lunatic fringe

The sun had dipped behind the trees on the side of the road by the time Stephen and Robert hauled Alex and Eric into the backseat with me: it was right then I had been tucked behind the passenger seat when Stephen took to the wheel on the right side of the car. He fired up the Alfa, and it rumbled to life.

“It started,” Robert declared.

“It started, alright,” Stephen repeated, quite proud of that fact as well. We rolled off the grass and dirt to the pavement. The trees whirred past us in a blur. We were safe, and we were head to the cozy place. I glanced over at Alex and Eric, both of whom were pale and battered from the trek: the former looked at me with sleepy eyes and slightly parted lips.

“Our packs are in the trunk,” he told me in a hoarse voice, and I breathed a sigh of relief at that. We hadn’t lost Tim’s guidance, but we lost our makeshift campground. Then again, we were headed for something much better than that, something much more bearable and comforting. Night soon fell over us: all the while, the five of us were silent. There was nothing either of us could say at that moment that hadn’t already been said, either, but once the signs for Cardiff entered out view, Stephen cleared his throat and peered intot he mirror at me.

“How’s our girl doing?” he asked aloud.

“Hungry and still in pain,” I confessed. “I could use some shepherd’s pie right about now.”

“Speak my language, darling,” he replied with a chuckle.

The lights from the skyline entered our view, and I breathed a sigh of relief. We took the next exit into a part of town which looked to be rather cozy, and it helped that Alex cuddled up next to me and rested a hand on the crest of my knee. I looked on at him in the darkness with a smile, and through the shadows, I could see the smile on his face and the twinkle in his eye.

Alex was officially my best friend at that point, and I could let him feel me for as long as he wanted at that point, as long as I got to feel him as well.

We pulled up to the pub next door to the hotel, and I couldn’t feel more eager to check into our room and have a shower, even with my aching bones. The water was warm and the soap caressed my skin: I let myself drink in the comfort. The sweet kiss of Wales at the helm.

Once I was done, I wrapped my hair in a clean, soft towel. My back, hips, and legs all ached, but at least the shower helped with my mobility. I had found a bathrobe in the closet, and I used that to cover myself up. Before I faced Alex again, and we fetched a bit to eat with Stephen and Robert, I re-emerged from the bathroom to find him shirtless and sitting on the edge of the bed closest to the bathroom. He peered over his shoulder for a glimpse back at me.

“Shower’s lovely,” I informed him as I tightened my belt. I stood next to him, and I glanced down at his little body. I spotted the scar on his chest and the bruises on his wrists, to which I gaped at him. “Oh, my god.”

“Long story,” he replied; “well, the mark on my chest is, anyway. The bruises are from all that we did today.” I sank down next to him, and all the while, I kept my gaze locked onto that scar. It wasn’t a surgical scar, but rather a long and shallow one, as if he had been stabbed there. What amazed me more was the perfect straight shape of the mark.

“Do you want a shower and then talk about it afterwards?” I suggested to him; I thought of putting my hand on his, but I also considered that the bruises were fresh, and therefore tender. We were alone in the room as Eric had taken the one next door. We could talk for hours if we so wished. He then looked on at me with a rather quizzical look on his face.

“Where’d you get the robe?” he asked me.

“In the bathroom closet,” I replied. “I didn’t see a second one in there. If there isn’t, I’ll find you some clothes.”

He showed a little smile, and then with nothing more to add, he stood up and rounded the foot of the bed. I watched him duck into the bathroom, and all the while, I noticed that he was slightly limping, probably from the walk and that run, as far as I could even so much as assume.

The pipes in the wall whirred into life, and I wondered as to what we could have in the pub besides shepherd’s pie. I remembered that we still had my loaf of bara brith in his pack, and I knew that we could perhaps fetch a little loaf. When in Wales, after all.

My ankles continued to ache as I stood up again and then ambled over to his pack resting there on the table. I unzipped it and found the flannel in there: if nothing else, he could wear that and have the towel wrapped around his waist like a kilt. When in Wales, after all.

The thought along made me giggle, but then I peeled back the flannel and revealed the bara brith as well as the ingredients that Tim had given us, and the hippos. I felt like we were in possession of paraphernalia, especially as I lifted my gaze to the window before me, and I could only assume that Stephen and Robert kept our quivers and arrows in the car. And yet I also wondered as to how the food moved from our quivers to the bag without my memory of it ever happening.

I could only assume that Alex was hiding something from me, and I could only wonder as to what caused the scar on his chest, especially as that was the first time I had seen it before.

I returned to the window, and I nudged the curtain open to look out to the dark street, as far as I knew, the soldiers could be out there. We were safe in Wales, safe in Cardiff and in that room, but then again, I thought that we were safe in the woods and the three of us nearly died out there, either to be pumped full of lead or by walking ourselves to death.

I moved my hand back and let the curtain fall back into place. I adjusted the towel on my head, and it was then the water switched off. Water cascaded down as he wrung out his long hair. I couldn’t help but picture him in there completely in the buff and dripping wet. I couldn’t help but imagine his body next to mine, in all his beauty and all his glory. I couldn’t help but be in love with him and every inch of him.

In fact, thinking about him made me forget the pain in my body and remember the feeling of desire once again. A chill ran up my spine and a tingling sensation emerged between my legs: the tingling only picked up more when I thought about putting my hands down inside of his shorts. I was the only girl surrounded by boys and suddenly, I thought of kissing all four of them, but especially after Alex. I wanted to protect his little body as we found solace in Wales and then thumbed our way through Britain: his beautiful little body.

I could hear him grumbling to himself in there, and then he followed it up with a soft “yes!” which told me that there was a second bathrobe in the closet. A brief silence, and then he re-emerged from the bathroom: his long black curls dangled all around his face and shoulders, and even though he had tied the belt around his waist, he left the lapels open so as to show off his chest and the fine curled sprigs of hair to me. The scar on his chest was all the more prominent to me at that moment.

But I showed him a smile as he gave his damp curls a shake.

“There he is,” I stated in a low voice. His cherry lips turned into a sweet smile.

“I’m here,” he replied, and I invited him back to the bed.

I crawled up onto the covers and leaned back against the headboard with my legs stretched out before me. Alex followed suit right next to me: it was then I realized he wasn’t wearing any underwear. I inched up closer to him regardless of that fact.

“Lay it on me, baby,” I encouraged him.

He sighed through his nose, bowed his head, and closed his eyes.

“Okay, I got stabbed last year, by my old girlfriend. The woman whom you saved me from.” I gaped at the sound of that.

“She stabbed you?” I demanded.

“Right in the chest,” he recalled, and he rested a hand upon the scar: his fingers curled over the mark itself, and all the while, he grimaced from the feeling. I leaned in closer to him, and I could feel the pain through that fine line of scar tissue. Sometimes, all it took was the finest of lines, the smallest of fractures, for us to feel the hardest of pain. Indeed, I raised my hand up to his chest to feel the scar tissue for myself: he felt so delicate and tender there, such that I wanted to kiss him there, and yet, a part of me felt as though kissing him on the scar would be akin to kissing barbed wire. I was about to kiss something hard and sharp.

“We got into an argument,” he continued. “She accused me of having an affair and I swore that I wasn’t. Things got really ugly fast and she wound up stabbing me in the chest with a corkscrew.” I grimaced at the sound of that. “The next thin I knew, I was waking up in the hospital with my parents and my brother at my side. She also apparently tried to shoot me in the head but I guess something stopped her. I don’t know who or what it was that stopped her, but I still shudder from the thought that I was that closet to death.”

I rested a hand on the back of his, and I leaned in closer to the side of his face for a soft kiss.

“And,” he continued, “because I’m a genius, I kept going back to her. She just… made it seem like I was going to die without her, aside from the fact that I nearly died by her hand…” His voice trailed off, and he bowed his head and closed his eyes. I leaned into him again, and that time, I tucked my head into the side of his neck. It was the best that I could do for him, for the pain still residing in his body. But even with the pain, he still felt soft and tender to the touch.

To think that we had nearly died together back there in the woods, and I shuddered from that thought. But Alex didn’t seem to notice the feeling or movement from me whatsoever.

“Do you ever blame yourself,” he began again, that time with a break in his voice, “for wanting to impress someone you love—or supposedly love, anyway—because the other alternative is to be alone forever? Do you ever blame yourself for getting so caught up inside of your own mind and your own feelings that you can’t even see the train coming your way?”

“As a matter of fact, I have,” I confessed to him in a soft voice. “I have blamed myself for getting inside of my own mind and staying there. It doesn’t help that I have a bad habit of overthinking things, either. Overthinking things and letting my own mind get the best of me as well.” I ran my fingers down his chest again, down the scar there, and he nibbled on his bottom lip from the feeling.

“The pain in my chest, like crucifixion for my own original sin and the nausea of my own sore stomach… the wandering Jew with a hole in his chest and the gray anomaly on the crown of his head…” He dropped his hand from the scar, and all the while, I never let him go.

“You know I love you forever, right?” I told him. “I love you and will always find you gorgeous.” I ran my fingers through his black curls, and I kissed him on the forehead. I rested my hands on his shoulders, and I held him so close to me. The scar tissue underneath my arm, the scent of his skin and hair under my nose, and the feeling of his whole body underneath me.

“We should go to Israel,” he suggested. “Go to Israel and never go back to North America for as long as you and I shall both live.”

“We won’t get there in one piece,” I told him, “knowing what the soldiers are like, and everything. I’d love to go there with you, though.”

“But I guess you’re right, though,” he confessed with a sigh. “And I’m sure we can survive here. We have to be brave, Hannah. I have to be brave in particular.”

I stroked my fingers down the scar, the scar on his heart.

“We can always be brave in the face of pain,” I assured him. “Let’s always be brave in the face of pain.”

I kissed him on the side of the face, followed by the side of his neck, which in turn made him his head to the side so he could relish in the feeling of my lips better.

The trees seemed to grow taller as we wove our way across the forest floor. All the while, Alex and I kept our fingers interlocked every step of the way. It almost felt like I was guiding him along the pathway to wherever the edge of the forest was, and it felt as though I was flying as well. I was flying through the Welsh woods with Eric guiding us along to where the next pathway could be.

We rounded the next bend in the trail, and we reached what I initially thought was a clearing, but the trees gave way to something more, something long and with treads—

“A road,” Eric stated, out of breath.

“Which way do we go?” Alex asked, also out of breath: even when we came to a stop, he still linked his hand to mine, but then he let go and flexed his fingers. Eric turned to me with his eyes wide and his face slightly pale from the combination of fear and running.

