2. Chapter Two #2
Tobago, however, didn’t seem quite ready to leave yet. And when I glanced up, I caught one of the men peeking his head in through the open doorway, then hastily pulling it back once he saw that I’d spotted him.
How . . . cozy and close we all were. I cleared my throat. “Perhaps we can have a moment to freshen up?”
Tobago nodded his understanding. “Sure thing. We’ll be eating at 18:00, family dinner.
That’s when everyone eats, mind you, unless you’re on duty.
Same goes for breakfast and midday. The crew that eats together stays together—or maybe eats each other, I forget how it’s supposed to go.
” On his way out, he motioned to Ursa. “There’s a free bunk for you down the hall with the other men. Let me take you there.”
An awkward silence settled. I’m not sure Ursa completely understood what a bunk was, but he seemed to intuitively glean that Tobago meant to separate us. He bristled again, rising up to his full height as best he could with the low ceiling.
I would have to smooth this over, and quickly, before any more shoving took place. Tobago would not excuse that sort of behavior a second time.
“Actually . . .” I faltered, wondering how best to phrase that I was regularly copulating with my wildman companion.
Knowing Tobago, I doubted he would care.
He’d been living outside of the social norms of Haven 3 for quite some time, which was why he’d rejected a more traditional life in favor of smuggling.
But I would care. While I didn’t regret the new physical side of my relationship with Ursa, I wasn’t quite ready to broadcast it to the world.
I needed time and space to come to terms with it myself first.
Time and space that, it seemed, we did not have in abundance. “Ursa and I have . . . well, we’ve survived together for so long now, we’ve gotten quite used to sharing close quarters. I think perhaps it would be best if we just continued on. In that manner.”
Tobago’s slow blink told me he did not buy for a single moment that Ursa and I needed to stay together for reasons of habitual comfort. “Right . . .”
Out in the hallway, I heard a loud whisper: “Yep, they’re definitely fucking!”
Oh, good Havens. I resisted the urge to cover my face with my hands. “So,” I said primly, “unless there’s something else . . . ?”
“Nope.” Tobago seemed to want to end this conversation almost as much as I did. Nevertheless, he stepped closer to me, lowering his voice. “I trust that in the future, you can keep a leash on your dog?”
I ought to have corrected him that, despite Ursa’s wild appearance, he was very intelligent and should not be underestimated. Though he didn’t yet understand everything about civilization, Ursa was not as animalistic as his exterior might suggest.
But before I could express this to Tobago, he departed. I don’t think it was only my imagination that he exited the room more briskly than necessary, seemingly eager to be done discussing my sexual proclivities.
Thankfully, he shut the door behind him, meaning that Ursa and I would no longer have any onlookers reporting on us back to the rest of the crew. Which was good, because we very much needed to have a conversation.
When Ursa had shoved the crewman, I’d wanted to put on a united front. Now that we were alone together, however, I turned to him with my sternest expression of disapproval.
Alas, it was wasted, as Ursa was too busy studying the mattress, reaching out experimentally with his bare foot to test its yield.
The results were apparently not what he had been expecting, since he hastily retreated, staring at the mattress for a long, assessing moment before venturing closer again.
Noticing my attention on him, he motioned at the mattress with his head. “What is it?”
If I hadn’t been so irritated with him, I might be thrilled that he had once again cobbled together an independent clause.
He really did seem to be getting the hang of it!
But that didn’t matter, I reminded myself sternly, because he had also jeopardized our place on the ship only a matter of minutes after coming aboard.
“A bed,” I said curtly.
Ursa’s expression twisted into a look of dismay. “Sleep?” he asked dubiously, before nudging the edge of the mattress once again with his knee. “Too soft.”
“Some people like that.” As a matter of fact, I was quite excited about getting to sleep in a proper bed again after so many weeks spent sleeping on hard rock and animal skins.
But now was not the time to get distracted.
It was important, desperately important, for me to help Ursa understand the new rules we’d be expected to follow on the ship.
I would have to give him a crash course in the expectations of civilized behavior.
Not only had Ursa been raised away from humans for most of his life, but we were also being thrust into intense circumstances, confined with strangers on a small vessel.
