Chapter 9-1
2016 Words
Morning sunlight came in through the large window along with the sounds of birds chirping and the sweet scents of summer, waking Anna from the best night"s sleep she"d had in recent memory. Even with the troubling thoughts of Dex, she had drifted off into a peaceful slumber.
Anna smiled, then pressed her cheek into the pillow. She squeezed her eyes shut. A few more minutes, she thought to herself. Just a few more minutes. I don"t want to get out of bed yet.
A few more minutes,Just a few more minutes. I don"t want to get out of bed yet.There was no denying it, however; she was awake. Awake and well-rested for that matter. Was it strange that she felt so safe in a stranger"s home? She had never been one to trust too easily.
She sat up.
Raising her arms into the air, Anna felt her mouth stretch in a yawn. She tossed her head about, sending blonde hair flying. On your feet, Lenai, she told herself. You"ve still got work to do.
On your feet, Lenai,You"ve still got work to do.She hopped out of bed and took in her surroundings. The apartment was a bit more orderly than she would have expected from a young man like Jack: just a couch facing a television and beyond that a kitchen where wooden cupboards lined both walls near the corner, broken only by what appeared to be the oven and the refrigerator. At least, she thought that big white thing was the refrigerator. Appliances on this world looked so very different from those she knew. Still, she was happy. Unjustifiably happy given everything that had happened, but she decided to go with it.
Biting her lower lip, Anna nodded to herself. There"s an elegant simplicity to this place, she thought, tucking her shirt into the waistband of her shorts. Almost as though Jack doesn"t want to be burdened by too many possessions.
There"s an elegant simplicity to this place,Almost as though Jack doesn"t want to be burdened by too many possessions.Anna fell forward, slapping hands down on the carpet and thrusting her feet into the air. She walked across the room on her hands, then flipped upright to land upon the chilly kitchen floor tiles.
A cheerful disposition put her in the mood for a hearty breakfast. Pulling open the refrigerator revealed a pitcher full of orange juice, packs of meat and cheese and a carton of eggs. Eggs! She couldn"t remember the last time she had had eggs, and she had a mind to repay her host"s generosity.
It didn"t take long to locate a frying pan or to figure out how to operate the stove; within a few minutes, she was ready to go. Even tracking down the cooking oil had been simple enough. Just a dab on the finger and a quick taste to make sure it wasn"t some sort of dish soap or something like that. She had never realized just how difficult life could be when you couldn"t read.
Cracking an egg on the counter, Anna split the shell and let the yoke drop into the frying pan. Oil sizzled with a satisfying hiss and she got to work. Nothing demonstrated affection more than a home-cooked meal, in her opinion.
The door opened.
Jack stepped in with a plastic bag in his hand, dressed in a pair of dark blue jeans and a gray t-shirt. “Good morning, Anna,” he said, shutting the door behind him and making his way into the kitchen. “You didn"t have to cook. I would have taken care of that.”
He smiled, bowing his head to her. Those bangs over his forehead were particularly messy today. “I got you something. Just consider it a welcome-to-the-neighbourhood gift.”
Anna looked up to meet his gaze, slowly arching a thin eyebrow. “What might that be?” she inquired. “I wasn"t aware that I merited a gift on top of everything else.”
“I figured you needed something to wear.” He snatched a t-shirt out of the bag and held it against his chest. It was the same t-shirt that had won her over – the dark blue one with the adorable green dinosaur. “What do you think?”
“So, you have a pretty girl in your apartment with almost nothing to wear and your response to this is to bring her more clothing?” The irony was delicious. “I don"t know if I should be impressed with your chivalry or worried that I"m not as cute as I think I am.”
moreJack flashed a grin, his face growing redder and redder. He lowered his eyes to the floor. “Well, um…” he mumbled. “That is um…I just thought it would be appropriate to help you with-”
“I"m joking, dummy!”
Anna lifted the frying pan, then scraped up a large hunk of scrambled eggs with her spatula. She dumped them onto a plate. “Honestly,” she teased. “It"s like all they see is a cute behind. They completely forget my propensity for quick quips.”
She handed him the plate.
“I"ll go change into something "appropriate," and you can appease my fragile ego by telling me how gorgeous I am.”
A few minutes later, she emerged from the bathroom in a pair of blue jeans and the t-shirt with the adorable green dinosaur. A little jolt of excitement went through her when she saw that her host enjoyed her cooking. He stood in the kitchen with the plate in one hand, scooping up the last of his meal.
Jack popped a fork into his mouth. He closed his eyes, chewing thoroughly with a satisfied grunt. “An,” he said. “Can I call you "An?" These are some incredibly delicious eggs. I didn"t know you could cook.”
