference after all!”
Eligh’s mind was racing now. There was a conference for local mayors…?—
Without the accompanying flash of lightning, the entire building shook as an explosion of thunder rumbled from the clouds above, sounding as if a missile and exploded just feet above the town hall’s rooftop. The lights flickered off and on for a second, and then there was silence.
“Boy howdy, I was really beginning to wonder when we’d finally get the grand finale.” The mayor yelled, slapping the desk with his meaty hand. “Wuz half expecting the lowlands to begin flooding, to be honest.”
Eligh was confused by the horses’ words up until the sun began to beam through the west-facing windows.
That final, violent thunderblast had seemingly blown apart the rain clouds.
Eligh immediately whipped out his phone and texted Brigid.
The horizon was a crystal clear blue ocean with hardly remnants of the thick grey blanket of clouds left to be seen. For what had seemed like a neverending storm, with two solid weeks of consistent heavy rainfall, it had dissipated in less time than it took to search for Google in a competing search engine.
Eligh scanned the distant mountains and the fields that rolled beneath them. Knowing the coast was out there, just beyond sight. He was a beast born in the mountains, but he longed for the beach: The blinding white sands, the rolling waves… the men in their tight-fitting bathing suits, the moisture-heavy fabric tightening around their manhoods. If his antidepressants hadn’t taken away his ability to get an erection without physical touch, he’d definitely have a stiffy right about now.
The intercom on Eligh’s desk buzzed to life, followed by the voice of Missus. “Mr. Brannigon, there’s Ms. Ashtear here to see you,” The cockatoo squawked. She was using her professional tone and voice.
The bear pressed the button down and began to speak into the mic, “That’s just Brigid, my roommate. You can let her in, please. Thank you, Mrs. Kinkaid.”
There was a clicking noise, followed by the big door opening slightly. Brigid appeared a second later. The fox was wearing her usual pink and black plaid shirt, buttoned up this time, too, no less.
“Is it cold out?” He asked. She nodded her head Yes.
“You’ve no fucking idea how happy I was to see that sunshine again, Eligh. No. Fucking. Idea.” She slammed the door behind her, moving deeper into the bear’s too-cramped-feeling office, at least while the bear himself was there. “Do you want to know what I spent the morning doing?”
Eligh didn’t respond, but his heavy blue eyes fell onto his little foxy friend, his round ears perked up to listen.
And she explained to him in great detail, no doubt just wanting to talk to another beast after having been locked away for so long, about how she’d finally gone through that underwear box of hers, how she took far too many stumbling trips down memory lane, to the very beginning when she’d begun blossoming, defying what was supposed to be an absolute for her species.
To all the failed relationships which had led to her purchasing special underwear just for the occasion.
“I’m proud of you, Brigs,” Eligh said with a smile, his deep voice sounding like thunder itself. The bear walked over to her, arms held apart as he went in for a hug. The positive reinforcement that he never got from his family, but still tried to doll it out to his friends.
Brigid awkwardly met the hug, her tiny arms barely wrapping around the bear’s massive frame. He nearly had two whole feet over the bite-sized fox, so when he hugged her, she was swallowed in all that he was.
The pair sat opposite of each other at Eligh’s desk, Brigid with her paws on the tabletop itself, her vibrant pink paw pads reflecting the overhead light. They looked like big pink gumballs; a mountain of differences lay between them and the huge, dried and cracking pads that lined Eligh’s paws and hands.
“So I know you haven’t had the best of luck getting out and meeting locals, but I’ve got some good news for you,” Eligh said, taking a bite out of his banana nut muffin before downing it with a huge gulp of black coffee from his thermos.
Brigid took a bite out of her own equally large muffin, her tiny mouth taking out a small morsel from the baked good in comparison. “I’m listening.”
“Well, you see, every other month, the mayor likes to hold a gathering at the school’s gymnasium on the second to last Sunday of the month. That’s this weekend.” He explained, but the fox didn’t seem too interested as she crossed her paws. Eligh wasn’t into paws, especially those that belonged to females, but he’d be lying to himself if he didn’t detect some sort of intrigued emotion somewhere in the recesses of his suppressed libido.
“The mayor said that the majority of the town show up for it, if for nothing else but the free food. But it might be a good way to meet some—“
“’ Free food,’ you say? Say less, I’m in.”
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