Chapter 11 #2
“Hush.” Lolly gave Tiny a look that had the smaller woman blushing anew but glancing towards me with a look that said she was dying to say more and wished I’d join in.
Was Tiny waiting for an answer from me? It wouldn’t be forthcoming.
“Where do you hang clothes so they can dry?” I muttered as I lifted up my hoodie and watched water pour out of it.
“Depends on the setup, really,” Louisa murmured as she stood. “If you have a wet room, a mud room, usually in there. For smaller places, over chairs, a drying rack if you have one. It’s too cold to leave them outside for long. They’ll freeze.”
“A chair by the fire,” Dace called out from her spot all the way down the river. “Works good for me.”
Red rolled her eyes at Dace and pretended like she hadn’t spoken.
On this went— I’d ask a question, someone would answer, and if Dace had any input she’d respond when everyone else was finished. There was nothing wrong with her answers. The chair idea was good as I had nothing to hang clothes on to dry.
“Why are you such an asshole about her?” There. I’d said it. If it didn’t pour out of me it was going to fester. I probably could have worded it better though.
Red’s jaw about dropped.
Lolly clapped a hand to her mouth to keep from outright laughing. Louisa’s good natured laugh had Red bursting out laughing, even if her face did pinken.
“I’m a total asshole sometimes, I will admit that right now,” Red murmured with a sigh. Shaking her head, she added, “She knows what she did. I hold grudges.”
It was the nicest mind your own business I’d ever gotten. My head dipped in a nod and I shut my trap.
“Kinda hypocritical of you, isn’t it? You know, all things considered,” Tiny piped up.
“Excuse you?” I didn’t understand. What things considered? What was hypocritical of me?
Lolly sighed, stood, and walked off towards her daughters. I had to bite my lip to keep from laughing as I caught Lolly mumbling about big mouths, gossip, drama, and folks needing to mind their own business. She wasn’t wrong.
I should’ve minded my own business. I know this. It was kind of gross sitting here like I’m part of this group while Red mocks Dace down the way.
“Leave it. She doesn’t know.” Louisa frowned Tiny’s way as she began to pat her little man’s back and rock from side to side in place.
“Maybe she should,” Tiny shot back.
“Does it matter?” Red cut in. The look on Red’s face while polite was just shy of passive but it clearly said she’d already decided where my loyalty lay and it wasn’t with them.
“She’s partaking of Dorothy’s family’s hospitality and all. It is Bia’s place she’s staying in, is it not? I mean, she should know who she’s been getting friendly with.” Tiny thought she was rather smug.
Red and Louisa did not.
“So, I’ve gotta get going but it was nice meeting you, Prudence.
” Louisa said her good-byes, grabbed the handle of the laundry she’d just washed, dragged it about five feet before a beastman working on cutting up a large slab of meat at a very long table across the way called out to her, barking at her, “Eh, my Lou! You wait! Smengal come!”
Louisa tossed back as she released the basket’s handle, “Your wish is my command, my Smeagol!”
Her punny quip had me snort laughing.
Once more, Dace chirped from her exile, “I don’t get it.”
As Louisa left, more women trickled in to do their wash.
There were at least twelve women surrounding us now, peppering me with questions that ranged from fine, normal, to stuff we plain weren’t going to go there.
Yes, I am hairless. I am Lo denaii. Yes, that is odd.
No, I didn’t think being bald and Lo denaii was funny.
Why am I not with Kehlor? Isn’t he my mate?
I didn’t know these people at all. The inquisition was jarring.
Tiny thought it her mission to try and interject with bits here and there about Dace’s sordid past with Bia’s mate Mina and answering questions as they were shot my way, even if she answered incorrectly.
Not much for information secondhand, I did what she did to Dace and pretended she hadn’t even spoken.
After about twenty more minutes of Tiny’s nonsense, dragging more women into it to gossip along with her, I grabbed my soggy clothes, the bit of soap wrinkling my hand, and stood.
“Where are you going?” Tiny frowned as I started off towards Dace.
“It’s too crowded here. I’m making room,” I tossed back.
I could feel Red’s eyes on me as I took my dripping mess down to Dace’s end of the river.
Maybe I’m a bit of an asshole too, I thought as I settled and smiled Dace’s way. She looked so surprised to see me I had to ask her twice, “Mind if I join you?”
“No! Of course!” Dace’s smile was so wide it looked ghoulish. Speaking of Smeagol. I’d probably be a little deliriously happy to have someone acknowledge my existence after the lengths the others went to ignore her and treat her like a leper too.
