Of course, afterwards, Mark was a mess, and had to take a bath again. It was his third bath in less than 12 hours, so he wanted to be quick. Before entering the shower, he recovered the camera, set it anew on its tripod and turned on the hose (the opening mechanism was too small for Zava’s fingers) and left Zava with a keg of shampoo and another of his surprise gifts: a comb he managed to get 3D printed and had been delivered last night. The last sight of her he got before entering the small bathroom, without closing the door, was Zava’s shapely backside as she sat on the ground to get her hair wet in preparation for her shampoo.
When he got out of the bathroom, she was still much engrossed in her toilette with her back to him, so he got dressed, smiling to see Zava had draped her improvised bikini on the same chair where she had put his clothes on top of (it looks like she even tried to fold them but could not manage it, they were to small) and went on to prepare her breakfast. He saw also that she had found and used the new plastic funnel for her Number Ones he had brought in the pickup last night. It was now propped in the farthest corner of the hangar.
“Ok, Mark I’m as ready as I’m going to get…” finally said Zava, almost whispering, self-conscious of the thin (to her walls). Mark went near the hose to close it. Zava had also taken advantage of the video screen, using it as a mirror to comb her hair and clear the snarls with her new comb.
When she turned, she saw Mark had prepared her a wooden barrel filled with some pink, seemingly fluffy fruits, another barrel of a darkly frothing, steaming brew, which thankfully did not seem to be that ghastly ‘kophee’, judging by the way its smell made Zava’s mouth water, and other two barrels, one filled with yellow flakes and a last one filled with long, white-mottled, red sausages as thick as Mark’s arm, and about 2 inches (to her) long.
“Mukira, video online. I want to see a clock, please”, said Zava, groaning as the computer initialized video on the wall again… but produced a frame with a round clock complete with hands (although she did not know they were called that) and all, but that she could not read, as she never had seen one like it ever.
“Mukira, digital clock, please”, said Mark, laughing as he neared the barrels. “A lesson for another day, I see”.
“I take it 12 would be midday?” Said Zava, seeing that it was 8:27 AM.
“Yes. We are now in the fall season (called that because the leaves start falling off most trees)”. Clarified Mark for her benefit. ”Sun rises at about 7:20 AM and sets at about 5:40 PM”. Each hour has 60 minutes, each minute 60 seconds… an hour here is about 27 of your minutes, I think”.
“Getting used to that will be difficult… By the way, what year is it, on your, I mean, America’s reckoning?”
“2035”, said Mark. “this calendar is in use by most countries by now”.
“Uf! After all those years, it is quite logical. Well, let’s leave the lessons for after our breakfast… I’m starving! We were so busy last night that I even forgot about dinner, imagine that!” laughed Zava, mischievously. “I think I had never skipped dinner before in my life!! Tell me what you got me, love”
Mark beamed.
“Well, Zava, I got you a barrel full of fresh season apricots picked right here on the island”, he said, pointing at the fruits. “A barrel of warm chocolate, I heated it with a portable electric heater inside the barrel, I hope is not too tepid for you, I know you hate too-hot drinks, a barrel of potato (a tuber) fried slices, and the sausages are called Salami.”
“Everything looks delicious… can I…I mean, we eat now??” Said Zava, eagerly eyeing the food.
“Of course!!!” Just let me take a couple of apricots…” Said Mark, doing so. Zava first took the chocolate and tried it.
Ohhh… this tastes so good!!! Thought Zava, approvingly, happily chugging the drink.
“How is it?” Asked a slightly anxious Mark.
“You definitely know me better than anyone, dear… it’s delicious!!”
“I hope all this is enough, I had the impression they did not gave you enough food yesterday”.
“Can’t blame them, though, it must be hard guessing how much someone my size can eat”, Said Zava, picking some salami. “ Huy… this tastes good too… “Oh Mark, I could get used to being pampered like this, you know”.
“Well, you pampered me quite a bit last year, you had to cook for me every day, it’s not like I could cook you anything in giantland, you know that… I could not even do the dishes afterwards”.
“Well, your little plate and pitcher was not exactly too difficult to wash… and you eat so little” Which reminds me… “Mark, how much this all cost?, I mean, only the breakfast, I see a lot of things lined up against the wall… It must have cost you a small fortune!” Said Zava, as she kept depleting the pastrami barrel and tried the potato chips as well. I was definitely famished…
“Don’t fret about it now, Zav. And actually, Betty paid for all this, I cannot access my accounts till tomorrow (I hope) when I go to the bank in person, which is when I plan to refund all this to her. Today I will spend with you”.
