‘How fast can you run?’ he asked.
I thought about the first time that I had run full out. I had been out for a run to get away from the kids, and suddenly realized that it was dusk. I have to be inside Ruth’s house before dark, or I’m in serious trouble, and get all kinds of crap chores as punishment. I was probably a couple of miles away, so I decided to heck with it, and took off with everything I had. Luckily, there weren’t very many people outside this time of day. I found myself passing cars going down the street, but I still had more. I got to the spot where there’s no sidewalk, and ran into the street. Houses began going by in a blur, like a picket fence or something. Papers and tree leaves blew up in a tunnel behind me, like the exhaust from a fighter jet that you see in the movies on TV. I didn’t hear any sound at all. Nothing. In no time at all, I realized that I had already passed Ruth’s house, so I slowed down, turned around, and cooled down by jogging back to it.
He’ll never believe that.
‘Of course I do. You cannot share a memory that didn’t happen. It’s impossible. So that’s where the legs of steel come from! Running.’
‘Could you see what I was just thinking of?’ I asked him.
‘Just like it was me that was doing the running,’ he answered.
‘How is running like that even possible?’
‘Apparently you have have inherited some very powerful genes Thia. I sense no vampire blood in you, so they have to be passed down from Gaia. I can, and I suppose the other gods can, run like that, but there is no other animal on Earth that can.’
‘So, that’s what you are? A god?’
‘Yes.’
‘So, you seem to already know my name. How about you tell me what yours is?’
‘Of course. I apologise. I am Nicholas, lesser god, given dominion over Earth and all its inhabitants.’
‘You talk funny. Did you know that?’
‘How so? I think my English is quite good!’
‘Oh… So like, English isn’t your first language? I get it.’
‘Get what?’
‘Why you talk funny. What is your first language?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘What is your… mmm… the language you normally speak?’
‘All of them. I speak what the individual I am speaking to will understand.’
‘Riiiight! You speak every language. Like in the whole wide world?’
‘Well, yes.’
‘Uh-huh. So when you’re doing your nasty little habit of reading other people’s thoughts, do you hear them in English, or something else?’
‘That is a very good question, Thia. Let’s see. Well… Quite odd! I guess I have never thought about that. I just... Know what they are thinking.’
‘You’re weird, but you’re really handsome!’
‘Thank you.’
‘Hey…’
‘Sorry. Again, not used to talking to humans.’
‘So how old did you say, you know, your body is?’
‘I suppose that it is about 15 years old. Just like the memories I was sharing with you while you slept, earlier. That was me. Younger than you. You will be 18 the day after tomorrow.’
‘You look older than 15. I mean, how long have you been 15? Nicholas! C’mon.’
‘I am not exactly sure, to be honest. I have not always kept track of that. Give or take a few years, maybe 50,000.’
‘What? No way!’
‘Oh yes, indeed I am. At least that. I no longer measure time in years you see. At first I did, then it was by centuries, and now it’s millennia.’
‘This is all so impossible, and I’m exhausted. I have to let my mind go back to sleep now. Will you tell me more of your story while I rest?’
CHAPTER 9: NICHOLAS
“I walked alone beside the lake during mid-morning, thinking about how to go about gaining the interest of the men of our tribe that were either too old, or physically unable to hunt for meat for our tribe any longer in making tools for them instead. I thought about how the men making the burn bowls and fashioning the wooden spoons had their own work area to gather daily to do their work and to socialize with one another. Were they made to do that, or was it all voluntary? How did their practices begin?
“I could hear the small children playing together in the sunshine up near the tents of the 3 family groups, and I could hear the voices of the elder women directing them, and keeping control over them while the mothers and sisters were gone from camp doing the daily food forage. What I didn’t hear or see, were the elder men.
‘Gaia, how can I help our elder men gain interest in learning this?’ I thought.
