10 comments/ 39557 views/ 31 favorites A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 01 By: TaLtos6 **No demons or werewolves here. This is just a straight-ahead romance. Ok, it's a little odd since I wrote it. O_o I may use this as a platform for other relationships among the people around the ones here, I don't know yet. I'd been planning to post a different story, but realized that this one has to precede it, so I may as well get this one said. I plant to post the chapters for this weekly if I can. ---------------- PROLOGUE Riding back to the compound, he felt more numb and empty than anything else. Two of the crew tried to engage him in small conversation to get his mind off everything, but he didn't have much desire to reciprocate and they gave up after a while. He imagined that he now knew how it felt to be a spent piece of ammunition and just wanted to be left alone. He knew that he was leaving a mess inside the armored personnel carrier, but didn't have enough concern left in him to feel badly about it. He made enough of an appearance at HQ so that everyone could see that he was still moving air and then turned away, nodding in agreement that he seek medical aid. He really didn't give much of a damn about anything, and was only there to lock up his rifle. Asked why he wasn't at the compound hospital already and he replied that he wanted a cigarette, and they probably wouldn't allow that, and the way that he felt at the moment, the result would likely be unpleasant for all concerned, himself included. He supposed that it was his small smile which put everyone off. He couldn't help it. They all thought that he must be in shock. The idea was what made him smile at the absurd irony of it. Two hours ago, he'd been in shock. Now, he didn't give a flying fuck. Insisting on the short walk, and ignoring the looks that he received, he headed for the hospital to let them do their business, but on the way, he reached into his shredded shirt pockets for his smokes. And of course, they were completely sodden with blood and who knew what else, he remembered sourly. He tossed them into a bin and seeing a corporal smoking nearby, he bummed one and a light. The corporal stared, and his only comment after lighting the thing was, "I'm uh,... I'm having a bad day." He shrugged. Well it was the best that he could come up with. "No shit," the corporal replied. Finally, he stepped inside. They began to fuss over him. He provided his serial number, and they got to work. He couldn't believe the questions. They asked him why it had taken him this long to seek their help. He shrugged, "I'm still walking, aren't I? I had to make sure my people were ok and that nobody else got hurt. The marketplace is a mess now and it took a while. You guys only see the results. It's a little different at the scene. I had a hell of a time just seeing everybody for the dust at first." He grinned, "But I'm here now, so you can get started, unless there are forms that I have to fill out in triplicate or something." The medics told him he'd lost some blood. He looked down at the blood and filth that he wore and replied, "Uh-huh." They told him his wounds were not serious. He looked over and said, "I kind of figured that since I walked here, but you oughta look for shrapnel. I itch in a few places." They told him that he'd need stitches. He sighed, "Yeah, I figured that too. Look, so far, the only reason that I ought to have gotten here sooner is because you seem to have to remark on all of the things that are really obvious. Can we just do this thing while I'm still young?" Just after the time that he had the last of the stitches removed, his rotation time had come around. Two weeks after that, he walked up the ramp into the cavern of the transport and sat down heavily. He still felt numb and empty. He'd started this deployment feeling lost over Sam's death and a few other things, but otherwise, he'd been up for it the same as at any other time. Now... After the usual interminable, endless farting around, and the long taxi to the active runway, the fat bird clawed skyward with its engines howling. He normally liked to try to get at least a look out the window if he could. This time, he was asleep long before they'd reached cruising altitude. Walking into his sparsely-furnished home days later, he set down his bags and looked around. "How is everybody?" he called. Listening to the silence, he smiled, "That's what I thought. Glad I didn't miss anything." He placed one long distance phone call, and after hearing pretty much what he expected, he promised to be on his way soon. He placed a second call, and made a hasty arrangement for noon the next day. He sighed heavily as he hung up. Later that evening, he stared at a pair of photographs on his desktop monitor as he drank his second beer. He clicked the PRINT button and pulled his camera's memory card from the reader slot. Setting the prints aside carefully on the table near the door, he went to bed. The next day, his usual artist couldn't help him, but introduced him to the new girl. He looked at her portfolio and nodded, explaining what he wanted, and produced the photographs, insisting that if at all possible, he needed her help right then. The woman looked at his arm and agreed, but asked him if he had a tendency to pass out. He nodded with a small smile, "Every damn time." "Ok," she said, "You know that's just your endorphins going crazy. It happens more to men than women, it's no big deal. I just wanted to make sure you're aware of the possibility." He was already taking off his shirt. She stood ready with the razor to shave his arm. He chuckled quietly, "If I've got any endorphins left, they were crazy long before this." As his shirt came off, the woman stared, "Holy shit!" "Uh-huh," he sighed, "I passed out when I got these too, but I hit my head that time." That evening, he carefully applied the Vitamin E cream after waiting the proscribed period of time to remove the wrapping from his arm. Like every other time, he felt as though he had a very local sunburn, and there had been some blood. And like every other time, he'd passed out once. He looked at the spot, both directly and in the mirror. "Damned endorphins," he muttered. Finally he went out back to light the fire in the pit out back. He'd dug it for the very occasional time that he had his friends over. Tonight, there was no one waiting there for him but his ghosts. It still being spring, it was too cool and early to stay out long, but the mosquitoes kept him company and he didn't care much either way. Sometime during the first beer, he carefully burned the photographs along with the memory card and stirred the ashes with a stick that he tossed in afterward. Sometime after the second beer, he heard the word again in his mind, the last thing she'd ever said as she smiled up at him just before she died in the arms of a soldier from the other side of the world. He heard that one word ring through his mind in the voice of the small child that he'd never forget. Fereshteh. He knew what it meant now. If he could have had his wish, he'd have been what the word meant, because then he'd have been able to save her. He hung his head and now weeks afterward, he finally began to weep for her. The house was locked up the third day, and he looked at his bike, wishing. Not this time, he thought. He climbed into his big Ford and began the long drive south. When he arrived a few days later, he had it together as the woman that he considered his mother hugged him tightly in welcome. ----------------- CHAPTER 1 Kayla Fraser found herself paying more and more attention to the engine temperature gauge as this trip wore on. It had been doing its imitation of a slow motion metronome since they'd left Phoenix. Overall, it averaged just above the center, but there were excursions above and below that point depending on how hard the engine was working, she supposed. She had noticed that the air conditioning kept cutting out going up inclines, or when she pulled out to pass, which was often. She wasn't sure, but it seemed to her that lately it was spending far more time on the high side of center. She cursed that fool of an ex-boyfriend for selling her this car the year before. The fact that she had almost hounded Frank into it against his better judgment was beside the point. She should have known better than to take the word of a man, and a weak one at that. They were all weak if it came right down to it. Frank himself had some misgivings about Kayla's planned move from Phoenix to Santa Fe, and wasn't sure the sedan would hold up to her abuse for the duration of the trip. Especially once she'd told him that she'd be pulling a rental trailer. She never maintained it, and only brought it to him when something was wrong. Kayla abused everything and everybody equally as far as he could tell and she expected things to last forever. He'd faced her frequent wrath as she pointed out his many failings as she saw them. She kept calling him for help and he dreaded picking up the phone when her number showed up on the display. He still wished her a safe trip. Hell, anything to get her out of his life. He figured it was a small price to pay just to see the back of her. And he'd been over looking at the back of her for two years now. Kayla Fraser was a handful in many ways. 33 years old, and just over 5' 4", she was lithe, but not bony or sinewy, with a smallish bust, and a wasp waist. Her green eyes were set above high cheekbones and seemed almost to flash if she was annoyed or angered, a not uncommon occurrence. She had very thick auburn hair that compounded the effect. The dark red mane hung far down her back, but the longish bangs out front gave those eyes a jungle to peer out of when she was pissed at something or someone. You could say that the girl had a temper. She was capable of amazing things when that fire was lit. She'd almost killed a 19-year-old break-in artist when she'd come home unexpectedly as he was ripping her apartment up in his search for something fence-able. He had pulled a knife, but since she was already angry, her response was not the fearful one that he had expected. She'd used her telephone to beat the tar out of him. He hadn't pressed charges. Kayla was used to having to fight for what was hers. She had little use for men of any kind. In her experience, they were all after one thing anyway, and were only useful to a small degree while they wound themselves through all sorts of devious knots to get there. She in turn used them along the way, but had always enjoyed slamming that door on them in the end. That was her favorite part. If they didn't like her treatment of them, they should have just left well enough alone in the first place. She was never the one who initiated the conversations that led to their pathetic games anyway. She'd been on her own since dropping out of college in order to get into modeling and dancing, though that had begun a slow trip into another entertainment industry altogether. She couldn't stand the work, but the money was alright. Kayla had finally recognized that her childhood dream hadn't led her to any castles, and wasn't about to, She'd done her best to bank as much of the money as she could against the day that she'd try to salvage her education. That plan had been overtaken by events, as it turned out. When life had handed her a completely unexpected reason, her interpretation was that it was the reason that she'd been waiting for. In a complete about-face, she'd gotten out of her slide by sheer force of will, and was now in a line of government work after completing college the hard way. It had forced her to lighten up some, since now her work demanded that she could function in a team environment. But the rough edges that she'd picked up along the way had kept trying to surface, and her coworkers sometimes found her hard to deal with. She'd been estranged from almost all of her family for a long time now as a result mostly of the type of establishment where she'd danced. As time went by, the numbers dwindled, not that she cared anyway. There had been few that had given much of a damn about her. Fifty percent of what family that she had left on earth was in the car with her now. Well, those who were worth a thought, anyway. Kayla's niece Jillian sat strapped in on the passenger side and listened as her aunt complained to the steering wheel about the car. Kayla stopped abruptly when she noticed it. The thought came to her that if they had lived a hundred years ago in the same circumstances the car would then have been a horse and she'd have long ago whipped it to death. She smirked ruefully at the thought, and was thankful that Jilly always had the effect of softening her outlook. Kayla exhaled and resolved for the billionth time to quit fussing about things and enjoy life when she could. She was moving them away from the place where there seemed to be no hope for them, and nothing but bad memories. The job transfer had been hell on earth to arrange, but had finally come through – there was even a month's leave before she had to start. She just wished they were already at the old ranch where she and her sister had spent a few summers when they were Jilly's age. Her aunt and uncle were the strongest people she'd ever met, between them they could take whatever the world threw at them - especially her uncle, Sam. He could manage any catastrophe with a wink and a smile. Kayla's kid sister Marcia had been killed in a rollover in Tennessee on a business trip together with her husband two years before. The highway patrol had attributed the cause to be a high rate of speed in less than ideal conditions; the fog, slick road surface, and an unexpected turn on an unfamiliar road being contributing factors. It all added up to a tragedy. In truth, Kayla realized, the tragedy had begun when Marcia and Bob were dating. Jillian was the result, and they both felt obligated to marry for that reason. They had liked each other a lot, but other than a moment of passion (or weakness if you listened to Marcia), there was no "head-over-heels" to it as far as Kayla could tell. Little Jillian was a payoff in her own way. A cute and lively seven year old who swelled Kayla's heart sixteen times a day, even though she could sometimes be a handful herself. Kayla had promised her sister's memory that she would raise Jillian to be someone that Marcia would have been proud of. She would do it without thought for herself. Jillian's arrival had been the catalyst that Kayla had needed to remake her life. She would do anything for this little girl, and God help anyone who hurt her. Jillian was so full of life that sometimes the deep reddish mop on her head looked like it was only along for the ride because it was attached. Once she stopped, her hair regained some composure, but in motion, it looked like it was hanging on for life itself. Jillian was listening now as her aunt explained the old "I SPY" game to her. Kayla looked over at her niece and smiled. She knew that she'd regret this game once they started, but Jillian had grown tired of her coloring books right then. ------------ Rose Marriott was on her way home. It had been a long day – well, a long week come to think of it. But now that she was on her vacation, she felt she had something to look forward to. The second real bright spot on the horizon since she'd been widowed. The first bright spot had been Joshua's arrival for an extended stay to help out. God, she loved that man. He was the son she'd never had, and never knew she'd needed until he showed up. She'd loved him since the day that Sam came back from town on that old motorcycle of his telling her that a young man might drop by for dinner, someone he'd met on the road. "He's just passing through Rosie, but he looked like he could use a proper meal. There's something about him that seems kind of lost to me, though he's polite and all and he looks like his head's screwed on straight. Not lost, really. More like he's searchin' for somethin', only he don't know it yet." That had been a mouthful for Sam, Rose thought back to that time. She knew that she was lucky if he said that many words to her in a whole day. There is a drawback to loving the strong silent type. She'd realized that too late, she knew. Right after she'd fallen for him years before. She'd known that she wouldn't get much more out of him on the subject, so she'd set about dinner. A couple of hours later she heard a strange-sounding motorcycle come howling down the long drive. Sam went out to welcome Josh, and then he dragged him in to meet her. Sam was right – Joshua Taylor was as handsome a young man as she'd ever met with no airs or pretentiousness to him. He had intelligent, thoughtful, and Lord, such blue eyes, and a quick, honest smile. But there was something about him, something dark, though not in a bad way necessarily. During dinner, she fussed over their guest to the point of making him feel slightly uncomfortable, but carefully not beyond it. Then she had a part of the puzzle – she could see that Joshua was slightly shy, but there was more to it, she was certain. He insisted on helping clean up afterward. Rose was having none of it until she'd let him persist to the point of having the dishrag in his hand. As they washed the dishes together, Sam remained at the table, with that small smirk of his that she loved so. He'd known what she was doing, the old rat! Rose asked, in ever-tightening circles, the questions that would tell her what she wanted to know. The line of her questions had the logic of a butterfly's flight path, but each one fell imperceptibly closer to the mark: Yes Ma'am, he was traveling alone. No Ma'am, there was no girlfriend at the moment. Yes, he used to have someone special, but that had come apart. No, there was no chance to repair it, Ma'am. Sam interjected at that point in his own inimitable style, "Sounds to me like he wouldn't piss on her if she was on fire." He winked at them. Rose rolled her eyes skyward. "Yes, honey. I kind of arrived at the same conclusion, thank you for that" she said, cuffing him with the dishtowel. Joshua had smiled, "Well, I wouldn't put it that way, Rosie. We just made some mistakes is all, and she's moved on." His hand kept catching her eye. At first she couldn't place it. It wasn't until afterward when they all went out to the porch for a beer that she thought she had her answer. His left hand looked to her (and if asked, she couldn't say why, she just knew) like there had once been a ring there. There was no tan line or indentation; he'd taken it off years before. "Joshua, I don't mean to pry. It's certainly none of my business, but I can tell you that Sam likes you since you're here. And I like you too, Dear. But you have a look about you that tells me that you're hurting someplace inside, and I'm certain it's got a lot to do with what you told me couldn't be 'repaired', as you put it. Was she your wife?" Josh froze. Sam later told him he had a real "deer in the headlights" look at that moment. He considered excusing himself to leave right then, but instead just nodded and quietly said, "Yes, that was 6 years ago." At that instant, Rose saw the full depth of his pain in his eyes. She was amazed at the intensity of what she'd seen given the passage of time involved. It was only there for half a second, and then he had it hand again. What she saw was inexplicably enough to hurt her too, a heart that was turning into a bleak and barren place. She didn't mention it again; he'd talk about it if he wanted to, whenever he wanted to. Josh never knew how it happened, but between the two of them they got him to stay with them for a week, putting him up in the small bunkhouse. He just puttered around with them, helped out where he could, and enjoyed himself. When he finally left to ride home, he felt better than he'd felt in a long time, and he was truly thankful for that. He'd promised to write them when he got back home. He'd been coming back ever since. That had been a long time ago. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 01 Now Josh was back because she needed him for some jobs here and there. The truth of it, she knew, was that she also needed him because he was a light in her life. Especially now that her Sam's light had gone out. She had struggled for months to decide if she should keep the old place or sell it and move to town. She thought about Kayla and Jillian. Even in her grief at Sam's death, she'd noticed that once they'd arrived after the funeral, the place had brightened a little. Kayla's eyes told a story she'd read before, but she knew that Jillian and Kayla had each other and had become a small family unit. Rose thought that unit was looking a bit fragile due to Kayla's circumstances. Her thoughts kept coming back to her waiting decision about the ranch. She just could never decide until one night the thought came to her that her niece could use a fresh start. She herself needed something of a fresh start to feel useful again. Josh had needed one for years. Once that thought had taken hold, she sat up in bed and turned on the light. She found that she couldn't sleep. She was wide-awake. She fixed herself a cup of tea and sat in the kitchen listening to the clock. Slowly the pieces showed up in her mind. She nudged them around in there, looking for possibilities. Once she had looked at everything, she smiled. Finishing the last of her tea, Rose went to bed. She was asleep within a minute. The following evening she had called her niece and found that though they were doing okay, Kayla felt like they were getting nowhere in life, just treading water if that made any sense. Rose laughed softly and said, "Oh, I know exactly what you mean" Over the course of the call, she suggested that it had been years since she'd spent any real time with her family, and with Sam and her own brother being gone now, maybe the few of them left ought to get together while there was time. And that was that. Over the next months, they began to have email discussions over the realities of a long visit. It gradually became a life-changing plan. The only detail that Rose hadn't mentioned was Joshua. She'd just have to play that by ear. She knew her niece, and she knew Joshua. The two had never met, and if either of them knew of the other ahead of time, then neither of them would have been there. "Sometimes you just have to throw things in and stir the pot," Rose told herself. At the very least, nothing would happen, and they would all hopefully enjoy the time together. The ranch would be more populated for a time, and in the worst case, could still be sold off. On the other hand.... well, they'd just have to see. ---------------- By the time Kayla had gotten off Interstate 40 and onto Interstate 25, she was certain there was a problem. The engine temperature was climbing. The rate of change was imperceptible, but over time, it was definitely heading up there. She had gassed up, and they'd had lunch, during which time the engine had cooled off, but she knew that with the climbs that were in their near future, it didn't bode well. At the gas station, Kayla had a brief conversation with the attendant who had mentioned the heat of the day. They'd left Phoenix with its 100-degree plus climate behind, but were climbing steadily. It was "only" 90 now, but they were at 6000 feet above sea level. The poor Cavalier was wheezing with the load, and the radiator fan was hardly ever shutting off now. "Well, you're climbin', and with a trailer like that. It's not that big a car, Ma'am," the attendant offered. "What does that mean?" asked Kayla. "Well she's haulin' a full backpack, if you get my drift." He said. "You can help some by making sure the tires are up to the right pressure, and you might want to shut off the air conditioning, and open the windows. You won't feel any better, but your car will thank you for it." "Thank you, I'll try it" Kayla said. Little Jillian was curious about that. "No Jilly, the car can't talk. The man just told me how to help the car to not work so hard." As she checked the tire pressure, Kayla concluded that it was probably a good thing the car couldn't speak. She figured it would probably have a thing or two to say to her about now. The temperature did go down some, but when they'd gotten off the main road, and onto the secondary roads it had begun to climb again. They had just gotten onto the dirt roads when Kayla heard the chime. She looked at the dash and saw that the engine warning light was on. The engine temperature guage was hanging just below the red. She pulled over and shut off the engine. The radiator fan kept running. "Are we there yet?" asked Jilly. "No, but I'm pretty sure we're close. We have to let the car have a rest for a bit, Jilly" said Kayla. "It'll be ok after a while, I ho... uh, I think." Kayla scanned the horizon, and thought she recognized the old water pump windmill on her aunt's ranch in the distance. She figured they could walk the remainder, and Aunt Rose might know somebody that could help with the car. They began to walk up the gentle slope, and past the rusted fence. ------------------ CHAPTER 2 Joshua Taylor sat sweating on the steps of the porch reloading the ancient Colt as the day's heat shimmered on. Looking at anything out beyond 100 yards caused him to wonder about the tales of the old West. He suspected that the waves of heat which came off the ground and distorted the view must have saved at least a few cowboys and Indians. That, and lousy aim, he thought. At 36, he was not what you'd call thin. He wasn't round either. He'd been lean and muscular as a young man and that had carried on, though he'd never seen the inside of a gym. His build came from working for a living. And maybe some genetics, he supposed. Over the years, he'd filled out a bit, but he still had a trace of a six-pack instead of the paunch that some of the men of his age group were sporting. Then again, he wasn't a sporting kind of guy. He and his television weren't exactly