Helena Chu (lostchu) wrote in thefield, @ 2009-07-24 00:23:00 |
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Entry tags: | cross, helena, z - 1st tribe - day 29 |
Another One Down
Who: Cross and Helena
When: night
Where: by the fire
It had been an extremely long day, but Cross was satisfied with the work they'd gotten done. Once the logging crew had returned to the island, he'd eaten and washed up, and it was full dark by the time he ambled back to the fire just outside the lean-tos. He picked out Helena from amidst the other shapes that huddled in the dimness and lowered himself down to sit beside her, shaking out the damp rag in his hand to show her. "I think it's done," he said of the shirt he'd been wearing when he'd arrived here. "S'there enough cloth left to use for anything?"
Helena had marked his arrival as she always did. She was used to Cross taking his time coming back from a day of labor. He was so fastidiously clean despite their surroundings but she liked that about him. Without the benefit of hot water and deodorant he almost always smelled of the cucumbery freshness from the soap pods. Beneath that, though, was the pleasant musk of his own skin. Damp or not, she graduated toward him and took the shirt from him. "Hmm, don't know," she said honestly. "The girls can always use rags though, if you're willing to give it up." She arched a brow at him. Coping with the natural course of femininity wasn't pleasant or something they even enjoyed discussing in this place. She'd only suffered with it once so far but she was due again in a little more than a week. No hot baths or water bottles, muscle relaxers or the most basic in hygiene products had left her testy and miserable. She supposed it would just become something they got used to. "And I'll make you something to replace it." She fingered the green thread she was currently working with. They were a tall pair of socks. She had delivered a similar pair to Rowan along with her poncho earlier that day. She was hoping to have the above-the-knee socks finished for Analiese and Coop by the next evening.
It took Cross a few seconds to figure out what Helena was talking about when she said the girls could use rags, but then it clicked and he nodded. "I can't really use it for anything," he pointed out. It wasn't something he'd really thought about, but now that she'd mentioned it, he could see how not having the most basic of supplies could be an issue. The shirt was too full of holes and rents and too stained for anyone to want to wear it again, so it might as well go to good use. He'd found that most of the time he went around without it, anyway. "Wonder how long it'd take to make a shirt that'd fit me?" he mused. Helena was getting quite fast at knitting by now. He sighed, letting his shoulders relax; he'd felt tense as metal wire all day long. "How you feelin'?" he wanted to know, glancing over at her again.
Helena had a helluva goose egg on the back of her head the day before but it seemed to have shrunk considerably since she was set upon by a dog. "Ok, a little headachey still. I think it's mostly tension in my neck though." Thorne had supposed she'd gotten some mild whiplash when her head hit the ground. It was he who recommended she find a fairly immobile job for the day. Nimble and reliable climber as she was, she'd hoped to take up Kenneth's position and keep an eye on the island from the top of the spring. The doctor had quickly vetoed that idea and she'd noticed the tension around Cross's eternally shut mouth that said he agreed with the assessment. "Got a lot done today, though. How did you guys fare?" she asked as she tucked the rag of his t-shirt into her knitting basket. Some of the guys had already stopped by and greeted her as they slopped clay bowls full of the spicy fish and seafood gumbo that Sophie had created. She knew nothing disastrous had befallen them and she'd even noticed that they'd floated a hefty cart full of logs back on to the island. It hadn't seemed like much given a full day's work but she knew they were working with limited tools.
"We did well under the circumstances," Cross told her. He never would have imagined trying to gather that much wood with such rudimentary tools, but at least they'd had a stroke of luck while they'd been out there. "Found an axe stuck in one of the trees... that'll help." It was peculiar how random items kept turning up, but he wasn't one to look that proverbial gift horse in the mouth. The axe would make any building progress they made go faster, could be used as a weapon if needed. "We need a lot more wood to even think about gettin' a building up," he added, "but we'll get there." With enough strong backs and enough determination, it would get done.
Helena let her knitting sag into her lap for the moment as she turned to level a surprised expression on him. "An axe? Like a normal, earthly metal axe?" Now that was more than a fluke. It had to be. No way a group of lumberjacks would wander in to their first stand of trees and find an axe stuck in a tree. "Were there any other signs that there were people in the copse? Like, um, old campfires and things? Was it rusted?" She paused to dredge her mind for any more questions, a frown appearing between her brows. "Who has it now?" she certainly hadn't noticed one of the guys carrying a new tool.
"An axe," Cross affirmed. "Looked like it just came out of a hardware store. New, not weathered." Her barrage of questions made him smile a little, although he'd thought many of the same things while they'd been out there. "I didn't see any signs of life. Dunno about the others." Cross wasn't much of a conversationalist under ordinary circumstances, needless to say. His brow furrowed as he thought. "We floated it back tied on top of the wood. Might still be there."
"Wow," Helena mused, falling into a chilly spin imagining where that might have come from. Especially at the time they seemed to need it the most. "That's really odd," she said as a line appeared between her brows. "Very lucky but odd." She fell quiet at that, willing to let it go. Ranting and raving about possibly being the rats in some kind of enormous maze seemed to get harder to suppress with each passing convenient find.
"Odd," Cross agreed. The word didn't really describe it, but he, like Helena, didn't see any point in going on about it. There was nothing they could do about any of it, and it was a feeling that Cross did not like. Before he'd come here, he'd been accustomed to having control over his life at all times. Very little had ever surprised him or taken him aback. Here, though, everything was different. He sighed, turning his head from one side to the other and listening to his neck pop. Another day of hard work, and likely yet another tomorrow... but that was something with which he could deal.
Helena sighed and gave him just a slightly tight smile. However the axe had appeared in their lives, it was perfectly timed and something they should be grateful for. "I don't feel like I did much today but I'm exhausted," she told him. "Maybe it was focusing on not messing up my stitches." She nudged her woven hamper of knitting. "Took more out of me than I'd have thought." Or it could have been the bump on the head. Every once in a while she asked herself her middle name (Mae) or her mother's maiden name (Pho) and called herself well enough off to make it through the rattle to her brain. Still, she was achey, headachy and tired.
"You took a good knock to the head," he told her, as if she didn't know that already. "Makes a difference." All that knitting could strain her eyes, too. He stopped just short of suggesting she lie down to get some rest. Although he thought it, he didn't want to seem overbearing. He preferred to save that for the truly important occasions when she might be in danger. He was about ready to pack it in, himself, simply because he was exhausted from the day's work he'd put in.
Helena sighed. "I did. Still hurts. But I did make you something, while you were off working away." She tilted a smile up at him as she reached into her knitting basket again. Inside was a scrap of cloth left over from when she'd made her sandals. The bright coloured fabric had started its life as her pillow case. Pulling out the round and flat cloth-wrapped item, she handed it over to him. "Something to go with your grazer for dinner." Inside was a couple of flatbreads, a little darkly browned around the middle, lumpy but still recognizable as bread. She'd carefully mixed egg, a little bit of goats milk and water and a pinch of salt to a couple of handfuls of the coarse sweetgrind flour that Rowan had gifted her with. A few failures had been scraped into the fire but she thought she'd gotten the hang of it eventually.
Cross pulled the cloth away from what was inside and looked at it, his expression at first as if he didn't realize what it was. "Bread?" he questioned, breaking off a small piece of it and lifting it to his lips. It didn't taste like anything he'd ever had before, but it was definitely carby, almost like a cross between loaf bread and cornbread. "You made this? It's good." He broke off another piece and then offered her the flatbread. If they could actually produce enough of this for it to become a staple in their diet here, it would help with the problem of everyone being hungry and losing weight. Protein was good, healthy and welcome, but it didn't accomplish a great deal toward keeping their strength up.
She nodded. "Yeah, I just experimented a bit. A lot of it didn't turn out well or burned to a crisp. A few of them turned out okay though." She accepted the flatbread and took a cautious nibble. "Just be careful. There might be harder bits, like in cornbread. Rowan's doing her best to get the flour even finer but I told her this was great." For a first attempt, anyways, it was nothing to sneeze at. "Any more food we can add into our diet the better, right?"
"It's good," he said again, nodding, when she warned him about harder bits. "At this point, I'm not gonna be picky." There'd have to be actual stones in it that might break his teeth before he'd complain, and then he might not complain all that vigorously. After all, it was starch, it was tasty, and Helena had gone to the trouble to make it. It was nice to know that they could have bread now that there was sweetgrind flour and eggs and milk. He ate one more piece and then made himself stop, not wanting to devour the whole cloth packet of bread at one go. "It could make all the difference in our energy levels, in how much we can get done," he said.
Helena smiled and nodded a couple of times. Really, she was just happy that he ate it. She came from one of the most modern and forward thinking cities in the world. She'd gone through so many female roles in her life, daughter, student, wife, mother (though all too briefly), friend and coworker. She never thought much about providing for the people she cared about. In the real world that they came from, seeing to everyone's needs was so much easier. To her, it felt like a coup just to make bread that was edible. Like she'd fulfilled some ancient role. "It's a slow process, grinding the flour. I guess some day we'll have to look in to building a mill but for right now," she shrugged. "I guess some of us girls are just going to have to work at it while you guys are dragging home trees."
"Maybe you could get anyone who needs somethin' to work on to help," he suggested. "Anyone who's at loose ends." He wouldn't be averse to helping with it himself when he wasn't off doing the heavier labor. "Wonder if the blond kid has a pot big enough to store some of it in?" he mused. He knew Ryan's name by now, of course, but now there were significantly fewer people who could be described that way with the absence of Clay, Rook and Milo. He carefully wrapped the bread back up, thinking that he and Helena could save it for the next meal with which bread might be a good accompaniment.
