by Cara Violet
There was a particular look about him that suggested he cared. Did he really? And did she? Somehow, she already knew the answer to that, already knew why she had chosen to come here last night. She hated at that moment how her heart stung.
“Okay,” she lied, “thank-you for everything.”
And just like that, he let her grab her dirty clothes up and walk out the door.
Kaianan soaked in her bath for hours. Julius was the only thing on her mind. She couldn’t get him out of there. Why did he speak so nonchalantly about his mother’s death? And his father believed in torture? But that wasn’t his biggest worry? Who was he? Where did he come from and why did she not push him for more information?
Not everyone was so guarded around her, but Kaianan was trying to deny how she felt about him because of his elusiveness. Julius was right, there was a connection between them as much as she wanted to think otherwise. That they shared commonality through the unrealistic expectations that had been placed on them by their family—whatever his were. Kaianan was trying to deal with being the Rivalex Mark and a Princess of Layos, yet when she was around him that burden completely lessoned. Different was an understatement. Nervously alive would be a better description of how she felt when she was with him. But how to tell him that? Or shouldn’t she?
“Kaianan,” Gaylene was calling from the corridor.
She rolled her eyes. “Yes,” she snapped.
“Can I see you in my office, please … ten minutes.”
Gaylene must not have waited for her to answer, because the woman’s footsteps grew distant. Kaianan huffed and got herself out of the bath.
Kaianan opened the door to Gaylene’s office. She’d dressed in another plain outfit, thick denim jeans, a short pink sweater, and her pink joggers. She left her hair out after she’d dried it, so it was wild around her face down to her waist.
Kaianan noticed Gaylene’s office was another bland room; white walled, timber desk, another square device and Gaylene’s face contorting and gesturing Kaianan to take a seat in the chair in front of the desk.
“Hi,” Kaianan said as she sat down.
The woman, in her usual shabby looking suit, gave this little, “uh, huh,” and then looked down. “So, you’re becoming quite the elusive little girl, aren’t you, Kate.”
“Whatever do you mean?”
“Well, you’ve been skipping meal times and somehow locking your door when we have no locks on the doors …”
Kaianan tried not to snicker.
“Is this amusing to you?”
“No.”
“You know,” Gaylene strummed her fingers across the table, “you’re disrupting the other kids. If they all acted like you, no one would want them.”
“That’s got nothing to do with me.”
“Reddy just failed his test with two lovely approved applicants. A nice married couple who would have treated him splendidly …” Kaianan felt something weird stab at her bones as Gaylene was talking, “…. he told them he wanted to stay here, with you, because you’re alone and keep escaping. That he didn’t want them to take him away from a place that he was trying to make suitable for you.”
Kaianan didn’t want to hear anymore. Thank the Sarinese gods, Gaylene stopped. Kaianan’s body had been in torment that whole time. Gaylene got up off of her chair, the light from the window behind her moving as she walked around the room to get closer to Kaianan.
Kaianan turned away from her. She didn’t want to hear anymore.
“You know,” she said, bent down leaning on the desk, “you might not care about being here, and making friends with the others … but you should try and pay more attention to those who, one, care about you, and two, who are desperately seeking people to love that can love them back.” Gaylene paused and sat back. “Life isn’t simple, Kate. But we shouldn’t let opportunities pass us by, and we shouldn’t step in the way of others who have to grasp their own.”
“I never asked him to do the things he’s done for me,” she said half-emotionally, half-angrily.
“But you’ve never asked him to stop either.”
Kaianan felt hot tears in her eyelids. “May I go?”
“You may.”
Kaianan walked out of Gaylene’s office. She didn’t know why the hot tears kept streaming down her cheeks as she walked back to her room, but they did.
Kaianan slammed her door in a fit; wetness all over her face.
She was a mess. She picked up her pillows and threw them at the wall. She went in search of others objects she could throw and destroy. She needed something to do to calm her down, turning into a green monster right now was not a good idea. Smashing things could help.
Her eyes stopped. Someone was standing in the gravel laneway staring at her. She crept closer. Julius was standing in blue denim pants with his hands in a hooded cream jacket smiling at her. The sun only catching part of his face as it began to set.
She opened the window and suddenly her anger diminished and a smile formed on her lips.
“I just wanted to see how you are after last night.” Julius said, casually strolling toward her.
Kaianan rolled her eyes. “You know you said we had to stop meeting like this. I feel like we are making a habit of it.”
He laughed. “I actually want to take you somewhere. Do you have the time?”
Gaylene crossed Kaianan’s mind and so did Reddy. There was no way she wanted to deal with them right now. Was this a cope out? Perhaps, but she wanted to see Julius. She’d been dying to see him again. The thought made her frown.
“Come on,” he said holding out his hand.
“I may get in trouble.”
“What, isn’t this place supposed to be for people without families?” he said ironically. “You can try making friends with me?”
She laughed. “You’re not potential family, though are you?”
