In days of auld lang syne
Cranky let the tools fall into the loam with a squelch. Steven winced, and plucked an axe out of the moist earth between two fingers.
“You’ve got them all filthy.”
“‘Course I did. They’re tools. What’s the point of tools if you’re afraid of getting them dirty?” Cranky did a slow circle around the pile. “I think this spot is good, anyway. There’s some stone beneath the soil here. We dig a trench, put some sleepers down, backfill it? Don’t need this to last that long.” He stomped his hooves down to see how much of an impression they made. “Don’t need to bother with cement.”
“I don’t see any timber?” Steven looked at the pile of tools with concern. “We’re not doing this the old fashioned way, are we?”
Cranky reached into the pocket of the overalls, popped the little plastic tube of painkillers, and swallowed one dry. “I’m too old to do it any other way. We got an axe. We got trees. What do you need timber for?”
“Cranky, it’s been years since we made a log cabin. I don’t think I know how to do it anymore.”
Cranky barked a laugh. “Here I thought you’d jump at the excuse to wear flannel again.”
Steven paused and stroked his moustache. “It has been a while since I wore flannel. But it just looks so tacky without the axe...”
Cranky grunted, straining to flip the gigantic axe he’d brought so the handle was sticking straight up in the air. “What, you thought I’d be swinging this thing? I made the head out of one of Big Mac’s old ploughs! I’m going to have my hooves full with other things.”
“Just like old times,” Steven smiled to himself as he easily picked the axe up and gave it a few swings to test its balance. “I’m the muscle, and you’re the brains, again?”
Cranky snorted at that, and started sorting through his pile of tools for measuring tape. “Please. You were the brains and the brawns. I mostly just showed up. Go cut some trees upriver and float them down to me. Try not to cut them too close to the banks, bad for the soil.”
Steven slithered out of the river like a snake. Cranky measured out the length he was going for, and dragged his hoof to dig out X’s, and when he looked back Steven was tearing a flannel button-up from a dry cleaning bag.
“Where’d you even keep that?”
“Trees.” Steven shrugged, and slipped into the shirt, fiddling with the buttons. His arthritis was slowing him down, he used to be able to clip those things up quick as a zipper. “Animals can’t get into the plastic.”
“Well. Alright then, as long as you’re happy.”
“It is very snug.” Steven patted his gut. “I hope I haven’t put on weight.”
“I think you’re just taller.” Cranky reassured him. “Longer, maybe.”
“Tsk. See, this is why you’re such a good friend. Some logs, coming right up.” Steven started swimming upstream, paused, turned around. “With or without branches?”
“Without. Want to be able to roll them around.”
“Well now,” Steven clicked his tongue, turning back again, “aren’t we the fussy ones this morning?”
“I’m old!” Cranky shouted as Steven swam away, “I’ve earned my fussiness!”
Steven just laughed. A minute later, Cranky heard the crack of axe blows. He checked his rope was tied in a loop, so he didn’t miss too many when they floated past. It did. He started digging the holes for the sleepers, just enough to mark them properly - the real digging would be another job for Steven when he came back.
Cranky would feel guilty about giving his big friend the heavy lifting jobs again but, well, you’re never too old to build character.
Steven swam back with the first felled tree, and rolled it at Cranky’s hooves. Cranky frowned at it. “Thought I said you could just float them down.”
“With your back?” Steven laughed, “You old goat, you tried to rope it like you used to, the log would pull you more than you’d pull it, and I’d have to swim back for you anyway.”
Cranky grumbled. Steven had a point, and it just made him feel less guilty about making him do the digging. “Well. Thanks.”
Steven pointed to the holes. “You need me to dig those, too?”
Cranky nodded. “If it’s not too much of a bother. I’ll start dividing this up for the poles, while you’re cutting some more trees.”
Steven rolled his eyes and held a forearm to his brow, “Cranky, all of this is a bit much of a bother. One more thing isn’t going to change that.”
“Yes. Well. Thank you, then.”
“Anything for you, sweetheart.” Steven picked the shovel up in one hand, and scooped one of the marked holes Cranky had started on.
It was like watching him stick a spoon into chocolate pudding.
After a few scoops, Steven threw the shovel into the soil, letting it stick up like a javelin. The wood twanged. “I’d say it’s about a yard deep. How many poles were you thinking of laying down?”
Cranky walked the length of the log, counting his paces. “This’d get me a good eight, before it starts tapering off. So we’ll call it eight.”
