Refuge

Chapter 11

I continued chopping the wood until there was a decent-sized pile of firewood for me to carry in. I looked up to see the two still sitting there in the grass perfectly content."What're you two doing exactly?"

"Just hanging out," Yatrinya answered.

"Aren't you bored?"

"Aren't you exhausted from chopping all that wood?"

"Nah, kid stuff"

"Hey, is that white thing yours? I think it fell out of your pocket" I looked to the ground and saw the little laminated paper Katie had given me. I picked it up and realized I'd forgotten about it. I picked it up and instantly recognized it.

It's the paper they'd held up to my hair. It listed what job you had been assigned depending on your hair color. I held it up to a strand of my unbrushed blue hair just to see for myself.

My eyes went wide, "$&@*, I'm not meant to be here" I whispered and gasped at the same time.

"They misplaced you," Mark said softly, "it's our father's doing. It was no mistake in the grand scheme of things"

"Your dad works in this $&#* operation?"

"He works in all operations," Yatrinya informed me.

"That &$#* $#&* #$&*$#&* $#&*. I could've put down this entire operation if I'd just killed him as he checked my hair. Sorry, I know he's yall's dad but you know"

"Don't worry, you couldn't've killed our father, only the soldier he used," Mark answered unconcerned.

I was about to say something else when I heard, "Jessie!" from inside the building.

"Hey guys I've gotta go, you seem pretty cool. Please don't rat me out"

"We gotch' you," Yatrinya answered.

"See you tomorrow?" Mark wondered.

"Maybe," I responded before shoving the card in my bra for safekeeping, grabbing a handful of firewood, just before slowing down, putting my normal attitude on my face, and walking inside.

"Hey Jessie! Would you mind putting that wood in there, we're about to put pasta in"

I didn't reply and walked over to where there were three metal stoves that had large rusted pots with boiling water atop them. There were two of the giant pots on each and the wood supply in each of them had grown small. I restocked each of them and used a large metal shovel to make sure it was in securely before walking over to see what Katie was up to.

She and the others had each a couple of decently sized balls of dough. She then announced, "Okay people, this is great so far but we're not done yet! Let's use this entire counter space to flatten these balls into one giant strip!"

They all followed her commands and did as she asked. Soon the entire island had been reached in pasta dough. "Where's my artists?" she asked. Three raised their hands. "Okay," she continued, "I want y'all to make some straight strips with this! Not long ways but width wise! About a quarter of an inch each, but no perfectionism. You start on this end and you to the other! Let's do this!"

It looked super boring so I told Katie, "I'm going back out"

"Okay, thanks for the help!"

I walked outside to see Yatrinya and Mark sitting on the grass reading. "Whatcha reading?"

"The Bible"

"Oh sorry, I'll just get to chopping wood"

"You're fine, do you have a Bible?"

"No of course not," I replied, more than ready to move onto a different topic.

"Well then here," she said reaching into her jacket's hidden pocket.

"No, I wouldn't want to take that from you," I said evasively.

"No, I insist, besides, we have plenty at home"

"No thanks, I don't have an interest in having one"

"Okay, we can't force you to take it, but if you ever get bored it sure can give you something to do"

"Okay, thanks for the tip but I'm good"

"Here," Mark said inching closer to the fence, "I'll lay it here on the stump in case you change your mind," He said carefully squeezing it through the fence.

"Okay thanks for the consideration, but no offense I'm not Christian and I'm not gonna take it," I honestly told them.

"Okay, we appreciate your honesty and we hope that you won't let our Christianity to get in the way of communion-ship between us," Mark replied.

"No of course not, and also just curious but did your father have different wives because you look sort of American and Portarican, while you look kind of native American decent mixed with Vietnamese with Mexican too"

They both burst out laughing, which embarrassed me greatly but I hid it underneath my expression and Mark said, "We are related through blood but not our own. We are siblings in Christ but very distant in relation otherwise. I'm Portiriquan and American like you guessed and she's... um, Yatrinya would you mind?"

"I'm slightly Korean, Native American, Mexican, a little bit Israeli, and a lot of Vietnamese; so pretty much everywhere"

"Wow..." I replied. That's a lot of history in one person.

"So what're you?" Yatrinya asked.

"Ummm, you know what that's a good question," I embarrassingly said. They both chuckled and shook it off with a chuckle. I decided that I didn't want this job taken away from me so while we talked I decided to make myself useful and chop the wood as well.

By the time the conversation had begun to die down I had chopped every log section in the yard. The pile of firewood was almost as tall as me and much wider too. "Did you really do all that in the past two hours or am I seeing things?" Mark asked.

"Huh, I guess I did," I marveled at my accomplishment, "If you don't mind I've worked up a thirst"

"I hope to see you tomorrow Jessie," Yatrinya said standing u[p and duasting her pants.

"I hope so too, see y'all," I said walking towards the door.