Meu amor marinheiro

Posted on 16 Apr 2018 @ 5:39pm by Lieutenant JG Gaius Weber

812 words; about a 4 minute read

Mission: History
Location: Porto, Earth
Timeline: 57747.49

Eu sou um marinheiro

The searing heat radiated from the concrete road that had seen better days. The darkened road that had once enjoyed shade in the form of densely packed silver fir trees had opened up into the heat and sunlight. Now only endless rows of vineyards dotted the view with the odd cork oak trees twisted and sunken with age.

The trip shouldn’t have taken this long but the roads into the countryside of Portugal and especially the mountain reins had quite the complicated bus schedule which in some cases only had the local native language explaining the routes. His bus had dropped him off 15 kilometers back and he furrowed his brow in annoyance at this walk.

The hair was slick with sweat and it stung his eyes as he walked. Still despite the heat he was rather happy to be in the birthplace of his family. While he had been born into the metropolis and cultural city of Porto he had spent a fair amount of time in the ancient and barely mentioned small town of his mother's family.

Passarela.

The sign was battered and browning at the tips and it move gently when a dry wind blew much to the relief of Gaius.

He stopped for a moment taking in the countryside, seeing in the distance the mountain ranges that seemed to rise out of the ground in all directions. The town was on a plateau and was isolated which seemed to not only keep out the modern ways of life but also concentrated the old ways of thinking and doing things.

As he walked down further the road he noticed a black figure staring down at him from a stone ledge that guarded the right side of the road. The animal turned its head in recognition and jumped down all but tackling Gaius to the ground in a flurry of jumps and paying at his legs in distress.

He chuckled softly petting the dog in it’s frenzy trying in vain to control its excitement.

After a few minutes he walked off with the dog in pursuit. Soon a large home came into view, it was a cement block home finished white with plaster that seemed to stand out beside the green of the olive trees and the dried grass that gave the rolling lawn a feeling of a golden yard.

He knocked on the door and after a moment of shouting between two people the door opened revealing a short and frail woman dressed in dark wool clothing.

“Agora você vem aqui?” The old woman answered in a rather shrill voice.

“Avó, please switch back to English. You know how terrible I am at it” he whined.
“That’s because you don’t practice!” she said waving her finger in annoyance. She gently led him into the cool home and sat him at the table quickly setting a small feast in front of him of fruit, bread, cheese and a large pitcher of wine.

“Come on stop running around and sit down I wanna talk.” Gaius said trying to get the attention of this short woman who was moving from cupboard to cupboard .

“Ok. Ok.” She said coming to a stop at the table and sitting down, sitting next to him and cutting cheese.

“So….” Gaius said trying to keep the conversation nice and light.

“....you’re leaving for the Gamma Quadrant and won’t be back before I die?” The old lady said never taking her eye off the cutting board.

As always his grandmother had pegged the situation had decided to cut away the possibility of him trying to break it easy to her. She had soft tears in her eyes but she was smiling.

“You have to go, meu amor.” She said pulling him into a hug.

They held each other for what felt like an hour, with both of them realizing that they would likely never see each other again. It was strange to be in a room with someone who loved expressing the idea of death in such an open way. She clung to him so that he would remember him and he clung to her to never forget her.

After a few moments they pulled away and stood near each other, neither sure what to say or what to do but knew that they wanted to be near one another.

An hour or so he had his arms full of food and small gifts that had been half-forced into his arms.

They hugged again and as he walked up the road with his friend jumping at his side. He heard one last word from his grandmother.

“Meu amor marinheiro!” She said waving in a mixture of both happiness and sorrow.

OCC: hey guys hope you enjoyed this first post! And please bear with me if I’ve misspelled anything.

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