Nanowrimo Day 21
She was right. Tamara hated to admit it, but she was right. She didn't really want to admit it to the others, though. Be brave, she told herself.
"Fine, then," she said. "Everybody goes home. Yin, you stay here. And we'll start this up again tomorrow."
* * *
"Me and Midori broke up," Michael said the next day.
"What, really?" Lachante said sympathetically.
"Who dumped who?" Crystal asked with her usual tact.
"It was me. I didn't really want to, but... I don't know, it's just been really weird between us for a while. She's been, like, super distant, and then when I tried to talk to her last night I could barely get ahold of her, and then when we did talk, it's like she wasn't even listening to me." He sighed, burying his face in his arms.
Lachante patted him on the shoulder. "Don't worry," she said. "She doesn't know what she's missing. She's an idiot."
"Or maybe she just has more important things to do." The whole table looked at Tamara's outburst in shock. She'd barely even talked to them over the last week, after all. "Maybe she had stuff to do, and it was more important than soothing your feelings. Maybe she needed you to support her instead of whining. Maybe--" She broke off, realizing how she sounded, and looked down at her hands, simultaneously embarrassed and furious.
"Come on, Tamara, stop being such a dick," Crystal said. "She hasn't got anything more important going on than the rest of us do."
"How do you know?" Tamara bit back.
"How do you know?"
There was no real way to answer that question. Tamara thought she was going to either cry or explode. Instead, she chose to stand up.
"What?" Lachante said. "Look, just calm down, Tamara, calm down. Maybe you were a little insensitive, but so was Crystal. And anyway, the important thing right now is Michael. Don't make his breakup just another one of your stupid arguments."
"Whatever," Tamara said, and sat back down, slumping over the table.
Confrontation defused, Lachante turned to Michael. "So, what now?" she asked.
"Man, I don't know," Michael said. "I wanted to talk to one of you guys about it, last night, but none of you were around. It seems like nobody is, these days. Like, do I smell or something? Are there rumors going around about me? Just because I'm friends with a lot of girls doesn't mean..."
"No, it's nothing like that," Lachante said. "Me and Crystal just... have some stuff going on."
"You know, that's almost exactly what she said," Michael said bitterly. "My girlfriend has stuff going on, my friends have stuff going on-- and you probably do too Tamara, don't deny it-- why am I the only one without anything going on? Y'all are making me lonely or something."
Lachante slipped an arm around his shoulder. "Listen, I will clear my calendar of all my super-important stuff for today, and just talk to you. How does that sound?"
"But Lachante--" Crystal started to say, but Lachante stopped her.
"You're my friend, and I want to make sure you're okay," she said. "I know I've been busy lately, but I can at least do that much."
"Thanks, Lachante," Michael said. "It's nice to know I've got one real friend."
As he looked across the table, Tamara's eyes slid away. She was sympathetic, sure, and a few months ago she would've rearranged her schedule to try and hang out with him some more. But against the backdrop of the real problems she was facing, this just seemed so small potatoes. Though she did wonder how Midori was feeling about it. Might throw off her aim or something. Tamara looked around the cafeteria just in case, but of course Midori wasn't there. She had an afternoon class with her though, so she could see how Midori was feeling there.
Midori basically looked like death warmed over, as it turned out. She looked, moved, and acted like a zombie. Even the teacher noticed; when he called on her, he had to call her name two or three times, and even then she only responded slowly, as if her thoughts were far, far away.
*Tamara looked at her, and her own lip curled. Midori's boyfriend had only broken up with her. And yeah, that sucked, but at least he was alive. She and Arsal could have-- they could never have anything. He could never have anything ever again. Midori could probably get back with Michael just as soon as this Dawn Queen thing was over. She wasn't faced with a life without him.
After school, it was time to go back in. Midori still looked bad, but she was at least trying to act stoic. Her face was pale and drawn, but her hands were steady as she held her bow beside her.
They went all around the village, as they usually did, finding and fighting obia. There seemed to be a lot of holes in this place, more than usual.
"Is there a reason for that?" Candace asked during one of their breaks.
