Father and the Cheese Wheel (excerpt)

***The following is an excerpt from ‘Father and the Cheese Wheel’, an autobiographical novel touching on the ardent life of the Common City Rat. The page has been translated from its origin tongue to English for ease of reading.***

Our hero’s eyes opened heavily from the long night of slumber as he rose to greet the day. It was always warm at this early hour, so as he rolled over to his little bottle-shard mirror, he gazed into his fuzzy morning face. He breathed a big sigh and opened his eyes wide.

“You got this, Albert! Come on! Seize the day!” He was, in fact, a veritable king of morning affirmations. From the very beginning, Albert was a simple boy. His father, a cheesemonger, had immigrated to the mainland on the S.S Rodentia in 1472, and four years later, Al and his forty-six siblings were born. He didn’t remember much of his mother, as she had left for Egypt just days after his birth. He always pondered this when scratching his rounded velvet ears and waking from slumber, which, supposedly, he’d inherited from her. This is how his day started, on the brisk autumn morning of October twelfth,1473. As he tested his legs, getting up from arid sleep beneath the baker’s oven, his wide mouth- almost that of a possum- stretched long and open, as he began to breathe in the fresh morning air. Alfred found his mind wandering. ‘Mmm… lemon bread.’ his nose twitched as he appreciated the scent of the baker’s loaf this morning. His friend Remi always said he was good at smelling, ‘But honestly,’ he thought, ‘who wouldn’t be if they lived here?’

Al got ready to leave for the great hill, packing a spotted bindle with some of his father’s aged parm, a kernel and a half of corn, and some honeyed apple. Setting off for this trek, he put on his navy green rating hood, and a flowing, long couchgrass tunic. Emerging from the baker’s home, He looked out on the beautiful new day.

The sky was tinted aquamarine- with drops of rosy golden clouds. Sunrise seemed too soon to be waning away as he wandered down the street. Passing by Vole, and Hare, and all his friends from school, he tried to stay focused on his goal. He had a mission, and would not fail. His teeny feet splashed in the damp morning road, and the hem of his cloak would need a wash, but moment by moment, he could tell he was getting close! Trying to remember the path, winding up the swirling dark ally, down the smithies hill, through the Clandestina tunnel, and up the cloth panes of the oat mill. There he perched, standing atop the brick mill, blades slowly turning in the brisk morning wind, unwrapping his food from his bindle, and looking out from his mossy spot. The clouds were dyed magenta, and the trodden paths to and from the town lined the neighboring hills. He took a bite of the sweet apple and reveled in it all. Right now, baking in the sun. Right now, breathing the bright, fresh air.

‘Right now’ Albert thought- ‘I feel nice. And that’s something I can cherish forever.’ And sitting there, making a memory, and eating a delicious morning picnic, he knew he would.