He didn’t reply, instead he reached out and grabbed her hand. “Let’s go.”
“Okay.” She climbed down into his arms and his fingers had slipped up her fluffy pink sweater and singlet to her waist. His hands on her skin electrified her. He released his grip as she reached the ground. Eyes up, Kaianan could see a smirk over his face. She let go of her hands on his forearms and pulled her sweater down, saying: “Where are we going?”
“This way. We are going to walk.”
“Is it far?”
“Do you ever relax and just take each moment at a time?”
“Shut up, Julius.”
“I thought we might try something new together.” He said. “Like back home, there are many cultures, but here they actually are integrated. People share their recipes and food ideas.”
“We are going for food?”
“We certainly are.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever been happier.”
He put his arm around her neck, “come on you, food is not everything.”
Kaianan didn’t reply. She could smell Julius now. She was under him; while he kept his arm around her, she took her time to gage what the scent was, it was like some type of soapy goodness mixed with berry. He smelt edible.
“Are you okay, Kaianan?”
Was she? Was this too much for her brain? Was she overthinking everything?
“I’m fine,” she lied. Another note she made to herself: try and stop lying.
Once they got to the main street it was relatively quiet, although in certain spots especially around the restaurants, it was busy with customers. It was similar to the street she’d been down at the beach but more run down and less clean.
“Which one are we going to?” she asked him.
Julius took his arm away from her and pointed. “This way.”
A few more blocks down, they got to a restaurant with a glass front. Inside it was lined with black tables full of people.
“Looks busy,” Kaianan said.
“It’s because its good.”
She nodded and they walked in, stepped up a ramp and were greeted by a
waitress. She had an accent, and she sat them on the end of a table that was connected to other preforms.
“It’s very together,” she said.
“Isn’t eating always a together occasion?”
She laughed at him.
“What was with the woman’s accent?” she asked.
“Earth has many languages, unlike the Felrin Galaxy, there are no restrictions on what they can and can’t say here,” he said. “Originally, when people fled the Felrin planet and system, tribes formed new languages. It all changed when the aura versus aura battle transpired and the Universal Order was formed. They prohibited all other forms of language and economy, and they had the Liege to back them up. The Felrin language and currency became universal very quickly. I don’t even think one planet resisted. Not even the Giliou on Felderin, but I guess by that stage Giliou the Wise had already died and they had no one to look up to.”
Kaianan nodded. Looking at it from this point of view, it seemed strange the Felrin had a bank in Layos, and changed the rules of language. What was the point in that?
The waitress returned. Julius asked her what the speciality was, and that they wanted two of those. Kaianan looked at him when the short dark-haired woman departed.
“What are we eating?”
“Pho, or fur, did you not hear her?” he said. “Combination meat too … we can try plenty other delicacies this planet has to offer soon enough.”
“I’ve already been pleasantly surprised.” Kaianan said. “I mean I love Sprindles and the La Merce Inn back home, but what I’ve had so far, they can cook really well here.”
“Imagine if we all shared food,” Julius said in daydream.
“Like how?”
“Nothing …”
“No, what?”
“Like how people should trade, species should appreciate each other and live in coexistence—”
“Your meal,” the woman was back with two bowls of what looked like soup, unintentionally interrupting them. She then placed another plate in front of them and explained how they had to put more ingredients inside the bowl, and chopsticks or forks, were over there to eat with.
Julius smiled as Kaianan tried to rip off some leaves and then put sauce in her bowl.
“What?” she said, bending down to smell the broth; it smelt like spicy Seevaar.
“Nothing,” he said supressing a chuckle.
“Smells alright …. so what were you saying earlier?” she said, plucking two black stick things from the holder in the middle of the table, the same time she was assessing the preforms on her left who were using the chopsticks to eat.
“Nothing,” he said. “I just want to appreciate this moment.”
Kaianan had her eyes on Julius in worry. “Well I for one have no idea what I’m doing.”
He laughed at her. “Here, just watch me.”
She stared at him as he put the food on his chopstick by twirling it round. “Why are you looking at it?” she said after a minute staring, “just eat it.”
“I swear,” he said giggling, “the more you demand the less I want to! It’s so odd, eating these animals that are in some ways similar and some ways different to ones in our galaxy.”
“Yeah. Now, just eat it.”
He took a big bite trying not to laugh. Then she tried her own. It was amazing. It was spicy, but the noodles amongst the broth and the meat was a perfect combination when it was in her mouth. Kaianan loved it. Julius made a joke when her mouth was full, and she almost spewed it all out.
Kaianan’s cheeks never hurt so much in her life during a meal. They ate and laughed. They chatted about stupid things, like pastry and sorbet, about women’s fashion on Earth for some odd reason, and about Kaianan’s inability to speak sometimes. What could she say, he made her nervous. Nerves that had come and gone her whole life.
“You know you’re beautiful, right?” Julius said after he’d finished eating.
