Victor Rosevale's Arc

Chapter 11 of 18

Morning light came through the small windows of the timbered house. Victor woke to the sound of Sable on the stairs. She was going down, not up, and she was not favoring the leg. He listened to her step on each board. Even. Steady. He got up and pulled on his shirt. She stood at the hearth stirring the pot. She had her flight vest on over her nightshirt. The goggles sat on her forehead again, the way she used to wear them before the river. "Try it, honey" he said. "Try what." "Walk across the room." She set the spoon down. She crossed the kitchen to the door and back. No limp. No hand on the table for balance. She turned in place and grinned at him. "Told you," she said. He knelt and pushed her nightshirt up past her knee. The scar was a pale line now, thin as a thread. He pressed the muscle around it. She did not flinch. "Does it ache at night?" "No." "On the stairs?" "Baby. It’s healed." She smiled. He stayed kneeling. He had carried her out of the river with that leg open to the bone. He had watched spring water close the wound under his hands. He had counted her steps for months. He stood. He kissed her lips. "Go easy on it please," he said. "One more week before you climb anything." "One week." "I promise." She caught his collar before he could pull back. "But it is healed. Say it." "It is healed." She let him go and turned back to the pot. He watched her from the doorway. She moved around the kitchen the way she used to move around anything, quick and sure. She reached for the salt on the high shelf without stretching for it. She bent to the fire without holding the mantel. He went out to split wood. The air was cold. He set a log on the block and swung. The axe bit clean. He worked through the pile and did not stop until his shirt was wet through. When he came back in she was at the table with a strip of leather in her hands. She was oiling it. He knew the strip. It was from her vest, the shoulder seam that had cracked in the river. "Spring," she said, without looking up. "Spring." "I mean it this time." "I know you do." She looked up then. Her hands stilled on the leather. "Victor." She waited until he met her eyes. "I'm late." He set the axe against the wall. He crossed the room and sat down across from her. He put his hand flat on the table between them, palm up. She put hers in it. "How late," he said. "Two weeks." He closed his hand around hers. The kitchen was quiet. The fire cracked once in the grate. "Then you are not climbing anything," he said. She laughed. She did not take her hand back.