Harper moved quietly back into the room the crew was sharing, stepping delicately over Julie as she did so, mindful not to wake the girl, not that it mattered. Julie could sleep through almost anything it seemed. It took forcibly shaking the girl in the morning to get her up and active. Harper sat down on her sleeping bag and worked at the laces of her boot, her hands shaking terribly. She worked fitfully at one of the knots, gritting her teeth in frustration as her fingers dumbly fumbled, unable to get a proper grip with their trembling. It was stupid to be so shooken up. Nothing had really taken place out by the trees so what was she so jittery for?

“Are you okay?”

Harper gasped and jumped, turning and looking to the side. Miguel was watching her quietly, lying comfortably in his sleeping bag with his arms crossed behind his head. His hair was a tangled, black halo around his face and she resisted the impulse to reach out and work at the knots of his bangs. His nightshirt was old, getting threadbare and thin, but she could vaguely make out the image of a cross on it. He shifted slightly to rest on his side, gazing at her sleepily.

“Are you okay?” he asked again. “Where’d you go?”

“I needed air.”

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.”

Harper tried to calm herself, pulling her hands back from her boots and drawing them close to her and tucking them under her chin as she pulled her knees up to her chest, curling into a ball. She took a slow and deep breath and closed her eyes. Her hands were shaking still. This was ridiculous. As if whatever had happened at the trees hadn’t been strange enough, she’d been on edge the entire walk back, frustrated at first, but then the feeling of being followed, of being watched had taken over. Every primal instinct in her had been screaming to run, to just go. Then walking up the stairs to get to their room she’d about broken into a frantic, stupid run, feeling heat on her back, heat against her legs, heat on her stomach, heat on her breasts. The heat of a look. She was still warm. She took a slow and deep breath.

“Eispneo.”

“What?” she asked, turning and looking at Miguel again. His eyes were closed and his chest rose and fell rhythmically. “Miguel, what?”

“Hm?” he murmured, curling up into his sleeping back tighter, his eyes opening only slightly and he glanced her way, eyes fogged. She frowned and looked about the room, her chest heaving against her trembling hands. Christ, it was hot. How could he handle it? She took another deep breath and let it out, shuddering.

“Ekpneo.”

“Miguel, stop it!” she snapped, turning to glare at him fully. His brow creased in confusion and very slowly he sat up, tilting his head. He looked to the others in the room, but they were all still quite asleep. Julie shifted to rest on her stomach, her head off of her pillow and settled on the floor.

“Stop what?” he asked, returning sleepy attention to her.

“Stop whispering things!”

His brow creased again and he opened his mouth to speak but she shook her head, working at her boots fitfully but her hands continued to shake. She felt tears of frustration pricking at the corner of her eyes and her face was hot, her entire body felt hot. The rancid smell of the peach was sharp in her nose again, touching and teasing at the back of her throat and she gagged sharply. Harper bit down on her lower lip, swallowing. She hated throwing up and damned if she would just because she couldn’t get that awful smell, that sweet taste, away from her. Sweat was dotting her face and she felt an eyebrow itch sharply. She reached up rubbed at it, closing her eyes.

“Come here,” Miguel whispered. She glanced to him, but he was crawling toward her, reaching to her. Harper flinched back from him, but he moved to her boot, quietly working at the laces. He undid the knot and she listened to the high pitched, rapid noise they made as he pulled them from the small, metal holes they were laced into. He tugged the boot off her foot and then worked at the other for a moment, before pulling it off as well. He remained where he was, sitting on his knees, one of his hands on either ankle and she felt one of the fingers on his right hand stroke up and down against the heated skin. “You’re flush.”

“It’s hot,” she breathed.

“Come here.”

She moved forward and his hands touched at the bottom of her shirt and then slipped under, his skin cold against her warm flesh. He leaned forward and blew a soft and tiny stream of cool air on her forehead, and then set his lips there, resting comfortably against her. Harper’s lips twitched into a helpless and tired smile and slowly she leaned forward, resting her forehead on his chest. He wrapped his arms tightly about her, his fingers still touching delicately at the bottom of her shirt. He smelled like cigarette smoke and cold earth. It overpowered the remaining scent of the peach and she took it in deeply, pressing her face against him.

“Hush,” Miguel sighed.

“I don’t know what’s scaring me,” she laughed softly and he shook his head, reaching up and petting at her hair. “It’s stupid.”

“Kalmaro, kalmaro.”

“I’m trying to.” She closed her eyes, curling up closer.

“Trying to what?” he asked and she bit down on her lower lip hard, not responding.

The trees rustled gently as a rare wind blew over them, the bushes giving a hollow shudder, and Harper froze a few feet away from them, her heart beating rapidly up in her throat as she watched them. Slowly she licked her lips, her eyes flicking from one spot to the next, but still nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Her right shoulder felt empty without the camera on it, but that was too much equipment to lug all the way out here just to look at some shrubbery. She moved slowly closer, until she was a mere five feet away and each step nearer felt too close for comfort. Her blood was rushing in her ears as she waited for something to come out and attack, some sort of wild and strange xxxxx, something as exotic as it was terrifying. Nothing moved though. Nothing jumped out at her. The only sound that appeared out of place that she could hear in the bizarre musical hum of the night was her own breathing, fast and unsteady from the walk from the village. This patch of greenery was a good deal further away than she’d thought.

