Worlds Apart
an excerpt

Rabin found Jora on the beach. He was quite impressed actually, not that the beach was all that far away but she was just barely walking again. Well, to be completely truthful, he had only noticed her standing for the first time last night. And when he hadn't found her in her room about an hour ago he had first been relieved, then oddly vindicated, and then he felt panicked. Not because he missed her but because he was afraid of what the others would do to him when they could not find her. Topher had been stopping by almost every day recently, and while Rabin (at least recently) had been enjoying his company, he had to admit the boy had some very concerning anger issues.
At any rate, he was glad he found Jora after not too long. He didn't want to experience Topher's bad side first hand.
He hobbled up to her trying to make enough noise so that he wouldn't startle her (Topher wasn't the only one with a bad side). Jora didn't react, Rabin didn't know if her hearing had been affected by her ordeal or if she was just ignoring him. Both were equally possible.
“Hello,” he ventured.
Still no reaction.
Rabin walked close enough to see that she was tracing some kind of design in the sand. She was laying on her back with her left arms bent awkwardly over the top of her head tracing her design. When she was apparently finished she returned her arm to the more normal position of resting on her chest. She was breathing a little harder than normal. Evidently, the walk and the design tracing were taking their toll of her. It wasn't surprising, even though she certainly looked better these days, she wasn't quite as thin as she had been, and her skin was quite as sallow as it had been. Rabin walked in wide circle so Jora would be able to see him approaching, there was still no response. He figured she must be ignoring him after all. He noticed the pattern she had been drawing. It was circle, more or so, the inside of the circle was a three way spiral, Rabin tilted his head as she tried to figure out exactly what it was. She had drawn enough of them, there was one over her head, two at her shoulders on either side of her body, two at halfway down her torso, again on either side of her, and then two more on the left side next to the others.
“I suppose that symbol means something to you,” Rabin muttered more to himself. He was still trying to figure out what it was, weird circle, spirally thing.
Jora didn't look at him or really acknowledge his presence but she did lift her left hand and turn it so that the back of the hand was facing him.
Rabin noticed the faded tattoo between her thumb and index finger. It was the same symbol. Now that he saw that he remembered that he had though it was weird at the time. Of course that had six months ago or so, and he was old, his recall wasn't that great.
“What does it mean?” Rabin blurted out. He wasn't sure if he really cared to know the answer, he just felt odd standing there with nothing to say. He couldn't say what he really wanted, which to demand why she had left the house without informing him first. But again, she wasn't his prisoner, and she was thus far cooperative about keeping her presence a secret for him. As annoyed as he was, he didn't feel like he was in a good position to be making demands of her. Plus if he thought about it too much then he would realize that a small of part him (a very, very minuscule part, but part nonetheless) was actually worried for her welfare. But he didn't like to admit that, even to himself. He knew full and well that he was supposedly leading a Christlike life and he honestly try his best to emulate Jesus in every task, but he was still human. And any descent human would care for someone as sick as Jora, but they would never feel pity, remorse or worry on her behalf. Any descent person would never forget that she had killed a man (regardless of the fact he had killed her first), and that probably wasn't the first time.
Jora pushed herself up on her elbows and looked straight into Rabin's face. “You don't really want to know,” she said as she stared at him.
“Why did you draw it?” Rabin asked.
Jora pushed herself up till he was sitting upright. It took some struggling and she erased half of her drawings in the process. Once she was upright, she intentionally wiped the rest of the symbols cleans from the sand with awkward arm motions. “Compulsion,” she answered simply. She then shrugged, and that apparently used up the last of her energy reserve and she fell of back in the sand. She hit the sand immediately began to cough weakly.
Rabin slowly lowered himself to the ground nest to her, in case she started choking or something.
Once she was done she was breathing hard with exertion.
“Need to go back?”
“No,” she replied testily, “it's relaxing out here.”
“You look relaxed,” he said looking pointedly at her faced reddened from exertion and her laboured breathing. “Come on, I'll help you inside.”
“Are you expecting company?”
“Only Topher, but he should be able to see you,” Rabin laid on his back next to her. He had to admit (although he would never out loud) that laying here outside actually was pretty relaxing.
“I'm not the only he should see.”
“Are you always in a bad mood?”
“No,” she shook her head slowly from side to side, “just recently. And by recentlyI mean ever since I got here... But seriously, I'm not blind and sometimes you do let near a window,”
“And you do talk to Topher,” Rabin cut it.
“Not about that,” she turned her head to face him. “No one talks to him about that. You should tall the kids though. He might want to know someday.”
“Now is not a good time,” Rabin answered.
“Because of the whole political thing?”
“I told you before,” Rabin closed his eyes, the brightness was starting to hurt them.
“You told about why you never mentioned it when this place was built for you,” Jora answered. “But I don't why not now?”
“Someday,” Rabin said, “someday will be the right, just not yet. Why do you ask? Does Topher want to do something about it?”
“If he did, he would've already done it,” Jora said bluntly.
“You just brought it up on your own?”
“Maybe I have a conscience.”
Rabin rolled his eyes, even though he knew she probably wouldn't see and it was thus an empty gesture. Didn't matter, she was already knew what he was thinking in spite of all her talk about mind reading. Whatever it was, it was unnerving and he couldn't help but think he was violated every time he was near her. Then he wonder idly how many other people felt the same way. Maybe that had something to do with why he was the way she was. He didn't think too far along those line though, that was the last thing he wanted to have a conversation about.
“I like thoroughness,” Jora said about a long pause. “I don't like loose ends. Even you don't do anything before you die, you should at least leave a message for him, it would be nice.”
Rabin agreed.