Last night we had a storm. Nothing unusual really in our neck of the woods. However, this time the storm blew Pirate back home. I haven’t seen him for ages. I think last time was when he wanted to sell me his dad’s old vinyl records, because he thought I still had a record player to listen to them.
Pirate is rather an odd one. He calls himself an entrepreneur. I am not sure, but I think in the old days you would have called someone like him a wheeler and dealer. Nobody really knows what he does for a living. Sometimes he has pockets full of money, other times he has to conveniently leave for an important meeting before the bill can be settled.
He has tried his hand at everything… pyramid schemes, that truly weren’t pyramid schemes (his words, not mine), fixing computer viruses via phone and selling grandmothers…. But if you know all this, and can withstand the pressure to buy, he is actually a really lovely Dede.
So last night he came round to my house and asked if he could stay for dinner. ‘Oh!’, I thought to myself, ‘watch out, he is poor at the moment’. I am not too keen on his company when he is poor. Not because of the fact that he has no money. No, no, I don’t like him for the hair-raising schemes he devises when he is desperate. But then, he is always happy to take us out to posh restaurants when he is rich, so how could I not share our simple meal with him?
“So, I hear the Dedes are doing well” he said, while he was watching me cooking dinner. “They even had something written about them in Austria!”
“Yes,” I confirmed, but didn’t want to say more.
“Are you making money yet?” he came straight to the point.
“What kind of question is that?” I asked. “We are not in it for the money – We are having fun!”
“Bullshit” he said. “Don’t give me that airy fairy crap…”
“And you watch your language” I interrupted.
“I am a pirate for god’s sake,” he reminded me of the obvious. How could I forget looking at his hideous mustache.
He came back to his proposition: “You know, you are sitting on a gold mine. Just let me be your manager. I will organise everything for you.” He pushed a piece of paper over the breakfast bar in my direction. I glanced at the heading: ‘Manager’s Contract’. “We could do T-shirts and printed coffee mugs and, oh, the mind boggles…” His eyes glazed over.
“Dream on….” I said to him, while I fished spaghetti out of the pot. “We have to sell the Hermit’s Web books first!” I didn’t have the heart to tell him outright that he would be the last Dede I would entrust with my affairs.
“But…” he started again. I stopped what I was doing and stared deep into his one good eye.
“Just asking…” he said a bit huffy, but I knew he’d got the message.
dedepuppets 