Bunty & Archie

I'm paper and I'm snow
I'm yours but I go slow
I'm lost but not alone...

Clara slammed the fridge door shut, balancing the jumbo-sized tub of Dippin Dots on her hip as she reached for the wine-rack, deliberating between the Chateau Margaux or the Domaine de la Romanèe Conti. She used to fantasize about living this kind of life, but her bank balance had kicked such dreams to the kerb, until the day Flynn had skipped her in the queue at Starbucks. Now, thanks to her monthly parchment payslip, she was laughing all the way to the bank, the tellers practically rolling out the red carpet for her every time she darkened their doors.

But for all the perks, Clara wasn't happy. It wasn't the irregular hours and even more irregular events that made up her work-load, but something more intangible, a vague doubt that undermined all she attempted to do. She was losing faith in not just herself, but also the others. Instead of making progress in their quest to become fully-fledged Librarians, they were backsliding to the point of blunder, and no matter what Eve did, she couldn't bring them back to par. The mistakes they were making were becoming near misses; Clara's being the closest call yet.

Yet the discord went deeper than that. There were factions springing up, Ezekiel siding with Cassandra, Jacob caught between Cassandra and Clara, swinging like a pendulum between the pair, whilst Clara struggled to forgive and forget what Cassandra had done. For all Flynn's wise words on faith, Clara just couldn't bring herself to trust Cassandra again. And if it wasn't Cassandra, it was Eve, Clara butting heads with both women, making Clara think so much for sisterhood.

A strange sort of power struggle had sprung up between Clara and Eve, leading to several rows, placing everyone even under more pressure. Everything Eve suggested, Clara challenged, Jenkins making an odd third in the fray, uncharacteristically backing Clara up before doing a complete 360 and backstabbing her. He was on nobody's side but his own, preferring to pass his time by stirring up trouble, always reminding them how much he resented their presence, pointing out their weak points whilst reminiscing about things they would rather forget, like the time Ezekiel got himself and Clara trapped in a Wendy House, or the night Jacob had accidentally unleashed a sand-storm in Cassandra's brand-new bathroom, wrecking her marble tiling.

Initially, Clara thought Eve's animosity was over losing Flynn to a lesser rival. She knew Eve was in contact with Flynn, and the knowledge stung, Clara having heard nothing from him, but Eve was their Guardian, Flynn the Librarian, and since Clara didn't fancy playing piggy in the middle, she kept quiet, stewing in silence instead. It was beneath her dignity to start scrapping with Eve over a man, and it was even more beneath Eve's dignity to do so as well, so they tried and failed to keep the peace. But Clara had soon learned Flynn wasn't the problem. Whatever Eve had felt for him, it had been fleeting, fading into friendship instead. The problem seemed to be about who held the upper hand, Eve forcing Clara to capitulate at every turn, Clara rebelling at every corner, turning the Annex into an oestrogen-fuelled battlefield.

As she finally decided on the Chateau Margaux, Clara tiredly suspected this was why she'd literally risked her neck in the limousine, trying to get one up on Eve, only to spectacularly fail, Eve having the last word by getting Clara's apartment blessed from top to toe by an exorcist, the rooms now wreaking of incense, crucifixes nailed over every door and window, not including as the one now hanging around Clara's bruised neck.

Carefully levering the wine bottle free, she picked up the Sangraal Jenkins had surprisingly pressed on her, before heading for her bedroom, dragging her feet as she went. With Flynn gone, life had taken on a Bridget Jones bent. She didn't know where she stood with him, whether they were even together or not, their last kiss as cryptic as a cabalistic symbol. Had it heralded a once upon a time or the end of their story? She wasn't sure, and she wasn't sure whether she wanted to be sure either. He seemed to be hiding something from her, but what it was, again she wasn't sure she wanted to know.

With a heavy sigh, Clara threw herself down onto her four-poster bed, dumping the ice-cream and wine down on her bedside cabinet made of rowan wood, nearly knocking over a pile of Betty Neels as she did. She steadied the pile of books before reaching for the remote control, only to freeze as a sonorous voice intoned an incantation from the depths of her antique armoire. Not being in the habit of taking her work home with her, Clara picked up the wine bottle, steeling herself for the storm ahead. Brandishing it like a club, she approached the armoire on raised tip-toe, heart hammering in her chest.

Before she could react, the doors flew open, only for Flynn to step out from between them, leading a goat wearing a gold crown. Clara just stared at them, too stunned to say anything. She'd been expecting a horned being of an entirely different variety, not Flynn and a farmyard animal. Her knees trembled beneath her, but she resolutely stood her ground, striking an incongruously regal figure in her teapot-patterned pyjamas.

"Talk about delusions of grandeur," the goat observed, eying the four-poster bed with disdain.

Flynn cleared his throat theatrically. "What are you doing with that wine bottle, Hartley?" he asked nervously, ignoring the goat. "And as an exquisite side-note, do you have any chilled Fanta onhand perchance."

"What are you doing in my wardrobe?" Clara countered, lowering the wine bottle.

"Archimedes here was kidnapped from his kingdom, but I rescued him - as I do," Flynn explained, pluming himself on his heroics, "so I thought I'd make a short stop-over here - as I don't usually do."

"I'm honoured," Clara snapped, setting the wine bottle down again.

"You should be," Flynn said, snapping his cuff buttons shut.

Clara folded her arms across her chest, not sure whether to kiss or kill him.

"I need you to goat-sit," Flynn announced abruptly, startling her.

"I'm not allowed pets in this apartment," Clara protested, seeing her evening of slobbing out in front of her cinema-sized television disappearing down the drain.

"A Merlin marathon?" Flynn asked, raising his eyebrows.

"I thought you couldn't read my mind unless I thought about cupboards," Clara reminded him.

"I'm reading your box-sets, not your brain."

"Oh."

An awkward silence fell, the goat rolling his eyes, making Clara frown.

"Well, like I said, I'm not allowed pets in this apartment," Clara reiterated, glancing at the goat again.

"Hey, I'm not a pet, I'm a personage," the goat said, narrowing his gold-rimmed eyes at Clara.

"And I'm a postage stamp," Flynn declaimed, puffing his chest out.

"Aren't you supposed to be finding the Library?" Clara asked Flynn, ignoring Archimedes.

"I... I was following a lead when I suddenly got side-tracked," Flynn said, suddenly looking shifty.

"Was that lead the same shade as a Dianthus barbatus by any chance?" Clara hazarded, gesturing to the goat's hot pink harness.

"I think I shall flee now," Flynn said hastily, making for the armoire. Before Clara could stop him, he was gone. Feeling a muscle tic in her temple, Clara turned to face Archimedes, the silence suddenly very loud.

"Well..." Clara began, clasping her hands together, "I'm Clara. Hi, hello, howdy."

"Salutations sister," the goat said, looking at her like she was something nasty on his hoof.

"So you're a talking goat, then?" Clara continued, trying to make conversation.

"Obviously," the goat said witheringly. "I also do a little predicting of the future on the side. I'm not your average augury."

"Obviously," Clara said equally as witheringly.

Another awkward silence fell, making the goat roll his eyes again.

"So if I go out, you're not going to chew my carpets, then?" Clara laughed nervously, her joke falling flat.

"Just leave me in the VIP lounge, Bunty," the goat said, shrugging a hairy shoulder.

"I don't do clubbing," Clara said, slightly taken aback.

"Well, what do you do, then?"

"Uh, I like to read back-copies of Coopers of Stortford mail order catalogues," Clara admitted unwillingly. "Sue and Daphne are delightful."

"Okaaaay, never mind," Archimedes said, looking at Clara as if she was mad. "Swiftly moving on, how do you know the biped formerly known as Flynn, then?" he asked, examining his hoof with casual interest.

"He's my boss," Clara said, shutting the wardrobe doors, condemning Flynn to the darkest depths of Hades's realm.

"Flynn fancies you," the goat said flippantly, throwing himself down onto the four-poster bed.

"Everybody fancies me," Clara said without arrogance. "Their heads unfortunately get turned by my pretty face, and that's how the trouble starts."

"You talking about the trouble between you and the Flynn?" Archimedes observed acutely. "I thought I detected a little tension between the two of you."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Clara said primly.

"After many trials and tribulations, the two of you will have ten children together and live happily ever after in Honolulu," the goat said, staring impressively off into the distance, as though he was looking out at some far shore only he could see.

"How many predictions of yours have actually been accurate, Archie?" Clara asked, raising a sceptical eyebrow.

"Many, mademoiselle."

"Prove it," Clara said, folding her arms across her chest.

"Come back to me in twenty years time, and I'll prove it then," Archimedes said evasively.

"Yeah, I'll hold you to that," Clara said, rolling her eyes this time.