“What do you think, Hannah?”

“We go right, we go back where we came and probably get ambushed all the while,” I suggested with a point off to the right of us. “We also potentially return to the pub as well as Tim. But… if we go left, we probably find another road and maybe Cardiff, too.”

“I vote going left,” Alex declared with a raise of his hand.

“Yeah, I do, too,” Eric stated with a nod of his head. With a quick glimpse back to the right, we then ducked left. I could feel those soldiers chasing after us. I could feel their instruments and weapons pointed towards us as if the three of us were in fact criminals. We were criminals: we defected from North America and now they wanted us to pay the price for it. But the three of us were running, running for our lives.

The trees were all a blur around us. I couldn’t think of anything else other than to find the road to Cardiff. If we found the road to Cardiff, we could find the road down to Cornwall after that. We ran for what felt like a mile when the trees cleared away even more, only to reveal a vast plain which extended out to long low hills, the sole landmarks were brick walls strewn over the hillsides: no trees were to be found.

It was at this point we slowed to a walk, just so we could catch our breath. Alex glanced back at the dirt treads behind us.

“I think we made the right choice, you two,” he said, breathless.

“Yeah, but we’re not out of the woods, though, brother,” Eric pointed out with a run of his fingers through his sleek black hair. “We stop here, we’re sitting ducks, although I do have a weird feeling about this.”

“It’s still midday,” I pointed out right then. “Sun’s directly overhead, which means we’re headed out west, which means unless this dirt road goes to a highway—”

“We’re going the wrong way,” Alex groaned with a tilting of his head back.

“But let’s keep going, though,” I continued. “The other alternative is we die.”

“What’s the worst that could happen if we keep going this way, anyway?” Eric asked me.

“We reach the Irish Sea and then we have to skirt along the coastline to Cardiff,” I explained. “At least, that would be obvious at that point, though.” As soon as the words left my lips, the road gently curved to the left, away from the hills and towards the sun. We needed to keep going as the road returned to the trees for a moment. At least the trees themselves bestowed us with plenty of shade: I could feel the heat on the vast grassland next to us like a blanket of heat. Either way, whether we were headed to a stretch of blacktop or the Irish Sea, we were going to Cardiff. I knew for a fact that we would be safe there as well as Cornwall, where Stephen and Robert were hiding. I had no idea as to how we could find our way down to Cornwall when we were on foot, but we would cross that bridge when we got there, and stranger things had happened as well: I never thought I would be picking up and scraping Alex off the floor and taking him away to the British Isles, but I had done that without a second though about it.

We kept on walking for what felt like hours: when I felt the sun hitting my head, I wanted to tell Alex and Eric to stop and set up camp because I knew for a fact that the two of them had to be tired as well. Every so often, Alex picked his hair off his neck and made a makeshift ponytail with his hand. Eric was as white as a ghost. I knew these boys wanted to stop, but it was either continue on or risk waking up dead.

At one point, a thought crossed my mind that we were going to die regardless of what happened. This was a part of the plan, to chase us out of the woods and make sure we would die before we reached Cardiff. When I thought this, I thought of crying, crying and linking hands with Alex one last time. At least I wanted to feel something soft before the three of us keeled over and used the dirt treads as our new bed—

“Is that—?” Eric pointed ahead of us.

“Where?” Alex’s voice broke.

I looked ahead, at the end of the trees, at a flattening of the ridge before us. I glanced to the right, at the groove in the hills.

“Oh, my god, it is!” I declared with my arms out before me.

“It’s a road!” Eric added with his hand out before him.

“The highway!” Alex cheered, and the three of us reached the end of the dirt road and the start of smooth tarmac. My knees quivered and my hips ached from the sheer amount of running and walking we had done, but we reached a road which I hoped would lead us to Cardiff. We came to a stop and glanced about either way.

“Go right, the hills break us if the Irish Sea doesn’t first,” I stated, and it was right then I wished for a drink of water. “Go left, we get food, water—”

“Beer,” Eric interjected, and Alex burst out laughing at that.

“Some beer, too,” I added with a laugh as well. “Food, water, beer, showers, a place to sleep, and asylum away from the technate soldiers.” I turned my head for a look at the sign down the road a bit: from what I could tell, it was fifteen kilometers to Cardiff. Fifteen kilometers, which meant we needed a set of wheels and fast as well, and the two boys on either side of me realized that as well.

“Fifteen kilometers, we may as well just kill ourselves right now,” Eric groaned as he reached down and massaged his knees.”

“It’s a road, though, Eric,” Alex pointed out. “And fifteen kilometers isn’t far when you think about it.”

“What are you saying?”

“There’s bound to be a car every now and again,” Alex continued; all the while, I examined the sign even better. With my legs shaking, I walked closer to it, and I saw that the one was actually a four.

“It’s forty-five kilometers, guys,” I called out.

“What?” Alex shouted, stunned.

“Forty-five!” I repeated. The two of them hobbled closer to me, and Alex looked ready to collapse right there before me.

“Son of a bitch,” Eric lamented. “How far is that?”

“Ninety miles,” I figured. “I think. Still, Alex said it himself. There’s bound to be some traffic at some point.”

Alex then breathed a slight sigh of relief, and he sank to the ground before me: he let out a low whistle, and I knew that it had to do with the fact that it felt good to sit down. Eric followed suit, and he laid flat on his back all the while. I followed suit, and my hips ached from having done so much running and walking, and for so long as well. In fact, I was so exhausted that I was nearly ready to fall backwards and go to sleep right there under the Welsh forest, technate soldiers be damned.

Indeed, I awoke to the sight of the sun hanging low over the trees and the rich royal blue crown of the apex of the sky overhead as well as a head full of dark curls looking down at me from upside down.

“Hannah?” Stephen’s voice sounded so soothing, even if he sounded completely worried and frightened.

“Hannah, are you alright?” I always thought looking into his brown eyes was akin to looking into my own, and it helped that his round face and head full of coarse, lush curls added to it as well.

“How—” was all I could muster. “How did—” I couldn’t hardly sit up from the sheer fatigue.

“Rob and I were going to the coast when we saw three bodies laying on the ground.” I missed his Mancunian accent as well; he examined my body. “Were you shot?”

“We were running from soldiers,” I informed him with a clearing of my throat.

“Mother of god,” he groaned, and he turned and glanced back at the something. “Rob! It’s way worse than we originally thought! They were being chased!”

Robert then said something and Stephen returned to me. “Right. Let’s get you three to safety.”

I could hardly stand up, much less sit up, and thus, Stephen tucked his arms underneath my armpits and lifted me into an upright position. I groaned and grunted from the pain in my back and legs.

“Bloody hell,” Stephen remarked once I was upright before him. I looked on at my legs, at the bruises on my ankles and lower legs, and I could only wish for better shoes once they took us back to Cardiff. Alex and Eric had rolled over onto their sides, and they both were still breathing.

“Can you stand up?” Stephen asked me.

“I don’t know,” I confessed.

“Here, let me help…” My legs shook and ached as he lifted me up off the ground. We worked together to get me up: gingerly, I turned around to face him and his soft brown eyes. I didn’t remember him being so chubby before: he looked healthy. Rob stood behind him, pockmarks on his triangular face and a wide-brimmed hat upon his head.

“Here, Steve, I got her,” he offered in his Welsh brogue, and he reached for me.

“Yeah, I’ll get our two boys here,” Stephen assured him; once he was closer to me, Stephen then turned to Alex and Eric. Robert kept his arm around me to hold me steady for a moment. My legs ached again, and that time, I glanced past him to the old but restored silver Alfa Romeo parked by the side of the road. Though it was a few feet away, it felt like a few miles away.

“Want me to help you?” he offered me in a soft voice.

“Please.”

“Okay…” Robert stooped down and tucked his other arm behind my knees. He let out a low whistle as he scooped me up and held me close to his chest. I took a second look at the car, and I knew that we faced forty-five kilometers to Cardiff in pain. Then again, we could rehabilitate. Our legs would heal. There was no healing from dying.

That was the only thing going through my mind as he carried me tot he back seat of the Alfa: there was no healing from dying, and the three of us had survived. The three of us had survived the assault of bullets as well as our country having died a horrible death.

“Could you get the back door, please?” Robert grunted out. Carefully, I reached out and opened the door of the Alfa: he slid me onto the cozy leather backseat with a loud groan. I let my legs relax behind the driver’s seat, and I breathed a sigh of relief. I glanced up at him and the rosy glow to his face.

“Are you alright?” he asked me; in the background, I could hear Stephen talking to Alex.

“In pain from all the running and walking,” I replied. “But relieved.”

“That’s what we want to hear,” he replied. “I’ll be right back—I gotta help Steve fetch your boyfriends.”

chapter seven: the way out is through

The three of us congregated around the fire pit, and at that point, it really looked like the loaf was baking over the open fire: Eric had helped me make a spit of sorts to suspend the loaf over the flames; the edges were caramelizing and everything seemed to be holding together. Such a wet, tacky loaf, and yet we watched it turn into that rich, golden tone with the kiss of the fire. By the time I figured it was finished, it was past midday: the sun caressed over our heads and I hoped that no more technate bullets would tear us out of the welcoming arms of Wales. Using my pocketknife, I cut the loaf down and laid it on top of my pack to let it cool off. Alex leaned over for a smell of the top crust.

“Smells like the British Isles,” he remarked; he propped himself onto one hand and gave his long black tendrils of hair a toss back. I could feel Eric leaning in closer to me for an examination of the loaf for himself: the dried fruits were as plump as the two of them, the walnuts bestowed all the thoughts onto me, and the dough made me think of gingerbread. It was me in a bread loaf, all the way down to the factor of natural leavening, of rising out of the ashes.

I had to chuckle at the suggestion of our nicknames, how Eric so unabashedly called me “vixen.” Then again, it was my debt to him. I needed to bring him something that he had given unto me when Alex was with his mother and under the wing of the dancing clown. Indeed, I took a glance down to his hands, to the prominent veins in the backs to the point they resembled thick spiderwebs. To lay in bed with him again, and to have Alex there on the side as well to round out the triad.

Indeed, I looked over at Alex, who hooded his eyes at me and turned the corners of his mouth up into a sweet little smile, one that looked ready to seduce me.

“I dunno if it’s the cinnamon and cloves in the spice mix, but I am really feeling some heat here, fellas,” I noted, and the two of them came even closer to the sides of my face as if to kiss me on either side. I braced myself in anticipation of the double kiss on my face, something I knew that I needn’t miss in the realm beyond the veil—

Something ricocheted off the tree trunk behind Eric. The three of us stopped, and we glanced up to the low-hanging branches.

