Page 60 of Kiwi Sin
Frankie said, “You’re joking. In ayear?How?”
“Because I don’t have to pay rent,” I said, “or for my food, so I can save for when I do have to.” I was better at saving than either Frankie or Priya. I made my own clothes, and I didn’t buy treats. For that matter, I was better atearning.Shouldn’t that count?
“You paying rent won’t be happening for a year and a half at least,” Daisy said. “Not until you’re done with school and ready to get serious about your future. But until then, while you’re living here? Yeh, I’m going to be offering my advice. There’s no reason you should have to learn everything the hard way, like I did.”
I could have argued, but I wasn’t good at arguing. I hadn’t had enough practice, maybe, except that Frankie’d had even less practice than me, and she was excellent at arguing. So I decided to just be glad that we weren’t talking about Gabriel anymore, and got up to get my strawberry and lemon curd tart out of the fridge.
Gabriel didn’t come over to talk to me after that, either, and I was sorry despite myself. I’d worn my prettiest dress today, and when I’d put it on, I’d imagined him telling me I looked nice, and me telling him that I’d made it on his sewing machine, and him getting that warm look in his eyes. The only thing that happened, though, was that Aunt Constance came over to me where I was serving out the sweets, picked up a knife, began to cut a hummingbird cake into slices, and said, keeping her voice low, “What do you think your mum would say about that dress?”
You’re not in Mount Zion anymore,I reminded myself.“I hope she’d think it was pretty,” I said, “and that she’d be proud I made it.”
“On the sewing machine that Gabriel bought you,” she said. “That was kind of him, wasn’t it?’
“Yes. Very kind.” I was stiffening up all over. Why was she saying this?
“He’s a good cousin, and a good brother, too,” she said. “A wonderful brother to Harmony, especially. He’ll be married before too long, I think. Long past time, really. He’ll be a Godly husband, like his dad. As long as he has a wife who’s glad to let him lead, who puts his happiness before her own.”
I was putting a piece of tart on a plate, but my hand slipped and it broke in half. She said, “We all want happiness for Gabriel, don’t we?”
Gray was, somehow, in front of me. He said, “I’ll take that one. Broken or not, Oriana’s sweets are the best. And, yeh, we all want happiness for Gabriel. Just like we want it for Oriana.”
24
FIVE NEEDLES
Oriana
On the Friday night after the barbecue, I was babysitting again, sitting on the front steps outside Laila’s house with Long John lying beside me, both of us taking advantage of the summer warmth. I was babysitting because Laila was out on a date with Lachlan, her neighbor, who’d also been at the barbecue. Laila was always so composed, it was hard to know what she was feeling, but I thought that she may have been nervous. It was their first date, and “first dates” were a thing, if people actually did dating. Which, apparently, they did. Just not people in high school.
I wished … well, I wished for too much. Like a high-school girl, probably.
Time for forget it. Time to sit out here on the not-church steps, enjoy the warm night and everything else there was to enjoy, and knit. I thought better when I knitted. If I could knit during class, it would be so much easier. I’d have an excuse for looking down, for one thing.
I had one of the flat’s huge wooden front doors propped open, so I could hear the girls in case they woke up. They’d taken some effort to settle tonight, Amira popping up again and again, always with another question. The latest had started, like the others, with, “Oriana?” spoken in a deceptively soft little voice from around the corner, as if she didn’t have ten times the determination I did. And this time, she’d brought Yasmin with her.
I’d heard them in their bedroom, talking and giggling. They were twins, of course, but I knew about talking and giggling with your sisters. We’d whispered to each other, daringly, from our bunks late at night, when our parents were asleep, and in snatched moments during the day, too, taking in the washing from the lines or washing dishes together in the kitchens. My sisters had been my constant companions, the holders of my secrets, and I’d been theirs.
Now, though, would they ever understand my secrets again? Would I understand theirs?
That was why I hadn’t shushed the girls, probably. Besides, I was used to little kids asking me for things. Ilikedlittle kids asking me for things, in fact. Better than adults asking me for things, especially if that was, “What can you tell us about the abolition in the European nations of the global slave trade from Africa, Oriana?” Another thing I hadn’t heard of before this year, and that I still wished I didn’t know. At least I’d been wise enough not to ask about this one when the topic came up in class, and had done my usual instead: looked it up on the Internet.
The world was full of horrors, more than I’d ever known. The problem was, Mount Zion had horrors, too. I’d seen too many of them. Which horrors were worst? I didn’t know. The ones at Mount Zion just seemed to be on a … a smaller scale. And there was no higher authority to appeal to, nobody to step in and stop the evil, because the only authority was the Prophet.
And your husband.
As long as he has a wife who’s glad to let him lead.
Was I? I wasn’t sure anymore. On the other hand, I wasn’t one bit like Daisy, so confident in every situation. I wasn’t Mount Zion, and I wasn’t Outside.
You can learn. Just keep your mouth shut so you don’t make a fool of yourself. Daisy’s right.
Amira’s question this time had been, “Why do horses have long tails, but rabbits have short tails?” Which was a much better topic.
In the past, I would’ve said, “Because God made them that way.” This time, I said, “I don’t know. Why do you think?” Everybody said it was good to ask questions, and besides, I reallydidn’tknow, other than the “God” thing. And if Godhadmade rabbits that way—why had He done it? There must have been a reason.
I’d never thought that way before. It would’ve seemed like questioning God. It was a bit heady to do it now. Exciting.
Amira put her head on one side and hopped on one foot a while as if it would help her think, and had just opened her mouth when Yasmin said timidly, because Yasmin was so much like me, “So they can swat flies? My mummy says that’s what they’re doing when they’re swishing them like that. Keeping the flies away.”
