I followed Cindy to the cash register. She jumped when she realized I was behind her, but then smiled and said, “Need anything, hon?”
I just looked at the cashier. “May I use the bathroom?”
“Code’s 1-5-4-2.” Cindy paid for her coffee and we both walked to the bathroom. I saw her looking at me, glancing at the bathroom doors. I decided because I’d gone with Alex as my name, the men’s room made more sense. And that way I wouldn’t risk Cindy trying to chat with me while we were pissing—for all her politeness, that seemed like something she might do.
We went our separate ways and met back at the car. Morv was standing, waiting for us, blinking in the dim twilight. “I’m going to sleep on the roof,” they said.
I wasn’t sure if they had slept the whole time they’d been with me, and I also wasn’t sure that they weren’t going to do something other than sleep on the roof. So I just nodded at this as though it was typical. “You can take the bed or the couch or the front seats of the car,” I told Cindy. “It’s your preference. You know, with the baby.”
She smiled at me. “I think the couch will be alright.”
I nodded and opened the trailer. She got in and I closed the door behind her, giving her some privacy—and because I wanted to talk to Morv. Or, maybe I didn’t want to, but Morv looked like they wanted to talk to me.
We moved a little ways away from Ruby.
“I don’t have a good feeling about this one,” Morv said to me the moment we were out of earshot. “There’s something not right. I can’t believe you did that, let a stranger into our space!”
“She seems nice. More than nice. I’m happy to give someone a ride, it’s no skin off my back. And she’s pregnant. You can’t leave a pregnant woman on the side of the road.”
“Yes, about that,” Morv said, brow furrowed. “How did you know?”
“What do you mean, how did I know?”
“How did you know she was pregnant? I heard you go, ‘with the baby.’ I connected the dots, but—”
“Morv,” I said, trying not to laugh, “have you really never spent time around humans? Why do you think her belly’s like that?”
“I figured that was just… how she was.”
“Perfectly round like she’s hiding a beach ball under her shirt?”
“Maybe she is hiding a beach ball under her shirt… ”
“No, Morv, she’s not. She’s obviously pregnant and obviously pretty far along. I should ask her how many months she has left.”
“Hmm.”
“You’re very smart,” I said to Morv, “and older, and wiser. But sometimes I do know more than you. Especially about humans. I’ve lived among them my whole life.”
“Speaking of which.” Morv reached into a pocket and pulled out a ruby. “Here.”
I swallowed it. It was cool water sliding down my throat. “When am I going to start noticing the effects of these? More than just feeling like they’re food?”
“You aren’t noticing them?”
“I feel normal. I don’t feel hungry if I take one. I still go to the bathroom, though, just as much as normal. I don’t know. I don’t feel like anything’s changed.”
“Okay,” Morv said. “I suppose that’s not a bad sign.”
“What do you mean? What would be a bad sign?”
“I think you’d know if there was a bad sign.”
“What would be a good sign, then?”
“Hm. I think you’d know if there was a good sign, too.”
“So… nothing is a neutral sign. A nothing sign. Means nothing at all?”
“Yes.” Morv was inscrutable. Obliviously naive one moment, frustratingly secretive and thoughtful the next. Like a baby dragon’s eyes, containing cold rocks and scorching fire at the same time. And so much smoke nothing could be clear.
“I guess… I’ll just look out for signs, then?”
“Yes. Look out very carefully.”
“I thought you said I would know.”
“Well, not if you’re not looking.”
“Okay.”
“You’re sure about this?”
“About what?”
“Florida. Cindy.”
I thought of Lola, and Mom. “Never been surer in my life. Never been surer of anything.”
Morv’s expression did not change. “Okay,” they said. “Sleep well.”
“And you.”
Dreams had always been rare for me, or at least if I dreamed I never remembered what I had dreamed about, if I remembered that I dreamt at all.
But that night I was thrust into so vibrant a dream that not only did I not question its reality, but when I awoke in the morning, I was still convinced that everything that had occurred in my dream was real. For a few long minutes I lay in the double bed in the back of Ruby which I had, for as long as I could remember, shared with Mom, and wondered where she was.
The dream began like this: I was driving Ruby, and beside me, instead of Morv and Cindy, sat my mother. It was like things were back to normal. Except something was different—I saw, out of the corner of the rearview mirror, that Mom was pregnant. And her face was strange—rippling like a wave. A vibration cast across her skin like it was a pool of previously standing water.
“Mom?” I said.
“Ae?”
“Are you—are you—” I couldn't get the question out.
“Yes, Ae?”
“Are you alright?”
“I am.” She turned away from me and opened the window. Cold air rushed in, and highway fumes. “Drive faster, Ae.”
I slowly pressed the accelerator.
“Faster!”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t think you can.”
“It’s not safe to drive fast. I can, but I don’t want to.”
“That was the right answer.”
Like always, I sensed that Mom was testing me before she revealed that she was. Like every conversation had some deeper purpose lurking inside it.
“Can you tell me a story?” I asked, gently relieving my foot’s pressure on the accelerator and recalibrating my pace to match the traffic’s.
“I can, but I don’t want to,” Mom parroted back at me.
“Please,” I said.
She frowned, and then began.
There was once a young dragon who had lived in a small cave all their life. They had never known other dragons even existed, but they did not miss what they never knew. They befriended animals instead. They breathed small fires onto the floor of their cave and curled around them for warmth in the winter. They had long and profound meditations upon life which brought them meaning and joy.
They even painted with crushed berries onto their cave walls, and foraged for seeds to replant and bring more plants to life into their corner of the forest. They only knew contentment.
Then, one day, a crop of plants which the dragon had fostered began to flourish so immensely that they spread beyond the small area in which this dragon lived and thrived. After a time the dragon did not even know how far this clever plant stretched. The dragon had no reason to believe that the spread of this plant was a problem, however; never had the dragon encountered a real problem before. So they continued to live their life as they had.
But this plant was in fact an invasive species, and it began to take over another part of the forest into which this dragon had never set foot. There were other dragons which lived in that part of the forest, and this plant killed their plants, came into their caves and spread nastily up their walls, suffocating the local berries and smothering the hidey-holes of the hedgehogs and squirrels.
The dragons of this region of the forest were outraged and fearful, not knowing where this plant had come from nor why. But they gathered their courage and numbers and began to follow the path this plant had taken. Eventually they made it all the way to the cave of the young dragon who knew no other dragons.
At first this dragon was terrified to see other dragons, having never seen them before, and, naturally, fearing anything which is unknown. But then, remembering that they had never had cause to fear anything before, their fear vanished, and they faced the strange dragon with a full heart and a proud chest.
“It’s you!” the dragons said. “You’ve been planting this invasive crop. You’ve been the cause of our suffering.”
But the young dragon had never heard words before, and all they understood was the wind.
They smiled, and opened their arms for a welcoming hug, just as they hugged their animal friends, even the hedgehogs and the porcupines.
The dragons interpreted this smile as a wicked smile, and this offer of a hug as a threat. They all lurched backward in fear—and then remembered their weapons and raised them high.
The dragon turned around, reaching for a basket of berries, thinking to offer them to their guests if a hug was not preferable.
But naivete is only useful sometimes. Maybe the dragons could have seen the berries and interpreted it as a peace offering, but in the dark of the cave, they only saw their foe turning into the darkness and reaching for an unknown object. So they descended, killed the young dragon, and, after returning home, never thought of that day again.
That’s the story.
I woke up trembling. How could Mom have told me a story in a dream? I looked around Ruby, but I only saw Cindy sleeping on the couch, a blanket pulled over her face. The sight gave me chills, but I couldn’t have said why.
I got out of bed. I tiptoed over to the couch, and reached out a single shaking hand.
To be continued.