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Chapter 5

Rhett

A few weeks after Helga caught Jakob teaching me to use his axe—which still felt like an innuendo, even after practicing with him multiple times a week—Helga informed me we would be having a talk over dinner.

"What do you think she wants to talk about?" I asked Hansel as he helped me set the table. Most nights she didn't stay for dinner, and I suspected she was on dates, letting other men pay for her meals.

"Who knows." Hansel shrugged. He didn't get anxious as easily as I did over open-ended phrases like, "we need to talk".

"She has me training with Jakob, so maybe she wants me to stop and stay home with Father?"

Hansel shrugged again and took a seat before looking at me. "With Helga, it could be anything from wanting to berate us for how our appearance embarrassed her to venting about what a burden we are. It's best to let her whine and get it out."

"True." I nodded my head and set the sauerbraten on the table. I'd been hungrier since working with Jakob, and not just for food.

The man had my fantasies running wild. Especially when he worked up a sweat and dropped the suspenders to take off his shirt. It was a good thing I couldn't pop full-on boners like most guys my age, or Jakob would be getting an eye-full. As it was, he made me ache and squirm under his gaze.

We picked at our cabbage and potatoes until Helga got home, immediately complaining I hadn't had wine ready with her meal. We didn't have any in the house since the last was used to marinate the meat, and she'd drunk the rest, but I didn't point that out.

"As I was saying, your father is very sick." Helga moved on without warning. "And I can't afford to keep feeding you all."

Helga acted as though feeding her husband's children was done out of forced charity, and not what was expected. Instead of replying, I waited. She would get to her real point soon.

"You both need to start contributing more or Rhett needs to move out."

There it was.

"Hansel has school, and he eats there twice a day," I pointed out, trying to reason with her. "He can't work and get his studying done."

"That's fine for now, but this summer he needs to work. I'm not paying the fees for university when he could be working full time." Helga bit into the meat I'd prepared and a dribble of red juices dripped off her chin, making her look macabre. "And you aren't in school or getting meals made for you."

"I understand, but what about Father?" I asked, since I couldn't leave home for work and care for him at the same time.

"You can work nights, then," Helga bit back sharply. "Or get out. You're not a child, as a certain woodsman pointed out. It's time for you to pay your own way."

Hansel and I didn't reply and Helga finished her meal quickly, leaving without a word to go talk on her phone outside.

Not waiting for her to return, I tried to get Father to eat. He refused water, but drank some of the meat broth. He wasn't able to talk anymore, but he would turn his head away and make his intentions clear.

When I returned, I wasn't hungry anymore, giving Hansel my leftovers.

He'd shot up in the past year, a few inches taller than me and still growing, but he tried to turn it down. "You need to eat more, don't listen to her."

"I'll eat something later," I promised, trying to give him a smile and only half succeeding.

Opening the window by the sink, I worked on cleaning the dishes while Hansel dried. We used to fight over doing chores, but Helga had us uniting and bickering less.

"I'm done with bankrolling these children." Helga's voice filtered in on the night air through the open window, the curtains ruffling as if her tone scared them.

A shiver ran through me and I met Hansel's eyes. In silent agreement, I turned the faucet off and we stepped closer to hear her.

"Yes, that's what I'm saying… What kind of twenty-one-year-old doesn't have a full-time job… No, my husband is a potato… The state will only give me so much pension."

"Pension?" Hansel mouthed to me and I shook my head.

What was she talking about? I knew there were ways to get money for being retired, injured, or caring for family, but Helga had told me Father didn't qualify. If there was money coming in, Helga was lying about it. But then it might not be more than what she gave me to buy food.

"...I should just take them to the woods and leave them there, let them fend for themselves for once." Helga cackled, and I saw Hansel's eyes widen. "No, of course not, Trudy, I would never. They go to the woods a lot on their own…" Helga backtracked as if her friend admonished her. She couldn't help getting another barb in, though, "Yes, Rhettel is still insisting on saying she's a boy… I know, it's ridiculous."

No one seemed to realize how horrible Helga really was.

"Have I told you about her silly crush on the new woodsman?" Helga laughed again, letting me know she'd picked up on my feelings for Jakob.

She moved away from the window and we finished the dishes before Hansel excused himself to work on his studies. I didn't have time to dwell on her words. I had a responsibility to Father, making sure he was clean and didn't get bedsores.

If I had more nerve, I'd ask her about the money from the government, but not that night.

A few hours later, when Hansel and I were lying in bed staring at the ceiling, we heard the bathroom door close, marking Helga's nighttime routine. She'd be in bed within the hour.

His whisper pulled me out of my swirling thoughts. "Let's sneak out and go for a walk. Get you out of this house for a bit."

"Might as well get used to being awake all night," I added morosely. I turned to face my little brother on the bed, "Since I'll be getting a night job somewhere soon."

"No, you won't. We'll figure it out," Hansel insisted. I could barely see him in the moonlight filtering the room, but I could imagine his stubborn face. "Together."

Nodding, even if he couldn't see me, I held his hand and we waited until the coast was clear. Climbing out of the bedroom window so she wouldn't hear the front door, Hansel and I made our way toward the woods in the light of his cell phone.

The moonlight brightened as the few clouds passed by, but it was cold, so we huddled close together as we walked quickly away from the cabin. On an overturned log, Hansel and I went down nostalgia lane with stories of playing in the woods as children.

"Do you remember," Hansel got out between bursts of laughter, "when Father told us there was a witch in the woods?"

"Of course, we made it our mission to find them and rid the woods of evil."

"I thought you were fearless," Hansel whispered, nudging my shoulder with his.

My lips quirked up at the corner at the compliment, having heard this from others before. I'd been a bold, take-charge kind of child, unafraid of the unknown. It was how I'd had the courage to come out. "I was."

"You still are," Hansel insisted, noticing my use of the past tense. He pulled out his cell phone and held it at arm's length. "Selfie?"

"More of an us-ie, if I'm in it," I teased, leaning into his shoulder so we were in the frame together.

"Say, ‘munster'," Hansel commanded and we laughed through the word. "Munster!"

The flash momentarily blinded me, but Hansel took a few before looking at them with me.

"You're so handsome," I told him, tracing his strong jawline and rubbing at my own. I was a little rounder, though I had more facial hair than he did.

"You are too." Hansel took a picture of the moon and seemed to weigh his words. "Is it wrong to call you a pretty man?"

Considering how I felt before responding, I let the words settle. Did I like being called pretty when it was followed by, "girl"? No. From Hansel and with man added, though?

"No, I don't think it bothers me."

"Good." Hansel looked through the pictures he'd taken again, deciding which filters to use for social media. He loved taking pictures and sharing them. "A girl at school called me a pretty boy, and I wanted to protest."

"But?" I prompted.

"But then I thought about the toxic masculinity I had internalized to think men can't be pretty, and decided to embrace it."

Just like that, Hansel reminded me why I didn't give up on society. The youth were learning.

Chuckling to myself, I stood and started pacing to warm up.

"Oh!"

Hansel's gasp caught my attention, and I watched as he lifted his phone to take a picture of me before standing.

"I think I'll head inside. I have school in the morning."

"Alright, let's go."

"No, you enjoy the weather," Hansel insisted with a smirk.

"The weather? It's colder than a witch's ti-" I broke off when I turned to follow Hansel and found Jakob leaning against a tree on the pathway. "Oh, hi."

"Don't do anything I wouldn't do," Hansel called back unhelpfully.

He dated anyone who was interested and never settled down, so he'd already done a lot more than I had. Not that I didn't want to.

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