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Stories from the Verse
Re Verse All
Chapter 109: Takano 46
Table of Contents
Previous chapter: Beam 96
Their host, who introduced himself as Luthus, made a decent something with macaroni, tomato sauce, cheese, and meat. At least some of the meat was sausage. When they finished Lauren helped clear the table and offered to help with the washing up, but Luthus said the dishwasher worked well, and he should show them the bathroom and the bedrooms so they could get themselves settled.
One of the bedrooms was a single, the other had bunk beds. Lauren said, “Do you want the top or bottom bunk?”
“What, we’re sharing the room?”
“Well, there’s no reason for us to dirty both of his spare bedrooms for him, and I don’t think you have any dark secrets I don’t know.”
“Well no, but--”
“Besides, he’s been very nice, but we don’t know for certain that we can trust him completely, so I’d rather have you near me in case of trouble.
“I wish I’d learned that meditation thing Taz did.”
“Taz?”
“Oh, someone in another world, another life. He could sit up all night, completely resting and completely aware. I think Tiras could do it, too. Saved a lot of worry about keeping watch. So, top or bottom?”
“Um--bottom? I mean, if it’s all the same. I don’t want to make you climb--” She was interrupted by Lauren laughing.
“That might be good reason for me to put you up there. Sweetheart, I could jump into that bed from here, directly or by handspring or flip or backflip. Getting into the upper berth is not a problem. If you think that climbing into bed might be difficult for you, maybe we should have you do it for practice. After all, we didn’t have much of a workout today.”
Tommy wanted to argue, as she could still feel the pushups in her arms.
“But that’s fine. I’ll take the top. Quick shower. First or second?”
“Um--I’ll go first, if it’s all right? I’m pretty worn from the hike.”
“Sounds good. Don’t be too long; I’ll be waiting.”
Tommy grabbed what she needed for the shower and went to the bathroom across the hall. As she locked the door, she started to feel nervous. Lauren’s thoughts about not fully trusting the host had not occurred to her. Suddenly not wanting to be alone, she washed off quickly, tossed on her robe, and rushed back to the room.
“Don’t take too long,” she said to Lauren, trying to sound nonchalant.
“Don’t worry; I’ll be back before you know it.” And with that Lauren was out the room dressed only in one of her red robes.
There is a behind-the-writings look at the thoughts, influences, and ideas of this chapter, along with five other sequential chapters of this novel, in mark Joseph "young" web log entry #395: Character Obstacles. Given a moment, this link should take you directly to the section relevant to this chapter. It may contain spoilers of upcoming chapters.
As to the old stories that have long been here:
