Chapter 6

It was one of those warm spring days that makes you glad to be alive, even if that means being stuck in Ankh-Morpork. Warm temperatures, sunny skies, birds singing (to most people Ankh-Morpork songbirds sound like three pack a day smokers) and the gentle breeze was carrying the odiferous stench of the river Ankh away from the Unseen University. The humidity fueled haze blocked the view of “the City of a Thousand Broken Legs” (Ankh-Morpork has a very active personal loan industry) and it looked like any other city. It was peaceful if you ignored the screams of the occasional victim.

Octavia had a busy day, so she didn’t have time to walk over to the remains of the fire brigade, which was nearly gone now. She still wanted to watch Nick nicking bricks, so she climbed to the roof of Somnambulist Hall where she could watch him from a distance and hopefully not drive herself to distraction. She settled down in the warm sun, loosened her chest binders and looked at the cover of her notebook, which was now covered with inscriptions that read “Pommeraie de la Montesquieu Stein” and “Mrs. Pommeraie de la Montesquieu Stein,” and “Mrs. Octavia Stein.”

As she sat and daydreamed of a life with Nick and added to the graffiti on her notebook, a small pile of dead pigeons grew next to her as the gargoyles brought her gifts to munch on while she sat studying her notes and gazed at the distant remains of the fire brigade. She tried to watch them bring her the pigeons, but when you look at a gargoyle, the stone effigy stops whatever it was doing and will remain motionless until the watcher averts his gaze. (You need to be close friends with a gargoyle before they let you see them move) Octavia squinted at the distant brigade hall and noticed that Nick wasn’t there chipping the mortar from the bricks and stacking them up, so he must have taken his current armload of bricks to the new location.

With a sigh, Octavia opened her notebook to a certain page that magically only she can find. Much of the same doodles featured on the cover could be seen on the hidden page with an additional twist that she included, which caused the hearts that were drawn there to leap off the page and take to wing. They fluttered around her and one by one they eventually would pop out of existence in a cloud of strawberry scented pink smoke.

“That’s so cute!” said Nick as he sat down next to her.

“What!?!” shrieked Octavia. She slammed her notebook closed, which made the dozen valentines fluttering around her pop, creating a pink strawberry scented fog.

“It’s a beautiful view from up here,” said Nick as he stroked a smiling gargoyle’s head. The gargoyle responded by purring, which sounded like somebody pouring gravel into a cement lined bucket.

Coughing in a cloud of strawberry scented fumes, Octavia waved the pink clouds away with her notebook and finally asked, “How ... why ... what are you doing up here?”

Scratching a gargoyle behind the ear, Nick said, “How - I climbed the outside wall, why - because I saw you up here and I wanted to see you, and what - I’m seeing you...”

Octavia almost burst into song. She was so happy! He wanted to be with her! The girlish scribble on her notebook now danced through her mind - MISSUS Octavia Stein!

Nick had turned his attention to the gargoyle who dropped a dead pigeon in his lap, and he started scratching the gargoyle’s neck rapidly. “Who’s a good gargoyle? Who’s a good gargoyle? You’re such a cute gargoyle.” The gargoyle panted happily in time with Nick’s scratching. Its stone wings whirred with joy and its hind foot started tapping the slate shingle in time with Nick’s scratching. The minute Nick lifted his hand, the gargoyle immediately stopped, stone still except for its panting.

“You could see me up here?” asked Octavia. When she looked at Nick far below, she saw a small moving object. She only knew it was Nick because he’s the only one who would carry an armload of bricks across the town.