Iliona and the resumption of ties Read online

  The place was open, so he padlocked his bike to a lamppost nearby and entered it. His first thought was that despite the lights were on the illumination was too dim. He didn’t see Winda right away because she was at the counter at the far back of the place. He passed by the sections looking with curiosity at each of them because he had never seen a store like that. He stopped in front of one section which plaque above it read, “Things you can eat” and observed the variety of little bags hanging from it. He walked a bit more and stopped in front of the “Things you can wear” section, and there were many types of dresses, rain capes and, somehow, there were umbrellas with pockets too.

  “Good morning. May I help you?” Winda’s voice came from behind him.

  He turned toward her, and she recognized him right away. The same happened with him since he hadn’t quickly forgotten that green hair. But neither of them said anything about it.

  “Hi, good morning,” Timothy said, trying not to look nervous. He saw she wasn’t with the same clothes anymore. She was wearing a dark brown dress, with black pants, and red sneakers, instead of boots, and there was a white flower in her pale green hair.

  “Could you get me a glass of water, please? I came cycling, and I’m thirsty.” He said pointing toward his bike, parked outside. She saw it through the giant showcases and nodded.

  “Ok,” She said, and despite selling water bottles, she guided him toward the back of the store saying: “We have a jar of water on the counter, this way please.”

  He followed her to the raw brick counter where there was a transparent glass jar and green glasses on a silver tray. Along with the emergency blue lights by the side of it, although the power outage was no longer, like decorative lamps. He sat in one of the tall bar stools in front of the counter while she filled a glass with water.

  While he was drinking it, a growing silence took hold of the place and lingered even when he had finished it, remaining with the empty glass in his hands. It was an uncomfortable quietness for both of them: for Timothy because he didn’t know what to say, and for Winda, because she suspected that boy hadn’t come in there just for a glass of water.

  “So…” She began to say.

  “Are you the one named Winda?” He interrupted her.

  She paused for a moment.

  “Who wants to know?” She replied.

  “I’m sorry,” He said, putting the empty glass on the counter and looking at her. “My name is Timothy, Timothy Bredal. I’m a 13 years old seventh-grade student...”

  “Ok, you don’t need to tell me your whole life.” She cut him. Then she continued:

  “Let’s suppose I’m Winda. What would you have to tell me?”

  “But in this case, I have to make sure you’re Winda because I have something I can only deliver to her.” He took her purse out of his backpack and showed to her, and the look of recognition on her face when she saw it worked as a confirmation sign to Timothy. “I came to give it back to you.” He put the purse on the counter. Then he added, with even more attentive eyes to her reaction, “You forgot it at my house last night.”

  She slowly took the purse and opened it, looking inside.

  “You can check it; I didn’t take anything. I don’t usually snoop in other’s things, but I was curious about the person who broke into my house.” He said almost adding, “Broke into my house and disappeared into nothingness.”

  And as she said nothing, he continued:

  “I found the address of your store in one of the business card inside your purse. It’s a cool place, by the way, just a bit dark, but cool. It’s new, right? ‘Cause I’ve never seen it, in all my years living in Nagranto.”

  “It’s not such a new store. It’s been here for three years already.” She said, closing the purse and looking at him.

  “I kept thinking if I had indeed seen you. And if you hadn’t forgotten your purse, maybe I would have believed I hadn’t.”

  It was true, if it weren’t for the purse, she could deny it all. But there it was, with her belongings inside. How would she explain that? Nonetheless, she could deny it all anyway; she hadn’t confirmed anything yet. On the other hand, she always thought ridiculous the way they were taught to avoid non-Iliona’s people. Then she just said:

  “Look, I know you’re probably wondering what I was doing in your house, but I can assure you I didn’t steal anything.”

  “Well, I could have called the police or told my parents about it, but you disappeared out of the blue. You were gone, how could I explain this to anyone?”

  She stood in silence for a moment.

  “I just want to know one thing, though.” He took a breath as preparing to ask something important, “Are you a magical being?” He carefully said it, making her stumped.

  “A what?” She reacted.

  “A magical being, someone like a witch or a half human half ghost being,” he repeated. “Look I know it can seem bullshit but you disappeared right in front of my eyes, so how come…”

  “Let me get things clear,” she said seriously now. “You saw me in your attic, I used a disappearance technique, and when you were gone, I left your house through the same window I used to get inside. And I apologize for all that.” She took a deep sigh and added, “No magic. I guarantee.”

  “I know you know Ed.” He paused, noticing her expression had changed into a more serious one. “I found his name in your contact list.”

  “You’re quite an eavesdropper for whom claimed not to snoop in a lot. How do you know him?”

  “He’s my new neighbor. I found his name on your mobile, and my first thought was that it could be of any Ed. So I called him, and recognized his voice…”

  “Called him?” She repeated incredulously. “Enough.” She said getting out from behind the counter, and saying toward him:

  “I broke into your house, and I already apologized for that, you came here, you returned my things, and I’m grateful you did so. You snooped in my purse, made crazy assumptions about me, called to whom you shouldn’t, and you’re probably missing out school. So I guess we’re even.” She finished saying the words already walking toward the front door.