Slipping hands into her pockets, she moseyed into the living room with her head down. “So what do you think?” she asked with a shrug. “Does it suit me? Will I blend in with a crowd?”
“Congratulations, An,” he said. “You are now a ten-year-old boy.”
Anna felt her face redden and turned her head to break eye-contact. “Well, I do have that boyish figure,” she teased. “Smear some dirt on my face, skin my knees raw and I"ll fit right in.”
When she looked up, Jack was trying his best not to look at her, blushing as though the topic embarrassed him. Had she said something offensive? “Oh, you"ve looked,” she said with a dismissive wave of her hand. “Don"t be ashamed of it! You weren"t vulgar like the people I met on the street and it"s…”
She trailed off there, refusing to say anything more. The simple fact was she knew very little of the customs of this world, and nothing made people touchier than the subject of s*x. Relying on her innate sense of what was appropriate would be a mistake.
When you got right down to it, it was nice to be looked at, so long as the one doing the looking saw you as a person and not a thing. The whole point of her comment was to entice him to…well, flirting must work differently here.
well, flirting must work differently here.Biting his lip, Jack closed his eyes tight. He turned his face up to the ceiling and let out a sigh. “Anna…” he began. “You are…well, you"re very beautiful. It"s just that while you"re a guest in my home…”
How odd.
He seemed to be feeling guilty. Was he completely oblivious that she had been encouraging his attention? After flirting with her so effortlessly not one day earlier? What are you doing, Lenai? A symbiont"s life was on the line, and she didn"t have time to puzzle out the thoughts of a young man. It was just…well, there was a good chance that she would be dead in a few days, and charming, honourable men were in short supply.
encouragingWhat are you doing, Lenai?“There"s nothing wrong with your body…” Jack went on.
Anna smiled up at him, holding his gaze. She batted her eyes to put him off guard. “I like the way I look, dear,” she replied. “All joking aside, my ego is not so fragile that you need to stammer out compliments.”
“I"m sorry,” he muttered. “I should have realized you were just messing with me. Anyway, if you feel up to leaving the apartment, there"s something I"d like to show you.”
“What"s that?”
Jack grinned. “Come with me.”
A white-tiled floor stretched from the library"s front entrance to a curved reception desk where an old woman sat with her head buried in a novel. Metal bookshelves lined the walls to her left and right, blocking out sunlight that came in through the windows, each practically overflowing with books.
And that was just the first floors. At the back of the room, a set of stairs rose up to the second story. Anna had never seen so much knowledge gathered in one place. On her world, e-readers were used to conserve paper. You could access just about anything from the palm of your hand. True, paper books still existed, but most were kept safe and never touched. A collector"s item.
Anna grinned, tilting her head back. She felt her eyebrows climb up. “Well, this is certainly unexpected!” she exclaimed. “I wish I could spend days here just gobbling up every last scrap of knowledge.”
She glanced over her shoulder.
Grinning down at the floor, Jack squeezed his eyes shut. He shook his head in wry amusement. “You"ve never seen a library before?” he asked, keeping his voice low. “Not once in your life?”
“Let"s just say I have most of my books in soft copy.”
“There"s something sad about that.”
Red-cheeked, Anna smiled down at herself. She brushed a lock of hair away from her face. “Guess I"m the most boring girl you"ve ever met,” she said, “talking about how much I want to gobble up knowledge.”
“Boring is not a word I"d use to describe you.”
BoringHe led her to a wooden table in the corner that was bathed in warm sunlight from a window on each wall. A few old books – some with tattered covers – were stacked upon the table"s surface. The leftovers of students who had been doing research? Libraries still existed on her world, but they were used mainly as a place of study. Physical copies of books were still printed, but they were kept safe in vaults so that the knowledge could be preserved in the event of disaster.
Anna dropped into a wooden chair. It felt a little strange to be learning how to read again, but if she survived the next few weeks, there was a good chance she would be living her life here. She would have to adapt. “Where do we begin?” she asked. “When I was a child, my favourite book was called The Moons of Myria.”
The Moons of MyriaJack sat next to her.
“I figured we"d start with something simple,” he explained. “You already know how to speak the language, so now all we have to do is teach you to associate text with sounds. So, Anna, let me introduce you to the English alphabet.”
“In a…hole…in the…groan…ground! In a hole in the ground, there lived a…hoe-bit?” Remarkable. Simply remarkable. After only three hours, Anna had advanced from learning basic vowel sounds to reading books that most people didn"t tackle until their early teens. Jack had never seen anything like it.
- Writer
