fandomhigh | Library; Wednesday [ 10/02 ]

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Library; Wednesday [ 10/02 ]

Adah limped into the library this Wednesday, October the Second, supposedly the Year of Their Lord Two Thousand Seven without the usual armful of books; it was a sad moment for her, really, as she instead had to clutch to a thermos of hot tea to aid in soothing her throat, which was inexplicably sore these past few days. She felt unbalanced without the books. And she let out a soft sigh when she saw the stack of books that needed to be put away on the desk, waiting for her, as though her usual stack was displaced, leaning tower of literature.

She dropped into the chair, looking at them idly, and decided that she'd just read them instead of putting them away.

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And River, true to her nature, which meant that Adah was glad for it, sure seemed to jump a lot. The babbling rapids of her disjointed thoughts had Adah's own brain bouncing everywhere but Adah, who liked to walk a straight, balanced path when she could, tried to capitalize on one, grab on as tightly as her one hand could, and go with it. She clung, of course, to Death. Death was certain, solid, inevitable. Rooted in a basic occurrence that few could ever escape. She idly thought that Death must be like what she read about in a psychological study, bipolar, completely rampant and unruly one minute, striking left and right like a child with a tantrum over a toy he thought he wanted merely because he could not have it, to a soft, gentle, coddling sort of thing. Death of a sister, serpent suddenly lashing out with a blue tongue, against the death of an elderly Tata, with the dust of a full life clinging to his black as midnight skin, curling up in the corner of his home one day and never even realizing that Death had even visited, so silent was his arrival and departure.

River looked down, studying her outstretched fingers. "Have killed," she said quietly. "Protecting my friends." And because others wanted her to, before that. "Insane cannibals. I'm a secret weapon."

The words came easily, and it surprised her. It was a secret, one she rarely told, or one she hid in plain sight. Part of her mind had obviously wanted Adah to know. "Want to know if one day you'll turn your head away in horror." Blair had, after all.

Adah's eyes went up and rested on River's face for a moment with her mind relatively quiet for a rare moment, piecing together the words carefully to make sure she was understanding them correctly. She blinked. Despite herself, she thought of the newspaper brought in by the Underdowns when they made the futile plea to her parents to take the family out of Kilanga before it was too late, the caricature of the bone-nosed Afrikaan cannibal, but, somehow, she knew this was nothing like what River was referring to. Not even the pygmies and their sharpened teeth for tearing meat would fit the image she way striving for. She'd seen the pygmies with their children; they were more human to her than most civilized people.

Which brought her around, finally, to her conclusion. Why would she turn her way in horror at someone protecting something, when she had to spend three years of her life watching a man blindly leading his family into danger without even realizing they were there, trailing on his shoestrings.

He hadn't even considered leaving after Ruth May died. After Ruth May died because he had carelessly made an enemy of a man who knew how to set a trap. Adah's throat was tight, but it had nothing to do with her affliction now, her eyes filling a little. She'd seen horror; her sisters called him Father, and his disease was blindness not of the eyes, but of the mind. One thing she felt certain River would never be afflicted with. And the whole notion that she would think that Adah would ever even consider her on the same field as that man just boggled her.

There were many reasons to kill; death was just another part of life. Kill micro organisms by bowling water, so they don't kill you. Kill chickens so that you can eat them, so hunger doesn't kill you. Kill insane cannibals, so they don't eat you and kill you.

...It was when death was senseless that Adah felt like she might need to turn her head, but not in horror. Just deep, crippling sadness.

River looked up then, meeting Adah's eyes. "Government did that. Killed them all and tried to get rid of the evidence." Including River. "Senseless." She wished Adah could feel how important her understanding was. Maybe, some day, she could tell her the darker stories, but not today. She reached out her hand and lightly brushed Adah's, wanting to convey how she felt.

Funny how that worked, that those were were supposed to be protecting us are left hurting us the most. Even wit hthe ants, her mother, not without her guilt, leaving Adah to be completely consumed if it weren't for Anatole...

Adah drew in a breath, trying to cut off the flow of thoughts; her fingers twitched a little under River's light touch, and she hoped that River didn't take her lack of response as anything against her. She had a habit of closing herself down over things like this; it demanded a lot of her mental facilities, and so her energy almost transfered entirely to it, and then it left her exhausted, mind, body, and soul. If she even had one of the last.

"Recurring pattern," River agreed. Her own parents had abandoned her after all. "Exceptions become important." She suddenly wanted Adah to meet Simon, imagining they would get along quite well. She kept her fingertips against Adah's hand, prepared to pull away should Adah want her to.

Adah didn't really move hardly at all at this point; she knew what had happened, understood it perfectly. Her anger, disappointment was so sharp that it took all the juice out of her half brain and left it quiet, dormant, simple. No more dancing; they'd hit a center. An unexpected one, like a nail on the head, driving it into the coffin of her brain functions.

She felt bad; she didn't mean for this to happen, to suddenly become just dead flesh when River expected more from her. She was tired, and she missed Leah, for the first time since leaving Africa. At times like this, she needed her other half to do what she no longer had the energy for.

"Find a book to rest in?" River tilted her head, slowly pulling away her hand. Most people got tired of dancing before River did, and it didn't bother her. She sat up, swinging her legs over the edge of the desk.

Adah made a soft, small noise into her arm. She had Japanese homework she should be working on. The jumbled structures of their sentences might help her feel a little back in her crooked place again.

River slipped off the desk, then turned to face Adah, smiling. She took a step backwards, towards the door, then another one. "Dance at the party with me?" She hoped Adah understood by now that River didn't expect anything from her that she couldn't do, that she only asked for things that Adah had a very particular talent for. Still, she was nervous, concerned that she was pushing Adah into a corner and far away, and to chase that away River spun around, before resuming walking backwards.

Adah recalled that one of the first things River had ever remarked to her was how loud Adah's thoughts tended to be, so she didn't worry about the thought that she would, to the best of her abilities, try not reaching the retreating River.

Adah got a quick smile and then River disappeared, quietly slipping out of the door.

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