  “Even?” He said, closing his backpack and following behind her. “How can this…” He started, but she interrupted him again:

  “Have a nice day…What’s your name again?” She pretended to forget.

  Now he was the one getting upset:

  “It’s Timothy. But can you at least explain…”

  “The answer is no, Timothy. And I don’t want to see you again in my store. Are we understood?” She said pointing him the way out.

  “So, I don’t want you again in my house either, understood?” He said, upset.

  “Completely understood. Goodbye.” She said closing the door when he was past the threshold. Then, she stopped in the middle of her action, letting the door slightly ajar so he could hear what she would say next:

  “This neighbor of yours, Ed” She paused as thinking if it was a good idea to say something about it or not. But she went on: “You would better stay away from him. That person means trouble.”

  “Why? He knows disappearance techniques too?” Timothy said, unlocking his bike from the lamppost, without looking at her.

  “It’s just a piece of advice. Consider it as a retribution for you have returned my stuff.” She closed the door after this.

  From his bike, he looked at the place through its glass door, and he watched Winda disappear again, but that time into the darkness of her store as she moved further from the exit.

  He went away upset because she didn’t answer his questions, and instead he just got more worried about Ed. He already decided he wouldn’t go to school on that day. So, he took a subway to Nagranto’s borders, near the woods. He could have gone by bike, as he was used to do, but it would take a time he was too impatient to spend. Therefore, he would carry it with him, and use it later, for the subway did not reach his final destination. He was heading toward the house where
lived the person to whom he could talk about anything at any time. He was going to visit Bob.

  *

  Timothy had barely left the street when Ed appeared. He saw when Timothy had entered the store, so he waited for him to leave, observing the place from a purposely hidden corner of a bakery in front of it.

  He rang the bell outside the shop because Winda had locked it. As she didn’t appear, he continued to ring it nonstop. He could call her and say he was outside but he doubted she would answer him.

  When she finally appeared with an irritated expression on her face, he gave her a smile through the glass door and waved to her.

  “It’s closed.” Ed heard Winda talk from the inside, pointing to the hanging sign of “Closed” in the doorknob. She backed to indoors. But he restarted ringing the bell. And he didn’t stop ‘till she opened it.

  “I’m closing the store for today; I have some matters to take care of.” She said half opening the door.

  “Good morning for you too, Winda.” He said, making his way to inside, as he hadn’t heard what she just said. She sighed and closed the door after him.

  “I didn’t know you knew that boy…What’s his name….” He put one hand on his forehead as if trying to remember while heading to the “Things you can drink” section, where he took a can of lemon tea from the vending machine. He turned to her while opening it:

  “Anyway, the kid who just left.” He didn’t recall the name.

  “I don’t know him.” She said, dryly, while taking a mango tea from the vending machine as well.

  “Are you sure? ‘Cause he spent a long time in here and I noticed you said something to him before he left.” He took a sip of his drink.

  “Are you wearing contact lenses?” She asked him, trying to change the subject, and also because she had never seen him with black eyes before.

  “Sometimes our work requires further efforts. They bother a bit, but I think they highlight the color of my hair.” Ed said with a mockery tone, passing one hand over his hair that was caught in a bun.

  She sighed again, impatient.

  “What do you want Ed? Just say it.” She sipped her tea.

  ‘“I just came to check on you. I have the bad habit of waking up too early. So I just thought ‘Why not pass at Winda’s and ask her what that phone call at 3 a.m. was all about?’”

  “Phone call? What phone…” She stopped in the middle of her sentence, remembering Timothy had called him.

  “Did you know there’s a nil in his house?” She asked him, changing the subject again.

  He squinted his eyes as trying to understand why she was bringing that up, and after a moment, he said:

  “He saw you, didn’t he?”

  “He saw me in his attic.” She drank all her mango tea at once. “But who goes to the attic in the middle of the night?” She threw the empty can into a trash bucket in front of her with irritation.

  Ed paused, just observing her.

  “He came to ask me things, but I didn’t answer them. I just sent him away.”

  “I thought so.” He said in a tone that she could tell he knew she wasn’t telling him everything.

  “Anyway,” he said, “We should make a meeting at my new house: You, Zian, Tevis, Muriel, and I. You know, to exchange some thoughts.”

  “Isn't that what the internet is for?”

  “Sarcasm is always better face to face.” He said, with a little smile. “I’ll text you when we get a day and a time.”

  “Aren’t you going to answer my question about the nil?” She asked him as he was already heading to the door. He turned to her:

  “Let’s just say I didn’t choose a house by the side of that kid’s by coincidence.” Then he continued heading to the door and left.

  6

  Bob and the woods

  Certain things give you an incredible sensation of freedom, like the smell of fresh leaves or the wind in your face or when you’re at home all by yourself. And Muriel had both of these; for she was riding her bike across the woods.