on a first name basis, and when he could find the remote, it usually wouldn't work since the batteries had given up waiting for the day they'd be put to use. He flipped out the loading cover on Sam's antique pistol, and began to work the spring-loaded rod under and to the right of the barrel, turning the cylinder each time to the next stop with a quiet click. One by one, the spent cartridge casings dropped to the step at his feet, ringing softly. He reached into the box to his right and grabbed a few new rounds, the rest squirming out of his sweaty grip. One by one, he slid them into a chamber in the cylinder, and rotated it to bring the next empty chamber into view. Once he'd loaded five of them, he rotated the cylinder again so that the single empty chamber was the one aligned with the barrel, and under the hammer. Just me and my trusty five-gun, he thought. The old Colts had no safeties to prevent accidental firing, and since the hammer rested lightly against the back of the cartridge itself, it was possible that just the right impact on that hammer would cause the pistol to fire – like if you dropped it. For this reason, it was always wise to load just five, and leave the hammer over the empty sixth chamber. Hollywood had never caught on to the old safety rule. Josh didn't care what was written on his tombstone, and long as it didn't include the words, "He shot his own dumb ass". Josh lived alone, and he'd told himself that he liked it that way for so long that he believed it. He appreciated women, and found them fascinating. But he'd never found the right one, and he'd eventually come to the realization that if there really is someone for each of us, then there must be an island someplace with hopefully a beautiful woman shipwrecked on it. Besides, in his mind he'd had his big chance, and he'd blown it. He closed the loading cover, picked up the empties, and placed them on the porch rail with the rest. Wiping his damp palm on his jeans, he stood squinting at the empty chili can on the old saw horse 15 paces away. He marveled at its immortality. The damn thing had been there since lunch. There was now so much lead buried in the rise behind from his misses that he wondered if it qualified as a mineral deposit. He extended his arm, and pulled back on the hammer with his thumb to bring a live chamber into line with the barrel. Concentrating on his breathing, he leveled the pistol, and exhaled slowly as he started to squeeze the trigger at the bottom of the breath. It would still be a race – either he'd get the shot off, or the drop of sweat that threatened to run from his right eyebrow would get to his eye. The can disappeared as the Colt roared in his hand, and then his eye stung from the sweat. He chuckled with a slight smile as he rubbed his eye with the back of his hand. "No pain, no gain." he sighed. He'd never been the type of guy who'd had to step over the women on his walkway to get to his car in the morning and go to work. He'd been introverted following an accident as a child, but he'd mastered his shyness to a large degree during the intervening years. He'd had to. The one time that he'd given his heart, he'd meant it. That wasn't something that had been easy for him to do. But it takes two to tango, as they say, and the other one preferred to dance without him. Married at 21, separated at 22, and divorced as soon as possible. One day she just told him that she wanted a divorce. He never did find out if there was another man, though he assumed there must have been. He just blamed himself. His wife was in such a hurry to leave that she signed over her share of the place to him, and was gone. And it was her idea. Since there was no equity at that point, she was really just leaving him holding her half of the debt. That kind of thing could work wonders for a guy's self esteem. He thought of the years afterward as the earthbound equivalent of Purgatory, a terrible time to be a trapped young man. Always broke, trying to pay for the mortgages he'd taken out to buy the house that his bride had just had to have, and eating dog food because it was all he could buy with what was left. He liked the Irish Stew flavor the best. It didn't taste too far off the real thing if you heated it. Once things finally got better for him he'd never touched even the real Irish Stew ever again. At the same time, it was positively raining women. He'd run into them every damn place, and his friends kept trying to set him up. But he seemed to be bound to the whipping post. His looks, though rugged, tended to frighten off the girls that he tended to be most attracted to. If he did seem to be hitting it off with a girl, he knew that out of fairness, he'd have to tell her of his status. Those ones would disappear just as fast as that old can – he was damaged goods. He smirked as he remembered the one from his doctor's office. It had gone well, until he told her over dinner in a restaurant one evening. She'd paused with a forkful of food at her lips, and looked at him for 4 seconds. Then she put the fork down, wiped her lips with her napkin, got up and walked out without a word. He hadn't really eaten for a week so that he could take her there. Then there was that long string of women who had shared only one common trait between them; they were serious nut jobs. He hated the bar scene, and gave those ones a pass as politely as he could. He began to think of ways to effectively search the South Pacific islands for one with a stranded girl on it. He doubted that his ex-wife ever had been "that one" for him. Plainly he hadn't met her expectations anyway, whatever they might have been. She'd never told him. Eventually, it stopped hurting so much, and he just lived his life. It never occurred to him that with this adjustment, he had effectively shipwrecked himself. He just knew that he never wanted to be that close to someone only to feel that kind of pain again. He'd worked his ass off to deal with the mortgages, but there wasn't much he could do to get more hours where he worked. When he could, he rented the place. The rent didn't cover all of his costs, but went a ways in the right direction. Josh himself joined the military. The structure didn't give him time to "wallow", as he put it. Besides, it was free room and board, and a job that made sense to him. His folks looked after the place, and helped him to sell it when a buyer appeared who wanted an investment with a tenant in it. Josh took the tiny profit and ran. Straight to a motorcycle dealer. He paid cash, got his license endorsement and was on the road the following week. Riding became his therapy. He didn't care where or when, and most weather didn't faze him. Where there's a will, there's a road. Whenever time permitted, he was riding. His postings took him all over, but he made every effort to keep a bike close by wherever the job took him if possible. The only thing that stopped him was winter. By spring every year he was ready just to go anywhere. He had very few ties; after his father had died of cancer, his mother seemed to have no interest in life anymore, and faded out soon after. That was sort of how he wound up here in the scrub land of New Mexico. He smiled, thinking of his old friend Sam as he holstered the Colt and walked forward to put another can on the sawhorse. It was during his second time riding Route 66 when he was 27 that he had met Sam and his wife Rosie. Josh had decided to take the old pre-1937 alignment through Santa Fe that time. As he poked along in no hurry, he was thinking of pulling over to have a cigarette when he saw an apparition about 200 feet off the road. He pulled over and flicked down the side stand as he killed the engine. He unzipped his jacket automatically, and pulled off his helmet. As the engine ticked quietly, the hot dry breeze began to cool his wet hair and damp T-shirt. He was staring at what looked like an old Harley police model from somewhere during World War II. He got off and walked over slowly to admire it. Other than looking a bit tired, it could have been on patrol the previous week. He noted some tracks leading away from it. As he was about to turn around to see where the rider had gone, he heard a low voice that had all the finer tonal qualities of a cement mixer. "It's not f'sale if that's what you're thinkin'." Josh turned on his heel to look at a middle-aged man who might have stepped out of an old nondescript western novel. He wore an open vest over what had probably been a white shirt when it was new. The jeans looked like they held enough dust in the fabric to seriously hurt the old bike's fuel economy, if that were possible. There was no telling what color the boots had started out life as. He had a walrus mustache over at least a week's growth of beard, and longish hair that brushed his collar. All of it might have been black once, but the salt and pepper mixture was leaning towards the salt part now. Josh hoped that he looked a bit like that when he got to where this man now was. "I wasn't thinking, just daydreaming." Josh smiled and held out his hand. "I'm Joshua Taylor." "Sam Marriott." The older man announced. "I was over the rise waterin' my sage bush when I heard your bike wind down and stop, and thought I'd better have a look at my old girl, just in case." Sam watched Josh's eyebrows begin to climb. "Waterin' your...." The man smirked, "I was havin' a piss. What would you call it?" "Sorry, I'm a little slower than usual today." Josh chuckled, and pulled out his cigarette pack. As he lit up, he caught the look in Sam's eye, and offered. It was accepted with a grunt. They talked a while longer, and Sam learned that Josh was passing through. Josh found out that Sam and his wife had lived in the area "forever, give or take a week." When Josh ground out the butt, he bent down and picked it up, depositing it in his jacket pocket. He caught Sam's quizzical look. "I'm not a tree hugger, but I don't see any of the other kids pissing in the sandbox as much as we are. No point leaving something else behind that doesn't belong." Sam's curious smirk showed the humor in his eyes, and he answered the question that was in Josh's mind. "I picked up two of these at a police auction over in Albuquerque a long way back. Planned to use one fer parts, but I've never needed to. The old gal just keeps on goin', though I don't work her hard. Other one's in my driving shed. Least I think that's where it is. Haven't looked for it in a while." After a few more minutes of talk Sam invited Josh to drop by his place if he was in the mood for dinner and a beer, and gave him simple directions as he walked to the old bike. He opened a saddlebag, pulled out an old open-face helmet, and traded that for the tired Stetson on his head, which took the helmet's place in the saddlebag. He fussed with the bike for a second, and jumped on the kick starter. The retired patrol bike came to life with a clatter. As he shifted the lever on the tank into first gear, and maneuvered his "old girl" around to ride back down the gentle slope, Josh asked which one was Sam's sage bush in case he wanted to contribute as he was leaving. The smirk grew into a slow smile as he winked and said, "Pick one out for y'self, boy. On this side of the road from here to the corner, they're all mine!" He laughed and was gone. Josh had known Sam and Rosie for 9 years now. He hadn't intended to take Sam up on the offer that evening. He naturally shied away sometimes, but after getting lost later in the afternoon and backtracking a bit, he told himself that he was on vacation, and that meant meeting people, an integral part of any road trip. So he found himself in front of Sam and Rosie's home early that evening. Inside of 20 minutes, Rosie had noticed the cold wound where Josh's heart should have been. She took to him like he was her own son and they insisted that he stay with them for a bit. At least they'd get some use out of the old bunkhouse. Rosie was a lovely woman in her mid-forties then with long thick auburn hair and light green eyes. They became his surrogate parents when he came to visit with them every year. He came as often as he could get time away, no matter where his posting was. Rosie was always telling him that for sure the "right" girl would come along, and to be open to it when it happened. Sam said that women were like buses; there'd be another one along in 20 minutes. "Hell, they even come in from ev'rywhere twice a day now in Santa Fe." he chuckled. Rosie chewed Sam out in mock outrage for it, and Josh decided that he had no desire to be a bus stop. One thing he knew for certain; those two had a love that most people could only wish for. Josh held no such illusions for himself. Sam had passed away the previous year. Josh was two weeks into a 3 week stay, but found Rosie pacing the living room floor one afternoon as he came back from town with some lumber to finish up the loft he had built in the driving shed. She confessed to Josh that Sam hadn't been well the past while. He had left that morning saying that he wanted to listen to the wind for a bit. He'd been gone for four and a half hours at that point, and she didn't know where he was. Josh knew exactly where Sam's "listening post" was. Sam had taken him there the year before. He'd found the spot as a boy, and had told no one about it until then. He loved to listen to the desert there. Together they drove out in Sam's old truck, grinding a bit over the rough patches. They found Sam not far from his Harley in a gully. He was alive, but his "golden 2 hours" had long passed. He'd had a coronary, and his face was the color of his beard. Josh pulled out his cell phone and dialed 911. He didn't know if the municipality had a medevac bird, but he prayed fervently that they had. Sam and Rosie were on their way to the hospital in Santa Fe within 20 minutes on the helicopter, but by the time Josh got there an hour later it was over, and Sam was gone. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 01 Josh stayed, but left within an hour of the funeral. Sam didn't have any family, and there were a few of Rosie's people there, so she would be in good hands. He himself was far too upset to talk to anyone. He'd been less upset when his own father had died. As he was turning onto the main road, he's was almost broadsided by an older red Cavalier. He just shook his head and rode on. He was back this year on a leave of absence to help Rosie with the jobs around the place that he and Sam hadn't been able to get done before his death. Rosie was still trying to decide what to do with her life. This was the first time that Josh hadn't ridden down. Sam's "old girl" had been left to him and he planned to have it shipped to his home. Josh knew he had maybe another hour before Rosie got home from the municipal offices where she worked. He had just walked back to the porch to begin working on his next victim, though he knew that the soup can was in little danger. He was fairly certain that the stars wouldn't line up for another miracle anytime soon. Josh had never hunted; he had no need. He had nothing against responsible hunting, it just wasn't his thing. He could drive a tack with a rifle, but never had a kind thought for pistols, until that rattlesnake had bounced off the side of his boot the week before while he was fixing some rusted out fence. He'd never seen so many of the things around before this year. He wondered what population of small creatures in their food chain had exploded to cause this many to be around. Surely they were living on something. He had no fear of snakes, but he did have a healthy respect for these pit vipers. He'd often surprised them accidentally, but had always been able to retreat peacefully, or give them a chance to leave if they would. It was the possibility of meeting two of them at once that bothered him the most. He was about to stuff another round into Sam's gun to replace that last lucky shot when a sound came to him faintly, it seemed like a small voice in the distance. He listened hard, but heard only the wind. He looked off to his right, and stared into the wavy haze. There appeared to be a moving blob out there, far off. "Damn, I guess Roswell must be missing an alien." he muttered. Josh walked onto the porch, wiping the sweat off his face with a towel, and grabbed the binoculars. "What the ....?" There were two of them. "There are TWO aliens walking on Rosie's land." He waited a minute, and looked again. He saw a woman and a child. He ran for his SUV. He only paused long enough to puzzle over the climate controls for a second. He never changed them much, but now he wanted the AC cranked when he got out there. He paused a second time when he saw that Daisy stood resolutely in his path, and that she wasn't going to let him go anywhere without her. He sighed, and got out. "Fine, but you get in the back!" He swung out the tailgate, and she jumped aboard. As he turned onto the rough, Josh selected 4 WHL HI and motored. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 02 **Well, ya know, I suppose that it is just possible for two people to bump into each other, heave a couple of deep sighs between them, and fall in love. I don't know about you, but it's sure as hell never happened to me. So if we take my version of reality as the valid one, I offer a look into the meeting of two classic "A-type" personalities in a less-than-ideal setting. ~chuckle~ So sit back and watch the fur fly. 0_o -------------- Jillian had been quiet for the last while. Kayla was concerned. They'd been walking for more than 45 minutes or maybe an hour, and the windmill only looked a little larger than it had from the road. The wind was almost nonexistent, and neither of them had a hat. Jilly had stopped telling her that she was thirsty. Maybe this hadn't been a good idea. She wondered how she would get Jilly back to the car. That would be a treat. It would be baking hot inside it now, and she didn't know if it would run at all or even start. She thought she heard a car, but wasn't sure. No, she decided. She was sure she was hearing something, but what? They stopped while she mopped Jillian's forehead, and her own. ------------ That was how Josh found them as he came trailing a cloud of dust. The white Expedition roared up over the rise and skidded to a stop. It sat for a second, before the driver's door opened and a man got out and strode rapidly toward them wearing jeans and a faded denim workshirt. He looked to be about 6 feet tall, broad-shouldered and muscular with blonde short-cropped hair on top, and not much visible anywhere else. Kayla was happy to see anybody at this point. She prepared to tell the man that she'd had car trouble, but then paused. His expression was severe. What was that on his face? She had a thought that perhaps this might not go as well as she'd hoped. She saw the six-gun strapped to his thigh and wondered about that as well. "Sign on the fence says 'Keep Out'," he said in a flat tone. Joshua would have liked to come off sounding a little more friendly, but he'd pretty much hauled ass out here wondering if he could reach them before they found themselves boxed in between a couple of snakes. He couldn't understand how they'd gotten this far. Torn between just getting to them as quickly as he could, worrying over the snakes, the distinct possibility of heat prostration and whether he'd lose any parts of his truck's suspension, since he was beating it up pretty well here hadn't left him much time to think of a better way to start at the moment. 'Hello' might have worked, but he hadn't thought of it. "We're having car trouble, and I saw the windmill," Kayla said, pointing past the Ford. Joshua was incredulous. Who the hell would just wander through this place with a kid when there was a road there - with gravel shoulders and everything - that would lead them wherever they were going and offer them the best chance to be seen and maybe ask for help? He couldn't believe it. "So you walked past the sign and straight on. Why not try the front gate? It's wide open." "It's too far." Kayla said firmly. Who is this jerk, she thought. He was starting to piss her off. Who the hell has a tattoo on their face? Jesus, a brown lightning bolt? He shrugged, "It's only a little farther. The ground's a lot easier to walk on, there are less hills, and there most certainly are a lot less –" Josh stopped as he noticed that the little girl looked a bit wobbly. She'd probably land on her face in the dust any time now. He began to step forward toward the girl, and his eye caught the motion of the small bush three feet to her left. He spotted the big rattler under it and remembered that he hadn't taken off the Colt's holster in the rush to get here. He drew the old pistol and cocked the hammer as he brought it up out to the right side. Kayla's eyes instantly widened. "What are you doing?" "NO!" she screamed. Josh swung the pistol out as he stooped down to the little girl. His right knee was down between her and the rattlesnake and he had his left arm under her tiny bottom as he pulled the trigger while picking her up. The Colt bucked in his hand and Jillian jumped at the sound. Josh was already pulling back the hammer again and swinging the pistol out wider as he began to turn away with the girl almost on his shoulder. This one would have to count. His own body was well within the snake's strike range now and some of them could strike higher than the top of his boot under his pant leg. ------------------- The Western Diamondback had lost most of her rattle the previous spring when it had gotten caught between a rock and a fence wire. She had tried for a day to pull it loose, and finally she'd been rewarded with her freedom. Today she had just watched her brood hatch; all fifteen of her babies were coiled in a ball behind her at the base of her bush when all the commotion began. First the two large animals with the strange rhythm she felt in the ground, and now another one. This was too much. She would protect her young until nightfall. After that they were on their own, but until then, she would defend them. Her tongue flicked out and in, getting the scent. Her tail quivered silently with excitement against the bush as she turned her head in the direction of the closest of them. The heat sensors in front of her eyes would have helped in the dark, but in daylight, they weren't that useful, especially at this temperature. She coiled back, measuring the distance between them, and then – The ground shook as a bullet struck a foot away to her left. She recoiled, and struck out tentatively at a new foe there that she couldn't see. This was getting uncomfortable. If she were alone she'd have already withdrawn by now. Finding nothing, she turned her head back quickly to look straight at a hollow piece of metal just as the second bullet struck her a foot behind her head before carrying on through her coiled body twice more, and through three of her young. Her head was sideways as she opened her mouth and flexed out her fangs to bite the air slowly. A drop of venom grew and hung from one fang as her eyes lost focus. ---------------------- "JILLY!" Kayla screamed. Full of adrenaline, Joshua's body was just humming now. It left him no smoothness at all and he heard his own words sounding like someone else's. In spite of it all, he could hear a second rattle. "There's another snake..." Kayla was nowhere near ready to listen. "Are you insane? Give her to me!" Jillian wailed softly into Josh's shirt. He turned his head toward hers and said softly, "I'm sorry that I scared you... Are you ok?" He felt her nod and sniffle before she turned to stare at his face for a moment. It made no sense to Kayla in the middle of this madness, but Jilly made up her own mind right then and put her arms around his neck. To Kayla he just offered Jillian, "Here, you take her, but don't put her down, alright?" Jillian didn't want to be handed over and fussed a little. Kayla wanted to kill him. "What the hell is the matter with you?" Josh stared right at her eyes and said "That was a rattlesnake. There's another one behind you." "So what if there's a rattlesnake? You could have just told me. What the hell did you have to shoot it for? You scared us both out of our minds," she railed. As he holstered the pistol, Josh was right back at incredulous. "Well your little girl here was already inside that one's strike range, and your ass is inside the strike range of the one right behind you, except that one's rattle is still working. You'd probably be able to hear it if you'd just shut up for a second." Kayla inhaled sharply and listened. Sure enough, the buzz was unmistakable. "Lookit..." said Jillian, pointing to the side. Out from under the body of their mother, a dozen baby rattlesnakes slowly fanned out in an arc. They knew that they were alone now. Kayla turned to stare at them. Josh spoke evenly, "They hatch ready to go. They've already got developed fangs and working venom glands, and they'll bite just to try them out." "Come on," he said calmly, "let's get a little space between us and them." Kayla remembered the snake behind her. Turning, she could see it now. She froze. Wanting to get her away before this got much worse, he closed the last step between himself and Kayla and took hold of her arm. He pulled her forcefully towards him, and started toward the truck. "What...Let me GO!" "In a second," he said, "You didn't look like you were able to tear yourself away, and I'll be damned if I'm going to hang around while you get your ass bitten out of stubbornness." Josh explained pointedly. He could see that she wasn't really listening to him, so he just went on. "Sucking snake venom out of your butt cheek is a pleasant thought, but I'd probably get distracted and swallow." He noticed by her glare that he'd been wrong. She was listening to him. They were beside the Expedition in a few steps. "Get in the passenger side. I'll hand her up to you, or you can both sit together in the back seat, I don't care. Please, let's just go." Josh