“How old are you anyway?” I asked.
“Hah,” Bear said. “That’s a more complicated question than you realize. You’re only familiar with the linear-time thing.”
“Try me.”
“Subjectively, I’m a hell of a lot older than I would be if I told you that I was born before the Messiah.”
“Jesus,” I said, blinking.
“That’s the one,” she said, nodding. “I was at the Crucifixion. There was quite a crowd actually.”
I stared at her for a second and then said, “Wait…capital-C Crucifixion?”
She folded her huge arms, watching the game, and nodded calmly.
I didn’t quite know how to respond to that. So I asked, “What was that like?”
“Smelly,” she said quietly. “Sad.” She glanced at me. “Not for me. I didn’t know the man. But the people in his life suffered deeply. You could see it.” Her eyes tracked the ball. “The world was a great deal more dangerous then, and in that time and place the Romans were the most dangerous people in it. I know it’s quite popular to talk about how awful the world is today, but I’ve been here for a while. Things are better now in more places than I’ve ever seen so far.”
I nodded toward the kids. “Pretty sure that there are people in town who might argue with that.”
She shrugged. “They’re playing ball, aren’t they? Sure, Chicago took a pounding. But it’s still here. I’ve seen cities where the gutters literally ran with the blood of the slain. Where not one stone remained upon another. On multiple occasions. By the standards of history, your battle was a mild one.”
My voice crackled with heat I hadn’t felt coming. “It didn’t feel very fucking mild at the time.”
Bear wasn’t ruffled. The big Valkyrie looked somewhere between sad and amused. “You probably don’t want to take that tone with me.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Oh. Yeah.”
I scowled at her and looked back at the game.
“You personally took a historically significant hit during it,seidrmadr. I’ll give you that. Time has rubbed off the rough edges of death on a civilizational scale. But it will never make losing friends or lovers or family any easier.”
I fell quiet at that and folded my arms.
Bear squinted at me. “You go to bed early every night.”
“Yeah. So.”
“You don’t sleep much.”
I grunted.
Bear tilted her head, studying me. “Sometimes I hear you talking. Even laughing.”
I didn’t say anything.
She nodded slowly. “Good for you to talk. Even if it’s just to yourself.”
“What I do with my personal time is my personal business,” I said.
“Of course,” she said. We watched the kids play for a couple of minutes, and then she asked, “What was she like?”
“I’ll meet you out front at three,” I said, and walked away from the game.
—
