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“Mamma! We’ve got the seawater!”
Moomin gently knocked against the house’s door with his foot, hands occupied with the handles of a large pot, filled to the brim with salt water. Snufkin holds the other side, even though they’d both set it down on the porch to regain the strength spent hauling it up from the beach. The door opens and Moominmamma invites both the boys in and they haul the pot into the kitchen.
“Thank you, both of you. Just place it on the stove, if you can.” Even though the two can lift it, Mamma gives it gentle support as the two others heave it up onto the burner. The knob beneath is turned, and the familiar clk-clk-clk starts up before the flame lights. Mamma wipes her brow and turns to the others. “Would you two mind doing me another favor, if it’s not too much trouble?”
At the shaking of Snufkin’s head and Moomin’s “Not at all, Mamma!” she smiles, and places a lump of dough on the floured kitchen table. She tears a chunk away, before quickly rolling it into a snake on the table. “I made some biscuits earlier, but the pasta isn’t quite finished.” She rolls the dough snake flat and slices it up with a nearby butter knife. “Would you mind finishing the rest with me?
Again, she’s met with the shake of a head. Two sets of paws reach for the dough, and the noodles are made in no time. Snufkin works quietly, brow furrowed as he rolls careful tubes of dough, but Moomintroll fills the space with idle chatter as he tells Snufkin of the many things he’s seen as of late. He tells Snufkin about the bug he saw down by the river, the diving one that ate minnows, and of Sniff’s new moneymaking plan (Snufkin pulls a face at this. It’s not a rude face, per-se, but not one that expresses excitement). He tells Snufkin of a peculiar dream where Snufkin was bald and had no tail or even mouth organ, and played a guitar instead. They all had a laugh at that, Moomin’s tail happily swishing against the wooden floors. When the pasta is finished (but the stories are not) Mamma shoos them outside as she stirs the large pot of water which has barely evaporated. “The salt will be ready by sundown, and the pasta not much before. Go and have an adventure!”
They do, but not before Mamma makes them wash their paws in the kitchen sink (Snufkin gets away with simply dunking his hands in the hot water) and are sent on their way with biscuits in each hand. Mamma’s cooking is too good to turn down, even if one isn’t hungry, so they store them in a tin back at Snufkin’s camp for later.
“Would you care to fish?” Snufkin asks, after a moment of lingering silence. “Yes!” Moomin claps his paws excitedly. “I’ll go get my rod!”
As Moomin runs back up the hill to retrieve his fishing gear, Snufkin gathers his own up from his tent before beginning to dig in the soft soil for worms. Once he finds what he deems enough, he places them into his tin cup. He’ll wash it later.
When Moomin returns, he has not only his fishing pole, but a jar or peach preserves as well. No doubt Mamma sent it with him, she’s been canning more and more and last year’s jams and jellies are being chased off of the basement shelves. The two make their way to the beach, walking down the sand until they arrive at the Moomin family’s bathing house. Snufkin settles himself onto the planks, removing his boots and allowing his toes to skip across the water. Moomin plops down next to him, bringing the cup of worms along. Snufkin baits his hook and tosses the line out before watching Moomin do the same.
They sit together in silence for quite some time, Moomin occasionally catching Snufkin’s eye and the other will smile slightly and blink slowly at him in the way that Snufkins so often do. The silence is comfortable, Moomin notes. It’s not the kind of silence that occurs after a blunder of words, or when no one knows what to say. It’s a silence between two people who know each other well enough that words just aren’t needed. The only sounds are the swish of Snufkin’s tail twitching against the ground, the pitter patter of paws kicking through the sea, and the gentle babbling of the water against the piles.
Snufkin removes his hat (the day is sunny, but not enough that he needs the brim to shield his eyes) and removes his pipe from his rucksack. Shaking the tobacco pouch into his palm, he packs the pipe, resting his fishing rod between his thighs and a gap in the planks. But when he goes to find his matchbox in his pocket, he can’t seem to find it. It doesn’t come up in his pack either. “Do you have any matches in the bathhouse, Moomin?”
Moomin tilts his head, thinking, before he jumps up and his fishing rod clatters down onto the dock. “Yes, I believe Too-Ticky left the last of hers up in the cupboard! I’ll go check, Snufkin. Wait here!”
With a nod from the other, the troll runs around to the door and begins to search the small cabin. They’re not in the cupboard like he thought, but he just knows that Too-Ticky told him she’d left some supplies here. He finds them up on the top of the doorframe near the stove and has to step up on one of the stores buoys to reach. As he steps down he hears Snufkin hollering from outside, and hurries out to see what’s happened.
“Moomin! Come quickly! You’ve a fish on the line, hold tight now!”
Snufkin’s heels are digging into the wood beneath him, back arched in an effort to reel in the fish. “Oh!” Moomin gasps, before running over to grab the rod alongside him. “Are you alright, Snufkin?”
The mumrik nods. Even with the both of them holding the rod tight in their paws, the fish still tugs hard. Snufkin pulls on the line, and the fish jumps high out of the water. “A big one.” Snufkin remarks, holding the line but no longer reeling. “We’ll have to be careful reeling it in.”