  When Muriel woke up on that day, she felt as visiting some old friend since she would spend some time in Nagranto anyway, in spite of she often visited Bob. Therefore, she put on her comfortable cinnamon flannel pants along with a white shirt and black shoes and rented a bike next. That’s how she spent the first hours of her morning on the day that Ed went to visit Winda, with her loose clothing and long hair swaying in the wind.

  *

  The forest was on Nagranto’s borders, and Bob house was in a clearing near a lake. The main path that led to there could be very narrow at certain points, where some leaves and branches stroked your face, making it only possible to pass through them by foot or by bike. It took about forty minutes from the paved road to Bob’s. And Timothy was on his way for about thirty-five, what it meant he was close.

  The lake was the trick: when you saw it, you knew you were close to Bob’s. Which wasn’t a big house, but it was a cozy one. And because at night, the forest could be cold, his place was all made of cork. There was also a small veranda at the entrance with a swing chair in the corner attached to the ceiling.

  The first floor was a big room, divided into the kitchen, the bathroom, and Bob’s room. No walls were separating them, though, but for the bathroom, so the kitchen and the living room were pretty much the same. Bob used the second floor as a library and office since he needed somewhere to draw and study the ideas he projected, for he was an architect. The whole place ran on solar energy, through solar panels on the roof, since there were no neighbors or conventional power source in the woods, and Timothy has always found this fascinating. There was also a huge willow tree in front of the house that hid it partially, whose leaves the wind often carried into the veranda and onto the swing, and which one Timothy liked to climb when he was little.

  Bob was Silvia’s brother, and he has lived in the woods since Timothy was one-year-old. And there were many pictures on his walls about the houses he imagined and other projects he liked.

  Timothy just passed by the lake.

  Since he was little, Timothy liked to spend time with Bob, and sometimes he would spend his whole vacations in the woods with his uncle. After the gazebo, we could say Bob’s was Timothy’s second tree house.

  When Timothy arrived, he saw there was another bike in front of the place that was not his uncle’s. He put his by the side of it and went in.

  Although telling Bob many things, Timothy hadn’t told him about his new neighbors yet. And if he had, Bob would have said he already knew them, because the scene Timothy saw when he crossed the door sill was one very usual to Bob. He saw Muriel sat at the kitchen table with his uncle having orange juice.

  Muriel looked from Timothy to Bob, who told her Timothy was the nephew he had already mentioned a couple of times to her.

  “Hi Muriel,” he said looking surprised.

  “Hi Timothy,” she waved back at him.

  “Come in Mothy, have a seat,” Bob said.

  Timothy closed the door and walked toward the table, beside which there was a wide window, whose white curtains were open, letting in plenty of luminosity and breeze.

  “I didn’t know you knew each other,” he said thinking that Bob had never mentioned Muriel to him.

  “I can say the same, Mothy. Muriel was telling me how she just moved to a house next to my sister’s and even spent the night at your home.” Bob said, getting up to take a glass for Timothy.

  “Do you know Ed too?” Timothy asked him sitting at the table.

  “Yes, it’s been a while since I’ve known Muriel and him. They come to visit me sometimes.” Bob answered serving his nephew some orange juice.

  And for a brief moment, Timothy thought about the things that had happened to him in those last days: His neighbors’ accident, Ed’s eye, Winda disappearing in his attic, then Ed’s voice on her cell phone and her warning about him. And now he just knew his neighbors were friends with his best friend.

  ‘I thought you wo
uld be at school today,” Bob started.

  “I had to miss school today because I had something else to solve that was not letting me concentrate, so I came to talk to you about it.” He said sipping his juice.

  “If you want to, I can totally come back another time, so the two of you can talk more comfortably,” Muriel suggested.

  And Timothy hoped she could leave so he could talk freely with Bob. Because although he had liked her more than Ed, he didn’t know if it would be ok to talk about his impressions over her work partner in front of her. But his uncle just cut out his expectations.

  “There’s no need of this.” Then he turned to Timothy with comprehensive eyes the boy didn’t get it because if his uncle intended to be comprehensive, he would have realized Timothy wanted to talk alone with him. And he said:

  “It’s ok, Mothy. Muriel is friend.”

  Timothy then looked at Muriel with doubt in his eyes, his dark brown eyes meeting her dark gray ones, and he realized her long hair was easily falling on the table. Then, he deviated his look because he couldn’t help thinking about the warning Winda had given him.

  “So, how’s the moth’s research going?” He asked trying to seem relaxed.

  “We haven’t started much yet, but we’re doing fine so far.” Muriel looked at Bob while finishing saying those words, as Timothy was apparently avoiding her eyes.

  “Here in the woods, we can see plenty of them yet,” Bob added.

  “Yah, they live better in woods and plantations than in cities,” Muriel said as tired of trying to make conversation but uncomfortable to leave since Bob had practically asked her to stay.

  Bob wanted Timothy to talk in front of Muriel because he was suspicious of what was bothering him and he thought Muriel could explain it better than himself. Muriel told him Timothy must have suspected something because of the way he treated Ed the night they appeared in his house.

  But Timothy just finished his juice and lied: