Fendel's Toys

Fendel was a toy maker, without any records of formal education, and with no official residence anywhere. He was by all accounts homeless...and yet he was welcomed into the homes, and hearts, of the people of Sun Valley.

The children loved him for the toys he made, and for the gentle and loving way he treated them. They recognized the wiseness behind his eyes, seemingly aged more than his body, yet more beautiful than any sunset. He taught the children, sometimes, about the making of the toys and the tools he used. But for the most part, he only taught them to find joy in the simplest of toys, and how to smile, even on rainy days.

The adults' reasons for loving him varied more. Some adored him for the smile he put on their child's face. Others saw him as a wise man and one with whom they could share even the most philosophic conversation, or the most intimate problem, and find a great answer. Some saw him as reliable, trustworthy, and helping to everyone he knew, and some he did not. All of them loved him. That is, almost all of them.

Rita was no fan of the beloved toy-maker. Why? No one really knew. (Just as no one really knew the age of the wise old man called Fendel) She had come to Sun Valley about the same time he had. And immediately, she had bad- mouthed him. She claimed that the parents "had better watch their children around that perverted old man!" No matter what Rita said about Fendel, or even to his face, he did nothing in return. He simply smiled at her, and asked if she had "any nieces or nephews that might would like a toy?" For this, she only hated him more.

Fendel was old. He looked to be around seventy, yet his eyes shone through to an even more aged soul. Not one that was old and tired, but one that was old and wise. One that was still as strong as any mans. He had white hair, and a white beard. But he kept both neatly trimmed. His clothing was not rags, but not that of a rich man either. He walked slowly, but not as one whose age had slowed him, but rather as one who would prefer to take in the things around him as he passed. One who wished to savour every moment. One who loved all he saw.

Many tales could be written about Fendel; about his times spent in Sun Valley, about the days before he came there, and the ones after. And there are many secrets that could be shared.

It was a cloudy day when Rita discovered Fendel working on his toys. Which was a secret process. She had followed him to his makeshift workshop, in a local man's extra building. There she had watched, hating to be so awed by the way his hands formed the toys. She watched him make many toys, including an airplane and a horse for a toddler. Then...she watched as he fashioned a doll. She couldn't remember seeing many dolls with his signature; this was a rare event.

The first one he made was a boy. He gave him brown hair, and made an outfit for him. He worked for some time on him. Then he did something peculiar. He cut out a piece of the cloth from the boy doll and set it aside. Then he sewed him back up and put his clothing on him. Then he set him up, and began work on another doll. This one was to be a girl.

He fashioned her hair for her, making it very beautiful. He worked for hours on her, making her perfect. She truly was perfect, and Rita was bitter that she had to admit it to herself. He used a different color cloth on her than the boy. He carefully placed the cloth he had cut from the boy doll onto her chest, right where here heart would be. He meticulously sewed it to her, so finely that you could not even tell that it was not part of the original cloth, if it had not been the color of the boy.

He repeated the procedure for the boy, placing a piece of the girl colored cloth onto his chest and sewing it in the same way.
He set him beside his counterpart, and smiled. They were his, he had created them, and now they were complete. And they were together.

He got up from his workstation, and walked over to his counter. From there he placed them into two boxes. "Why two boxes?" thought Rita. "Aren't they a set?" But he continued to package them, separately. Rita noticed that he frowned, as if the thought of keeping them apart troubled him. "He wants them to be together!" Rita thought to herself. Suddenly she no longer cared for the thought that they belonged together. "If that old fool wants them to be a set, he should've made it that way. Now I'm going to do what I can to see that they stay apart!"

At this she decided to go and knock on the door. But before she could knock, she heard the old man's voice coming from inside the building. "Come on in, Rita! The doors unlocked."

"How long has he known I was there?" she wondered.
When she walked in, she noticed he had no air of ill will. He was not smiling, as was characteristic of him, but he was not upset either.
"Sit down, Rita. Surely your back hurts from crouching down beside my window for the past few hours," he said kindly.

She stared at him, but took the seat nonetheless. He was right, her back did hurt. She was trying to think of what to say. Where had the plan gone that she had just had? Why had she moved to the door? She was losing herself in her thoughts, when Fendel spoke.
"How may I help you this evening? Would you like to buy something?" he said.

Her eyes went immediately to the dolls. She remembered her plan. "Yes, as a matter of fact, I am quite interested in those dolls over there. How much for them?"

He looked at her, as if knowing her mind, and replied, "I'm afraid you cannot buy them. They are not for sale."

"Why make something that you will not sell, you mad old toy-maker! Those are some of the most wonderfully crafted toys you've ever created, and you say you will not sell them! Have you gone senile?!" she spat at him. She was suddenly overcome with hate. She ran past the old man, expecting him to stop her, but he did not. She grabbed up the two dolls, and ran out of the building with them. Fendel did not tell anyone what had happened. He simply continued on with his toy-making.

Rita thought him a fool and a coward for not telling anyone what she had done. She did not want to be found out, but she could not understand his passiveness. She only knew one thing, that she would not let those two dolls be together. They were packaged separately and placed into different closets in her home. She would not let them be the set their maker had intended. They never knew each other, they never met. They stayed in their boxes, and saw no one. Darkness was their companion.

Three years passed. Rita went on a short trip to her sisters house, which lay some seventy miles away. She was only to be there a couple days, but they were to be fateful ones. On the last day of her visit, her nephew, a charming young seven-year-old, accidentally left a couple of his playthings on the steps. As she carried some of her bags down the stairs, she tripped and fell down the wooden steps. The pain was sharp, only striking her as she landed. But she was dying. The last thing she saw impassioned her hate and made her weep, along with the pain. There, lying next to her at the bottom of the stairwell, she saw the object of her demise. The culprit that had caused her fall? A small wooden yo-yo, apparently hand made, and with a large engraving of the letter "F". "F" for Fendel.

News of her death came quickly to Sun Valley. Everyone sent their condolences, though no one really liked the woman. Her house was put up in auction, by her sister. Her sister was her only living family and she had no desire for the house, nor any of it's belongings.

The auction was held on a Friday, and on the following Monday, a new family moved in. They were a beautiful family. A young mother and father, with twins named Adam and Abigail. The children were around the age of five or six, and very playful.

The mom was going through one of the closets, with Abi helping any way she could. They came upon a box, dusty, yet beautiful. "I wonder what could be in here?" the mother said. To Abi's delight she pulled out a beautiful and beautiful doll of a young girl. "A doll mommy! A doll! Can I have her?" the little girl begged. Her mother loved seeing the little girl smile. She said, "Promise you'll take care of her?" Abi nodded her head definitely. "I promise, mommy." she spoke eagerly.

And so her mother handed her the doll. She jumped for joy and asked, "Can I go show her to Adam?" Her mother nodded in approval. She ran down the hallway, excited to show her brother her new toy. But before she could get there, she met him in the hall. He was running her direction, holding something too. Before Abigail could get a word out, Adam shouted, "Abi! Look what I got! Me and Dad were looking through some old stuff and we found this! Isn't he great!" Abi stared at the doll he held, then held hers up too. "Mom and me found this one! They must go together!

Yes, surely they must. The children had both noticed something about the others doll. They had a patch of each other's color over their hearts! They had to have been made as a set. They were two of a kind.
Abigail smiled, "Well then, they should be together all the time!"
Adam nodded, "Yes, we won't ever keep them apart!"

Across town, sitting in his workshop, Fendel smiled.

The End