Page 48 of All That Has Flown Beyond
He could do this, he told himself. Even if he was terrified.
Fear was an integral part of bravery, after all.
**********
Kaiyo catalogued the changes as he drove by. The big box stores where rows of old mom-and-pop shops used to be. The redone roads, still shiny with new tarmac. The new traffic light on one of the corners, no doubt won in city hall by Mr. Kerrig.
The Bamsdale of his memories superimposed itself onto the one around him. He could feel his own ghost sitting in the seat beside him. They drove around together, taking in the sights. The mailbox he’d accidentally rammed his bike into, cutting up his elbows and knees. The shop Thea had dragged him to, insisting she needed help choosing a prom dress only to declare every opinion he had useless. The millions of streets he had walked with Ahmik, hand in hand.
There was so much love in this town but loss had turned it to pain.
He parked the car outside the grocery store. It was almost nice running errands for his mom, knowing he could help out as she worked. He was lucky that being her son was a debt paid by nature, or he would never be able to pay his mom back for everything she had done for him.
That wouldn’t stop him from trying, though.
Despite his eagerness to help as he investigated the deaths, he still had to take a deep breath before getting out of the car. He hadn’t informed the Garrow pack of his arrival, something he would never have allowed himself to avoid if he were working anywhere else. He could allow himself the neglect of protocol due to the circumstances, however. And he knew his anonymity wouldn’t last long. Going to the grocery in the middle of the day, even grown as he was, could only mean trouble.
Kaiyo tried not to look suspicious as he walked the aisles of the store, basket hanging from the crook of his arm. People looked at him curiously, but it wasn’t in recognition. He had to admit that, despite having grown up in Bamsdale, he didn’t look like the normal resident. He was dressed casually in a white T-shirt and shorts cut right above the knee in deference to the summer heat, but that was where the normalcy ended. His arms were sleeved in tattoos. Colour swirling with the depth of black-and-white. Flowers, hands, symbols, runes, lines, they all made a patchwork of his power. On his calf, a snake twisted and curled around the mirror image of its shed skin. The other was etched by a hand-poked tattoo, a feminine hand offering herbs to heal.
And then, of course, there were the scars. The small one on his face, shaped like a sickle-moon hanging below his right eye, on the edge of his cheekbone. There was a three-nailed slash on his left bicep, camouflaged and embraced by the colour needled there. Above his right wrist was the discoloured skin of a burn, a ragged island in a sea of ink.
Kaiyo made it to the checkout before he ran out of luck.
“My goodness! Kaiyo?” the checkout woman said. Kaiyo covered his wince with a smile as Mrs. Thinley took his appearance in. She’d been working in the store for as long as he could remember, had caught him trying to steal a bag of gummy bears once.
“Hi, Mrs. Thinley. It’s good to see you.”
“Oh, it’s Mrs. Steveson now. I divorced that bum and got a new man,” she said, still gaping at him as she scanned his items. He bagged them dutifully, nodding.
“Oh, well. Congratulations?”
“Thank you. My goodness, look at you. You’ve grown! And look at those arms. You look like a bird of paradise. I’ve been thinking of getting a tattoo, you know?”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Life isn’t over when you’re sixty, you know. Does it hurt as bad as they say?”
“Depends on where you get it.”
“I’m thinking my butt cheek,” she said without pause. Kaiyo blinked, moving to feed his card into the machine.
“Well, that’s probably a good spot pain-wise. Not a lot of…bone.”
“Oh, is that where it hurts?”
“Yeah, and where the skin is thin and sensitive.”
“Hmm…I’ll have to keep that in mind. Oh, wait until Cecil sees you! Your mom must be happy you’re visiting. Or are you here to stay?”
“No, no, just visiting.”
“Well. I’m glad. Have you seen Ahmik yet? Thea just had another little one. I’m sure you know. It’s a boy this time.”
“Oh, yeah. It was nice talking to you, Mrs. Th-Steveson. Have a good day.”
“You too, dear!” she called out as he walked away.
The mention of his past pack had tied his lungs into a knot. He breathed through the ridiculous reaction. It was strange to hear about how their lives had gone on without him. A million things he hadn’t experienced. He hadn’t even met the children of the girl he’d called his best friend until he was eighteen. One of the people he had lost family with, that he had fought alongside, that he had survived because of. Now, there was nothing more than a passing mention of her existence in a store.
