Every Little Thing She Does

SHIBA KLEIN

At her apology, the smaller of the two women began to laugh, sending a heavy bundle of resentment into her gut. If there was one thing the Klein woman was not used to, it was being laughed at, and for a moment she regretted having approached the pair, but the words that followed the laughter dispelled those unpleasant feelings, replacing them with a tinge of embarrassment. She’d been wandering on her own for so long it seemed she had begun to forget how to interact with others. She smiled at them as they welcomed her, inviting her to join them. "Thank you." She quickly stepped forward, taking a long drink of the mead offered to her. Relishing in the warmth that slid down her throat and pooled in her belly, she stepped back and found a spot in the grass to lay with the two.

Having missed the first part of this encounter, Shiba had no idea if the women knew each other, or if they were just as much strangers to one another as they were to her. It didn’t matter much to her, she was perfectly content with their identities remaining a mystery to her. Her eyes slid closed and her head tipped back towards the last few rays of sunlight as the warmth spread through her body, loosening the stiffness in her limbs and her spine. She felt a lightness that she had never known before and suddenly the laughter that had come from the smaller woman made sense to her. Thoughts of her family fluttered through her head, and while the faces of those she had lost had been a constant, throbbing ache in her chest before, she now wanted to laugh at the thought. She wanted to laugh until her lungs burned and her throat was sore, until there was no sound left within her body that she was capable of expelling from her mouth. She had survived the drought, the illness, she had traveled countless miles to find her family, only to lose them once more. She had survived, but without them, what did she have left to live for?

Despite the desire to laugh, she stayed silent, her eyes opening once more, glancing over to the women. Was this a celebratory drink for them? A way to relax and unwind after a long day? Or were they just as lost as she was? She turned her head away again, hoping that neither had noticed her lingering gaze. She was capable of taking care of herself, but she was not emotionally cut out for life as a loner, and sitting here in the company of others and allowing herself to relax brought back bittersweet memories, and served only to remind her of the things she no longer had to look forward too.

"Speech."