Steven grabbed the shovel again and started digging along the marks, so they made the corners of three conjoined squares. Nice and long and evenly spaced. “I still say you were the brains, you know.” Steven didn’t even pause for breath as he dug the holes.
“I got us into too many stupid messes to be the brains.”
“But you got us out of them, too.” Steven pointed out, “I’d have just turned us both in to the Khedive, during that whole mess with the museum...”
Just remembering it still made Cranky mad. “Why’d they think we’d steal the sarcophagus, anyway? We found the darned tomb in the first place, we turned them in once.”
“I seem to recall they said we’d done it to get them appraised. So we knew what to sell them for.” Steven sighed. “It was very silly, wasn’t it?”
“Silly now. Wasn’t then.” Cranky grumbled, “And you wanted to turn us into the Khedive!”
“I did!” Steven laughed, “It’s true!”
“What did I tell you?”
“You said it was probably the Khedive that did it!”
“And who did it end up being?”
“The Khedive!” Steven laughed, “I know! I know, I remember. That’s what I was trying to tell you, you old crank.”
“Well!” Cranky grumbled, measuring out foot long yards on the log with chalk. “Hey. Where was that?”
“What do you mean?”
“They don’t have Khedives anymore.” Cranky muttered, chalking off another segment, “Was it Saddle Arabia, or the Cowliphate that happened?” He grunted. “I mostly just remember sand. Lot of sand. And heat.”
“Saddle Arabia.” Steven answered immediately, “I remember, because it had the coast line.”
“Saddle Arabia had the coastline, but the Cowliphate had the river. That’s right. The big, wide river... Took half a day to get from bank to bank.”
“Took you half a day.” Steven pointed out. “Not my fault you took one of those terrible row boats.”
“We were having a fight was why.” Cranky thought about that. “Didn’t trust you not to leave me in the middle to swim the rest of the way myself.”
“You’re right! We were having a tiff!” Steven clapped his hands together and rubbed them. “Why was I so mad at you again?”
“Wasn’t because I didn’t want to turn us in, was it?”
“No, no, couldn’t be. I was mad at you before that. You running from the museum, cussing up a storm, is what made me forget about it.”
Cranky thought about that. “Cowliphate? They had the markets didn’t they?”
“Oh yes!” Steven gasped, “Those long markets with the beautiful handwoven rugs! And the colourful fabric roofs that went on forever! And they had these dates, mmf. We should go back some time.”
“Mm,” Cranky grunted, “Maybe. I’m a bit too old and cranky to haggle, I think.”
“Puh-lease. You were too old and cranky to haggle then, too, and you still had your own hair.” Steven laughed. Cranky grimaced.
He had not enjoyed the Cowliphate.
“I remember what it was now,” he said, marking the last segment. “I said you shouldn’t get a silk bathrobe. You couldn’t pull the look off.”
Steven’s expression darkened immediately. “Right. I remember now.”
“Still nursing that one, huh?”
“It was beautiful, and it matched my scales perfectly, and I’m basically always in the bath.” Steven groused. Cranky chuckled.
“It was bright pink, and it had the tackiest silk-screened flower print on it I ever did see.”
Steven gasped. “Those flowers were bee-you-tee-full! You wash your mouth out with soap!”
“Remembering how mad you got at me, huh?”
“You were so tactless!”
“Were?” Cranky raised an eyebrow? He struck off the last segment and went to grab the saw.
“Time’s worn down your sharper edges, I will say.” Steven laughed. “Not that Pinkie Pie would believe it.”
“Yeah, well,” Cranky sank the saw into the wood and began pumping it, “she’s lucky she met me when she did.”
“I don’t know! Maybe she’d like the old Cranky. He was quite dashing.”
“Yeah, always dashing away from someone.” Cranky laughed. “You know, it’s a funny thing that.”
“What, how you always managed to have somebody out there who wanted to kill you? Babydoll, they just didn’t see you the way I did.” Steven finished digging the last hole, and Cranky hadn’t cut his first segment yet. He started sawing harder, sweat starting to drip.
“Well. That,” he finished his first cut, went to the second, “But how your younger self’s your old self. Just funny.”
“That’s an old saw. And I don’t mean the one you’re using like a butter knife.”
Cranky chuckled. “I guess so. Why don’t you go cut some more logs for me?”
Steven grinned. “Bet you I can finish cutting trees before you finish with that first log?”
“I never take a bet I expect to lose.”
“Tsk!” Steven folded his arms, “You’re spoiling my fun.”