She gave the bushes and few trees a suspicious glance, and then turned and looked back to the village. None of the lights were on, no candles lit, and it looked foreign to her, as it had when she’d first laid eyes on it a few days ago. The houses were small and square, white and cool in the darkness. Small, dark windows without any glass stared emptily back at her. This place was so different from an American city, where no matter what there was at least a Waffle House or McDonalds open somewhere, its florescent lights glowing and pulsing, breathing in the shadows. It was a beacon of light that kept the thick darkness at bay. There was nothing here though. No life, no breathing. It was terrifyingly honest in its emptiness and simplicity, a place that met the darkness boldly and without defenses, with yielding, open arms and trembling breaths. It was a place that was full of homes that were so exposed and so easily penetrated by the night. People that were afraid but so accepting of that fear. It was suffocating in its strangeness, and for a moment Harper was petrified of going back and losing herself in the foreboding hush, her throat tightening and she felt her chest constrict.

She turned back from the village to move to the foliage, glancing about curiously and taking a deep breath as she did so. It was fairly barren, even with the trees and few bushes. Some of the trees had fruit, peaches by the look of them, ripe and lush. Why didn’t the villagers ever come out here and pick them? Of course, there were fields just outside the village where some of the farmers did their work, but those were mostly vegetables and grapes for wine. Why not get the peaches too? They were here, weren’t they? Or maybe the villagers couldn’t see them past the demon. She smirked uncertainly at the idea, stomach twisting uncomfortably.

Harper reached out and touched at one of the peaches, felt the soft fuzz under her fingertips and she wrapped her hand around the fruit, giving it a tug and it came off the tree with ease. Some of the leaves on the tree were curling, red globs raised on them like thick, grotesque sores. She touched at one curiously as well, wrinkling her nose, and then looked down to the peach. She hadn’t eaten dinner, hadn’t had an appetite at all, especially after the strange display that morning. After a long day of filming, trying to get in all the last shots they could, all she’d wanted was a cigarette and sleep, but she’d been unable to get the latter. She’d lain for hours on the stone floor of the room, tucked into her sleeping bag far enough only her eyes peered out into the dark, cool room. Miguel was warm to the left of her, breathing, his chest rising and falling, rhythmic and pulsing in his sleep.

They’d brought a small crucifix with them on their trip, hung it up on any wall they could. In a small village in Israel they’d had to sleep outside and had managed to set up a stick to hang the crucifix on. In the dark of the small, stone room, Jesus Christ’s suffering face had been accusatory in the shadows. Accusatory of Harper’s thoughts of Julie’s curling toes and Miguel’s throat and lips and the sweat on his neck.

She’d decided to go on a walk. To the edge of town, and past.

Harper set the peach to her lips, stroking it back and forward over her mouth, the fuzz just as gentle on the flesh there as it was in her palm, the scent disgustingly sweet to the point her stomach felt as if it were curling in on itself, but she figured that was hunger. She closed her eyes, taking a deep breath of it. The fuzz tickled over the small bit of flesh between nostrils and at the tip of her nose. She stuck the tip of her tongue out and teased at the peach, circling and savoring the strange sensation. She sank her teeth into the peach. It gave way with ease and the sweetness was in her mouth, juices dribbling down her chin to drip onto her breasts. It was sticky and chewed strangely, feeling thicker and heavier in her mouth, more like meat than fruit. It juices warmed its way down her throat the same way hard liquor would, burning in her stomach and her knees felt weak. With the skin torn by her teeth, the syrupy smell was even heavier now, rotten in its sweetness. Her jeans felt tighter, her stomach and thighs were warm. Harper took another bite, slower this time, testing every sensation that came forward to her. She felt her teeth break the skin again, sinking down into the peach until the fuzz and juice was up against her gums, the fruit stroking the roof of her mouth. She felt the meat full in her mouth, heavy on her tongue, potent and rancid.

There was a strong, putrid smell in her nose suddenly and Harper frowned and quickly dropped the peach and brought her wrist to her nose, turning about rapidly, her brow creased. The scent of sulfur curled in her nostrils, like rotten eggs, and she gagged, moving her wrist from her nose to press her hand over her mouth. She gazed about desperately to see something, but there was absolutely nothing there. No hulking, frightful figure, no lizard creature with bat wings, nothing. She groaned in frustration and kicked the peach into a bush, turning and leaving for the village, keeping her nose covered as she went.

“She meant post-enlightenment,” Miguel nodded, rubbing his chin as he took a deep inhalation of his cigarette. They were sitting outside of their hotel, or what passed for a hotel. It was no more than a spare loft above a tiny restaurant. All six of them slept cramped together in the small spare room. The metal tables of the restaurant had all been pushed back against the white walls and she and Miguel sat quietly on a small, three foot high white wall that surrounded the tiny restaurant. There were two men off to the side of them smoking as well, talking in drunken foreign slurs.

