The First Love

"No Tous. It is time for the babies to come out." She told me to be strong, and then she left me alone. Birth was a private thing, not be witnessed by anyone else. Unsure of what I was supposed to do, I lay on my back and insticntively started to push. It was very painful, and I screamed out for hours, before a male entered my mother's shelter.

I screamed out for someone to help me, but no one came. The male approached me, his steps slow and deliberate. It was hard to see his face with his large thick beard, but I could see his eyes, as intense as a fire.

"Someone! Help!" I called out again. Why wasn't anyone coming, wondered. The male came to me and knelt down by my side. He nuzzled my neck, the way Nun used to.

"Tous. I came back to you." he murmurred. "How long have you been like this?"

"Nun! Ah!" I felt a stab of pain. "Hours, Nun. I feel so weak. I just want to sleep."

"No, Tous. That is how women die." He took me arm and brought me to a squatting position, supporting me. "Push as hard you can."

"It hurts so much! Ah!" I felt the pain again, but with Nun here, I could do anything. I started to push, as hard as I could.

"Good! I can see the head!" he told me. I kept pushing, and pushing, and before long, I had my first daughter. But that was not the end of it. I pushed again, and there was another child born, a son. Nun made me lay down, and he handed me my children, crying healthily. I cried with them, relieved.

I spent the next few days in my mother's shelter caring for the children, and Nun took care of me, making sure I had enough fruits to eat. When I was strong enough to go out, I looked and saw males around a fire, poking something in the flames. I screamed and called for Nun.

"What's wrong?" he asked rocking our son.

"Males! They're everywhere!" I shrieked. I went to pick up my sharpened stick.

"No, Tous! I brought them back with me!" he said stopping me. The males all turned to stare at us, then turned back to the fire.

"What are they doing? They'll burn everything with a fire that size!" I pointed out. The fire had tounges of flame rising six feet in the air.

"They're cooking meat. That's why males make fires." The males were putting out the fire and pulling the carcus of an impala from the flames. Then they started cutting it up with sharp rocks and giving everyone a piece. Nun took a large piece and gave half to me. "Here. Men are stronger because all they eat is meat. You can be strong too."

I chewed on it slightly, not used to the taste. The meat had all kinds of layers, like a fruit, the thick skin, the soft fat, the hard muscle and bone. I liked the fat, it didn't taste bad. "Thank you, but I like fruit best." The males were all moving off into seperate shelters, where I knew the women were waiting. There was still a large piece of meat left in the dead ashes of the fire.

"Shouldn't we do something with that? Hyenas and lions could come out of anywhere and take it off." I suggested.

"It's ours. As leader, I get the biggest piece, and I get what's left." he said, going to the meat to drag it to me.

"What's a leader?" I asked.

"All the male groups have them. They're the ones who know what to do."

"Do what?"

"Almost anything."

One of the babies was crying, and I could tell it was little Osane, my daughter. Benat, my son, barely barely made a sound. After Osane was fed, I had more questions for Nun.

"Where have you been all this time? What did you tell these males to make them come back with you?" I asked him, rocking a still fussy Osane.

"First, I had to join a group that would take me by proving I could survive by pinning one of the members to the ground. It was very difficult. I was beaten many times and turned away by many. Finally, I came to the last group in the area. One-Eye was the leader, the one I had to defeat. I was scared, but I knew if I didn't win, I might not come back in time for you to have the babies. I was prepared to wrestle him to the death, but he just gave up. He remembered how I wounded him before, and didn't want o be hurt again."

I winced. I didn't want him to be ne of the males Nun brought back! Even if he was going to stay. "He's here?"

"No. One-Eye left the group altogether. He didn't even want to be near me. The other males started talking and found out who I was, the one that had protected you, and they wanted to kill me. I knew I couldn't win against all of them, so I picked up a stick and waved it at them. I told them if they didn't do as I said, they would all be hurt like One-Eye. So they agreed to come back with me."

"And they all came back?"

"A few ran off, but most of them followed me."

I yawned, feeling sleepy. Taking care of two babies had made me weaker than usual. "Sleep beside me, Nun. Like you used to." Nun obeyed, curling up against my side. It felt good to feel his familiar presence. That, and knowing he was fine, and that he wouldn't let any male hurt me. "Do you think it will always be like this? Not worrying about attacks?"

He was quiet for a while. Then he ran his fingertips over my face, looking at me like he was searching for something. Nun looked my straight in the eye, with a look that stopped me. I couldn't breathe, I couldn't move, and for the first time I knew why. A feeling, as solid as the earth under my body, passed between us, making us closer than possible. But I wanted to be closer still. I encircled his body with my arms, resting my head on his shoulder.

"They'd have to kill me before I let anything happen to you." His voice was foggy with emotion, so soft, I almost didn't hear him. Nun then decided to do the starengest thing of all. He pulled away from me, just a little so he could look me in the eye again. "And you know I'm pretty hard to kill." Then he started to laugh, a rolling deep sound. For once, I understood, and my voice joined him.

Nun had never laughed before. He had always been so serious, always so sad. It made me happy to see him feel...joy we call it. "Nun, you make everything better." I said, pressing my face to his shoulder again, so full with so many emotions I didn't know what else to say.

"I love you, Tous." he said. Again Nun changed everything, and all he did was say words. They had never been said before, but what he had done had never been done before. There had to be something new said for a new beginning. For new feelings.

For once, I understood him. "I love you, Nun." I told him. I froze in fear though, as if we had disrupted some natural order that was balanced by human misery. But then I decided that something as important as love was worth fighting for, suffering for. And I breathed then. I breathed, and I held Nun even tighter.