The Melody of Home

A short story about nothing

Happy Monday!

My brother who’s been receiving a lot of airtime on my Instagram stories lately- has been getting a lot of requests to guest on my Substack. This morning, he emailed me a short story he came up with in the middle of the night. Now, I know most of you were expecting him to come in hot and spill some NFL secrets. But instead, he surprised me. The first thing he wants to share is a fictional story—something gentle and a little magical to balance out the dark exposés I’ve been writing lately.

I told him if he wanted to publish it, he’d have to narrate it himself and draw an illustration.

He said yes.

So, I present to you:

STORY HOUR WITH ANDY

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Prologue from Andy:

Hi friends,

Lately, I feel as a society, we’ve lost a bit of our sense of wonder.

Last night, as I was falling asleep, the idea just came to me. I started telling the story out loud, not knowing exactly where it was going - but something about it felt special. It stirred up memories of a time when life felt simpler. When you knew your neighbors, and they knew you. When small things, like a melody in the air, could feel like magic.

I miss those days.

So this is a story for anyone who’s ever felt that same longing. A little reminder that wonder still lives in quiet places, and sometimes, the smallest people carry the brightest light.

I know this is random and a little fantastical to tell a campfire story on my sister’s Substack. My friend discouraged me from dipping into nostalgic times completely, warning me that nostalgia “makes you poor.”

“Nobody cares about nostalgia,” he said. “They only want the new thing.”

I didn’t write this for external validation. I’m writing this as a middle finger to the darkness that is being exposed each day. I know how bad things are. This is not me turning a blind eye to what’s wrong, but more about me putting my energy into a different basket- a basket full of strawberries instead of coal. Until things lighten up, I choose fiction.

-Andy

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“The Melody of Home”

By Andy Hagen

Narration:

There once was a boy named Piper. He didn’t go anywhere without a flute in his hands. Step by step, he’d blow into his flute and the world would sing with him.

Piper got the flute on his seventh birthday, a gift from his mother. She worked long shifts at the sawmill by the railroad tracks. The sound of the trains, wheezing, whistling, rushing past, was the closest thing she knew to music. She couldn’t carry a tune, couldn’t even whistle, but she hoped Piper would be different.

When she placed the slender silver flute in his hands, he lifted it to his lips and played a single proud note—and for a moment, the wind outside stopped to listen.

From that day on, Piper and his flute were never apart.

They lived in the small, cobblestone village of Attica, New York, tucked between golden hills and whispering woods. Every Sunday, like clockwork, Piper would walk barefoot through the winding lanes, knocking on doors with a gentle tap and a bright smile. As the villagers opened the doors to their homes, he played: soft lullabies for the weary, cheerful tunes for the lonely, lively jigs for children who clapped and twirled in delight.

His music was sunlight in sound. Warm, golden, and impossible to ignore.

To Attica, he was more than just a boy. He was their boy joy-bringer. Their weekly wonder. Their little bit of magic.

But one Sunday morning, everything changed.

Piper woke to find his flute missing.

He searched every corner of his home, from beneath his bed to the rafters in the ceiling. He turned his drawers inside out and even crawled under the porch. But it was gone.

Gone without a trace.

Still, he couldn’t bear to let the village down. The show must go on he thought. So he dressed, took a deep breath, and went door to door anyway.

But this time, he danced.

He spun. He leapt. He smiled as wide as he could.

But it wasn’t the same.

One by one, the villagers closed their doors. Some watched with confused frowns. Others simply turned away. There were no claps. No cheers. Just silence.

By the time he reached the end of the village, Piper’s feet were heavy. His smile had vanished. He walked home alone, his heart sinking with every step.

Maybe they never liked me, he thought. Maybe it was only the flute.

In the days that followed, Piper barely left his room. He stopped humming. He stopped smiling. He even stopped eating . His once-bright eyes dimmed, and Attica felt a little bit duller.