Taking the wrapped flatbread from him she tucked it carefully back into her knitting basket, which was turning into her daily catch-all. Soon, she hoped, she would work her way through the basket just so that she had more room for the items they made and found. They were starting to accrue possessions with the addition of Cross's bow and quiver, a few bowls and mugs from Ryan and little things like those. If they ever had to move again, they'd be packing much heavier. "Yeah, Sophie and Rowan have been doing the bulk of the work. I imagine Ro's roped Ryan into it though when she gets tired."
Cross nodded. Like just about everyone else at camp, he was aware of Ryan, Rowan and Thorne's sleeping arrangement, though he hadn't commented on it, and he figured Ryan would do just about anything the girl wanted him to. "Mm-hmm," he said, wiping his hands off on his khakis and getting to his feet. He exhaled a deep sigh, realizing anew how worn out he was. "Think I'm gonna turn in," he told her.
Helena stood as well, taking care to brush all the sand off of her fanny before bending to gather up the handles of her basket. "Yeah, I should sleep as well." It was the best medicine for her aches and pains after all. A little wave of dizziness washed her up against his side but an arm around his waist steadied her as she got her bearings.
It wasn't far to their lean-to, and Cross was happy to guide her there. Once he was sure she was steady enough, he took off his shoes and, after a quick glance around, unbuttoned and unzipped his pants and slid them off as well. Usually he did that once inside the lean-to, but if there wasn't anyone nearby, it was easier to take them off this way. He put his shoes inside the structure, then folded up his pants to put away; once he had those things taken care of, he climbed inside and settled into their bed, which felt as comfortable as any bed he'd ever slept in as tired as he was.
She mumbled about standing up too fast as he led her to the entrance of their lean-to. Sighing, she followed him in and tucked the basket far into the corner. She'd lost a bunch of wool when the dog had emptied her basket, she didn't want to lose any more to the monkeys. "Do you want light tonight, or should I tuck up the robe?" she asked as she sat near his feet and untied the ribbons of pillow case that held on her rubber sandal soles.
"Whichever you'd rather," Cross said, already sounding distracted and sleepy. As far as he was concerned, it didn't matter either way, because he was going to be asleep in a matter of minutes, anyway. And when he did fall asleep, he was unlikely to move at all until morning. There was nothing like backbreaking work to make a person sleep like the dead. He watched her taking off her shoes through heavy-lidded blue eyes, a soft sigh escaping his lips as he thought about more logging to come tomorrow.
"I think one of these days I want to come out with you guys to see these trees," she said as she tucked the shoes away. The weather seemed to be warm enough, there was no need for her to wear the robe to sleep or muffle the weather from coming through the door. She laid down next to him and pulled the robe up over herself, finding it made a nice blanket for the more comfortable nights. "Just to look around and see what I can see." The island still needed a lot of exploring as well, but she was curious about where the men were going to be spending their day. "Not tomorrow, I have different exploration plans tomorrow, but maybe the day after."
"Mmm," was Cross' comment as she was getting herself settled in. "Gonna watch us sweat?" He was teasing, something that might not be obvious to anyone who didn't know him. He chose not to cover up at all, finding his briefs to be plenty of cover for this warm night. He restrained himself from telling her to be careful tomorrow; he might end up saying it before they parted for the day, but he was conscious of the need not to be overbearing. He had a bad habit of that sometimes.
Snuggling up against his side, she slipped her arm around him as she always did. He was a mountain of a man next to her, even when he lay flat on his back. She chuckled softly and brushed a kiss against his shoulder. "It's not a bad way to spend a day," she said, the wry humor plain as day in her voice. She could understand why people thought Cross was humorless and intimidating. She'd be lying if she said she didn't enjoy their misconception of him. Helena was more than aware that they couldn't really account for the personalities that arrived in this place. Some day she might find herself faced with someone dangerous and she was more than a little bit glad that Cross would always be there. Even if he was away with the boys for the day.
Cross exhaled soft laughter and then turned his head to look at her. "Glad you think so." It would be nice to have Helena there, he thought. Obviously, she couldn't help them with the logging, but he always found her presence soothing, warming somehow. He tilted her chin up with gentle fingers and brushed a kiss over her mouth, just because he wanted to. Then he settled his arm over hers, feeling his gritty eyes trying to fall closed with every second that passed. "'Night," he said softly.
Her arm tightened around him reflexively when his lips grazed hers. One of these days, she decided, I'm going to have to insist I get him alone.... It was tough trying to find the time to explore this quiet romance between them when their days were so exhausting. "Night," she said, feeling him ease back in to sleep. Helena turned her eyes up to the darkness above them and felt her headache ease a little more. Sleep would be the best thing for her for now, she knew. Now if only it would greet her as quickly as it claimed him, life would be alright.