I had an enormous uphill battle to climb.
As I pondered this, worrying my lower lip with my teeth, Ursa sat on the edge of the mattress.
At first he pulled himself away quickly, but after a moment, he allowed himself to sink back.
He tilted his head, his expression such an innocent, unfiltered display of bemusement that I might have laughed had circumstances not been what they were.
“Mina sleeps here?” he asked.
“Yes. But Ursa, there’s something I really need to—”
He nodded, resolved. “Ursa sleeps here.”
This conversation was really getting away from me.
“Ursa, stop talking about the bed. I must speak with you about the incident with our crewmate earlier.” At his blank expression, I had to fight another wave of irritation, reminding myself that he (likely) wasn’t purposefully being obtuse. “The man you shoved.”
Ursa’s expression immediately darkened. Perhaps because he’d read the clear disapproval in my voice, or perhaps because he did not yet know any words to describe what he felt for that other man, he remained silent, watching me.
I, too, was suddenly at a loss for words.
How in the Havens was I possibly expected to explain all the intricacies and nuances of human interaction in one brief conversation?
It was a very delicate business. I needed to impress upon Ursa the importance of the situation, but I also had to take into account that he wasn’t intentionally acting out—he didn’t know the rules!
The many strange, shifting, contradictory rules of civilization.
I finally settled on, “You must not go around shoving people.” As soon as the words left my mouth, though, I realized I would need to provide some caveats. “Unless someone is threatening you. Or me, I suppose. But otherwise, no shoving. Do you understand?”
Ursa’s expression made clear he did not understand. “Man threat.”
“No!” I held up an index finger to help emphasize my point. “He was not threatening me. He was staring at me, I’ll give you that. And he did come rather closer than he needed to.”
Ursa raised his eyebrows as if to say, Yes, and?
“That’s not the same as threatening,” I explained. “When you spend time with people, lots of people, you come to understand they can be . . . strange. Uncouth, sometimes. They might not behave how we would like them to behave, but that doesn’t mean they deserve to be harmed.”
Narrowing his eyes at me, Ursa leaned back on the bed, palms splayed out behind him. “Too close to Mina.”
It really was rather unfair and distracting for Ursa to sit that way when I was trying to tell him off.
The position made the muscles of his chest and abdomen sort of .
. . ripple. I cleared my throat. “I’m afraid that’s not for you to decide, Ursa.
If the man were trying to grab me or shove me or pull my hair or something, then you might be justified in shoving him. Otherwise—”
Ursa’s eyebrows furrowed, his face the picture of skepticism. “Ursa watches man harm Mina?”
Oh, dear. We’d have to work a bit on pronouns and verb tense.
And anyway, when he put it like that, even if it wasn’t entirely grammatically correct, I realized it was rather ridiculous that Ursa should have a bad feeling about someone but need to wait until the person actually attacked me before intervening.
Ursa’s instincts were uncannily good; after all, he’d instantly disliked Rawley.
I huffed. “I know it isn’t perfect, but . . . listen. If you’re worried about me, you can intervene without being overtly physical. Step in between us, or put out a hand to stop him from coming closer. Match the energy that’s being shown to you. Do you understand?”
At last I seemed to have scored a point with Ursa. He tilted his head to the side, seeming to ponder the idea. He might not be fully agreeing yet, but he was at least considering.
Noting that he was distracted, I took just the quickest glance down at his exposed torso. That really was very nice.
But I needed to stay on task. “He was only staring. You’d think you’d be more sympathetic.” At Ursa’s eyebrow raise, I persisted, “You used to stare at me all the time, as I recall.”
His gaze darkened again. “Ursa wants Mina.”
Ah, yes. I probably shouldn’t have drawn that connection for him, since even from our early encounters, it was likely that Ursa had been having .
. . well, less than platonic urges toward me.
Hence, the staring. Let us hope our new crewmate just had some boundary issues and wasn’t similarly trying to stake any kind of primitive claim.
“You don’t know what that man wanted or didn’t want,” I reminded him. “And you won’t ever know if you go around shoving people. That might work in the forest, but here in civilization, we use our words first. Always. We talk things out.”