“Hey, sleepyhead! You’re up.”
Crindi set aside the pan of sizzling bacon and moved a kettle over a blue flame. She did something to a device mounted on a three-legged stand that was aimed right at me.
Then she almost skipped through the cozy, brightly lit room, around the small dining set with its floral candle and unreal green tree, to where I lay immobile on the cushy bed.
Something was making a regular noise that was an undertone to the gentle music. Her skips matched the ticks and tocks like she’d practiced it.
She pulled over a chair to sit next to me. “I’m so happy you’re awake!” She’d obviously been dying to talk to someone, even someone who couldn’t understand a word she was saying.
“You were sleeping like you were dead. I kept checking your pulse to be sure you weren’t. You stopped looking dead after a day or so, but you were breathing, like, once a minute and it was totally freaking me out.
“When you finally let out a snore, I was like ‘Yes! Not dead!’” She threw her hands into the air like her favorite strongman had won a wrestling match with a crocodile. “You can snore all you want. Proof of life! Ha ha!”
Just watching her was already making me exhausted again.
“I shouldn’t keep saying ‘dead’ over and over. Just keepin’ it real. But I’ll cut back.”
Crindi looked different—and a lot less threatening—without her lab coat and goggles and noisy, terrifying metal tools.
She’d changed her hair. Her afro was now styled in small, loose twists that framed a sunny expression. She tucked a few delicate, coiling strands behind one ear. Her bright yellow cardigan was perfectly sized to her narrow frame. Her pants—blue jeans, I learned when I got some of my own—looked new.
She smelled faintly of something earthy, nutty, and rich with hints of coconut. I smelled of it, too. It was wonderful.
Small earrings dangled from her ears—the loop and cross of the ankh, symbol of life, death, immortality, and a bunch of other stuff. They appeared to be made of actual, polished gold and must have cost a fortune. She turned slightly, and the gold glinted in the light from the candle against her deep, black skin.
My first impression was that she must be royalty. The expensive jewelry, the rich fabrics of her clothing, her perfect, white teeth and skin without a single wrinkle or scar obviously placed her far above my station in life.
Not to mention her beauty. Her features were the ideal ones of every Nubian woman I’d ever seen, with a wide, rounded nose, full lips, and broad cheekbones under lively eyes.
On the other hand, I’d never met a princess, but I couldn’t imagine that one would care for someone of a lower class like me, or even acknowledge I was the same species.
Whatever Crindi was, she was wearing enough clothing for at least three people. This was my first clue that we must not be in the scorching, open-air oven of Egypt, where a typical woman’s outfit might consist of a simple, knee-length shift of linen and bare feet.
Or nothing at all if it got hot enough.
Although it was the oddest outfit I’d ever seen, I got the impression that she’d taken great care with her appearance, as if she was trying to impress me—which I found both adorable and unbelievable.
(The videos of her from that morning became some of my favorites.)
Even without getting up, I could tell that Crindi was tall enough that I’d have to look up at her a bit while standing. I was on the short side, even for my day, at four feet nine inches, and she was probably at least three inches taller than me, which put her at about five feet—undoubtedly normal height in this new reality.
This makes me laugh now. The first time I ventured out of the flat, I immediately learned that we were both shrimps in the land of giants.
On the street, women glanced briefly at us, but some of the gigantic men looked at us like we were dolls. In my weakened state, it made me feel fragile and was, honestly, terrifying at first. Crindi told me to remember that feeling since it would come in handy if we happened to go out at night.
(In other words, nothing had changed in that regard over the last 4,600 years.)
Crindi folded her hands in her lap and her entire personality changed from jubilant to guilty in an instant. Her voice became somber.
“First off, I need to let you know that you have a tiny little bandage on your tummy. A plaster, I guess they call them here. But only a teeny-weeny little bandage. I feel absolutely horrible for trying to sample your intestines with a power drill. Like, horror movie much? But I barely nicked you.”
She waved a finger in the air. “Still, Nurse Crindi is on the job, so no slacking on the infection patrol. But it really is super teeny-weeny. And I’m so sorry. You can’t even imagine.”
She dialed her smile back up to eleven and her sunny demeanor returned, along with her excited voice.
“I have good news and bad news. Which one do you want first? The bad news? Good call.” Crindi was more than capable of carrying on both sides of a conversation by herself.
