"Husband Day"

Princess Prunilda was having a horrible day. To start off with, the name "Prunilda" would make any day absolutely unbearable. And PRINCESS Prunilda was even worse. The alliteration made her skin crawl. But today had decided to heap even more indignities on the princess, and, as you well know, indignities are not to be born by even the most angelic princess. They hurt her pride, and, as you also know, pride is one of the things that makes her a princess. (Just a smidgen, mind you.) No, today there was more than the burden of the world's worst name. Today was just ALL WRONG.

To begin with her toast had burnt. Black toast is nasty, especially if you have an economical queen mama who makes you scrape the bread and eat it any way. Then the maid had ironed her skirt backwards. This meant that all the wrinkles and crinkles were now at the front of the dress, because this was a very lazy maid who forgot to iron all the way around. Her father finally found the mirror she had broken in the upper hall, and her brother called her a "fat old hag."Her bath was cold, and she got soap in her eyes. Her hair decided to rebel and rather than be silky smooth, or glossy ringlets- it chose to resemble a hay stack. Bad hair days are hard enough, but add in the name Prunilda, burnt toast, bad ironing, broken mirror, "fat old hag" cold bath, and soap in the eye, and I think you will all agree- Prunilda was having an awful day.

But that's not the worst of it.

Today was a "husband day." At least, that's what Prunilda called it. I believe it was more commonly known as "Royal Audiences" but everyone knew better. For, you see, Prunilda was now almost 21 years old. At 21 every princess must be married. If they're not, they immediately become dowagers and have to wear black to every party. At that point it is generally accepted that they are "on the shelf." Prunilda did not want to be "on the shelf" but neither did she like "husband days." On "husband day" countless bachelors visited the king and queen. And Prunilda too, of course. She sat in the grand throne room with her mother and father on either side. They all looked regal and every man came in, bowed, and spoke a few words. If Prunilda liked the look of him, she would tap her fan twice. If she didn't- she merely opened the fan and fluttered her eyelashes. The tap twice men got an invitation to dinner. The open fan, flutter eyelashes... well, they were escorted out.

So far there had been only one "tap twice" man. He had come to dinner and refused asparagus (Prunilda's favorite), he had made jokes about the king during their walk through the garden (not nice jokes, and Prunilda loved her king papa), and he shown a propensity (expressed through his yellow gartered stockings) to flout conventionalty. Prunilda like a certain degree of conventionality. He was a nice man. But not Prunilda's type.

So here was another husband day. Prunilda sat very straight (because her mother occasionally jabbed her in the back with her fan) and tried to look regal, but it is very hard to look regal with a hay stack on your head and wrinkles down the front of your gown.

The first man came in. He was quite dapper looking. Very attractive. Prunilda sat up straighter even though her mother's fan wasn't prodding her. He bowed. And then he began to talk. And talk. And talk. And talk. He wouldn't shut up. Prunilda opened her fan very widely and they dragged him out after putting duct tape over his mouth. Even then, Prunilda was pretty sure he was still talking.

Next followed several boring ones. There were always lots of those. Prunilda had thought that she was now used to the horrible dullness of it, but she wasn't. They were just so terribly normal. Yes, you may label Prunilda as a fickle princess, for indeed she is. After all, she didn't like the non-conventional man with the garters, but then, she also didn't like the conventional men who all wore grey pants. Prunilda yawned behind her fan as another man was escorted out. Why did they all look the same? And was it just her, or were they all saying the same thing too?

But the mundaneness soon ended. Right about the time that Prunilda started glancing at her watch every 10 seconds to see if it was lunch time- things began to get interesting...

First there were the two brothers who seemed to be a little unclear about why exactly they were seeing the king and queen. I do believe that they were slightly deaf and instead of "Royal Audience" they heard something else. I wish I could tell you what exactly they thought they heard, but it was hard to talk to them.
"Your majesties, the Herkelmein brothers." (The very rotund brothers bowed)
"We have come, your majesty, for the chicken."
"I'm sorry," said the king, "But I dont' understand.
"No, no," protested the brother on the right, " no curry, and we don't want it underdone. We always eat our meat thoroughly cooked." His brother nodded vigorously.
"I'm afraid you're confused. There's no fowl."
The other brother spoke up: "No, there's no need to be afraid of a muse. They're quite harmless. I see one every month so I can find out what day to buy my milk on. Buying milk is tricky, you know, have to get it at just the right time. Muses are harmless. Not at all "foul" as you implied."
At this point the king was nonplussed and the queen looking rather puzzled. Prunilda was laughing.

However, at this exact moment, the footmen decided to show in another man. (One of the footmen was jealous because the otherfootman had just made a lemon custard pie which had won the annual, "Footmen's Lemon Custard Pie Bake-Off" so he instructed the winning footman to escort a new person in even though it wasn't time. I think he hoped that this would get him demoted.) Into the room walked a very large, very swaggering man bearing in his hands two chickens. Some men came with gifts for the princess, but as of yet, no one had brought the princess a chicken. The man thought to make an impression.

And he did.

The identical fat brothers both reached for the chickens.
"Thank you, Mr. Servant, most kind."
"Yes, thank you for delivering them fresh." Now, no man reacts well to having his chickens, meant especially for the princess grabbed out of his hands by two pompous bulbous brothers, and this man was a man of limited vocabulary and few words. He had hoped the chicken would make up for his lack of elocution. (He didn't know the princess had a phobia of fowls.)
"No. Mine."
"No time? I know we don't have much time, brother, don't we have dentist appointments at noon?"
"Give to princess." grunted the big man
"Go to recess? What do you think we are? Children? We may be short, my fine fellow, but we are not dumb! Don't ever treat us like that. Now, GIVE ME THE CHICKEN." During this whole time there had been a mild tug of war going on between the both of them for the chicken, but now it errupted into a brawl.

The queen and king watched in horror (and Prunilda with fascinated delight) chicken feathers flew and the two little fat men pummelled the giant's legs in attempts to hurl him to the ground.

I believe that eventually the castle guard had to be called. At any rate, the throne room was cleared with some difficulty, and the exhausted queen and irrate king went to eat their chicken salad lunch.

Prunilda stood up slowly. There were feathers all over the floor. She grinned. Not the worst husband day ever... then she sighed. Still no "Prince Charming".... A puff of feather poofed around her feet as she stepped off the dias. Despite herself a small smile twitched around her mouth, then a grin, a chuckle, and suddenly she sand to the floor roaring in laughter.

All well, so he hadn't shown up today. Who cares? Life was hilarious, wonderful, and slightly odd.

And there was always next "husband day."