The First Stone / Working copy
A palace with excellent puddles
PiPi had drawn seventeen versions of his palace. Every version had a balcony. Six had a swimming pool. One had a swimming pool on the balcony, which raised questions he preferred to discuss after breakfast.
He lived beside a puddle.
It was an excellent puddle: broad, pink at sunset, and deep enough to swallow criticism. That morning it contained the reflection of a peculiar pig wearing a red beanie and practising his arrival.
“PiPi,” he announced. “The Perspicacious Pink Pepe Pig. Public Protector. Prolific dreamer.”
A bubble broke the surface.
“Yes. There will be paperwork.”
In the legend, God had made him with a heart that felt for all His children. PiPi sometimes wished this gift came with a lid. He could pass a closed window and wonder who was lonely behind it. He could hear laughter down the lane and ache to join in. Even the pig who called his drawings ridiculous received an inconvenient portion of his love.
And when PiPi opened his mouth, out came a koink.
That was difficult to explain at formal occasions.
He folded the newest palace drawing into his pocket. Along its bottom edge he had added a long table, a school, and a room where anybody could sit without having to buy something.
The balcony pool remained. There was no reason everyone should suffer.