Character Exploration #8

She checked in every few hundred speed bumps, hum-ing and haw-ing at his bitty bloom in the clay pot they swiped off a table from the last city. Even though it reached a foot in length, the cactus didn’t have much to stand for, except in successfully turning Cedar’s hands into swiss cheese. Sap oozed from his hole-ridden skin. He still smoothed his fingers along the ridges of each spine, pulling and twisting at the pathetic plant’s will to grow. Soon.

Not soon enough, according to the witch. “They haven’t found us yet, but you know they will. We can’t just keep moving; people talk. The more they see us, the easier it gets for them,” She said. Her gaze shifted from his crouch over his latest creation, to their latest find. “How’s the kid holding up?”

“We’ll call him Neil, ” Cedar said. Devin took up the largest flat surface in the trailer, lying on the bed made of old clothing scraps of different paisley patterns. His short, chubby arms rested at either side, one hand propped against Cedar’s back. Across the spread, on the floor, and all over his space-themed clothes glittered dreamer dust. Although, as fast as it appeared, it fluttered out of existence with each poke and prod into the little Saguaro.

“Is this thing going to be able to protect Neil if we get caught?”

“He is going to protect all of us.” The plant bloomed another little flower beside the first, as though cheered by the thought. Cedar smiled. Palo verdes was the family specialty; Hante’ claimed their people sprung from its bark in newfound life. Creating any other plant proved impossible for years, and yet the thorny greenery beneath his hands proved otherwise. “He’ll be ready in a day. The hardest part was starting from basically scratch.”

The witch still lingered at the doorway. Her broad shoulders darkened the entry, clawed hands clamped at the metal frame, and she bore her gaze down on his raw hands nursing the blossom like a couple beams of sunlight. Beside Cedar, Devin breathed in and out of steady slumber. He dreamed of the distant moon and twinkling lights in the night sky, of jettisoning off in a metal tub not unlike their current hideaway to meet them.

“Will he have a name?”

Cedar’s hands stilled briefly, ignoring the spine that dug into his flesh as the cactus stretched just a smidge more. “You should know,” He said, “I wouldn’t give away something like that so freely.”

She narrowed her eyes to slits, and like a focused beam, bore holes into his hands. It was fine. He did already have holes there, anyway. “Well, what are we going to call him?”

The cactus grew another inch or so between the course of their conversation, and although having worked at it for a few days, Cedar still moved with the same dutiful efficiency as when he first imagined the task. Dust spilled from his fingertips and onto his lap, supplying enough energy to fuel them for another week, if need be. They wouldn’t. If he kept at it, he’d finish before daybreak.

“We’ll call him Rae.”