First to Dance (17 page)

Summer was over, now.  There were
a few weeks left before they would all journey to the winter dwellings, and then the cold air would come.  The air was still warm now for the most part.  As she walked through the forest she listened for but heard no music, only the distant sound of the waterfall.

“Good morning,
Dakarai,” she said as she approached him. He was sitting beside the lake, and instead of him looking at her with mild confusion and needing to be reminded of her name, he simply looked up at her, smiled, and said “Oh, hello Ayita.”

She stopped in her tracks.
“You remember my name,” she said.  Butterflies filled her stomach and her face lit up. “You remember my name!”

His eyebrows scrunched together for a moment as he thought.  “Hmm,” he said.  “I guess I do.”  He smiled
brightly.

Her smile grew and she wrapped her arms around him
.  He remembered something more than a feeling. He actually remembered her name. She wanted to leap for joy, but she would have felt silly doing that because he didn’t seem nearly as excited. He was acting nonchalant, like it was no big deal. But she didn’t let this pull her down. He was starting to remember her.  Her enthusiasm shone through everything she did that day, and she stayed all day with him. They talked, they swam, they ate, and that evening Ayita left with the same smile still on her face from that morning.

When she got home, Ziyad was there waiting for her at the base of the tree, and her enthusiasm evaporated.

“The kids missed you today,” he said. “But they did great. I switched around the race on them. Gave them seven things to do in an order they haven’t tried yet, and every one of them got it right the first time through. They all did it.
Remembered seven steps. Better than you remembered today. You weren’t even there.”

“I’m sorry Ziyad. I was with Dakarai. I got distracted and lost track of time.” Then she smiled wistfully. “He remembered my name today.”

“As long as you know what’s important.”

She frowned. “It’s all important, Ziyad. The kids. You. Dakarai. Panya. Everyone. You’re all important to me. I’m glad to hear they did so well today. That’s exciting.” She didn’t sound excited. She was disappointed with herself, and also with Ziyad’s demeanor.

“
If we’re important, don’t bail out on us. One man in the forest remembered your name today, but out here a man and eighteen kids have remembered your name for weeks. So Dakarai remembered your name. That’s great. Eighteen kids remembered seven new instructions today and followed them in the correct order. That’s beyond amazing, and you weren’t there to see it. I wish you could’ve seen their eyes, seen their faces. They wanted you there, Ayita. They were pleased with themselves, but they missed you. They wanted you to see them succeed.”

“I’m sorry
Ziyad. I’ll be there tomorrow. I promise.”

“Don’t apologize to me,” he said. “You need to apologize to those kids. I can run the games on my own, but it’s your approval they look for, not mine. They need you to be there.”

Ayita nodded. The men and women of the community were like family to the children, but Ayita was teacher. She stood out because of her different background and her excellent memory, and the children usually noticed it more readily than the adults did. They knew that if they shared their joy with their family, it would be forgotten, but if they shared their joy with Ayita, it would always be remembered.

After that,
Ayita never missed another afternoon with the children, and she continued to visit Dakarai every morning and evening. On most days he could remember her name now, though he still forgot how they met and where she came from.  Weeks passed.  Dakarai talked Ayita into the lake on a regular basis, and it wasn’t long before she was confidently swimming underwater with him. 

The leaves were starting to bro
wn and some had fallen already, when the whole community started to pack everything up.  The table-top trees were the last to lose their leaves, and the day that one dropped to the ground was they day they prepared for their journey. They brought out large carts which had spent the summer behind the garden and were filled to the brim now with dried fruits and vegetables.  Empty carts were being filled up with the fruit still on the trees, and people were putting their personal belongings in cloth sacks that they kept in their wooden chests. Panya explained that they all left their summer clothes here for the winter, and left their winter clothes there for the summer, but everyone had a favorite item or two which they wanted to take with them. After listening to Panya explain their customs and helping her in the small ways she could, Ayita decided to go check on Dakarai and make sure he was aware that the move was taking place. 

Because of the few leaves already fallen
, Dakarai didn’t need Ayita’s reminder and he was all ready to go before she arrived.  “Let’s go for one last swim,” he suggested. 

Ayita smiled, but shook her head.  “If you’re good here, then we should go help everyone else.  They still have a lot to do, it seems.”

“Like
what?
”

“Food.
  Water supplies.  We won’t be back here again for months.”

“Oh.  That didn’t occur to me.”  He looked at the lake.  “We won’t be able to go swimming again until spring.”

“I know, but I wouldn’t feel right about having fun while they’re all scurrying to get everything ready.”

“Will two more people really make a difference?”

“Does it matter?”

His eyes rolled back in his head. 
“All right.  We can go help out.”

Ayita walked
with him to the gardens, where nearly everyone was helping to finish the harvest.  There were rows and rows of trees growing varied fruits, and rows of fruit and vegetable plants.  Ayita found a basket no one was using and started filling it from one of the fruit trees.  She and Dakarai picked everything they could reach, and when they couldn’t reach anymore Ayita sat up on Dakarai’s shoulders, stretching her arms as far as she could.  When their basket was full, she got down and let him carry it back while she started on another tree with another basket.

Ayita
continued filling the basket until there was nothing left in her reach, and then she started wondering why Dakarai wasn’t back yet.  She got her answer when Ziyad walked up behind her and patted her on the back.

“I’m surprised,”
Ziyad told her.  “You actually got him to come out here and help everyone else with the move.”