“Right away, I felt her invisibly take my hand in hers. In the blink of an eye, I found myself still holding her hand while standing next to an elder man and a younger woman. They worked together in front of a growing crowd of elder men, who watched with great interest as she cooked a stew in one of the canoe shaped log pots and as the elder man worked at making another.
‘This is where she lived before she married her husband from another tribe and went to live there. This is her husband’s father, making the burn bowl pot. It was her idea to bring him here to teach her family how her husband’s people make and cook with these. As before, they cannot see or hear us. Keep holding my hand, and be silent, while I find her memory of organizing this in her mind. You will be able to see it just like I see it.’
“That gave me two ideas. The first being my teaching not only my tribe about this practice, but others as well. The second being my finding wives for our unmarried men from other nearby tribes, like the nomadic tribe I’d seen on the other side of our mountain to increase our numbers more quickly. Surely all smaller tribes had the same problem of not enough proper mates. This one depended on Gaia helping me to find them though, by taking me flying as she had before.”
‘Of course I will do that for you Na,’ she assured me out loud. ‘Now close your eyes and see. It may feel confusing to you at first, seeing within your mind the memories of another.’
“What happened next was nothing short of incredible. I was filling a freshly cleaned pot beside my family group’s cooking fire with water from skins that I and my daughters had filled at the nearby stream. I wasn’t watching this woman do it, I was her! I knew the names of my daughters who had helped me, and I could see their faces in my mind. I saw my own hands pouring the water. I sang a story about my maiden family to my infant son who nursed at my breast as I worked. I could see him there. I could feel the sensation of him suckling, hear his greedy grunts and whimpers, and feel him tugging at my long tangled hair as he did. That was very strange to accept.
“The weather was warm, and I had two large freshly killed rabbits for the stew, that the boys of our family group had killed by throwing rocks at their heads, just that morning. They had been gutted and skinned while I had washed the pot out with sand and ash from the fire pit, and then rinsed out with water. The whole carcasses hung skewered on a stick at the ready, beside me. I had two neatly arranged stacks of flat rocks directly in the edge of the hot coals of the fire in front of me, one to my right, and one to my left. I had two long handled, flat, thick wooden spoons at the ready, to move them.
“I placed three hot rocks in the roughly three gallons of water on the far left side of the pot, and then placed three on the right. The rabbits were placed in the middle. After placing my baby in some furs to sleep, I changed out the rocks for fresh hot ones. This caused the water to come to a rolling boil. As the boiling slowed and stopped, I switched out one rock on either side with a hot one to keep the water near to boiling, but not quite. After doing this several times, I began fishing out the meat, and removing the bones, and tossing them into the fire.
“When I was certain that the bones were all out, I began adding edible roots, leaves, and herbs that had been freshly foraged close to camp, until it contained about even portions of meat and non-meat ingredients.
“As I changed rocks again, my husband’s fa
ther brought back the water skins I had emptied into the pot, full of fresh water. ‘My people do not know how to make these pots, or cook food like this,’ I told him. ‘It would be good for them to learn. Will you make a pot like this for them, and go with me to teach them how to make bowls and spoons, and teach them how to use them?’ I asked him.
‘I will, if the other elders agree,’ he told me.
“Gaia tugged gently on my hand, bringing me out of the memory, and back to her. She smiled at the look on my face. She had expected it, I guess. ‘Did you find what you needed Na?’
‘Yes. I know what to do now. Gaia! I felt what she felt!’
‘Imagine the endless amusement I have had with that in my existence,’ she said teasingly, heavy with sexual innuendo.
CHAPTER 10: THIA
I yawned and stretched my arms and legs, wiggling my toes like I always do in the morning, enjoying the warmth of my bed, and the quiet… Quiet? When the hell has it ever been quiet here at Ruth’s? Did I oversleep? Am I late for school?... My eyes opened with a start. Crap! The sun is already bright. I did sleep too late. I can see the fronds of the palm trees waving in the breeze through the skylight in the ceiling… Wait! There’s no skylight in the ceiling of the girls’ room at Ruth’s, and there are no palm trees in Illinois! Where the hell am I? I shook my head, and blinked my eyes several times to clear the sleep from my head.
