Undestined: Fight your Fate

Chapter 13, Pt. 3

Breakfast was a simple affair, eggs and toasts with jam, but to Silay it was a feast. Eating inside, at a proper table was not something she had ever thought to consider a luxury. Jarlen all but inhaled his breakfast before Silay was barely halfway done with hers. He stood up and dropped his napkin on the table the two of them had been sharing. "Well, back to the apothecary." Before Silay could respond, he was out the door.

Edo approached the now empty chair. "Mind if I join you?"

Silay gestured for him to sit, and he did so. She waited for him to say something, but he he didn't. Deciding he still didn't feel like talking, she finished her meal in silence. She thought it should have been awkward, eating in silence like that, but was surprised to find it wasn't. When Silay was done eating, Edo finally spoke.

"Would you go for a walk with me?"

"Sure." Silay stood and picked up her and Jarlen's plates. Edo walked over to the door, waiting for her. After Silay set the plates down on the bar tables, she joined Edo. "All right," she smiled. "Let's go."

Edo returned the smile, but like the his earlier one, it didn't quite reach his eyes. "I didn't really have anywhere in particular in mind. I just thought we could walk around the town and maybe...talk?"
"Fine with me!" She smiled again.

The two of them set off down the main street, heading away from the town hall where they had been last night. Again, Silay waited for Edo to say something, but when he didn't, she decided it was time to start the conversation herself.

"Was there anything in particular you wanted to talk about?"

Edo paused before answering. "You're a very strange person."

"I--What?" That was not the reply she had been expecting.

Edo blinked. "Ummm...sorry. I think I meant to just think that, not say it out loud. I didn't get a lot of sleep last night."

Silay raised her eyebrows. "And that makes it better?"

"No! I didn't mean it in a bad way. It's just...it's odd. Sometimes, you seem really young, naive. And other times you--"

"And other times I seem like, oh, I don't know, like I'm the same age as you, which I am?"

Edo shrugged. "Like I said, I didn't mean it in a bad way. Nor do I think it's bad. But it is odd."

"I'm odd."

"No! I'm saying that! Just that the way you act..."

Silay cut him off again. "I know you aren't saying that. I'm answering your question. I am odd. That's why my behavior is strange. I'm not upset with you." She had intended the last part just to be kind, as Edo really did seem to regret what he had said, but as she spoke the words, she realized she really wasn't upset with him. If anything, she was upset that he had pointed out something that she was too aware of herself.

Edo hadn't said anything else, and Silay realized he was waiting for her to explain what she meant. She sighed.

"It's the whole not having a future thing. It made me an outcast in Dargrosa."

Edo nodded, and Silay continued.

"It was more than that though. Since my Fortune Day and before this...quest," she almost said unquest, but remembered her decision about that last night, "the only people I had to talk to were my parents. And of course, I was their little girl to them. Not an adult. Which is why I am the way I am. I haven't had a lot of experience talking to other people. Or even being around them. Which, I suppose, does make me strange."