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“I’m looking for Kaiya. We have an appointment.”
“She’s not available. You’ll have to come back.”
“What are you talking about? She never misses an appointment.” Before Kodiak could stop him, he barged into the house and shouted, “Kaiya!”
Kodiak was on him immediately, shoving him up against the wall so he could check him for weapons.
Her bedroom door opened, and in an acerbically amused tone, she said, “At least you didn’t clothesline this friend.”
Kodiak looked over at her, her face making him want to pummel something, it was so swollen black and blue.
The guy swore softly and struggled. Kodiak backed up and let him go.
Kaiya’s visitor’s jaw dropped, his face twisting from the initial shock to concern. “What the bloody hell happened to you?”
“I ran into someone who wanted information I wasn’t willing to give.”
“My, God, woman, sit down,” her friend said, moving toward her and taking her arms, steering her toward the sofa.
He sat across from her, that concerned look still there. Kaiya tried to smile but grimaced instead. Her face must still be pretty damn sore. “I’m sorry. I forgot about our appointment. I’ll have to take a raincheck until I’m better.”
He nodded, then looked over at Kodiak. “Who’s the tree trunk?”
She giggled, then winced. “Don’t make me laugh.” She looked at Kodiak, her face softening. “Kodiak is a work colleague from the United States. He’s my self-appointed bodyguard. He rescued me from the bloke who did this to my face.”
“Well, I hope he got his.”
“He did,” he said.
Kaiya nodded. “Kodiak, this is Jiemba Davis.” She looked away and bit her lip, a tell he recognized as her sign of anxiety. Why would introducing this guy to him cause her to be unsettled?
Kodiak nodded and Jiemba nodded back. “Sorry for the mix-up, mate,” Jiemba said.
“We’re good,” Kodiak responded, looking between the two. She wasn’t romantically involved with this guy. He just wasn’t getting that vibe. But they were friends.
“I’ll go so you can get some rest. I’ll call you later to reschedule.”
She nodded. “Thanks, Ji.”
He left without saying anything to Kodiak. He locked the door and turned to her. She was sitting on the sofa looking bruised and battered, and not from her beating. He walked over and sat on the coffee table across from her. “Who’s that guy and what is he to you?”
Her chin lifted. “Why is that your business?”
“Because I’m interested in you, in case that’s not apparent, and the look on your face ties my gut into knots. So, tell me, Kaiya, babe. Just let it out.”
“He’s my language teacher.”
“What language?”
“Do you know your native languages?”
“Yes, I know Alutiiq which is the Sun’aq Native Alaskan tongue and Marathi and Hindi. When I was a kid, my dad taught me the language and my mom taught me both the East Indian languages.”
She took a hard breath and met his gaze. “You were lucky then. Ji is teaching me Torres Strait Creole. It’s the dominant language spoken on Thursday Island off the coast of Queensland, where my mom grew up.”
“Why didn’t she teach you when you were young?”
As if everything was crowding in on her, she got up and went over to the window and stood staring out, her arms clutched in front of her. She didn’t say anything for a moment, then said, her voice barely audible, “My parents thought it was wise to spare me the discrimination that came with being part Aboriginal. They thought it best to suppress my mother’s heritage.” She lifted one shoulder in a small, defeated shrug. “It wasn’t what I wanted, but I didn’t fight against presenting myself as Indian because my father was so adamant. It’s not that my mom rejected me as a person, she rejected me as part Torres Islander, downplaying my Aboriginal roots so that I would be more accepted into Australian society as an Indian coming from professional parents. She wanted me to avoid the stigma and bias of racism. But denying that part of myself went against everything that made me a unique individual. The pressure to fit in was enormous.” She turned and faced him, her eyes haunted. “I was always terrified of being unmasked, that people would find something fundamentally wrong, not because I was Torres Strait Islander, butbecauseI went along with the deception. My younger sister got into drugs and alcohol when she was a teenager, acting out against the same pressures that forced me to comply. She rebelled against hiding who she was, but my parents couldn’t seem to hear her pleas. As of present, we have no idea where she is, only that she’s gone and that has left a hole in our family and a hole in my heart when I realized I never even protested like she did. At least she had the courage to speak up.”