This wasn’t my bed, and I didn’t have my favorite cat pajamas on. I was fully dressed in my purple running outfit, but it was torn to shreds! I’ll be in trouble with Ruth for that. Big trouble! I was sitting up on a couch, in a strange house, in an unfamiliar place. Fear swept across me. Goose bumps flashed across the skin of my arms. My right hand, with my perfectly shaped nails covered my mouth to stifle a cry. Wait a minute! I bite my nails. I lowered my hand and stared at it. I raised my left hand and stared at it too. What is going on?
“I fixed those for you, while you slept.”
I about jumped out of my skin. Behind a light colored granite covered snack bar, with his hands flat on either side of a large platter of fresh fruit, stood the prettiest man I had ever seen in my life! He must be on TV. I shook my head again to wake up more, but he was still there…
“You look well this morning,” he said. “Don’t move so quickly though, or you’ll be sorry. You could pass out and fall. That wouldn’t do either of us any good. I brought us some breakfast from the buffet. You like oranges, bananas, pineapple, and bagels, I checked. I took a chance on fresh mango. I like it, if you don’t decide to try it. You should try new things, you know?”
Nicholas is his name. I remember his voice from last night. “Where am I?” I asked.
“Key West, Florida,” he answered. “I brought you here yesterday afternoon, to keep you safe while I, err... took care of you. Come over here and have some fruit. You need the vitamins, and the fructose won’t hurt anything either. Just take it slow and easy getting here.”
Vampires! It all came rushing back to me then. I had been out for a run to get away from the noise at Ruth’s, when I’d felt like I was hit by a truck from behind. The next thing I knew, some Alice Cooper wanna-be looking dude had ripped my blouse half off, and was just about to sink his fangs into my throat in front of a bunch of creepy looking goth kids. There was like an explosion then, and as goth kid body parts flew left and right, the vampire holding me went flying through the air in a blur and hit the cement wall at the far end of the room hard. I expected him to splat. He didn’t. He did fall in a heap though. I must have passed out again then, and now here I am. A thousand miles away, being offered tropical fruit for breakfast, by a handsome young god named Nicholas. No biggie.
I automatically did as I was told, and took a seat on a plain wooden stool across from him. The granite was cool, as I propped myself on my elbows and forearms. He set a plain white ceramic plate in front of me, along with a bright blue cloth napkin and a very ornate silver setting. He poured me a mug of cocoa, and dropped three tiny marshmallows in it, just like I like. He placed six slices of bacon cooked well but not burnt, just as i prefer, on my plate and smiled. “Dig in,” he said.
“Where in Key West are we?” I asked, trying to say something intelligent, but not scream the words out. Then I stuffed bacon in my mouth like I’d never eaten before.
“This is the Cypress House B&B,” he answered. “It’s the best bed and breakfast on the island. I’ve been staying here for a few months now, observing some, ugh, people of interest. Nobody gets in anyone else's business here, so I figured you’d be safe here while you heal.” He slid the fruit platter closer to me, and handed me a set of silver tongs that matched the flatware.
I felt guilty wiping bacon grease off of my fingers on that pretty blue napkin before accepting the tongs. I took a few pieces of fruit, thanked him, and sat back to eat. He was right. The fruit went down like candy, and hit bottom well. I started feeling stronger, and my head cleared up a bit with each bite. He took a large plate of it too, and poured himself a cup of steaming coffee, to which he added cream and sugar.
“So, you can eat regular food then?” I asked.
He smiled, flashing his perfect, white, normal looking teeth. Of course they’re perfect. Everything about this guy is.
“Oh my goodness yes!” he replied. “And thank-you.”
“Hey!”