"I don't remember if I told you this before, but the holes are really places where this world is colliding into ours." Brittany took a sip of water. "Well, I'm not sure if colliding is the right word, but that's the word we use. It's worse on this side, maybe because this is a smaller world. But that's why we occasionally get obia on our side too."
"I feel like we haven't gotten any on our side in a long time," Midori said.
"Well, we probably have, but we just never see them. It's not like we scout for them very much in our own world."
"Shouldn't we be doing that, then?" Tamara asked, suddenly alarmed.
Brittany shrugged. "I guess," she said. "But once we crown the queen, that kind of 'seals' this world and pushes it away from ours. Without any of the holes, the obia wither and die pretty quickly. Plus, the ones we seal up here will also defeat obia over there. And it's easier on this side."
"Still, you seem pretty chill about it," Candace said. "Aren't people getting hurt?"
"Well, yeah, but the stuff we're doing over here protects them," Brittany said. "Besides, what else can we do? We can't patrol both worlds."
"I think you're all doing good," Yin said. "At least, it seems that way to me. And your world is pretty impressive too."
"You barely even saw it," Candace grinned. "I wish you could come for, like, a week or something. Then we could really show you some stuff."
"Maybe next time," Yin said.
"No, there's not going to be a next time," Brittany said. "After this, we aren't camping anymore. It's straight on to the next village, no stops or anything. They're closer together here, so it should be doable."
"Ugh," Midori said. "Well, I guess at least a forced march will take my mind off stuff."
"I didn't want to say anything before, but are you okay?" Candace asked, taking a sip of water.
"Yeah, I guess. It's just-- my boyfriend broke up with me, out of nowhere. I thought that I could depend on him, you know? But I guess not."
"Whatever, boys suck," Tamara said.
"Yeah!" Candace echoed. "Boys suck."
It was a long time later, when the others were busy arguing whether something was an obia trail or just the track of water runoff that Midori sidled up to Tamara.
"So, uh," she started. "Did Michael, like... say anything? About me?"
"Yeah," Tamara said. She'd had a feeling Midori would ask. She already knew what she'd say to her, though. She owed her fellow Warrior the truth. "It's like, he said you've been really distant lately, and he couldn't deal with it anymore. Sorry," she said, grimacing. "I do think you guys can get back together once all this is over, though."
But Midori was looking off, tears gathering in his eyes. "I told him as much as I could," she said. "I told him I had a big thing to do, but it would be over in a few months, and could he just trust me and be there for me. I really thought that he could do that much," she said, wiping away tears.
"If it helps, he didn't even hint to us that you had something going on," Tamara said. "I mean, I think Lachante and Crystal guessed it, but I didn't even know you'd told him that much. And I already knew what you were doing."
"That's good, at least," Midori said."Thanks, I guess I'll think about it."
"Look, it's from an obia," Yin said, gesturing. "I know more about this than you do, so can we just go?"
"Fine, but just for the record: you're wrong," Brittany said. She turned to Tamara and Midori. "You guys ready?"
Tamara patted Midori on the shoulder. "Yeah, I think so," she said. "Come on, let's go."
Yin was right, as it turned out. And as if to underscore it, this obia's trail led the Warriors to a group of six. By now, this kind of thing was old hat for them, but Tamara still felt the same familiar, satisfying rush. With Candace beside her, Midori backing them up from the trees, and Brittany steadily debilitating them, she felt like she was exactly where she belonged. And she knew that each of her fellow Warriors felt the same way.
After the battle was over, as a special bonus, they also found two holes nearby to be sealed. Yin smiled smugly, and high-fived Candace, who had been on his side of the argument, while Brittany looked on sourly.
"Fine, fine, you won, I lost," she said. "Let's just go after the next ones."
"We should've made a bet or something, I'm telling you," Yin said.
Tamara had kind of had enough by then. "Okay, come on, you guys," she said. "These obia aren't going to kill themselves."
"Yeah, yeah, we know, we know," Candace said. She sheathed her dagger. "Okay, let's get on with it."
They cleared out the area around the village without any trouble-- or any sign of the Dusk People. Tamara supposed it was better than the alternative, but she couldn't help looking over her shoulder the entire time. She worried about the people in all the villages east and west of them. Were they safe? Or had they been attacked, with no Warriors to protect them?