On the Mend

Honeybees

"Hello Miss White!" Flycatcher called out as he entered the Business Office, mop in hand.

"Hello Flycatcher." Snow White looked up at him from her paperwork, smiling at the friendly janitor.

"I'm done with the Sheriff's Office." He placed his mop into the yellow industrial bucket and proceeded to swab the office floors. "How are you today?"

Snow's smile deepened. He was always so chatty in a good way. Whenever he would see any of the Fables in the building, he'd stop what he was doing and greet them or ask how their day was.

"I'm fine Flycatcher," she put her pen down, taking a little needed break from the paperwork she had since 6:00 this morning. She glanced at her watch, it was an hour past closing time. Of course, that was the story of her life -- start work early and end work late -- that's how it always went.

She watched the young man mop the floors. He was always odd that one, with his penchant for bugs and his buggy-eyed frog hat, but out of all the Fables -- even Bigby, who was an acquired taste -- he was the most pleasant.

"How are you Flycatcher?" she asked, trying to ignore the astonishment on his face. It wasn't always that Snow would stop to ask him how he was or to even dole out a 'good morning' -- what with being Deputy Mayor and often rushing off to wherever she was needed at that moment.

"I-I'm fine Miss White," he flashed her a goofy grin while leaning on the mop.

"That's good..." She yawned and pinched her the bridge of her nose with her fingers.

"Pardon me, Miss White," Flycatcher placed the mop in the bucket, wheeling it to her desk. "But maybe you should call it a day."

Snow White was about to tell him off -- seeing as she didn't like to be told what to do -- but one look at Flycatcher's genuinely concerned face had changed her mind. She could easily tell off Bluebeard or Bigby and especially Beauty, but Flycatcher was different; it was as if he didn't deserve to be yelled at. Plus those toad eyes on his hat were so oddly amusing that it appealed to the carefree girl she had tried so hard to lock away for centuries.

"Maybe I should..." she smiled weakly.

"Don't worry about closing up here, I'll do that for you."

Snow stood up, scooping the papers into a drawer in her desk, "Goodnight Flycatcher."

Flycatcher watched as she headed toward the door. "Goodnight Miss White!"

Snow gave him one last smile before walking out and heading to her apartment for a well deserved sleep.

Flycatcher stood in the center of the office, leaning on the mop. "Keep dreaming, Fly... she's with Bigby, remember."

Even though he was still technically a prince, he didn't deserve her. Here, he was just a gangly awkward man that hung around with a bugle boy and a former wooden puppet, collecting comics in his spare time. She was out of his league -- and he certainly was no match for Bigby. He sighed sadly before returning to his work.

______________________________________________________________________________

Red Riding Hood and Jack walked into Woodland. He was soaking wet and bent over, obviously in pain while Red soothingly rubbed circles on his back.

"Jack, let me take a look..." Red pleaded.

"You--" he groaned. "You just want to take advantage of a... dying man."

Red sighed in annoyance, "That's definitely not something I want to do... and you're not dying so cut it out."

The "date" was going swimmingly. It was actually romantic and Jack had behaved himself the whole time as they walked the trail, just living in the moment, loving the nature and talking about things they were both interested in.