“I don’t get it,” Harper said, her voice heavy. She felt heavy, she felt drained. She blew smoke from her cigarette too, her attention to the side of them, where they’d come upon the villagers that morning standing and staring. She adjusted the strap of her night top, no more than a white spaghetti strap shirt that scooped low, probably inappropriately so in this village, but she was planning to go to bed soon anyway, and the men to the right of them didn’t seem concerned with her. Her jeans felt stifling in the vague heat that was present even during the night. She adjusted and felt her right leg press against Miguel’s. She jerked it to the side quickly, the heat of the touch still uncomfortably there through the tight fabric. Miguel didn’t seem to have noticed, his eyes gazing forward, squinting, as if he were looking through fog.

“Post-enlightenment. It was when science became important, I guess. Anyway, they started analyzing the Bible and debunking it during that time.” He said ‘debunking’ while holding up bunny-ears on each hand and bending them, the light of his cigarette a fiery blur in the dark of the evening. The streets didn’t have lights, their only source of it coming from the Cheshire-smile moon above them. “Did those tests of ‘if I can see it, smell it, taste it, hear it, and touch it then I know it’s real.’ Found that most of it was impossible and didn’t really happen, didn’t take into consideration the cultures at the time. Eventually those who were part of a post-enlightened culture logically stopped believing in things like angels and demons and the bullshit idea that Yahweh actually spoke through burning bushes and whatnot. What Elene meant was that we think different than the village. It’s like we’re not wired to see and hear and feel the shit they do anymore.”

“Do you really think they saw a demon?” she asked, taking a slow drag of her cigarette, and Miguel shrugged, glancing at her out of the corner of his dark eyes. They were smoky from liquor, but his speech was still clean and steady.

“Maybe,” he whispered, returning his cig to his mouth and holding it there with smooth, thin lips, his hands settling at his knees. “If they believed they did, maybe they did. I can’t really say for sure, you know? You gotta understand, this is a culture that thinks the information they get from their dreams is as valid as the information you and I get from the news or a library book.” His cigarette hung from between his lips, bobbing up and down when he spoke. Harper frowned and slumped against Miguel, still feeling unsatisfied with the answer, but knowing he could do no better. Her leg pressed against his again and, unsurely, she kept it there. One of his hands moved from his knee and patted hers. Her knee seemed to fit perfectly in the palm of his hand. She watched as the old woman that had given her the evil eye sulked across the street from them, pausing when she spotted them and spitting toward them. Harper pulled her cigarette from her lips and blew the smoke in the old lady’s direction.

“We’ll go home tomorrow,” he whispered.

“Thank God.”

“Thank God,” he replied, his hand moving from her knee and she felt cold in its absence.

Part 3, woot, almost there! In the mean time: *hack hack cough cough* I didn't need that lung anyway. My 'rents gave me their cough over Thanksgiving, how thoughtful!

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The air inside Ioseph and Elene’s small house was surprisingly cool, despite the heat outside. The kitchen smelled of spices and earth and dust flickered and sparkling in the sunlight that gleamed through the glassless window. Harper could hear people outside the house going about their daily lives, as if what had taken place that morning was years away from them. For her, it was still uncomfortably close, like a warm breath on the back of the neck.

“I’m telling you, it was damn weird,” Harper told Julie, recounting what had taken place outside in the village that morning. “I mean, everyone just stopped whatever they were in the middle of doing and they just stood there and were staring.”

“What’d Joseph, like, say it was?” Julie asked, her feet up on the small table used for cutting foods and occasionally eating. She was wearing designer flip-flops with fake gems on the straps, her small toes curling. She probably curled her toes during prayer, the same way a woman curled her toes during an orgasm. Harper frowned, instantly regretting the nasty thought, and she looked about the kitchen instead of at the blond opposite her. Julie was painting her fingernails, the smell of the polish thick and repulsive compared to the warm, seasoned scent of the kitchen.

“Day-mon-ahs.”

“What’s that mean?”

“I don’t know. Sounds like it might be ‘demon,’ but that’s too wild. Would you take your feet off the table? That’s disgusting.”

Julie shot her a frown and lounged further back in her chair, her feet sliding further over the top of the table. She took her unpolished pinky nail and dug it along the ravine of her thumb on the opposite hand, where nail met flesh, catching some excess drops of polish. Harper scowled at her and leaned back in her own chair, looking down at the camera. She wished in that moment it had a working playback option, wanting to go over the footage from that morning. The school had done the best they could though. Most of their funds had gone into affording the trip itself, lodging and meals, though Ioseph’s family was taking fine care of them in regards to meals. Elene said frequently she was happy for the company and the chance to practice her English and had invited them, with Ioseph’s permission, to take their breaks in their home. Harper knew the boys had decided to nap at the small residence they were staying at, except for Miguel, who was scouting for last minute places to shoot.

“I’ve just never seen anything like that though,” Harper whispered. “Maybe we could go check it out? You and I?”

“Why the two of us?” Julie frowned. Her head was bowed as she worked at her nails, but she looked up at Harper from beneath dark lashes, her pink lips pursing together.

“Because the boys are busy.”

“I don’t want to go.”

“You’re not the least bit curious?” Harper asked.

“No.”

“Julie, God damnit!” Harper scowled, blurting the curse before realizing it and too frustrated to stop herself. She leaned forward moodily and glared at the other girl. Julie’s face took on a slack look, the same look of shock that crossed every Christian’s face when they heard a fellow Christian use the Lord’s name in vain. “It was creepy. They were all freaking out and they were all just staring at this spot and I mean, I didn’t fucking see anything.”