“What the hell was that?” Eric whispered; I turned my attention to the bara brith, which was still cooling off in the midday sun. I then looked over at Alex and the anxious look on his face.

“Do you still have that flannel that you used to hold the gouda cheese?” I asked him in a hushed whisper, and he nodded in response.

“I’m guessing I’ll have to work quickly,” he suggested with a flick of an eyebrow.

“That’s the best plan,” I promised him. Alex reached into his pack for the flannel in question: he bundled the loaf of bara brith when another ricochet behind us caught us off guard. In a haste, we tucked the fruits, nuts, sugar, and tea into my bag. A third ricochet, and I could feel them coming for us. The only thing I knew about the technate soldiers was their appearance was so shocking and bone-chilling that even thinking about them brought those old feelings of being dead once again. The three of us scurried over to the trees and bushes to hide away from them.

“Where are they,” I muttered as I huddled closer to Alex. He held onto the bara brith, which meant I could draw my arrow if I so wished. Eric huddled even closer to me: his thick fingers held onto my upper arm. They were in the bushes in front of us,

I reached behind me for my bow and arrow straight from the quiver.

“Hannah, don’t,” Alex coaxed me,

“I can take one down,” I assured him as I propped up one arrow into the string. I tugged it back to ready myself. I could feel my mind slipping away at the mere thought of them, such that I needed to focus on the two boys on either side of me. 

I couldn’t. I couldn’t focus on them, even with my fingers on the string and the arrow ready.

But I was determined. Those officers needed to go, especially after badgering Eric and chasing us away from the North American continent. I was determined to fire an arrow through one of their thick skulls.

“I can—take one down—”

“Fuck it,” Eric blurted out, and he tugged me away from there; Alex followed suit right behind us. We were running for the stream and the pond, away from our campground, but at least we had our things and we could find a new spot for ourselves. It was our racetrack, which we had set up for ourselves, and I could only hope that it would still be there for us once we returned to the mountains of Wales, that is if we returned to the mountains of Wales.

We reached the waters near the campground, and I hoped that Alex would keep the flannel dry as he bypassed the water for the trees lining the edges; Eric and I meanwhile dove headfirst into it all. Bubbles surrounded our heads and shoulders, but he and I managed to break through the surface and swim together. Twigs on the river banks snapped and broke as Alex wound his way through the brush with the flannel tucked in his arms as if he was about to lose it.

Water splashed into my mouth and eyes, such that I could feel myself ready to choke and suffocate if Eric and I missed the edge of the water and the grass. But he held onto me with one hand, and we paddled as fast as we could, away from those soldiers: I swore that I heard more ricochets on the branches all around us, and I knew they were shooting at Alex.

Through the splashes of water into my ears, I heard a voice, and I couldn’t tell if it was his voice, either. But the voice speared through my mind, and for a moment, I closed my eyes and focused on the time that I had died. It was such a feeling like being in that water, the feeling of floating, and I had returned to the light.

And at that very moment, I was returning to the light, the light of the sun as it burned over our heads. From through the clouds, Eric gasped as he lifted his head out of the water, and I believed that I had seen the other side once again.

“Over here!” Alex’s voice sliced through the whirring bubbles like a cork off the bottle of champagne. Eric coughed, but I held onto him. He grimaced in agony, but I tugged him along towards the water’s edge where Alex was trembling and holding the flannel under his arm. Eric grimaced and groaned in pain.

“What happened?” Alex demanded, stunned.

“I don’t know,” I confessed, out of breath.

“I hit my foot against a rock,” Eric groaned out, “right against the bone.”

“Oh, shit! Yeah, let’s help him out—” Alex lunged for us when I caught the sound of more ricocheting on the trees.

“Hurry, Alex!” I declared as I clambered out of the water first. We both reached down and helped Eric out of the waters right as more bullets hit the trees before us. Alex and I put our arms around his shoulders, and we hobbled along into the brush to safety. Out of breath, we huddled behind a bush, on a stretch of grass so Eric could recline back and relax his aching bones.

“Where did you hit yourself?” I asked him as he grimaced again.

“Right on my ankle,” he groaned out, “right on the bone.” He laid his head down on the grass and opened his mouth. However, no sound bled out from the back of his throat. Alex helped him lift up his legs onto a small shrub, while I tended to his head. He grimaced once again, and he rolled his head over my palms in pain.

“Oh, shit, Hannah, he’s got something in his pocket,” Alex informed me.

“Oh, that,” he stammered; indeed, I spotted the smooth lumps in his left trouser pocket, to which I reached down and slipped my hand inside. It was something smooth and stony, and there were four of them in there. I retrieved two from his pocket: a pair of shiny black hippopotami lined with what I assumed to be gold. Alex knitted his eyebrows at the figurines.

“What on earth?” he muttered. The marbling in the black stone made me think of clouds; with my free hand, I turned them over for a better look at their chests and hooves.

“What are these, Eric?” I asked him.

“Black jade,” he choked out. “Both of those are carved out from fifteen carat stones. They’re worth forty-five million dollars each, and that’s not counting the gold trimming, either.”

“Each?” Alex gaped at him.

“How did you find these?” I demanded, taken aback.

“They belonged to my grandfather. All I know is the tidbit about black jade being worth millions.” He grimaced again, and he let out a low whistle.

Alex and I gaped at one another. “That’s why they were chasing him,” he concluded.

“And what’s the other thing in here?” I clutched at the hippos and kept them close to my chest, and I reached into his pocket again. I revealed a pair of mice, one of which had what appeared to be a ruby on its back.

“And those are ninety million each,” he sputtered again. “No clue what the ruby’s worth, but the fact that I have it on me could cause World War III without a second thought.”

“God above,” I breathed out. “Is that why you and Christine were running?”

“Yes and no. Yes, because… well, look at them. And no, because it’s a damn long story and one that I dunno if I want to talk about here.” Indeed, we were met with silence, and all I could think was that the soldiers were in the bushes waiting to strike.

Alex nibbled on his bottom lip, and then he inched closer to me as well as Eric’s head.

“We have to stay together,” he told me in a low voice. I cracked the hippos in my hands, and he inched closer to me to see them for himself. Millions of dollars worth of precious stone in my hands, and I knew that we were on more of a mission than baking a second loaf of bara brith.

“What do you think we should do?” Eric then asked us with a run of his fingers through his hair.

“Well, for starters, let’s do a better job of hiding these,” I began as I ran my thumbs over the smooth surfaces of the hippos.

“I can hide those in my pack,” Alex suggested. “I kept gouda tucked away in there for a few days, I can hide those.”

“Okay,” I breathed out. “Next, let’s get you up to snuff, Eric. Then we make a run for it.”

“Those soldiers are going to shoot at us again, though,” he pointed out.

“Yeah, and Tim doesn’t know we’re here, either,” Alex added.

“Well, we have to get out of here and get down to Cornwall where Stephen and Robert are,” I told them. “We have to get out of here at some point. We could die here.”

The two of them looked at one another with grin expressions on their faces.

“Let’s stay here and wait it out until the sun goes down,” I continued.

“They could have night vision, though,” Alex pointed out.

“Yes, but noticed how quiet it’s been,” I observed with a gestured back to the bushes. “They haven’t been shooting at us because we’re hiding, so when the sun goes down—”

“Night vision kicks in,” he followed along with a raise of an eyebrow.

“They start firing at us again, so we ride at dusk.”

“We’ll have to get something to eat again by then, too,” Eric chimed in.

“What about your bread?” Alex asked me, slightly worried.

He had these soft dark curls that seemed to float around and over his head and shoulders against the warm winds. When she stood before him, she couldn’t help but imagine herself running her fingers through those lush tresses. Alison stood out on the porch of the bakery with her cup of coffee in one hand and a chocolate chip scone in the other; and she watched him walk closer to her from up the street perpendicular to the bakery. From a distance, she could feel her heart swooning at the mere sight of him there before she would meet Alex the next day. She hardly ever had such a feeling when she saw a man. 

Moreover, he looked distinctly British: Alison could tell that he was a brother even from a mile away. And she saw him coming towards the bakery from a mile down the block, with his hands tucked in his pockets and his blacked-out sunglasses protecting his face. There was that white silk shirt, something that seemed a bit too sophisticated for such a small backwater town. He stood at the street corner in anticipation of crossing; from across the street, Alison could see his glasses sliding down his otherwise straight now to reveal his dark eyes. A gust of wind made his curls flutter all about his head once again; Alison’s ponytail floated behind her head like she rode off into the sunset. She watched him walk along the crossing, and it was there she could tell he was somewhat heavy: a skinny man who had gained a little bit of weight. 

“You look new,” she remarked as he ascended the wooden steps next to her. 

“Indeed, I am.” His voice was smooth and pleasant, and she knew that northern accent so well. In fact, it made the hairs on her arms and on the back of her neck rise on end. 

“Manchester boy,” she breathed out. 

“Yes.” His smile crept over his face, albeit at a reluctant rate. “How did you know?” 

“I have lived in the North for the last twenty years,” she confessed, and he glanced behind him to the street below. 

“How in the world did you end up here?” 

“I don’t really know,” she confessed again, and he chuckled at that. 

“What do you mean?” 

“I’m not really sure, to be perfectly frank,” she corrected herself. “I miss Britain every day. 

“So, that explains why everything over there seems to have gone sideways in the last month or so—the homeland’s missing one of their own.” 

She chuckled at that, and he showed her a little grin at that. He took off his sunglasses for her, and she downed the rest of her coffee and turned to the door. He then lunged for it himself. 

“May I?” 

“Please,” she replied, “and thank you, love.” 

“Did you say ‘love’ or ‘my love’?” he teased her as she walked in first. 

“I said ‘love’,” she clarified for him, and she walked on over to the counter to fetch her apron. 

“I thought so,” he replied. He turned his head, and he raised his eyebrows at the sight of the Manchester tarts on display. His whole face lit up and then softened, much like the look of a dog seeing its owner. 

“Be still my heart,” Alison heard him breathe out. She strolled on over to him with her arms still behind her back as she tied up her apron. 

“Completely authentic,” she promised him. “There are some subtle differences, like the butter in teh crusts and the custard being American instead of European or Irish, the cherries not being so tart, the coconut not being as finely ground... they’re still Manchester tarts, though. I made them myself.” 

“May I have a taste?” he asked her in a breathy voice: it was as if he was telling her a secret. Alison glanced about the bakery: it was only but teh two of them in there, and thus, she could provide him with a sample. She wondered if she could buy one for herself and then share it with him from there. 

