The Princess with the Shiny Shoes

Once upon a time there was a very busy woman, who tried very hard to look after her family. Most of the time she did this with a happy heart but sometimes she would be lonely and would be cranky with the ones she loved the most. She had become so busy that she had no time to clean her shoes. Her husband had died eighteen years before and she had lived without love (well, almost) for a long time. Sometimes she would even be cranky with him for dying. Time passed and suitors came and went, none had the right stuff. She accepted her single status and resigned to live her life for her family.

One day a silver haired knight rode up on his silvery steed to her humble cottage. He had come to check on his travelling carriage that he had garaged in her yard as there was no room for it at his castle. This knight and his lady had been dear and treasured friends of the woman and her late husband for many years. He, too, was lonely as he had lost his lady to the same illness that had taken the woman's husband. When he was leaving a feeling of tenderness for the woman came over him and he held her face in his hands and kissed her sweetly on the lips. This gentle touch was soft like the flutter of a butterfly's wing, but it seared itself into the woman's heart.

Over the waxing and waning of the next moon, the knight found love with the woman and she with him. The knight calls the woman his princess and last week he stayed at her cottage and helped her by doing those simple fixing up things that men do. But the most amazing thing he did for her (well almost, this is, after all a children's story) was the polishing of the shoes. I am sure the princess with the shiny shoes will live happily ever after with her silver haired knight.