Page 8 of These Godly Lies
She shifts the weight of the bag on her hip, letting the door close behind her. The tiny brass bell above her rings as it shuts.
The boy is waiting by her cart, staring at Loki with an odd expression as he clutches the paper bag to his chest. It’s not until she places her items in the back that he turns to look at her. There’s a stubbornness in the set of his brows, a determination in the way his chin tips. “Thank you,” he says, as his hand pulls some coins from his pocket before holding it out for her to take. “Here. For my things.”
Anna considers refusing, but she gets the sense that it would wound his pride. She accepts the money, the coins warm in her palm. “I’m sorry I had to step in for you to get them.” She places the money in the pocket of her dress. “What’s your name?”
He hesitates, just long enough that Anna thinks he might not give it. “Jiro. Jiro Okino.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Jiro. I’m Anna.” She lets her stare linger. “Do you have somewhere to go?”
“Yeah,” he says, but the tired shrug of his shoulders contradicts the word. “There’s this old boat shored up on the beach.” He scuffs the toe of his shoe against the sidewalk, the grip on his bag tightening until Anna catches the sound of crinkling paper. “It’s close to the docks. Sometimes I can make a bit of money helping the fishermen. It’s not a lot, but they’re the only ones willing to hire me.”
Anna considers him, mind turning over the idea for a few seconds before she commits to offering it. “I could use an extra set of hands at home, if you’re willing. Help in the garden, the kitchen, things like that.” She gives Loki a scratch behind his long ear. He lips at the hem of her shirt. “Of course, I’m a ways away. It would have to be a live-in position. But I could give you meals and a room in addition to a weekly payment?”
He frowns, his brows lowering and eyes narrowing. “I don’t want your charity.”
Anna tilts her head. “Is it charity if you’re providing me a service?”
He adjusts his hold on the bag, eyeing her cautiously. “What if you decide to fire me?”
“Then I suppose I’d bring you back on my next trip into town. Assuming that’s where you wished to go.”
He considers it, lips thin and brow furrowed. “Yeah. Alright.”
Anna hides her relief behind a smile. “Come on then. We’ll swing by the pier so you can grab your things.”
The first half of the ride home is quiet. Filled only with the creaking of wheels and Loki’s petulant sighs as he stubbornly makes his way up some of the steeper hills. Once, when she was younger, Anna might have been tempted to fill it with questions just to save her from the awkward edge of silence. She feels no such need, now.
The centuries have given her the confidence that comes with knowing the fragility of a moment—taught her to recognize the insignificance of some and the importance of others. She senses, instinctively, that she has more to lose with the boy beside her by pushing questions than she does by embracing his silence. So she steers Loki around some of the bigger rivets on the dirt road leading to home and watches the landscape slowly change from the comfort of her seat until Jiro chooses to break the silence.
“You didn’t give a last name.”
“You’re right,” Anna hums. “People in town know it as Spector, but I ask that you not call me by that. I only borrowed it for the sake of avoiding questions.”
The suspicion in his gaze is as evident as the edge in his voice. “So what’s yourreallast name?”
“I don’t have one.” She shrugs. “Hard to have a family name without a family.”
The confession seems to snag his interest, but he doesn’t continue the line of questioning. There must be a thread of understanding, of likeness, because the tension in him relaxes, the rigid set of his shoulders slowly melting. The silence between them feels less forced now.When he breaks it for the second time, it feels more candid than accusatory.
“A car would drive this a lot faster, you know.”
Anna doesn’t bother to hide her smile. “A car would,” she agrees, “but the trip keeps Loki young. He’s more prone to trouble when he’s bored.” She also has no interest in troubling herself with the process getting a driver’s license would entail. Besides, she doubts a car would make it past the redwood grove where the trail thins and winds between the giants.
Loki’s ears swivel back, hearing his name. Jiro frowns at him. “What kind of weird name is that?”
She glances at him from the corner of her eye, weighing his interest. “It’s the name of a Norse god. I could tell you about him, if you’d like?”
A moment of hesitation. Anna gets the sense that he is weighing her as carefully as she does him. He must find her offer sincere, because he eventually nods. “Yeah. Okay.”
She spends the next two hours telling him the stories of Loki and his mischief. The entire time, she thinks of blue-green eyes—of how they would light if he heard her spinning the same stories he once wove for her.
Anna knows next to nothing about Jiro’s past, but it quickly becomes apparent that her lifestyle is vastly different from what he knows. He regards Loki with a curiosity that borders on distrust, as if waiting for the animal to bite him the moment he turns his back. When the chickens rush him, eager for their meal, there is a shadow of panic in the way he tosses the table scraps as far away from himself as possible. Still, if he complains about any of his tasks, he only does so out of earshot.
He takes to cooking much easier.
When Anna shows him the garden, points out the herbs and thevegetables and explains which of the scattered fruit trees grow what, she can see the interest in his dark eyes. Sometimes when they cook, when he doesn’t notice her looking, she catches his lips moving soundlessly around the words as if trying to commit each recipe to memory. On a whim, she offers him a cookbook from her shelves and lets him choose their evening meals. He pours over the pages with an enthusiasm only matched by the excitement that lights his eyes when it’s time to eat it. She has a sneaking suspicion that, with time, he will become more adept in the kitchen than she is.
The apiary also seems to spark an interest. Though, to be fair, Anna suspects part of his curiosity is fed by the honey they lick from their fingers when they harvest. Still, he listens as she explains things. Looks when she points out the differences between the workers and the drones, squints when she points out the queen hiding amongst them.