“Yes, you may,” she vowed to him. “Just give me a minute.” 

“Take all the minutes you need, darling,” he promised her, and he stood upright and ran his fingers through his dark curls. Alison showed him a smile as she paid for one tart, and she brought it around the side of the display case to show it off to him: she kept two forks tucked in between her fingers, one of which she handed over to him. He hooded his dark eyes at her as he took it for himself. Alison held it between the two of them so he could sink the tines into one side. It was a small bite, but she could tell that he had the perfect amount of custard with shredded coconut as well as a bit of crust. They locked eyes as he took a bite. 

He closed his eyes. Alison could feel a wave of warmth over her all the while. When he swallowed, he opened his eyes: they seemed to burn through her like the cherries of cigarettes. 

“So?” she asked him. 

“Absolutely fabulous,” he said in a husky voice. “The memory of home.” 

“Forever and always…” Alison nibbled on her bottom lip as she swallowed down the bite for herself. “Stockport?” 

“Middleton,” he said, and she shuddered from the feeling within her. 

“Oh, you thespian,” she sputtered. 

“Thespians and bakers make the world go round,” he pointed out. “Haberdashery, too.” 

“I go on break in about an hour or so,” Alison assured him in a low voice. “Could you be a dear and hold onto this tart for me until then?” 

“For you, anything,” he promised her. “I’m Steve, by the way.” 

“Call me Alison,” she said. 

“And I shall,” he said with a sly wink to her. 

And the next day, she would meet Alex. 

(book two of moon shadows)

Soon, after we had finished our food, Tim returned to us with a towel slung over his shoulder and a look of utter determination on his face. Alex and I were feeling the warmth from it all as well as the drinks which we had had, but we needed our bread, and with all of this at the helm, we couldn’t turn any of this away, either. Alex ran his fingers through his black curls and turned to me with a little smile on his face. 

“That slice of pie wasn’t very large, but damn, was it filling and delicious,” he remarked. 

“Same with the toad in the hole,” I added; it was a feeling that I had missed, and it was a feeling that I always wanted to relish in, always and forever. And it was a feeling that I had missed especially when he and Eric lingered closer to me as Tim guided us behind the bar to the corridor in question. There was a big part of me that wanted us to forfeit the camp site altogether and pitch ourselves there in the pub, especially as we made our way into the pantry on the side of the corridor. However, at the same time, I wondered if the owners of the bar would appreciate three defecting Yankees hiding out in there all night long. I also knew that there was very little space in there for one person, much less three: Alex, Eric, and I congregated at the doorway as Tim delved through the cramped shelves right before him: I spotted cans of peaches as well as cans of pears and dried berries, the latter of which still looked fresh despite none of us knowing how old they were at first glimpse. 

“Fascinating how an otherwise busy pub could have such a cramped pantry,” Eric remarked. 

“This is just one of several, mate,” Tim assured him, and he held out a bag of dried cranberries from the shelf, and he handed them over to me. All rich red and juicy looking like a bag of precious garnets in my hands. “This is where we keep the dehydrated stuff and stuff with long shelf lives.” 

“Can you give us these?” I asked him in a low voice as I worried about someone, be it his boss or someone else eavesdropping on us. 

“Actually, no,” Tim replied with a quick flash of his eyebrows at me. “In fact, I’m not even supposed to be back here, but you lot are desperate, so I need to help and play my part.” 

“So, if Alex, Eric, and I need anything, absolutely anything,” I began again, “we could just come to you.” 

“Aye,” he replied as he handed me some raisins, walnuts, and blackcurrants. I was already going to have my hands full with these two guys as is, but now with my arms full, I couldn’t help but smile to myself. He then handed Alex a few bags of black tea as well as some brown sugar. 

“What’s all this?” he asked Tim. 

“To go with the dried fruits and the nuts,” he duly replied. “You make the tea and then steep it all plus the sugar.” 

“Yeah, I think I told you that,” I pointed out, and I couldn’t help but smirk at him. 

“I just... kinda spaced out on that,” he confessed. 

“He’s bent on protecting you, Hannah,” Eric told me in a loud whisper. Tim took off his cap and ran his fingers through his sandy hair. 

“We’re all bent on protecting each other,” he pointed as he put his cap back on. He then rubbed his hands together. “Now, let’s mosey on out of ‘ere before me boss catches us and tosses me out on me bum.” 

I glanced to my left to the rest of the pub, and I wondered how the three of us would bust on out of there. I turned right for a look at the rest of the corridor next to us, which in turn snaked around a right-hand corner: Eric noticed it as well, and he guided me and Alex towards there. 

“Be careful here,” Tim advised us as he followed us close behind. “The fire door is here.” Indeed, we stopped right in front of the door in question, only to find the fire alarm right above the top part. I turned to face Alex and Tim nad the disgruntled looks on their faces; if only I could tell them that I could feel the way out in the back of my mind because resurrection had done something so bizarre to me in ways that I couldn’t fully explain to them, not to mere mortals. 

“Through the kitchen and—may I suggest tucking all of this in your quivers as well,” Tim told us. 

“Good plan, good plan...” I replied, and I set the fruits down on the floor and slung my quiver off my back. Alex did the same while Eric and Tim then helped us. It was a tight fit, especially with the brown sugar in Alex’s quiver, but we managed to do it, and Alex and I returned our quivers to our backs. Tim then rubbed his hands together and let out a low whistle. 

“Okay,” he said in a low voice. “Follow me.” 

Alex and Eric stayed on either side of me as we followed Tim into the room before us. I kept my head bowed so we wouldn’t have to look at any of the cooks hard at word in there. I was met with the utter cornucopia of smells, the meats and the spices, the rice and the puddings, the sight of the lemon meringue pies up on the shelf closest to the high counter and the stove tops. That was yet another thing I needed to make whilst we were hiding out in the British Isles. Tim reached the back door first and pushed it open right as one of the cooks was about to take another pie out from the oven. 

With bara brith, I could go from there. 

He pushed the door open and the four of us stumbled outside to an overcast morning; I tugged the door closed behind me so no one would see us for a second. 

“Alright,” Eric declared with a rub of his hands together, “so we just go from here?” 

“Well, I have to make sure you lot get off to a safe place first,” Tim pointed out. 

“We’re right down by a river,” I told him. 

“Which river?” 

“I’m not sure,” I confessed. “It’s in... that direction.” I nodded to the stretch of pathway right before us: it wasn’t like we could miss it at all so to speak. 

“Oh, the pond!” Tim declared. “Let me, er... sign out first, an’ then I can join you three.” 

“Would you really?” Alex asked him, taken aback. 

“Yes! You lot emerged from a place of death, so ya need all the support ‘ere that you can get.” He patted me and Alex both on the shoulder, and then he rounded the side of the pub to the front door. 

“How ‘bout that?” Eric decreed with a gesture towards us. 

“How ‘bout that, indeed,” Alex said as he handed Eric the bags of black tea. The last teabag left his fingers when something chipped the railing over our heads, as if someone was shooting at us. 

“What was that,” Alex stated in a flat tone. Another chipping sound, and that time, a piece of stucco fell off and landed on the ground behind us. 

“Let’s get out of here,” Eric advised us, and he tucked the teabags into his pockets. 

“Yeah, we should go,” I declared; even with my arms full, I managed to run towards the pathway in which we came in. Something chipped off one of the trees over our heads and the three of us bowed out of there. 

I could only hope that Tim would be able to find us as we bowed our heads and broke into a run. More bullets were thrown our way, and I didn’t want to look back to see as to whom it was that was shooting at us. I knew that if I took a simple glimpse back, I face one right through the skull. I knew death when I saw it before me, and I couldn’t afford to die a second time. 

Another shot to one of the trees next to us, and a stick fell to the brush next to us. 

“Ow,” Eric yelped out. 

“What happened?” Alex asked him, but he didn’t reply. We soon reached the main artery where I hung a left, back to our little makeshift campsite. More bullets sped our way. 

“Alex!” Eric’s voice sounded so far away, but I kept going, back to safety, back to camp, back to bara brith. I skidded to a stop at the top of the crest, and I turned around to find Eric behind me. 

“Alex!” he called again. 

“Where did he go?” I demanded, out of breath and with a stitch in my side. 

“He went the other way,” Eric explained with a deep swallow and a run of his fingers through his black hair. “We were running side by side, right behind you, and we got to the fork, and he just bolted off to the right.” 

My heart sank at the sound of that. My best friend went into the other direction, and someone was shooting at us: the mere thought of all of that made me wish that I had officially died. 

“I hope Tim can find us,” was all I could muster right then. 

“He knows where the pond is,” he recalled. “I’m sure he can find us.” 

I didn’t want to think about losing Alex, but I thought it, anyway. He had gone the wrong way, and now, as far as either of us knew, he had lost himself in those Welsh woods. I could feel my throat closing from the immense fear of having lost him. I hoped that he would be okay as Eric put his arm around me. I brought a hand to my face, even though I had no tears to cry at that moment. 

He stroked my shoulder with one hand, and he guided me away from that trail right behind us and back to the makeshift campground that Alex and I had set up. The vestigial feeling of death lingering within me may have been keeping the tears at bay for me, but I hadn’t a clue as to why I couldn’t cry for him right then. 

Eric and I reached the narrow pathway which led us down to the patch of grass under the trees, and I was the one to guide him down there first. 

“Do you have the brown sugar?” I asked him as we reached the fire pit, which still had hot, glowing embers down inside and my bread dough, which I knew still hadn’t proved all the way yet. 

“I have the tea,” he told me. “Do you need brown sugar?” 

“For the next loaf of bara brith, yes,” I replied as I knelt before the initial dough and took a peek. 

“I think Alex took it with him.” 

“I have the dried fruit and nuts, and you have the tea... we need to sweet caress of the earth underneath us.” I closed my eyes: I still had no desire to cry at all, and yet I wanted to do so. Eric huddled up next to me, and he peeked at the dough as well. 

“What’re we looking for?” he asked me. 

“It needs to double. Kind of asking a lot with airborne yeast because it takes a long time.” I reclined back onto my knees, and I rested my hands on my thighs. Eric glanced over his shoulder once again, but we were met with complete silence instead. At least we weren’t being shot at there. “Also, this bread has already been made, but I’ve just been thinking ahead. Thinking out loud, too, and... by the way, you never said who was following you earlier.” He swallowed and looked long and hard at me. 

