Page 75 of Fierce

Wonder Woman

The next night was a first for Karen and me: a Women’s Wednesday that would include a man. I was nervous, and because I was, I changed into my PJs, exactly as I normally would’ve. Which made Karen look at me with astonishment and ask, “Aren’t you supposed to, like, dress up if a guy’s coming over? Maybe you want to put on some mustache bleaching cream while you’re at it.”

“I do not have a mustache. And anyway,” I tried to explain, “Hemi’s coming into our place. Into our special night. He’s seeing my real life for once, and I need to know that he can be OK with that. I’m not glamorous, and I don’t have a glamorous life, and it’s just too hard to pretend I do.”

I stopped, sighed, and pulled the mesh bag with my hand washing from its hook. I was way behind on laundry, and I wasn’t going to have anything to wear the rest of the week if I didn’t do something about it. “I mean, like this,” I said, hefting the bag. “Behold my life. I guess I just need to know I can be myself, because being anybody else is going to get too exhausting. If that’s what he wants, I need to know.”

She plopped herself down on the bed and reached for a nail file. “I’ll pretend to get that. The fact that you wear Wonder Woman pajamas might be a little too much reality, though. I’m just saying. If he takes one look at you and leaves again, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

“Uh...you’re in your pajamas, too,” I told her. “And actually doing personal grooming.”

“I’m just the little sister. Plus, I already puked on him. Nowhere to go but up.”

When Hemi appeared, he was wearing jeans and a T-shirt himself. Which was a relief, but fortunately—or unfortunately—didn’t diminish his attractiveness one little bit. He kissed me on the cheek, then, to my surprise, gave Karen her own kiss before standing back and saying, “Wonder Woman and Catwoman, eh. I’m a bit intimidated, suddenly.”

“That’s our deal,” Karen said, stepping right up to defend my honor. “Love it or leave it. But you have to admit, Catwoman’s way more badass. Wonder Woman’s kind of lame.”

He actually laughed at that. “I’ll love it, how’s that. And I’m not going to comment on who’s more badass. I reckon Hope’s got her share.” He put his arm around me and drew me closer.

“Hmm.” I may have had a weak moment, have snuggled up and rubbed my cheek against his chest. Just for a second. “You trying to soften me up or something?”

“Could be,” he said. “Could definitely be.”

Karen sighed. “Guys. PDA. I’m an impressionable teenager.”

“What?” I stood up again, though, and took the plastic bags from Hemi’s other hand. “I’m not allowed to hug?”

“Not like that. No offense, but it’s a little sickening.”

“Speaking of that,” Hemi asked her, “how you goin’? That medicine working?”

She shrugged. “Not too bad.”

I frowned a little. She’d woken that morning with another headache, I was pretty sure, and the nausea, too, because she’d wanted a smoothie for breakfast again. She said she was doing better, and that the pills helped. I hoped it was true.

“Tell me how much suffering’s in store for me,” Hemi said when I’d brought over plates, plus juice glasses for the inevitable bottle of wine, and had sat on the couch beside him with Karen on my other side. Cozy, and that was all right with me. “I’m holding out for action, maybe a superhero movie, as you’re both dressed for it, but I’m guessing I may be disappointed.”

“We did try to keep you in mind,” I said. “But I don’t know how you’ll feel about it. Karen and I both wanted to watch a New Zealand movie, since you were going to be here. We found Whale Rider, which is supposed to be good. You’ve probably seen it, but would you mind watching it again?”

He shrugged. “I’ve seen it, yeh. It’s a pretty good film.”

“Plus,” Karen said, “sounds like total girl power.”

It was, too. By the time we were halfway through it, Karen had forgotten that Hemi was with us, was lying curled up with her feet in my lap as usual, and I was stroking my hand over her legs, also as usual. Snuggling, like we did. And if I was lying back against Hemi myself, and he had his arm around me? Well, that was just comfortable. If I got a few tears in my eyes towards the end, that was normal, too. When I cried over real things, the tears hurt too much, but somehow, in a movie, it was different. Anyway, I was allowed to be vulnerable, to be a normal girl, in the dark like this where nobody could see. Surely I was.

“It’s funny, isn’t it?” I said, doing my best not to sound sniffly when the credits were rolling at last, the haunting music still playing in the background, and Karen had reached a hand out to turn on the light. “You and I were just talking about this last night, Hemi. When you were saying that the Maori legends were all about proving yourself, overcoming your weaknesses. That felt so real just now. I mean, the legends felt real. Like magic, still, but like a...a real kind. Not like a fairy tale at all.” I caught myself up, laughed a little. “Even though I know that’s silly.”

“Mm.” His arm was still around me, his fingers rubbing a lock of my hair, and I didn’t want to get up. Not yet. “That’s because it is about what’s real. The natural world, I guess you’d call it—it’s not separate for Maori. It’s not ‘nature,’ or if it is, we belong in it, and it’s part of us. We’re all tied together. The ancestors, the family, the ones who’ll come after us. The land and the sky and the sea, and the creatures, too. All together, all part of the same world.”

Wow. That had been a whole lot of sharing for Hemi. The movie must have had an effect on him, too. I wondered if he were ever homesick. It seemed like he’d have to be.

“So is that movie really what being Maori is like?” Karen asked. “That place—is it like where you’re from? And do you believe all that? The magic part and everything? The legends? Even though you live here now?”

When he didn’t answer for a moment, I worried that she’d offended him. But when he finally spoke, he didn’t sound offended. “I don’t think any one film could tell you that, but it’s a start. Yeh, not too different from where my grandfather lives, that film. And being Maori isn’t just a box you tick on a form. I wouldn’t say I ‘believe’ that people can call to whales, or that whales would answer. I guess I’d say that the legends, the traditions, the waiata—the songs—all of it’s in in your blood, no matter where you live. In your bones.”

Clearly, I’d been right. That he was sometimes homesick, that he cared. But I didn’t push it, because he didn’t go on. Instead, I said, “I see what you mean about Maori women being strong, anyway. And maybe I’m beginning to understand a little more about Maori men.”

“You mean that we’re stubborn buggers?” He was smiling a little now.

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