Jim Gem's Arc

Chapter 17 of 23

Jim laid down his last block and waited. Lena stood on the scaffold, rope in hand, and said nothing. Her silence hurt worse than her words. He waited for her to climb down, to touch his arm, to take it back. She only looked at the half-built walls. So he wiped the mortar from his hands and left. The stone house stood open to the sky, a job stopped cold. He walked to the tavern instead of the waterfall. Inside, Kael sat at the wide wooden bar, turning an empty mug between his fingers. Kael was one of the few who knew what Jim could do, and had never flinched at it. He was also the man who told Jim to catch Lena mid-air and propose. When Jim dropped onto the next stool, Kael read his face at once. "You look like a man who lost a fight he didn't throw a punch in," Kael said. "Lena hates the house." Jim stared at the row of bottles on the shelf. "I'm building it for her. For us. She called it a stone box." Kael slid a mug down the counter to him. "She say she hates you?" "No." "Then she doesn't hate the house." Kael set his own mug down. His voice stayed level. "You built her a place. You never asked her what she wanted in it." Jim frowned. "She helped me lay every wall." "She passed you mortar," Kael said. "That's not the same as choosing." He softened, the way he did only for a few people. "Ire sets my shoulder when I come home broken. She never tells me to stop leaving. I thought that meant she agreed. It meant she was scared to say no." He met Jim's eyes. "Ask Lena. Don't decide for her." Jim turned the mug and didn't drink. He thought of Lena stilling on the rope. Not angry. Scared. The same fear as always, dressed up as a jab. He stood. "That's it?" Kael said. "One mug and you're gone?" "You already fixed it," Jim said. "Thanks." He found Lena at the waterfall, sitting on a low block with her knees pulled up. She looked up when his shadow fell over her. "I didn't mean junk," she said fast. "I meant I'm afraid. Of the cliff. Of children I don't know how to raise. Of wanting all of it." "I know." Jim sat beside her. "I stopped building because I built the whole thing without you. Tell me what you want. Room by room. I'll haul it or I'll tear it down." Lena wiped her eyes and laughed, wet and surprised. "A door," she said. "A wide door. So a kid can run in without me watching the ledge." "Then we start with the door." Jim took her hand. The house would rise again, but different now. Hers as much as his. The dragon's home, and the runaway's, built by two.