Apocalypsis 02 - Warpaint

there and back, and my butt wouldn’t be spared, either. I couldn’t imagine the special torture a bunch of skeeter bites on the hind end would be.
    Kowi walked me back to the hut, and I took note of the path we took, feeling confident I could find it again on my own. By the time we reached our destination, the sun was fully above the horizon, blazing with its warmth. Peter and Bodo were awake, busy eating breakfast - the cold remnants of last night’s dinner. I was happy to have them, since it beat starchy, plain noodles -all I had left of my own food-any day. I picked up my wood platter and stood in the living room of my hut, eating while I talked.
    “So what time do you want to start?” I asked.
    “I’ll have your first group come get you in about an hour. Do you care who’s in it?”
    “No. Whoever. Whatever. Doesn’t matter.” I was trying to talk around a lump of dry bread, and it wasn’t pretty.
    “I’ll leave you to your food, then,” he said, smiling slightly. He walked away through the trees, going I don’t know where, since we hadn’t yet seen where the Miccosukee live.
    “What about the meetings?!” I yelled out after him. Supposedly the tribes had to work out the mechanics of coming together as one nation - united against the outside world.
    “We’ll come get you!” he responded.
    I shrugged. It’s not like I had plans. Might as well do the beck-and-call thing for a while. It’ll keep my mind off of other less pleasant thoughts. Like canners keeping kids locked up in a room, removing limbs to eat when they got hungry.
    Bodo came out of the other connected hut with a platter in his hand, distracting me from my morbid thoughts. I picked up a cup with water in it that had been put on a shelf by our food preparers and pretended to drink, hiding my lower face with it.
    I had no idea why I did it. I guess because I was feeling nervous all of a sudden. He’d kissed me with almost no warning last night, and it had sent my heart racing. But Bodo was always cracking jokes and messing around, so I had no idea how serious that kiss was for him. If I let it, it could feel very serious to me, but I didn’t want to assume anything was mutual and get my feelings hurt. This world had become an incredibly small place, and a bad breakup could mean someone having to leave the only home we had.
    “Goodt morningk,” he said, no expression on his face. His German accent was stronger right now, like it was sometimes when he first woke up.
    His lack of expression made my heart spasm uncomfortably. “Morning.” I put the glass back on the shelf. If I kept hiding behind it, it was going to start being obvious, and it’s ridiculous that a girl like me would be so nervous over a guy. It was starting to tick me off.
    “Didt you sleep well?” he asked, picking up a piece of meat and biting into it, chewing slowly as he watched my face.
    “Yes. Except for the mosquitoes, I slept fine, thanks. How ‘bout you?”
    “Very nice. I think maybe I hadt a goodt sleeping magic.”
    Was he talking about the kiss? “Oh, yeah?”
    “Yeah. I think so.”
    He winked at me and smiled a little, making my heart suffer a different kind of spasm. I turned away so he wouldn’t see me smile back, pretending to be busy with arranging food for Peter.
    I could see that Peter was awake, lying in his bed and staring up at the roof of branches and palm fronds overhead. Buster hadn’t left Peter’s side, but he’d flipped over and his eyes were open, following my every move. It was comical the way his eyebrows lifted, one at a time, as his eyes rolled around.
    Walking over and getting closer to them, I noticed something greenish on Buster’s forehead. It looked like a small marble or plant seed pod or something, stuck to what little fur he had left after Peter’s haircut. I bent down to get a closer look, setting Peter’s plate down on the ground next to me.
    “Come here, Buster, let me see your head. What did you get in your fur?” I tried to pull it off but almost immediately realized it wasn’t plant matter fixed to his forehead. “Oh, sick . You have a humongous tick on your head, you dumb dog.”
    Peter instantly sat up, pushing Buster none-too-gently away from his side. “Ew, are you serious?!” He reached over quickly and grabbed his food platter, holding it close to his chest and staring at Buster with suspicion.
    I smiled. It was nice seeing Peter experiencing an emotion other than utter despair for a