'Maki! Maki Koala, are you up there?' Handy, standing at the base of her tree, called.
'Why yes, I am, Handy,' Maki, a carpenter koala, looked down at him from the window of her tree house. 'I'll be right down.'
She opened the trap door in the floor of the house and started down the ladder that led to the ground. After descending, she turned to him. 'How are you today, Handy?'
'Fine, just fine. I thought I would come over and bring you that wood you ordered. It's right here in my wagon.' He pulled a cover off the cargo in the rear of the open-backed wooden wagon, to which two sturdy anteaters were hitched in the front.
'My, that looks like wonderful wood! And some of the pieces are long enough to make floor boards!' Maki was delighted.
'Well, I know you have several orders for tree houses, so you'll need as many long boards as you can get. I'm just sorry I couldn't smooth them out a bit more.'
'Oh, don't worry about that, Handy. After all, I'm a carpenter. I have all the tools I need to smooth down and sand the pieces, but without your help, we never could have brought them here from Koalaville. There is so much lumber we left there when we all moved over to Eucalyptus Grove, and I suspect it'll be months before we're able to have everything transported over here. Wait, I'll go up and get your pay.'
'Oh, you don't have to pay me now. I've got some work to attend to, and don't need the almonds now.'
'All right, but they're here whenever you want to come over and get them. I'll tell my father how much it costs, so maybe he can pay you when you see him,' Maki assured him.
'Well, I'll be over in Koalaville again in a couple of days. I'll bring back some more wood, and you can pay me for the lot when I deliver it.'
'Fine,' said Maki. 'Can't I help you unload it?'
'No, it's pretty heavy. I'd better do it.' Maki watched as Handy unloaded the larger pieces of wood. 'Well, I can at least take out the small pieces,' she said, and began to do just that.
Handy couldn't help but admire Maki, as did almost every koala who knew her. Always even-tempered and polite, she had built a reputation for herself by helping her father to craft the very first tree houses in Southern Koalaland, all of them based on their own designs. She had constructed her first one a few years before, back when they all lived in Koalaville, and had made several others, though the last one remained incomplete, since the sudden migration to Eucalyptus Grove had rendered it senseless to even consider finishing it, for there would no longer be anyone there to use it.
Nonetheless, the experience she had gathered while making tree houses had taught Maki a lot about how to form the boards for the floor, shaping them just right so that they made a natural fit with the tree branches on which they rested, and had taught her the value of crafting wooden joints to hold the boards together, instead of relying on nails. Experiments had shown her that which her father had always told her: due to the gentle swaying of the branches, nails would eventually come loose, and the boards would separate. Joints, on the other hand, offered flexibility as well as strength to the construction; a tree house whose boards were held together by joints would almost always last for many years. Maki Koala was a perfectionist by nature, for whom quality was a must in everything she did.
Maki was a young adult koala in her best years, and though modest and unassuming, possessed an attractiveness of the kind valued by those who were capable of seeing beyond the superficial – which is not to suggest she was homely. Indeed, her grey fur was delightfully soft, and shimmered in the sunlight. Her nose, more pinkish brown than black, was relatively small. Her hands, skilled yet delicate, seldom gestured when she spoke, and when they did, they always moved with a sort of simple grace that revealed at once both great refinement as well as natural femininity, qualities not in the least diminished by the plain grey overalls she usually wore while she was working.
But her most attractive feature was her eyes: dark, very gentle eyes that reflected common sense and uncommon perception, as well as knowledge of the kind that isn't gained from books, but that seems to be innate, the sort of 'knowing' that many equate with what we call wisdom. Maki Koala was wise beyond her years, and that quality, coupled with her compassion for all creatures, great and small, was what made everyone sense that she was truly someone very special.
'I guess I'll be going now, Maki,' Handy said, climbing up onto the wagon's seat and picking up the reins.
'Good-bye Handy, and thanks again. You were such a big help!'
'Glad to oblige. I'll see you in a few days.' He shook the reins, and the anteaters began to move, pulling the wagon with relative ease now that the wood had been unloaded. 'Bye! And give my best regards to your father!' he called back to her.
'Thank you! I will!'
Maki picked up a large waterproof cloth that was neatly folded up next to the base of the tree. She carefully unfolded it and then spread it out over the pile of wood, in order to make sure it was protected. She would go to work sanding the boards the next morning. But now, she wanted to go prepare supper. Her father would be home soon, and she was looking forward to a nice meal with him. After supper, they would settle down for a good night's sleep. Maki always thought that was the best part of the day!