“Technate officers,” he replied in a low voice; I realized I was walking a very fine line with this and given the fact we had just escaped from being pumped full of lead. Once he had said that word, the technate, I knew that Alex and I were marked. Even in the woods of Wales, far away from North America, we were not safe. We needed to be as tucked away in the trees for as long as possible, and in fact, the more I thought about it, the more I wondered if Alex had run the other way to lose those who were shooting at us. 

I had no idea if these were technate bullets being fired at us, and I honestly didn’t want to know if they were or not. 

“How did they find you?” I asked him, still with a low voice; Eric and I both tossed a couple of sticks into the embers to stoke the fire once again. He leaned forward and blew on the one closest to us, to which they glowed a fiery fearsome red. When the sticks began to char, he returned to me. 

“I don’t actually know, if I’m honest,” he answered. “Christine and I took the highway down to Mexico, the last bus down into the Baja before they shut the country down. We transferred buses and I thought we were taking the one to the airport, because I knew the British Isles were safe. She must’ve gotten on the wrong bus, because I hadn’t seen her since then. I mean, as far as I know, she’s in Oaxaca at the moment. I remember we were talking about hiding out there, but... it felt like nothing was going to come of it.” 

“Then you split up at the junction,” I followed along. 

“We got separated. I flew out of Mexico City on a free pass and got here, alone. And I promise you, Hannah: those were technate officers following me out here. I could see their solid black ball caps in the corner of my eye and with their knives out, ready to take me out and slice me up like a fat pig. The fat pig that I am.” 

“You’re not a fat pig,” I pointed out to him. He glanced down to his stout, sturdily built body with his eyebrows raised up. He then returned his attention to me, and I rested a hand on his knee. I felt that body against my own skin: he was no fat pig. I shook my head at him. “You are not a fat pig, Eric.” 

“I am a fat pig, Hannah Fernandes,” he retorted; he returned to the fire pit for another blow on the embers. I joined him, and I also added another twig: that time, the twig charred and smoldered a bit against the heat. 

“We should invent nicknames for ourselves,” I suggested. “You know, in case they might be eavesdropping on us over here.” 

“Well, as long as we stay away from any city,” he began again as he held back and let the twigs smolder and heat up with the hot embers; “I think we’ll be safe here in Wales in particular. That being said, that’s not a bad idea. You never know when shit hits the fan, as we’ve seen on the other side of the Atlantic.” The twigs continued to smolder until they turned a rich red: another twig, and that time, it ignited into a small flame. 

“You got it, big fella,” I chided to him. “That’s your nickname.” 

“’Big fella’?” he chuckled at that. “If I’m Big Fella, you get to be ‘Vixen.’” 

“Gladly,” I proclaimed, and we had the fire once again. 

“What would Alex be?” he wondered aloud, and as soon as the words left his lips, twigs behind us snapped, and I caught the sound of someone out of breath. We both turned our heads right as Alex emerged from the woods with leaves and pieces of twig stuck in his hair, and the bag of brown sugar still in his hand. His quiver remained in place on his back and a few red marks covered his belly, and I was glad that that was the only injury he had sustained as well. 

I had showed Alex the start of the dough, and he returned the favor with a big beaming smile on his face: I also told him that I needed the filling for the next loaf and that meant leaving camp for a time. 

“But you incorporate all of this and then you bake it all over the fire?” he asked me. 

“Nah, I incorporated all of that, let proof a second time and then it bakes over the fire,” I explained to him. “I’m just thinking about the next loaf as I figure we’ll be here a while.” 

“So, we better go on a little treasure hunt of sorts,” he stated with his hands to his hips. “Find all that dried fruit and then come back for round two and then some.” 

“And not get our asses handed to us, either,” I added, and I stood to my feet before him. He handed me my quiver, of which I slung over my shoulder. I adjusted my hair, to which he responded with a little smile on his face. I saw that he was already wearing his, and I noticed that he had found a long thin walking stick as well: he gripped onto the top part with one hand, and he rested his other hand on his hip. 

“You look like a mountain man,” I told him. 

“In a way, I am,” he said. “Well, now, anyways.” 

“Except this isn’t the mountains,” I pointed out. 

“We’re not too far from them, though, mind you,” he insisted with a wag of his finger at me. 

I turned to the fire pit as well as the dough, of which I kept covered with the blanket lest any wild animals find themselves there with us. I returned to him with a wave of concern over me. 

“Now, question, do you think you have enough strength in your little body for all of this?” I asked him. “Because we could be out here all day long, or we could be out here for a few hours.” 

“Let’s look, anyway,” he replied, “because you and I are going to be out here and we’re going to be hungry regardless of what happens.” 

“I like the way you think,” I told him, and I gave his shoulder a light little pat. I was going to remember the way back to our campground even if it was going to kill me. 

He scoured back up the slope first: when he reached the top, he stopped and turned for a look back at me. I nearly landed on hands and knees at one point, but he outstretched a hand for me to take. I took his hand, and he helped hoist me up the slope. Panting, I stood before him, and I rested my hand on his chest. I could feel his heart pounding in his chest, and I couldn’t resist leaning in closer to his body as if to better feel his warmth. 

Alex raised his eyebrows at me in surprise. 

“What’s that look for?” he asked me with a break in his voice. 

“You’re soft and sweet,” I replied with a gentle stroke of his chest; he squinted his eyes at me, and then he put his arm around me and held me close to his own body for a moment. 

“You saved me,” he assured me. “It’s the least that I can do.” 

“You can also help me find some dried fruit for the next loaf as well,” I added, and he stroked my shoulder from the sound of that. Then, without another word, he let me go and we proceeded to walk on into the woods together. I remembered the way the trees looked, as well as the fact that there was a small patch of daffodils sprouted off to the right side of the trail. 

“Okay, so what do we need?” he asked me as we returned to the woods from the day before. 

“Raisins, dried apricots, dried cranberries, dried blueberries, and walnuts,” I declared to him. 

“My goodness,” he remarked with one hand on his little belly. “Let’s make this a quick one then.” 

We trekked on into the woods, and once we had rounded the bend, a layer of fog low to the ground took us both off guard. 

“Was it foggy yesterday?” he asked aloud. 

“I don’t remember,” I confessed to him. “I think there was some fog yesterday, but I can’t really remember so to speak—” Snapping twigs in front of us stopped us in our tracks. Alex put his arm in front of my chest. I reached behind me for my bow as well as an arrow. I propped the arrow into the string as Alex took a step forward. 

He reached the bend in the trail and peeked around the tree on the bend itself. Slowly, he took out his bow as well as an arrow. His body curled a bit, and I knew he was hungry, but we had to defend ourselves. 

He held the bow and arrow up to his face, and he crept along the trail’s edge towards the tree. He hung there next to the thick trunk in anticipation, and he closed his eyes to relish in his singular moment of peace. 

A moment of peace just before a battle. I still had to teach him how to properly shoot, however. 

A twig snapped again, and I swallowed so as to slow down and steady myself. I held the bow and arrow ready to protect him as well as myself. Another twig snapped, followed by another, and another, and then— 

Alex stepped back as a stubby dark figure stumbled out from the bushes. I recognized the mane of inky black hair as well as the chunky hands. He lifted his head and showed me his big brown eyes and full, round face. 

“Eric!” I declared, and Alex and I both lowered our arrows. He groaned as he hoisted himself off the ground. 

“How did you find us?” Alex asked him: my heart hammered in my chest as I looked on at Eric’s thick body there before me. My fingertips tingled at the sight of him. I never learned, and the slight twinkle in his eye told me that he never did, either. 

“A lucky guess,” Eric confessed. “I actually didn’t think you were out here, if I’m being completely honest. I got out here to get away from the city because I was being followed.” 

“Followed by whom?” I asked him, and he raised his eyebrows at me as if to clue me in. I gaped at him. “They were actually following you... did you figure out why?” 

“It’s kind of a long story,” he replied with a shake of his head; in the corner of my eye, I could see Alex looking at us with his brow furrowed, as if he was trying to put the pieces together. “And... when we find a moment, that’s when I promise to talk about it.” He ran his fingers through his jet-black hair, and he turned to Alex with a puzzled look on his face. “Do you have an extra one of those?” 

“What, a quiver and a bow?” Alex asked him with a gesture to the bow in hand as well as the quiver slung over his shoulder. 

“No, a spare shirt—yes, a spare quiver and bow,” Eric teased him, to which Alex chuckled and shook his head at the sound of all of that. 

“I’m afraid we don’t, no,” he said as he tucked his bow and arrow back away. I did the same, and then I ran my fingers through my hair. Eric showed me a thoughtful little smile, and he moved in closer to me as if to feel me again. 

“We’re looking for some dried fruit,” I explained to him. “I’m planning on some bread for us.” 

“You guys’ve gotta be starving!” Eric declared. “I just had a full English breakfast back at this pub up the trail from here.” Alex and I gaped at one another at the sound of that. 

“You found a pub?” Alex asked him, taken aback. 

“Yeah, and I bet they have dried fruit galore, too,” Eric said, and Alex and I then smiled at one another. We kept our quivers on our backs as Eric led us along a branch of the trail tucked back in the bushes: at first glimpse, I believed that this was something that had sprung up overnight, as we hadn’t seen it there on the side of the trail when we walked through there the day before. But then again, we were so set on finding a place for ourselves that we may have missed it at first. Alex and I trusted Eric to boot as well. 

He led the way through the trees, and he nudged a low-hanging branch out of the way for me; Alex bowed his head all the while. 

I could feel something between me and him, those old feelings that I had experienced from our brief time together were quickly welling up into something, and something that I didn’t really expect, either. Those brown eyes twinkled at me, and I couldn’t resist showing him a smile. 

He brushed his fingers against the side of his head, and then he grazed the crest of my shoulder. He stepped ahead of us, and we kept on trekking through the bushes until we reached a clearing with a stone well, a stretch of grass, and a long low building with brightly lit windows. Thin wisps of smoke drifted from the mouth of the stone chimney, and I knew we were in good hands here. 

Eric huddled closer to me and Alex just before we reached the front door and then held the door for the two of us. 

“Thank you,” I whispered to him, and he hooded his eyes and nodded at me; Alex lingered so close to me that, for a moment, I believed that he was going to hold my hand as we ducked in there. 

It was a cozy, warmly lit pub illuminated by candles along the walls and from a candelabra suspended from the ceiling overhead. Only a few people had bellied up to the bar, which in turn gave us three in a row right at the far corner, away from the front door. I skirted past two guys shooting billiards, and I took the first stool at the corner. Alex followed suit, and then Eric rounded out the trio at the end of the bar: I hoped no one would notice the quivers on our backs all the while, either. 

