Page 12 of Ra
“Oh, you’re Ra? If that’s what you’re trying for, maybe have them use a bigger actor next time,” one lady told him.
“Yes, or dress you with more regalia so we know you’re pretending to be a god,” another offered.
“You do not deserve my blessings! I take them back, all taken back!” he declared.
More laughter followed his declaration.
“I have to give you props for your dedication to the role! You’re sticking with it!” a man shouted.
“Ra, get in the damn car now!” Azi insisted.
He ignored her.
Thankfully the light turned green. Azi pressed her foot on the gas, in what America was known as flooring it, and quickly left the laughing, phone holding, video taking crowd behind.
“You nearly tossed me from your chariot!”
“It’s a car. I’ve been telling you to get back into it for four minutes. It’s not a chariot. It’s a car. A vehicle. A machine to take you from one place to another.”
“I nearly fell from its window!”
“It’s meant to look out of, not crawl out of!” she half-yelled at him.
Begrudgingly Ra sat back down, his arms crossed over his chest, his feet planted on the passenger-side floorboard, as he did his best to stare straight ahead. He would have pulled it off had it not been for the sights rushing by that he just had to see. And while he didn’t thrust his body out of the window again, he couldn’t resist leaning his head through its opening to get a better look at all they drove past.
Watching him as she drove, Azi decided that maybe getting clothes this evening was too much to hope for. He wasn’t ready to be face-to-face with other people, and she wasn’t ready to try to corral him because he was face-to-face with other people. She put her blinker on and turned at the next intersection, takingthem onto a less busy, and much more rural area, where her home was located. Tonight, all she was up for was dinner, a shower, and a bit of praying. If she had to, she’d slip him a sleeping pill or two so they could both get some rest. Tomorrow they’d worry about everything else.
~~~
“What is this place? It is quite small,” Ra said critically.
Azi shot a bit of side-eye at Ra as she pulled her keys out of the ignition and got out of the car.
“Are we leaving the… car? That is what it is called. I remember!” he announced, shoving an arm into the air, with his index finger pointing to the sky triumphantly as he rushed to get out of the car and stand beside it.
Azi shook her head and simply started up the curved cement path to the front door of her father’s three story home.
“Azi! Are you experiencing trouble hearing my voice? You know, the oracle once had issues hearing me. It was not long afterward, only a thousand years or so, until no one heard us anymore.”
“I can hear you,” Azi said, using her keys to unlock the front door and let herself in.
“That is good. If you can hear me, I am alive. And I am most definitely alive.”
Azi paused briefly beside a side table near the front door to drop her purse and keys in their usual place, then leaned over to untie her hiking boots and kick them off only several more steps into the house. A few feet later she balanced on first one foot, then the other, as she snatched her socks off and tossed them to the floor in her wake as well.
“Why do you toss your things about? It is imperative that my temples be kept clean and tidy.”
“First, what I do with my things is no concern of yours. Second, this is my home, it is most certainly not your temple.”
“Any structure in which I live, even temporarily, becomes a temple.”
Azi, who was already in the kitchen digging in the fridge, looked at him over the open door as she bit into an apple. “Not this structure. It was my father’s home, and is now mine.”
Ra looked around the room he stood within. It was very austere. Dark wood, old furniture. Shelves lined with books. White furniture. His brow furrowed. “The white seating does not match the rest of the decor.”
“How nice of you to notice.”
Ra narrowed his gaze, wishing that he had his powers so that he could teach her a quick lesson in knowing her place. “Why does it not match the rest of the decor,” he settled on.