She picked up something and poked at it. The music subsided to background-noise level. I had no idea what the flat, pink miracle-in-a-box was, but I immediately wanted one.
“I’m sure you didn’t get to hear music every day, so I thought something from your era might be nice. That flute-y stuff’s growing on me.” She winked. “We’ll save the metal for when we really need to get your blood moving.
“OK. Brace yourself. I’m super, suuuper sorry to tell you that your monkey didn’t make it.”
Yeah, I never owned a monkey. I’m positive Mr. Cheapskate didn’t pay for an underworld companion, so I must have gotten a mummified bonus monkey from some mortuary mix up. Score!
I’m kidding. Monkeys are barely domesticated little hoodlums on steroids.
“Apparently, since little Peppercorn—such a cute name!—was found right next to you, you’ve always been kept together as a pair, which is sweet, right? Ms. Satsohimopltep and Mr. Monkey, taking a trip to eternity together. It’s romantic. Except for the monkey part, I mean.”
Yep. Me and my trusty monkey, off to search for paradise side by side. Not in a million years. If I’d had any idea what she was talking about back then, I’m pretty sure my laughter would have revealed that I’m a non-romantic, heartless monster.
Crindi wasn’t good at sitting still and was smoothing all the wrinkles out of the light-orange, plaid bedspread covering me. My stomach, curious if not actually hungry for the first time in forever, started asking politely for bacon.
“I was careful opening him up in case he’d gotten whatever magic potion you got, and I even tried giving him a little wine. But he was very much your standard 4,600-year-old, mummified monkey. You can imagine.
“It wasn’t until afterward that I remembered I had to do something with the body. We don’t exactly keep linen wraps and resin around, so re-mummification was off the table and I didn’t want to use duct tape or something. I already had evidence to hide and didn’t want any more, sooo…
“I snuck out and gave Peppercorn a nice burial in the park in the middle of the night. Insane, right?
“I have no idea what I was thinking. It’s been hectic. That would get me deported all the way back to California if I got caught. Good thing you liked small monkeys, right? Small monkey, small grave.
“Oh, and, ha, ha! I may have also used an extra shovel from the coal miner collection, but they have dozens of them and they’re not that old. And it was a shovel, which like, nobody really cares about, right?”
She threw her hands in the air again.
“I’m breaking so many rules! And I can’t stop! Opening 4,000-year-old wine turned out to be a gateway drug to a life of crime! It’s like I’ve become Dr. Jekyll or Mr. Hyde or whoever the bad one was. I wanted to get everything just right for you and maybe—just maybe—my better judgment went out the window for a bit.
“Oh, oh! Right! I said a few words from the Book of the Dead and tossed in a few things from the dollar store—I mean pound shop.”
She patted the sleeve of my baggy, light blue pajamas.
“So don’t you worry. I might be going to archaeologist hell, but I’m sure your little monkey buddy’s going to be completely fine in the netherworld.”
. . .
Wow. Just… wow.
Trying to bring dead animals back to life and burying bodies in the dark of night.
(Another reason this became one of my favorite videos was because it was chock full of blackmail material.)
No wonder Crindi had gone a little thick with the makeup. She was trying to hide the fact that she probably hadn’t slept in three days and was being kept conscious by willpower and caffeine.
A whistling sound came from the kitchen area, which occupied half of the same white wall the large yellow door was in, plus wrapped a bit around the far corner from where I lay. A narrow counter separated it from the crowded living space.
Crindi hopped up and dashed to the stove, calling out “Teatime!”
She came back with a little tray that held two dainty, white porcelain cups on saucers and a small dish piled with white cubes.
“It isn’t really teatime, but this isn’t really tea. You look like you could use a pick-me-up.” She sat again and glanced at the results of her bedspread smoothing.
“Whoopsy! I made you look like a mummy again, all tucked in tight. But we’ll say it’s more like a cocoon with a beautiful butterfly growing inside.”
(You can roll your eyes at this point. I always do.)
“My favorite lemon-berry herbal blend.” Wisps of steam floated above the teacups. It smelled enticing.
She set the tray on a tiny bedside stand, then used strings to bob little white bags up and down in both of the cups. She glanced at the thing that was tick-tocking on the kitchen wall.
“Two minutes for steeping. Good news next. And there’s more than one thing. First of all, girl, you are looking amazing!”
