Wasteland

Leona found Egor right where she suspected she might, in the kitchen. He wasn't doing anything, not even cleaning. He simply sat in the corner near the fridge on an old stool with his back to the wall. There was something in his leper like fingers she had not seen many of since leaving the vault, and none in so good a condition. The cover was hardly worn, the corners were rounded from multiple impacts, but the cardboard beneath was not exposed or frayed. The pages were yellow with age as he turned them, not noticing the squeaky door as it opened, letting her into the small room.

"Excuse me," She nearly whispered, not wanted to startle him, but she knew not what else to do.

Egor looked up sharply. Quickly, but carefully he snapped the book shut and hid it behind him like a child caught with a cookie before dinner. Seeing it was not who he feared her to be, he relaxed and settled the book on his lap with a finger to his lips, hissing his attempt at a shush.

"I won't tell a soul." She promised him. "If ye will offer me the same."

Egor slowly shook his head in agreement. Uncertainty of what he would be needed to keep secret was written on his face. He gestured for her to come nearer with a wave of the hand that had provided the shush. She sat on the dusty floor at his feet, tucking her boots under her knees.

"What'er ya readin'?" She asked.

Egor held up the book so she could read the title etched into it's graying surface. It read simply the author's name. She imagined it a collection of the artist's works, though she's never heard of him. The book was much to thick for it to consist of only one tale. She nodded and smiled, as if she liked his choice of reading. The ghoul smiled back with but a faint straining of the lips.

"Who was he?" She asked, then realizing her mistake reworded the question. "Was this 'Poe' alive when ya first read 'is words?"

Egor shook his head.

"Would ya lemme borrow it t'read m'self?"

Again he shook his head, and clutched the book tightly to his chest.

"I see..."

Her eyes dropped to the floor boards, the tips of her, now dirty, fingers drew fluid patterns in the dust. The words tumbled out of her mouth before she could stop them, like a dam that can't hold back the flood waters any longer.

"I was thinkin' 'bout stayin', but I don't know if I should. Jack confuses me. He tol' me 'is story. His life was not what mos' prob'ly suspect. He seems kind enough, but there are things 'bout him I don't trust. The worse' part is, I don' know why I care. Have I deluded m'self t'cope t'the point I don' know the truth?"

She looked up at the ghoul with a furrowed brow and dry eyes. Her lips were in a subtle pout, letting a measure of her distress expose itself on her face. Unfair as it was, a part of her expected Egor to have answers for her. Some wisdom or epiphic advice that would guild her down the correct path. Egor seemed to think for a moment, his eyes steady on her but not looking at her. Then a spark of light appeared to twinkle in his, otherwise, deadened eyes. The pages of the book in his lap fluttered like the wings of a bird in flight as he filtered through them in search of some phrase or line of words. His terrible fingers held the pace of a few pages before he waved her up to him to read where he pointed over his shoulder. Her eyes followed the tip of his finger, reading quietly aloud as best she could. He then flipped the pages to the next place held for her to read when she'd finished what the intended passage.

'Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary.'

flip

'It is the nature of truth in general, as of some ores in particular, to be richest when most superficial.'

flip

'Experience has shown, and a true philosophy will always show, that a vast, perhaps the larger portion of the truth arises from the seemingly irrelevant.'

flip

'The ninety and nine are with dreams, content but the hope of the world made new, is the hundredth man who is grimly bent on making those dreams come true.'

Thump. Egor snapped the book shut, grinned at her and, hopping off the stool, left the kitchen gutturally humming an unknown happy tune in his throat. It was a strange sight to see and a strange sound to hear a ghoul in light spirits. He must have thought he'd done a great deed and helped her with his borrowed words. However, as smart as she was, Leona stood more confused than ever by the refrigerator in the corner of a small kitchen in a tavern in a hidden town. A week from the mountains and a day from a sloping hill which sheltered a little house where two women lost the rest of their minds and a man lost his life. A few days beyond that the river bed where the hundredth man broke his legs when he thought he was flying. Beyond that, the remains of a slaver compound that used to be a military outpost instillation for the U.S. Army with an incomplete bomb shelter. Had she known, she may have fled that very moment with whatever she could carry in the burlap sack that lay on the floor by the door. But she tarried to long with muddled thoughts and her would be plans were foiled by the unexpected hunger of a man craving a snack. Iguana-on-a-stick was not the only thing to be poked in the kitchen that afternoon, but surely the only thing that had not enjoyed it.