Fraul, 6

The girl glanced between her parents sleeping, her mother in the white-sheeted bed and her father under a blanket on the couch. She saw the wheelchair beside him, bamboo and oak.

Fraul, whose coffee addiction woke him every morning, groaned and reached out a hand for the chair. Blindly he reached down and locked the wheels, and then rubbed his face with one hand and grabbed the armrests.

His gaze snagged on his daughter, standing in her nightshirt before their fireplace, warming herself in the early morning and waiting for him. He smiled at her as he lifted himself into the chair. He held his legs as close to his body as he could, and let them relax when he was settled in the wheelchair.

In the first years he had walked a lot, terrified to lose muscle mass, terrified to lose the feeling in his feet. He took pride in his pain tolerance, and in those first years he had discovered its outer limits.

Then, after he had taken to falling every third step, he acquiesced more often to the chair. His daughter had very little memory of this time–when she became cognizant, he was rarely walking. The thought of walking nowadays made him want to vomit. He associated it with pain, and his time in the army, and both of these things gave him nightmares and nausea and made him want to go back.

For now he wanted coffee.

He didn’t realize that his daughter had climbed up in his lap, and that he was spooning mound after mound of grounds into the cup. He swore quietly and dumped half of them back into the satchel.

“Tali, dear,” he muttered, “will you start the fire?”

She scampered down and squatted by the fireplace, bringing the embers back to life. Fraul got a cup of water from the barrel near the door, and poured this into the kettle. He exhaled and took to watching the fire.

“Da,” she said, and he waved his hand.

“Shh,” he said, “Sandrine’s asleep.”

“Can I have some?” she whispered. He nodded, and she went to the cabinet to get a white cup.

Nathalia, named after her mother’s healer, took a seat on the low living room table. Her father sat in the chair. Both watched the fire until he leaned forward and took the kettle off the fireplace. He poured the water quickly and then replaced the kettle and shook out his hand.

She followed him out to the front of the house, where the sun had already come up. He sat in his chair and faced the white road, watching the goings-on, and Tali stood beside him and drank her coffee.

“You’re getting tall, birdie,” he said, glancing sideways. She beamed.

“Yes.”

“You been reading?”

“Yes, Da.”

“You still want to learn Ezuran?”

She didn’t know where Ezure was yet, but she liked it when he swore in that language. She nodded. He said, “Good. I think they’re on their way back here. Ilcoceum tried to take back the coast, you know. I wonder if Crowe will send a company. It would be expensive. But then again…”

Nathalia glazed over, not listening. He spoke of people and places she had never heard of. Then he sighed, and put his empty cup on the ground.

“Ready?” he asked. His daughter followed him to the school where both of them spent their days. He tried to stay present and failed, as always. He preferred his memories anyway.

When they all returned that night, he sat on the couch and stared at the wall, his knees drawn-up. Sandrine and Nathalia went about their evenings. Tali wrapped her skinny arms around her father’s neck, and then retreated to her small room. Sandrine leaned over the back of the couch and glanced Fraul up and down.

“All right?” she asked. He nodded slowly.

Tali called from her room and Sandrine rose to tuck her into bed. Then she returned to the living room, sitting down on the couch a distance away from him.

“You could sleep with me, if you wanted,” she said, glancing at Tali’s closed door. He smiled.

“It’s all right,” he said.

“I’m serious, Fraul. Don’t do that polite thing with me, I can see it.”

His voice became hard. “What else do you want me to say?”

“I just don’t want you to sleep out here because you think you have to. This is your house, too.”

“No, no," he said, waving his hand. “It’s yours.”

“Well, you are my husband. On paper, anyway.”

Now he smiled a little. “What is that supposed to mean?” he asked.

Sandrine sighed long, looking at the wheelchair. She hadn’t really meant to bring it up, but she had.

“I know you aren’t…well, I know it’s not me. Right?” she said. “I know…I know you love me. But be honest with me, Fraul–is there another woman?” He huffed a laugh. Sandrine put a hand on his, earnest, and his smile faded.

