Ch.5 Results of a choice

“To think he’d just grab three of them…” My father said. “What do we tell Chief Aldric and the rest of the elders?”

“Just that.” My mom replied. “I can understand the little sword, it looks the most like a toy, by why’d he take the staff and feather too?”

“He always seemed smart, perhaps it wouldn’t be bad if he became a scholar… I just hope he won’t grow expecting to become a warrior and a mage too…”

“It will be fine, dear, he doesn’t even know what these things are. It’s childish tradition and a childish response, what could we expect? What can he expect?”

‘Damn it, I don’t know what those words mean… I’ll ask later in the village after I decide it’s time to start speaking…’ I looked at them annoyed by my own inability to understand what they said about the significance of this things. ‘Would they even teach me stuff related to these?’ They didn’t, I had no way of being sure back then but as things stood it did open them to the idea that I might have some unexpected learning abilities and desires which prompted them to quietly prepare. Anyway, as things were, I was just frustrated and unhappy with how things turned out. I got their puzzlement and they dismissed my choice as a childish approach… How infuriating… Nothing I can do… yet!

Little did I know that my choice would stir some interest in the heart of the village chief’s wife, Edith… Well for now the surprises I was to get were over and I could finally enjoy my first real food! Or so I thought… I was met with utter disappointment to have a very soft paste in front of me… It wasn’t bad… Just bland and had no satisfying texture to chew on. But I longed for some real food… For some pork chops with fried or baked potatoes… I’d probably have to investigate what kind of animals existed around here first… Should I have chosen the scythe? I might have been able to discover what culinary prospects existed faster… Oh well what’s done is done…

I once again surprised my parents by eating without help and relatively politely at the table without making a ruckus or throwing food or refusing to eat. Aside from the fact that my small hands had a hard time grasping the spoon I was given and that my mouth was too small for it, I was eating pretty much just like them. Seeing them stupefied I wondered if I overdid it… To salvage the situation I took some of my paste in my spoon and extended it towards my mother, as if to ask if she wanted some since she kept staring at me. What at first thought seemed like a good idea, I soon realized would turn out strange… I was not supposed to understand sharing or the gesture I was stuck in either… So I froze not knowing what to do… Now we were three living statues staring at each other, neither of us knowing what to do or how to process the situation… In the end I broke the stand off by just eating.

I did not know if it was the right choice, but it was the only one. And my hand was hurting from keeping it extended straight with a filled metal spoon… As I ate under the frozen stare of my parents myriad thoughts rushed through me…

“A, hahahahuh” My father broke into a dry and strange laughter. One that seriously made me fear for his sanity. All things considered at least my mom’s attention shifted to him.

“What’s so funny?” She asked looking very displeased with him.

“Oh nothing… I just thought that we looked very stupid right now… Looking petrified like that…”

“Very funny!” My mom became even more annoyed but with a sigh her tension dissipated and asked again. “How do you think he learned to do that?”

“He took after us?” Then he looked at the fork he was holding, then back at me and answered defeated. “I have no idea.”

“I’ll ask latter Eld-Mother Edith about this… At the very least this made things easier… No mess to clean at the end…”

“Yea…” My father answered with a weak tired voice.

Soon they started eating again. Their movements were stiff but there was nothing I could do now… Even after several months eating was still ingrained into me… I overlooked how much of a problem this could be… Well, when thoughts are troubling you… Meditate. Move your focus to the one thing that undoubtedly requires it all. First though, I must finish this paste… Damn, it could use some ketchup…

After we all finished eating dad hurriedly left. He looked very tired and irritated these days… I started to wonder if he took up another kind of occupation then what he was used to, so that he’d be home for me… Of course, he was probably enjoying his bonus time with mom too if that was the case, but it definitely took a toll on him, whatever it was that he was doing. At first he came back looking somewhat greasy, he didn’t get close enough for me to see better before he was washing or something… I wasn’t sure as he wasn’t doing it inside and the weather outside would have made for a bad time washing… Now he was cleaner but he caried a more minty smell to him and sometimes I spotted wood flakes on him. I wondered how long it will take until he cracks… Should I act more foolishly cute? But I wasn’t a real baby… If I really tried I think I’d make him feel better about it but then my own pride would be in shambles… Hm? Pride? What pride? That was gone since the days I was defecating and urinating uncontrollably and had to cry for my mom to change my rags and clean me and the mess… You can imagine what followed…

