I smiled back. I hadn’t seen Nick since orientation.
“Hey, Nick. What’ve you been up to?” He held the café door open as I walked in to join the short line of people waiting to get their hot beverages. The chilly Welsh weather had gotten even colder moving into the October month and my jacket was severely lacking on the warm side.
“Just came back from a mini-trip to Amsterdam. You?”
I stopped scanning the menu board as a dubious look crossed my face, the line getting shorter. That explained why I hadn’t seen him lately. How was he able to travel and miss classes and still keep up with his work? Except for the occasional night out, I barely had time to do anything but read. Jackie had threatened that if I didn’t come out to socialize this week she would set my books on fire.
“School. Dying slowly inside. The usual.” The classes here were easy enough. Back home I had to go in every single day, the week filled with lecture upon lecture. Here, on the other hand, I only had classes three times a week. The rest of the time it was up to the student to learn everything, which put even more pressure on us.
Nick was up to order, his money already in hand as he asked for an Americano. “Are you going to Folk Night on Thursday?” he looked at me with a hopeful grin.
“Yeah, it’s in the pub the town over, right? I think a flatmate is going to walk us there.” I hadn’t realized Folk Night was a big thing. Melissa said the evening would be filled with drinking, singing, and folk music down at one of the local pubs. It sounded interesting so she invited Jackie and me to tag along.
He got handed his coffee and added a packet of sugar to it. “Great! Then I’ll see you there,” then popped a lid onto the cup and gave me a backwards wave as he walked off.
Now by myself I was able to survey my surroundings. The café was vibrant. A wall of pure window let its patrons see onto the patio outside, the rain having started while I gathered my order of ginger herbal tea. There was an L-shaped couch in the corner, catering to those wanting to lounge around with friends and chat, the striped green and brown wallpaper behind it leaving me dizzy. At the perimeter were more robust tables and chairs, their black wooden surfaces scarred with tea and coffee stains.
I found an empty table near the windows and got straight to work. With a day free from classes I was able to focus on upcoming assignments, the morning quickly passing. By lunchtime, I had gotten through the organization of my political and economic anthropology paper, though it was far from perfect.
Starving, I took a break and ordered a jacket potato with tuna, the mix of hot potato and cool fish satisfying my every taste bud, the rest to be washed down by a second cup of tea. By then the café was extremely crowded. Students and professors were scattered around engaged in one conversation or another, but with my mind so focused, the noise soon dissipated, and by the time the place had to close, I was finished researching for my essays.
Thursday rolled around too quickly. All week Jackie hadn’t let me forget we would be going to Folk Night. Every time I picked up a book she would look at me with squinty eyes and just whisper ‘Thursday’ in a creepy stalker voice. But I loved her for it. She made sure that I was enjoying as much of the life here as I could.
Thankfully, we didn’t have to get all dressed up as we would for a club night. I threw on a pair of faded blue jeans, my favorite brown t-shirt, some flats, and a heavy winter coat I had found in one of the many charity shops in town.
“Come on, Jade, everyone’s waiting,” Jackie yelled from down the hall.
“Coming!” I quickly slapped on a bit of maroon lipstick and grabbed my purse.
Walking to the pub took longer than I had expected. Compared to Lampeter time, what usually was a two-minute walk to the local pubs was a twelve-minute walk to Cwmann. I hadn’t even noticed we had crossed the border separating the two villages until Nick and his friends started shouting insults about how Cwmann shouldn’t even be its own settlement, the boys already heavily into pre-drinks.
The pub was different from the ones in Lampeter which were old and smushed together. This one stood on its own, its yellow stone structure looking sturdy on the corner of the road. The inside had modern slate floors and an expresso machine behind its pristine bar. But what was really different was its clientele… After many trips to the cafés in Lampeter, Jackie and I had become fast friends with some of the locals whose sunny dispositions made a lasting impression. Here, on the other hand… I didn’t want to go anywhere near them. Their gruff faces turned up in disgust at us students breaching their sanctuary. The only exception was a guy who looked completely out of place in his pale lavender button-down shirt and black suit pants. His hair was short and shiny brown with tints of natural blonde, the front slightly curved to the left, giving him that retro look.
When I passed by we made eye contact, his fist clenching so tight around his glass I could see the whites of his knuckles. I don’t know what I was more scared of, him or the glass shattering.
We headed to the back of the pub where the music was already flowing out and found a table big enough for us to fit around. A gigantic fireplace that was cut into the wall acted like a bench with pillows and blankets thrown around to make the seating more comfortable. The room was already packed with students drinking and clapping their hands to the beat.
A couple hours later, the place started to thin, making it easier to talk to each other and not be drowned out by hollers and song requests. It also made it easier for some of the local boys to cozy up next to our table, their drunken conversation soon spilling over to ours.
“Do you girls want to get out of here…?” one of them slurred, making it hard to understand him. The guy was burly, his thick arms and slightly muscular, protruding stomach was nothing compared to his buddies who were well under the BMI scale.
I had been hit on by enough drunk fraternity guys to know when they were trying to chat me up, and fell back on my usual tactic to pretend they didn’t say anything, which didn’t sit too well with his pride.