And all the while, his older brother Milo watched.

Milo, who had always lived in the quiet shadow of Piper’s music. Milo, who had smiled politely as the village praised his little brother, but inside, felt something sharp twist. Milo, who had taken the flute in the dead of night and hidden it under the floorboards in the old shed, just to see what it would be like to shine for once.

One night, unable to sleep, Piper wandered through the hallway and heard it.

A melody.

His melody.

He followed the sound with cautious steps until he reached Milo’s room. Inside, lit by candlelight, his brother was playing the flute. Unevenly. Nervously. But playing nonetheless.

“You stole it,” Piper whispered.

Milo froze.

“I didn’t mean to… not for this long,” he stammered. “I just… I wanted to know what it felt like. To matter.”

“All of the townsfolk laughed at me, they hated me last Sunday” Piper said softly.

“I didn’t think they’d shut their doors on you,” Milo admitted. “I didn’t think it would hurt you like that.”

Piper said nothing. He walked into the room, took the flute abruptly from Milo’s hands, and left.

That night, he couldn’t sleep. The house felt too small. The village too close.

And so, before the sun rose, Piper was gone.

He left a note on the kitchen table, scrawled hastily on the back of a song sheet:

“Don’t look for me. I don’t belong here anymore.”

He vanished into the woods beyond Attica with nothing but the clothes on his back and the flute clutched to his chest.

Days passed. Then a week. The villagers noticed. The silence on Sunday morning was louder than any song. The children didn’t dance. The elders didn’t clap. And the baker no longer swayed behind the counter.

When Piper’s mother found the note, she wept in the square. “My Piper is gone,” she whispered.

And the village listened.

They gathered in the field where Piper used to play. One by one, they came-old Mr. Lounsberry with his dusty accordion, the blacksmith’s twins with homemade drums, the baker’s daughter with a little tin whistle. Even Milo showed up, eyes red, holding Piper’s worn sheet music.

And then… they played.

It was out of tune. Crooked. Too loud in the wrong places and too soft in others. But it was full of heart. They played the melody Piper had made famous…the one he always ended with, as the sky turned orange and gold.

For a while, there was only wind.

Then - twigs cracking. Leaves parting.

Piper burst from the trees, wild-haired and wide-eyed, flute in hand.

“Stop playing!” he shouted, breathless. “You’re ruining it!”

The music stopped. The villagers froze. His mother ran to him and wrapped him in her arms. Milo stood, unsure, watching with hope and shame tangled together in his throat.

Piper looked around at all of them, awkward, out of breath, completely stunned.

“Why are you all here?”

Milo stepped forward.

“We didn’t come for the music,” he said. “We came for you.”

Piper stared. For a long time, he said nothing.

Then, slowly, he raised his flute to his lips.

And he played - not the songs of sorrow, not the songs of doubt. But something new. A tune that rose and fell like laughter, like wind through summer grass. A melody full of forgiveness, warmth, and home.

And when the last note faded into the dusk, the villagers clapped - not because it was perfect, but because their Piper had come back.

And Attica never forgot again that the magic was never in the flute.

It was always in the boy.

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We’re sitting here crying and laughing as we listen to his first attempt at being a children’s book narrator. He said fruit instead of flute. Whoops.

“Who am I?” Andy asked. He’s having an existential crisis wondering why he wrote a story about a boy named Piper.

I don’t know. Sometimes the weirdest ideas come to you at night.

We welcome everyone here to go think of a short story of your own. It could be about anything. A box of tissues that never runs out that cures the whole world #MAWA.

Andy wants to leave you with this:

Life is all about moments in time. And right now we are having one together: I’m reading you a bedtime story at 5:00 PM on a Monday, one you didn’t ask for.

Andy is already counting down the days until Kathy Lee Gifford invites him on Good Morning America to discuss his award-winning new children’s book called “The Melody of Home.” Don’t tell him she retired. All we have in this life are our dreams.