“Humor me, dear… I know I do not know the price of things in…”
“Dollars”
“Dollars, yet, but please tell me a similar and proportional meal, bought in ‘giantland’ would have cost, how much?”
“The breakfast alone was about 2 thousand bucks, dollars, I mean, more or less 6000 lukass, is my best guess”. Said Mark, reluctantly. “Actually, had we been in my hometown, it could have topped 3 thousand, easy”
OH.MY.GODS!!!! I’m going to eat my way into Mark’s bankruptcy at this rate!!!! She was losing her appetite…
“Holy shit!!! Going like this, I think we would have depleted our whole savings in less than a week!” she refrained to add the words ‘back home’. Home is where Mark and I are together, she thought, emphatically to herself.
“Well, Zava, I am fairly well off here on Earth, thankfully, even near to what you would call a millionaire. I cannot check now, but I’m guessing after all this time my savings must have grown with interest rates and the digital currency mining I do… and of course I’ll have to sell my house, we obviously cannot live there together, but I know what you’re thinking, Zav. It’s going to be expensive. It’s not only the food and clothes, medical care will be needed at some point for you, that’s for sure, and in this country, THAT is not cheap. Insurance, the housing and plumbing we’ll need to build for your needs... things we’ll have to fabricate…”.
Zava almost dropped the apricot barrel she was holding, as the implications dawned on her.
“Oh Mark… I’m so sorry… what are we going to do? I’m going to be the ruin of you!” I wish we could have known this would happen, I guess my jewelry would fetch a pretty price here on Earth…
“Never say that! I’m happy we’re together Zava!” Said Mark, firmly. “I shudder to think what I would have done with my life had I found out I was transported here alone!! Or even worse, if I had been left behind!!! Thank god you came along too!”.
“Me too! But I shudder at the costs! I rather think I’m the punishment the Goddess put on you, love…”
“What do you mean?”
“Remember what I told you about entering a place forbidden for men?“
“Are you serious? I never thought you were religious!”
“Never been, but… I don’t know, Mark! What explanation can you offer of how we made it here? It’s fairly specific, don’t you think, that we both ended here in YOUR country… why not another planet? Or even space, to suffocate and burst like overcooked sausages in the void? And the thing happened as I made you come… it started right after that!” Zava said at her normal voice tone, forgetting for a moment that they could be heard from outside. Before, she had been talking as she used to talk to Mark, in a subdued tone, but now she had reverted to her ‘normal’ tone, the one she used to talk to people her own size. She could see Mark had thought about the strange event, too, in his face, but failed to notice how he cringed from her too-loud voice.
“It wasn’t that specific” said Mark. “We could have landed in L.A., I mean, Los Angeles in the front of my apartment… now THAT would have convinced me”. But she could see the doubt in his eyes… he knew too how eerie it was to have appeared on Earth. She was convinced it was no coincidence.
“It could be part of the punishment, dear. I’m guessing I’ll have to walk there as well… how far is it?”
“About 250 of your miles” Said Mark, too quickly, which told Zava he had also given the matter some consideration, much more than Zava, knowing his attention to detail, and, after all, it was his turf, as he had said. “I think it’ll take us at least a week to get there”. If I’m ever allowed to. The pessimistic thought crept into Zava’s mind.
“Getting there will be costly, too, it’d be my guess” Zava mused.
“And how do you suggest we atone for our sin?” Said Mark, annoyance creeping into his tone. “Do you really think anything we do will send us magically back to giantland?”
“I don’t’ know!”, she exclaimed. This time Zava, taken aback, noticed she had talked too loudly, as Mark, wide eyed, gave an involuntary step back, his back stumbling against the still half full potato chip barrel. No…no… don’t be afraid of me, please… my sweet Mark. Does he really think I would hurt him? Zava thought, with a surprisingly intense pang of grief.
“Are we going to really fight over this, Zav?” Said Mark, hurt plain in his voice, eyes looking pleadingly into hers.
“No, we’re not” Zava said, placated, as she extended, unthinking, her hand to grab him, and was relieved when he stepped forward, walking eagerly towards her hand, and stopping between her outstretched fingers, laying his left arm on her index finger, ready to be grasped. What would I have done, just now, if I had tried to touch you and I had seen you cower, fear of me in your eyes? I really do not think I could have endured it, my dear little Mark. If that happened, I would have known I was truly being punished… I would have known I had, beyond doubt, landed in hell…
But as she held, with just her fingertips, the supple but firm body of her little fiancée, and lifted him to her face, the familiar, simple but very pleasant sensation of his warm little body squirming between her fingers, reassured her that everything was well, as he grabbed her fingers in turn, adoringly, smiling sheepishly up at her.