“Oi. Bitch! I’m talking to you!”
I glanced at Jackie. This time I had heard it. ‘Bitch’ was too prominent a word that you couldn’t not make it out. My face flushed red, not with embarrassment, but with sheer anger.
I knew saying anything would cause more trouble, so I settled for striking up a conversation with one of Nick’s friends. “So. Who’s your favorite band?” I swished the straw in my glass around, the bubbles of my gin and tonic popping.
“Oh well, I do quite like–”
I didn’t get to hear his answer. From the side, I felt the strong grip of a hand around my arm and cried out as I was swiftly jerked away from the table, my head just missing the top of the fireplace. Before I could make a move to try and ram my palm into the guy’s face, I was released, the drunkard now sprawled on the ground.
The man in the lavender shirt was on top of him, pinning the boy down at the shoulder, his fist striking his face punch after punch as blood spewed out from the kid’s mouth and nose.
A retching sound escaped my lips of its own accord as the wet, red liquid splattered towards me.
Chairs scrapped back from the table and the owner of the pub jumped out from behind the bar, unsuccessfully trying to rip the suited man off the guy. “Finch! Bloody-hell get off the poor fella before you kill him!” the owner shouted, struggling with them both.
The man still holding the bloodied boy beneath his hand pushed the owner into the next table where empty glasses crashed to the floor, making the ground a glistening pathway.
Jackie grabbed my hand and pulled me towards the exit, the sound of shards crunching beneath our feet as we quickly made our escape.
Once outside she pulled me in for a hug.
“Are you all right?” Her face was flushed, as if she were the one they had tried to grab, not me.
“Yeah… I’m fine…” I could tell she wasn’t
sure whether I was in shock, angry, or needed to throw up. “Should we wait until the police get here?” I tried to ask calmly, but it came out broken, adrenaline still pumping through me.
“For a small fight like this?” one of Nick’s friends countered. “It wouldn’t be worth their time. The owner’s handling it.”
Jackie could tell I was shaken, though I was cooler than if it actually would have been her in the situation. “Hey. Why don’t we just go back to the dorm and pig-out on ice cream?” She looked to the others. “Does anyone else want to join us?”
Her question went unanswered as the guys were already walking ahead, Nick being calmed by his friends not to go back in there and join the suited man in pummeling the rest of them.
“It’s fine,” I said, holding her back as the adrenaline quickly left my body, causing it to shake. “I don’t think I could deal with too many people tonight anyway.”
She nodded and looped her arm through mine. “Melissa left an hour ago to meet up with Tom, her new boyfriend, so it looks like it’s just you and me tonight.”
I smiled and hugged her closer. “Great. I just want to eat that whole tub of ice cream in the freezer, and veg out on a marathon of North and South.”
Jackie was all too happy to oblige.
VI.
Saturday morning we got up early for our first cultural trip to one of the local castles, Llansteffan. Owen greeted us in front of the building where we were first dropped off, its strobing lights turned off for the rare sunny day.
“Did everyone have a good sleep?” he asked as we all filed onto the minibus.
I was starting to get used to the Welsh accent, its strange vowels and twangs hitting my ears with ease. We all nodded in agreement, except for Claire.
“Well, the endless noise outside my window went on till the mornin’ hours, and is y’alls mattresses as flat as a pressed linen sheet like mine? I might as well’ve slept on my desk.”
I looked at Jackie and rolled my eyes, her response to hang herself with an invisible rope producing a giggle out of me.
The hour-long bus ride to Llansteffan was filled with conversation, mostly about the differences we could point out in coming from different countries.
“They keep asking me to say random words,” Jackie complained.
“I mean, we do it ta them as well,” Claire chimed in.
“Ya, I guess.” She took a bite out of her breakfast bar and chewed long enough for Luke to finally put his two-cents in, a miracle in itself as I had never heard him sound so animated in the past weeks.
“I swear, I had a ten-minute argument with a guy about how to pronounce ‘zebra’. I still don’t think we came to an agreement.” The bus filled with laughter, Luke’s voice almost pleading for someone to agree with him.
“What about you, Jade?” Nick asked. “Anything you find different?”
I had to really think about it. Of course there were substantial differences in the scenery and food, but there were other slight things like not having a proper recycling system or the more important bit, my own bathroom.
“I’d settle for full service and data for a change,” I said longingly, missing the fast connections America offered. Jackie and Claire nodded their heads in agreement, each of us pulling out and checking our phones as if we could magically will them to work properly.
Finally, we arrived at Llansteffan.
Piling off the bus we were pleasantly surprised that not only were there castle ruins on top of the hill, but below it sat a beach, its shores so close to one another we could clearly make out the opposite side. To our backs was the small town of Llansteffan, the beach-front houses painted in every gradient of the rainbow. A small shop sat on the corner, a sign flashing in the window that they had tea and coffee ready and waiting for those who had finished exploring the place.