said. "Where? Where are you taking us?" Kayla was on the verge of a combination of emotions, and even she didn't know which would surface first. Josh exhaled the tension out heavily. "To the house, or haven't you had enough of playing hopscotch with these things yet?" He was panting. "Lady, get in. The truck's cool by now, so she'll be out of the heat." he said, indicating Jillian with his eyes. "I promise you can yell at me in there if you want to." He got them up and into the back seat. He stopped as he came around the back of the vehicle and drew the Colt to extract the remaining rounds as quickly as he could. He dropped them in his breast pocket. Though it had worked out, he was annoyed with himself for driving with the loaded pistol in the holster. He didn't like the possibility of blowing off his kneecap, and putting a hole in the engine if they hit a bump the wrong way. He slid the old pistol into its holster and mildly cursed his luck. The woman looked like a walking dream to him, but ... He sighed to himself. If he'd had a chance to meet somebody like that in a sane place like a club where nobody was distracted by the heat of the sun or a landscape littered with pit vipers, ... He smirked to himself ruefully. Well then, he thought, he'd have at least a fair shot at watching somebody else likely walk away with her on his arm before old Josh could spit out 'hello'. It didn't matter, he thought. One look at her face now and he was just happy that she didn't have a weapon. The really odd thing that was driving him a little nuts was that he kind of liked the idea. Climbing in, he tore through the plastic film on the flat of water bottles on the passenger side floor, and handed them back one each apologizing for the warmth of them. Jillian looked at him, and then at the bottle. "Oh," Josh said, taking the bottle back and twisting off the sealed cap before handing it to her again. "Are you alright – " He turned to Kayla. "What's her name?" "Her name is Jillian." Kayla replied coldly. "Hi Jillian, my name is Josh." Jillian nodded and took several swallows from her water bottle. Her green eyes remained locked on his face. He winked. Turning to Kayla, he frowned for a second. "You're not going to tell me your name, are you?" She shrugged, "It doesn't really matter. As soon as I can get my phone out of my pocket, I'll call the sheriff and after that, I'll always be known to you as 'Complaintant,' won't I?" "Well," he said, "You go on and knock yourself out then. I'll just wait here. You let me know when you're done and we'll drive to the house. With any luck, the sheriff will meet us soon after we get there. I think I'd like that very much." "Why?" she demanded. He laughed for a second. "I haven't done anything wrong but try to save your backside. I'm kind of hoping that you'll become their problem. What are you doing here, anyway?" Kayla glared at him. "Look," he said, "I came out here because I saw two people wandering around and I was worried, that's all. You don't want to talk to me, that's fine. I didn't know it was the snakes out here who are in danger. You go on and make your call. I'll even meet the deputy's car at the end of the driveway." He looked at her for a moment. Kayla looked back. "Well? Why aren't you dialing?" "I don't know the number of the Sheriff's office here," she answered. He rolled his eyes, "9-1-1." They looked at each other some more. Kayla took a drink from her water bottle. "You don't have a cellphone, do you?" he asked. "I must have left it in my car," she shrugged, deciding to play nice for the moment. She hoped that he wouldn't force this by letting her use his. She'd had to cancel her phone last month. "My folks used to bring my sister and I out here to visit with my aunt and uncle when we were kids. I haven't been here for years, well I was back last year for a couple of days, but –" She looked at him, "What are you doing driving around with a loaded gun?" "I was shooting tin cans when I spotted you guys out here. I didn't think to leave it behind." Josh said. "Why were you shooting tin cans?" Kayla asked. He wondered how to explain it. "Because there are entirely too many of them wandering around loose. Somebody's got to do it. Besides, I enjoy the frustration when I miss. Same reason I bang my head against a brick wall sometimes, it feels so good when I stop." Josh explained, "Besides, it worked out ok for you." "I think you're nuts." Kayla decided. "You're pretty reckless and irresponsible doing that." He managed not to look too astounded. "You know, I was just thinking the very same thing, seeing as how you thought it would be fine to trespass on signed land, and drag a little kid across a 2 mile snake-filled frying pan on a sunny summer afternoon. You didn't remember about the rattlesnakes and wandering around out here?" "My uncle wouldn't let us go walking off alone, I remember – why are there so many?" Kayla asked. "There isn't one under every bush or anything," Josh said, "but there are more this year for some reason. I guess there's more of whatever they like to eat." "I am going to call the sheriff, you know." she stated. "That's fine with me." Josh said flatly. He grabbed a water bottle for himself, and wiped the sweat from his forehead with an equally sweaty forearm. "Where's the label?" Josh asked as he looked out over the hood. "What did you say?" Kayla's eyebrows almost met over her eyes. Josh turned toward her again. "I said, where's the damn label? The one that's supposed to be on your forehead that says 'Does not play well with others'." Kayla wasn't going to let that one by without a response. She was about to fire off a broadside of her own when Josh glanced past her in the mirror and forcefully said, "Down." There was a muffled thump behind them. Jillian put down her empty water bottle, folded her legs and turned around on her knees, climbing up to peer into the dim tinted cavern at the back of the vehicle. "What?" Kayla demanded. He smirked at that. "I wasn't speaking to you, though who knows, it might work. I said,... Down." Another thump. Jillian began to giggle. "Alright. Who WERE you speaking to then?" Kayla sighed as though she were playing a game with a very young child. Jillian kept giggling. "Behind you." Josh said quietly. Kayla turned around slowly. For the first time, she noticed the heavy wire mesh behind the rear seats. Josh grinned, "Ok then...Up. The lady wants to meet you." There was a shifting of weight behind her, and then Kayla heard breathing that sounded like a bellows. Slowly, a massive dark head came into view. Jillian squealed and laughed, her little fingers were holding on to the mesh. The brown head had a stubby snout in a mostly black face. There were large brown eyes that looked into Kayla's own. "AAHH! What the hell is that?" Jillian was still laughing and wiggling her fingers through the screen. The eyes considered the little fingers for a moment and a large pink tongue began to lick them. Jillian shrieked with joy. "It tickles!" "Not what," Josh corrected, "That's my friend, Daisy." Josh put the Ford into gear and drove very slowly in the direction of the house. "My aunt mentioned that she had a puppy named Daisy, but she said that her Daisy was such a delicate little thing." Kayla said. "Well, Daisy is only 10 months old, and she WAS a delicate little thing once... for about 90 minutes." Josh smiled, "Must be a coincidence. Where does your aunt live?" "Somewhere close, I think. I was sure that was her windmill that I saw." Kayla said as she watched Jillian talking to Daisy and laughing as Daisy dropped back into a crouch and then jumped up again playfully. "She won't hurt Jilly, will she?" Josh smiled. "Well technically she could hurt her. I think I just have to make sure that Daisy doesn't sit on her, and everything ought to work out. Besides, she's already tasted Jillian and figured out that she's not food." Kayla wasn't so certain of that. "What is Daisy, anyway?" Kayla asked, "I mean what breed is she?" "Well, she's half St. Bernard. I know that because I found her mother's body last week, months after Daisy showed up on the porch. She'd been dead for too long to figure out the cause of death, or if there had been any other puppies." Josh said. "And..." Kayla waited. Josh looked over. "And what?" "What was her father?" Kayla persisted. Josh looked serious. "Oh, I don't know... a buffalo, maybe. Look at her." Kayla laughed, and they drove on quietly for a bit. "Look, I'm sorry for freaking out back there," Kayla began. "I'm supposed to be visiting my aunt, and so far things haven't gone well. My car overheated and...well, I wasn't expecting someone like you." Josh smirked to himself. He wondered if there had ever been one time when he was what someone had expected. He almost laughed for a second. "I'd almost like to hear you try to explain that." "Come on," she said, "I'm not having a really good day here. My car's fried. I thought that the windmill was closer than it obviously is. Then you show up, and you weren't exactly friendly-looking. You pick up my niece and start shooting that thing off. Just exactly how am I supposed to react in your little world?" He shook his head. "Alright, forget it. I'm sorry that I acted like such an asshole. I'm just glad that I saw you walking out here. Let's just get to the house and figure out where you're headed, and I'll do what I can to help you on your way, ok?" "Thank you." Kayla tried to smile a little. She looked at Joshua and as upset as she'd been, she still found a way to manage a thought that maybe Aunt Rose might know who this neighbor was and that with a bit of luck, she could maybe talk to him without snakes or six-guns. Her next thought was a little hope that he didn't live too far away. Before she could wonder where that thought had even come from, it was replaced by another one where she thought that he might not clean up too badly. She wanted to, but Kayla managed not to shake her head as she dumped the thoughts and wondered what was wrong with her. She was still pissed off at just his Wild West entrance - never mind everything else. She decided to at least try not to be murderous. "Not many snake charmers pack a cannon... you're pretty good at that..." "I usually suck at it, but not at that distance. I didn't want to shoot her; I was kind of hoping that she would leave if I put a shot into the dirt close by. Looks like her babies had just hatched. That's why she didn't back down. They're not protective for very long, but I guess we caught her at a bad time. I was just praying I'd hit the thing when she turned back. I was afraid she might. I grabbed Jillian to get her out of there and turned away as I fired. I just had to be ready for the snake to turn back. They can get aggressive if they can't get away." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 02 "Yeah," Kayla observed, "some girls are like that." "Amen." thought Josh. -------------------- Rose was thinking about dinner and how the meeting between Joshua and Kayla might go as she drove onto the dirt road. She concluded that there was just no way to predict the outcome. It would depend upon the circumstances, she supposed. Her attention was suddenly on the rental trailer that was parked on the shoulder. Slowing, she stared as she went past. She was almost certain that this was Kayla's car. She pulled over and got out. Walking back, she noticed the coloring books and a few toys on the passenger seat. Looking up and down the road, she saw no one. She was getting worried now. Where were they? She saw the tracks leading up the gentle swale to the area beyond. She ran up as quickly as her office shoes would allow. Peering into the distance only raised her heart rate. There was nobody there. She was really worried now. She cursed herself for not listening to Joshua's repeated suggestions that she get a cell phone. She ran back to her car and then the front of Kayla's abused Cavalier disappeared under a shower of dust and gravel as she fishtailed off toward her own home. She prayed that Joshua was there. What little family she had left might need him now. -------------- They were coming around a low hill and just starting down the short incline as the house came into view. Kayla stared at her aunt's home and a slow fear began to grip her chest. Kayla looked for her aunt's car and her eyes flicked down to the old leather holster strapped to Josh's leg. She suddenly recognized it as the one that had belonged to her late uncle. What the hell had happened to Rose? She acted on an impulse and decided to pick a moment to lunge for the pistol. "Stop the car." she said. Josh looked into the mirror. "What?" "I said stop the car! Stop it now!" Kayla's voice was rising in alarm. "I will in about a hundred feet anyway, what's the matter?" Josh asked. "What's wrong?" "NOW!" None of them were belted in, and mindful of that, Josh had driven very slowly watching for potholes, but now his land yacht pitched forward slightly on its suspension as Josh gently stepped on the brake. Jillian, who was still holding on to the steel mesh that separated her from her new friend tightened her grip, and stayed where she was. Daisy's huge paws were on the on the other side of the mesh, and therefore she stayed where she was. The only one affected by the motion was Kayla who was moving forward anyway. The gentle stop added to her momentum, and she stiffened as she continued forward. The console deflected her hands a bit. At the same time, her forearms rocked off the edge of the vacant front seat. The net effect was that she punched Josh in the hip, cracking a couple of knuckles on her left hand as her face hit the back of the seat in front of her. Josh had no idea what was going on. He thought this woman had possibly lost her mind. Maybe it was a regular thing with her. He turned in the seat and found himself with much the same sight that had confronted the now-dead rattlesnake earlier. "Hey!" he exclaimed. The muzzle of the Colt vibrated in the air two feet from his face. "Is for horses." Kayla spoke through her clenched teeth, "Now get out. Get out NOW!" "Kayla?" Jillian was becoming upset. She liked the man, and she couldn't understand what her aunt was doing. "It's okay, Jilly." Kayla said without turning her head to look. "Joe, or whatever his name is, was just leaving. Isn't that right? Get out, Joe!" "My name is Joshua," he said. "Look, Miss, don't do this –" He began to reach for the key in the ignition. "STOP! I guess you have difficulty with simple instructions. Most men do, I find. Don't touch that key or so help me, I'll shoot you. Just get out and leave the door open. I need you to walk away, and don't stop until I tell you to. Is that clear enough for you?" Josh hadn't moved. He was fixated on a point five inches past the dancing muzzle of the old revolver. He sat staring at the front of the gun's cylinder. He didn't want to trust his memory and needed to see if there was a loaded chamber there just in case. He moved his head to get a better look. The muzzle followed him. "What are you thinking about?" Kayla asked, "I'm making it easy for you. For once, you don't have to struggle to try to get a thought through your simple mind. There's nothing difficult about it. Just do it." "Now I'M the one who wants to talk to the sheriff." Josh thought to himself as he turned away and opened the door. "There's really nothing to think about here, Rufus. What's your problem?" Kayla asked. As he got out, he said over his shoulder "Arithmetic. I find it keeps my simple male mind amused during moments of stress if I start at six, and begin to subtract." "Shut up and walk." Kayla commanded. She was trying to keep her tone more grim and determined than she felt. Sam's pistol felt reassuring in her hand, but she found that she couldn't keep the stupid thing still. Josh took a few steps away and stopped. "Christ, you're stupid," she barked, "I didn't tell you to stop yet." "Well, I can't hit a tin can with that thing from 40 feet away, and I've been practicing. The further away I get, the less probability you have of hitting me." Josh stated, "I'm trying to improve your chances of success." Kayla got out of the truck and walked to the open driver's door. She wasn't sure what to do next. "Alright then, you can turn around now." she said. Josh turned around slowly and found that she was now pointing the old .44 caliber more or less at his genitals. Thank God it was wavering around. "Now that's just cruel." he said. ------------ Rose was astounded at the scene before her when she came down the long drive. Josh was standing looking at Kayla, and she was pointing Sam's pistol at his private parts. She slid to a stop and got out. "Kayla!" she cried. "Aunt Rose! Thank God you're all right! I was afraid this maniac might have hurt you, and – please call the sheriff. I'll cover him while you call." Josh let out a long breath and fumbled in his pocket for his cigarette pack. Kayla spotted the motion, and took a step forward still maintaining the elevation of the barrel on his lower body. But he had turned away, so she raised her point of aim to the side of his face. "Oh, please call the sheriff," he said, "Pretty please?" She glared at him. "Don't move!" she said. Rose shouted "Kayla! What are you doing?" Having felt the two rounds in his pocket for certain, he looked at her for a moment from beneath his eyebrows as he lit a cigarette and snapped the Zippo shut to put it in his jeans. He exhaled and quietly growled, "Fuck off," before turning away from her. "Are you going to throw that empty pistol, or just hit me with it?" He was talking to the horizon. "I really can't take much more suspense." Kayla stared at him. There was something different. The lightning bolt on his face had turned from brown to pink, she noticed. Must be the light, she thought. "Arithmetic." Josh continued to speak to the horizon, "Six, minus the one that I never put in it, minus the one hit that I got on a tin can all afternoon, minus one beside Mamma Snake, minus one into Mamma Snake – " "Leaves two!" shouted Kayla. He continued on, "No, minus two since I unloaded it before I got in so that I wouldn't shoot myself accidentally. I just wasn't really sure until now. That leaves zero, my Lady of the Overactive Imagination." Kayla groaned. Josh looked down, his brows furrowed. "Aunt Rose? Aunt freakin' Rose?" he asked his boots. Rose couldn't believe the scene in front of her. "What's going on here? What are you doing with Sam's gun, Kayla? What's gotten into you?" Josh spoke up. "I have no idea what's gotten into her, Rosie. All I know is that she's not wearing her federally mandated 'Nutbar' label today." Rose said "Now Joshua, calm down. I need to know what happened!" Kayla was amazed. "Rosie? You mean two know each other?" "Did you think I was an escaped convict or something? What the hell have you been reading?" Josh snapped. He had more on his mind, but suddenly stopped. He stared at them. "I must be an idiot – how could I have missed that?" He looked at Rose, then Kayla, and then over at Jillian in the back seat. "Oh, I'm definitely sensing a dominant gene or five here." He chuckled, shaking his head. "I'd say she's working herself into a cell, Rosie. I don't know this state's laws too well, but where I come from, it's an offense to point a firearm at somebody, let alone threaten them with it. Probably is here too. So that's one. And using a firearm in the commission of a crime is another offense. That one's worth ten years by itself back home, so that's two -" Kayla was getting hot now. "What crime, you asshole?" "If Rosie hadn't come by just now, I'm pretty sure you'd have made it all the way to 'Grand Theft' inside of another minute by driving away with my truck. That would have been three." "You knew? You knew all that time that it wasn't loaded? You bastard!" shouted Kayla. "I was pretty certain it wasn't loaded. Being scared shitless makes me doubt my memory sometimes. It's one of my many flaws. If I told you that it was empty, would you have believed me? I doubt it. You took one look at me, and decided that I must be a part-time axe murderer." "My only crime is being stupid and well-meaning enough to keep you from getting hurt out there, and then to try to talk you out of committing a federal offense. I can see how that makes me an asshole AND a bastard in your view. Hell, yes." Josh was hot himself now. Rose interjected, "I see you've met. Kayla stop waving that around. Put down Sam's gun!" "DON'T drop it!" Josh said. Kayla looked at the pistol. It hit the dust with a thud. Josh groaned. "I'll need a week to clean the sand out of it. Thanks so much." Josh walked over, and picked up Sam's Colt. Double-checking to be certain, he carried it to Rose, and held it out to her. "Rosie, could you please put this in Sam's chest on the sideboard? I left the key there. I'll clean it up later." Ignoring Kayla, he walked back to the SUV, and opened the tailgate. Daisy exploded out the back, and began to gallop toward them on her way back to them, but Josh stopped her charge by showing her his open palm. "Daisy, ....Nice." he said. Daisy stopped instantly and stared at him. He closed his right hand into a fist, and thumped it lightly into the center of his own chest. Daisy dropped to the ground like a sack of flour and looked at him expectantly. Kayla moved to get Jillian. Kayla opened the rear door, gently lifted Jillian out and set her on the ground. She walked over to Josh and they smiled at each other. Jillian said, "Thanks, Joshua." He tousled her hair, and said, "Anytime, darlin'. Try not to hurt Daisy, ok?" Her smile grew wider as she nodded. Josh turned to Daisy and again said "Nice." Daisy stood up, and walked slowly to Jillian, her tail swinging in a wide arc. He closed the door, and got behind the wheel. Jillian hugged Daisy tightly. They both had bliss written on their faces as Josh pulled ahead. "AUNT Rose," he accented the syllables pointedly, "you should call Bart over at the garage, and have him come over to do something with this woman's car. I was going to go over and see if I could do anything to help her out, but I'm finding myself to be less charitable than usual all of a sudden." Rose felt terrible. She knew she'd had a hand in this debacle, even if it was well intentioned. "Joshua, wait. Where are you going?" she asked. "It's been quite an afternoon for me Rosie. I was shooting at some cans. I got my first shock when I spotted your guests stumbling around. I took off to get them with my heart in my throat. When I got to them, I saw a rattler not three feet from uh, Jillian there. Way too close. I shot that one, and then I heard a second one and kept Drama Girl here from stepping backwards onto it. Then I had to listen as she gave me grief over that, and just now she pointed the gun in my face and at my nuts while she was in the process of stealing my truck. I'd love to press charges, but I can see that you're all related. That's the only thing that's stopping me. I'm feeling a little tense at the moment. I really want a beer right now. " Josh wound down. Rosie was about to point out that there was beer in the fridge, but Josh headed her off. "And I want to feel a little safer while I drink it, thanks. I think I saw a biker bar down the main road someplace. I ought to be safe enough there. Just don't tell HER where it is. I don't want to be responsible for unleashing her on innocent people." Kayla found her voice. "But you knew the gun was empty the whole time!" I should have stayed at home, he thought. He had intended to continue to ignore her, but changed his mind suddenly as he turned his head toward her. Kayla couldn't believe that blue eyes could glitter so coldly. His tattoo appeared to have changed color again to a dark, almost blood red. It felt as though Joshua had struck her as his eyes flickered and he hissed, "I was staring at it trying to be sure. I thought it was empty, but you pointing it at my face makes me want to be more than at least a little certain." "It doesn't really matter, does it? You thought it was loaded, and you ramped up a bit of confusion and at worst, a simple case of mistaken identity into World War fucking three. I only wanted to help you, and you were close to killing me. You shoved that thing into my face in the belief that it was capable of killing me. That makes it personal." Kayla looked up and seethed, "You want personal?" She spun and pulled the revolver out of her aunt's hand in a split-second. Before any of them could blink, she pulled back the hammer, moved the muzzle to within three inches of Josh's face and pulled the trigger. There was a sandy scraping noise but the hammer fell on the empty cylinder with a click. Kayla was disappointed. She'd expected him to flinch or something. He hadn't even blinked. She threw the old pistol down on the sand and glared at him. "That's personal, just so you know how I feel about you. You come flying out of the dust and I thought that somebody might have wanted to help us, but you're all shitty attitude. You grabbed Jilly and started shooting!" "What the hell was I supposed to think? I'm sorry that I overreacted and made a mistake," she hissed at him. "I thought for a second that you were a lunatic instead of the regular garden variety asshole that the world has no shortage of. You sure had me fooled. You actually don't look like the assholes that I left behind in Phoenix until you open your mouth and the same shit falls out. So pardon me for ruining your fine afternoon of tin can shooting, but I didn't ask for your help." He looked down at her, his face completely impassive and cold. His voice was even colder. "You'll pardon me Carlene, or whatever the hell your name is. I don't know you from a hole in the ground, but if you'll allow a bit of conjecture on my part here, I'd take a wild-ass guess that you probably go through life leaving a lot of very confused and upset people in your wake. Just sayin' is all." He threw his head back and laughed, "And oh, wait! I just