“We’re hibernating,” Cal would say, and reach for her.
She’d been so bored with that one-room house and the woods surrounding it. That grimy outdoor cooking pit of theirs, it would never get hot enough until it got too hot, and that same door to look at when she woke every morning. Sometimes even the sound of Cal’s voice, his stiff walk, how he held his mouth when he was being serious, had bugged her. She’d been so sick of their isolation. And now look at her, she was imagining that old life with something bordering on longing. Dada had always called her capricious. Maybe this was what he was talking about.
The first time they were alone after they argued in the Bath, he’d said, “I’m doing what you asked.” He had pulled her to him, and kissed her.
Whatever he meant by that, Frida felt comforted. She wanted it to be enough. It had to be. Cal was offering her the only solace available, and she took it because it helped push the gruesome images of her brother out of her mind: Micah using a large knife to behead the Pirate; threatening Anika with that bandanna; taking the Bee from Ogden. Did the baby wail out for the toy, refusing to let go, or was he asleep, and Micah nimble as a thief so as not to wake him?
“I found out what happened to the children,” Frida had said.
“So did I.”
“Micah told you?”
He nodded. “We have to remember that not everyone on the Land had children. And those who did knew they were giving their kids a better life. It wasn’t cruel, Frida. You see that, right?”
“What about the older children?” Frida asked. “They weren’t adopted. Did you find out about that?”
Cal didn’t say anything.
“Cal?”
“He won’t touch our baby,” he whispered. “Micah needs us here. He won’t let us be exiled.”
“You really think Micah will protect us?”
“You’re his sister. And he needs my help.”
“But don’t you think some people will be upset about the pregnancy?”
“I don’t know, Frida. We need to wait and keep watching. With a little more time, I think we can win them over. Micah will make them see that it’s for the best. He’s good at that.”
“That’s true,” she said.
Frida let him kiss her again. He’d said he was doing what she’d asked, and she decided that meant he was looking out for her. Since their fight, he’d been attentive and gentle, actively seeking her out after Morning Labor, seeing if she needed anything. He was paying attention to her again. He hadn’t gotten lost in the dark.
Frida got out of bed and got ready to head downstairs to the kitchen. She was just pulling on a sweatshirt when Cal entered with a flashlight. He was wearing a raincoat, but it looked dry.
“You’re still in here,” he said, surprised. The flashlight’s beam bounced across her and then paused on the unlit candle by their bed. “I didn’t see any light coming from under the door, so I assumed you’d left for the kitchen already.”
“I can get dressed without a candle,” she whispered.
He kissed her and put down the flashlight so that its light spread across the ceiling.
“But why?” he said, heading to the candle. “Let’s splurge.”
The flame flickered and rose, and Cal turned off the flashlight.
“I’m going to the campfire tonight to talk to Anika,” she said.
She’d decided that she would be up front with Cal, show him she could gather information, too.
“I’m going to hang out here,” he said, “if that’s okay.”
“Of course it is,” she said. “I think I’ll have a better chance of talking to her there. I haven’t been able to since Fatima started baking with us.”
“I thought Anika already told you everything.”
“She did.”
“You haven’t said anything about the baby, have you?”
“You know I haven’t,” she said.
“I know.”
“I guess I still feel unsettled,” she said. “Like, I need to see that this place is good, despite all that’s happened.”
“It is,” Cal said. “It will be.”
He was sitting on the bed now, and she stood before him. She placed her hands on his shoulders, her eyes on the far wall. She imagined herself on the deck of a majestic ship. She would just have to keep reminding Cal that they’d come here together, and that, if necessary, they’d leave that way, too.
“I love being married to you,” she said.
Cal smiled. “I could live off those words,” he said, and pulled her toward him.
*