Listen to the Water | FULL SERIES | Wattys 2022 Shortlist | ✔

(8) Taiki: All of Both

I can't stop the stinging in my eyes. My secret is out now. I didn't want to tell it at first, but I understand more of what Yaz has told me about this now. How people often don't change their minds until an issue is personal to them—until someone they know turns out to be on what they perceive as the other side. But I also understand the fear. This conversation will move now. In what direction, I can't tell.

"Please don't tell anyone yet," I sign. It's a pathetic attempt to stop the current I've unblocked already; if Satomi or Naina decides to stop respecting me now, there's nothing I can do about it. They could tell the whole tribe and village, and the other tribe, and the other village, if they wanted to.

"I won't," signs Naina.

Satomi doesn't answer for longer. My temptation to say I was lying mounts high enough to burn me, until Naina elbows Satomi with a stern look.

"Fine," signs Satomi, but she looks disturbed. "You really don't want anyone to know?"

"I want to be the one to tell them."

"I think that's fair," signs Naina. Satomi opens her mouth like she wants to argue, but Naina shoots her another look. She shuts her mouth again.

"How long has it been?" she signs instead. She hasn't asked if it's okay to ask questions, but I don't think it's going to cross her mind unless I point it out, and I only have so much energy for this conversation. It's already draining me at record speed.

"I was ten."

She gapes at me. "Wait. Is that where you went for... how long was it?"

"Three years."

"You didn't even visit. Everyone I asked thought you were gone, and we'd only just found you. Where were you?"

I'm struck by a sudden and powerful aversion to telling her. Revealing myself is one thing. Exposing Lix'i to any potential consequences is another.

"An island," I sign.

"No duh. Where?"

"I don't want to say."

"Were you in one place the whole time?"

"Yes."

"Did they attack you? How did you get in?"

My eyes are prickling again. The words in my head are that Lix'i was kinder than this. They didn't ask questions. Or maybe they did, and I just don't remember. But I have some of my clearest childhood memories from my arrival there, and I don't think anyone raised a fuss. Then again, I was ten. Maybe that had something to do with it.

"They didn't attack me."

"Did they know Shalda-sign? How did you communicate?"

She doesn't get it. Either she's still in denial about just how much I integrated—"half Karu" should have told her everything she needs to know—or she genuinely isn't thinking. Like a Shalda-Kel being welcomed to a Karu island and learning their language is too many steps outside her understanding for her imagination to fill in the gaps. Or maybe it's me who's having trouble understanding her lack of understanding, because I've spent so long around other Kel peoples that some of these things are second nature to me. I don't assume everyone knows or needs to know my native language, for one. It's why I've learned so many.

"Taiki?"

She wants an answer. I rest my face in my hands, then drop them and sign, "I know their language."

"Oh my gosh. Really? Then why didn't you use it six years ago, when we were fighting for that island for the squid to spawn on?"

"That was a different language."