The fish continues to struggle and leap, every few pulls of line earn the pair a glimpse of its silver scales as it jumps and wriggles against the pull of the rod. Moomin pulls the rod towards him, and it looks like they’re close to landing the giant, before Moomin is pulled back, and the pair, still gripping the rod, is pulled into the ocean.
The sting of salt water hits both their eyes and the shock causes Moomin to let go of the rod. Snufkin tries to hold on to it as well, but the line snaps as he attempts to dig his feet into the sand, and he stumbles over into the water again.
Moomin laughs.
“Oh no, what a fish! What a nasty way to lose it, huh Snufkin?”
Snufkin wrings out his hat, giving it a few shakes before tossing it back onto the dock above him. He sticks out his tongue, trying to rid his mouth of the seawater taste. “Yes, I suppose so.” He pulls himself onto the dock, the water they’d fallen into was luckily shallow enough to stand in. Then he holds a paw out for Moomin, which is gladly taken, and heaves his friend onto dry land. Moomin shakes his fur out, though unsuccessfully, and Snufkin lays his jacket and hat out to dry in the sun. The two lie out in a sunbeam, tired.
“What a shame, I’d thought Moominmamma could’ve dried that out for jerky.”
That gets a chuckle from the troll. “No, a big fish like that deserves a big dinner! Something like her fish bake. That’s always so tasty, isn’t it? And we could put the bones out on a tray to pick clean…” Snufkin hums low at this, his eyes closed. They sit like that for a while, imagining all the possible meals a fish that size could provide, before lapsing back into that comfortable silence.
Moomin watches the clouds pass by. One looks like a wolf, and then one comes along that looks like Sniff, and he points it out to Snufkin, who remarks that it looks like Sniff but only if his snout was stung by a bee.
After a while, Moomin gets up to retie his fishing lure. When he goes to ask Snufkin for the hooks though, he notices the mumrik is fast asleep, tail curled around him ever-so-slightly. His paws are closed into fists, though not the fists one makes when they’re having a nightmare. Moomin thinks he just looks… Peaceful.
He finds another hook by himself, opting to let his friend rest. Every so often, the trolls gaze migrates over to the sleeping Snufkin, who’s not quite snoring, but is making soft noises in his sleep. ‘What could he be dreaming of?’ Moomintroll thinks. ‘Maybe of eating the big fish… or of travelling’. Snufkin’s tail twitches a bit in his sleep and Moomin reaches out hesitantly to touch the tuft at the end. It’s not like his own, the hair covering it is a scratchier, like the hair on Snufkin’s head. Moomin’s own coat is soft, yet thin, but Snufkin has denser, wiry fur that sticks up at odd angles. ‘Might be the lack of brushing’ Moomin muses.
He fishes idly for a while, bringing two medium sized perch up. They won’t have quite the feast that he’d imagined, but they would be good for dinner. He gathers up their things (Snufkin’s pipe has been knocked over in the earlier commotion, and Moomin sets it next to his friend) before gently shaking Snufkin by the shoulder. He makes an odd sound, mirrp, and opens one eye. “Oh, hullo Moomin. Did I doze off?”
“Yes,” Moomin says, nodding. “But I caught some fish to make up for the one we lost earlier. It’s getting dark though! We should head back to Moominhouse.”
Snufkin makes a noise of agreement before sitting up and stretching tall. He shuffles on his pack and rolls out the kink in his neck before taking his rod and the bucket of fish from the other. They head up the trail to the house, discussing dreams as they go.
--
When they arrive back home, Moominmamma eagerly takes the fish from them, and listens to their story. She ends up grilling the perch skin-on, which is a delight. There’s fresh orange juice at the table, along with fresh bread rolls and the pasta they made earlier, now coated in a cream sauce. The pot of seawater from the stove is finally finished boiling off, so Mamma gently scrapes the soft crystals from the bottom of the pot, placing them in a glass jar. When only a little remains, she lets the waiting guests all take a finger and sweep the bottom of the pot, resting a few grains of pillowy salt on the tips of their tongues. Sniff’s face scrunches up at the taste, and everyone laughs as he downs his juice in big gulps.
When everyone finishes dessert (cherry jam with biscuits) and dishes are done, Moomin and Snufkin sneak off down to Snufkin’s tent. Moomin talks about things said at the table, and Snufkin sits down and snuffs out the lantern beside him, quieting the troll.
“Look,” Snufkin says, pointing up to the night sky. “I wanted to share this with you.”
Moomin looks up, and the night sky is full of stars. Any clouds from earlier in the day have been blown away, and the stars illuminate the sky like fireflies, impossibly still. But what Snufkin is pointing to isn’t the stars, it’s the shimmering green-blue of the lights above them. They stretch across the sky like ribbons, dancing like waves. Moomin gasps, putting a paw to his mouth. He stays speechless for a while, before he finally says a quiet “Thank you” to Snufkin. They lie on their backs in the grass, bellies full, and minds wandering.
Hours later, when Little My goes to fetch them for bed, she finds them both asleep in the grass, tails intertwined.