Isolation & Fear (Damned of the 2/19th Book Seven)

The Back Yard

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I stared at him as he finished eating. He was dressed in his furs again, that big black knife on his hip. I was wearing a dress I'd woven on the loom, warm comfortable moccasins on my feet. I didn't bother to wonder where he'd learned all these skills. He'd told me that he'd been an Eagle Scout, I'd met his father, and I knew William often made things out of leather and had a whole bunch of leatherworking tools in his room.

The odd thing was he didn't look any older with the beard, mustache, and long hair. His face still held that taut wariness that had been there as long as I'd known him, the scars on his face were still red on his tanned face, but he still looked so young. He wore an eyepatch of brown leather, tied to his head with three pieces of soft brown leather strips no thicker than a strand of spaghetti.

I had to remember that he was only twenty. If that. I didn't know if his birthday had passed while we had lived here.

"Stillwater," I said. He looked up at me, cocking his head slightly and frowning. "Anthony Stillwater. That's your name."

He nodded, slowly.

"Do you remember me?" I asked him. He shook his head. "Heather Cromwell. Remember me? Out at Atlas?"

His brow furrowed as he thought. Then he shook his head again.

"Nagle. Do you remember Nagle?" I asked, flinching inside and worrying that he'd react violently.

Again, he shook his head.

"Two-nineteenth?" I tried. Another headshake. "Can you talk?"

He sat there for a moment, then shrugged.

"I need you to talk, Stillwater, I need to hear another human's voice," I said. I got up and sat next to him, taking his right hand. His pinky still jutted up at an angle when his fingers were relaxed, the joint in it destroyed from too many boxer's fractures. "Please, Stillwater, I need to hear a voice beyond my own."

He stared at me for a long time.

"I like it here," he said. His voice was rough, like he'd been inhaling CS all day.

"I know," I told him. I could understand, I really could. Compared to the Hell he'd been living since 1984, compared to his childhood before he'd been adopted, this was a peaceful and comfortable existence.

"Do your eyes hurt?" He asked me. His voice was still scratchy, uneven, so I picked up the jug of fermented juice, pulled the wax lined copper lid off, poured him some juice, and replaced the lid. Jesus, he spent most of his awake time calmly working on stuff. He'd carried back that massive comb of honey, wrapped in cattail stalks with the corn-dog looking heads still intact. He'd roasted them, put butter on them, and gave me one.

It had tasted pretty good.

"Just when its bright," I told him.

"I like them. They're lavender," he told me.

That made me frown. My eyes had been blue.

"Are you sure?" I asked him. He nodded. "Damn."

I sipped on my thick berry juice "wine" and thought about it. "Anthony?" He looked at me. "Can you get us off the mountain? Get us home?"

He frowned and put his hand on the table. "Home." He said firmly.

I shook my head. "No, Tony, this isn't our home. We belong with other people. People like Bomber."