I caught a whiff of some shepherd’s pie as well as some toad in the hole from the back of the bar, and almost immediately, I was hungry, and I was hungrier than I could ever imagine from before. 

“Oh, man, I could totally go for some stout right about now,” Alex confessed. 

“Mulled wine for me,” I chimed in, and the bartender strolled on over to us with a twinkle in his eye. Indeed, Alex and I told him what we wanted for drinks to start with, and once we got going, we could decide on what pie we wanted to gorge on thereafter: all the while, I kept asking about dried fruit tucked in the back of my mind. A fine glass of mulled wine was going to be more than enough for me, and I hoped that it wouldn’t cloud my mind too much. 

All the spices, from the cinnamon to the star anise, caressed my nose as I held the glass up to my nose for an initial whiff. I sipped on it right then, and though it hadn’t been all that cold, the wine warmed me up the way it would on a cold wintry day. I closed my eyes and ran my fingers through my hair. I then watched Alex do the same with his glass of rich dark stout capped with that tan foam. 

Once he lowered the glass, he licked his cherry lips and let out a low whistle. 

“Good stuff,” he remarked in a breathy voice. 

“The wine is wonderful,” I added. 

“It smells glorious,” he told me. 

“Yeah, I can smell it over here,” Eric chimed in as he sipped on his earl grey tea. Alex took another sip of stout when the bartender returned to us. I decided on toad in the hole while he landed on a classic chicken and mushroom pie. 

“We should come in here again and try the shepherd’s pie,” Eric suggested. “I had some of that when I came in here earlier and it was truly divine.” 

“Agreed, mate,” the bartender said with a grin and a wink at him. The three of us sipped on our drinks some more, and all I could think about was that wonderful Yorkshire pudding with those thick sausages. But then again, I couldn’t make bara brith even with my full stomach. 

He soon returned to me with a good helping of the toad in the hole, complete with some ground oregano in the Yorkshire pudding part and a small boat of beef gravy on the side. 

“Thank you, and... I have a question,” I began, and he raised his eyebrows at me. “Where would I find some dried fruit to make bara brith for my two boyfriends and myself?” 

“Bara brith! I thought I’d never hear about that again, much less from the mouth of an American. Um...” He drummed his fingers on the edge of the bar and peered over his shoulder. After a moment, he returned to me and leaned in closer to me. “Meet me in the back room in about an hour,” he advised me. “I reckon I know to find what you’re lookin’ for.” 

“Over here?” I gestured to the corridor right behind him, right within my line of sight. 

“Yes, actually!” he declared. “I just need to tend to everything ‘round here for a bit, though.” 

“Of course.” He flashed me a wink, and then he stepped away to fetch Alex’s chicken and mushroom pie: I then turned to him as he held his glass of stout in between his hands. 

“Did you catch all of that?” I asked him. 

“As a matter of fact, I did,” he assured me. The bartender returned to Alex with his big slice of pie, with the tender chicken and mushrooms doused in gravy; Alex showed the plate a big smile and a raise of an eyebrow. “Good lord.” He chuckled at the sight of the golden crust as well as the lush gravy spilling out onto the ivory white plate. 

“You two Yankees enjoy yourselves in the meantime, now,” the bartender advised us in a low voice; he slung his towel over his shoulder and drummed his fingers on the edge of the bar before him. 

“What’s your name?” Alex asked him. 

“Tim.” 

“Tim, I’m Alex. This is my best friend, Hannah, and this is our best friend, Eric. And you are correct; we’ve defected from the United States.” 

“By the skin of our teeth, no less,” Eric added. 

“More on that later,” Tim advised us, and he ducked over to the other side of the bar. Meanwhile, Alex and I dug into our plates, and Eric kicked back in the chair right next to us. I was feeling glad that we were eating something quite hearty because it would be a while before the bara bright could be fully made. Everything was rich and warm, flavorful, and delicious: the Yorkshire pudding was moist and airy at the same time, and the sausages snapped when I bit into them. I glanced over at Alex, who looked to be enjoying that slice of pie just a bit too much from what I could tell, such that I couldn’t help but smile at the sight of him. 

By the time I had fallen asleep, I was warm, and I had my arms around Alex as if I was holding a teddy bear. He buried his face and neck against my body: it felt so good to hold him again, and I wanted to hold him all night long and into the morning hours. I could feel his heartbeat down by my hipbone, and I could feel his slow, steady breathing on my chest. 

Before I fell asleep, I thought back to the time his mother was sick, and he had to be away with her for a while: for me, it was the first clue that he was being taken advantage of. The mere thought of him being wrecked like that gave me a feeling I didn’t want to know, and I found solace in Eric’s arms instead. His body was thick and soft, and he gave me utmost comfort. I could still smell him on my clothes even a week after Alex came back out of the darkness, and I could scarcely explain to him the meaning of the aroma, either. 

Alex snuggled harder against me, and that was when I fell asleep. I could still dream about my time in purgatory, the way I found myself in the darkest tunnels under the earth and get it felt as though there was a dark veil separating me from the real world as well as the hereafter. I stood in a shallow pool of cold black water which only reached my ankles and pure blackness surrounded me, but I could see my way around the tunnels, however, the gaping voids that loomed before me and I had to decide as to which way to go. The veil wrapped itself around my head and shoulders as if I was lost in a thick thatch of cobwebs, but I could move about as if I stood out in the plain air. 

The water stood still underneath me as I took one step forward, but I stopped. I was all too familiar with this feeling from deciding whether I wanted to race or if I wanted to stay in bed as I loved both. But something about this felt even worse, however: the wrong decision could leave me reeling and walking down a dark and shadowy path from which I could never return from. As far as I knew, I was taking the absolute wrong direction. 

I turned around and faced the darkness right behind me. There was a soft glow to the waters at the end of the tunnel from whence I had come from. A light from the place I came from before: it felt as if life was beckoning me back. 

It was calling me back. Even though I had died and stared at death in the face more times than I ever would’ve liked, a part of me told me to go back. I had to go back. I was too rebellious to resist life, but I was also too rebellious to resist death. I took a step forward, and the light continued to glow before me, a low steady stream near the surface of the water at the end of the tunnel before me. 

Another step forward, and the water washed itself over my feet and ankles, even though I swore it was never that deep from before. 

I took another step, and the water deepened more that time up to my knee. I could feel something squishy at the very bottom of the hole: something squishy and sticky. I moved my foot to the side, but I was stuck. I was stuck in the mud, and I couldn’t see to top it all off. The only thing I could see was the light at the end of the tunnel. I was so close that I could taste it. I could touch it. I could feel it. I could yearn for it as much as I wanted as well, but yearning could never pry my foot free from the black mud at the bottom of the hole. 

I jarred myself awake. I gazed up to the dark sky overhead, at the stars that perforated the black tapestry above me. The fire had died down to stray embers, but there was still plenty of heat to be felt down in that pit. Alex stirred but he never awoke for a second: I rolled my head to the side for a better at him there next to me. Through the dim light, I made out the round shape of his face and the smoothness of his eyelids: his black curls kissed the sides of his face; through every stray lock of hair on the side of his face, I noticed the white sliver of skin. A boy from the moon with his eyes so deep and luminous, and he was fast asleep for the time being. 

I smiled at the sight of him there before me, and I thought of putting my arms around him and giving him a kiss on the lips and the nose. There was a time I did that to him, and he stirred with a little smile on his face, but he never woke up. At the same time, however, I wanted to let him rest and relax as we both had had a long day, and he in particular needed to sleep. 

I sighed through my nose and rolled my head back over the top of the pillow of grass. I returned my gaze to the beginnings of the bara brith. It was hard to tell if it was doing anything, but I had hope that the wild yeast was doing its job there by the fire pit. 

I returned my gaze to Alex, and I thought of surprising him with another kiss once again. I could help the feeling even as it tempted me. 

I inched closer to his body to better feel his warmth: though it wasn’t that cold there in Wales, I still wanted to feel his warmth. To feel his body. I put my arm around his waist so I could rest my hand on the small of his back. His skin was soft and smooth like porcelain: the dew had begun to set on his skin as well as his belt. I inched closer to him, so his belly brushed up against my own: in the dim light, I could see him smiling at the feeling. 

There was something about the feeling of his bare skin against my own, something so intimate when we were on the ship together. We slept in separate bunks, and I could tell that he wanted the feeling, and he wanted company as well. He lay there with his arms curled up to his chest and a lock of hair spread over his face. 

I pressed my chest against his own, and it was there I could feel his heartbeat. We were facing a long day come the morning, but I was happy as long as I could lay there with him. 

Indeed, I drifted off to sleep as I relished in the feeling of his skin against my own and I found myself atop a hill somewhere. Sagebrush and low bushes surrounded me, and the wind gusted at a steady clip as well. First, I was down in some tunnels, then I found myself out in the desert. 

I glanced about the horizon in search of any signs of life or civilization. Wherever I had landed was completely empty, and I had only my instinct to rely on from thence forth. I glanced down the edge of the cliff next to me: I had no memory of climbing up such a steep incline, but my hands and feet were clean and free of any dirt and rocks. There was no way I had dropped onto the mesa, but I had a hunch that I had been. 

I stood up and examined the surface of the mesa for any sign of a pathway down to the valley floor before, but all the slopes around me were sheer drops. 

The wind fluttered my hair about as I stood at the edge of the mesa and looked down to the sun-scorched earth below. No matter which way I went from that point onward, I was going to fall and slide once I hit the very top part of the drift near the bottom. I was going to fall. I was going to die. 

I turned around and faced the blue sky over me. Not a single cloud to be found, and yet, everything was blue with the hallucination of life itself as it spilled forth from me. 

“Hannah!” Alex’s voice sliced through the winds and the sands of the desert like the blade of a knife, and I jarred myself awake again. That time, I awoke with his face right before my own: his deep eyes gazed into mine and his cherry lips looked somewhat parched, even though we were camped out near a stream: he had moved away from my body and my first thought was that he had gotten up for a drink of water and then shook me awake: nothing could deny the look of concern on his face. 

Breathing hard, I gazed up at him as he rested his hands on the sides of my face. 

“What happened?” I asked aloud. 

“You were all rigid,” he informed me. “I thought you were being bitten by something.” 

I looked down at myself, and I craned my neck back for a better look at the small of my back as best as I could. As far as I knew, nothing bit me, but I wondered what the rigidity of my body meant, especially as I was asleep. 

“You were getting all pale, too,” he continued. “I thought you had died in your sleep or something.” 