She knew he hated when she broached this topic, but she continued doggedly, “I know it’s not about me. And I know you care for me. But I want to feel loved by someone. It’s not the same. We are friends. Yes? You can be honest with me about these things. And I am honestly lonely, darling. I need something, from someone.”

“Oh.”

His voice was soft with surprise. His brow creased, and he rubbed his knees with his knuckles. They rarely hurt, but they also didn’t quite work right. He ran one hand over his chin.

“I’m sorry,” he said at-length, and Sandrine threw her hands up.

“I’m not trying to make you feel guilty, darling,” she said. “But–am I wrong or right?”

Fraul looked away, his jaw tight. He said, “Tali…”

“Tali will understand. Is it all right with you if I do this?”

Fraul sighed. “Is there someone else you have in mind?” he asked.

She pressed her lips together and deliberated telling him. Finally, she said, “Andre.” He laughed.

“Damn Andre,” he said, but felt no bitterness. “Well,” he said, “better Andre than Georges.”

Sandrine laughed. “You think I would be attracted to Georges?” she asked. “The lecher.”

They sat in gentle silence, and Fraul looked down at her hand over his. His face was unhappy when he looked up.

“I love you,” he said. “I do.”

“I know, dear. But we do not deserve this.”

“Is it so obvious to you?” Now his voice was worried, and Sandrine shook her head.

“No, no,” she said.

“You know they’d kill me. The magistrate.”

“I know, Fraul. I don’t want Tali to be fatherless.” She paused, and her voice came softer. “Is it different, in Ezure?”

He looked away. “I don’t know,” he murmured. “Raru says…” Now he looked up at her, and she smiled knowingly.

“Raru, Raru,” she teased. “What does he say?”

“He knows someone who was caught, once. And the man’s still alive. So I suppose it is different.” He looked at the ceiling. Sandrine patted his hand.

“I’m going to bed,” she said, and then paused. Her voice was gentle. “Did you really think I didn’t know?”

“I suspected,” sighed Fraul. “I just…I don’t think about it much, anymore. I try not to.”

“Well. You are welcome to the bed. I don’t mind the nightmares.”

He was silent, eyes downcast, as she got up and went to her room. She heard him shift, the wheelchair creaking, and she paused.

She heard a little tease in his voice, otherwise emotionless. “If you bring Andre home, warn me.”

Sandrine grinned. “Of course.”

Fraul laid back. Sandrine closed the door and threw his arm above his head and looked into the dark.

When she got up for water in the middle of the night, he was still awake. She filled her clay cup with the barrel by the door, and disappeared back into her room.

In the morning, having not slept, he took a day off his teaching job. Well, to be clear, he didn’t show up.

“I’m going back. Just for a short trip,” he said to Aristide, who had invited him into the forge and now leaned over the table with long blonde hair spilling onto his hands.

“How you going to do it?” Aristide asked, smiling warmly, waiting for the plan.

Fraul was silent, sitting in his wheelchair. Aristide heaved himself off the table and went to the locks he made, oiling tumblers, tinkering as his friend pondered. He drew a pipe of Bazairi shisha from under the table and lit it on a candle, absently. Fraul’s gaze burned into it and Aristide glanced up and passed it over.

“Don’t tell Zelda, though, will you?” he rumbled.

“Zelda doesn’t like me anyway–what reason have I to speak with her?”

“Well, well, don’t we have a way with the women.” Aristide took a slurp from his whiskey bottle and belched out smoke. “Myself included,” he added. Fraul rolled his eyes.

“So,” he said with purpose, delicately setting down the pipe, “I need a way to get across the countryside in a wheelchair. I can find a horse once I get there.”

“Aye,” Aristide said, “let me talk to some of my customers. I’ll bet you need a chair that folds.”

Fraul brightened. “Yes,” he said, slipping into Ezuran. His old friend nodded, wandering to the other side of the table to examine the wheels of Fraul’s current chair. He grunted, nodded to himself, and then toddled back to his stool and sat down.

They were both silent. Smoke filled the house. They heard Aristide’s wife playing music in the adjoining building, which was their living quarters. Judging from the state of the forge, Aristide spent most of his time here instead.

