Ro sleeps in Granddad's bed that night, in the loft that looks down onto the kitchen. I nestle in my own bed, right below that loft. He sleeps real quiet-like—so quiet, I cain almost convince myself he ain't even there. But my own breath catches when I do that. I want him to be there but I ain't at peace with that. I been alone long enough that I should be used to it by now. So how come I like havin' Ro 'round so much? It shouldn't matter whether he comes or goes, but I'm honestly glad he's here now, whether it's because of what he told me out on the porch today, or in spite of it—I'm not sure which.
Ro ain't killed no one. He tells me that first off and seems keen on me believin' it, if nothin' else. He adds in that he ain't no threat to me. He'd sooner slit his own wrists than do me harm.
"That's pretty dramatic," I tell him. Leadin' with a declaration of suicide should he act dishonorable towards me—he certainly has a flair fer tale tellin'. So I say, "Go on and git to the rest of the story."
He's from the capital city, which is what I suspected. Grew up there all his life near the city's soarin' spires. And also like I thought, his life is lucky, right from the start. He's privileged and never wants fer nothin'.
He got him a good childhood... happy. Durin' his young days, he rarely sees the parts of his city where the poor wretches live—the slums where folks are driven in order to escape their fruitless farms 'fore they get swallowed up by the desert. The Regions don't take in common folk as a rule, but it turns out the capital city makes an exception. Likes to show how merciful it is, lettin' desperate folk from inferior stock feed off its leftovers, and even gives a few of those folk employment of the toilet cleanin' variety.
I believe Ro has a toilet cleaner at his own fine house, but the only time he ever glimpses at where that woman comes from is when he leaves the city each summer to go on what he calls a wilderness expedition. That's where, if you cain believe it, people actually pretend to be homeless and without all their city conveniences. They make fun times out of survivin' off the land, till it tires 'em out, at which point they go back to their food-brought-on-a-platter-every-morning lives once more.
I cain't quite wrap my head 'round this, that his kind have to play at survival, that it don't just come natural from day to day gettin' by. They still gotta find a way to pretend once a year when the weather is nice and all the forest berries are in season. Must be rough. It do explain how he managed to git this far from the capital, across hundreds and hundreds of miles of harsh land, not a toilet cleaner in sight, all without expirin'. Pretend survival's paid off fer him, and I gotta remember that. Best I don't discount Ro as fast as I was first inclined to.
Anyways, goin' on these wilderness expeditions means travelin' from its pristine luck-filled center through the dangerous parts of town, where all the folks like me git stuck and evidently stay stuck till the day they die. But he tries his best not to see 'em, tries his best to ignore their stench, to ferget their sufferin'. He's a kid, so he cain push his mind in other directions, but not entirely. Somewhere at the back of his head, he notes their sufferin' and stores it fer future reference, and it's so well hidden, he don't even know this knowledge exists in himself till years later.
Eventually, the campin' trips stop and the upper education starts. College. That's something they got in the Regions, along with schools in general. Ro is on his way to becomin' a journalist. He learns all about turnin' facts into a good story, as his own life facts spelled out fer me in one hotter-than-hot afternoon stand in testament of. He gits apprenticed to a man who teaches him how to set type, how to put thoughts on a piece of paper and make 'em stick there. Ro believes he'll finish school and then work with this teacher till that teacher retires, which is what wealthy folks git to do 'fore they die, stead of constant work bein' the cause of their demise. After that, he'll take over, writin' government-approved news stories, printin' papers, gittin' people to read what he wrote. Well, this end up comin' to fruition, just not nearly the way he imagines it.
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Desert Wake ✔
Adventure***The Corner Booth Contest Runner-Up*** WARNING: contains one blue-eyed stranger, one fast-talking heroine, and a couple of scenes steamier than a mirage at noon. Throw in gigantic dust storms, lawmen out for blood, plus a wasteland to be traversed...