“Don’t ever be afraid of me Mark, it’d break my heart if you were”. Said Zava, as she tenderly deposited a kiss on his whole face, before lifting him to eye level, and caressing him with her other hand’s fingers.
“I’m not afraid, but being told off and glared at by a giant woman is not something a man can easily be accustomed to, I think” Laughed Mark, leaning contentedly against her stroking fingertips.
“I did not glare!” Said Zava in mock indignation.
“I got it all in video, I’m afraid”
“You do??!” Said Zava, shocked.
“Just kidding” Said Mark, delighted at seeing her credulous face. “Don’t worry, I’m not mad at you either. I could never be mad at a naked, sexy woman!” he looked down at her meaningfully.
“Oh, yes!!! I forgot to dress!” Said Zava, lowering him to the ground and reaching for her makeshift bikini. I keep forgetting any of these little people could walk in here at any moment and see my naked ass…. And other things… out in the open!!! Zava started to dress, noticing the delighted look in Mark’s face at seeing her struggles to get dressed in the relatively confined space, which doubtlessly offered him a view of quivering parts he was very glad to be seeing.
“Sorry for ruining the breakfast!” Said Zava, subdued, while she tied her top, the bottom already in place. I’ve got an idea to make you forget this ridiculous quarrel, you’ll see. But a little later when you least expect it… hehhehheh, thought Zava impishly, but trying to keep her poker face, as Mark called it.
“Are you finished, really?” Said Mark, surprised.
“No…” admitted Zava, eyeballing the still abundant remains of the breakfast… she extended her hand towards them.
“That’s what I thought”. Said Mark. “Anyway, you have always been very thrifty, dear, and as soon as you adapt a little you’ll be in charge of more money matters, anyway. I have to be honest, though, I WILL need your help to support you, eventually. We’re not going to spend the rest of our lives (hopefully) living on a rented hangar, taking baths from a fire hose, eating off kegs… and you cannot keep sleeping in the floor, either”. Zava was now munching blissfully at the fruit, looking adoringly at her little man. Mark noticed she chewed the apricots whole, several at a time, actually, kernels and all, her strong teeth gnashing into paste them with no trouble at all. “We did not have time to put the mat last night. Aren’t you sore, really?” Said Mark, Inquiringly.
“I was, yesterday, at the field. I thought my ass was going to fall off… the ground was too hard and too cold”.
“And this cement floor was not?”
“I’m looking forward to deploying the mat tonight, of course, but I felt so rested, so comfortable when I woke up this morning that I did not think of it; maybe the heaters helped. Anyways, Since we reunited, actually, I’ve felt so much better. At first, when I first came to myself, the stronger gravity was such a burden, but today I don’t feel any different than in my world. In fact, I doubt I’ve ever felt so strong, so good! Even colors seem to be brighter, somehow, not to mention flavors. I hardly notice these gravity shackles anymore, even, only because they sometimes get warm when I move them” Finished Zava, shaking her hand freely, shackle wobbling.
“If you agree, we need to continue the computer lessons”
“I do agree” Said Zava. She was about to finish, actually, now she suspected she would not be able to finish the whole potato barrel. “What’s next?”
“Well, you now got the basics of controlling the computer with your voice, but that is not practical in most situations. For more complex and fine control, we’ll have to learn how to use keyboards and pointing devices”.
“Before we continue, where exactly is the computer” Inquired Zava. “It is not in the camera, I suppose”.
“See that tablet lying on the kitchen counter, plugged to the wall outlet with the white cable?”
“It looks like that PDA you had, but larger”. Said Zava.
“That’s the computer”.
“And how are we seeing the images in the wall?”
“I mounted a video beam in one of the trusses of the ceiling. It projects images from the tablet into the wall. The camera is connected wirelessly to the tablet, feeding video into it, and the tablet, in turn, connected wirelessly to the video beam, projects it into the wall through the video beam, mirroring what’s on the tablet’s screen”.
“And the little frames on the screen, like the clock and the images, text and videos?”
“Those are applications, each running a different task; Each frame is a different one”.
“And where is the keyboard?”