“Now, why in the world would you think that happened?” I teased him. 

“As white as ivory and as stiff as a sarcophagus, the frozen beauty that you are,” he retorted, complete with a grin on his face. 

I rubbed my eyes, to which I beheld the soft light of the sunrise right beside us. I rolled my head over for another look at the beginnings of the bara brith. We had this loaf here, but I wondered about the future. 

Alex and I set up our little camp under the trees together with what sunlight we had left; I had our tent pitched up by the time that he had set up a fire near the trail head. 

“Why’d you put it there?” I asked him at one point. 

“Keeping it away from the trees and the bushes,” he explained. “Anyone who comes this way won’t be coming down the trail, either.” 

“Dangerous but also very protective,” I noted as I zipped up the tent doors. I took my spot on the grass right next to him, and I prepared to make us both a cup of tea: one thing I bought when we first arrive in the British Isles was a kettle. I didn’t exactly buy it as I did swipe it from the back part of a kitchen in the airport: no one would suspect the dead woman, either, especially not so soon following the war, either. I showed him the kettle once I unsheathed it from the protective layer of flannel, in all its red glory as it shimmered under the soft twilight. He showed it a smile, and then he leaned back on his hands to better relish in the warmth radiating from the flames. 

“Care for a cup?” I offered him. 

“Please,” he replied. “While you’re over there, allow me to prep the fruits and nuts for the bara brith in the morning.” 

“Aw, Alex, you don’t have to do that,” I told him off as I stood to my feet and held onto the kettle by the handle. 

“We gotta have bread for the morning, though,” he pointed out. “Something to fill us up for our first full day here in the Isles.” 

“I’ve been here two days,” I pointed out. “You, three days.” 

“Notice how I said ‘our’,” he said with a raise of his eyebrows. I squinted my eyes at him, and then, with a slight wiggle to my hips, I tucked the kettle under my arm, and I began onward into the bushes, back to the river from where we had our little race together. 

Though the shadows were falling over me with the impending night, I still had enough light to guide me along to the edge of the water. At one point, I took a glimpse over my shoulder to ensure that Alex was in fact out of my sight. I was going to tell him that I had died and resurrected: it was just finding the right time to go about with it. 

I still remembered the days leading up to the start of the war: in fact, those days were imprinted on my memory bank. A bad trauma in the form of a bad dream, and a bad dream that happened for real. There were moments from when I had returned to life, that allowed me to return to those feelings in my body: the breaking of my bones, the puncturing of my lungs, the stopping of my heart from a full-on sprint, the way my muscles seemed to separate... there was no way that I could spell it out to Alex in one fell swoop, not without a great deal of digging on my part, either. The rush of blood straight to my head, my heart, and into my repaired lungs: the way my heart seemed to break repeatedly the more I thought about it. I knelt at the edge of the water with the kettle tucked under my arm. I pried off the lid and dipped the kettle into the river waters. 

The feeling of water on my skin and bones was what brought me back to life, and I restarted my own heart from the ground up. When I woke up from the slumber, my muscles were as sore and tender as fresh red meat. I stood up and held steady with the kettle in hand, and I put the lid back on top: my legs and ankles felt so spindly and fragile, and yet I had the strength within me. I stood tall and strong, and I began back to our camp. A few glimmers of golden light flared up against the incoming darkness: I never imagined Wales having lightning bugs, especially not when the nights of springtime still clung onto the dampness of a persistent winter. Then again, it may have had to do with the fact that I had died and returned to life, and the vestiges of death remained in my bones and muscles. 

I nearly lost my balance when I stepped away from the muddy riverbanks and returned to the trail head, but I gathered myself and pressed onward. For a moment, Stephen and Robert ran through my mind. It felt like ages since I had seen those two guys, especially the former with his long curly hair. I knew in my heart that they were both gay, but he always let me touch his curls and run my fingers through them. He had such soft ringlets on the crown of his head that I couldn’t resist the feeling whatsoever. I knew he loved it as well, what with the way that he looked at me whenever I did it. In fact, if I truly recalled things well, his hair was one of the last soft things I felt before my death. 

My fingers tingled at the memory of his curls, but then I spotted the fire before me, and there was Alex: speaking of soft hair, soft curls, and enjoying the feeling; he raised his gaze from the flames and showed me a lopsided little smile once I came back to him. 

“Got a good fire going,” he remarked as I perched the kettle on a stone right next to the base of the fire. 

“Indeed, we do,” I replied as I took my spot on the grass right next to him. He hooded his eyes at me, and I wondered as to what he was thinking right then. 

“You want bread for when we wake up in the morning, don’t you.” I couldn’t help but smile at him, to which he shrugged his shoulders. 

“Understand, I don’t want you to do anything you’re uncomfortable with,” he pointed out with a raise of his dark eyebrows at me. 

“I’m always comfortable making bread,” I promised him as I leaned forward and crossed my legs. I rested my elbows on my knees and gazed on back at him with the fire at my left. 

I always knew how to make bread, even if the memory remained embedded elsewhere from my own flesh. I turned to my pack to fetch my ingredients, starting with my dried cranberries, raisins, walnuts, and brown sugar in one of my bowls. We had boiling water in the kettle for our chamomile tea, but I had plenty for the black tea to soak them all in over the next hour or so. The bread dough needed to sit and ferment from the wild yeast all around us, and thus, I let it do as such right next to our fire. 

“I hope we can continue with a bread adventure of sorts,” he stated as I covered the bowl with a blanket. 

“A bread adventure with our fight against this brave new world as well,” I added. Alex ran his fingers through his hair and cozied up right next to me: even after all of that trekking through the woods, he still smelled wonderful, as if he had just climbed out of the shower. He hooded his eyes and showed me a little smile. 

“When in doubt, sleep by the fire,” he assured me. 

“We should probably consider sleeping closer to the trees,” I suggested to him with a slight shrug of my shoulders. “I sleep better when it’s cool, anyway.” 

He cozied up next to me. I had died and returned to life, and because of that, I enjoyed the cozy feeling of life before my death, but I also relished in the feeling of the cool darkness, especially the kind cast down by the trees. I hoped that one member of our gang over in Ireland had biscuits or something on hand because I knew Alex was going to be hungry again soon enough: if he was full and warm, then I could lay close to him and put my arms around him. 

“If I’m honest, I hope we can stay here a while,” he confessed to me. 

“In the face of war, yes,” I replied. “I’m in no rush to leave here. I'll make us a loaf of bara brith and then we can shoot off some arrows and swim about more in the waters over there.” 

Alex sighed through his nose, and then he and I reclined back onto our elbows in unison. The heat of the fire caressed our legs, feet, and lower parts of our bellies while the cool of the night settled over our heads and shoulders. I could feel the dance within me, the feeling that I walked a fine line of sorts. I knew for a fact that I had to tell him about my past at one point, but at the same time, there was a bit of power in secrecy. I had transformed with the resurrection, and with the transformation came a deep love of him and his mind. But I needed to trust him with my secrets, and I knew he needed to trust me as well. We were best friends but there was still that one thing that evaded our friendship. 

Alex leaned back all the way, and he lay flat on his back on the grass with his hands folded over his little belly. I lay down next to him, except I rolled over onto my side, so my face hung right next to his. 

“Penny for your thoughts?” I asked him in a soft voice. 

“I’m glad we’re here in Wales, but I’m also worried about Matthew and Nathan, though,” he confessed in a single breath. 

“I don’t blame you,” I assured him. “I worry about them, too. I worry if they’re getting enough food and water back over there.” 

“And a roof over their heads,” he added. 

“A place to stay, yeah,” I echoed him. 

“Last I talked to Nathan, they were hiding in the studio away from the soldiers,” he informed me, and then he gazed up for a moment. “What were they called?” 

“Icemen?” I recalled. 

“No... I forget but I’ll remember it at some point or another,” he promised me. “I’m sure the triplets will help me refresh my memory if and when we see them again.” 

“I’m sure we will,” I promised him. “And I’m sure we’ll be reunited with Matt and Nate, too.” But nothing could deny the crestfallen look upon Alex’s face, however. I leaned towards him and put my arm around him: his skin was soft, and his body was warm. I rested my hand on either side of his head, and I kissed him on the cheek, a soft tender caress upon his skin. 

I put my other arm around him, and I rested my head on his shoulder. I held him the way I would hold a teddy bear. He treated me to a gentle groan in his throat, and I could feel his body rocking back and forth as if to better relish in the feeling. I stroked my hand down his shoulder towards his elbow, and I breathed in his scent: I breathed him in deep. I knew he worried about Matt and Nate, as they were more his best friends than I was, and the last we had heard, they had been stranded in New York City with the country shuttered down. It didn’t help that they were stuck in a flat with a woman whom I had nicknamed “Pennywise”, as she had no qualms about controlling them. 

She had no qualms about controlling Alex as well: somehow, I managed to pry him away from her. He was my best friend, and thus, I needed to protect him from her ways. Our escape across the Atlantic over to Wales could not have come at a better time, even if the country had been shut down. I vowed to teach him how to fire an arrow, and how to bob and weave. 

“Be strong,” I had told him as we left New York for the British Isles together, and he had this look of utter devastation in his eyes. It had dawned on him as to what he had escaped from as well as what he was leaving behind. I held him in my arms the same way I did there by the fire with the ocean breeze in our faces. “I have to be strong, and you in particular need to be strong as well.” We stood next to the railing with our gaze fixed on the cold darkness before us: his long black curls swept back over his shoulders and partially onto my chest; in the dim light, I could see the shape of his face as well as the light of his eyes. 

He always had this cool, calm demeanor on his face, but there, I could see the look of pain. 

But I knew that the woods and the hills of Wales were going to be the perfect escape for him, as how I knew they would be for me as well. 

We both needed a fresh start, and I also knew that we needed sets of skills to survive out there, especially since neither of us had any idea if Cardiff was safe at all. He had gone to Wales before me just so I had a safe place to come to, but he never went anywhere near the capital. 

When we landed there together as a unit, I had hope that Cardiff would be okay for us after all. I also remembered the friends we had in Cornwall and in Ireland. 

The last boat out of North America and we were safe and sound, even if we had to camp out under the stars for a time. 

I let go of him and lightly stroked his shoulder. 

We both looked on at the beginnings of the bara brith right next to the fire, and he sighed through his nose. 

“We’re safe out here,” he stated in a soft voice. “Though if I’m honest, I would’ve been happy with going to Canada.” 

“I wasn’t sure about it, though,” I recalled, “what with the border being so tight and everything. I did think of taking us somewhere like Yosemite or the mountains of Oregon, though.” 

