The way we used to be

Chapter 6 / Friends

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After having sailed by the shore for months, they were on the open sea again, with no land to be seen in any direction. It was time to head back home.

Thorfinn wasn't very happy about it. Of course, he had begun to miss his family, but he hadn't done what he set out to do.

"Leif." He called out to the man as he walked by, and he stopped.

"Yes, what is it?"

"Do you think I can come with you again? After the winter," Thorfinn asked, watching as Leif frowned. He sighed and walked closer to where Thorfinn stood, watching the water as he so often did.

"You're not asking that for the right reason."

Thorfinn couldn't help but feel a tinge of shame at the man's sad voice, but he tried to ignore that feeling.

"So it's a no?"

Leif looked down at the boy as the wind blew through his blonde hair, which had grown longer during their time away from home. He had hoped that nine months away would make him come to his senses, but he could tell that what drove him to ask him to come along again was not an adventurous spirit but still vengeance.

"If your mother agrees, I will take you." Leif relented. Thorfinn was still driven by the need for revenge, and that meant that if he was not with Leif, he could possibly still run away, as Helga had first feared nine months ago.

Thorfinn looked surprised. He had thought that Leif would say no.

"Do you think she will let me?"

"I think your mother will let you do what she thinks is best for you."

"And what is that?"

The palm of Leif's hand suddenly hit the back of Thorfinn's head, just enough to hurt a little and send hair flying around his head.

"Do I look like your mother? I can't possibly know the answer to that." Leif growled, and Thorfinn rubbed at the spot on the back of his head.

He thought of his mother's face when she had told him he would go with Leif. It had come as a welcome surprise to him, but he had been frozen in his seat when she told him, only watching her face. She had looks so sad. He knew he had hurt her every time he talked about leaving Iceland. He didn't want to hurt her... he just hoped she understood him well enough to let him do what he needed to do.


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"What are you doing Leif? Are you planning to build a children's home?" Thorbjorn laughed, patting the newest addition to Leif's crew on the head.

They had made it back to Greenland, back to Gudrid's village. She had been the first time greet them, spotting the ship from the hill where she was tending to the sheep, leaving them with Odd as she hurried down onto the beach.

Just like when Thorfinn first arrived on that shore she had been upset to find another boy not much older than her. She really was beginning to think that Leif lied to her. She knew that he didn't want to take her because she was a girl, but he had also told her that it was just as much because she was too young.

Those boys were only three years older than her. If three years passed by and Leif still said the same thing then she would call him a hypocrite.

"What's your name, boy?"

"Thorfinn"

"Huh?" Gudrid tilted her head in confusion as she heard the boys answer, and she looked toward the boy she already knew. Wordlessly asking him if that was really true.

He caught her looking very quickly and merely shrugged, giving no comment.

"But everyone just calls me Bug eyes" the other Thorfinn continued.

"Why Bug eyes?" Gudrid asked, and he turned to look at her, putting a finger under and over each of his eyes and stretching the skin to make his eyes pop.

"I have big eyes"

"Oh, you sure do"

Leif went on to explain how Bug eyes had become a part of his crew, leaving out enough details so the smallest children didn't get upset. In the meantime, knowing it would take a while, Thorfinn walked over and sat himself in the sand, watching the adults.

"Are you tired?" Gudrid followed him, not knowing if Thorfinn was sighing because he was exhausted or because he was annoyed.

"No, but my back hurts. I'll finally get to sleep in a real bed again."

"So you'll sleep in the house this time?"

He finally looked up at her, looking at her like she was stupid.

"Why wouldn't I?" He asked like he hadn't gotten so upset the last time they met that he had decided to sleep on the ship in freezing cold instead of being underneath the same roof as her.

She watched him without saying a word for a while, and Thorfinn looked away again.

"You're a lot nicer to me this time than the last time we met," Gudrid muttered, smiling down at him.

Was he? He wasn't really trying to do anything different, but he supposed that he had gotten more used to people, and then there were Bug eyes...

"You're not as annoying this time, at least not as annoying as others I know."

Leif hailed him as the reason Bug eyes had been saved, but the boys didn't get along very well. Thorfinn was mostly quiet and always brooding, while Bug eyes, despite his trauma, was very outspoken and loved to talk, laugh and play pranks on the other crew members.

They didn't hate each other, not at all, they simply didn't understand each other very well. And one thing that Thorfinn certainly didn't understand was how Bug could so easily call Leif his father.

When he had learned very quickly that Bug eyes had been separated from his parents and had nearly no hope of seeing them again Thorfinn had hoped that he could understand him, but Bug eyes didn't dwell on his loss, he ignored it, but Thorfinn thought that he should be angry. It was something they could never agree on...

