Edris Ro: The Good Tablecloth

His household and his work

Edris lives with his eleven-year-old son, Evin, in two rented rooms above a cobbler's workshop in Velisar, the capital of the Orinthian Empire on Caelune. The kitchen window admits the smell of warmed leather. Their folding table also serves for homework, mending and the small model boats Evin builds without any evident interest in their ability to float. Evin spends alternate restdays with his mother, whose work takes her between several provincial theatres. The adults exchange practical notes and occasionally manage a pleasant conversation.

At the palace laundry, Edris sorts damaged textiles before they enter the washing drums. Machinery handles volume; his task is to decide what the machinery would ruin. He recognises scorch marks from ceremonial lamps, cosmetics that require separate treatment and the stiff little crease that means a careless hand has pressed over a fastening. He takes pride in returning an object fit for use. He has never met most of the people whose clothes pass through his hands.

Rent and food take most of his regular pay. He accepts additional shifts to cover school materials, replacement shoes and the repairs that their landlord considers improvements. There is usually enough, provided enough means the same thing every week. Edris wants Evin to remember a father who came home with something to say. Recently, he has mostly brought home tired feet.

The promise

The tablecloth caught on the inspection rack. Edris freed a loop of silver thread with his smallest needle and spread the corner beneath the light. Someone had stitched a field of flowers around its border. At a banquet, plates would cover most of them. He wondered whether the person who had made it knew that.

His supervisor, Marit, put the following day's shift sheet beside his elbow. 'Can you stay through the evening? We have the reception linen as well.'

Edris almost said yes. Evin's school would open its workshop that evening. The boy had mentioned it over breakfast with studied indifference, then left the invitation beneath Edris's cup. On the sheet, an empty square waited for his name.

'I can start early,' Edris said. 'I need to leave at the usual time.' He kept his eyes on the thread. Refusing felt extravagant when he had spent the morning calculating the price of shoes.

Marit considered the piles behind him. 'Early will help. Write the hour you can do.' She passed the sheet to the next worker. Edris had prepared an explanation involving his son's education and the importance of fathers. Apparently the laundry could survive without hearing it.

At home, he found Evin repairing a wheel on a model ferry. 'I'll be there,' Edris said. The boy looked up. He did not smile at once; he had learnt to wait for the qualification. Edris sat down and held the axle while the glue set.

What he brought home

At the school workshop, Evin explained his ferry to a visiting engineer and forgot that his father was watching. His hands moved as he spoke. He had made a loading ramp that folded, a gate that latched and a little compartment for the crew to eat in. Edris had heard about the ramp. He had not known about the crew.

'Everyone needs somewhere to sit,' Evin told the engineer. He glanced towards his father then, suddenly shy. Edris nodded as if the point were technical and beyond dispute.

On their next shared restday, Edris spread their own tablecloth over the folding table. It was plain, with a faded patch where a hot pan had taught them something expensive. He had repaired its hem months earlier. Evin fetched their mismatched plates and set the ferry between them.

They ate baked onions and the small savoury pies Edris had bought on his way home. Evin described an argument between two classmates, gave both sides different voices and laughed so hard that the crew compartment came loose. Edris laughed too. The extra morning hours had left him tired, and the evening wage he had declined would still be absent from his pay. Neither fact spoiled the meal.

Where we leave him

Edris has kept one promise and put the school's next open evening on the kitchen wall. Marit has agreed to consider early hours when extra laundry work is available; she has not guaranteed them. His household remains careful with money. Its table now has a repaired ferry on it, and Evin has begun asking what his father makes at work. Edris is deciding how to explain the flowers.

The notice at the tram stop

On a later school morning, still before the princess's departure, the warning board at the tram stop had turned amber. Edris could smell the industrial air before he read the affected districts. The back of his throat felt lined with warm metal.

Evin pressed close to read beneath his arm. 'Does that mean no school?'

'It means they keep you inside.' Edris checked the school message. Lessons would continue, but the morning route through the lower ward was suspended. The alternative stop lay beyond the square. Walking there would make him late for the early shift he had requested.

Evin coughed once and immediately looked guilty. Edris hated that look more than the delay. He took them back towards the cobbler's entrance, where the air was no better but they could sit while he called Marit.

'I can come after the replacement bus,' he told her. 'I can't leave him to find it alone.'

Marit said nothing for a moment. Machinery rattled behind her. 'I'll move the damaged linen. Record the actual time when you arrive.'

That meant less pay. It also meant she had not asked him to invent an illness for himself. Edris thanked her and put the device away.

The cobbler opened his door. 'You can wait inside. Don't touch the new soles.' He stepped aside with the solemnity of a man admitting refugees to a room full of glue.

Evin sat on an overturned crate. 'I could have gone by myself.'

'I know you could try.' Edris heard the sharpness in his answer and crouched beside him. 'I want to know which bus you're on.'

They waited among strips of leather. The cobbler shut his outside vent and checked the filter indicator, muttering at the cost. Evin asked whether the palace got the same warning.

'Yes,' Edris said. Then, because the boy was watching him, he added, 'It has more doors between the warning and the people.'

When the replacement bus arrived, Edris walked him to it. Through the glass, Evin held up the folded school project he had kept safe inside his coat. Edris waved until the bus turned, then hurried towards work with the taste still in his mouth.