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“It’s not their mission,” I say. “I mean, it is, but it’s also mine. I joined EET because I wanted to be an explorer more than I wanted to be anything else. I craved adventure. And I’m having adventures.”
“Adventures,” he sighs. “Get in the bath. The water is getting cold.”
I get in the bath obediently and almost immediately the water looks like a microcosm of the bog I recently departed. There are some kinds of filthiness that baths are just incapable of handling.
He looks at me, in a bath that is going to have to be refilled with fresh water in order to even vaguely approximate cleanliness. I am marinating in the filth of the world, covered in scratches and scrapes, and with a head full of new experiences, some of them fascinating, and many of them traumatic. I don’t think I will ever forget what it looks like to see a massive, powerful buck torn apart by troll fangs and devoured like a desert ration pack.
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you,” he says, wonderingly. “There is nothing domestic about you. You are a wild thing, and you insist on running to the wild no matter how comfortable I make you.”
I give him an apologetic look. I do feel guilty for my actions. I know I am driving him mad, that I must seem ungrateful at best, and uncaring at worst.
“Finish cleaning up,” he orders. “I have work for you to do, and you won’t be getting out of it just because you’re covered in scrapes and bruises. Use the herbal soap. No. Not that one. The green one with the yellow flecks, it has healing and antiseptic properties.”
I pick up the bar he tells me to take, give myself a quick once over with it, then empty the bath, and dutifully refill it. Gruff has retreated back downstairs. I can hear him and Roger laughing together, getting on together like old friends. Gruff told me once that he had plenty of defenses. I never imagined one of them would be a fifteen-foot troll.
This bath is like coming home. I seem to have spent more time in here than I have anywhere else on this planet. This is my zero zero point, the place from which my expeditions launch, and the place to which I return when they are done.
That thought makes me feel a little happier. I wonder if I expressed it to Gruff it might make him happier too. I don’t want to leave him. I love him. I can’t say that, because I know he’s mad, and I don’t know how to say it, either. How do you tell a dominant alien who is mostly annoyed with you that you actually love him even though you escape at every turn and get into trouble constantly?
The bathwater has grown cold, and I have to go down and face the alien who owns me. I pull the plug and watch the water spiral down the drain slowly, until I have no further excuses to remain upstairs. I dress myself and pad down the ladder, feeling something like shame.
Gruff is in the kitchen, preparing food. He does not look up as I approach him, though I am sure he knows I am here.
“Gruff?”
He grunts and gives me a dark look. “What is it, Jem?”
“I… uhm…” My mouth has gone dry. I can’t tell him my feelings. I’m too embarrassed. I don’t know how to be soft. And it’s not the time. I’m in trouble, and there’s still a troll outside.
“Take this out to our guest,” Gruff says, handing me a tray absolutely loaded with food.
“All of this?”
“I learned long ago that if you feed the trolls, they bring back the goats when they wander instead of turning them into a meal,” Gruff says. “Roger has been a good friend for a long time.”
Roger has taken a seat on the grassy knoll outside Gruff’s house. He sits cross-legged, consuming entire wheels of goat cheese and loaves of freshly baked bread in single mouthfuls. In spite of eating Gruff’s larder bare, I am sure it is still barely a snack for him.
“Human,” he says to me as I bring him fresh supply. “You look prettier cleaned and dressed in a robe.”
It’s just another one of Gruff’s shirts belted at my waist, but it is rustically comfortable. I wish I had a change of clothing made to fit me, some new boots and maybe some socks or stockings, but who am I to demand new clothes when I keep doing the things I do.
“Thank you,” I say as he shovels the tray into his mouth.
* * *
The meal proceeds and I sit off to the side, quietly. I feel bad, especially when I remember Gruff’s expression, and how upset he obviously was to have lost me. This attachment between us is inconvenient, and thrilling, and sweet, and frustrating. I did not come all the way across the universe just to fall in love, though. I remember my instructors saying that female explorers were a waste of time because they always begged to be brought back so they could pursue romance. I swore I’d never pursue romance. I promised myself I wouldn’t be distracted by anything resembling love.
A hunk of bread and a big wedge of cheese appears on a plate under my nose.
“Eat,” Gruff insists. “You need your strength for whatever incredibly stupid thing you plan to do next.”
I’m not hungry. Or I am hungry, but I don’t feel like I should be eating. It’s weird what guilt will do to you. Gruff’s looking after me, and literally every creature on this planet seems to recognize his claim to me. But I am unable to accept his care, and right now even the food he is offering me feels like something I do not deserve. I should be fending for myself, not relying on the kindness and mercy of a male.
Just as I am contemplating my sad lack of feminine independence, Roger stretches and farts, creating a sudden stench cloud that envelops the exterior of the house and makes eating a distant concept. It smells like the bog, and the buck he ate, and the bread and now the cheese. The air around us takes on a faint brown-green hue. My vision grows hazy and fuzzy at the edges. I feel a sort of strange tingling beginning in my extremities, and a lightness in my limbs. I start to laugh, not just because farts are funny, but because suddenly I am overcome with what feels like a cosmic giggle, a great amusement at the madness of creation. I start to laugh, and then I start to choke, but the choking doesn’t bother me as much as it probably should. Breathing feels like it’s probably always been optional, I just never noticed before.
Just as I am about to gleefully asphyxiate, Gruff tackles me out of the cloud.
“Troll farts are poisonous,” he explains. “And psychoactive for some species.”