“It is a virtual keyboard” it does not really exist, physically, or with the voice but you can invoke it with predetermined gestures or by voice. You’ll learn both. Mukira, keyboard on”
Immediately, a giant (to Mark) QWERTY keyboard appeared in the floor in front of Zava. It was only illuminated letters and numbers, projected in the ground. To the right of the keyboard, there was a 1 meter wide circle.
“I see I’ll have to learn to type all over again.” Groaned Zava, as she saw the keys much differently arranged that she was used to. But there was no point in asking Mark to make it like the one back in giantland’s typewriters.
“And that circle is the mouse, or trackpad…”
The lesson continued, Zava realizing more and more the long, but very interesting and no doubt very rewarding road ahead of her…
****
A little past midday, somebody knocked on the door, and Mark walked to it, opening one of the rolling doors to receive additional kegs of food, which Mark entered one by one. Finally, he entered three more rolling crates, and took the (mostly) empty barrels of food outside.
Oohhhhhh… what is that smell?? Zava’s mouth watered anew as a very nice warm food smell came wafting all the way to where Zava was, at the other end of the Hangar.
Zava was kind of cowering back there, covering her breasts with one arm and her crotch with another, Mark noticed, covering herself against the prying looks of strangers, self-consciously. Despite her large size, she was looking very vulnerable, eyes very wide trying to see if anyone was peeking at her from the door, lips tight, her shoulders hunched, very much unlike her usual cheery demeanor. OK, thought Mark, as he closed the door: getting her properly dressed just made it to the top of the list. Will get that 3D scanner here tomorrow…
“Lunch time already?” Said Zava, crawling towards Mark in all fours to help him with the crates, picking them easily and hoisting them from one hand to the other, easily setting them in the side of the hangar where she had slept.
“It’s nice to have my own portable crane” laughed Mark, catching up with a beaming Zava, now kneeling.
“What are you now going to treat me now with, baby?” said Zava.
“Two of the things I’ve missed the most from Earth. The first is…” Mark said opening the steaming crate to reveal… “Pizza!” he slid several flat cardboard boxes and passed them to Zava, who saw that is was a kind of flat bread covered with melting cheese, bits of sausages and other toppings she could not identify”
“Ohhh it looks as delicious as it smells!”
“And some coca-cola to go with it”, said Mark, opening one of the kegs, with a bubbling liquid, evidently some kind of soda. Zava started opening the boxes and eating them, and then she tried the coke.
“I did not know I was this hungry…. Mmm” said Zava, as before, making short work of the food. “Dear, hate to be the wet blanket but if we keep eating this every day, I’ll not fit through that door at the end of the quarantine…”
“Of course we can’t eat these things every day” Laughed Mark, “but I’m afraid getting proper, healthier food for you takes time, dear devourer, and we don’t have a freezer that can keep up with your needs around I’m afraid. I’ll have to go shopping every day for you, until I get acquainted with the local shops and can order the stuff brought to our doorstep. Just wanted you to relax today with me, and I like the chance to show you some of the good things Earth’s cuisine has to offer”.
While they ate, Mark played some videos for her on the screen, showing her cities, landscapes and people of Earth. He showed her also some street scenes of L.A., as well, where he hoped to take her as soon as he could… and as soon as they let him. Many movie stars and celebrities lived there, said Mark.
Zava, on her part, was delighted with the very crisp images and sounds playing on the screen, and all the people! Looking at such sharp images is like being there! Thought an astonished Zava. It’s mindboggling to think that if Mark were to step into any of the scenes we’re watching nobody would bat an eye at him… well, maybe the women would, he’s so handsome… but if I were to appear there, people would probably scatter, screaming in a panic… all these people in these videos… every one of them… even the President Mark mentioned, would fit in the palm of my hand… and other places, too! I can never enter any of the rooms or houses I’m seeing, only peek from outside of the windows, perhaps… same with cars and planes, which means I will have to walk everywhere, too… And, I’m probably the strongest woman, no, make it the strongest person or being, likely, on Earth.
“What’s in that last keg?” Said the observant Zava, as the pizzas were drawing to an end, and noticing Mark had avoided mentioning it.
“The third thing I’d like you to try: ice cream! Even got a nice new shovel for you to eat it with”
Zava laughed. Before Mark zoomed the videos to full screen, she had noticed the background image on the screen was the self-portrait he took of them at the field with his phone. They both were smiling happily in the pic, lit by the sun, seemingly without a care in the world.
At least for today, I can pretend I’m in heaven along with my handsome, if small guardian angel. A very expensive paradise, though, this is turning out to be.