“Oh for goodness sake, Harper!” Julie sighed, throwing her head back dramatically. “It was, like, probably nothing. They’re all totally weird here!” Her brow creased in irritation and she sunk even further into the chair, her rear end resting off of it now and she was lying on her lower back. “Stupid actually. I mean, like, I’ve never heard more bullshit than women having to, like, stay hidden away. And these men, they think we’re dirty. We’re, like, bad. I thought the textbooks were just, like, over exaggerating but no.” She drew out the ‘no,’ rolling her eyes as she did.

“It’s the culture, you remember that. Would you please get your feet off the table?” her voice was rising now.
The feet stayed. The impulse to reach out and shove them off the table was hot in her arms and she tightened her fingers around the camera.

“It’s bullshit, not culture. Gu-awed. I went up to talk to a group of guys today and, like, they looked at me like I was insane.” Her voice was turning into a fussy whine now.

“Because to them you are,” Harper scowled, hoping that was the end of it. Julie opened her mouth for more though, stopping when they heard footsteps. She looked over her shoulder as the backdoor opened, Elene walking inside holding a net bag full of groceries. Julie quickly slung her feet off the table and rose into a stand, smiling at Elene. Harper took a deep breath, trying to calm down.

“Here, let me help you,” Julie cooed, smiling with more cheerfulness than was necessary at Elene and holding out a hand, the one that had yet to be painted.

“Efharistó polí,” Elene smiled blandly and they put the net bag down on the table, pulling items from it and setting them on the old wood. Harper tapped her nails over the camera, and then looked curiously up to Elene.

“What does day-mon-ahs mean?” she asked. Elene blinked down at her, and then crossed herself, face paling slightly.

“It’s Greek for daemon. Ioseph mentioned they saw one today.”

“Right. Out by those trees and bushes. I didn’t see anything though, not even an animal. I even tried videotaping it, but I mean, even when I zoomed in I couldn’t see anything.”

“You Americans,” Elene smiled emptily, but she looked weary and sat down in the same seat Julie had been occupying. She reached up and touched at her brow, closing her eyes. Harper frowned and let the issue drop, asking if perhaps they could make some tea. Elene nodded her head, quiet still, and silently Harper went about putting a pot over the stove and lighting the fire beneath as Elene had shown her that morning. The youngest girl ran into the kitchen, cheering something in Greek but the only word that Harper could catch was ‘finish.’ The youth ran to her and held out her arms, bouncing, and Harper leaned down and picked the little girl up, balancing the little girl on her hip as she waited for the water to boil. She’d heard Elene call the child by name many times, but she could never remember it. Happily the girl began to touch at Harper’s dreads, giggling over them. She looked over to her mother and asked a question Harper couldn’t understand and Elene gave a hollow laugh.

Julie found the small jar of tea leaves and put them into two cups and when the water began to boil Harper poured it into the cups. Julie picked up hers and dipped an unpainted pinky nail into it, swirling slowly, unbothered by the heat. That had always fascinated Harper and she’d asked Julie about it once, but the girl had merely shrugged and quipped she’d been doing it all her life. Harper returned to the table and set her cup in front of Elene, the woman smiling warmly at her and accepting it.

“You Americans,” Elene spoke slowly and carefully over her words, as if testing and tasting the English heavy and thick as molasses in her mouth. “Your brains are different. Your eyes are different. You do not see things, even when they are right in front of you, because you forgot. In these villages, and other villages, we still see fine.”

“Still see?” Harper murmured, resting her elbow on the table and her chin in her hand, watching Elene. The woman nodded her head, gripping the cup of tea firmly in her hands, her expression sober and harsh, her knuckles white. The little girl watched her mother in confusion, not understanding the English, but she seemed to know the look, and quietly she sat down on the floor and began to play with her hands, bouncing the fingers and muttering in Greek, as if little people were talking to each other.

“We had another person come here once, not from here, from Een-glund. There was a daimonas,” she crossed herself again, “right behind him. It stared at him. It touched him. He did not see it, did not feel it. He wonders why no one in the village will come close.”

“It touched him? How did it touch him? How did he not feel it if there was something there?” Harper asked, leaning closer. Elene shook her head, waving her hand at her.

“Because his brain,” Elene tapped at her forehead. “It is different. He only smell it. He stands there in the middle of the village yelling ‘What this gawd-awful stench? Why don’t you come here? Come here! No wonder people not visit! Savage, all you!’” She scoffed and glared off to the side, muttering. “Ilithios.”

Harper rested her chin in her hand, catching her lower lip and nipping on it again, a bad habit of hers. It didn’t make any sense. How could their brains be different? They were all humans. If something wasn’t there, it just wasn’t there, but if everyone in the village was seeing something, then logically it must have been there. How could a group of people see something and another group not? Maybe the village was taking some sort of hallucinogenic, but that wouldn’t explain how that group outside this morning had all seen something at the same time.