I started making faces at dad. Whenever he was home, which was… effective… Not in the way I planned but it worked so I won’t complain… All his bad blood from work was turning into bafflement whenever he was seeing me make faces. It took a few days and talks with mother to figure out that perhaps I noticed he was in a bad mood and I copied their way of trying to make me happy. They were about right… Only I did it because I had the face of a baby which meant that my expressions would be cute regardless, while the two of them would have made a normal baby fill their garments and cry…

Over these days I found the fact that no one said anything about the strange eating manner or my choice of objects. It was as if the matter was solved and forgotten. If not for the fact that I still got incredulous side eyes while eating I’d have been worried that something happened. Other than that considering That no one did anything or said anything, I decided to play it cool too. Let ‘em think I’m some kinda genius… I planned on that from the beginning.

The next few months passed quickly and I reached the age of nine months. The only note worthy event was a fight between the girls and the boys over custody of me during the goods exchange. The boys where at a clear disadvantage… All the older ones were leaving with their fathers to work so only those bellow fifteen were left. The girls which unlike the boys were only capable of enjoying this moment of peace due to me where hell bent on keeping me. Otherwise, they’d have to stay home to clean, make baskets, sort grains or clean in the house. The boys were free to do what they wanted until they were thirteen however, so in my eyes their claim was weak. Their numbers were small, their arguments lacked depth, but they had a will so they pressed on. In the end my mom intervened and together with Eld-mother Edith decided it would be decided on a rotation basis, such that once the girls would keep me and then was the turn of the boys. This allowed me to observe the games of the boys, which were nothing much. Something like a throw to the target, stick fights, running after one another, throwing insults and the chasing each other for a beating…

A lot of running so I couldn’t participate. It was boring as all I could was to watch. Not that I could do much more with the girls, but since I was straight I could at least enjoy the sight. Not like those rough head idiots that were insulting them. I still hated the fact that often to the girls I was their plaything, but at the very least they carried me around for convenience and I didn’t need to just wait and watch from afar while they did their stuff. In other words, despite the humiliation I preferred to be left with the girls and not with the guys. The girls also seemed to know much more, their gossip was more than welcome, allowing me to enrich my vocabulary and delivering a lot of common knowledge to me on a platter.

Now with nine months under my belt, I decided to start walking. I was bored of crawling and I was old enough… I thought so at least… And if I paid attention constantly to how I walked I should be able to avoid the worst-case scenario. Even more so since I was basically walking bare foot. The only form of shoes that I saw around were some leather bags that were tied around the ankle… Strangely everyone seemed to have a pair… As I thought about it I realized how strange it was. Not only the boots, but there were also many leather ornaments in the clothes. This and the metal cutlery made no sense to me.

Things didn’t add up from the perspective of my old world, where even in modern time, leather, natural leather was expensive. Here it seemed as a commonplace expendable material… And yet aside from some birds kept for eggs there were no other domestic animals around. Or at least none that I saw or knew of.

I waited for the right moment when both my parents were home and awake. I crawled around to get them to be vigilant and pay attention to me, then I tried to gain as much dramatic momentum as I could while I straightened myself, placed a foot in front of me, turning my position from on all four to a one knee kneel and then pushed myself up to stand on my own two feet and started walking. I expected a big reaction or something, but no, I made my parent’s numb to my strange acts… At this point they might suspect I was reincarnated… Nah… It was a far removed concept… Well they definitely will be hard to surprise from now on…

“I’ll bring some skins tomorrow and let you make some more suitable clothes and some footwear for Cato.” My father said.

“Mhm! It’s about time… I’ll take care of the dies too. I’ll make sure he gets some cute clothes.”

Quite the unimpressive reaction… While shoes and clothes better than my current rags were quite welcome I had wanted to make them happy through this sudden act but it seemed like I had failed. It mattered not. There will be more prideful occasions in the future as I grew and displayed hard won prowess. My speech was still impeded somewhat but it was getting pretty good by my own standards and I planned to start talking soon too, perhaps that would draw more of a reaction.

With the new set of clothing coming, I was also ready to embrace the new stage of this life that will be unfolding before me.