had a thought! That in itself is amazing, considering what men think with, isn't it, Miss Snap Decision?" "Whether you see it or not, you're an idiot who was about to have a sunstroked little kid down in the dirt right in front of a rattler that you pissed off. No no, that's alright, I don't need any thanks for helping a sweet little girl out of the danger that you put her in, but I'm pretty sure now that I shot the wrong snake." He almost felt the glare from her green eyes then. "You think I need to hear more of your noise? Give me just one of the bullets that you took out of the gun. I'll show you real personal. So go soak your bullshit male pride in a glass someplace, just as long as it's not near me, got it?" Joshua had just decided that she wasn't worth any more of his breath when Kayla smiled at him sweetly and added the icing to the cake, "Now why don't you just fuck off and die? I just know the world would be a better place for it." She spun on her heel and walked away. Josh drove past Rose's car and was gone. There was a moment of almost-silence. The SUV could be heard accelerating out on the main road in the distance. The breeze puffed fitfully. Rose looked over at Jillian and Daisy running around in the dust together. They'd both need a bath tonight. She stepped over to Kayla and cleared her throat. "Well, that went better than I thought it would." she offered. Kayla turned to face her aunt. "You're joking." Kayla said. "Yes I am," sighed Rose. "Don't worry about Daisy by the way. She wouldn't hurt a fly, though she gets defensive around children and wants to protect them. Jillian is safe with her." Kayla turned to her aunt, "Couldn't you have warned me or something if you keep stupid gorillas like him around?" "I don't do anything of the sort," Rose replied, not liking where she thought this was going, "Would you mind telling me what the hell just happened here? I just tried to get home from work to get here before you and I find 'Gunsmoke' being filmed in my yard. Did he hurt you or anything?" "No," Kayla said, turning away in case she burst into tears, "I think he saved our lives." Kayla tried to exhale the tension that she felt. She was surprised to find herself losing at fighting back tears. "I've only known one helpful person around here for not even half an hour, and he's got me pegged. I don't know why I thought that it would be any different here." She looked down, "I know I just overreact sometimes and I made a mistake here, but ..." She looked at her aunt, "I don't know what it is about him. I mean, I know he's an asshole. That's obvious, but I really went over the top on him. God knows how many laws I just broke." Kayla knew where it came from and why she did it, but she couldn't really tell her aunt - at least not yet, but where she'd spent a lot of her time, you needed to have quick thoughts and a loud mouth sometimes. It didn't matter all that much back there if they were incorrect, but that sure didn't translate too well here. "Joshua is not, ... what you just said. You just got off to a bad start." Kayla had a reply loaded and ready to go. "They're all - " Rose raised her finger in Kayla's face. She knew exactly what was about to come out. "No they're not," she said quietly. "Not all of them. Not even most, and not that one for damn sure. If you think you've figured out one half of the human population with what you were about to say, it only points to your own failure as a human being. If that's what you truly believe, then you'd better take a good look in the mirror so that you have a starting reference. Maybe you ought to think about that a little before you stick a gun in a man's face." "What the hell do you think you came off here as? Which one of you just acted like the lunatic? You might have gotten some signals crossed between the two of you, but that's no reason to threaten him with a gun if he did nothing to you or Jillian." "Really, Kayla, did you just HAVE to win whatever this was that badly? Did you really need to piss all over his shoes for helping you and then get nasty when he got a little tense after you pulled a gun on him? All you needed to do, no matter how you felt, was say two things to him - 'thanks' and 'I'm sorry'. It wouldn't have cost you a thing." "Why are you taking his side?" her niece asked. "I'm not," Rose said, more than a little exasperated now, "You were both acting like idiots." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 02 "And he's only half right, Kayla." Rose said, "You listen to me. He hit pretty close to home, I'll grant you, but he missed all of your reasons. You acted the way you did because you perceived a threat to the ones you love. It was misguided, but your heart was true. You would die to protect your own. I know that. He does too, or he will when he's had a chance to think about it some." Kayla very much doubted it, and her face told that story as she blinked back the tears looking at her aunt. "Look," Rose said. "He's no angel, Kayla, but he's no turd either. I've known that boy for years now. I haven't seen him this mad in a long time, though. The funny part is, he only gets really mad about things that he cares about. You hurt him when you misjudged him. I guess he's a bit like you in that, isn't he?" "There are two people that I know who are always being misjudged by somebody, Kayla, and you've just met each other." Kayla's jaw fell open. Rose smiled. "A lot of this is my fault, Kayla. I knew that something a little like this might happen between you. I just didn't think there would be firearms involved. I'd say that I've got apologies to make to both of you." She sighed, thinking that this wouldn't work at all and now there likely couldn't be any possible alternative to selling the place. "Now come on. We've got some things to look after, but I think we could both use some tea first." Kayla didn't follow right away. She stood looking out at the main road. "Too bad I can't apologize to him. I really owe him that much, I guess. I ought to thank him properly too. I'm pretty sure he saved Jilly from a snakebite. You should have seen it. He shot at the snake to distract it, and then he put his body in front of the snake and shot it to pieces. And he more than likely saved me from blundering into getting my own ass bitten as well" she said. Kayla turned to look at her aunt. "It might have gone a little better in different circumstances, but we were about ready to fall over in the sun there, and he came at us like I don't know what. I guess I reacted really badly, but then so did he. I can see that now, but it's still not all my fault. I don't think he'll be back. I guess I've worked my usual magic on a helpful stranger." "Oh now don't you worry, dear," Rose said, "He'll be back soon enough and then you can both struggle over your apologies. He stays here, you know." Kayla gasped and stared at her aunt. "What?" "He comes here every year, and stays a while. Longer this time. I believe that he thinks he needs to help me get this place ready to sell." Kayla thought about that and about what her aunt had said about Josh coming back. She groaned. Apologizing was something that she knew she should do, but she wasn't looking forward to it in this case. She shrugged, "Well, I guess you're right about his getting mad about things that he cares about, Aunt Rose." she said. Rose looked at her niece, "How's that, Dear? she asked. Kayla looked over, "I saw how he took to Jilly, and I've never seen her even smile at a man one time since her dad and Marcia died, but she sure surprised me today and ..." she laughed for a second. "I was pointing Uncle Sam's gun at his....his.." "His balls. Yes, I noticed that." Rose smiled, and Kayla followed her aunt inside. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 03 **A little more strangeness. O_o --------------- Bart Smith was a big man, 6' 7" and built like a linebacker. Those who were close to him knew him to be a gentle giant. Everybody else just tried to stay out of his way. He was at the ranch twenty-five minutes later as Kayla explained what had happened to her car. She rode back to it with him in the wrecker. On the way, she asked him if he knew Joshua. "Josh Taylor? Shoot, he's a friend of mine. We go back a ways. Comes by every year to stay with Rosie and Sam." He paused to puff on his cigar. "Lookin' at you, I'd say you're Rosie's kin?" Kayla nodded. "My aunt. Sam was my uncle," she said. "Oh, I'm sorry for your loss," Bart said. "He was a fine man. Everybody knew him hereabouts. You here on vacation or somethin'?" Bart asked. "Sort of," Kayla smiled. "I've been transferred to Santa Fe from Phoenix, and I've got a month's leave first. I'm staying with my aunt." They came upon the hapless Chevrolet at that point, and their conversation stopped as Bart pulled the wrecker around behind the trailer and got out. Kayla followed. He opened the hood, and then took off the radiator cap. "She's a mite low," he said as he tried to peer into the depths of the radiator filler while blocking the bright sunlight with his hand. He looked up, "As in, I can't see any" he said and walked back to get his jug of coolant. "Tell me, did it get all the way over to the hot side?" "I pulled over just before then and shut it off." Kayla explained. "Why?" Bart sighed. "Well, these things are all aluminum engine blocks now. They can't take over-temperature. The blocks can warp. If that happens and it's not too bad, you can just mill the head down a bit and live with it. If it's real bad, you'll need a new engine." he explained. "I'll tell you what," he said as he replaced the caps on both the rad and the overflow container. "You try to start it. If she starts and runs, just drive on over to Rosie's and park it. I'll follow behind you. Don't go fast, 30 is good enough." Kayla got in as Bart closed the hood. She turned the key, and the Cavalier cranked and settled down to an idle. Bart looked down at her. "Ok, just take it slow, and if you can, try to pull it around so you're facing the road again. You can unload it if that's what you mean to do." Kayla nodded and put it in drive. She pulled out slowly. Bart watched her accelerate gently, and he let out a soft whistle as he walked to his truck. "Damn," he said. Daisy looked up as the wrecker pulled in. She acknowledged its arrival with a "Whuff!", and bounced over to greet Bart. He smiled as he got out and waited stoically. Bart was about the only person who Daisy would jump up on and nobody knew why. But really, Daisy knew full well why. She resisted all of Josh's or Rose's attempts to curb the behavior. Up came the huge head, and her front paws landed on Bart's shoulders. He grabbed the cigar out of his mouth just in time, and hoped she wouldn't drown him with her affection. He laughed and hugged his "little girlfriend" as he fussed over her. Once this had been accomplished, Daisy dropped back down on all fours and trotted happily to resume playing with Jillian, who had watched with fascination. Kayla said, "When I first saw her, she scared the heck out of me. But now I see that she's so affectionate. I don't know why I was afraid of her." Rose gave Kayla a glance full of unspoken meaning. Kayla held up her hands, and laughed, "Yeah, I know, I have to learn to look past the surface." Bart asked where Josh was. Kayla shrugged, and Rose spoke for her. "Josh didn't know my niece was coming, and Kayla didn't know that Josh would be here. They'd never met, but they ran into each other today, and you might say that it didn't go well. It's my fault, really. I should have told them beforehand." Bart smiled as his cigar seemed to wander over to the side of his mouth by itself, "Well I can't imagine how meeting somebody like you just couldn't go well, Kayla. Josh is all right. He's a mite shy, and he keeps to himself, is all. He's good to know if you need a friend." He paused and thought, "I don't know about your circumstances, but if you'll pardon me, I don't see a ring on your hand. This is a small place and word gets around. Without you doing a thing, it might be that the girls down at the market could have somethin' to worry about now, knowin' the way that they think..." he chuckled with an exaggerated wink to Rose. "I was going to warn you about them sooner or later, "Rose said, "You can't imagine a bigger pack of needle-nosed busybodies with nothing to do but make up stories about people. I think that what Bart here means to say is that once it's known that you're here, and they know that Josh comes here every year, those razor-sharp tongues down at the supermarket will come up with something, I just know it." Kayla smirked, "Oh, trust me Bart, I don't think there's any need for them to worry on my account. I made him pretty mad. I think it might be fair to say that we pretty much hate each other." She thought about it for a moment, "Well, that's not strictly true, I guess. You know how sometimes two people can hit it off?" Bart smiled and nodded a little. "Well," Kayla said with a grin, "we just want to hit. I don't give a damn about any gossip. Joshua and I don't have much use for each other. Or does target practice count?" Rose laughed a little and said, "That doesn't matter, Kayla. They'll come up with some nastiness. Every year it's the same. Joshua hits town and they go into overdrive. To hear them talk, Joshua has a new girlfriend about every hour or so – and none of it ever happens except in their little minds. He's an easy target. It's no secret that a lot of the women around here would crawl through a mile of broken glass to get to that boy." Bart chuckled, "But Josh don't care, if he even notices them at all. I do catch him looking sometimes though. So he's human. But nobody's found the chink in that armor yet. And by the way, Kayla? If Josh was still talking to you in any way, I'd say he was just pretty annoyed. I've only seen him get really mad just one time, and he turned quiet and stone cold. And THAT wasn't pretty," he grinned as he used his index finger for emphasis. Kayla frowned at the trailer hitch. "I don't know why we're having this conversation." She looked up. "It doesn't matter. I don't really care if he's breathing, and I'm sure it's mutual. Look, Bart, what do I owe you for this?" "Don't worry about it, Kayla. I told you, Josh is a friend. – AND you can put your hands back down again. Even if he's not YOUR friend, I'd do it a hundred times over for Rosie. I don't think there's anything really wrong with your car. It'll feel a whole lot better without that trailer following it around. I just added a bit of coolant. It ought to be ok. It's on the house. You just take it easy from here on out for a while, and watch your guage to make sure it don't make me a liar. I've got to go now. Consuella will be wonderin' why I haven't followed the smell of dinner home by now and she's gonna want to know that her favorite Viking is back and hear all about the new girl in town," Bart said as he clomped back to the wrecker. "Thanks, Bart!" the women both chimed and they settled in to unloading the trailer. Between them, Rose and Kayla unloaded the trailer and put most of the stuff into the bunkhouse where it could wait to be completely unpacked. Then, the "kids" as Rose called them were washed. Kayla gave Jillian a bath in the tub, and Rose tied Daisy to a post, and using some warm water and shampoo, got most of the dirt off. Daisy moaned piteously throughout the ordeal, and only brightened when Rose turned on the hose for the rinse. Daisy loved the hose. By the time she shook off, Rose was soaked, and needed the bathtub herself. Kayla put a couple of steaks on the grill. She asked Rose if she thought Josh would want one. Rose told her that it didn't matter. Even if Josh wanted one, he wouldn't eat it if he were starving, so she might as well save the steak. "Where did Joshua go?" Jillian asked over dinner. She'd actually forgotten about him completely because of Daisy, but now that things had quieted down, she'd noticed his absence. "He had some things that he wanted to do," Kayla replied, "like lick his wounds," she finished quietly. Her aunt was looking off at the horizon, but Kayla saw the slight change in Rose's expression and regretted her words. "Sorry, Aunt Rose," she said, "I guess I'm just gloating now." "Does Joshua live here too?" Jillian asked. "No, Jilly," Rose said, "but he always comes to visit and when he does, he stays here. See that big old building there?" She pointed to the large driving shed, "the one with the open doors? Joshua lives on the top floor of that. He'll be back, ..." Rose thought about it, "sometime soon, I guess." "Why don't you like him, Kayla? "Jillian asked, "He helped us and let us ride in his cool truck. I felt pretty sick before he came with Daisy." "You're right, Jilly," Kayla said, not necessarily enjoying with the way that her niece had of causing her to regret her spiteful words, but a little thankful for it all the same. "I don't know why. It's not that I don't like him, I just, ... I can't really say." She tousled Jillian's hair, "But I know that I wasn't very nice to him, and I know that I should say 'thank-you' to him, and I will if I get the chance. Sometimes people just don't get along, but he did help us." She smiled, "And he introduced you to your new friend, didn't he?" Jillian smiled and nodded. Kayla smiled right back, "Well, I can see that you like him, and you sure surprised me today with the way that you just jumped out of your shell. So you tell me why you like him, then." She paused for a second, "You know, ... if you know,..." Kayla knew that this would likely trigger a little game between them that they sometimes played, and it did. "I don't know," Jillian said with a little smile, "I just like him." "See?" Kayla laughed, "We just know what we know and we don't know why." Jillian nodded, "You never know what you never know," she giggled, using one of her favorite sayings, "that's what I always say." "My Jilly, the twisted little philosopher," Kayla laughed. Jillian twisted her head a little. "What's a fill..." "A wise person who can think deep thoughts," Rose smiled. "Well that's not me then," the girl laughed, "I just know things." -------------------- Long after dinner, Jillian was put to bed on the couch, and Kayla sat down for some tea with her aunt. "I don't know what to do, Aunt Rose. Do you think Joshua will show up? Should I wait up for him and apologize?" "You'll do nothing of the kind, Kayla." Rose stated flatly. "First off, I don't even know if he'll come back tonight at all. He's a man and they tend to get all pouty, some of them." Kayla smiled at the mental image that came to her of Joshua with his lower lip stuck out petulantly. "More importantly," Rose continued, "none of this would have happened if I'd done the right thing and told the two of you about this beforehand. It's my fault, so I'll speak to him first. He's going to want to stay out of the way when he comes back. He knows we're family now so he'll feel like he's intruding, and he more than likely hasn't finished whipping himself over that blast he gave you." "What? He was right!" Kayla objected. "I deserved every bit of that." "Maybe so, but he was upset, Kayla. You both judged each other pretty harshly. He gets a lot of that. He's a good man, and he's quick to offer a hand to somebody who he thinks could use one. He has no one but me now that his own folks are gone, and that's not much of a change for him anyway from what I can tell. If I know him at all, he's kicking himself around the block for what he said right now. You just leave him be. Besides, when the time is right, you've got the perfect little conversation starter right over there on the couch." She nodded toward Jillian. "Once she gets started, Joshua won't be able to get away to save his life," she chuckled. Kayla smiled. "She likes him a lot, you know. She's usually really standoffish with strangers, especially men, but she liked him right off the bat. I've never seen her take to someone that quickly." "Of course she does," Rose smiled, "there's a lot to like, since he's really just a big kid." "Aunt Rose, I don't mean to be nosy, but you know Joshua and all, and – " "We can speak plainly, Kayla." Rose prompted. "Well,.. I didn't see a ring. Why isn't he ... you know ... taken?" Kayla flushed. She didn't really mean to ask the question, and couldn't believe that it had come out that way, especially since she didn't even really know why she was asking in the first place. Rose was looking at the horizon again, wondering what she'd do without the place where she'd lived for so long once it was sold. She didn't appear to pick up much from Kayla's question as she replied more to herself than to her niece, "There's usually at least one around here who tries to bring down that buck every time he comes to visit. Usually they only succeed in embarrassing him." She came back to herself and looked at her niece. "Joshua was married once. It was long before Sam and I met him. I guess you could say that it was a short flight," she said quietly. "He hasn't had a serious relationship since that I'm aware of. Sam and I would always ask him why he'd come alone every time and he'd just grin and shrug." Kayla found herself biting down on her desire to flippantly state that she thought that she might know why when she saw her aunt look away again. She sighed absently, "I think a part of him died at the scene of the crash." "What does that mean?" Kayla asked, "He doesn't have anything to do with women because he couldn't make a relationship work or something?" "Poor muffin, "she pouted sarcastically. "Maybe he likes men." Kayla knew instantly that she'd gone too far. The trouble was that from the look in her aunt's eyes, there was likely no way now to take it back. "And maybe you ought to take a good look at your own fine history," Rose snapped back. "He dates a little from what I've heard him tell of it, but he's never found anyone that he wanted to be involved with, that's all." Rose tilted her head and glared pointedly at Kayla, "Does that sound familiar, Kayla? Jesus, pull your claws in. He's not even here and you're on him again. If you don't like him, that's fine. This ranch is plenty big enough so that you won't need to even see him much until he leaves if it's such a big problem for you. He's here because I need some help. He's been here working his tail off for me every day - on his vacation. He thinks it's all about getting the best price when I sell and it might come down to that, but it's not what I want. For what I want, this old place might even have to run again." Kayla knew that her aunt was right. She didn't even know where her latest shot at Joshua had come from. "What do you want, Aunt Rose?" "Well what I DON'T want," she said, "is to live in a condo. I've managed to keep a few little gardens here. I just can't imagine the same little kind of garden in the yard of some little place in the suburbs either. I like my gardens with about a half a mile of open space behind them. What I want, Kayla, is a place where I can offer two people in my quickly thinning family who are very important to me a better life than they can manage to have for themselves without my help. This isn't all bone dry land. There are lots of shady places and rolling hills where I can graze cattle and my great niece can have a real childhood in the fresh air, and where my niece might just be able to heal from her troubles. And with any luck, that beautiful girl just might lose her own shitty attitude and maybe LIGHTEN UP SOME!" She glared at Kayla, "None of that, not one little bit of that will be possible without the help of that man. I've known him for getting on to ten years and in that time, Joshua has become like a son to me, so as much as I love you, I'd appreciate it very much if you could just spare him a kind thought, and if you don't think that you can manage that, then I'd at least like it if you could keep your nasty comments to yourself." Kayla apologized instantly, seeing how her comments had upset her aunt. They sat in silence for a long time before Kayla cleared her throat to ask about where she would sleep. Rose thought for a second, and then stood up. "It might be a good idea for you to sleep in my room for tonight. That way, if Jillian wakes up, one of us will likely hear her if she gets confused. Tomorrow, we'll fix up something in the bunkhouse for the two of you. Would that be alright for now?" "Sure Aunt Rose. That will be fine." Kayla replied. "Sorry for being catty." ______ The sun was beginning to set as Josh sat on a boulder and nursed his second beer. He felt like a flattened piece of road kill. Joshua Taylor could admit to himself that he was upset. He didn't normally spend a lot of time over self-analysis, but he thought about it now because he knew that how he felt stemmed from a couple of things. No matter how he looked at it, he'd been an ass and it surprised him that he'd been unaware of it at the time. Introspection wasn't high on his list unless he knew that he'd handled something badly. Looking back at it all, he wondered if he could have done any worse. It came to him that Rose's niece had managed to light his fuse. That was a surprise. If he didn't like somebody, he normally just shut down and grew cold. Why had he reacted as he had? It just wasn't like him. He had driven aimlessly for a while with no intention of going to a bar in the first place. He knew that a bar was the last place to be if he was upset. He had slowly doubled back to get some gas, and then headed back toward Rosie's. He'd picked up a six-pack, and settled for some drive-through food on the way. Seeing that the Cavalier was now gone, he slowly went up the swale that Kayla had parked beside earlier and meandered along until he found himself at Sam's favorite spot. He got out and had his beer then. His ability to act like a jerk had surprised even him. He thought that he'd gotten that worked out a long time ago. Well, he smirked; he had been distracted, after all. Rosie's niece had a body that could stop a clock, and Jillian's bright eyes were like twin green suns when she smiled. "Man," he said to the bottle, "somebody somewhere sure knows how to grow them." He chuckled, and then felt the cloud of guilt settle over him again. She'd come driving over from Phoenix she'd said, with the little girl and an overheating car. Then she'd probably taken what looked like a short cut to her to try and get some help, and she'd been rewarded with... Indiana Jones on a bad day? What an idiot he'd been. He wasn't sure what she must have thought when she saw her aunt's house, with Rosie nowhere to be seen, and there she was in a truck with a dusty, argumentative, and – his hand went to his left cheekbone - rough looking man in dirty clothes. And then she figured that maybe something bad had happened, and she'd just reacted. Well, it was a stretch, he thought. She could have tried something new and revolutionary like conversational dialog. It might have worked. He'd gotten furious at her snap judgment of him. Why? It wasn't that out of the ordinary for him. A lot of people didn't trust him at first blush. The only difference was that she'd gone a little deep into left field with Sam's gun. He didn't like being badly thought of for nothing that he'd done, or prejudged and convicted all at once, but it wasn't as though it had never happened before. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 03 She sure had an edge to her, he thought. And even though her take had been a mile off, she was ready to do whatever it took to protect Jillian and Rosie. He could admire her for that. As far as that went, there was an awful lot that he found he could admire. He chastised himself for that stupid line of thought. He was annoyed with Rosie for not telling him that her niece was coming. What had she been thinking? Well, she probably didn't imagine that there would be any gunplay involved, that was certain. Suddenly he realized that if Rosie had told him her relatives were coming beforehand he would have felt uncomfortable, and would probably have wanted to leave. Hell, he sure wanted to leave now that he'd made such a fool of himself. Well, he couldn't leave now, no matter how stupid he'd been. There was too much to be done before Rosie could sell the place at a good price. He cracked open another beer, and considered it. He usually never drank three at a sitting. Then again, he'd never had a gun pointed directly at his family jewels before either. He laughed out loud at the thought. No telling when his manhood would get over that shock and want to come out to play again. It wasn't as though it had anywhere important to be anyway, he thought. The sun had completely set now, and the full moon was rising to shine down on the high desert. The rock still felt warm to his butt, but the air was cooling fast. A coyote started to warm up in preparation for the evening's concerto not too far away. Off in another direction, a small group joined in. Josh smiled and listened. What could be better? Dinner and free entertainment. He came to a decision of sorts. He would come in quietly and see where things were. Rosie's niece, (Kayla, was it?) said she'd been hauling a trailer. What did that mean? Was she just passing through, or was she going to stay? It didn't matter much, he guessed. He knew that the guests would either be in the house with Rosie or in the bunkhouse. It didn't matter. He'd fixed up a loft in the driving shed, and he was bunking there anyway. The plumbing that he'd run in there worked, so he was good for a shower tonight, and the appliances in the kitchen nook that he'd put in worked just fine. Tomorrow, he'd head into town and pick up a few groceries. He could live there until he'd gotten everything done for Rosie. He'd just stay out of the way as much as he could, and head home when he was finished. He figured that he'd have most of the things done inside of a month. Kayla. Nice name, he thought. Suddenly the memory of the hard words that he'd spoken to her came back to him again, and he hung his head. She was right. He was a bastard. He decided that if he got the chance, he would apologize to her, then get into the background and stay there. An hour later, Josh drove through the empty landscape very slowly. He wasn't sure that his blood-alcohol level would exactly qualify him as legally impaired, but he'd had four beers in three hours. Then again there wasn't much traffic to tangle with out here in the dirt on Rosie's ranch. He never drove on roads after two drinks. -------------------- Jillian woke up and looked around. It took a second for her to remember why everything looked different around her. The living room was lit by the glow of the old nightlight that had been a part of her life for as long as she could remember. She was a little groggy but she felt better when Daisy noticed that her new friend was awake and walked over to the couch. Jillian was thinking about Joshua. She didn't understand what had happened between him and her aunt, but she knew that she liked him, and then had a thought that if he'd come home while she'd been sleeping, then she might be able to see him and tell him that Kayla wasn't always like that. Kayla was the center of Jillian's universe and Jillian had never seen her aunt like she's seen her today. Kayla had never raised her voice to Jillian, no matter what, and couldn't understand what had happened. She got up and wandered to the screen door with Daisy at her side. Standing on the deck, the yard looked a little strange, lit up by a bare bulb over the door of the barn yards away. But she could see the driving shed and headed toward it. Jillian wasn't sure why, but she walked inside, and in less than a minute, she was lost in the cavernous darkness of it. She was glad that Daisy was with her. "Joshua?" ------------------ He came to the gentle slope that would bring him into the yard, and shut off the headlights of the old Ford once he's rounded the bend halfway. He didn't want to talk to anyone at that point and so he allowed a minute to let his eyes become accustomed to the dark, and let the SUV coast down quietly. Near the bottom of the slope, he shut off the engine and coasted the last hundred feet in silence. He didn't need to steer at that point. Getting out, he stood chewing over the things that he'd planned to do in the morning, and was satisfied overall. He made his way to the driving shed, and was about to walk inside when he heard Jillian call to him. Her voice sounded frightened and tearful. He called softly to her and listened for a second until Daisy made her low and quiet bark that usually served as a heads up that there was something going on that she didn't necessarily agree with. After that there was silence for a moment, and then Joshua heard Jillian's small voice as she began to sob. He walked into the shed and looked around in the darkness. His eyes adjusted quickly and after a second he spotted her when she moved slightly. Josh found Jillian frightened and shaking. She was standing between Sam's large tool chest and the old police bike. Somehow she had wandered in and gotten stuck by feeling her way until she touched an obstruction, and moving in a different direction, until she had finally trapped herself. Josh thought she looked so small and vulnerable. His heart forced him to move. Picking her up, he smiled as her little arms encircled his neck. "Josh, I'm scared." she told him. "There's nothing to be afraid of Jillian. I'm here with you now." Josh marveled at the words that came from his mouth and wondered where they'd come from. That wasn't what he'd meant to say, but what the heck, he thought. He carried her gently to the shed doors, and pushed them open farther with one foot. Then he walked as carefully as he could to the house with a very relieved Daisy alongside. Kayla had woken and had gotten up to check on Jillian. Finding her missing, she'd pulled on her jeans and pulled her nightshirt overtop. She was surprised as she met them at the door. Josh whispered that she was ok, and that she'd gotten lost outside somehow. He quietly explained that he had heard her in the shed a few minutes before, but that was all that he said. Once inside, Kayla pointed to the couch, and Josh carefully laid Jillian down. She opened her eyes sleepily, and hugged him. He softly wished her a good night, and stood up to back away. Kayla placed the blanket over Jillian, and quietly asked her if she was alright. Jillian nodded, and after a smiling hug, Kayla could see that her niece was already close to dropping off to sleep. Josh heard Jillian say Kayla's name and wondered why. He'd have thought something like 'Mom' would have come into it. Kayla tucked Jilly in carefully and decided that now was as good a time as any to get Joshua outside and apologize for what had happened. She turned around. The screen door was closed. She walked to the door, and opened it. "Joshua?" she called. She was alone. The doors of the driving shed were closed. Kayla's interpretation was that while he might be concerned for a lost little girl, he was now treating the child's aunt in the manner that she deserved. Well that shouldn't come as much of a surprise, she thought. Kayla sighed and leaned on the rail of the porch. She actually wanted to talk to him, and that bothered her all by itself. She'd decided what had to be done, and the longer it took, the worse she'd feel about it. A part of her just wanted to forget about the afternoon, but she also knew she'd overreacted to nothing, really. She was surprised at herself, and couldn't really say why she'd come to her snap conclusion. He didn't look like a criminal at all. He'd made no threatening moves or comments. For some reason, they'd just managed to lean on each other's "Launch" buttons somehow. She looked over at the shed, wondering if she ought to follow Joshua and apologize. She looked a bit higher up the wall and noticed some motion in the dirty old windows. Josh had turned the light on in the loft. The driving shed was two stories tall, and there were windows up there to allow light in when the doors were closed. The windows probably hadn't been washed since the building was erected before the Depression. They were so grimy that she hadn't noticed them during the daytime. And it was looking like Josh hadn't noticed them much either... Joshua had found the mostly empty loft above the rear half of the shed the previous year. He had cleaned it out, put down sub flooring, and created a small loft apartment up there shortly after arriving in June. He hadn't gotten around to planning for some generic walls yet to divide it into rooms, other than just what was needed to basically hold up the sink and the mirror in the "bathroom" and have something to lean the cupboards and counters against in the "kitchen". Mostly, the walls were there to hide the wiring and plumbing. The rest could be any way that Rosie decided. But the openness of it was providing Kayla with some novel entertainment just now. She knew she shouldn't look, but hey, the TV was on so to speak, so she watched. Josh went to the small fridge and took out the last two slices of pizza from the night before, and put them into the microwave. He was thinking that he hadn't lived a stranger day in his whole life up to that point, and that was saying something after his overseas postings. Usually when somebody pointed a weapon in his direction, he at least had a clue what it was about. He went to the old claw foot tub and turned on the water. He'd decided to have a bath instead of a shower. He took off his shirt and draped it over the chair by the table. The shirt was quickly followed by the rest of his clothes, as the microwave beeped. Kayla thought this show was beginning to look like the best one she'd seen in a while, but the grimy glass sure wasn't letting her see the degree of detail that she wanted right then. His upper torso was worth the price of admission by itself, she decided. There was some kind of smudge on his right bicep, she thought. It moved with him, so it wasn't the dirt on the window. When he turned to get something out of the microwave, she saw his backside, and her heart began to flutter a bit. "Now that's nice." she said to herself quietly. He bent down from the waist to get the laundry detergent, and she saw – something, but again, no detail. She was starting to throb a bit lower down now. "He's just standing there eating something completely naked – why do guys DO that?" she wondered aloud. "What do I care?" she smiled, "Let him eat, as long as he doesn't disappear." The only annoying thing was that he kept his side turned toward her as he ate at just the wrong angle as far as she was concerned. Kayla had a small grin on her face as she willed Joshua to turn toward her - at least just a little. Josh stood munching on his pizza and looking down over the railing at the old Harley parked downstairs. He hadn't ridden it in a week or so – there had been no time. He thought about the other one that Sam had said was around here someplace. He'd never seen it. He finished the second slice, and grabbed his clothes to throw them into the washer. He'd do a load tomorrow, he thought. Then he walked to the tub and eased himself in. Kayla had been watching with fascination. She had positioned her butt to lean on the end of the handrail. Joshua's recent excursion around the loft had made her lean around in some odd positions as she strained to keep him in view. He turned around for a second, and she had a full frontal view – or she would have, but the wood separating the glass panes was in the way. She leaned out farther to improve the angle when something warm and wet touched her hand on the rail, and she let go of it in alarm. She almost landed in the dirt, but managed to save herself with a few extreme gyrations. She turned around, and there was Daisy with her tail wagging, and obviously wondering what the game was. Kayla felt foolish as she walked up the steps, and tentatively patted the big head. She looked back toward the windows, but Joshua had gotten into the tub. "Thanks for nothing, Daisy." she sighed as she walked back into the house. Daisy followed and lay down on the floor in front of the couch. Kayla went back to bed, but sleep eluded her for a long time. --------------- He'd gotten about as relaxed as he thought he ever would. He wet his hair well, and washed it with the bar of soap. Nothing like a no-maintenance haircut, he smiled, as he leaned back. His eyes closed as he sank a little deeper into the hot water and after a few minutes, he fell asleep. He was back in the village again. It was happening more often. He saw the little girl and her smile once more as she ran toward him on her little bare feet through the dirt, laughing and calling to him. He had no idea what she said to him. He never did. She was just a beautiful little kid who looked for him whenever he came this way, just as he managed to keep an eye out for her even as he oversaw his people to make sure that they were on the job. Like generations of soldiers and peacekeepers from his country before him in many altercations, Josh and his men tried to keep some candy in their pockets to toss the kids here a little when they passed through just to make the kids' day. His little friend was too small and shy to push her way to the front when that happened, and Josh had seen it. That was how they'd noticed each other. From then on, if he could, he would sometimes stand so that she would be sure to get some and he stayed long enough for her to at least begin to enjoy the treat while she stood next to him. Josh noticed the woman that he assumed to be the girl's mother, leaning against the door frame of her home with a smile. Then he looked down. The girl stood looking up at him, saying something. Her eyes shone with joy. There were none of the other children around and she was so excited to have all of his attention for once. All of the alarms in his head were going off, and he felt a sudden sense of foreboding. The hair on the back of his neck rose as he heard the comments on the open channel through his earpiece at how deserted the place was that day. In the next instant he lost all positional references, as though the video recorder in his mind had run into a bad section of tape. He had no idea what had happened to his body armor. It was just gone along with some of his shirt. He pulled himself from some razor wire that he'd landed against with his chest. The house was more than half fallen in and it was plain that the girl's mother was dead. The next second, he found himself looking into her eyes, close up. Josh didn't remember when he'd picked her up off the ground. She smiled weakly as he gently kissed her forehead and spoke to her, trying to sound more reassuring than he felt as he tried to find his personal radio to get some help, but it was gone as well. She touched his face, and looked so happy as his heart pounded painfully. The world was hazy with dust and confusion as his men ran around, seeking other threats, warily looking around them with their rifles ready. His chest and arm pulsed. He knew that he was bleeding, but it wasn't what caused his horror. He felt the warmth. On a hot day in Hell, he could feel it, her warmth on his arms, chest, and stomach. Oh God, how could there be this much. He could barely hear anything. The confusion around him was muted as though they were alone in a whirlwind, and his ears were ringing from the noise and adrenaline. But somehow he could hear her through it all. She smiled again as she spoke to him for a moment, just a short sentence or two in a language that he knew very little of. Her eyes rolled upwards a bit as her little heart ran out of blood to pump, and then she was gone with a sigh. He could smell her blood mostly, but everything else that her body would normally produce added its terrible cachet as it left her. On a hot day in Hell he stood clutching the tiny, wet, and torn bundle to his chest. Somebody told him that she had said that he was an angel. He thought his heart had torn open. Finally, he began to scream. He sat up violently, and heard some bathwater land on the floor. He still got tears in his eyes every time. The bath had gone cold. He stood up and reached for the towel. His chest hurt again. ----------------- In her own way, Daisy was pretty bright. She had no measure of the days on a calendar or the names of the days, since dogs have no need of it. But she knew what day it was, even if the word 'Saturday' held no meaning to her. From the way that the bright morning sun shone down, it was time. To Daisy, it all meant that today was one of two days in the cycle of a week while people were here that everybody ate breakfast together, and with just a little luck, she might be able to mooch or otherwise come into possession of a little of the treat of a scrap of their food. But Daisy knew that for that to happen, her male human friend would have to be there, and he wasn't - yet. So Daisy decided - as she had every Saturday since Joshua had arrived to go and try to wake him up so that this whole procedure might be expedited just a little. She sat by the screen door, and knew that before long, somebody would let her out. Today it was Jillian. Once Daisy was outside, she ran toward the driving shed. Jillian followed, walking. As they passed the door of the bunkhouse, Kayla saw them, but thought nothing of it. ----------- Joshua gradually noticed the change in the air. It caused him to work his way a little closer to full consciousness so that he could wonder about it. He knew that slight odor. He'd only known two individuals whose morning breath came to him like that, and unless something was terribly wrong with the universe, he thought, then he just couldn't be in bed with the woman. That had been something of a short-lived friends with benefits thing, years ago, and anyway, she was married now. The way that he heard the heavy breathing and the snuffling had almost shocked the hell out of him, until he remembered the other female with this sort of morning breath. The cold nose against his cheek cinched it for him and he opened an eye. Kayla had been busy sweeping out the bunkhouse for a time but she suddenly wondered where Jillian and Daisy had gone. She turned around. They were either around the back of the driving shed or they were in it. Those were the only choices. Kayla leaned the broom against the door frame and started to walk. "Thanks, Daisy, I'm up," he groaned and Daisy tried to show him her happiness by licking his face. Josh turned his face into his pillow and tried to push her away blindly, but not before he'd gotten the dubious and questionable thrill of feeling her tongue against his ear, and then it was gone. He waited a full ten seconds as he heard her nails on the floor receding away from him. He wondered why. Daisy never gave up that easily. He cautiously turned his head and opened one eye just a little to see Jillian smiling at him from fifteen feet away. Joshua closed his eye as his brain started its power-on, self-test routine. He knew who he was. He knew where he was. He knew that he was capable of speech. Frantically, he tried to sense the sheet which ought to be there over top of him. He was relieved to feel enough of it to know that he was at least covered to the small of his back. He heard Kayla's voice then as a hissing whisper and wondered what was going on. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 03 "Jilly," he heard her hiss, "what do you think you're doing? Go back to the house. Joshua is sleeping and you shouldn't be here. I shouldn't be here either." "Holy cow," he heard her whisper to herself, "I hope to God he's still asleep. I can't believe this. Get going, Miss." Jillian wanted to protest that she'd only been following Daisy, but she knew that it wouldn't fly with her aunt. She turned and went down the stairs quietly with Daisy tagging along and hoping that she'd get something out of this in the form of a half a piece of bacon. Josh thought his options over and kept his eyes closed as he struggled with the full bladder that he was lying on. He just hoped that there wouldn't be any more discussions. Kayla turned to follow and noticed several things that caused her to pause. She could smell the coffee in the coffeemaker that she assumed had been set to start on its timer and she heard the hissing burble as it finished its task. She looked around quickly and noted the sparseness of the loft. It didn't slip her attention that the place was spotless. Kayla gave a thought to the bed. She wondered why a man who lived alone as far as she could tell would sleep in a double bed, and since she was in this part of town anyway, so to speak, she regarded the form there in it for a moment. He was on his front with one arm hanging over the side and his face turned toward her. She took in his general form and then her eye went to details. The bed was low, and his hand easily reached the floor. There was a tattoo on his left bicep with what she thought might be a scar through it. She wanted to get close enough to really look at it, but she didn't dare, and anyway, she knew that she had no business being here like this. She was about to turn and go when she noticed his face. She decided that she liked to look at him when he was asleep and not glaring his dislike at her. The lightning bolt was still there, and today, it was back to being brown. She still wondered what would possess anyone to have that done to them, but like it or not, it seemed to fit him somehow. She felt a strange urge to step closer and touch that face, but before that stupid idea could get any stronger within her, she decided to leave before this got ridiculous. She turned to go and managed only one hopefully silent step. "Kayla," he said very quietly. She froze and wanted to groan. "Yes?" "I'm uh,... I'm very sorry for yesterday." Kayla looked back and saw that his eyes were open and regarding her. He groaned as he raised his arm to place his hand on the bed, palm down to push himself up a little so that he could pull his pillow a little closer. He put his head down and looked at her again. She could see that he wasn't angry at the intrusion, but then she wondered just how awake he really was. Kayla decided that he was awake at least enough to be good enough to try to apologize for the day before. She thought about that and doubted that she'd be this nice about everything if it were her who had been woken up this way. She decided that she had to give him points for it. As far as that went, she realized that while he was lying there looking that nice to her, she couldn't keep an insane little thought from her mind. A double bed with that in it? She wanted to smirk, but kept her face as impassive as she could. She wanted to ask him to move over. He exhaled, "I just wanted to say that before I do anything else wrong." "That wasn't all you," she said, "I'm sorry too." She looked down for a second, "I'd like to say that I didn't really mean it when I told you to ..., you know. I actually can't believe that I went that far." "Well you did," he said, "and you meant it," he said as well, rubbing his eyes a little, "because I pushed you that far." "Yeah," she admitted with a sigh, feeling foolish, "I meant it." "It's ok," Josh said, trying to offer a better smile, "I deserved it." Kayla actually thought that he looked a bit sweet like that. She smiled, "It's alright, Joshua. I was pushing back just as hard, and I was the one being stupid with a gun - which I can't believe I did either, so let's just call it a draw." "Ok," he smiled a little, and Kayla knew that she couldn't stand there for much longer. She had to remind herself that they'd wanted to kill each other not that many hours earlier. She reminded herself of her previous relationships and how they had all seemed to go - with her feeling used. She reminded herself that she'd had no desire to even get near a man again afterward and how she'd told herself that everybody else must be idiots to let a man into their lives. Really nice guys only lived between the covers of novels. In reality, they were as hard to find as leprechauns, or unicorns, and other fictional creatures. And they were that hard to find because just like true love, they didn't really exist. All that she'd ever found were bastards, and none of them had looked like this. She thought about how he'd looked to her the previous night through the dirty glass. She thought about how much she wanted to hold on tightly to what some cruel twist of her rotten luck had laid out right in front of her in that bed. It came to her that under that thin sheet, he was very obviously naked. She watched him sigh and wished that her arm was over his back when he did that just to feel it. "So before I really get the chance to add another day of being an idiot, I just want to tell you that I'm regretting it a lot. You didn't deserve that." It came to her right then just how badly she wanted right now to taste his skin. "Joshua," she said, "look, I'm really sorry that we disturbed you. I've got to have a talk with Jilly. Daisy came to see you and Jilly just followed, but I'm not dumb enough to think for a moment that she didn't want to see you. Anyway, I followed her, once I'd figured out where she'd gone. She seems to like you quite a bit, but that's no excuse for just walking in here the way she did." "That's ok too, I won't leave the shed doors open again, "he said, "I didn't think of it. I'm just glad that I don't have that much to be embarrassed about. At least I didn't throw off the sheet while I was sleeping." Kayla nodded and turned to go. "I think Aunt Rose will have breakfast on soon." Josh nodded and Kayla walked down the stairs and out of the shed. Josh smiled a little to himself for just a second before it left his face and he stood up to head for what passed as his bathroom. He wanted a cup of coffee and he wanted to brush his teeth and shave. He wanted to get dressed. But he didn't want to have breakfast. He had other things on his mind. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 04 **Well, I suppose that anyone can get along - now and then - a little, anyway... O_o --------- Now that he was finally alone, Joshua got out of bed and walked to the "bathroom" for a minute before making his way to the coffeemaker. That had been a few minutes of mild torture – waking up with a full bladder, the erection from that, and not being able to do anything about it. He supposed that he ought to consider himself lucky that no one had expected a long conversation from him, but he did feel a little better for beginning an apology. Armed with a cup of coffee, he was back in front of the mirror and shaving inside of a minute. He had almost settled into "automatic pilot" mode, but his visitors a little earlier kept coming to mind. He liked them both – he couldn't help it. He was a little sad that he likely wouldn't ever get to know them beyond seeing them around the place while he tried to get things done for Rosie. "It sucks to be you," he told his reflection. The fact that he'd met a gorgeous woman who'd wanted to kill him was at least momentarily amusing from this morning's perspective. He almost cut himself when he'd smiled then, since he felt a lot better today and much more like his usual self. He'd leave Rosie with the place looking its best and then he'd be gone. He had his own troubles. And there wasn't anybody who could help him with them. They were just little things - like what the hell he was going to do for a living soon? He wasn't agonizing over it and he had a few options, but it was there all the same. He also wondered if the ghosts that he carried would ever leave him alone. He thought that Jillian was the sweetest little girl that he'd ever seen in his life and Kayla, well, that was a kind of beauty that somebody like him just never came into contact with. Now that she wasn't glaring daggers at him, he recognized that he was human enough to think for a second that just maybe he might have a little better than a snowball's chance in Hell with her. He tossed that thought as he looked in the mirror and saw what the world had always seen when anyone had looked at him. "It really sucks to be you." Cleaning off the remnants of his shaving foam, he drew as much of a mouthful of the hot coffee as he could and swallowed it – eventually. It was in preparation for brushing his teeth. Joshua shaved every morning when he could and brushed his teeth without fail, but he absolutely hated what toothpaste did to the taste of coffee. He grabbed some more of his clothes and got some laundry started. Pulling on some clean jeans and tugging a T-shirt over his head, he poured himself a second cup and began to make a list of the groceries that he'd need from now on. With that done, he made his bed. It was something that hadn't come to him naturally, but his time in the service had fixed this habit in him. Done with his coffee, he trotted down the inside stairs, and slipped outside. He was careful to close the hasp on the doors. The driving shed was no place for a small child. He was just climbing into his truck when Rose came around the front. "Joshua Taylor, don't you believe in answering when somebody wishes you a good morning?" Rose asked sternly. "I'm sorry Rosie, I didn't hear you. Good morning." Josh replied. "Where are you going this early in the day?" Rosie demanded. "Look, Rosie. I know you have some family here now, and, ... well I don't feel like butting in all the time. I was going to get some groceries. I've got the little kitchen fixed up in the loft now, and I can pretty much live out of there when I'm not working. I won't disturb you that way." Josh explained. "You finished the kitchen up there? I want to see that! Come on and show me." Rose said, and she began to walk toward the shed. Josh sighed and gave up his attempt at slipping away unnoticed. He fell into step with her. Kayla was just inside the door of the bunkhouse. She let out a breath and began to sweep again but then stopped as a thought came to her. Joshua had been about to leave. She'd been a little hopeful that they could iron out what had happened the previous day over the neutral ground of the breakfast table, but he plainly had other plans. She decided that she couldn't blame him much between yesterday and how he'd woken up. Once they got up the inside stairs, Rose looked around with approval. "Looks great to me, but what about walls, inside walls?" Josh replied, "It's kind of open concept. It's not formal or anything. I can put in some walls where they're needed. The only ones that have to be there are the ones holding up the plumbing and the little counter. Why don't you decide what kind of apartment this should be and I'll wall it that way? Everything is hooked up now, so I can do it any way that you decide." Josh suggested, "I'll put up the wall studs and wire the place and then I'll drywall it." "I see you've got about two cups worth left in that coffee maker. Why don't we talk, you and I?" Rose said. Joshua shrugged. When they were seated, Rose began "Joshua, I owe you a great big apology. Left to your own devices, you and my niece spent an hour or so yesterday demonstrating what strong-willed adversaries you can be. A lot of that was my fault because I didn't tell either one of you that the other one would be here. I did have my reasons. If I had told you that she was coming, you'd have reacted much like you're reacting now – by retreating because you feel uncomfortable about it. I know you're shy, Joshua Taylor. Everyone who knows you is well aware of that." Josh looked at his cup. Rosie's got a full head of steam up today, he thought. "And Kayla wouldn't have come if she'd known there was a man working around the place and keeping odd hours. She's very protective of Jillian. And she's got a right. Joshua, I feel the need to have what's left of my family around me now, so I can help them where I can. That way I can feel useful around here again. I think you can understand that. My niece needs a place for a new start, Jillian needs a place to be a child in and an apartment in Phoenix is not that place. We can do this Joshua, you and I, because whether you realize it or not, you became a part of my family nine years ago in that house over there. I expect you to remain a part of my family, and my family eats meals together, don't we?" Rosie finally wound down. "Come on, Joshua." Rose's eyes had lost the fire they'd had. "At the very least, that little girl needs some kind of male figure in her life for right now, and my Sam's gone. Just be nice to them while you're here. That's all I ask." Josh looked up and opened his mouth. "What?" asked Rose. "Never mind. I was about to say something very stupid, and very hurtful to your niece if she were here. I've already got enough to apologize for. Forget it, Rosie. I'll help where I can. The kid twisted my heart in a knot last night when she hugged me." Rose smiled. "What were you going to say?" He shook his head. "Please, it was just a childish swipe. And I regret thinking it, even if I didn't speak the thought - which I now regret telling you that I'd had." said Josh quietly. "We speak plainly around here, Joshua Taylor," said Rose in mock gravity. "Ok, just remember that you forced it out of me. I was going to ask what had happened to Jillian's original 'male figure', and then I was going to ask if he'd been tossed out of the picture for being considered too dumb." Josh said regretfully. Rose looked at him and said,"Car wreck." as she got up from the table. Joshua Taylor squeezed his eyes shut and hit his forehead with his palm. "Rosie, I need you to run me over with your car. Could you do that for me? I'm thinking eight, maybe ten times ought to do it." Rose was down the stairs and on her way to the door. "There's breakfast for you on the porch, come on!" Josh walked out into the sunshine for the second time that day, and headed for the house. On his way past the bunkhouse, Kayla opened the door, and said,"Hey." Josh turned toward her, and said, "Hi Kayla. Look, I need to talk to you – " "And I need to talk to you, too. Uh, truce, ok? What do you say? It's a little out of the ordinary for me, but I'm actually trying to be nice," smiled Kayla. "I want to avoid having to wear my label." Josh sighed a little guiltily. "Another thing that I regret saying. Ok, truce. We'll talk a little later on. Right now, I'm still smarting from the subtle whipping I just got. She gave me both barrels in her quiet way." Josh smiled ruefully. "I am SO glad she doesn't know my middle name." "Kayla smiled a little conspiratorially. "Don't feel bad. She gave me both barrels earlier and," Kayla's voice dropped to a whisper," she didn't say 'Good morning' to you first like she let on to have " she winked. "But what does your middle name have to do with it?" Josh smirked at her. "If a mother uses your full name, every name you have, you just know you're in deep shit." He winked back at her, and walked to the porch. Kayla laughed then, a really good laugh. It felt like chains had been unlocked from around her ribs. She realized that he was right, of course. She also realized that she'd give a lot to spend more time in the blue light of those eyes. When he wasn't murderous, Josh did have a lot of charm, she thought. She came in from the yard and sat down next to Jillian and opposite Josh. Rosie set a cup of coffee in front of her. "How's it going in there?" she asked. "And what was so funny?" Kayla said, "Nothing Aunt Rose." Her eyes smiled at Josh over the rim of her mug for a moment. "It's not bad. I'm done for now. Mostly, I just needed to sweep it out. It sure doesn't look like a man has been living in there –" Josh looked up. "Well at least none of the men I've known." she smiled, trying to cover the barb that she hadn't intended. "I'm having trouble thinking of it as a bunkhouse. It sure doesn't look that way to me, well, what I'd have imagined one to look like." "It used to be just a big room like an army barracks, and it would house a dozen men in cots with the washroom added later," Rose said, "Years after, it was used as a cool storage. The thing hadn't been used at all in years until Joshua cleaned it all out and turned it into a little house all on its own with walls and doors – the works. He did that maybe six years ago now." "And don't kid yourself. He's no angel, I just keep on top of him, is all" Rose chuckled. Josh looked at the line of hills in the distance and decided to let that one by as well. His gaze drifted down to Kayla's hair for a moment. "I'm going to divide up the rooms a bit." continued Kayla "There's one for Jilly, and one for me, but I'll need to get some things out first to make some space." Josh was suddenly aware that he had been staring at Kayla. He wondered where she put the batteries to power those eyes. Her hair was tied up so that the fall of it was clear of the back of her neck. There was still a lot of it, he mused. Her laugh had sounded so free. Childlike, but a bit lower. When she wasn't looking as though she was having trouble deciding whether to beat him, shoot him, or steal his truck, she could sure cast a spell. There was also something green that was just visible near the right side of her neck, but he couldn't figure it out. She was stunningly beautiful. He was aware that he was being charmed, though she appeared to be unaware of her effect on him. And now she was looking at him. He felt his face flush. Jillian saved him by reaching out and touching his knuckles gently. "Hi." she said shyly. "Hey, Jillian," Josh laughed, "How are you today, darlin'?" "Fine. Thanks for finding me last night. I got lost and it was pretty scary." she said. "I'm sorry for going into where you live this morning. I shouldn't have gone, but I wanted to see you." "I understand Jillian. Hey listen, – " he began. "Everybody calls me 'Jilly', so you can too, ok?" Jillian suggested. "Ok, thank you, Jilly. I was just going to say that there are some things around here that you need to know about. From now on, I'm going to keep the shed doors locked if I'm not in there, or if it's not ok for you to come in. If they're open, you can come on in because that means that I'm there. Also, I don't want you wandering outside the big yard alone, ok?" Josh said. "There haven't been kids around here in a while, I guess, so I need to take a look around to make sure it's safe for you." Josh looked at Kayla, who was smiling back at him. "If you see something that you just have to explore, you need to ask your mom first, because I'll tell her what buildings and things are safe beforehand, ok?" "'Kay." replied Jillian. "But Kayla's not my mom, she's my aunt." "Oh, sorry Jilly, I didn't know that." said Josh. Jillian looked at him for a moment longer. "Lookit, Kayla!" Jillian cried excitedly, and pointed at Josh's arm. "He's got -" "Jillian," Rose interrupted, "if you're done with breakfast, come over here, I think it's time you learned to dry and put a few of the smaller dishes away." "'Kay." said Jillian as she got down and ambled over to Rose. "Where were you going when my aunt stopped you?" Kayla asked. Josh shrugged, "I was about to go run a few errands. I need to order some parts for my bike and then I thought I'd get myself some groceries. I was thinking that I didn't need to get anything big started around here today, so if you need a hand with anything, I'm free." "Don't you eat here?" she asked, "With Aunt Rose?" "I did," he said, "but I don't want to intrude. She's got company now, and –" "And we'd prefer if you ate with us," Kayla said earnestly. "I can understand how you might think, Joshua, but this isn't really a family gathering. Jilly would be a little disappointed if you weren't here." She winked, "Don'tcha love how I'm shamelessly using my niece?" "Anyway, there's no need for you to feel like that. I think that Jilly and I are more like the guests." Kayla found that Josh had a way of being casual and friendly while still being very polite. She liked it, though it was something that she found that she had to get used to. At one point, she commented on it. Josh thanked her and then added, "My mom raised me right, I guess, though I'm not always this polite when I'm being an idiot." He sighed, "It happens. Kayla, there's plenty of room in the barn for the extra bunks and things that you want out of there. I can have the inside of the bunkhouse painted for you in a day or two, I just need to know the colors that you'd like." Josh offered as he pushed his plate away. Rose appeared at the table again as if by magic. "Ok, now we're getting someplace." she said. "Here." "What's this?" Josh looked at the sheet of paper in his hand. "Well, you said you were going grocery shopping. So, we need groceries. That's the list, and my credit card. Don't lose it. Also, Kayla needs to know where things are in town, so you can show her around a bit. You should take her car; she needs to drop off the trailer. Bart said to see if it still overheats without pulling the trailer." Kayla, get him to stop at the hardware store so you can pick out the paint for the bunkhouse and buy it. Also, see if they have what we were talking about earlier. Joshua has my card. Make sure he doesn't lose it. Joshua, take her someplace for lunch where they don't oil up their cutlery to keep it from rusting, please. You know what I mean, someplace without flypaper rolls hanging from everywhere. You're paying for that part. You should get the groceries after lunch, so things don't cook in the car." Rose stopped for a breath and looked at Kayla. "At least with you along, it shouldn't take hours for Joshua to shop for groceries. You probably know how to shop cheaper than he does anyway, and you can peel off any women who might get stuck to him along the way. Jillian can help me keep the puppy out of trouble, so get going. And don't lose my credit card." Both Kayla and Joshua sat through the lecture looking at each other with their eyes wide. They both got up and headed for the yard. Josh turned and asked, "Uh, Sarge, what did you use to do in civilian life?" Rose lunged forward for something, and they took off for the yard in a trot. "What was she reaching for?" asked Kayla with a grin, "the dishtowel?". "Flyswatter. She's wicked with that thing. I'll bet she's still the state champ." he laughed. As they walked to the car, Josh stopped and said to Kayla, "Listen, It's going to be as warm as it was yesterday for sure and you're wearing that denim shirt. If you know where your clothes are, why don't you put on something cooler? You're gonna melt dressed like that." "I'm ok, "she replied, "this is a bit cooler than Phoenix. Here, you drive." she said handing him the keys. "I don't know where we're going, and you probably know more about cars than I do, so if it acts up, you can just talk some sense into it." Kayla untied her hair. He was speechless. Josh stared as they approached her car, but didn't say anything. He recognized it from the previous year when it had almost T-boned him on his motorcycle. He wondered why he wasn't at all surprised, but decided to let it go. This seemed like a different woman completely, and he liked today's version a lot better. The first part of their drive passed in a slightly awkward silence. Josh broke it first by asking, "What are you supposed to see if they have at the hardware store?" "Jilly's birthday was yesterday, and Aunt Rose didn't have anything picked out for her. She intended to take us all out to dinner, and talk to Jilly about it then. Afterward she planned to go wherever she could to get what Jilly told her she wanted. But you and I got all tangled up." She sighed, "My imagination took off for the horizon, my reasoning went south, and you were beset by snakes." she said. "Joshua, I can't tell you how sorry I am for being such a fool and getting wound up so tightly. I ruined everyone's evening by being stupid. And I pointed a gun at you after you helped us." She found herself fighting back tears, and beginning to lose the fight.. Josh groaned. "Listen. I'm really sorry I got so angry. Maybe you made a bit of a judgmental error, I dunno. But I can see how it might have played out in your mind. Don't drag yourself around the block over it. Yesterday I said the cruelest, harshest things I've ever said to anyone before and I'm ashamed of myself." Kayla shook her head, "No Josh! You don't know it, but you were absolutely right about me! I –" He interrupted her gently, "Come on, Kayla, Whatever happened before is done. I'd rather forget the whole thing. I will say one thing though; you're one tough lady. Faced with what you thought you were faced with, not many people would have done that." Kayla looked up from her hands. "Yeah, Most people aren't as nuts as I can be. What do you mean?" Josh smiled, "I'm telling you, I almost peed in my pants looking at you with that Colt in your hand. The only hope I had was my uncertainty about it really being empty. Please don't ever draw down on me again." Kayla laughed and fished out a Kleenex to dry her eyes. She flipped down the visor and checked the mirror. "Glad I didn't put on makeup, I'd look like a raccoon." she said. Josh looked over at her and said, "If you didn't put on any makeup and you look like that, Kayla you don't need makeup, and that's a fact." Kayla was blushing now, but she said, "I also want to thank you for what you did for us yesterday. I almost got Jilly killed. If you hadn't come along -" She looked out the window blinking hard. "Why are we stopped?" "You began to cry. I'm not driving around town with a crying woman, and I don't know why." he said. "Besides, it's a good test for your engine temperature, idling with the air on for a few minutes. It's up a bit, but I'll bet it drops once we start moving again, especially since the trailer is empty now. But are you ok?" A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 04 Kayla nodded, thankful that they seemed to have buried the hatchet. "You never told me, what would Jilly want for her birthday?" Josh asked. "Rose wants me to pick her out a bike with training wheels within a certain price range, and I'm going to buy her a helmet to go with it. That's not what she would have asked for, and I'm kind of glad that Aunt Rose never got the chance to ask Jilly about it." Kayla's eyes were filling again. "Well, what does she want then, maybe we can – " Josh said. "She misses her parents." Kayla said quietly. Josh had nothing for that. His eyes began to sting. ------------- They dropped off the trailer, spent an hour driving around, and then pulled into the hardware store lot. Some of the staff were on a first name basis with Josh and were very friendly. Josh was careful to introduce Kayla, adding that she was Rosie's niece. There was an awkward moment the first time, since Josh didn't know Kayla's last name. Kayla felt a bit uncomfortable about the attention until they whispered to each other while they were looking at paint chips. "Why are they staring?" Kayla hissed. "Uh, this is a small town, Kayla. Small towns are kind of like goldfish bowls in that regard. Everybody knows pretty much everything about everyone else, whether they want to or not. Everybody knows Rosie and they liked Sam, so the looks are natural. You're the new kid on the block, and they're just curious about you. They don't mean anything by it. Most folks here would give you the shirt off their backs if you needed help, but this is the other side of that coin. Once they get to know you, it'll settle down. ... Or you'll just get used to it, and not notice it anymore." he smiled. Kayla picked out the colors that she thought would look good, and Josh arranged to have the cans mixed up while he grabbed a few rollers and trays. Then they tried to pick out a bike for Jillian. Kayla wanted to explain, but picked up on Josh's signals and let him explain that the bicycle was for a child's birthday present, and that he had told her that this store had a good selection of quality products. Josh suggested a flaming pink one, but Kayla shook her head. "I don't know if you've ever noticed," she said gently, "but girls come in various shades just like paint chips. Jilly isn't that much of a girly, if you get my drift. I know that I'll be spending a fair amount of time pulling her off of eaves troughs and out of mud puddles." She laughed. "And you're no help, Mr. Adventure. All I've heard lately is 'Josh this, and Josh that', and you weren't even around." She smiled, "How about I handle this?" Josh was astounded. He smiled shyly, and let Kayla do her thing. She picked out a much better bike for slightly less money than the pink one, and grabbed a glittery helmet too. Josh held the helmet and studied the box. Suddenly, Kayla stopped short. "How are we going to get it home with my car?" she asked. Josh smiled. "Simple. Rosie buys the bike and the paint, you buy that cool helmet, and I'll pay to have it all delivered, but in return, you have to allow me these and one other thing." He sheepishly held up a chime, and a set of streamers. Kayla laughed and agreed. "I see that you're going for the retro look," she said. From there, they drove to a motorcycle dealership, where Josh dragged Kayla inside, and said that he needed to order something. It took about five minutes. While the parts guy was on the computer, Josh wandered over to the clothing displays while Kayla wandered around the showroom. She had just told a salesman that she wasn't in the market when she turned to walk back to the parts counter and saw one model that caused her to stop in her tracks. Josh returned with a child-sized Harley-Davidson ball cap that was adjustable for fit. "What are you looking at?" he asked with a smile. "This one," she said pointing, "I like them all, but I really like the way that this one looks." Kayla noticed as his smile turned to a grin, "What?" "Nothing that you'd believe," he chuckled, "I usually ride here when I come, but I knew that I'd