The villagers stared quietly past the stone and brick houses, crossing themselves. It was mostly a group of men, all having been in the middle of a day’s work, when suddenly they had all stopped, frozen, their eyes turned to the trees. There was a primal feeling in the group, something Harper had never felt before, something that brushed a cord in her that felt as ancient as this culture. The villager’s eyes were slightly glazed and lips moved soundlessly with prayer as they stared in silence to the empty landscape past them. There was nothing in the distance, except a few small trees budding with some sort of fruit that Harper couldn’t make out, and bushes, all sparse and rather unremarkable. Harper quietly videotaped while Jordan held a boom mike just over the top of the camera, trying to catch the sounds of prayer without being intrusive, or getting caught in the shot. Miguel leaned toward her, his voice very soft and his dark brow creased in confusion.

“What are they doing?” he asked and she shrugged, balancing the camera on her shoulder with one hand to put a finger to her lips and point to the boom mike, but Jordan had lowered it, frowning slightly and rubbing at the back of the neck, just as perplexed as the rest of them. This wasn’t something they’d read about in the anthropology class they’d been required to take a semester before this trip, but a class couldn’t possibly have prepared them for a lot of what they’d encountered already.

Harper sighed and turned off the camera, lowering it from her shoulder and tilting her head curiously. Slowly she moved forward to the small crowd, squinting her eyes as she looked out to the trees and bushes. Ioseph was there, his expression hardened and the lines in his face severe. His thumb ran back and forward along his forefinger nervously, as if he were coiling a rosary or worry beads and suddenly Harper couldn’t remember for the life of herself what the main religion in this village even was.

She tapped Ioseph and he jumped and glanced toward her quickly. She pointed curiously toward where everyone was standing and put a dramatically inquisitive look on her face, brows drawn together, her lips tugged into a frown, and raised her hands, palms up, shrugging. ‘What?’ she said, unable to remember the Greek word, or any Greek right now for that matter.

“Daimonas.”

Her brow creased more in bewilderment and she looked back to Miguel, but he merely shook his head, reaching up to run a trembling hand through black hair. She returned her focus out to the small patch of greenery, nipping her lower lip, worrying over it. The air around the trees wavered from the heat of the sun. She hesitated, and then hefted her camera up again, pressing the record button on it. There was a vibrant glare from the sun around the trees and she squinted against it, before shaking her head and giving up the filming. There was nothing to see there.

The village was just spooked by something, hell if she knew what.

I finished editing my short story for my advanced fiction class and figured I'd post it up here. It's got a few parts, but here's the first. =)

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The old woman was giving her the evil eye, and Harper bit down on a smile, so as not to offend the lady more than she already had, focusing the large camera’s view closer to the woman’s eyes. They were a milky shade of blue and a bleary film rested over them. The tanned skin was wrinkled and covered in liver spots, the face pudgy, round and leathery. A few strands of gray hair slipped out of the black scarf around her head, one tickling just over where eyebrows would be, but it seemed the hair there had fallen out years ago and the woman had none. Harper watched through the video camera as the woman stuck out the tip of her tongue, as if tasting the air, and then pointed a gnarled finger at her, spitting something in Greek that sounded none too pleasant, before picking up her short, round body and shuffling away, pulling her black dress and shawl tighter around her. Harper watched her go until she made a turn around one of the small buildings that lined the street they were on. When the old woman was no longer in sight, she turned off the camera and slowly lowered it, knowing better than to follow after the old woman. The evil eye was enough punishment for the morning anyway.

The original offense had been her blue jeans.

Harper grinned wryly and glanced down at them. She probably shouldn’t be wandering around in the clothes she was, considering the culture, but the people in the tiny Kypseli village knew what the video crew was there for and were generally accepting as well, even pleased to be in a documentary. She set down her camera on a small table outside a tiny cafe and checked her makeup in the window, touching carefully at her eyeliner with her pinky nail. The jeans hugged her legs and tucked into hiking boots that had been needed just to get to the village at all. It wasn’t that it was necessarily remote, but the road to the village wound down a pale xxxxxx cliffside and the road was more occupied with carts pulled by animals than actual automobiles. The crew had figured it’d be more fun to walk to the village than actually bother the villagers with the noises of a truck anyway.

Plus, she’d need these hiking boots to get to some villages in other countries that were a good deal more remote. This one was their last stop, and thrilling though this trip had been, Harper was damn ready to be back in the States.

God, she thought, a tiny smile touching her lips. Tomorrow. Tomorrow we go home. Thank you.

She adjusted the ponytail holder around her grey t-shirt, the wrinkled picture on the front of it of the island of Crete that read beneath “[Insert Greek text here that didn't transfer well from document to blog]” which hopefully meant “One language is never enough!” The ponytail holder held the fabric taut and above her stomach, the back of it and the underarms starting to become wet with sweat, and she tugged fitfully at the collar, figuring she might take some scissors to it later on and widen it out a bit more. She could never stand the feeling of things around her neck, even her crucifix felt choking at times. It was only seven in the morning and already the heat was starting to become uncomfortable. She grabbed a spare ponytail holder from her pocket and pulled her blond dreadlocks back from her face. Those had gotten a good laugh from the locals when they’d arrived yesterday. The men had a good time making fun of her ‘pouli folia,’ bird’s nest, hair and cheerfully she’d laughed with them, already noticing the cultural differences as they sat at the same restaurant she was presently standing at. The men had filled the stuffy, liquor smelling room, downing shots and offering cheers to their visitors, while the women stayed in a backroom and well out of sight, eating and drinking in their own separate space.