As Owen told us about the history of the castle, we took pictures of the surrounding area. “It was constructed by the Normans in the twelfth century during the Iron Age, and acted as the primary fort, guarding the ports and crossings of the Tywi estuary. It changed hands many times, ownership jostling between the Normans and Welsh; withstood the bubonic plague and even the reign of Edward of Woodstock, who, centuries later, was known as the Black Prince. It was through neglect that the once great architectural piece fell to ruin, leaving what we see here today.” We all looked at him starry-eyed. “Right. If you all follow me I’ll show you the way up.”
We walked across the beach, the sand dark from the going tide, and further up, it undulated into barnacle covered concrete stairs which gradually met up with a maroon wall of rock, the colors only offset by the green and brown vegetation covering its rough surface.
Once at the top of the stairs, we came to a fork in the road.
“Jade! We’re’ll headin’ this way. Owen says it’s the easier path!” Claire shouted.
I turned towards her and the others who were now taking the dirt path that ran through a gorgeous forest, its sky-scraper trees protecting its occupants from the outside world.
“I’m good. I’m going take this route,” I said pointing to the left. It didn’t snake its way through the lush forest, but it held a sense of the unknown that tingled my adventurous side. One glance at Jackie and she came to stand next to me, a look of relief on her face from saving her from the all-too-cheery Claire and the nonstop talking that would ensue all the way up to the castle. There wasn’t anything wrong with that, but sometimes silence is the best ambiance to appreciate nature.
Nick and the others followed Owen and Claire, reseeding further and further into the woods as Jackie and I made our way onto the left path. Five minutes later, we understood why Owen had encouraged us to take the easier way. Halfway up, the dirt road abruptly stopped and gave way to an almost vertical hike through tall, sea-beaten grass.
We both contemplated turning back.
“Do we go for it?” Jackie wasn’t gung-ho about the situation but she was willing to give it a try if I was. The sun escaped its hideout from behind a stray cloud and beat down on us, her glasses sliding down her face from the sweat of the journey.
“Why not? It may kill us but I’m not about to turn back now and let everyone know Claire was right.”
With petty determination I started the climb, Jackie hot on my heels. Thinking we were almost at the top I made the wrong decision to look up. We were only halfway there. I had done track in high school, but that was nearly three years ago, and it didn’t help when you needed more endurance and less stamina.
Panting and sweating, my knees buckled under me. “Shit.”
Jackie’s sentiments mimicked my own. “I know…”
“Are you okay?” a man’s voice called from the top of the hill.
Wow, the boys were faster than I thought.
“We’re good! Just taking a short break. Don’t mind us! We’ll meet you guys up there in a bit!” We finished catching our breaths and made the rest of our journey up to the ruins. The second half of the climb was just as bad as the first, and once at the top, we collapsed onto the soft grass.
We could already hear some of the internationals inside and dragging ourselves to our feet, entered the castle.
Right in front of us was its inner gate, the structure towering over us. It was bigger than we had assumed from the bus, the only structures were its exterior walls, the gray stone worn and weary while its middle was totally gutted with lush grass flattening everything. It took us two hours to explore through the many remnants of stairs and unforgotten entranceways, crumbling leftovers that told me there had been more than two floors at one point in time. The air was musky, the scent of grass and morning rain still puddled into open-topped rooms. Rough stone jutted out from one place or another, broken off from the passage of time.
“What do you think they would’ve used this room for?” Jackie asked.
We had
just finished scaling a small wall to get to an upper section of the castle that no longer had its outer structure, its foundation still holding strong. Standing in its center I surveyed the room and looked for any indication that might help to answer her question. Inching closer to its outer shell, I found black soot engrained into the grout between the stones and reached out to touch the cool surface. An electric shock passed through my hand and I quickly jerked it back, a strange feeling of déjà vu passing over me as my fingertips went numb.
“You okay?” Jackie asked as I staggered a step, my mind dizzy. “What happened?”
“I just got a shock… It’s nothing.”
I rubbed my hand against my jeans, the sensation in it nonexistent. I came back to her question, not wanting to let on. “Not sure. Could have been a bedroom. They usually had them on the higher floors so that the heat would naturally rise.”
In my last semester at UCSB, my anthropology teacher took us to a historic park where they had recreated a medieval cottage. Though the cottage was nowhere near the size of this castle, I noticed then as I did now that the ash from the fireplace had blackened the stone beneath it, an indication that it was in constant use. Considering it was only the beginning of October and the sun wasn’t doing much to alleviate the cold temperature, they would have had to use it more heavily in the middle ages.
I made my way up to the edge of the castle wall, the sea spanning so far out that at some point water and sky could no longer be distinguished from each other. The other students were dotted around taking pictures of the scenic view and of each other, trying to capture the moment for prosperity. I spotted Luke on the floor below us.
“Hey, Luke,” I called down. “Thanks for seeing if we were okay.”
He looked up in confusion. “When?”
“When me and Jackie were climbing the back hill… It wasn’t you?” My eyebrows furrowed in the same uncertainty that covered his face.
“No.”
“Oh. Maybe it was Nick…”
To Those Who Never Knew (A Monksblood Bible Novel Book 1) Page 4