"Gee, thanks" Gudrid giggled. Not sensing the deeper meaning in what Thorfinn said, though she could guess that it was the new boy that annoyed him.

After a while of standing over him she sat down in the sand next to him, digging at it around her to make it more comfortable. "So, was I right?"

"About what?"

"That you liked it once you got there" she laughed. "You saw the world. Much more than I've ever seen, but when you were about to leave you sounded like you didn't care at all."

"Did you say that? I don't remember" Thorfinn mumbled, but he remembered it. He had thought about it but didn't want her to know so.

"So?"

"So what?"

"Did you like it?" She sighed.

Thorfinn didn't answer her immediately. He thought of what he had seen, what he had done, and what he hadn't done. He thought of the men and women who praised him for helping Leif, and he thought of the man who had been whipping Bug eyes.

It wasn't a question he could just say "yes" or "no" to. It was a question he almost didn't want to answer.

"It was..." he began, but had no more words prepared. He saw her lean forward next to him to see his face better, but he looked away, not knowing what kind of face he was making. "There was a lot of good, and a lot of bad too."

"Oh, like what?"

"Like—" Thorfinn began, not knowing why he was entertaining her this time. "Like, the people. Most of them were kind, but some were rude, and some were... some were monsters."

"What do you mean?"

"It doesn't matter; just believe me."

"I believe you."

Thorfinn had thought she would pout or say something sarcastic when he refused to explain it to her, but she seemed to have a better understanding of what questions not to ask. He appreciated that, and so the two of them fell into comfortable silence, something Thorfinn wouldn't have thought was possible with her.

"How about the food?" She asked after a while, breaking that comfortable silence.

"The cheese was good, and they had a lot of bread too, but besides that, it was nothing special. My mother's and sister's cooking is better."

She laughed at him answer and Thorfinn frowned, feeling his ears turn warm with embarrassment. Did he sound too much like a little child talking about his mother?

"Nothing is better than a mom's food," she answered, letting him know that she wasn't making fun of him; she was just agreeing.

"Yeah"

"Do you miss her?"

Now he knew she was trying to make fun of him, and she turned to look sharply at her, and she recoiled a bit, though she kept on smiling.

"Sorry, too much," she admitted, and the two of them became quiet once more as she decided to ask the rest of the questions he had about his journey later. He would be staying a few days longer than last time, so she had enough time.

They sat looking at the others still by the ship, watching as Bug Eyes tried to copy his adoptive father, practicing how to make a sale even though Leif kept trying to stop him, just as he hadn't wanted Thorfinn to learn how to barter just yet. There was no stopping that boy, however; he seemed eager to learn, or maybe he just wanted to make the man who had saved him proud. At the very least, it was entertaining, but Gudrid surprisingly didn't feel as drawn towards that boy as she did towards Thorfinn. She wasn't sure why that was; there was just something about him—something she knew she hadn't reached yet, but if she kept trying, she would one day. That's at least what she hoped.

"So, are we friends now?" She asked carefully, not breaking the silence as harshly as she had the last time.

Again, Thorfinn looked at her like she was stupid, but there was something else too—true, genuine confusion—and maybe a little sadness in his eyes as well.

"You know Leif was lying right? He won't take you with him just because you try to be my friend"

Gudrid pouted, remembering how rude Thorfinn had been last time when she asked him if he thought Leif would ever let her come with him, but Gudrid knew that Leif often lied. She knew he had lied when he said he'd consider it if she became friends with Thorfinn.

Of course, deep down, she always hoped Leif would keep his words, but she had really wanted to be Thorfinn's friend regardless of any promises.

"I know that." She answered him, but his expression didn't change. He clearly waited for her to say more, so her drive deepened, and she leaned closer to him as he leaned further away from her. "I want to be your friend!"

"You're so stupid..."

That was not the response she wanted. She reached down to the pile of sand she'd dug to make the spot where she sat more comfortable and grabbed a fistful, throwing it at him before he had closed his mouth, causing him to sputter and try to spit the grains of sand out of his mouth.

He looked so ridiculous as he wiped at his face as he spat in the sand beside him, so Gudrid couldn't help but laugh at him, but then Thorfinn paid her back by doing the same thing she did to him. Though she was sure she got less in her mouth than he did, she still hurried to her feet and tried to get the sand off her face and out of her mouth.

"And annoying too..." Thorfinn mumbled, giving his face one last wipe as he watched Gudrid.

Gudrid wasn't listening to him anymore, so he averted his eyes, thinking back to the question Gudrid had asked just moments earlier: if they were friends. And he sighed, bringing his knees higher up to his chest.

"Yeah, okay... we can be friends..."