“How do I pay you?” Fraul asked finally.

“Well, I assume you’ll help me a bit. Then you can send me the money, eh? Once you get there.” Aristide elbowed him and Fraul rolled his eyes.

“I don’t think I’ll be gone that long,” he said, and his voice was easy and drunk. Aristide shrugged.

“Then work for me. I’ll need the help. You don’t have to stand to make locks.”

“If you think it would be enough,” said Fraul.

“Sure, sure it would.” Aristide slapped a deck of cards on the table, pulled from some knee-level receptacle in which he also stored the shisha and whiskey. Fraul pressed his lips together to hide his smile, taking the hand of cards.

He rolled down the street and ignored the looks of neighbors. He went to the dock, to the station there with a quill and paper, and he took a long look at it and reached for the quill. The paper was just barely within reach, and his long fingers felt around for it and grappled a slip of it off the podium.

He turned the chair around so he sat in the shade, and leaned back with the paper on his knee. The quill scratched on the uneven surface of his leg.

Raru,

I feel old. I miss Ezure always. Sandrine has known this for a long time, although I did not tell her.

He paused. It felt good to write the language again.

I am lost here, era. I thought this place was my home. I know I could not stay in Ezure, but I may try to come back. Just for awhile.

Fraul sighed. He folded it up and took an envelope from the podium, then deposited a coin in the iron-latched box. The letter he brought to a ship headed for Ezure.

He rolled the perilous way down the gangplank, then rolled backwards the whole way, since the plank was too narrow to turn around. He felt people staring at him, but he focused on not falling to the rocks of low tide.

He started checking the post every day. He rolled down to the port and saluted to the usual faces, then found a letter sitting in a box that he’d forgotten to check. He tore into it savagely, inhaled the Ezuran words.

Captain,

I had to have Ashin write this. Maybe I should have learned to read.

You are old. If you do manage to get here, Heath is working on something you might like. He retired into medicine. That’s what he calls it.

No guarantee of pay. But I doubt Crowe would turn you away. Is everything all right, with Sandrine?

Raru

Fraul stuffed the letter in his front pocket and clawed on the podium for a piece of paper and the quill. He had brought his own table this time, a piece of scrap wood, and he wrote the letter in the middle of the port. He searched for the words in the other language, muttering to himself.

Raru,

I thought it would not reach you. Ashin has my gratitude. Sandrine is fine–I think my absence will benefit her. I don’t make enough here teaching, at least not as much as I'd like. But if I can help Heath somehow, I will.

I am glad to hear from you.

Fraul

He put a bit of white sand in the envelope and sealed it. His father had always sent land in letters.

When the day came, when Fraul and Aristide finally finished the chair whose wheels might be removed, with hinges on the back so it folded flat, Fraul opened his arms and his friend bent over and hugged him fiercely.

“Does this mean you won’t work for me anymore?” Aristide asked, going for the bottle. He uncapped it, swigged, and Fraul answered, “Not at all. When I get back, I expect a good wage. You have spent too much energy teaching me to throw it away now.”

“As I thought,” said his friend, holding out the bottle. Dreaux shook his head.

“Thank you, era. I am more grateful than you realize.”

“This will make it easier to travel on the ship, too.” Aristide held the chair still as Fraul swung from one to the other. Fraul held his breath and the wood held his weight with barely a creak. “The only thing,” said Aristide. “The wheels don’t lock.”

“A minor setback. I’ll figure it out.”

On the way back, Aristide dragged the spare chair with one hand. He found it odd to be taller than Fraul. At the house, he bowed to Sandrine and then turned with hands in his pockets and cut a lonely silhouette across the street.

That night, Fraul lay awake for hours. Some part of him was afraid to leave. He reasoned that he would only be gone a few weeks. He got in the chair and rolled his way to Tali’s door, glanced around it and listened for her soft breathing. Satisfied that she was all right, he rolled back to the couch and finally slept.

He dreamt that he was in a white canvas tent. It was a rainy half-morning, filled with low voices. The men always went straight to the coffee and the firepit, rustling in their boots and canvas tents. He had loved waking to that sound.