What Do You Think?

Writers: Jane, Vix
Date Posted: 14th June 2008

Characters: Lineal, Vaheri
Description: Lineal shows his aunt, Vaheri, the redecorated captain's room.
Location: Elsewhere on Pern
Date: month 10, day 8 of Turn 4

"Want to talk to you about something," Lineal called along the balcony, waving his aunt toward him.

Vaheri sighed as she moved toward him. "I know, I know – I've arranged for more food than usual, but we've more mouths to feed now." "Oh, no. It's nothing like that," the new captain of the Sungazer assured the headwoman. "It's this, in here." He indicated the door of the half-sized stateroom directly behind the captain's office on the crew deck.

She paused for a moment, considering the room that for so many years had belonged to Lineal's father before smiling wryly. "So you've finally decided on a use for it?" "I have. It's no use to me and Rahona. Our family's going to be Turns growing up." He pushed the door open and indicated she should enter the room.

All the staterooms on the Sungazer (on most riverboats) were a standard size - 18 hand-spans by 15 - and slept four when fully used. Except this little one. Always called the Captains Room, most likely because it was situated right behind the office at the front of the crew deck, it was decidedly snug, only a little over the length of the double bed and barely twice as wide. The door opened to reveal the foot of the bed and the narrow cupboard that had been fitted between the bed and the wall.

"We redecorated," Lineal said, know that would get the headwoman's attention for such jobs were her domain and nobody else's.

She raised an eyebrow. "Redecorated? I'd never pegged that as one of your interests." "Sanded and polished and cleaned and replaced the mattress," he explained. "I didn't do the cleaning bit, but I did some of the rest."

It had been his father's room, the room his father had died in. When he thought about it, probably a lot of the Sungazer's captains had died in it over the Turns. But now the woodwork in the tiny room glowed fresh and clean and the bedding was as neat as was humanly possible. There wasn't anything else in the room, other than the deep woven-reed armchair, and even that had been refinished.

Riverboat rooms were seldom so bare, but there was a reason for this one being so.

It was a bit of a shock to see the room without Jesten's personal effects, most of which she had helped to remove, but it was time to move on. She nodded her approval, sidling in to run a finger over the new finish of the chair. "You did fine work." She turned to him expectantly.
"So what do you intend to do with the room?" "Give it to a person who deserves a room to themselves."

Vaheri frowned as she puzzled over this reply. "I'm sure that several think they deserve the privilege, but how do you decide?" "Well, I said to myself there are five people with essential leadership roles on the Sungazer. The pilots I eliminated because their role isn't as much leadership as just vital." He counted off two fingers for the rejected pilots. "And Uncle Barr, but he's settled with the other oldies - and don't repeat that. And me, in with my family." He waggled the last finger at his aunt. "Which left you."

"Me?" Her eyes narrowed in puzzlement. "Here?" "You. Here. If you want it."

This truly was an honor that he was offering to her, but still. . . "I.
. . I had never considered. . ." Her eyes wandered around the room, small, and yet cozy in its arrangement.

"It's tiny, I know," Lineal said apologetically. "But the window is the same size as normal rooms so it feels a bit ..." He shrugged. "It's up to you, Vaheri."

The size had nothing to do with it. She moved to the center of the room – a few steps from the door – and looked about thoughtfully. It was further from the kitchen and less convenient in that way. But she was getting older and others should be taking on more of that responsibility. It was not the room to which she was accustomed, was the room she associated with Jesten. Yet it would help her and everyone else to move on, to recognize that Jesten was gone and would not return to this room.

She pointed to the wall behind the bed. "My wedding quilt would look good there." "It would. And look at all the shelf space," Lineal said. Because the bed was fore-and-aft on the riverboat instead of port-and-starboard the whole outer wall of the room that wasn't window had been fitted out in wooden shelving. "Plenty of room for -" He didn't really know what his aunt would treasure and all his life he had kept very few possessions with him, as was typical of riverboat children and seacrafter adults. "-
Stuff. Your stuff."

Vaheri nodded and chuckled at his description. "And even space for more.
. . stuff." "Yeah. As much stuff as you wanted, pretty much." He studied his aunt's expression, now that she was smiling. "What do you think?"

She shrugged. "I think that moving in here would free up more space for our new crew members while still giving me privacy." She glanced around the room, nodding once more. "And I've a feeling that with all of those extra people on board, I'll need that privacy more than ever." "You probably will. So ... Yes?"

Vaheri nodded. "Yes." The young captain of the Sungazer grinned. "Do you need help moving in?"

"I'd like to put everything in place by myself but I won't say no to the carrying of everything." "Nobody in their right mind would," Lineal said, resigned to an afternoon of trotting to and fro along the balcony under his aunt's command.

She took a last glance around the room and then headed for the door. "No sense spending our time standing around here." "No. None at all."

Last updated on the June 15th 2008

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