Ayita smiled, nodding.  “He forgot he was supposed to be helping me, didn’t he?”

“That’s one way to look at it, but at least he’s helping.”  Ziyad smirked.  “Here, I can help you.”  He started picking the fruit Ayita couldn’t reach. Their friendship had improved since earlier in the fall when she neglected to help him with the children. They shared many good moments together watching the kids grow and learn. At first the kids raced for the fun of it, but now even they saw the fruits of their labor. They were remembering names without needing any reminder, and remembering various things they experienced days or weeks before. It was exciting to everyone who noticed it, and especially to Ayita.

Ziyad
and Ayita worked as a team filling baskets and carrying them to the carts. The harvest was larger than usual this year, and when everything was done it was late in the day.  Ayita and Ziyad walked over to where everyone else was standing; it wasn’t long before Dakarai was beside her again.  Everyone was tired, and after some discussion they all agreed to stay another night and leave first thing in the morning.

Ayita turned to
Dakarai and smiled. “That means we can still go swimming,” she said.

“I’m tired.”

Ayita tapped his shoulder.  “Come on. You said you wanted one last swim; let’s do it.”

Ziyad
watched as they walked away together, and for a second he considered following them to take a swim himself, but instead he walked out away from where everyone else was and sat alone.  He had a good view of where Ayita and Dakarai were headed, and also of the tree beneath which she slept. 

Ziyad
was jealous of Dakarai because he knew Ayita loved him. Yet every day it was he that she worked with, as a team, helping the children learn to remember. It sounded crazy to him at first, but it was actually working, and Ziyad admired Ayita very much for believing in them from the start. But she believed in Dakarai, too, and that was a problem. As long as she believed in Dakarai, Ziyad knew he didn’t have a chance of winning her heart. At first Ziyad thought it was only a matter of time before Ayita would give up on Dakarai and see that he was the logical choice, the one who had an at least semi-decent memory already, but now Dakarai could actually remember her name. Ayita was working miracles with him, but Ziyad wondered how deep those miracles actually went. Surely, he thought, the miracles weren’t strong enough to survive the winter.

Dakarai and Ayita were about to enter the forest when Ayita stopped walking.

“Is something wrong?”
Dakarai asked her.

Ayita took a deep breath and turned to look at the other lake, the one she crashed in
to in her spaceship. That was where she started her first summer here on Adonia, and it felt like an appropriate place to end it. She wanted to prove to herself that this lake was nothing more than a body of water. It held no power over her, except for the power she gave it. It was time to take that power back.

“I want to swim here,” she said.

Dakarai shrugged his shoulders. “Okay,” he said. It made no difference to him which lake they swam in. He only planned to go to the other lake out of habit.

They walked dow
n the beach together and came to the water. Ayita watched where the water met the sand, and remembered cautiously and fearfully putting her face into the water with Dakarai’s encouragement. She smiled slightly, then walked away from the beach.

“Where are you going? I thought you wanted to swim here?”

“I do,” she said. She went around the side of the lake to where there was a small mound of earth hanging over the water, and she ran up to the edge then leapt out into the water with one hand plugging her nose and a big smile on her face. It felt freeing. She was here. She was in this lake, under the water, and completely okay. Ayita swam up to the surface and gave herself a new memory. Instead of desperate fingertips reaching the surface, she came up face first and took a quick breath of air. The sun was shining down on her face, and Dakarai was still on the beach watching her. He smiled and came into the water. Ayita swam to where she could stand with him. He stood still and hugged her for a moment. He didn’t remember enough to know why, but he sensed that this was a big moment for her.

They swam together in the lake and Ayita swam under the water several times with her eyes open. She hoped she might catch a glimpse of the spaceship, but the water was too
dark and too deep. She didn’t tell Dakarai what she was looking for. Finally, she gave up that idea and swam toward him, playfully splashing him in the process. He smiled and splashed her back.

When they were
done swimming, they walked out of the lake and went through the forest to Dakarai’s home. His garden had gone unharvested and he didn’t plan to pick the remainder of fruits and vegetables there, except what they needed to eat tonight. They sat down together and talked, then lay out in the grass with their eyes to the sky.

Dakarai
smiled and pointed to the scattered stars.  “What do you think they are?” he asked her.

“They’re like the sun, but further away.”

“There are so many of them.”

“It’s better than there being few.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because each one might have new worlds surrounding it.
  Each one is another hope.  Another dream.”

“But what do they matter if you can never reach them?”

Ayita sighed thoughtfully.  “I could have.  I could have traveled to the end of the universe if my only means hadn’t crashed into the lake.”

“What do you mean?” he said. He sat up and looked at her intently.

“I didn’t grow up here, Dakarai,” she said. “I grew up on the planet Zozeis. I left to find a planet called Earth, but I crashed here instead.”

Dakarai
frowned, and stood.  He walked to sit down beneath the table-top tree, and Ayita followed him.  He turned toward her, then looked at the tree trunk.  He scooted himself closer, and with a sharp stone started scratching into the bark.

“What are you doing?” Ayita asked.

“Making sure I
always
remember.”

She looked to see what he was carving
and so far there was a tall ‘A’.  It looked like next he was scratching a ‘y’ into the tree.

“You’ve remembered my name
regularly now for weeks,” she told him.

“I might not.  Not always.”

“I’ll always be here to remind you.  You don’t need to carve my name into the tree.”

“But what if you aren’t
here?”

“Where would I go?”