Chapter Twenty-Nine: Met Kafu

**Nadir**

He was moving through the hall of the main building, carrying a heavy jug of water that one of the ladies asked him to fetch from the water pump out back, when the head nun poked her nose out of her bedroom like a nervous mouse, sniffing the air for signs of trouble, before ducking her head out.

Nadir, passing by just as she did this, stopped to look at her as she eyed him in mild shock.

"Oh, good morning, honey," the woman greeted, pulling the large, button up shirt she wore over her tank top nervously around her. It looked like it was eight sizes too big for her.

He nodded. "Good morning."

"Where are you heading under that heavy load?" She asked, moving to relieve him of his burden.

He stepped back. "I have it, thank you. The blonde woman asked me to bring this to the front for the men leaving to hunt."

"How's your mother settling in?" The woman asked, walking alongside him.

Nadir blinked. "She's fine, thank you."

"How are you settling in, honey?"

"Very well, thank you."

"And your…um, Mr. Cash?"

"He's fine, thank you."

Setting a polite hand on his shoulder, the woman pulled him to a stop. "You know you can come to me if you or your mother need anything, right sweetheart?"

Nadir bowed his head. "Yes, thank you. You've all been very nice to us." He had to admit that he wasn't sure about the people who had taken them in. He didn't trust many after what happened to his family in Arkansas, but the people in this group seemed like they only had good intentions. Truth was he sort of had a chance to observe them quietly as he wandered around. He was too small to be noticed, too quiet to encourage conversation, but he liked it like that. It gave him a chance to get deep inside the heart of the group.

At the door to the front of the dorms, the woman opened the door for him, after first poking her head out to cautiously look about.

Nadir tilted his head at this, her actions were almost as though she were afraid.

Parting ways with her as she spied the tall soldier standing on the wall, Nadir continued on towards the men and women who were gathering around a truck.

Carefully he set the water jug down on the back of the open tailgate of the truck, stepping back and nodding to the big man with the blade hand. "Water for you," he said quietly.

"Yeah, thanks," the man said in his rough tone.

Nadir stepped further back, keeping close to watch the proceedings, but far enough away to stay out from under foot. Settling his back against the nearby wall of the priest's small little bungalow home that butted up against the outer walls of the place on the east side.

As the man called Merle, with the blade, packed up some weapons in the truck, and the woman with the sword doled out water into canteens for the others, Nadir spied the man named Rick milling about nearby, his baby girl in his arms.

Pushing away from the wall, Nadir headed for the infirmary as his mother left it and Cash behind. He passed by the scruffy man named Daryl as he stood in the shadows of the church with Carol, both of them deep in conversation.

"—amazed he wasn't shouting it from the bell tower," Carol mused as Nadir passed.

"Give him time," Daryl replied.

Weaving between the buildings, Nadir brushed by the soldier and his lady on the way into the dorms.

"—my shirt, huh?" The soldier asked.

"Incentive, honey." The woman replied.

"What about your shirt?"

Hurrying beyond the table Mr. Mamet had set up on the lawn just to the side of one of the sheds, where a dead man's head had been stuck in a bowl so that he could dissect it, the man's glove covered arms were coated in blackened blood from the rest of the thing's body, his face covered by a surgical mask as he operated. Nadir held his nose against the stink, as Sister Mary Claire helped Mr. Mamet, the old man named Herschel and the old woman, Mrs. Douglas watching in curiously.

"See the rate of decay in the brainstem?" Mr. Mamet was gushing as he breezed past. "It's basically soup."

Catching up with his mother, Nadir fell in step at her side, smiling as she stroked his hair with a small comforting smile cast in his direction, he beamed at her.

"Have you been making yourself useful?" His mother asked in their language.

Nadir nodded. "Yes, mama."

Pulling to a slow stop, Nadir's mother motioned to the little girl from the group who was emerging from the dorms, rubbing her eyes sleepily, followed closely by the younger blonde woman and her dog.

"Why don't you go and play with that little girl, Nadir?" His mother asked. "She must be so lonely."

"I don't want to, mama," Nadir said. "She's so young."

"Nadir, be nice," his mother warned. "Go ask her if she wants to play."

Obeying his mother, the boy parted from her, heading for the little girl who was dragging her dog off the ground and trying hard to continue walking with her dog in her arms.

"You think she'd punch me if I asked though?" Glenn asked the lady named Karen, as Nadir hurried past them, trying to catch up with the little girl.