It was stuff exactly like this that she and the rest of the crew were looking for.

Seventy percent of the world population still lived in ways similar to cultures of the Bible. There were, of course, slight differences, but the premises were similar. Ideas of honor, barrenness, age, and gender. Her little group of six students were from Golgothas Christian University in northern Georgia and the school had most recently landed an impressive grant, therefore able to fund most of this trip so they could take a look at some of the societies that closely resembled those of more ancient times. Through this village, and a few others they would be stopping at around the world, Golgothas was hoping to get a better understanding of the customs in the Bible, and therefore be able to better understand a lot that was going on in subtext.

The school could afford the trip, but their equipment for the documentary itself was questionable. Harper’s lips twitched into a wry grin at the thought, and she glanced down to the camera. It was a massive black hunk of plastic and metal that had been found in storage, an old fashioned camcorder that required actual videotapes, not a flash memory drive. Its small LCD screen was shattered and, as far as she knew, hadn’t worked all that well before anyway. Its small view finder worked fine though. The camcorder had to be hoisted to the shoulder while videotaping, because simply holding it up with two hands made it unwieldy. Still, it was a video camera, and they’d had to make a trade. Excellent equipment and a shitty trip, or an excellent trip and shitty equipment.

They’d gone with the latter.

She picked the camera up by a thick handle on the top and moved down the street, waving in greeting to two older men she passed, both of whom gave her odd glances but nodded in return. They weren’t used to outsiders, not tourists and sure as hell not documentarians, but they weren’t displeased with the visitors either. Harper had personally been thoroughly anticipating this trip. She’d never gotten the chance to travel.

The smell of breakfast was beginning to waft from a few houses and she closed her eyes at the scent of eggs and meat, savoring the heavy aroma of them in her nose, on her tongue and down her throat. She rounded the corner to the home she and the rest of the crew had been invited to have breakfast with. It was a modest residence, a small, square white house with no more than about five little rooms altogether. Nine people were living in it, so long as they didn’t have extended family coming over for a stay. A father, a mother, four sons and three daughters occupied the humble residence.

Miguel, the project leader and director of their film, was sitting outside of the house, leaning against the side of it, smoking a cigarette with the men of the household. He grinned at her and nodded “hello” and she twiddled her fingers in return. He was a handsome enough man in his early thirties with dark black hair always brushed back from his face and kept short. His skin was a rich shade of brown, like mocha, and his eyes had a naturally lazy, hooded look to them, that belied his amazing attention to details. Amazing attention to detail, yet his shirts were usually buttoned crooked. The collar of his shirt was off balance because of the awkward buttoning and she could see the sensitive dip of his throat and the way sweat was starting to dot on his skin. She quickly looked up to his eyes.

“Find anything good?” he asked and she shrugged in return, offering the camera as if for him to see, and they laughed. Its playback option was broken.

“Some old woman giving me the evil eye,” she joked and Miguel laughed again, shaking his head ruefully. The men looked at him and her curiously and she spoke. “Baskania.”

The head of the house, Ioseph (though the crew just called him Joseph) frowned and shook his head but the younger boys, not yet understanding the dangers of such a thing laughed with Miguel. Two of the younger ones pulled on the skin beneath their eyes to reveal the pink under-flesh and sucked in their cheeks, making faces at each other. Ioseph smacked one firmly over his head and the boy looked appropriately chastised, until the father turned his back and the youths started up with the face-making once more.

Ioseph pointed to her and then around the house to the rear where the back door and the kitchen would be. His wife, Elene, would be there. She was supposed to be talented at warding off the effects of the evil eye. Ioseph had bragged about that last night during the welcome party when Julie had been there to translate. Harper politely nodded and walked around the side of the house, rather than through it. As she passed the boys and when Ioseph was looking back to Miguel, she stuck her tongue out at the two youths and they shrieked with mirth, covering their mouths.

Harper knocked on the backdoor of the small house when she reached it, leaning to the side where a small window without any glass was and peering into the kitchen. Inside she saw the sturdy Elene, her three daughters, and another girl from the crew, Julie. Elene was beside the stove, a full bodied, strong looking woman with thick brown hair and smoldering eyes. She looked back at the knock, setting some dough she’d been kneading off to the side, and walked to the door, her lips turning into a warm, but tired smile. Her apron was already covered in flour and a screaming little girl, white with flour, ran to the door with her to meet Harper. Harper took a step back and held up her hands, shaking her head and the child stopped obediently just before reaching her.

“What’s wrong?” Elene asked, her English thick with the Greek accent, her words clipped and heavy sounding. She was a sad looking woman, her skin tanned from the sun and crow’s feet deep at the corner of her eyes, but she usually retained a small smile, Harper had begun to notice, and her affection for her children knew no bounds, even when they were shrieking, as the smallest one continued to do for Harper’s attention, bouncing and holding her arms up, demanding to be held. The smallest was fascinated with Harper though, her man’s clothes and her pouli folia hair.

“I got the evil eye today,” Harper chuckled, rubbing the back of her neck. “Old lady on the street.”

“What you doing on the street so early?” Elene’s voice was chiding and Harper ducked her head to look reprimanded as the sons had for their father not a few minutes ago, rubbing the back of her neck.

