The corner of Ira’s mouth twitched, but he said earnestly, “All I’ve ever wanted to be was a person.”
“What do you mean?”
Ira busied himself with his sewing. He’d cut one shirt apart to add fabric to another.
“I don’t... fit in here, the way everything else does. It doesn’t matter what form I take—the beasts, the plants, they all know I’m not one of them. But I’ve never fit in with humans, either, because I’m not human. I’m always the Lord of the Wood. I’m never just Ira.”
He’d gone pink.
Arthur hesitated. Their situations weren’t the same, but his way of being a person had always seemed wrong, somehow.
“Well,” he said lightly, “now I’ve seen you wake up in your chair with your neck sore and your eyes crusty, I can’t say I see you much as Lord of the Wood myself.”
Ira let out a huff of laughter.
“Anyway,” Arthur continued, “I’ve never fit in, either. The villagers think I’m odd.”
“Why?”
Arthur smiled ruefully. “I’ve never quite known. BecauseI like the wrong things, I suppose, and because I’m bad at everything, and...”
Because of everything about me, because that was the case as far as he could tell.
He buried the thought without voicing it. “Well, I appreciate that you had to ask, anyway.”
Ira huffed another laugh. Arthur’s smile turned into the real thing.
“Here,” Ira said, “let’s see whether this shirt fits.”
He tried to stand but dropped right back into his chair because Calyx was wound around his feet. He kicked it away with a beleaguered sigh, stood, handed Arthur the altered shirt, and turned away so Arthur could change.
Arthur did the toggles, thinking of his parents talking about him in their bedroom before George’s last trip to Port Lorne.
He’s so... You know what he’s like.
To this day, Arthur didn’t know what his father had meant.
He hadn’t quite finished doing up his toggles, but he said, “Ira?”
Ira turned around, his gaze dipping over the sliver of Arthur’s chest where the shirt was open. “How is it?”
“The shirt’s fine. I just wanted... What did Dad tell you about me? Did he ever...?”
He wasn’t sure what he wanted to ask. Whether he wanted to ask. He could go on believing his father had loved him as he’d been, would’ve loved him as he was, and never thought him strange.
“Did he what?”
Arthur squeezed his eyes shut.
“Nothing. Never mind.” His cheek throbbed. He cleared his throat. “How does my scratch look? It feels...”
Ira stepped closer, Calyx trailing him like a shadow, and touched Arthur’s cheek. Arthur winced.
Ira’s hand dropped to his side. “You’ll have a scar, I expect, but it’s healing well.”
Arthur nodded. When he’d finished with the toggles, Ira had him move his arms to check his range of motion.
“He never said you were odd,” Ira said suddenly. “George. If that’s what you were wondering.” He fiddled with the collar of the shirt, his fingers brushing against Arthur’s skin. “He worried you were lonely.”
