ASUNDER (I) : tmr newt

09: I'm Searching

 

9 Leo

I think we are all supposed to be settled now that the oaths are done, but I am not. Michelle has already disappeared, slamming the door behind her again. Everyone else has managed to dissipate amongst the crowd of boys. There is no party planned for tonight, although there is a fire near the Homestead I can sit by.

"Hey." I see one of the boys off in the distance jog towards me. "So, you're going to be the new Med-jack?"

I nod, and I am about to say something before he continues.

"That's what Clint was telling me." He nods, looking around for the other boy and surprised when he doesn't find him. Clint must be the leader, although I've got no idea where he is. "I am Jeff, by the way."

He sticks his hand out towards me, and I find a smile on my face. Jeff and Clint don't look at me the way a lot of the other boys do. They always are sizing me up, either trying to figure out what to make of me or how to make me. I can't help but find it entirely unsettling.

"I'm happy he nailed you." Jeff says, wrapping his arm around me and pulling me forward. "Not that your friends are... you know, but you aren't... you know?"

I don't quite understand what he is getting at, but I nod anyway. It's easiest if I pretend to understand him, and I'm not sure what else I can do.

"You'll like being a med-jack." He tells me. "At least I think you will. I don't really know much about you, but I take it you don't know anything about me, or anything about anything either. And that isn't a knock on your intelligence; you're a greenie, and greenies are ignorant to everything around them. Before you argue, it's definitely true and there is no way around it."

Sure, I guess. At first I thought maybe I just wouldn't talk, but Jeff seems very keen on talking. And he continues to do it.

"I mean, we haven't had a greenie med-jack in ages. Which is nice, you know nice. Just me and Clint for the longest. And I do mean the longest, about a year I would say. Clint's been here longer, since the beginning group anyway. But that doesn't matter I don't think. Why would it to you anyway, you're a Greenie?"

"I have a name" I throw the words in, finally finding a break.

"Well, of course you have a name, all of us do. Except for that one girl who says she doesn't know it. But since you're new you are a Greenie, like all the other Greenies. That is actually quite confusing after all, you know. I don't imagine you know why you all came up in a group, but that sort of klunk doesn't happen, you know. It's always the same, day in and day out."

I guess so. It's only been a day I've been here, so I wouldn't know anything about regularity. It all seems the same, and it all feels the same. There is nothing, and I actually mean nothing, that I am familiar with. Familiarity as a concept seems so foreign to me.

"So, tomorrow we will train you. If you'll meet us at the crack of dawn, then we will get right down to business."

He lets go of me, back off for a second.

"Good that?"

"Good that." I answer, with a smile spreading across my face.

He turns and runs away, further off into the Glade, and I can't help but shake my head. Jeff is many things, all of which are odd and confusing, but he makes me laugh all the same. Or maybe I should say he makes me try not to laugh.

I'm closer to the Homestead, and the fire that burns right by it. Tonight it is smaller, but just as warm. If anything, it feels cozier and much, much more comfortable.