“We wanted a few shots of the place without too many people on it. Happened to run into this old woman and she starts with the glaring and the spitting and cussing.”

“Kuss-eng?” Elene frowned, her brow creasing and she tilted her head in confusion.

“Uh,” Harper sighed and rubbed at her brow, trying to think of what Greek they were taught quickly before going on this trip, but it was meshing with the few other languages they had learned. She knew all of the Greek bad words just fine, but she had a feeling Elene wouldn’t appreciate those being repeated to her, especially in front of her daughters. “Uhm, kata…kataraiemai!” she smiled proudly when she caught the word and Elene nodded her head in understanding. She beckoned Harper inside and she went willingly, wiping her feet on the small stoop outside the door.

Julie was at the table, helping one of the older daughters cut potatoes. Julie was only going to be the narrator for the film, technically she didn’t need to come on the trip at all, but the boys had managed to come up with a bullshit excuse (her supposed fluency in Greek) as to why she needed to be with them, not wanting the girl left out of the fun. She was Greek in heritage and she’d thought it would be a hoot to see what some of her culture was like. It was coming out to be more of a shock than originally intended, and an unpleasant one in Julie’s opinion. Greek in heritage though she may be, her family had become thoroughly Americanized. Personally, Harper wished they could have left her behind. She’d never much cared for Julie. It wasn’t that the girl was unpleasant or rude, she just struck Harper as an idiot. Julie had the tendency to ask Harper at least thrice a month how she kept her dreadlocks clean, always using that dainty little tone of hers, her head tilting to the side on every habitual ‘like’ in her sentences. Aren’t those, like, totally dirty? I could, like, never do that to my hair, she’d sigh, touching at her blond highlights fretfully.

Worse off, something about Julie irked Harper. Julie was too close to God, one of those girls that was always smiling during church and prayer. During songs she was the one girl with the stupid, at-peace-with-the-world look on her face that sang with her hands open, palms up and raised to shoulder height. It was as if God and she shared a secret and the rest of the world simply wasn’t privy to it.

“How was, like, the street?” Julie asked, smiling up at her cheerfully and Harper offered a dull grin in response, trying to place faux cheer on her face. The past few weeks she’d tried to imagine she and Julie could perhaps become friends over the trip, but Julie’s holier-than-though smile continued to dig at her. She raised her hands and formed claws with her fingers, waving at the air some.

“Evil. Got the evil eye.”

“You got the what?”

“Evil eye.”

“Oh,” Julie raised her brows thoughtfully then shrugged. The elder daughter frowned and asked Julie what Harper had said, but Julie waved her hand dismissively, replying to her curious glance with: “Tipote, tipote.” Nothing, nothing.

Elene had Harper sit on a chair and began to quietly chant a soft prayer. Harper waited patiently, aware of Julie’s attention as well as all of the daughters watching, the smallest one finally settling down from her wailing. Harper felt a fullness in her jaw and covered her mouth to resist the urge to yawn, not wanting to be rude, but Elene gave a healthy yawn in the middle of a prayer, and Harper finally allowed herself to as well, keeping her mouth covered. Elene crossed herself three times then spat thrice as well, before nodding her head and smiling gladly.

“Finished.”

“Efharistó polí,” she smiled in return, thank you very much, and Elene cheerfully congratulated her on her pronunciation. Kala. Good. Harper gave Julie the thumbs up and the girl smirked and shrugged again, returning to the cutting of the potatoes.
Harper helped Elene make the breakfast. Just like traveling, she had never really cooked before in her life. While her family had never been poor, her parents had both worked two jobs at a time to make sure their lower-middle class status stayed that way, which left little time for them at home. Despite all else, her mother had been the queen of cooking dinner when the children had gone off to sleep. There would always be something for them to reheat after school the next day, while the ‘rents were out. Harper couldn’t remember much of her parents though. Even after visiting them on holidays, she would leave the house trying to recall how they looked. After experiencing so little of them in her childhood, Harper could barely bring herself to want to memorize their features. All she could remember was her father’s nervous habit of checking his pocket watch constantly and her mother’s curved jawline, soft and slow to gaze over, leading up into straight blond hair and a shell ear. She wore pearl earrings, her single vanity.

When it was time for breakfast Harper helped serve the men and then returned to the kitchen to eat with the other women quickly. When finished, she set her plate on the counter and grabbed up her camera, quietly filming the mother and daughters. They laughed and joked in Greek, the smallest child, still covered in flour, tugging on Elene’s apron for attention, a piece of egg hanging from the corner of her mouth. Harper sneaked into the small dining area where she filmed the men, Miguel and the other boys in their small group eating off to the side and out of the shot.

The words they spoke were warm and pleasant, smiles bright on their faces. The two young boys were still making faces at each other every time Ioseph turned his back.

that when I return to my room from classes all I want is a little quiet, and not to hear my suitemate and her friends from THEIR room talking girl talk?

Ah, that urge to get married has poofed upon me again. Ack x.x

What's more, could all you ladies try leaving my tattoo artist alone? Lmao! I get a call from sissy during thanksgiving and we start talking about him and she says how all the girls think he's just WAY too pretty for my first time, he'd ruin me for other men. Then she mentions the girls at her place think that SHE should test drive him FOR me.

