I let the duffel bag I’m carrying slip off my shoulder. “Hi. I brought you some fresh clothes and things. New prepaid phone, your ID and credit cards, Aussie cash, that kind of thing.”
“Thanks,” he says. “Odin told you where I was?”
“Yeah.”
“Mind grabbing a shirt out of the bag for me? Lady in the teahouse almost called an ambulance when she saw this.”
“Sure.” He peels his blood-soaked shirt off over his head and puts on the fresh one I hand him, and he does so with only a little awkwardness. He must have those nerve endings locked down tight.
I’m scared about what comes next as I sit down on the porch with him, feet in the dirt. “Sooo…”
“Hold on a second. Oberon, would you and Starbuck mind heading around to the back and investigating some shrubbery or something? We need to talk in private. Just holler if anyone gives you any trouble.”
The hounds oblige him and trot around the corner of the house, and I grow suspicious. “You already know why I’m here?”
“Yes, but it wasn’t any kind of divination, if that’s what you’re thinking. Telling Odin to drop me off anywhere but home was a pretty big hint. Bringing me my ID and some clothes was another.”
I wince and suck my teeth; I hadn’t realized I’d telegraphed it so plainly. “Oh, yeah. Sorry.”
“But go ahead. Say it.”
I take a deep breath and let it out. “Well, I want you to know I’d already made up my mind about this before we got interrupted by the Norse. I mean, obviously you’re already having the worst day ever and I’m really not trying to pile on. But it won’t be less true later, and after hearing what you did to Freyja—gods, Atticus, I know where she’s coming from. I want to hit you myself. I can’t believe you did that. It just confirms what I was already feeling: I think we should go our separate ways. Because you made a decision for me, sending me to Taiwan like that, and it doesn’t matter if you thought it was for my own good. I can’t live in this situation where I have to wonder if you’re manipulating things behind my back. I know you’re not the only one doing it either—obviously Brighid thinks it’s fine, and Flidais too. Well, it’s not. I am simply done with all that. I’m nobody’s chess piece.” My throat dries up suddenly as I see a tear leaking out of the edge of Atticus’s eye, trailing toward his jaw. I continue in a calmer voice, since I’d gotten a little worked up. “I am obviously grateful for all you’ve done for me and I owe you everything. If you ever need me, I will be there. But this—us—it needs to end.”
He nods and his voice is a tightly controlled rasp. “First, I am sorry, Granuaile. I was wrong. And second, I understand your decision and do not blame you. Clearly this is my time to go off to a corner of the world and think about what I’ve done. May I ask about your plans regarding the cabin?”
“Oh. Yes. Well, I really can’t leave the cabin now, with Orlaith just having her pups. We need three months to get them weaned, and then we’ll be out. Can you give me that?”
“Not a problem. I can give you longer if you want. But when you’re ready to vacate, if you’d let me know, please…? I’d like to sell it.”
“Of course.” He is making this easy for me. “Do you need me to bring you anything else?”
“No, the clothes and the basic needs of modern commerce are all here. Thanks. If I think of anything, I’ll give you a call.”
“Okay, then.” I get to my feet, a bit disoriented to be walking away from someone who’s been a huge part of my life to this point. It’s necessary, though; there’s an open road before me and I want to see where it goes. “Goodbye for now. I hope that after all of this…Well. May harmony find you.”
He replies in kind and I take my leave, intending to return to the cabin in Oregon for some sleep and a cuddle with Orlaith. I hope harmony does find us both, though it will have to find us in different places for a while.
I will finish up my studies in Poland while Orlaith is nursing, and we’ll find those puppies a good home somewhere—if not with Owen’s grove, then with some other lucky people. I think Orlaith and I will go to Taiwan after that to discover how we may both learn and grow. I would first like to learn how that monkey in Wukong’s shop knew my time to be sorry would be coming soon. For I am very sorry. This is not the future I’d been contemplating a month ago.
Perhaps Atticus and I will be together again and perhaps we won’t, remaining nothing more than colleagues of a sort. I write this knowing full well he’ll read it. He knows from experience that attraction is an alchemy of chemicals and circumstance and ever-shifting emotions, and they may or may not align and ignite again for us at some point in the future. We have a lot of it in front of us.
It’s been good to review how we got here. All I can conclude, however, is that he’s given me an extraordinary life and he’s already lived one. Despite that, he remains a work in progress, and so do I. So do we all, for that matter.
In one regard I am eternally content: I know he and I will always love Gaia, both together and apart.
“owen? Owen, wake up. You have to see this.”
“Hnngh? What? See what?”
Greta’s standing over me and there’s sunlight streaming through the window. “People trying to figure out what happened yesterday. The news is hilarious.”
“News? Uggh.”
“Plus your sloth looks like she’s missing you, so get up.”
“Oh, shite! Slomo!” That cleared me head quick. “Is she all right?”
“Seems like it, but it’s hard to tell. Is she going to stick around?”
“I’m not sure. Hey, what do ye think of the apprentices having wolfhound puppies? Granuaile’s hound had six and they’d like to give them to us. Would the pack be all right with that?”
Greta flinched. “That’s a lot of number one and number two.”
“We’ve got a lot of land and we can tell them to go outside. Instant training, the Druid way.”
Me love considers it and shrugs. “Sure, why not? I mean, run it by the parents first. If one says no, then it’s no for all of them. Can’t have one being left out. But come on, now, you gotta see this.”
The news isn’t what I’d call hilarious. Earthquakes in Bavaria. Animals killing people in Peru. Bizarre sightings of demons and flying monkeys in Taiwan. Conflicts between strange figures in most every country, with eyewitnesses claiming to see gods and other supernatural creatures in the flesh. Lots of collateral damage. And over all of it, fires to put out around the world as a result of a singular explosion in Sweden. What Greta finds amusing is how they keep bringing on experts to say they don’t know what’s going on and nothing makes sense.
“We could have walked downtown and shifted into wolves right in front of everybody yesterday,” she says, “and it wouldn’t even have made the news today.”
“Is there a fire near here?” I ask. “If there is, I’d like to help put it out.” That might be the best use of the next few days or weeks—putting out fires, since they obviously do tremendous damage but can impact smaller ecosystems disproportionately.
“I’ll switch to local news. And don’t worry about the kids; they’re out with their parents in town right now. Wanted to give you a chance to sleep.”
“Thanks. I’ll check in with Slomo.” I pour a cup of coffee in the kitchen and then use that connection I forged yesterday to send messages of happiness and welcome and an inquiry into her health, the equivalent of smiling and asking, “How’s me favorite sloth this morning?” Her answer comes quick and then I’m smiling for real as I step outside, steaming mug in hand.
<Hi, Oaken! I am kinda cold and dry and hungry for fresh leaves. But your tiny humans are great. They want to be Droods of Guy like you?>
Druids of Gaia, yes.
<Oh, yeah! I thought maybe I wasn’t saying that right. Actual words are hard. Pictures and feelings are better. Are you still in the house?>