“I know, I know. It’s rude to read the girl’s mind. Yes, I can eat whatever I wish, just like you. My body functions normally, just like yours, except I usually pee standing up,” he winked.
For some reason, that made me blush like heck! I looked in the big mirror on the wall to my right to see how bad it showed, and stopped chewing. My face was definitely a shade lighter than normal, but my skin was perfect. I jumped out off of my stool to go for a closer look, and Nicholas rose from his to follow. Judging from the amount of pain I’d felt before passing out yesterday, I should be seeing a bloody mess. Bandages, at least. There was nothing of the sort. My hands went to my throat. I turned my head back and forth. I saw Nicholas’ reflection behind me, smiling broadly. Proudly.
“You look beautiful,” he whispered.
My nose was even straight. It had had a slight bend to it ever since I’d fallen on my bicycle when I was 12. I’d broken my nose, and had a big scar on my forehead where I’d landed on it on the cement. Both were gone! My pizza-face, as the mean boys at Ruth’s always called it, was perfectly clear. My lips were fuller than I ever remembered them being, and my teeth were now as white as Nicholas’ and straight as could be! “Did you do this?” I asked him.
“Yes.”
I spun around quickly and locked him in the biggest bearhug ever. I kissed him on the cheek about a dozen times, and landed a good one on his lips. Then, I turned to look at myself some more. He’d returned to his stool, and sat with his first two fingers of his right hand touching his lips where I’d kissed him. Oh man! Did I just ruin everything? What was I thinking? Or not thinking, more likely. I don’t just go around kissing people like that…
“I’m sorry,” I told him. “I was out of line.”
“No, no, no. Not at all! You just surprised me,” he answered. “That was quite nice, actually. I just haven’t been kissed like that in… hundreds of years, at least.”
“Are you really as old as you told me last night?”
“I’m afraid so. Grossed out now?”
“Not even. I’m just trying to get my head around all of this, that’s all.”
I took my seat, trying to remember my manners, and ate more of the delicious fresh fruit. And the bagel. Real butter on a fresh bagel was something I’d never actually had before, but it was good. Delicious even!
Holy crap! This is a lot to have dumped on my lap all at once. Talk about my life changing 1,000% for the better. Nicholas seems nice. I’m pretty sure I can trust him. Ha! I guess it doesn’t matter either way though. It’s not like I could do anything about it if he weren’t. Besides, he’s so good looking! Oops… He knows I’
m thinking this. I looked at him sheepishly. Nothing. He didn’t seem to know, or was at least acting like he didn’t.
What an adventure. I never want to go back to Ruth’s now.... Dang, I need something to wear. This running suit is shot!
“What would you like?” Nicholas asked. “There are entirely too many beachwear shops on this island.”
“Hey! You’re doing it again,” I accused. “I can’t go out looking like this to shop, and I don’t have any money anyhow.”
“No problem. Tell me your size, and I’ll go get you something basic. Then, we can go shopping together and you can get anything you want,” he offered.
“Well, I guess. If you’re sure. Size 0, or extra small.”
“Help yourself to the bath. I’ll be back before you know it,” he said, and he left.
The bathroom was the coolest I’d ever seen. Very modern, or something. Nothing like Ruth’s, or my mom’s either. There was a Jacuzzi tub that I just had to try out. I’d never ever been in one. I filled it deep, with nice hot water, pushed the button that started the jets, and climbed in.
Aww man this feels nice!
CHAPTER 11: NICHOLAS
One step out the door told me today was another perfect day here in the southernmost place in the United States. Blue skies, a few light fluffy clouds way up high, with just a hint of a breeze coming to shore, bringing with it the salty, slightly fishy smell of the ocean. Nice and warm, but not scorching hot. I don’t generally care much for excessive heat. I tend to migrate with the weather, much as the waterfowl on this continent do.
What are you doing Na? Have you lost your mind? Are you lonely? You’re going to be sorry…
GENESIS (Tales of the Lesser Gods Book 1) Page 6