Dace was nice to me. Until she did otherwise, we were cool.
“I heard Tiny,” she mutteringly mumbled as we worked in tandem.
“I didn’t hear it from you or Mina. It’s just talk otherwise,” I muttered as I wrung out my t-shirt as good as I could.
First day on the job and I already missed washers and dryers.
“She’s not wrong.” Biting at her lip, the tiny blonde’s shoulders slumped. “If you’re staying at Bia’s, you probably shouldn’t be seen talking to me.”
“Do you want me to stop talking to you?” My hands paused and I lifted my head to meet her wide-eyed gaze.
“No,” Dace whispered softly. “You’re the only friend I’ve made aside from Buu and Carrie that I know isn’t just tolerating me for someone else,” she admitted.
“I’m here because I want to be.” Finished wringing out my shirt, I rolled it up and placed it in the blue bag I’d brought along.
“They’re both so busy with their families now… I don’t want to be the third wheel just hanging around and being in the way. You know?” She spoke softly, quietly, glancing over in the direction of the larger group of women down the way.
“I can’t say I have all that many friends, either.” My admission was met with an understanding smile.
Her smile dropped just as fast. “You really probably shouldn’t be seen with me, though. Mina hates me. She has every right to.” Again, her gaze darted from me to the group of women.
“What do you all do for food around here?” I asked her. My stomach chose that moment to growl angrily.
Dace blinked at the sudden subject change.
Her eyes widened at the noise my stomach made.
Her hand clapped to her mouth as she began to chortle out a laugh.
She did the piggy snorts giggling thing.
“There’s a community garden for vegetables and eggs, fruit is gathered nearby, I can show you where, and grain is harvested from the fields just before Sorak’s place.
He’s the Monociren that runs the kep-kep ranch across the way over there.
” Lifting her hand, she pointed off in the direction behind me.
“Monociren are unicorn men.” With a roll of her eyes, she muttered sarcastically, “Or horn heads, as Rek likes to call them.”
“I got the impression Rek was not on good terms with him.”
Dace laughed at that. “Besides Joanie, Celuk, and Buu there’s not really anyone else Rek really gets along with.” After a moment, she conceded, “He gets along well with the babies. He loves babies.” Huffing softly, she added, “Maybe because he IS a big baby. Babies are his people.”
Her softly mumbled train of thought did not feel meant for my ears but I’d heard it all the same.
“Sorry.” Dace blushed then, her pale skin going beet red with embarrassment. “I’m too used to talking to myself and not being heard.”
Sobering at that, I ventured, “Surely it wasn’t all that bad, whatever caused a rift between you and Mina you can’t be civil. Maybe-”
“It’s worse than whatever you’re thinking.
” Dace’s shoulders slumped as her gaze dropped.
“It’s too awful.” Daring a peek at me, she bit her lip.
“I’m afraid if I tell you, you’ll decide you don’t want to be friends with me anymore.
” Sighing heavily, her lips pulled down into a disconcerted frown. “I should tell you. You should know.”
“Only if you think I should.” The idea of Dace doing something absolutely heinous to deserve a communal shunning baffled me, but I acknowledge my bias at the start. I’m coming into all this blindly, based solely on what little I do actually know.
When she hesitated, I eyed her. “Did you murder someone?”
Dace glanced up sharply and a splutter escaped her. “Heavens no!”
“Did you… shoot someone?”
Dace paused there and I wondered if I had my answer. Yikes. She shot someone?
My eyeballs must have been majorly bugging when Dace glanced up because she glanced from me to the group again and quickly shook her head.
Leaning in from across the way, she whispered, “I’m nearly done.
If you’d like to talk some more, I’ll wait for you past the buildings just over there,” she gestured with her eyes past a string of huts, then over to the women staring at us and trying to pretend they weren’t, “we can take the back way to my place. I have the fixin’s for sandwiches.
We have to space it out so it’s not obvious you’re leaving with me. ”
Nodding, I continued with my wash. Dace finished up hers, grabbed her things, said a short good-bye to me, then the ladies, and was off.
Counting Mississippily in my head, I pretended I hadn’t finished shortly after Dace had, buying just enough time our departures didn’t appear suspicious. It was kind of silly to pretend like this but if it made her feel better about it I would.
Gathering my things up, I stood, thanked the ladies still gathered for their help with the wash, and left.
Walking down the path, I was just shy of our rendezvous point when I heard voices, one gravelly and deep, the other high and squeaky.