[h2]Jungle Orchid[/h2]

[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/MqEoKnS.jpg[/img][/center]


The rough hewn girl..Abby...had brought her fresh coffee and cookies.  With the aid of an extra blanket and the cheerful glow of a space heater, her room aboard this boat...the China Doll, was quite to her liking.  Perhaps a good deal of the reason for that was the lockable door.  The ratty apartment she’d fled had no door through which Andres couldn’t force his way.  

The black was wonderfully silent.  Save for a few pleasant words exchanged between the girl Abby and the other passenger, she hadn’t heard a thing since they broke New Melbourne’s grip.  Locked behind her door, a pistol tucked beneath her pillow, Edina could suddenly lower her guard.  Her reward for this leap of faith was the kind of sleep she could only enjoy when her husband wasn’t stalking about the flat.

Andres had put to sea this morning, signed onto one of the big corporate boats.  He’d be out for at least four weeks.  [i]A nice head start,[/i] she’d uttered to herself before every one of his castoffs.  [i]Drain the account, book a passage anywhere.  Just go.  Just go.  Figure it out while you’re on the move.[/i]  It had become fantasy, a tale told only to assuage her feelings in the aftermath of “being uglied up”  to ensure her chastity during his absence.   As it usually did, the story would fade in time with her bruises.  She’d spend the latest respite in peaceful solitude, slowly building the rationalizations for both their behaviors until his return commenced the latest cycle.

Until today.  

The long held pipe dream finally proved itself a script, so embedded in her DNA that she seemed to be on autopilot through each step.  Andres’ boat wasn’t through the channel mouth before she’d taken every pfennig from the account.   Next came the armourer's shop, and a look of surprise on the gunsmith’s face when she actually laid down coin for the pearl handled .38.  Then, home.  

The landlord was grateful for rent in advance...at least Andres would still have a place to collapse after his drunken nights out.  The suitcase was exactly where she’d placed it.  She knew the clothes she’d pack, the toiletries she needed, and the few keepsakes she couldn’t part with.  She was meticulous, the years having cemented so many of her choices for a day that would finally come to pass.  Perishables out with the garbage.  The door was firmly locked; the key hidden beneath the third walk stone...just where he’d find it.  All according to plan.

 Except for the final step, the booking of passage on the next boat off planet.  Edina wandered the spaceport, her search becoming ever more aimless as the resolve to escape began to crumble.  The suitcase was getting heavy...this was insane.  She should just go home...maybe talk to a shepherd.  Swallow it all down as she’d done so many times.  The bed was unmade.  Andres hated that.  She should…  The Firefly looked to have just taken a cargo.  Edina didn’t conjure much about the workings of spacegoing boats, but she was fair certain that was a reactor fuel truck that just uncoupled its’ hoses.  She spied a young girl seated in a lawnchair.... 

Now, she could hear that girl, laughing, along with the man across the corridor.  Their conversation was animated, upbeat until the sounds of movement followed them to the passenger lounge out by the medical room.  She lay for awhile, sipping coffee and taking unusual pleasure at the friendly tone of their muffled dialogue.  The girl’s speech would end in the frequent upturn of a question.  The man would respond, his tones either corrective or encouraging.  She could hear the excitement building in both voices, punctuated by bursts of communal laughter.  Her curiosity piqued, Edina wrapped herself in a blanket and ventured out of isolation.

“Like that?”  Abby glanced over her shoulder.

Marquina studied her work.  “No,” he shook his head.  “I think those lines are too neat.”

The pair had flipped lampshades upside down, angling both to splash light upon an open bulkhead above the lounge’s sofa.  The man, a scientist of some kind, she’d heard, was seated in an easy chair, papers and notebooks scattered over his lap and the coffee table.  Abby was standing on the sofa, it’s limp cushions rising about her feet as she moved to and fro.  The bulkhead was decorated with a very large blossom.  She didn’t know much about flowers, beyond the roses Andres would offer after a night's beatdown.  In that moment, she swore an oath to never accept roses again.

This blossom was a creation of chalk, drawn by the girl’s hand at the professor’s guidance.  Each petal was a burst of unusual color, ranging from a deep violet beginning to a pale yellow across the tips.  Some vibrant orange marks snaked their way outward like the veins upon her hand.  The contrasts were stark, but their beauty was undeniable.

“So I should mess ‘em up?”  Abby made some rough zigzags on a clear patch ‘o’ bulkhead.  “Like that?”

“I don’t think so,” the professor sifted through his pages.  “He calls it ‘a ragged crosshatch…”

Abby worked quick, drawin’ out a neat grid on their test spot.  “A crosshatch...like this.  I use it fer shadowin’ all the time.”

“Nooooo?” he brows furrowed as he reached for a datapad.  “I might find a capture.”

Edina broke her silence.  “I think I know,” she offered.

“Oh!  Ms. Wyman,” the girl turned.  “I’m sorry.  Was our racket botherin’ yew?”

The professor came to his feet, realizing only too late that his inbred courtesy now sent a sheaf of papers scattering to the deck. “Oh...oh...yes, I apologize. Abigail was helping me...so sorry to disturb.”  

She chuckled at the awkward greeting, then dropped to her knees, joining the academic’s rescue effort.  “I wasn’t disturbed,” she offered up handfuls of pages carefully collected.  “I was fascinated.  What are you two doing?”

As they finished recovering the scattered papers, he told her of his unclassified orchid, the upcoming jungle research trip, and the need to have a decent image for his guide.  “And so, Abigail has kindly offered to help...oh!” he stammered.  “I’ve been quite rude; I apologize.  I’m Sergio Marquina.”  He extended his hand.

“Edina Wyman.”  They clasped hands briefly.  “Do you two mind if I join in?”

“I’d be delighted!” Marquina exclaimed.

Abby made to come down off the sofa.  “I’ll fetch yer space heater an’ yer coffee.”

“No, no,” Edina waved her hand.   “I’ll take care of that...oh, and that ‘ragged crosshatch’ the professor mentioned?  Abby, have you ever seen paint that’s cracking and chipping up?”

“All tha time.”  The girl give her a curious eye.

Edina smiled.  “Sometimes it looks like a whole bunch of mismatched little squares with crooked sides?  Or maybe,” she continued, “like a plank that’s been fire burnt on one side.”

“Ya mean somethin’ like this?”  The deckhand drew up another crosshatch, but this time it’s all crookedy with little curves an’ ain’t nothin’ lined up neat.

“Yes!” both Edina and the professor replied.  “That’s it exactly….on each petal, and the color is a red orange.”

Adding the detailed crosshatch to a drawing of such scale would take a couple hours at least, a chore she witnessed Abby tackling with a deep sense of enjoyment.  The professor looked on, his expression rapt at the first sight of his prize.   Edina had once thought to hide her bruise behind the sunglasses, but the easy companionship and their acceptance decided her otherwise.   It would eventually heal, as would she, though she felt some scars might be carried the rest of her days. She’d have to come to terms, live with her wounds, learn what might be taught by them.  But despite the questions of her future, one answer came clear. Her time for hiding was ended.