No. =P

Then mom sees him and says that yes, he's VERY attractive. Not the marrying type. And I'm like wtf?! Why?! And she mentions that ALLLLLL women would be flirting with him. And it's like 'yeah, I know that... *le sigh*'

But here's the thing. I haven't been in a relationship before really, so I've never really been able to test how my jealous works. Maybe it wont be a big deal. He's gotta flirt. He's a tattoo artist. His flirting is what made me so comfortable being so exposed like that in front of him. But if he's flirting while I'm a date with him, yeah, that'd bug me I think. But sometimes it's kinda funny when girls flirt with the guy. I went on a date with Pat and there was a girl just ALLLLLL over him and it was more funny than infuriating, because it came down to the fact that he's on the date WITH ME, not WITH HER.

In any case. I'm not thinking about marriage with him. Way too early in the game. I'm just wanting to go on dates and get to know him better. And if we become bf/gf, awesome. If it gets even BETTER, fantastic. But right now. Just friends, just date.

So let me ya'll =P

Got home. It was very wild yesterday. It started with a text from Ash saying not to bother coming to get her, they changed her schedule and now she couldn't go home. And I'm like 'what?!' So I ask her what her schedule is and she says it's not 9 am to 9 pm and it started that day, so just don't worry. And it's like 'well...can't you just skip?'
'No [digoree], it's a very intensive class and I can't afford to miss any. Just go on home without me.'

Now I know she's irritated with me because she's typing out my whole name lmao So I ask her if she has tomorrow off and she replies with yes, but I don't want to go home late. And it's like "Oooouhhhhhhhhh~" Yah see, a few days before I'd mentioned that I damn well wanted to leave Tuesday because I want all the time home I can get and I totally don't wanna arrive like, the day OF Thanksgiving. Because I just can't stand waiting, it's so frustrating. So like, she thought I meant that NO MATTER WHAT I'm going Tuesday, with or without her. lmao So I replied with 'ffs ash, I wanna be home early yeah, but I'd rather be late than you spend thanksgiving alone. I'm taking you home like it or not.'
And she responds with that being sweet and okay, maybe they'll let her out early. So I figure it's no biggie, we'll leave tomorrow and that way we're at least both definitely awake. And I let dad know and he's cool with it of course and I figure this way I can get the test questions from ethics too. Win/win in the long run. Then around 2 I get a voicemail from ash that's all hurried saying they changed her schedule at school AGAIN and now she's done at 5 again lmao

SOOOOO, I went to Orlando, got there at 5, met her at her place and then we hit Best Buy so she could return some stuff and then went to Chik'fil'a for dinner (mmmmmmm). By the time we were all done it was 6:30 so we were a little late leaving xD But we hit the interstate and all around it was a really good ride. We laughed a lot and talked a lot. Her cat was loose, but Mew pretty much stayed in her lap. Got into mine two times and on the second time she started to slip between my legs to the floor near the pedals (which is just no place for a cat), so she tightened her claws into my inner thigh and it HURT so I gripped the wheel and bent and jerked the car to the left, and the cat went flying to the left and slammed into the passenger door face first. lmao she stayed in Ash's lap after that.

She told me she's more or less back together with her idiot boyfriend, which doesn't bug me as much as it used to. I dunno why. Like, I still don't really like, but it's been about two years since I've actually seen him, and I know in the two years since I've been at college I've changed a fair little bit so I'm sure he has too. What's more, the guy keeps making SO much effort to try and be nice and be friends toward me and whenever he talks to Ash he asks her to say 'hi' to me and he's trying to be nice, so it would make me a total hardcore bitch to not even try on my part.

That, and I'm so caught up on the idea of anything that might brew between me and my tattoo artist that I can hardly care about Ash's relationships right now lol

I find out that it's only going to be Ash and her mom for thanksgiving, since her dad decided he wants to open his new business Thanksgiving Day (what a dumb ass) and is making her brother open it with him, so I told her she and her mom are MORE than welcome at our house and she said they might consider it. Right now I'm just waiting for her to wake up. We got in around 2:30 last night and stayed up later working on her school project. So she's really tired and I've always been a morning person, so I'm trying to get her up and going so I can take her home already and surprise her mom with her. Problem is, Ash can press a snooze button that goes off every ten minute for the length of two to three hours xD So it can be a little hard forcing her up lmao

I'll be heading home tomorrow for Thanksgiving, and arriving vury late. Ash doesn't get out of class until five, and we're surprising her parents with her being home, since they can't really afford to get her home and she's got them convinced she's not going. So it'll be a nice surprise I think :3 BUT, she's not out of class until 5, so around 3 I'll head to Orlando and pick her up, and then we'll drive the 5-7 hours home. I asked her if it'd be cool if she just slept at my place when we got into town and I could drop her off, like... on Wednesday. While I don't mind taking her home, it's already probably going to be 11 to 12 when we arrive in town and her place is about an hour and a half away from mine and I'm already going to be tired.

She says it's cool. I'm just glad to be going so early and I'm glad she's cool with going so early too. I've got the dorm room mostly cleaned up and got all the shit I don't use packed up. Now it's just waiting to go. I HATE waiting.