“They would’ve put out a search for us,” he pointed out. “Then we’d really be in trouble. ‘Sea to shining sea’ becomes meaningless in a fallen country.” He shivered, and I put my arms around him again. He reached behind us for his pack, to which he took out one of his blankets. I helped him wrap it around our bodies; and I remembered that I had one as well. 

“You know what this looks like, right?” I stood there at the crest of the hill with my hands pressed to my hips. The wind was blowing, and thus, my hair billowed back over my shoulders, and I could give him something of a view as he ascended the slope behind me with his quiver slung over his shoulder. Those blue eyes gazed on back at me, and I could tell that he wanted to rest. We had been walking through the woods for some time, and I was happy that he and I had packed enough water and food as well: he looked ready to put down his things and take a nap on the grass.

Alex stood next to me for a view out to the gully down below us. There was something about the way in which the trail wound down towards the bottom and then widened out right down within our line of sight. The way the trail twisted and turned and looped back around through the trees back towards us had my mind rolling. I turned to him as he was catching his breath and showing me his tongue.

“What’s it look like?” he asked me with a clearing of his throat.

“It looks like a racetrack,” I told him, and Alex cracked a smile, that sweet little lopsided smile.

“Even now, you still think of racing, Hannah,” he chuckled.

“Hey, I can’t help it,” I teased him as I hoisted up my own quiver on my back. It would be a good excuse to put down our bows and arrows for a time, even if he and I had no cars so to speak: we could do a little triathlon together with what we had on our person. He kept his hands on his hips, and he let his well-fed little belly hang out before him ever so slightly, such that I wanted to reach over and gently pat him there: long lush black curls down to his waist, tall wiry slender body with the most toned arms and a chubby little belly, and as wily and intelligent as a fox, Alex was the warrior he never believed himself to be.

“What do you think we should do with it?” he asked me with a look in his eye that told me he knew business.

“Well… we’re both here in the woods,” I began again, that time with a hoisting of my cargo pants; “and it’ll be some time before we reunite the guys again. Let’s have a foot race of sorts. A triathlon of sorts.”

“A triathlon requires swimming,” he pointed out.

“Let’s hope there’s a pond nearby,” I suggested. “We are in Wales now. Any pond that’s nearby is bound to be a nice and clean one.”

Alex ran his long fingers through his lush curls and hooded his eyes at me. I let my eyes meander down to his beautiful little body, and I was glad that I had the ingredients to make bara brith in my pack because I knew that little belly would crave something after all that we were about to do there on the hillside.

“Shall we begin with a walk down to the bend here?” he offered.

“Please,” I declared with a little grin.

He adjusted his quiver once more, and he gave the slope before us a gentle nod.

“Ladies first,” he said, and I squinted my eyes at him. I then led the way down the slope first. The earth was soft and plush underneath my feet, but not so soft that I could fall completely flat on my back. I could hear him coming up behind me, but I was more focused on the way down to the bottom of the hill. A smooth stone at one point kept me from losing my balance, but then again, I wondered if I could hold onto him for a moment if I absolutely had to do just that. Indeed, I took a quick glimpse back at him to see him descending with his arms extended out on either side of him to hold himself steady.

I reached the bottom first, and I set my pack down on the ground right by my feet. I was about to take my quiver off, when he rejoined me, he showed me his mischievous grin once more.

“See you on the other side!” he decreed, and he took off up the trail.

“Hey!” I called out, and I chased after him. Our legs pumped as we ran together through the bushes and the trees: he may have been quite the runner himself, but he was no match for me, however. I caught up with him within time, and we were running side by side together. I made out the look of pain on his face, as if running that fast put a lot of pressure on his otherwise sinewy legs. I showed him my tongue as we reached the next corner up, to which he skidded off to the side and nearly lost his balance. I kept going, however: my quiver snug on my back and my boots kept my feet protected from the rocks and firm soil all around us. I leapt over a small bush on the ground, and I kept going.

I wasn’t going to let him win. Not this time around.

I rounded the next bend up where the trail wound its way down through the trees, and I spotted a ridge of jagged rocks off to the side.

“Waterfall! Waterfall!” he called out. Indeed, right in front of me stood a smooth clear waterfall up against the jagged rocks: I was going to run right into it. But then again, it was part of our makeshift triathlon.

I reached the waterfall first, and the thin veil of cold water cascaded over me like a curtain. I bowed my head and pressed on against the shallow pool of water before me. I had to be careful as the stones at the base of the falls could be slippery, and thus, when I slowed down, he caught up with me. Water collected in my eyes, and I ducked back away from the falls themselves so I could see him as well as the pool better. It was shallow right where we were standing away from the waters, but we could both see that it extended out into the trees.

We both wore cargo pants, and we both had quivers hoisted over our backs, and yet we both thought the exact same thing at the exact same time.

He dove first into the waters, and I followed suit. Indeed, the bed of the river was right underneath us, but we could swim forth as if we were a couple of dogs. He was the better swimmer, however, and he began to pull away in front of me once again. I was pulling back as my legs thrashed behind me, whereas he scarcely kicked his legs and feet about.

“No, dammit!” I called out, and some water splashed into my mouth all the while. But I could hear him gasping in front of me, and I could feel my quiver filling with water, but just like with the feelings and memories of the war within me, I had the strength within me, however. My arms began to burn as I caught up with him again, right as we were about to reach the edge of the water: as far as I could tell, that was the edge of the water, the shoreline and the pathway back to the hill from whence we had come from before.

He groaned out as I caught up with him, and he did it again once we reached the shore’s edge. I crawled out onto the soft mud first, and I coughed a bit from the stray droplets of water that found their way into my mouth. Alex crawled up next to me: his long lush black curls pressed against his face and the sides of his neck, to the point he resembled a merman. Out of breath, he and I inched up the soil together towards the nearest weeping willow on the grass. The trailhead extended off to the right of us into the trees, but we had to stop and catch our breath for a moment.

I climbed to my feet and ambled up the grass to the roots of the tree, but once I reached the edge of the shade, my knees buckled, and I found myself in a crawling position once again. I crawled up the slope towards the gnarled roots of the tree, and I reached the base of the trunk itself. I leaned back against the wood as Alex caught up with me: his chest heaved, and his body writhed with the rush of adrenaline through him.

“Lay with me,” I begged to him. “Please. Lay with me.” He chuckled and panted at the sight of me, and then he crawled up right next to me, completely winded. He took his spot there next to me: our chubby little bellies hung out in the open, the only bits of softness on our otherwise-toned bodies, and the only things that made us realize that we were in fact soft and fleshy.

“Shall we set up camp?” he offered me, and he put his hands behind his head and gazed up at me so sweetly.

“Here?” I gaped at him, stunned.

“No, no, over where we dropped off our things,” he replied. “I mean, we should make our way back there.”

“Once we catch our breaths, baby,” I assured him with a gentle pat of his belly. He grinned at me, and I knew that he had to be growing hungry soon enough: I certainly was feeling it.

We stayed there under the willow before I stood up again and returned to the waters before us. There was no use in clearing out my quiver of the water as it was only going to fill up once again. I began swimming in those shallow waters, and over the rush of them around my ears, I could hear him right behind me. There was a tributary that made its way off to the left of me, but I was focused on the main artery before me.

I couldn’t resist laughing as he quickly caught up with me, but I had to maintain focus, especially since I was moving my head in and out of the waters with each pass. I had to keep my strength: I needed something to eat, but I had to keep going. I had to beat him—

Alex reached the next shore up ahead first, and he quickly climbed out of there and onto the dark damp soil. With a little grin on his handsome face, he reached down to help me out of there, to which I took up his offer. Once I was out of the waters and I stood before him, I spotted the rest of the trailhead and the way it meandered through the thorny bushes right before us. The third part of our triathlon would have to consist of walking back from where we had come.

And as we walked together, we linked our fingers and kept our free hands on the straps of our quivers over our shoulders. I saw right away that it was a short walk back to the beginning of the trailhead, and all the while, I wondered as to where the rest of that river had gone off to. But on the other hand, we would have to investigate that once we had recuperated and had some food in our bellies. There was a tall oak tree off to the left, and we fetched our things and posted up there away from the trail.

“You’re like a pistol, honey pie,” he said, completely out of breath. He lay on his back with his hand up on his brow, and his tongue sprawled out from his full lips. He showed me a smile, and I suspended myself over him, just so I could look at him in the eye. He reached behind my head to feel the braid from the back of my head. I was in no mood for making love to him, however, especially when I knew that we were both hungry. Instead, I leaned down and kissed him on the lips.

“Yeah, let’s set up camp here,” I offered him. “Set up camp and we can spend some time here.”

“When in Wales, after all,” he declared with a shrug, and he leaned back on his hands and spread out his legs before him.

I opened my pack and took out my water bottle, and I took a big drink from it. Alex followed suit with his bottle, and then he took out some sheets of Gouda cheese which he had nestled inside of his flannel shirt to keep it moist and cool. He handed me some cheese, to which I followed up with some slices of the whole meal bread we had swiped from the trash bin back on the American continent.

“Kosher—Hannah, you darling girl,” he told me with a smile and a shake of his head.

“But of course!” I declared, and I added my bread and cheese with a slice of corned beef for myself.

“So, Stephen and Robert are over in Cornwall,” he followed along with his mouth full. “Richard, James, Rowena, Corinna, and Bubbles are over in Ireland. Matthew and Nathan are still back in North America, and as far as I can tell, so are Emerald and Serenity. What do you think we should do?”

“Let’s hang out here for the rest of the day and into the evening,” I offered him. “We’ve been walking since we got here to the Isles, and I can tell it’ll be some time before we find a house with an oven.”

“You can’t make bread over a fire?” he asked me, taken aback.

“I can, but we won’t have it until the morning, though,” I told him with a shrug of my shoulders, “just from the fact that it needs to prove, and it needs to ferment as well.”

“I see,” he said with a sigh. He held his bread in one hand, and he leaned back on his free hand that time, and he let his little belly hang out before him.

“So cute,” I remarked with a smile. “So strong, too. I didn’t know you were such a good swimmer.”

“I have to be,” he assured me with a raise of one eyebrow. “Gotta keep my gut full and my body even fuller.”

“I can drink to that,” I promised him with a raise of my bottle to him. We made a toast to one another, and we drank down in unison. I hoped that we would be able to find our way through that tributary again, through those clear waters and down that one pathway through the trees. If nothing else, we had to keep on exploring and challenging ourselves, especially if we wanted to survive out here in the wilderness.