The Lonliest of Girls (or How Aga Came To Be)

It was one of the few sunny days of the summer and Ziggy, Lennard, Sylvia, aaron and Mordechai were taking full advantage of it by messing around by the river. The boys were having a great time building little boats out of sheets of paper and sending them on their merry way down the stream.

However, Mordechai (Lennards’ imaginary friend), had noticed that Sylvia, who was sitting a little distance away from the ship builders, was lookin’ a little blue…

“What’s up Syl?” asked Mordechai. “Oh…nothing…” replied Sylvia in a tone that Mordechai recognized instantly…that of someone who was longing for a friend.

Mordechai returned to the other guys and discretely told them what he thought was up with Syl…Ziggys’ imaginary friend, aaron, seemed a little upset that he had failed to noticed Sylvias’ blue mood right under his nose and was determined to do something about it.

So Ziggy and Lennard set about building a new paper boat big enough for aaron and Mordechai to fit in and sent them on their way to Anomelea, the land that only friends of the imaginary persuasion can go to. Once there, they searched valley and mountain, sea and shore, forest and city but still could not find anything they felt worthy of being able to cheer Sylvia up.

Defeated, they headed to ‘Pintos Pint’, the imaginary bar in which they had first met. After a good few drinks, aaron noticed a striking young girl sitting by herself at the far end of the bar and aaron, being the kind gentleman he was, decided he simply must go and talk to her.

But no sooner had aaron sat down than the girl had burst into floods of tears, weeping hysterically. Perplexed at having such a strange effect on a girl, aaron looked around the room for some help. Mordechai joined them and together they managed to calm her down a little bit. The girl went on to tell them that her ‘real-life’ friend had just been involved in a terrible car accident and had…well, had not made it. This is why the girl was crying.

And for the first time a sudden realization came to aaron and Mordechai… It was not just real-life people that needed imaginary friends, but it was also imaginary people that needed real-life friends…the yang to the ying. Mordechai knew what to do… “I’ve got it!” he proclaimed. “Great!” Replied aaron, “because I left my wallet back in the real world.” “No,” explained Mordechai, “This is the solution to our problem.”

And after a great deal of persuasion, they managed to convince the girl to come back to the real world with them, something she had avoided doing since the terrible accident. When they again reached the shore, it seemed to Lenny, Zig and Syl that they had only been gone a few minutes but, of course, to aaron and Mordechai it had been weeks. The girl, who they only just realized was wearing a very nifty pair of roller skates, glided onto the shore, determined to keep herself together. Sylvia, very slowly, walked up to her and looked her up and down…

“You can see me?!” asked the girl, amazed. “Sure,” replied Sylvia, “I used to have those same skates when I was a little girl.” And for the first time since they had met her, the girl smiled. “My names Sylvia. What’s yours?” asked Syl.

aaron and Mordechai, who were looking very pleased with themselves, realized that in all the excitement to get the two to meet, they had completely forgotten introductions. The girl continued to smile and held out her hand to Sylvia… “My names Aga…pleasure to meet you!”

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