“I’m saving the big room for my husband and his tame time-shifter. I hear he has a head like an elephant now, and the boy has become very bossy.” She reached up to pull away the hood.
His hand lashed out and caught her by the wrist—but so gently she could hardly feel the pressure of his hand. “Not yet,” said Loaf.
“I can bear anything,” said Leaky.
“But I can’t bear the look on your face if you don’t already know it’s me,” said Loaf.
“Come in then,” she said. “But don’t let go of my hand. I like the feel of you. It reminds me of a man I once slept with.”
“Slept with him a whole lot more than once,” said Loaf, “if it’s the man I’m thinking you mean.”
“What I’m trying to figure out is why that damp-headed boy thinks he’s coming in with us,” said Leaky. “He had his say, and now he waits outside like any other river rat. If he wants to be useful he’ll keep other fools from knocking on the door.”
Umbo backed away. “Don’t let the fact that I’m hungry and thirsty and tired change your plans in any way.”
“Me me me, that’s all the boy thinks of,” said Loaf. “And he ate only yesterday, which was about fifteen minutes ago, so he’s just being whiny.”
The door closed behind them.
Umbo leaned against it and surveyed the street. “The problem with time traveling to get here,” he said aloud, “is that nothing has had time to change since we left.” But it also meant he could go across the street to the baker, who was bound to have something edible in stock, even if it was late in the day for fresh morning bread.
Bread in hand, Umbo took his perch outside the roadhouse. When people fi
rst came to the door, he tried explaining that Loaf had come home after long absence, but they looked at him like he was crazy. “I saw the two of you set out this very afternoon,” one woman said, “and if that’s long absence I’m young and beautiful.”
“And indeed you are,” said Umbo, using his most sincere voice. Olivenko could have brought it off and won a smile from the woman, but at Umbo’s clumsy effort she only sneered and left, saying, “If they don’t want my business, so be it, but I don’t have to be mocked by a boy who’s also a stranger.”
“I’ve lived here for months,” said Umbo, because that had been true at the time they set out. “I’m strange enough, but not a stranger.”
His wit was wasted on her—she and her husband (or whatever he was) didn’t show any sign that they could hear Umbo’s clever remark. But after that, Umbo didn’t tell anything like the truth. “A feral cat got in there and peed all over the tables and they have to scrub everything down to get the smell out,” he explained. Oddly enough, the lie was believed instantly, while the truth had been treated with such contempt.
Late at night the door opened. It was Loaf, no covering on his face now. “We’re staying closed, but we can’t leave you outside all night.”
“Like a feral cat,” said Umbo, “I think I’ll pee all over everything.”
“You’ll go to your room and have a good night’s sleep. I assume you already found something to eat.”
“Why would you assume that?”
“Because you’re Umbo,” said Loaf. “Now come in.”
Umbo wasn’t quite sure how many hours he had been awake in a row, but he fell asleep before he actually got into bed, as attested by the fact that he woke up only half undressed. But it was light outside, so he put his clothes back on and headed for the privy.
He met Leaky coming back. She gave him a curt, preoccupied nod, but he didn’t read anything into that because her idea of manners included the idea that a man was supposed to pretend that he didn’t know that women pee and poop. So obviously they had to pretend they hadn’t seen each other.
It wasn’t till breakfast—with the roadhouse still closed—that Loaf said, “That worked pretty well. Whatever you said.”
“He was bratty and bossy and rude,” said Leaky.
“You stick with that,” said Loaf to Umbo. “You have a talent for it.”
“I didn’t hear any yelling or anything breaking so I guess you two hit it off like newlyweds?”
“On the contrary, our wedding night was full of yelling and breaking,” said Loaf.
“Your five trips to visit me were time well spent,” said Leaky. “Though Loaf was acting like a man who was five years celibate, while I hadn’t even had time to notice he was away.”
“Meaning she hadn’t even had a chance to stuff a lover in a cupboard,” said Loaf.