She pulled something circular with a handle from a drawer in the bedside stand and held it up. It was the clearest mirror I’d ever seen, way better than polished bronze.
Shockingly, I didn’t look like I felt, which was one step above dead.
I was wearing a red and green knitted cap with deer on it and a fluffy ball on top. I could feel it against my bare scalp. Apparently, whatever magic had kept me alive hadn’t stopped my hair from falling out.
In the childhood of my first life, I’d had thick, full hair, wavy but not quite curly when I grew it out, which I and my sisters all did. But my husband had liked long hair, so I developed an instant aversion to it on myself and cut it off. My normal style as an adult was anything from shaved to a couple inches in length, and I endured whatever punishment came with that decision.
Baldness was fine by me, but cold. Covering up with a Christmas stocking cap suited me fine.
I was still painfully thin, borderline emaciated. But my eyes weren’t sunken into their sockets and my medium-brown skin had an ever-so-slight glow of health.
As I gazed into the mirror, I tried to lift my left hand to my face. Crindi saw what I was doing and helped me run my fingers over my cheek, then my lips. My rehydrated skin appeared smooth, no longer affected by severe dehydration and a full-body, eons-long resin wrap. I was darker than I had been in my past life, more like the brown of the swollen Nile River during the flood, rather than the dark tan of wet sand. I liked the change.
My skin was softer than I had anticipated. Softer than it had ever been. That wonderful, rich smell was even on my fingertips, mixing with the aroma of lemon-berry tea and bacon.
My nose, at least, was willing to believe this was heaven.
“You’ve still got those amazing cheekbones.” Crindi could always find a silver lining. She laid my arm down gently and winked. “Don’t you worry about your moisturizing routine. I’m on it. For your whole body. I’ve been using my own special, hand-blended cream I mixed up for you. Cocoa butter and coconut oil. It’s heavy, but your skin is drinking up every drop.
“I, uh, I’ve been putting extra on those… rough spots. I know it won’t do anything, but…”
Her brows knitted in an unfamiliar expression of anger.
“I can’t imagine what you’ve been through. History overlooks ordinary people, you know? And we gloss over stuff we don’t want to hear about. One of my professors used to say, ‘history almost rhymes with misery.’
“But, like I told you before, I’m here and I’ll protect you from anything like that ever happening again. We don’t do that stuff anymore… well, it’s not supposed to happen. But anyone will have to go through me to get to you. Seriously. I really mean it.”
She turned her attention back to the teacups and lifted the small bags out and laid them on the saucers. Her brows relaxed as she focused on the comforting ritual.
“One lump or two? I’m a two-lump girl, so we’ll go with that.” She used tiny, silver tongs to plop white cubes from the small dish into each cup.
She tested her own tea for temperature, then carefully gave me a small sip. Instantly, lemon-berry tea—with two lumps, thank you very much—became my favorite, too.
“I don’t think you’re up for a cookie yet—I mean biscuit! Trying to blend in with the locals.”
I could hear clunks and creaks from outside the room, and muted voices. It seemed Crindi lived in a communal dwelling. The large door must lead out to a common area.
A tiny spike of fear stabbed into my chest. One person in this new world had earned my trust. Knowing human nature, odds were good that outside the door were at least a few people I wouldn’t want to meet in my current, debilitated condition.
After a few more sips, she sat back and put the cup aside so she could punctuate her sentences with hand waving again
She patted my arm and turned her smile back on.
She pointed at a clear bag hanging from a nail in the wall over the bed. It was dripping into a tube that disappeared under some bandages on my right hand.
“It’s amazing what you can order online. Fifteen of those so far. I’m not even kidding.” She winked again. “Between you and me, I may have to fudge a few things when I fill out my grant paperwork. But finding a vein! OMG, it was like my nursing finals.”
(Yes, Crindi is one of those: a winker. I’d known a few winkers in my time and they never had any idea they were doing it constantly. It always made me feel like I was in on a conspiracy when they were just telling me the sheep had been fed. It was cute. Until it got irritating.)
“You’ve been soaking up saline and glucose like a sponge. I don’t think I can pick you up anymore. Too bad, because I was all, like, superwoman to the rescue the other night.” She flexed a bicep and laughed.
“Maybe we’ll try some real food soon? I’m making some, well, it’s basically baby food. But it’s super tasty. And fresh. Not what you’re used to, I’m sure, but healthy.
