The Book Eaters(56)

And now she grew thoughtful. She must hoard this splendour! What a little ignorance her gaolers had made of her! Life was a mighty bliss, and they had scraped hers to the bare bone! They must not know that she knew.

—George MacDonald, The History of Photogen and Nycteris

Devon found her second pregnancy was strangely restful, perhaps because she’d given up entirely. Hope was a thing you lost when simply trying to imagine better days became so exhausting, overwhelming, and depressing a task, that one opted for despair out of sheer weariness. Giving up brought peace.

At Winterfield Manor, Devon had spent much of her pregnancy wandering the grounds aimlessly but happily, always by foot since she’d been barred from riding due to her condition. But Easterbrook lands were riddled with farms and human labor, things that distressed her rather than soothed her. She stayed indoors.

Having little enough to do and few other places to go, she spent a week or so pottering miserably in her room, watching rain clouds pelt the workers and fields alike, before finally venturing down to find Jarrow again.

She entered the games room without knocking and simply said, “I’m here to play,” in answer to his puzzled expression.

“Um, hello,” Jarrow said, hitting Pause in astonishment, “I mean, sure. But isn’t it kind of late?”

“I’m pregnant, if you haven’t heard,” she said. “I don’t have to see Matley in the evening anymore.”

“Congratulations, I think,” he said, after a minute. “You, um…” He scratched his head. “No beer, right? I’m guessing. With the baby and … Can I get you some tea? And wanna keep playing Final Fantasy?”

Devon nodded.



* * *



The happiest six months of her life were spent in Jarrow’s game room, staying up all hours of the night and drinking inktea and being mostly ignored by the rest of the Easterbrook troupe. She had never been more trapped, yet so free.

“It’s strange,” she told him, on one of their many afternoons lost to the worlds of PlayStation and Nintendo. “When I thought about my future as a little girl, I could never have imagined any of what I’m living right now. And definitely not this.” Her gesture took in the games room, encompassing not just consoles but the unconventional friendship they’d struck up.

“None of our kind imagines the future,” Jarrow said, stretching out his legs. “We make plans and we predict things, but really, it’s too difficult to think about life outside the bounds of what we’ve already experienced. Which is exactly what the future is: life beyond what we’ve already experienced.”

“Jesus, Jarrow.”

“What?”

“Just…” She hit the Pause button. “You actually listen when I talk to you. And think about responses and say things that are pointful, and … it’s weird, that’s all.”

“Jesus, Dev.”

“What?”

“You’ve a low bar for friendship, that’s all.”

“If it’s such a low bar, then how come most people can’t meet it?” She sounded bitter, even to herself.

“I guess most people are kind of shite, then. Shite enough to make bare-minimum Basic Courtesy layabouts like me look good, eh?”

“I suppose.” She added, without thinking, “I wish it had been you. I could have done all this so much easier if I had a husband I liked, but instead I have Matley. No offense to your brother.”

A very awkward pause and then he laughed an unfunny laugh, a vein pulsing in his temple. Almost a sob.

“Did I say something wrong?”

“It would never have been me, that’s all. Sorry.”

“Why not? I mean, you’re a little young, but it doesn’t always have to be the older brothers, does it?”

“No, it doesn’t, but they’d never pick me all the same. Not when there’s so many others vying for the role.”

Games music looped endlessly in the background. Press Play, the video screen urged. Neither of them did.

“I don’t understand.” Even as she said it, an unexpected memory surfaced: Matley on her first night here, leering from the games room doorway.

Any other man, and I’d be questioning your fidelity.

“No one’s told you, have they?” Jarrow said. “Suppose I should tell you, before you hear it from someone else. It’s common enough as a joke in this house.” He set down the console controller and picked up the television one, pressing Mute to silence the volume. “I don’t like women.”

“What do you mean?” she said, affronted. “You do like me, don’t you? We get on.”

He groaned, dragging a hand through curled hair. “No, you’re not understanding. I don’t like any women in the way men are supposed to.”

“Oh, do you like men? That’s no big concern. Lots of knights and brothers—”

“No, not that either.” He plucked invisible dust off the sofa arm. “I’m asexual. I think.”

“Um.” That was not a word Devon had encountered in her forays into fiction, so she sifted rapidly through her dictionary knowledge. “Which one?”

“Huh?” His turn to be confused.

“The word has four definitions?”