"Excuse me?" Nadir asked the little girl as he caught up with her and the blonde woman. "Excuse me, little girl?"

Annie, the little girl, turned around with Beth to eye him as he approached.

"What do you want?" She demanded.

Nadir paused, he supposed he had been sort of rude to her earlier, but he wasn't expecting her to bite back. It kind of made him mad that she took it so hard.

Scowling, he looked over at the older girl who was with Annie.

"My mother says I should ask if you would like to play," he said.

"No."

"Annie, that's unfair," the blonde urged. "Why don't the two of you go and play on your swing?"

"No." The little girl insisted, putting her dog down and shoving her small hand onto her hip. "He smells and it's my swing, he can go make his own."

Frowning deeply, Nadir shrugged. "Okay."

As the spoiled little girl stormed off, Nadir kicked his foot idly at the foundation of the church, before spying a clump of dirt that had been upturned when the flower bed had been weeded and worked.

He stooped and picked it up, tossing it in his hand, eyeing the retreating girl's backside for a moment, before a wicked urge came over him.

Without much thought, he whipped the dirt clod at her bottom and hit it smack on, a cloud of dry dirt exploding as it struck.

Turning with a shocked expression, the girl looked around for the source of the hit and found him standing in the shadows of the building, pulling a face.

She pulled one back.

Incensed by the little girl, Nadir pulled an uglier face.

With wide eyes, Annie clenched her hands into tightly balled up fists and screamed across the convent lawn at him. "You're a stupid asshole!"

As everyone who had been standing around fell quiet, Nadir ducked around the corner of the church, out of sight with a blank expression. He wasn't sure how to take that. Surely the girl would get in big trouble for using that kind of language, he didn't like her, but he didn't want to get her in trouble.

Peeking around the corner cautiously, he spied the adults who were still loading up the trucks to go on a run, all still standing stock still, eyes on the little girl who, realizing how much trouble she was in, began to weep softly.

It was that Rick fellow, the one who beat up Cash, who swooped in, handing his baby girl to the blonde and scooping Annie up in his arms, saying, "I'll deal with this. No need to bother Grace."

Annie began to bawl louder now, thinking herself in real trouble and Nadir, worried for her, hurried to the other end of the church, as Rick took the little girl out behind it.

"Please don't tell on me, Mr. Rick?!" Annie sobbed, almost pleaded, as Rick settled on an old stone bench in the cemetery behind the church with Annie in his arms.

Nadir watched quietly as the man chuckled, stroking Annie's hair. "It's alright, sweetheart," he assured her. "Calm down. Want to tell me what happened?"

Annie shook her head as she laid it against Rick's shoulder.

Feeling a tug of guilt and missing his daddy and baby sister more at the sight of them, Nadir took a quiet step out from his hiding place, but ducked back when Annie turned angry eyes on him.

He waited behind the wall for the longest time, before peeking out again.

Rick was still holding Annie gently, stroking her hair and her back in order to get her to calm down, murmuring soft nothings and sounds to her.

"You won't tell on me will you, Mr. Rick?" Annie begged, sniffing against his shoulder.

"You know what you did wrong, don't you?" He asked.

"I'm not supposed to say 'asshole'," Annie mumbled.

"Well, between you and me and that boy hiding over by the church," the man went on, causing Nadir to duck out of sight again, "no one needs to know that I didn't punish you."

Annie's arms wrapped around Rick's neck tightly and she kissed him on the cheek. "Thank you. I'm sorry I said a bad word." She said.

Pulling away from the corner, Nadir slumped against the wall of the church in the shade. Deciding he lingered long enough, Nadir pulled out of the shadows and headed for the infirmary. He missed his father and he wanted to see Cash, Cash was blunt and sometimes he got a little short with Nadir, but he could always be counted on to distract him.

Inside the infirmary Cash was busy trying to scratch his leg with a rolled up piece of paper, his arms and legs still strapped to the cot he was in for precautions, the paper not even getting further than his hip.

"Hey, kid," Cash greeted, "do me a favour, find me something to scratch my shin with, would you?"

"Or I could just do it for you," Nadir pointed out.

"I'm not sure what the rules are on kids touching grown men who aren't their dad's," Cash returned. "Just get me something longer."

"Why not get the priest-man to help?" Nadir asked, pointing at the other adult who sat in the corner of the infirmary with them, watching over Cash, book in hand.