“OK! Next good news. You are about to be Rosetta-Stoned, modern style! I’ve got everything ready.”
She was so excited she couldn’t sit any longer and began pacing back and forth, gesturing wildly, being careful to stay in my field of vision.
“This is amazing! The British Museum has the actual Rosetta Stone. Oh, you don’t know what that is. It came a long time after you. It’s a big stone tablet that was the final key to figuring out hieroglyphs since it has three different languages on it, all saying the same thing.
“It would be so cool if I could teach you using the Rosetta Stone itself, but you don’t need to learn ancient Greek. Only English, which is probably just as hard. I’m kidding! But not much!”
She stopped long enough to give me a few more sips of the fragrant, sweet tea.
“I’ve been quizzing myself to make sure my hieroglyphs are up to speed. Aaand…”
She grabbed some large cards off the coffee table and fanned them out so I could see the colorful images.
“Ta-da! Flash cards! My old ones, a little used but they aren’t making any new glyphs, so…” She put the cards back down then sorted through a couple different piles and pulled out two. She held them up together for me to see. The glyphs on the cards signified “underworld” and “monkey.”
So, basically, “hell monkey.”
At the time, I was mystified why that was the first phrase of my language lessons. I nearly died laughing when I eventually figured it out, which made Crindi pout for an entire day.
She flipped them to the back and there was a drawing of the named object and a string of symbols printed on each one that presumably meant the same thing as the glyphs. It was mystifying since an alphabet-based language was completely new to me. And the symbols were in way better handwriting than anything I’d ever seen.
Crindi held up a third card next to the first two with a glyph I didn’t recognize, a circular yellow face with closed eyes and a smile. A blue halo floated over its head.
“Just like the Rosetta Stone, three languages: glyphs, English, and emojis! Fun, right? The right emoji is worth a thousand words. Seriously, you can write an entire sentence using one.
“I know you probably can’t read or write, but no judgment! Hardly anyone could back then. Maybe I’m expecting too much, but with the pictures… I’m sure you can figure it out. And I’ll say the names of things anytime you want.”
She shrugged. “I didn’t know how else to start communicating.”
She put the cards down as her mouth stretched into a wide yawn. She obviously was running herself into the ground. For me. The person who was occupying the only bed in her flat. The folded, faded green quilt and pillow meant she’d been sleeping on the floor.
“Whoa. Gotta keep moving. Maybe I need to break down and buy one of those gross energy drinks.”
Bacon and more tea would have to wait. I gathered every last bit of strength I had in my spindly arms and legs and, inch by inch, scooted over to the side of the bed against the wall that held the clear, liquid-filled bag. I slowly turned my head to look at Crindi, who was staring at me, her hand over her mouth.
I nodded slightly and looked sideways, down at the pillow.
“Teppi, I can’t. I have so much to get ready for you, and you need your sleep. I’ll be fine, I swear.”
I couldn’t understand her words, but I could tell by the look on her face she was resisting. I shook my head, almost imperceptibly, then forced my lips into a tiny smile.
Crindi drooped as the last three days caught up with her all at once. She sat on the edge of the bed, looking at me with a small frown and a wrinkled brow. She sighed as she fussed with my blankets again, tucking them tighter under my chin.
“Teppi, I’m not gonna lie. The truth is, there’s more news that’s not so good. But I made a promise that I’ll never break, not in a million years, not even if it kills me, so we’ll figure something out.”
She paused for several tick-tocks as her steady, brown eyes continued to gaze into mine.
“I’m so glad you’re here. With me. I mean it. This is the best thing that’s ever happened to me. You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me. I can feel it.”
She yawned again.
“I guess I can rest for a little bit.”
Crindi kicked off her shoes and laid down next to me on the bed, falling asleep in moments. Her soft, black hair, smelling of lotus blossoms in summer, was inches away. Memory carried me back and I longed for the strength to lift my hand to stroke it.
Her breath fell into a gentle rhythm.
I had the sensation of my past, until now marooned on the other side of an endless, formless, confusing dream, starting to draw closer. I was in a small room at night, the light from an oil lamp casting flickering shadows on the beige walls, a humid breeze blowing in through the open window from a star-filled sky.
I was lying on a woven reed mat spread on the floor, huddled together for warmth while the one person I valued above all others and any amount of treasure breathed gently by my side. I fell asleep, exhausted again, my cheeks wet with tears I couldn’t wipe away.