For an instant, Livia forgot everything else-her fear, her shame, her nakedness. “What?” she said. “What news? About Nason? Please, what?”
“Really? Why should I tell you now, when you’re so ungrateful?”
“Tell! Please!”
“You want me to be honest with you, is that it Livia? Open? Not to keep secrets?”
“Yes. Please. I want.”
“You want that.”
“Yes. I want that.”
“And yet look at you. Locking the door. And then standing here in front of me, trying to cover yourself. What are you hiding from me, Livia?”
“What? No, not…”
She couldn’t find the words. Everything Nanu had taught her, it was all suddenly gone. She was confused and afraid, and the feeling of what the men on the boat had made her do mushroomed in her mind like an evil spirit, and Mr. Lone knew something about Nason and he wasn’t even telling her.
“Not what, Livia? Stand up straight. Lower your arms.”
She couldn’t. She tried to make her arms move. But she couldn’t.
“That’s fine. If you want to hide from me, I’ll hide what I know about Nason. It’s up to you.”
He turned as though to leave.
“Wait!” Livia shouted. “Wait.”
He turned and looked at her, saying nothing.
Her lips were trembling. Her arms and legs were worse. She dropped her head and did her best to stand up straight. Then she lowered her shaking arms. She gritted her teeth, trying desperately not to cry.
“All right,” Mr. Lone said. “That’s good, Livia. That’s a good girl.”
Her vision blurred. She blinked, and saw tears hitting the tiled floor.
“Now, would you like to learn about Nason?”
As desperate as she was to hear, all she could manage was a nod.
“Look at me, Livia. Look at me when I talk to you.”
She looked at him. And saw the bulge in his pants, the same as the men on the boat. She had already known it would be there.
He reached out and brushed away her tears. His touch brought a wave of nausea, and made her cry harder. But she didn’t flinch.
“Your sister is all right, Livia. I know where she is.”
One of Livia’s hands flew to her mouth and she sobbed. She clasped her other hand over the first, pressing her palms in hard, trying to stop herself from crying, but another sob erupted, and then another. Her legs wobbled, and she reached for the towel rack to steady herself.
“Yes, Nason is all right, but she is in some danger. We have to be very careful about how we try to help her, do you understand, Livia? Very careful.”
Livia shook her head, still sobbing. She didn’t understand. She didn’t understand any of it. Danger? Nason?
“Don’t cover yourself,” he said sharply. “I told you.”
She hadn’t even realized her arms had moved back in front of her. She managed to part them a little.
She breathed in and out and tried to concentrate, to think of the words she needed. “Why she danger? Why-”
“Why is she in danger?”
“Yes, why that. And we help. We”-she tried to remember the English grammar for necessity, couldn’t-“we help. Help. Help Nason. Please.”
“Yes. We’re going to try to help. But it’s going to take time. And it’s very important that the men holding her not know we know.”
“Why?”
“I can’t tell you that right now.”
“Why?”
“I just can’t.”
“Where she is? Please.”
“Where is she?”
“Yes, yes, that!”
“I can’t tell you yet. You have to trust me. Just as I’m trusting you, by telling you this much. Do you understand? I’m telling you because I trust you, Livia. But if we tell anyone else, even Mrs. Lone, it creates danger for Nason. I’m doing all I can. Now, do you trust me?”
She felt her arms trying to move in front of her. She stopped them.
“Yes. That’s right, Livia. That’s a good girl. You trust me, don’t you?”
She nodded.
“And you respect my position as head of the household, yes?”
Again she nodded.
“Then show me you trust me. Show me you respect me. Show me.”
What could she do? She looked down and parted her arms while the tears ran down her cheeks.
He reached behind him and picked up the towel, then stepped close and wrapped it around her. She felt a sob shake loose, and bit down hard to stop the next one.
“Don’t do that with the door again,” he said.
She shook her head and managed to say, “I won’t.”
“When I have updates about Nason, I’ll want to know I can share them with you. Privately. In this bathroom, in fact, where no one else can hear us. Do you understand?”
She nodded.
“Look at me, Livia.”
She did. And for a moment, her fear, her confusion, even her thoughts of Nason… it was all gone. She stopped crying, feeling nothing but an overwhelming, burning hate. It felt like a force, like something radiating from her yet also somehow separate. Something that was new inside her and still relatively small, but that one day could become big. Terrifying. Could he sense it? How could he not?
“Tell me you understand. Say it.”
She let her vision defocus, so she was looking more through him than at him. That was better. Yes. It was better not to have to see him.
“I understand.”
He nodded. “That’s a good girl.” He leaned forward and kissed the top of her head. “We’ll talk again soon. I promise.”
She pulled on clothes the instant he was gone. Then stuck her head under the faucet in the bath and washed her hair again, scrubbing the spot his lips had touched.
Nason. Was she really all right? In danger of some kind, yes, but still, all right?
Part of her thought she shouldn’t believe Mr. Lone. But how could someone lie about something like that? And besides, she had to believe him. She just had to. She had to believe that Nason was all right. That somehow, soon, they would be together again.
She stood in front of the mirror, pulling a comb through her damp hair. She was amazed Mr. Lone hadn’t seen her hate. But she could tell he hadn’t.
She couldn’t say why, but she realized she needed to hide her hate. Her hate had made her feel strong. And it was better if he didn’t know she was strong. Because her hatred… could be a kind of warning.
And she didn’t want to warn him. She wanted to surprise him.
With what, she didn’t know yet. But something.
22-THEN
School was horrible. Livia had thought her English was good enough, but it turned out that listening to Nanu and the other tutors in a quiet room where she could see everyone’s face was one thing. A noisy room from far away, and without being able to ask questions if she didn’t understand something, was another.
Some of the teachers were nice, but she didn’t like the children at all. At best, they ignored her. A few treated her as a curiosity, staring at her and asking if it was true they ate bugs where she came from. Livia wanted to tell them that when you’re hungry enough, you eat anything, but she knew they were stupid and had never gone to bed with anything other than full bellies and they would never understand. So she didn’t bother answering.
Some of the children were mean. They made fun of her accent and her struggles with English. They had heard she was Lahu, and spread rumors that she liked to eat dogs, warning the other children to be on the lookout for their pets when Livia Lahu was around. One group of bullies in particular, ninth graders led by a blond boy named Eric, would sometimes surround her and chant, “La-hoo, La-hoo,” drawing out the second syllable in long, mocking high voices. Other times, one of them would sneak up from behind and knock her books out of her arms, then run away while the others laughed at her helpless fury. And they’d repeatedly ask if she was going to jump out a window onto a fence and kill herself. That taunt she didn’t even understand.