“It’s a gift. Uh—pris!”
His face lights up at that word and I promise to be right back. I skip over a few blocks and keep my head down. Last thing I need is for the Patrol I just lost to catch sight of me. But what am I supposed to do? Let him starve in an alleyway?
I jet across an intersection that veers off to the eastern side of the island where tightly knitted rows of units sit, their roof tiles staggered like steps. The east side’s where Bri and most Zrukis live. As the perimeter of the festival comes back in view, scents of qui, something like a turnip with the flavor of garlic, wafts past and my stomach churns. Meatmen hover slabs of dripping carcasses overhead, searing them with flames from their fingertips. The really talented ones can sear it with breaths of fire.
I stick to the shadows close to the buildings and wait. A boy no older than Tasha grins at the crowd, offering skewered samples. The clink of coins changing hands slices through the melodious backdrop.
Meatman sets down his slab to talk to a customer and the little boy is absorbed in serving an eager group of samplers. I slip my hand around the metal skewer and snatch the entire slab of meat, woodsy spices dancing under my nose as I hurry back to the alley with hot juices dripping down my arm. “V’ja, maca,” someone shouts. I don’t look back.
Little Guy is still there and his mouth falls open at the sight of the savory meal.
“Take it to your mom. Quick, hurry.”
His brows meet.
I fold his little arms around the skewer, grease running down his arm. “Take this”—I point—“to your mom.” I cradle my arms, then give him a gentle shove. “Hurry. Fast.”
He just stands there staring. Why didn’t I pay more attention in Language class? I sigh. How do I say, “go” or “mom?” I don’t have a clue. “Listen, kid. You gotta get the hell—I mean, you gotta get moving.” I rip off a piece of meat and hold it to my lips. He watches me chew and something clicks; he understands. He runs off hugging the slab of meat, which is as big as he is.
If that were Tasha, I’d want someone to make sure her belly was full. It’s only one meal, but it’s something. Angry voices grow louder. Meatman’s coming around that corner any second. I take off in the opposite direction, toward Bri’s, when my wrist shakes.
Bri: You close?
Me: Sorry, detour. Yeah, Why?
Bri: It’s your father. He’s on his way here.
* * *
I hate the man who calls himself—my father.
For bringing me here. For leaving Tasha there. For coming to the block to “change my life,” but not coming back to save Moms. For being a stranger my entire life. I hate that I wear his nose and our shoulders hang the same way.
So grateful Tasha didn’t grow up with that BS. Her pops was around, offering to take us places, apologizing for my pops being MIA. Said he knew him for a bit before he got snatched up by the cops. That’s what folks assume happens when you ain’t been seen around the way—either locked up for ten or carried by six.
But that wasn’t true in my father’s case. He wasn’t behind bars or in the ground. He chose to leave before I was even out the womb. Moms would make excuses, but I stopped caring around Tasha’s age. By then, I figured if that nigga ain’t want nothing to do with me, I didn’t want nothing to do with his coward ass either.
“Rue?” Bri asks, holding her front door wide open. “You listening? Where’d you go?”
“Me first. Why’s Aasim coming here? Like, how’d he know I would be here?” And what’s he even gonna do?
Bri gestures for me to come inside. I’ve only been to Bri’s once before. She doesn’t like being here, so I don’t get an invite often. The whole house is just like everyone else’s: a concrete box with two small square windows. Near the front door are two other doors, one for the bedroom they all sleep in, and the other for the bathroom. I sit on wide, pillowed cushions on the floor next to a table covered in metal pieces and wires. Bri’s stuff, no doubt.
In the corner, Bri’s mom is folded over a pile of colorful strings that look like yarn but not nearly as fuzzy. Her fingers move a mile a minute like she’s conducting a yarn orchestra and a beautiful tapestry of colors interlace and knot, weaving itself across her lap. She doesn’t say a word to me, but cuts me a look and mutters something to Bri in Ghizonian.
“Ya, Memi.” Bri rolls her eyes but doesn’t explain.
“So, Aasim…” I tap my foot. “I’m listening. How’d he know I’d be here?”
She shrugs. “He just sent a message that said he’d be here. He assumed you were with me, which isn’t that far-fetched.”
He’s literally the last person I want to see. “Ugh.”
Bri’s mother glances at me, shifting in her seat. I don’t think she likes the sound of Third in Command coming to her house, and she probably isn’t all that happy about harboring a fugitive, either.
“Na’yoo zechka.” She stares a moment then gets back to her work, looping a purple strand around a line of rainbow-colored ones.
“How did you even get her to agree to let me be here?”
“I sort of told her Aasim asked that I bring you here.”
I’ve never heard her mother speak anything but Ghizonian. Bri says she knows English but doesn’t approve of using a western language just because it’s widely popular. The western world is near idolized here. Without contact, it’s like forbidden fruit, making it all the more alluring. Fashion magazines are about all the insight anyone has, and even those are contraband. No idea how they get them, but never fails that at a party, someone’s passing around a very worn, out-of-date copy of Teen Vogue or something.
“She’s just really old-fashioned,” Bri had explained. “She doesn’t think we need English since we have no contact with any other countries. It feels like treachery a bit to use anything but the native tongue.”
I didn’t say anything else about it, but that didn’t sound like the whole story.
“What took so long to get here?” Bri asks.
“Just got caught up with some Macazi.”
She laughs. I don’t.
“Oh man, you’re serious?”
“Quintomae,” her mother mutters under her breath.
“What she say?”
Bri rolls her eyes. “Quintomae. It’s nothing.” She looks from her mom to my blank stare and back to her mom. “You’ve never heard The Myth of Quintomae? Like, really?”
“Nope,” I say. “Didn’t grow up here, remember?”
Her mother mutters something under her breath again, this time too faint to hear. Maybe hiding here wasn’t the best idea.
Bri pulls a pillow into her lap. “So, legends tell of a man who was half man, half lizard. He thought he was invincible because of his impenetrable scaled skin. So when J’hymus, the Sea Monster, appeared off the northern coast and the king himself couldn’t fend off the beast from terrorizing his people, Quintomae saw a chance to make a name for himself. He—”
“He pleaded with the king to let him fight the beast,” a baritone voice cuts in. Bri’s father is home from the mines. “And the king said no. But he ignored the king’s edict and marched into the sea with only a bewitched javelin to take on the sea creature. Quintomae was never seen again.” Bri’s father loosens the ties on his shoes. “Ya’weshna e verzee. Disobedience is death.”