"Hey, kid," Cash began sternly, "when you get to be my age, you realize the less a priest puts his hands on you, the better."

"Why?" Nadir asked, moving to find Cash something with which to scratch his itch.

"You'll understand when you get older, kid."

"About what?" Nadir went on, finding a coat hanger near the door, hanging behind it in a little cloak area. Bending it straight, he handed it over.

Cash began to vigorously scratch at his shin with it. "Just drop it."

"The hanger?"

"You know something, just forget it, alright? What are you doing here?" He growled in frustration as the hanger fell from his hands.

Nadir handed it back to him and then plopped onto the side of the bed. "Nothing, Cash."

"Well, that's a steaming load." He argued, distracted by his scratching. "You know what my daddy used to do when I'd get pissy like this? He'd throw a bottle at my head and tell me to put down my purse and pick up the glass. Fucking comedian," Cash ended bitterly, satisfied with his scratch enough to set the coat hanger aside.

Nadir pulled a face. "I don't like it here."

"Yeah, well it's not much better out there."

Remembering what it was like in Little Rock, what the men who killed his daddy was like, how Cash was when they first met him, Nadir nodded. He had to admit that compared to the Little Rock group, these people were basically the best they could hope for.

"Are they really going to catch up with you, Cash?"

The blond man shrugged, sniffing uncomfortably. "Fuck 'em. I get my ass back inside Madonna, I'm golden." He fell silent, studying Nadir with his green eyes, before continuing. "Don't worry, kid, you're safe here. Better off with these people then my sorry ass, right?"

Nadir shrugged. "Why do you have to go?"

"Because I'm trouble and I'm no good to these people here, I'll only bring them hell. Hey," he said firmly. "You have to think about what's best for your mama, right? You're the man of the family now."

"My mother doesn't want you to leave either," Nadir said.

"Well, she was in here earlier, still can't understand a fucking word she says, but I know a 'I'm-better-off-without-you' look when I see one."

"You lie," Nadir insisted.

"Do I? Or maybe I'm the only one who spits the truth around here, ever think of that?"

"I always think of your lies and they are lies." Nadir said, fidgeting with a thread that had fallen out of its place on the worn blanket Cash was swaddled in.

"Well, calling me a liar ain't going to keep my ass around," Cash argued. "Why don't you go out and play or something, kid. Do some dumb kid shit for once. Steal a car, punch a cop, you know?"

Nadir smiled.

"I once took a piss on a cop car, because I could," Cash went on. "During a presidential motorcade parade, cop car was still moving down main."

Nadir laughed. "You're lying again."

"Hell yeah, I am! You think I'm a liar, then I'm fucking doing nothing but from now on."

Still laughing a little, Nadir turned his brown eyes on Cash as his smile faded. "Cash?"

"What?"

"Will you tell me one truth?"

"Maybe."

"Do you like me and my mother?"

Cash blinked at him. "Nope."

The little smile that appeared at the corners of Cash's mouth told Nadir everything he wanted to know about the man who saved them from the group in Little Rock, it brought a broad grin to his usually sombre features.

"Hey," Cash said after a bit, "why don't you poke around here and see if you can track me down some smokes, I'm nic fitting like a little bitch."

..-~-..

The Voodoo Dialect

Met Kafu - As a "trickster and a destroyer of life", Met Kafu is probably not the first Loa you should go seeking assistance from. He is a well-known teller of lies and causer of trouble and mischief. Met Kafu is likened to the Christian devil and is probably the last loa you'd want to invoke.

DarylDixon'sLover - O_o

missdaryldixon - Gah, your review was very lovely. And I agree, maybe the Lt taking the plunge might inspire Daryl. You think?

HaloHunter89 - I hope it wasn't during class or at work or something...

Brazen Hussy - I really want a chapter of Merle drinking with Cash, think those two might get along...also a Merle chapter with him getting some love.

Merle's Right Hand - I'm glad I fulfilled everything on your checklist.

itsi3 - Your dream sounds delightful. Hot Cajun soldiers are something everyone should dream about.

GG - I think Fertile Myrtle is perhaps the greatest thing I've read in years. It was seriously so funny it took me a moment of staring at it stone faced before I began laughing.

BanannaFlvdSnow - I do enjoy Milton's nerdgasming. I hope to have a full chapter devoted to it soon.