“You get all the fun of showing me up, drama queen.” Cranky pointed upriver.
“I was going to enjoy that anyway,” Steven laughed, disappearing up the current. Cranky shook his head, and got back to sawing along the lines.
Hopefully this’d come out even enough.
“Cranky, I was joking,” Steven dropped an armful of trees, letting them roll along the ground next to the worksite, “I even got all the branches off for you. You’re only just finished?”
Cranky wheezed, leaning on the shovel for support. “Leave me alone! I’m old, and I’m tired, and my bones hurt!”
“I just thought it was married life making you soft.” Steven leaned down. He was only just noticing how much Cranky shook when he tried to keep still.
“You keep joking about it.” Cranky pointed out. Steven frowned.
“Joking, because I thought it was funny. But it’s not, is it?”
Cranky grinned. “Naw, it’s a little funny. We used to pretend we were immortal, didn’t we? It’s funny to just be puttering about like this. Not running to anywhere, from anything. You ever look at us, trekking through Tuskany, living off the land, and think I’d outlive my joints?”
“Pretend we were immortal? Cranky, sometimes I’d worry we wouldn’t outlive the day!” Steven pushed the piles of dirt into the holes around Cranky’s poles, patting them down like sandcastles.
“Yeah, well. Maybe it just all seems so easy now, because I know we made it out okay.” Cranky opened the little red toolbox he’d brought with him, and pulled the peanut butter and pickle sandwich Matilda had made for him. “Donkeys get old faster than ponies. Ponies get old faster than sea serpents. I’m getting old, bud.”
Steve chewed on a finger. His lips quivered. “Do you have to?”
“What do you mean, do I have to? Do I have to get old?” Cranky barked a laugh. “Do you see a tiara on my head? ‘Cause if you don’t, yeah, I gotta get old.”
“But that’s so sad!” Steven protested.
“Stow it, ‘cause I ain’t dead yet!” Cranky walked around the site, nodding at the work done so far. “Splitting some logs in half and putting them down flat-side-up would probably be the next thing to do. Make a frame out of them, then come back with some planks for a proper floor.”
It’d be a little bit of money, but he could finish the walls and roof now. Not a problem.
“I can do that.” Steven said, but he’d gotten all mopey now.
“What are you sad about? You still got all the colour in your moustache for a few years yet, don’t you?”
Steven nodded, tears forming in his eyes. Cranky sighed, and rolled a log to him. Steven picked it up and fiddled with it, not really doing much with it.
“You really never put two and two together on this one, did you?” Cranky walked up to Steven, took a moment to get himself into a position he could sit down next to him without twisting anything that didn’t like twisting. “Why’d you think I was in such a rush to find Matilda again? Crossed Equestria half a dozen times, nearly got us both killed ten times that, looking for her?”
“Because it was fun?” Steve lay next to Cranky, and Cranky patted the top of his head.
“It was,” Cranky admitted, “But Matilda was someone I wanted to spend the rest of my life with, Steven. And by the time I found her, I had more years behind me than I had ahead of me.”
“But we were only together for a few decades.” Steven frowned.
Cranky winced. “Yeah. That’s a long time to a donkey. Too old for me to be a Dad.” Cranky tousled Steven’s hair, just ‘cause he knew it’d annoy him. “Took too long to find her to have a chance of that.”
Steven sniffled.
“Hey. Hey, hey.” Cranky hugged him - which mostly involved kind of leaning on him. Sea serpents are pretty big. “I spent the best years of my life with you, ya big galoof. And I was happy to do it.”
Steven smiled through the tears. “I don’t know what a galoof is.”
“Well, get a mirror then.” Cranky punched Steven in the side playfully. It hurt his hoof. He shook it off. “Now, help me with the rest of this. I’ll cut the notches and you stack them, and we’ll have ourselves a cabin before night.”
Steven wiped a tear away. “Why are we doing this, anyway?”
“What? Didn’t I tell you?”
“You showed up with a bunch of tools and started telling me what to do.” Steven sniffled. “Just like old times.”
“Well. I did have a bad habit of that, I suppose.”
“Did?”
“Oh, stow it.” Cranky snorted. “Matilda wanted to spend Hearthswarming with family. I thought it’d be good to have a place next to the river, since it was easier than bringing the river to us.”
Steven started bawling so hard, Cranky wished he’d brought a poncho. He patted Steven’s side.
“Take your time. Can’t finish this without you. Celestia knows, wherever she is right now, I never could.”
