Ayako, Ilinka and the Enchanted Prince

On the same day on which Mum severely scolded me for not brushing my teeth, my good friend Ayako asked me if I would want to get hold of an enchanted prince. She had read somewhere, in an old book with torn covers and with stains of cocoa drink with milk, how we could find such a creature. By the way, Ayako it's a name, not a nickname. Just like everybody calls me Ilinka, she's called Ayako, because her parents are Japanese.

It may very well be that in their language 'Ayako' may actually mean 'Ilinka' and that's why we get along so well together.

"And if we do get hold of an enchanted prince, what do we do with him?" I asked her.

"I don't know...perhaps we put him in a box and look at him," she said.

"And what do we feed him?" I asked.

"Well, if he's small, he'll get a milk bowl," she said.

"And if he's large”” rolls of cabbage," I added.

"What are 'rolls of cabbage'?" wondered Ayako. "Oh, you really have no idea? These are those round patties made with rice and ground meat that we are made to…" I replied. "Oh, I know, I know! This is a kind of Romanian sushi, with pork," said Ayako.

After that we quarreled a bit. I would have liked that, since he already has magic powers, we should put him to do our homework, but Ayako's opinion was that we would be better off keeping him in a box until we grow up and marry him. "After all", she said, "we could catch two of them, one for each of us. And, if they were a pair, they wouldn't get bored, they could play pretending they are samurai warriors".

I have already forgotten this discussion, but last night something weird happened. I was already in bed under the blanket, had turned the light off and was watching the moon and the phosphorescent stars glued to the ceiling in my room.

I can actually watch the real stars through my window on c’ear nights, because I live on the eighth floor. But tonight it was c’ouded, and the windows looked as if someone has poured crude oil on them. Suddenly, I heard a knock on the window. At first I thought that this was some tree branch brought over by the wind, or perhaps a bat that has just gotten a new bump on its forehead. But the knocks kept repeating and in my chest the heart started humping. I pulled the blanket over my head, hoping that I won't hear any noise any more. I was frightened.

You have to admit that it's no shame to tremble when the reason is an unknown visitor, in the middle of the night, on the eighth floor. I was very c’ose to screaming to call my parents, who were in the next room with their door open. I would have done that, but my curiosity made me peep, with one eye, just one eye, from under the blanket. Right in front of the window, a patch of light from a lantern revealed the face of a child who was saying something, but I didn't hear a thing. Looking more c’osely, I realized that this was no other but Ayako. Or, well…it could have been also someone else who resembled her perfectly. I gathered some strength and got c’oser, and the creature was desperately signalling me to open.

With unkempt hair and s’anted eyes, she looked as if she was on the watch, and it could have been a wicked demon that took my friend's appearance. Nevertheless, it seemed to be her, by the way her mouth was mumbling non-stop. No, I couldn't tell whether it was really she or not. With a heart the size of a flea that has been starving for a week, I opened the window.

"Is that you, Ayako?" I whispered. "Well, it's not the Emperor of Japan, is it? Please let me in already, or I'll pee on myself…"

"And what if you are a wicked spirit?" I asked

"If I were, I would have eaten you fifteen times already…'If he's large””rolls of cabbage', is this password good enough?" she said.

She borrowed my pajamas, as we are the same height, and away she went to the toilet, so as not to stick out in case she met someone from the household. She left her enchanted balloon with me, the one with which one could travel at night only. Apparently, my s’eepy dad has scolded her for drinking too much tea in the evening. When she returned, I got dressed; we both hung ourselves from the balloon and went on the search for the charmed prince. Ayako had it all written down on paper. In a forest known only to her, we were supposed to catch an ugly toad and give it a kiss, between midnight and half-past-midnight. It would transform immediately into a handsome prince. This is what the book said, and we had no reason to doubt its teachings. The more ugly the toad, the better…

In the forest I had to keep my teeth c’enched to keep them from c’attering. It was pitch dark and one could hear the branches crackling with a terrifying noise. A bird opened its wings right on our lantern, and kicked it one metre away. Luckily, it hasn't turned itself off.  All of a sudden we came upon what we thought was a toad, with big eyes and with a mouth as big as a s’ice of watermelon, but Ayako didn't think it was ugly enough. With a stick, she turned it with its belly up and whispered:

"See, it's got no bumps, it's a frog, not a toad".

So we kept looking.

Well, finally we found one that suited, ugly enough. We both leaped in the air with joy. It was big and wide, like a succulent pear crushed by a truck. It only had one eye, with cold skin, s’obbering, and as an additional ornament, his belly was full of small orange dots, like some disgusting fish eggs. It had a real itchy rash. The time was twelve twenty-five. The first one to kiss it, with much emotion, was Ayako. As it wasn't showing any visible signs of transformation, she handed it over to me.

I looked into its only eye and, without much hesitation, deposited a kiss on the top of its head. It croaked with a hoarse and s’eepy voice. We both sat in tension, watching it. Every moment now was passing with difficulty and our Enchanted Prince was letting us wait. After about one hour we decided to call it quits and started to go home. We quarrelled all the time we travelled above the city. Ayako was saying that most probably her watch has been running fast, and we did not follow the exact time, whereas I was convinced that we kissed an ordinary and disgusting frog, and not an enchanted toad.