20. Chapter 20 #2
I’d tried to talk Maz into letting me help him with his work, but he had the lab set up for one person. Having two people in there, even someone as small as me, didn’t work. I hated being crowded when I worked, so I understood and would only go in there for short visits.
Unfortunately, that left me without much to do when Nadia was napping.
After our movie night date, we’d reconfigured the empty storage room as a play space for Nadia. Maz had covered the floor with mats and had them going partially up the wall. Soft blankets, pillows, and a bunch of colorful items he’d bought for Nadia were in the room too.
I set Nadia down near the middle and moved a stride away before dropping to my knees. “Come to Mama,” I said, holding out my hands.
She was quick to reach me. I helped her balance and take a few steps, then let her crawl some more. After a little while of doing this, she decided it was nap time and collapsed down on her belly for a snooze.
I loved the way Nadia could be giggling and active one moment and sound asleep the next. It was yet another adorable thing she did.
The problem was I didn’t have anything to do while she took a little nap. After standing up and stretching, I moved over to the boxes and cases stacked at the far end of the room. We hadn’t opened all the items Maz had bought for us, and now was as good a time as any to unpack.
The first few boxes were nothing but food packs.
I stopped looking through that stack and moved to the next one.
There was a tomer bag on top. When I pulled it open I chuckled at the sight of many more tomer bags inside.
I remembered wanting them to make outfits, but then Maz had bought us clothing and I hadn’t gotten access to any tailor machines.
Staring down at the tomer bags sparked a memory from my childhood. My grandmother had knitted in her free time. I’d found the process fascinating and begged her to teach me. I’d done it for a few years, but when I was old enough, I’d gotten a job and didn’t have time for knitting any longer.
I could see the weave of the tomer bags. I didn’t know what they were made of, but I could see how they were made. Would it be possible to pull them apart and try knitting using the yarn?
Nadia was still sound asleep, and Maz was busy. What else was I going to do?
By the time Maz joined us in the playroom, I’d successfully unraveled one of the bags!
“Look what I did!” I said, holding up one of the balls of yarn. There were six more, and that all came from a single bag.
“That’s nice,” Maz said, crouching down next to me. “What are you going to do with it now?”
“Knit,” I said. “Although I’m going to have to figure out what I can use as knitting needles.”
“My INT doesn’t have a translation for the word knit,” he said, falling back to sit next to me. “Please explain.”
I told him all about the Old Earth art of knitting, my memories of doing it with my grandmother, and wanting to take it up again. As I was finishing, Nadia woke up. Without hesitation, Maz picked her up and settled her against his shoulder.
“It seems your first task has been successful,” he said. “You have yarn. Now we need to find you needles.”
I eyed his quills as he shifted Nadia from his shoulder to the floor between us. “What do you do with the old quills when they break off?”
“Usually throw them away,” he said.
I tilted my head. “Usually?”
“I was fixing a bot and broke one off inside. I left it because it would’ve been too difficult to pull it out.”
“Can I try?”
“You want some quills?” he asked. I nodded, ready to assure him I wasn’t going to do some kind of evil magic ritual with them, only to have him casually break two off one arm and hand them to me.
“Maz, didn’t that hurt?”
He sounded a negative rumble and shifted Nadia so she could balance on her chubby little feet.
“I didn’t pull them out by the root, only broke them at the base. They’ll grow back.”
“Thanks, Maz,” I said.
I examined the quills. With a little sanding to reshape the tip into something more round and less pointed, I was sure they’d be perfect.
“You entertained Nadia while I worked,” he said. “You can focus on this project while I play with her.”
I wasn't shocked that Maz recognized how much I wanted to explore this. After all, he was the best guy ever.
“Can I borrow one of the stones you collected?” I asked.
“I’m finished with them,” he said.
“I’ll be right back,” I said, and got to my feet. I rushed to the lab, picked one of the rocks that looked like it would work best, and returned.
Maz and Nadia played while I used the stone’s rough surface to sand down and shape the tip of the quills. After I was finished with that, it took me a long time and many failed attempts to cast the yarn onto a quill.
By the time I had a row of stitches, Nadia was fusing in a way that told me she was probably hungry. Feeling ready to put the project down for now, I held my arms out to Maz.
“I’ll take her.”
He handed her over then carefully picked up the quill with the yarn. “This looks complicated.”
“It is,” I said with a chuckle, undoing my outfit so I could give Nadia my breast. We’d do more solid food later. “It doesn’t help that I haven’t done this since I was a kid.”
“I’m impressed you were able to do so much so quickly,” he complimented, setting it back down.
“It doesn’t feel like it was quick,” I muttered. No, I shouldn’t think like that. I was half remembering and half reinventing. I needed to give myself some credit. “The more I do it, the more I remember. It’s going to be fun once I get the hang of it again.”
A chime sounded from his Ident. “That’s the sound from the ship’s interface,” he said with a questioning rumble. “That shouldn’t happen unless there’s an emergency or a message.”
He tapped on the Ident then let out a worried rumble.
I looked up at him. “What’s wrong?”
“We’re going to have visitors.”
He sounded a negative rumble. “No, one of the investors wants to visit.”
I switched Nadia from one breast to the other. “Is that common?”
He looked up at me and sounded another negative rattle. “This would be the first time it’s ever happened.”
Now I was worried too.