And then he was jerked back to the present when the wind tangled his long blond beard around the pump handle.

He had just begun living with her, and he was squinting up the path through the fields where she had gone. Uri and I were fixing an irrigation pump, but I knew his mind was on one of the women, Ninia. The breeze smelled bittersweet, perhaps from something in bloom. Nine-legged crabs silently hunted the lizards. They did not come back, they were not answering their radio, and the Sun had sunk almost to the top of the hills.Īround us, tiny lizards in the trees had begun their evening hoots and chimes. “There’s too much interference again, I’ll try one more time, but if they don’t answer, we’ll start a search.”Īn hour ago, three women had gone to pick fruit. My wife, Paula, shook her head as she left the radio hut in the plaza of our little village. But even then, we knew we could easily be in danger. The war had begun long before we arrived because war was their way of life It took its first victims among us before we understood what was happening, on an evening that seemed quiet. This Friday I’ve just started Semiosis by Sue Burke Stop on by and link up with Tenacious Reader. This is a quick and easy way to share a snippet of information about your current read and to perhaps tempt others. The idea is to feature the first few sentences/paragraph of your current book and try and outline your first impressions as a result. Friday Firsts is a new meme that runs every Friday over on Tenacious Reader.

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