More new segments: Skeletons on the outside

The Safety Pin Cafe is a place where magic pins itself to time and story in unexpected order ... This is a new segment from the border witch's journal. It surprises me, too. 

Once again, a note to the reader: If you have not yet read the original entries from The Joy Weed Journal, this one may put you into the crack between times. Read the originals by starting here.

"Skeletons on the outside," I said. "Barnacles wear their hard shell on the outside, humans and many others had their bones on the inside. By the time Max had finished the story I wasn't positive, but pretty sure he was telling our story. The one that connected him with me over the Long Time. I missed that last time around or left the remnant memory for now.
The twins born from eggs and Raven blood stretched the grace of things. But now I was hearing how Grace with a capital was not limited by a skeleton.
"You do see?" Max finally asked. "You are the young girl, the girl born kapu, sacred and timeless."
"Lokahi is me?" I knew the answer to that, but needed something tangible. An elder's answer would do that for me.
"You are."
"What does that mean then. How can I be both the young Wailuku girl, and me here in the woods on an island in the middle of the Salish Sea?" I was trying too hard becoming brittle with the fencing of habit. Protecting me from being fluid.
"Eighty is a good time to become more comfortable with flow. I remember when I was that young." Max was laughing, and I saw his mouth was filled with teeth top and bottom. "In many ways the girl Lokahi remained a girl, living in Wailuku, on the island of Maui to be present long enough to remember the Long Time. She was able to call across to the past that began with me and your Spiritual Mother." He waited for me to catch up with him. I felt my legs buckling, braced myself with my hands against the kitchen chair and sat down.
"I think I'd like some tea with a lot of sweet. Sugar!" As if the story of Lokahi weren't enough, "sugar" seemed to be some sort of pass word. I saw that look in Max's eyes. The one that sparkles when he's about to tell a new tale.
"Is there no stopping these stories?" I asked hopeful I could plug the portal. Wasn't I old enough to do that!
"Not now Pale. These stories have waited long enough. There is at least one more splinter of a story you need. And when you know them your children will find them easier when they need them." Max spoke over his large shoulders. His hands were pulling the bowl of white sugar from the shelf. The kettle chirped from the hot burner. It wasn't often I drank hot water and spoon-fulls of sugar.
"Keep it coming," three spoon-fulls wasn't enough.
"Lemon?"
"No thanks." I stirred till the white crystals disappeared, sipped and then closed my eyes ready for the next story. I exhaled and felt this.