On the Path of the Giants

Chapter 13: Joshua

        Joshua woke up as the sun shone on his face. He could not remember the moment he had fallen asleep, or even if he had at all. He got up from the straw mat, and looked at the hole between the planks of the wall. He could not see the disk of the sun yet, but knew from the light that it would be just slightly off his viewing angle.

        Joshua was listening to the sound of the village. The songbirds were singing their virtues, trying to attrach mates in the Giant's Forest. Joshua empathized with them, to the way their songs were desperately trying to attract a long lost lover. Joshua began to hum a tune, a tune that he had often heard sung by his own mother, a song that Old man David’s wife liked to hum while her husband talked endlessly about the life at the time of the Giants, of Graham the hunter, who killed a Giant deer and fed the village for the whole winter with it, with so much meat that they had to dig a second meat pit. Joshua hummed his tune, thinking back to all the times around the fire, with the other hunters, eating and laughing and talking and telling each other stories of grandeur and exaggeration, trying to impress each other.

        Joshua hummed and hummed until the disk of the sun rose over the outer wall, but still he was stuck in his jail. He hummed liked his life depended upon it, and hummed until the echoes of his tune filled the whole hut, until he felt like it reverberated around the whole village. The dogs from the kennel started to howl in unison, as if they, too, could understand his pain, could feel how he felt. The echoes of their song seemed to create a life of its own, embodying the spirit of time, the painful joy of life.

        Joshua heard footsteps coming towards his door. He felt compelled to stop humming, and the dogs, following his lead, stopped howling and started to bark.

        Joshua went back next to the straw mat, standing, his head held up high, remembering who he was and where he came from. He did not feel ashamed: he was from the village. He was a direct descendent of Graham the hunter, he was the arrow that slew the deer: he was the Giant’s son. He felt pride for the first time ever since he had left the village, and got very optimistic about life, and his hope of finding his rightful place once again.

        He heard the clank of the door as it unlocked, and its creaking as it opened. The familiar face of Johan appeared, and Joshua looked directly into her eyes. Today, he would not fail; he would answer any question without remorse. Today, he would hold his head high. Johan seemed to appreciate his enthusiasm.

        “Good song you sing before. I like it. The dogs like it too.” She chuckled as she said this, and Joshua was not sure whether it was meant as a slight, a compliment, or an observation.

        “I need to go back where I am from.”

        Johan looked at him as if he had said something she could not understand, as if she was feigning a linguistic barrier to prevent her from truly understanding what he had meant.

        “I am bringing you to my mother, she wants speak with you.” He could see in her face that she had at least understood part of what he had said. Her smile had vanished to adopt a stark and unmoving face: from motherly affection to brute pragmatism. Yet, he could see a shred of sadness in one of her eyes.

        As he walked towards the building where Mary still sat, he could see the eyes of the Gats turned towards him. From the way they talked and looked at him, he understood that Johan was an important member of the community. Some of the children who had stopped started to hum the tune that Joshua had hummed, and he did not know if they were mocking or supporting him. The look they had on their faces made him think that they had simply understood the song, the meaning behind it, in a way that their parents were not able to. As if they, too, were in the same situation. As if they, too, felt both freed and imprisoned within their village walls.

        Joshua noticed amongst the people looking at him that there were no girls of his age, and very few boys. He saw that the age jumped from twelve to twenty, without passing through the eight remaining years. He did not know if that was due to the siege of the city that Mary had mentioned earlier, or if there was a completely different reason.

        As he walked towards the building, he could feel his heart growing fonder and fonder of this people, of the children that sung his song and understood his plight. He meant to apologize to Johan; he meant to tell her that he would stay; he meant to tell her that he would be glad to become a part of the community. His heart was torn between his life in his native village and the possibility of a new life in this village. He started to walk with less assurance, trying to remember the reasons worth fighting for, desperately clinging to the memory of Lydia. The fact that he could not recognize her in anyone of the village helped remind him of his goal. And yet, he was still torn.

        He finally entered the Giant’s bark house, keeping his head high, yet evading Mary’s gaze, as if he knew she could tell his feelings through his eyes, as if he was trying to keep them away from her. Johan stood behind him, blocking the doorway, preventing him from leaving if he had meant to. He stood in front of Mary, who looked at him with the wisdom of her years and of her status.

        “Do you have something you wish to tell me, Joshua.” Mary had read right through his mind. Joshua, who had been so eager to announce his departure, was now unsure he was making the right decision. He still felt her gaze reading his face.

        “I wanted to leave” he said, truthfully. “I wanted to go back to my village.” Joshua left the rest unsaid. Mary understood.

        “You wanted. What do you want now?” Joshua looked behind him, and saw Johan, still standing in front of the door, facing him. She kept a stern face, but he could see a glimmer of hope where sadness had been before. He looked back at Mary, directly at her face, letting her read it to its full potential.

        “I do not know. I want to go home.” Joshua had said the word as if he meant something other than the village. And in fact, it did. He meant to go home, but that did not necessarily mean he meant to go back to his village as it is now.

        “Do you wish to stay here with us?” she asked, understanding what he had meant. Joshua looked back at Johan, and saw that she had cracked a small smile, a motherly smile of satisfaction.

        “Maybe” was the only answer that Joshua could muster, as he heard the smile on Johan’s face appear from behind him.