Kaianan knew she possessed the ability to draw people to her, but beauty was always subjective. She was, however, extremely glad he thought it of her. Julius looked up as the waitress returned, and Kaianan wished the moment hadn’t ended when she handed them the bill.
“You know how you said you got to know me a little better by watching me,” Kaianan turned to Julius as they were walking back along the footpath and through a park to get back home to her dorm, “do you know, learning about the preforms has been something else, Julius. I mean the way Reddy is, especially about this thing called football, and they love music, they love to dance. It’s something I never had the time to sit down and appreciate.”
“You’ve formed quite a bond with him,” he said, kicking the dirt under his boot in the park.
“Just because we’ve evolved, we shouldn’t disregard Homo sapiens. You can learn things all the time.”
“You certainly have.”
“Yeah, I have,” Kaianan said half-proudly, half-concernedly, “although I’m uncertain of why he has such an attachment to me.”
“Maybe he needs a friend more than you know?”
“He needs family,” she said matter-of-factly.
“What if there’s no difference?”
She didn’t say anything to that. Julius had a point.
“What are you going to do when you get home?” he said.
“Have a bath,” she replied automatically.
“No,” he snickered, “I mean home, home. Back to Layos, back to your status as Princess?”
She wasn’t sure what to tell him. That her heart was burning knowing she was so far from home. That she wasn’t sure, that after meeting Julius, she could go back and feel like that was home. Something felt so right just being here with him.
“I don’t know if I even have a home,” she admitted. “I’m relying on others—I mean I don’t want to rely on others, but they won’t let me help reclaim my home from the people that invaded it.”
Julius looked unhappy at this. “I may have to leave soon … will you be upset if I go?”
“When?” she said hesitantly, and the upset stabbed her chest.
“I don’t know, it could be soon.”
“I want to see you again,” she just blurted it out. Her face flushed.
Julius stopped walking and looked to her like he was pained. “Kaianan, I have to tell you something.”
“What is it?” She wet her lips in anticipation.
“You can’t be mad at me okay?”
“No.”
There was a long pause of silence. It was like he was looking for something, trying to avoid her green eyes but couldn’t.
“What is it, Julius?”
“I, I…” his voice fell to a whisper, “nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Yeah,” he jerked his body away and kept walking, “I’ll tell you tomorrow.”
Kaianan stood outside her room on the gravel staring up at Julius. And in spite of them not talking since he’d withheld his truth in the park, Kaianan felt such a force pulling her toward him. “You know how you said that its odd that two different people from a different galaxy have met in another galaxy on the same planet and have found a connection in each other…”
He nodded.
“… I – I don’t think that’s odd at all.”
“No?”
“No, I think you know exactly where you want to be in your life, and you do that. You go through those things because you want to, we know the people we want to be around and somehow, through our tumultuous existence we find them. And sometimes we do things to make ourselves think we don’t want the things we actually do.”
“I see what you’re saying. Like the night you came over and told me you nearly got yourself killed, you did that to spite me, didn’t you?”
“I did that to not think of you.”
“And how’s that going for you?”
“I’d rather not say,” she diverted her eyes.
“You’re blushing, Kaianan.”
“Shut up!”
<
br /> He was so close now. She could feel him breathing on her.
“But you’re saying you want to be here,” Julius suddenly had his hand on her cheek, “right in this moment now. With me? Because that’s where you’ve chosen to be?”
Kaianan swallowed. “I mean ….” she mumbled some gibberish and then looked to him.
The electricity was zapping around her body and inside of her; in her blood, in her skin. All the nerves and warning bells were going off in her head—one, to prepare herself and two, to run.
“I’m sorry,” her voice was shaky from the nerves, she was trying to keep focus on her whole body remaining stable and to somehow get away from him, “it’s just I have so much going on—”
“No no, of course, it’s fine.” He dropped his hand from her face. “You’re right.”
And then he smiled half-heartedly and Kaianan knew she couldn’t let him leave. That what she was saying didn’t align with what she wanted. She didn’t need to know everything about him to not fall for him.
So she didn’t say anything, she just lifted her chin to his and kissed him.
He wasn’t prepared for it, but it didn’t matter, it was still an insatiable moment of exploding emotions and hunger. Actual hunger for him. She used her hands to get closer, to get him nearer to her. He responded just as eagerly. Their bodies intertwined and Kaianan thought there was nothing greater than this. Nothing greater than finding someone that fit you.
She backed away from him, smiled, blew him a kiss goodbye and in the silence of the night, climbed back inside her window.
Chapter Nineteen: An Uncomplicated Lesson
“Ka, Ka!” Her door was being knocked on.
Her eyes waned as she was spreading around in the water. Lying her neck back on the tub, she was concentrating on what Julius looked like—the curves in his cheeks and mouth, how he would, at inappropriate times, stare at her with those eyes that could look happy and then sad all in a few minutes.
“Ka, Ka!” he said again, breaking her imagined form of Julius.
“Dammit … I’m in the bath, Reddy!” she called back, not sure if she wanted to talk to him just yet.