need my truck this time." He nodded to the bike, "I own one of these, but mine's blue and shiny. I didn't go for the flat paint like this one." In the car afterward, Kayla held it up and raised one eyebrow. Josh explained, "Well, you told me she wasn't too girly. I started thinking that all of the kids I've seen with bike helmets usually wear a ball cap underneath for the visor. Jilly's going to go to school here, I'm guessing. So she might as well start off with some schoolyard cred. I figure it will augment the helmet". Kayla chuckled. "She'll love it! Thank you." Josh said "For what? I'm the one having fun!" They went to a little Mexican place that Josh knew, and he asked her if she knew her way around Mexican food. She rolled her eyes, and said, "Frankly no. Why, there's absolutely no Mexican food available at all in a place as close to Mexico as Phoenix." He stared open-mouthed, and she laughed. "I love it, why?" "I was hoping that you could help me," he said, "I come in here several times every year, and order the same thing every time to be safe. I love this stuff, but I can't take really spicy food." he admitted. Their waitress was a young college student. Kayla was pleased to order for them both, and they settled in to wait. Josh looked a bit uncomfortable. "Kayla, what happened to Jilly's parents?" Kayla shrugged. "My brother was a sales manager. He was always on the road. My sister liked to go along whenever she could line up their schedules. They went off the road in Tennessee a few years ago. Jilly was staying with me when it happened. So I'm raising her now. I'd do anything for her." Josh nodded. "It shows in the way you look at her." Kayla sighed. "It might sound strange, and don't get me wrong, I still really miss Marcia every day, but in a lot of ways, Jilly has been the best thing that ever happened to me." Kayla noticed a woman at another table nod at Josh, and then start talking to the people who she was seated with. "You know this small town thing is starting to creep me out a little." Kayla said. "I think I liked it better in the city where you don't know your neighbors." Josh said, "Trust me Kayla, it will pass. You should have seen the looks that I got when I first started hanging around. They've either kind of accepted me, or they nod and play nice, and lock up the silver when I come to town." Kayla was about to ask him what he meant when her eyes were drawn to his arms. She thought that he could probably open a can of chili by placing it in the crook of his arm and scratching his nose. She'd never been big on men with his type of build, but then, she realized, she'd never really known anyone like Joshua. He was so ... different and out of the ordinary to her, almost a different species or something, and she struggled a little trying to figure it out. She looked at the tattoos for a full minute, and then she said "I can't stand it any longer. I HAVE to know this first. What is that thing?" she motioned to the tattoo on his left bicep. She was looking at a falcon's head turned to one side in front of two crossed battle-axes. He didn't say it, but it was the emblem of a helicopter squadron that he was in at one point before switching branches. There was a scar through it that had obviously happened after he'd gotten the tattoo. On his right bicep was a shining dagger with a form of script on the blade that she couldn't read. It looked recent. Josh smiled a little sheepishly. "Stupid is as stupid does, I guess. It's just an emblem and it's only partly finished. I didn't think I'd survive all of those feathers since it took forever. I didn't have the money to do it all at once. I was going to have it finished, but I just never got around to it." Kayla wanted to ask about the scar through it, but decided against it. He shrugged, "I wised up a little though; my other ones are a bit more to the point." Kayla's eyes flicked to his cheekbone and forehead. It started midway between his hairline and his left eyebrow and went down to his cheekbone where there was a zigzag before it continued on down his left cheek, ending at about the same level as the bottom of his lip. Yes, she thought, it certainly is. "I was young and stupid, I guess. Now I'm just older." Josh said. "Why were you stupid? Kayla asked, pointing to the falcon's head, "It looks fine to me. You should have finished it." "I'm not in that space now. My life has changed. It's not the focus now like it was then. That's why it's really important to consider what you're getting in a tattoo. It's meaning has to remain current for your lifespan, if you can understand that. I've seen some absolute works of art. On the other hand, I knew a man who had a fire breathing dragon's head on his forearm. It looked pretty cool. There was a hand holding a sword that was being shoved into the dragon's throat." Kayla blinked. "What's wrong with that?" He grinned, "There was a woman's name under it all. It was his wife's name when he had it done, but she was an ex-wife when I knew him. Besides the symbolism, I often wondered if the dragon was supposed to represent the woman." Kayla was sipping her drink and started to laugh. She snorted and some cola came out of her nose. Josh handed her his napkin, and apologized. "So now you hate tattoos?" she asked when she'd recovered, "I think it's a bit late for that, isn't it?". "No, no. I didn't say that. My point was that it's idiotic to get a marijuana leaf tattooed on your shoulder when you're 18, because it might bite you in the ass if you want to become the sheriff later, is all I'm saying. I really wanted this thing then, but I doubt that I'd want the tattoo today. That's what I meant when I said I was stupid. Shit, I've done a lot dumber things than that." Josh said. "So have I." Kayla said quietly. "Hey, what did you mean when you said that folks lock up their silver? What was that about?" Josh laughed. He was about to speak when a female fireball came shrieking the length of the restaurant at him. She greeted him as if he were a long lost brother, jumped onto his lap, and hugged him tightly. "Josh, where have you been, honey?" she asked him. "Consuella told me you were in back in town and we waited for you to show up, but no," she looked at him petulantly, "you hide in the dust like a ghost." She suddenly remembered there was someone else at the table, and took a vacant chair. "So this is Kayla! She looks like Rosie, too. Welcome! I'm Margarita. My sister told me about you. This is our place. My husband noticed that Josh the Viking wasn't ordering the same old thing this time. We only keep it on the menu so that he can have something to eat when he's not sleeping one off in the corner." She glared over at him. Josh protested, "Hey, I only did that one time!" "Yeah," Margarita laughed, "for two days! We were going to start charging extra for that authentic 'Old West' atmosphere that you were providing. And then I see that the Viking isn't here alone for ONCE!" she said pointedly. Kayla smiled, but looked confused. Josh caught the look. "Margarita's sister is Consuella Smith, Bart Smith's wife." Josh explained. Kayla laughed, and said. "Must be a small town..." Margarita complimented Kayla on her choices for lunch. "Some of the northern riff-raff that we get around here wouldn't know good Mexican food if it bit them on the ass." she said. Josh smiled and said that this was the very thing he was afraid of, and both of the women laughed. They hit it off immediately. Josh was alone in a crowd for a few minutes, but he didn't mind as they chatted about cooking. It seemed they had some connection there. Josh was thinking that might be interesting. Food had always been high on his list. He was lost in thought when Margarita nudged him. "Hey, Rip Van Winkle! Did you bring them?" "Yeah. Hang on a minute," Josh said as he slid down in the seat slightly to reach into the watch pocket of his jeans. "Here you go." he said as he placed four coins on the table. They were silver-colored, but there was a yellow center section that was about the size of a dime. Margarita frowned and said, "I've only got three kids. Seems like twenty some days, but I know there's just three. You can't count or you just forgot?" Josh smiled "Well you and Jose might get romantic tonight, you never know. This way I don't have to remember to bring another one next year." Margarita laughed, and said, "No way baby, I'm done, I hope." Kayla looked at the coins curiously. "What are these anyway?" she asked. "Here Kayla, you keep this." Margarita said, pushing one of the coins toward Kayla. "I don't want to take it in case what he said comes true. Josh has strange tastes. These are pictures of his girlfriends. They're polar bears. We all know he sleeps with them, because he's sure not doing anybody around here. He just comes here for a rest when they've worn him out, right baby?" "I'm hiding out until the paternity suits blow over." Josh explained. "These have 'Canada' written on them. I've always wanted to go there. Josh, have you been there?" asked Kayla. Margarita saw her husband's signal that he needed her help with something. She got up and said, "I've got to get back to work. Thanks for the coins. Joshua, you'd better bring Kayla back again if you know what's good for you or I'll be some pissed, I mean it. I've got a feeling this girl can cook. Kayla, it was lovely meeting you. You and I need to have our next meeting in a kitchen with my sister, honey. We'll make some food that'll knock these old men out and we'll have us a time doing it. Oh, and if you can get your hooks into Frosty, don't let go, ok?" This last was tossed over her shoulder. She was gone as fast as she'd appeared. Kayla laughed. "She's like a tornado! I like her. She told me that she has a seven-year-old girl too. Jilly might have a potential buddy, I hope. I was worried about her being out in the sticks with no playmates." Josh nodded. "I was thinking the same thing. I'm sure she'll get along great with Jacintha," he said, as Jose brought their food. He stood smiling with his hand on Joshua's shoulder and told Kayla that he was very pleased to meet her, and that she should come back with Josh more often now because he looked almost respectable in her company. He chuckled as he retraced his steps to the kitchen. The food was perfect, and Josh was pleased about a few things, not the least of which was the new taste experience that he was into at the moment. Mostly, he was happy just to be in Kayla's presence. She was very easy to be with. He could almost feel it when she laughed, and when she looked at him, he felt foolish again for getting angry the previous day. He suddenly realized that he had an earnest desire for her friendship. He never expected more from a woman than that, because that would infer a word that really wasn't in his vocabulary anymore, well, at least from an expectation or hope of return. Kayla commented on Jose being such a quiet man. Josh winked at her. "That's because he never gets much of a chance to say anything, so he chooses his words carefully. Usually, by the time he's chosen them, his opening is long gone." "What was that Viking thing?" asked Kayla. Joshua shrugged, "I dunno. Rita and her sister started it and some of their friends call me that too. I don't pay much attention to it. My hair and eyes, maybe that you can dress me up, but I'll still look crude like oh, a maniac, or an axe-murderer," he smiled. Kayla smiled back ruefully. "Hey, I said I was sorry. And I don't find you crude either. Anything but. I was actually thinking that your mom did a pretty good job. It makes me even more uncomfortable over how stupid I was yesterday. I was freaked out by a man and his scary-looking dog. Once I got to know her and thought about it, I realized I'd better stop making snap judgments. I'm too quick for my own good." Joshua smiled warmly. "Well you ARE pretty quick on the draw, if you'll pardon the pun." Kayla rolled her eyes and groaned. Josh continued, "It was an easy mistake to make. I don't have any hard feelings. And though I got upset, I should have known better, anyway. I know what I look like, and if I put on a heavy layer of stupid, I can see why you'd maybe want to shoot me." Oh no, she thought, deciding that she definitely didn't want to shoot him anymore. Kayla had noticed that they'd been getting a few curious and admiring glances from around the cantina. "Anyway, I'm glad that you suggested a truce this morning. I don't think we'd have gotten far on the way over without it." Josh said. Kayla smiled, "Well I knew we'd need some kind of arrangement. I think it's obvious that we've both got strong personalities. This is much better, I think. I don't think either of us could have survived the morning without it as you say. Besides, I'm pretty sure that you were about to suggest the same thing." As they were leaving, Kayla picked up the coin. "May I keep this? I'd like to give it to Jilly." she said. Josh smiled, "Of course." On the way to the grocery store, Josh asked if it was all right to have a cigarette. Kayla said that she thought he'd never ask, adding, "I don't smoke much, but I enjoy one after a good meal." Josh glanced down at the ashtray, and said "You must eat quite a bit then." Kayla admitted that she hadn't cleaned it out in some time. "I don't smoke around Jilly, and never when we're in the car together. Hey, you never answered me. Have you been to Canada?" "I get there once a year. Why?" asked Josh. "I've always wanted to see it, that's all" Kayla said. "Well, take your time, and choose where you want to go. It's a little large. And think about the time of year that you want to go, winter is longer there, and in some parts it can be a cast iron bitch, in others it's not so bad." he said. Just then he pulled into the food store lot. As they entered the store, Kayla noted that some of the female staff just seemed to light up when they spotted Joshua. He seemed oblivious to it though. He was actually more interested in what appeared to be a green anklet that he glimpsed just above her left ankle when she stepped ahead to get things off a shelf as they passed. He said nothing to her outside of their chatter as they shopped. They ran down the list and picked up everything in short order. They were out and back on the road within twenty minutes, though Kayla noted that their cashier had looked at her a bit coolly. When they got back to Rosie's they unloaded the car, and Josh was removing the items that Kayla had wanted taken from the bunkhouse in preparation for painting when the hardware store truck pulled in. Jillian was watching with curiosity from the kitchen where she and Daisy had been banished temporarily. Josh helped the driver unload, and whistled the bicycle into the bunkhouse while the truck blocked the view from the kitchen, and then Kayla swept the bunkhouse out again, as he added the bell and the streamers. ----------------- Josh had been correct in his prediction of the weather. His T-shirt was an early casualty in the heat. He removed it and took what Kayla wanted into the barn on a wagon drawn by an old tractor. He returned to help Kayla, bringing a couple of water bottles with him from the small fridge in the loft. As he passed one to her, he said, "Hey, you must have some cooler clothes unpacked by now, Kayla. You're as red as a beet." Kayla stood watching Josh drip sweat. She didn't feel well as she puzzled over the lines on his chest and abdomen. There seemed to be another tattoo, but she had trouble focusing on it. Her pulse pounded in her temples and her face was a bright red. She sat down on a bunk. "I'll be fine." she said, "I just need a minute." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 04 Josh stared at her throat as she drank. Besides being lovely, he noted with alarm that the skin appeared to be dry. Her hair was pulled back again, and the small flash of green beside the base of her throat winked at him. He'd never seen a bra strap in Forest Green before though he had seen a few in Olive Drab. He glanced at her ankle. Suddenly, he remembered something, and muttered to himself. "I'm such an idiot!" He ran out the door. Kayla heard a dull thump followed by a loud humming sound, and then felt the hot air begin to move. She also felt the room begin to move with it. Josh returned, and looked at her with concern. She was holding her head in her hands. He knelt down, and lifted her chin. Her face had paled, and her forehead felt bone dry. She looked at him slowly, and asked "Pat?..." He said, "No darlin'. It's Josh. You're fading out from the heat. That's what I was afraid of. I've seen it lots of times. Kayla, I forgot that I fixed the air conditioning before I left last year. I've just turned it on. It's a big unit, so it'll cool the place down quick. In five minutes, it'll be cooler in here than outside. You just lie back down on the bunk and relax." He lightly touched her throat. Dry. Her forearms were dry as well while he was putting out enough moisture to irrigate the back forty. He went to the small bathroom, turned on the cold water, and found a facecloth to soak as the sink filled. He ran back into the main room and started wiping her exposed skin down. On the third trip to re-soak the facecloth, he soaked a towel and asked her to sit up if she could. It seemed that she couldn't. Josh sat on the bunk, grabbed her wrists, and pulled her forward so that she was leaning against him with her forehead near his left collarbone and throat. He started to press the towel gently to her back. She didn't flinch much from the cool dampness as her back was wetted down through her shirt. Kayla knew what was going on, and tried to cooperate, but she felt so weak. She liked the feel of his moist skin and lifted her arms. Her right hand touched his shoulder. The heel of her hand was at the spot where his bicep met his shoulder muscles, and though she had long thin fingers, her fingertips couldn't reach the top. When he reached that arm forward, her whole middle finger sank into the indentation between the muscle groups. Though she wasn't really with it, she was surprised at how much his body appealed to her. She'd never liked muscle-bound men before. She thought about this through the fog in her mind. He wasn't muscle-bound, not like a body builder, anyway. He was just powerfully built. She didn't think it was something that he had aspired to, it just seemed to be the way that he was made. She couldn't put her finger on it, but Kayla felt a bit pleased with herself for being able to make the distinction somehow. The way his muscles moved beneath his skin felt so pleasant. She smelled his sweat, but found it comforting instead of offensive. Her left palm reached up and touched his right ear, and her fingers felt the wet bristle of his head. The sudden urge that Kayla felt to kiss his throat surprised her. She felt like smiling, but there was a reddish blob which hovered in front of her eyes, and it bothered her that she couldn't focus on it. She gave up trying to focus and leaned against the blob with her cheek. Her face found the strange sideways ridge on his pectoral muscle. She wanted to ask him about it, but that would have taken too much effort. He took a deep breath, and lowered her slowly back down. She groaned quietly in complaint. On his next trip back, he felt her forehead again. Not much change, but something, anyway. He spoke to her softly. "Kayla, I'm trying to wet you down to cool you off some. This next bit might be a shock, so forgive me" he said as he held the wet towel by one end, and draped it down her chest. She inhaled, and looked up at him. "It feels good," she mumbled, "Who's Patricia?" Josh wondered what she was talking about, but he knew that people close to the edge of consciousness often spoke nonsense. He removed the towel to get the best cooling effect, swabbed her face again, and put it over his shoulder. He willed his eyes to lock onto her face, and asked her if she felt nauseous. "A little, but I need some water." He handed her the bottle that she'd set down and told her that he'd get her another in a minute. She finished it, and just said, "It's ok, I'll have yours if you're done with it." He looked at his bottle on the shelf. He'd only taken a swallow of it earlier. "I don't mind if you don't." she said. He jumped up to bring it to her. "No, here you go." he said. He ran out of the door go to get a few more for her. The room was quickly cooling to the point of being chilly, and Josh pulled his T-shirt over his head again and sat down on the bunk with her. He tried to watch her carefully while not being too obvious about it. Kayla smiled a little out of embarrassment and thanked him. "Hey," he said as he smiled back, "we've spent a lot of the day together and I've really had a great time. You haven't threatened to kill me either, so I'm taking that to mean that it's been fun for you too. I'm so sorry about forgetting to turn on the AC, I didn't think of it. But you didn't listen to me about lightening your clothing while we're working in here and it's knocked you on your ass just now. It's getting cool in here, but aside from that, I think you need to maybe lighten up your clothes. Look, um,... I know I'm not pretty to look at, Kayla. I can't help that, but I'm not going to hurt you, and I'm not trying to take advantage of you in any way, if that's what you're worried about. Is there a problem with me, or are you just afraid that I might catch a look at an upper arm or calf and lose my tiny male mind?" "No." Kayla sighed. "There's a problem with me, and I'm working on it. I just feel very uncomfortable, that's all." She sat up slowly, suddenly aware of what her wet shirt might have revealed. Josh caught her expression and said, "Hey, I just soaked your shirt to cool you off. I did nothing inappropriate, and I kept my eyes on your face the whole time. You saw my eyes, right?" Kayla nodded. "Are you uncomfortable with everybody, or is it just me? If it's me, I guess I understand..." Kayla looked down. "Not Jilly or Aunt Rose, but everybody else a lot, and you a lot less than I was, but still some. Joshua, it's not you, it's me." she said. "I'm sorry that it doesn't make any sense." Josh sat down and sighed as they shared another water bottle. "Ok, that's something, at least. Put your hand here." he said indicating his left kneecap. She looked at it dumbly. "Come on, your hand won't shrivel up and blow away, and I won't start drooling. You're a tough lady, I'm sure you've seen a kneecap before, so just trust me." She carefully put her hand on his kneecap. He slowly laid his hand overtop of hers without squeezing. It felt warm and rough. "Ok" he said, "We agreed to be under a flag of truce this morning. I want you to know something; I like you. I don't care what you're wound up about; I'm only concerned that you're uncomfortable with me. I promised this to Rosie this morning, and now I'm freely promising it to you. Whatever you or Jilly need, if I can, I'll help. That's just how it is when I like someone, so get used to it. I'd like very much to be your friend. If you can get more comfortable around me, since we have to work together for a while, then maybe we can work on the root cause, whatever that is. I wasn't trying to take advantage of you. I think you know that. I saw your red face, and I was worried. I've seen heat prostration before. My fears were justified, I think. If I do make you uncomfortable at anytime, just tell me and I'll leave. You just tell me, and I'll give you space. Are we clear on that?" asked Josh. Kayla looked at him and nodded. God, he's so serious, she thought as she nodded.. "Ok, that's settled then. Now this is as far as I'm going to go in this conversational direction, but I want you to know something else. I don't know what's wrong, but if you have a self-image problem, then speaking as hopefully your friend, I can wholeheartedly tell you this; I personally think that you're drop-dead gorgeous, so get over it." Kayla's eyes widened. Josh squinted and interjected "But I'm gonna need sunglasses if you don't turn those things down a notch. All three of you have them, and I swear, they burn me through sometimes." Kayla smiled. Josh lifted his hand from hers. "Now stop trying to cop a feel, and let's get to work, ok?" Kayla sputtered and laughed as he stood up. Before she could say anything, Josh said seriously "I do want you to take it easy for a while. Take a break while I get this stuff ready." He was opening a can of primer to stir it. "At some point, we're going to have to turn off the AC and just run the fan for ventilation. The temperature will go up again. I still think you ought to put at least a lighter top on, but that's just me. Besides, I don't know what you're all squirmy about anyway. It's not like there's three of them under there or anything, I counted." he smiled as he poured the primer into a tray. Kayla's jaw dropped. "But you didn't look!" "Not directly, no" he replied. "With determination and resolve, I was a perfect gentleman, and steeled myself for the onslaught of temptation." Kayla began to chuckle at the tone which he was affecting. "Well, go on," she said, "I can't decide now if you sound like a televangelist or a scoutmaster." "I was firm of purpose," he continued, "My high moral upbringing kept me on the path of righteousness, and would not allow my gaze to falter. I did what any true gentleman would do in such a circumstance." he explained with as much gravity as he could maintain. Kayla smiled at his feigned correctness. "What?" she demanded. He picked up a roller. "I relied on my peripheral vision." He said with a wink. He had just enough time to dodge the empty water bottle. "What?" he said, "You think it's all fun and parties up in that loft? A guy has to have dreams. It's not like I have pay-per-view." "Joshua Taylor!" He rolled his eyes, "Oh fine. Invoke two names. I'm SO not telling YOU my middle name either." Josh said petulantly. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 05 **I thought I'd put this up while I'm working on the next part of "The Sighs of the Priestess". Oh, and in case you're wondering, I'll just say that while they don't loathe each other, there are still uh, issues hiding here and there for Joshua and Kayla. ~grin~ They're just not in this chapter. As always, I welcome comments and constructive criticism. O_o --------------- Between them, Kayla and Josh had a coat of primer on in little time. Kayla had to go around touching up small spots that Josh had missed. He apologized, but she wasn't having any of it. "I can't go as fast as you. I don't mind it if I have to get a lick of paint in on some of those spots." Josh admitted that he missed some on purpose because he liked watching her get all ballerina-like to get at them. He retracted the statement when she threatened a paint fight. Rosie had pulled out the stops for dinner, and for desert she brought out the birthday cake that they'd bought. Jilly was thrilled. She didn't think she was going to have a birthday this year because of the move and all. She also knew that her aunt was struggling to keep everything together, and had to watch her money until they got settled. It was tough for her, but she did it anyway, and told herself that meeting Daisy had been a pretty good birthday present all by itself. Jillian was talking to Rose when she noticed that Kayla and Josh were gone. She looked around, and asked Rose where they went. Rose smiled and suggested that they go look for them in the bunkhouse. So they went together, and Jillian opened the door. Josh and Kayla stood smiling side by side in front of the bike. Jillian could see something behind them, but she wasn't sure what she saw until Kayla and Josh stepped apart. Jillian shrieked and since Josh was new to little girls, he hadn't braced for it. He was amazed that there were no broken windows. They wheeled the bike outside for her, and she stared at it for about 3 minutes. Kayla gave her the helmet and got it adjusted for a slightly loose fit. Jillian noticed, and asked her to tighten it a bit, but Josh said that a tiny bit of room would be needed. He took the helmet, and showed her the ball cap. Kayla told her that it was the "real deal", and pointed to the logo, explaining that the name stood for a kind of motorcycle. Josh put the hat on Jillian, and fit the helmet over top. The fit on everything was perfect. The little girl took about eighteen seconds to get settled on the bike, and she was off riding around the big yard, with Daisy in pursuit. The three adults had as much fun as the the two of them. Jillian hugged and thanked them all. She'd never dreamed of a better birthday. When she hugged Josh tightly and kissed him, he thought he'd gotten a glimpse at something that he'd never experienced, and it was an epiphany to him. When Kayla sidled up to him and whispered "Way to go, Josh," he admitted that he'd never felt anything like that before. Later on, when the Jillian was out on the couch, the grownups sat on the porch and had a beer. Kayla noticed the binoculars on the table. She glanced at the driving shed windows and thought about how they could prove useful out here. Joshua looked over at Kayla and said cautiously "I've been thinking about some things that the two of you said to me at different times today. Rosie told me that Jilly needed a place for a childhood, and you mentioned that Jilly wasn't very girly, and I'm taking that to mean that you might have a bit of a tomboy on your hands." Both women listened expectantly. Josh sensed that he might have entered a minefield, so he proceeded cautiously. "I don't know a thing about raising kids, ladies, so put down the war clubs. Jilly should be whatever she wants to be, and it's none of my business anyway. It's just that if she's very active, you ought to be prepared for a lot of skinned knees and chipped teeth in a place like this, that's all I'm saying. I've only known her for two days, and I think she's the greatest kid I've ever met. I'm just saying that she's got a bike now and I know what'll happen at some point. If she falls down in front of me, and doesn't break anything, I'm going to look everywhere but at her to give her time to suck it up. I won't make a fuss over her. Once she's got it together, we'll carry on with whatever we were doing." Kayla looked at him over the neck of the bottle. "Joshua, that's how I've been trying to handle it since Aunt Rose told me that was the better way. I've seen for myself that it works over the past year. Now I don't doubt your intentions, but I think that if you saw her go down in a cloud of dust, you'd break the world speed record to get to her. Let's just see, shall we?" Josh looked over with raised eyebrows and an indignant smile. "Rosie, what does she mean by that?" Rose smiled and said, "It means Joshua, that she thinks you're full of crap, and I agree with her." she laughed. Afterward, Josh brought the empties inside, and returned with Sam's pistol. "Well, I'm going to take my wounded male pride and go clean this old cannon out. I'll lock it back up when I'm done Rosie." he said, walking toward the shed. Rosie and Kayla watched him walk away. Kayla said quietly "Bart was right about the girls at the market." Rose smiled and said, "I know it. Josh never says anything, but I know it embarrasses the heck out of him to go shopping there. He says it takes forever for him to get clear of those hens. And most of them are married, too. You could do needlepoint by the glow of their smiles. It's disgusting." Kayla laughed and said that once she'd figured it out, she was looking for the non-stick pan spray in case she needed to hose him down. They both laughed. Kayla said, "There's no need now that I know roughly where it is, but if you want, I wouldn't mind going grocery shopping with him again sometime. Those ladies are a mile off, but I've got to admit I enjoyed the ego boost." Rose nodded. "I'd have loved to have been a fly on the wall just after the two of you had left. But don't sell yourself short, Kayla. You two look really good together. It might not be quite a mile, I think. You're not looking like you want to kill him quite as much." Kayla smiled at the ground for a moment and Rose said that it felt great to have all of them there. It had been so lonely over the last year. Kayla said, "I want to thank you for what you're doing to help us. This is just wonderful. Jilly's having a ball, and I feel a lot better too. I never realized how seldom I've laughed until now. You just have to make one comment and I'm at least chuckling, and just watching Jilly and Daisy is usually good for a laugh before too long. I think Joshua had me laughing most of the day... well except when I almost fainted in the bunkhouse from the heat in there. But Josh was on top of it right away and cooled me down with water and wet towels. He was so concerned and serious." Rose stared, "You almost fainted? Kayla ..." "My fault," she shrugged. "We just didn't want any dust blowing in while the paint is wet, so the windows are closed up. Josh seems to be able to work just fine in the heat, but --" "But you're not, because you dress like it's not summer in New Mexico?" Rose's face was revealing a little of what she thought. "It won't happen again Aunt Rose," Kayla said, "now that I know what to watch out for. Josh showed me where the thermostat for the air conditioning is, and after the painting is over with, he'll make sure that all of the windows will open and close easily. There's one that even he can't budge. He was talking about trying to replace the whole thing at some point, but the rest work, he's pretty sure. He told me that if he sees me get like that again, then he won't let me in there until the painting is finished and the windows will open." She smiled, "He's a really great guy. He thought that I was uncomfortable because of him. He tried hard to put me at ease because he took it personally. I'll admit I was a bit put off of him the first time I met him, with that lightning bolt face tattoo of his and all, but -- " "Scar." Rose said quietly. Kayla's eyes widened.. "What?" "That's not a tattoo," Rose said, "It's what's left of a scar after a lot of plastic surgery. He fell against a hot steam radiator when he was two. He was wedged against it and couldn't move. By the time his mother got to him, his face was burned on the left side from his forehead to his cheek. His folks took him to a plastic surgeon, and he had some operations during his childhood. The surgeons could only do so much with the grafts every time because he was growing and allowances had to be made for that. That's why it's that shape, to allow for his facial movements. The final operation to graft it closed it was supposed to be done once he reached eighteen or twenty years of age, but by then his folks didn't have the money for it. Since he'd had the disfigurement for his whole life, he's just accepted it and it's been like that ever since. A lot of people are put off by him at first. They think he's crazy, or trying to look like a hard case. He's been shy his whole life because of it. He jokes about it though, says it 's kept him humble." Kayla was stunned. "You mean he went through childhood with a burn scar on his face?" "Pretty much the whole left side," Rose nodded, "From what he told me - the one time that he told me the whole thing, the way that it looks now is how it's been since he was almost sixteen. He said it looked a lot worse before that. That was the last operation that he had, and it was done that way to prepare for the final one that never happened. He let me touch it once, and you can't really feel the edges. He jokes that he can get a lot more mileage out of a razor because his beard doesn't grow there." Kayla shook her head, "That must have been horrible. And kids can be very cruel. I can't even imagine what that must have been like for him. He must have really suffered through adolescence. I feel terrible for him..." Rose got up to bring them each another beer. They sat for a few minutes in silence until Kayla spoke up. "Well, I like it." Rose looked over with a small smile. "You do, huh?" Kayla nodded, "Yup. Scar or not, he's the best-looking man I've ever met, hands down, now that I know him. It sure gives him a bit if an edge when you first meet him, but it really doesn't take anything away from his looks to me." She stopped for a moment, "I think it even adds to how he looks to me. When I went to look for Jilly this morning, I found her up in his loft there and she was staring at him smiling while he was sleeping. I shooed her out of there quick, but then I couldn't take my eyes off him myself. I'm pretty sure that he was awake while I was looking at him, but it doesn't really matter. If he was awake, he couldn't have been for more than a minute by then. I was looking at his face, Aunt Rose, and it was all that I could do to keep myself from touching him." She was a little embarrassed as she continued, "Don't you dare tell him any of this, but I really wanted to kiss his face right there in that spot, and I hadn't even apologized to him yet." She chuckled to herself, "It was the strangest thing. It's not exactly the way that I am with men, you know? I'm a hell of a lot thornier than that. But with him lying there like that, - and I'll admit this is pretty crazy, even for me, but for just one moment, ... I felt, ..." She exhaled, deciding just to say it. "I felt like he was mine. I can't even say that it was like a fanciful thought or a wish. It was just something that was there, as though I knew it like it was a fact. I can tell you, that was a really weird feeling, for damn sure. But it did feel pretty nice. Then he opened his eyes and we sort of apologized to each other. He wasn't upset that I was there, with me dressed and him, ... well, half-covered by a sheet. I realized that we could likely talk about anything anytime, him and me. It felt good." Rose looked a little pleased and surprised at the same time, "It was that strong?" Kayla chuckled, "I'm actually trying hard not to sound like a 14 year-old girl, but I'm telling you, it was that strong to me. For just a few seconds, I knew what it might be like to have a man like that. I've never felt anything like it before. I tried to argue it all away in my head, but after all of that, he was still there, and so was that feeling. I didn't really feel like I was intruding so much as I felt as though I'd just found the right place." She blushed bright red and busied herself with sipping her beer and toying with peeling off the label. "A long, long time ago," Rose said softly, "I was confused over what I felt for a man. I asked your grandmother about it, and she told me that if I ever found the right one for me, that I'd just know it. I thought about what she told me, and then I ditched the boy that I was seeing that day," she laughed. "But two boyfriends and a year later, I met Sam and I just knew." "Well I don't know if what I was feeling was the same thing, Aunt Rose, " Kayla smiled a little, "I just knew that I had to get back here for breakfast, and I have Jilly to think about, and all of that, but if it was just him and me alone there, I'm almost sure that I'd have just crawled into the bed there with him and held him. It was almost all that I could think of. Well, besides the other thing, And the damndest thing is, that I'm almost sure that he'd have let me hold him like that and that would have been it." Rose nodded, "I think that's what I was trying to say. Maybe the supermarket hens are only a half-mile off?" Kayla shook her head. "Let's just say that I'm a long way from wanting to shoot him now. I think I can say that we can be friends. I doubt that he felt like I did. He just woke up and found the crazy lady looking at him. It must have been a hell of a shock. I'd bet that he was afraid to move until he'd figured out that I wasn't there to kill him in his sleep." She sipped her beer for a moment. "And anyway, he won't be here for long, so I'm just going to file that little moment away." Rose gently prodded Kayla back to herself. "Kayla honey, you're going to have to come to grips your own problem sooner or later. You could suffer through the summer, it'll start to cool off in a few more weeks, but it will still be there. Look, you're out in the middle of nowhere, and you're with people who care about you. Seems to me that ought to be the first place to try." Kayla looked down. "You're right, Aunt Rose, I know it. It's really tough, you know? What about Josh? What'll he do when he knows I belong in a sideshow?" Rose put her hand on Kayla's shoulder. "You know that's not true. Stop talking yourself under a rock. You need to make an adjustment in your head, a small one to start, and stop kicking yourself. You need to like yourself Kayla. Don't worry about Joshua. You don't know it yet, but he'll support you in this. It sounds like he was already trying to do that without even knowing what was wrong. Think about that. Am I right or not?" Kayla agreed. "Yes, he tried awfully hard, alternating between trying to make me laugh, and using horse sense." "Kayla," Rose said, "You need to try. Something at least. Josh can help you fit into this town, so he'd be a logical start to see how it goes. He's not judgmental, so you don't have that to fear from him. Really he's not. He accepts people the way they come, and I think now you can see why. If nobody else can understand, Joshua will. But you need to get him involved for him to help." Rose looked over at her niece, "There's something else you should know about him. He's incredibly observant. Even if you don't let him in on it, he'll figure it out eventually." "Well THAT certainly takes the pressure off." Kayla looked at the dirt and sighed. "I just need a bit of time to get our feet down. Then I'll have a clear head for it, ok?" Kayla asked. "Whatever you say, honey." Rose said. "So you've apologized to each other?" Kayla looked up. "Yes. We declared a truce before breakfast, and then sort of apologized to each other on the way to town. Right now though, I think I need to thank him for today. He went all out, and I really appreciate it. I think I made my first friend out here through him. He introduced me to Margarita at the cantina." "Oh, I like her, but after I've spent any time there she makes me feel tired afterward. She's got so much energy, I can't keep up." Rose smiled as she got up to go inside. Kayla pouted slightly in thought. "Aunt Rose, was Joshua's wife named 'Patricia'?" Rose thought a moment, and said, "No, I'm almost certain that her name was Janice, why?" "Nothing, I guess." Rose went inside, and Kayla walked slowly toward the driving shed. She decided that her aunt was right. Again. But this was hard for her. She'd made so many mistakes in her life it was a wonder that she'd lived this long. She shook off that line of thought, knowing very well where it was headed. She had gotten herself and Jilly this far, and thanks to Rose she could start over here. She thought of Joshua. The guy is definitely different, she concluded. He was so caring. He had great looks, even with the scar, she observed. It's a part of him, she thought to herself, and he did seem to have good parts... She came to a decision. She'd make a small start right now. She stopped as she undid the tie in her hair and shook it loose. Then she undid the collar button on her shirt, and the one below that. Really it was nothing. She didn't do it for anyone but herself. But for Kayla it was a start. -------------- Joshua had changed his mind. He decided to finish cleaning the gun tomorrow. He'd carefully stripped the old Colt down completely. It was now a jumble of loose parts lying on a few rags on the workbench. The fall into the dust had necessitated this, rather than just a normal cleaning. He removed the wooden plates from the grip, and set them aside. Everything else he placed carefully into the parts washer. He turned it on briefly just to get all of the parts totally wetted with the solvent. He switched it off again, and then closed and locked the lid. Even completely disassembled, it was still a firearm, after all. He wiped his hands, turned out the light, and stood for a moment in the pitch black, lost in thought. A small sound outside caused him to look up. After a few seconds, he saw Kayla's silhouette outlined by the moonlit sky in the doorway as she stepped tentatively inside. Josh began to breathe silently through his mouth. If she kept walking forward, she'd walk right into him and probably freak out. If he spoke now to warn her, it would have the same effect, though probably not as pleasant or painful for him if he let her keep walking, depending on how she'd react to the shock. He decided that it would probably hurt. He stepped to the side on the soft dirt floor, and moved forward, putting his weight on the outside edges of his boots first, and stopping each time Kayla stopped. He actually passed within three feet of her, and slipped outside. He leaned gently on the grill of the Expedition as he thought about her shape and smiled. Even though she was fully clothed, he recognized the unintended effect that she had. The girl was like a dream. He lit a cigarette to let her know that she wasn't alone. Kayla was definitely getting weirded out. She hadn't really been inside the driving shed since she was a girl not much older than Jillian. It had never seemed so foreboding then, because it was usually warmed by the presence of her uncle. Then again, she thought, she'd never been in it after dark before. Why were the lights off? Where was Joshua? She kept taking cautious steps forward, afraid that she might fall over some piece of equipment that her uncle Sam had in here. Finally, she'd had enough of it. Rather than call his name, she decided that he must have gone to bed. She was just turning around to leave, when she heard the scratch of a cigarette lighter, and saw a glow reflected on one of the open doors. It was gone with a click. "I'm out here." Joshua called softly. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 05 Kayla walked out of the shed and over to Josh. He offered her a cigarette. After she'd accepted, she asked him "How did you know I was in there? Were you following me?" She felt slightly alarmed. "No," he explained. "I was done for the night, and had turned off the light to go upstairs to bed. I wasn't going up just yet, and I'd been standing there for a minute or two, maybe longer. I'm a slow thinker, as you may recall. Anyway, I heard you coming, and then saw you in the doorway. I figured if I said anything, you'd about jump out of your skin, and if I didn't say anything, you'd walk into me eventually. As pleasant as that thought was, I figured that you'd probably pound me to pieces, so I walked out to give us a little space." He smiled. She looked at him doubtfully. "That means that you must have walked right past me. It's not possible. I'd have known." "Actually, it was close." he said. "You were about to stop just when I was this far away," he held out his hands. "I was thinking then that it might not have been a such a good idea, but you didn't stop, and you didn't turn, so I was home free." She didn't look convinced. "All right," he offered, "I can show you our tracks in the dirt in there, if you want. Let's just wait a minute, though, there's too much solvent and gasoline in there for these things." They passed a few minutes in small talk, looking at the moon and stars, and then Josh opened the door of the SUV, and pulled out a flashlight. "What's that for?" asked Kayla. "Well, if we walk in together, we'll mess up the tracks. If I go in ahead to turn on the lights, you'll suspect that I will just create some to prove my story. This way, we can go in, and I can prove my innocence as we walk." Josh said. "You certainly seem to know what I was thinking, are you a mind reader too?" Kayla smiled. He shrugged, "Nope, I just know you're smarter than I am, and if I don't prove this to your satisfaction, you're gonna pound me to pieces anyhow. I'm just trying to save my skin here." Josh said. "See? These are your tracks, going pretty much in a straight line. You stopped here, there, and there. Those tracks are deeper at the front. Right there's where you turned around to come back, and you can see that you didn't stop. Over here are my tracks going around you. You walked on a few of mine on your way out." Kayla was impressed. "Was your father an Apache, or what?" "Loans officer at a bank." Josh said, "Come on upstairs, I think I've got something for you." Josh said as he led her ahead, and turned on the shop light before leading her toward the inside stairs. They went up to the loft, and he turned on the light there. He offered her a chair, and asked her if she'd like a cup of tea, or a beer. She thought about the tea, but declined, thinking that if she had any more liquid, she might just explode at some point. After the two beers that she'd already had, Kayla didn't think she'd have much trouble dropping off quickly when she got to bed, she explained. "Aunt Rose snores a bit." Josh chuckled, as he searched through his stuff. "I was thinking about you downstairs before you came in. I thought this might be just the ticket for you to wear tomorrow. It's old, so you don't have to worry if you get paint on it, and look here; it's not a v-neck. It might allow you to be cooler while you work, and since it will be too big for you, it will be nice and loose which equates to more comfort. Especially if you don't tuck it in, though in my opinion, it will just ruin your outline." he grinned. Kayla stuck her tongue out at him, and blew a raspberry. She held the shirt out, and looked it over. His consideration of her comfort, while recognizing that she seemed to have a need to cover up touched her. It was just a light blue men's T-shirt. On the front was a black circle with a bleached steer's skull drawn on it. Above the circle was the word "PENHOLD", and under the skull was a banner that read "Versatile". "Who is this guy Penhold, and why is he so versatile?" she asked. "And how did you end up with his shirt?" "It's a place, Kayla. Anyway, will it be ok for you? It's clean, and like I said, it's old, and I don't care if it doesn't survive." he said, "If you think it would be useful, it's yours." "I think it will be perfect. Thank you very much." She said, meaning every word. Kayla changed her mind about having another beer, since she seemed to still be thirsty even hours after being dehydrated. Josh looked at her and she laughed that it was a woman's prerogative to change her mind. "I'll give you the point," he smirked, "since I can't even pronounce what you've just said, and since you can, I'm thinking that you're not exactly drunk." She proved her sophistication by blowing another raspberry and they sipped on their beer in silence for a few minutes. Josh asked, "So, what brought you out to the hired hand quarters?" "I'm not a prude, -" she began. Josh was in the middle of a swallow at that point. His eyes grew wide as he felt the beer go down the wrong pipe. After a full minute of choking and spluttering during which Kayla alternated between being concerned for him and tyring not to laugh at the faces that he made as he struggled, Josh settled back down. "I guess I deserved that for making you blow cola out your nose earlier." he said. "What were you saying before my near-death experience?" "I said, I'm not a prude, you know. Um, look, I know I must seem downright weird to you, and I wouldn't blame you for thinking that if it crosses your mind, the way I've been acting. I've just got some problems that I need to work out." Kayla said, "And it's really difficult for me. I'm not uncomfortable around you because of you. I made a career choice a long time ago that didn't work out. Couldn't have worked out, but as you said. 'young and stupid'. Then I listened to some bad advice to try to help the career, and instead of helping, it actually made it worse." Josh was listening transfixed as she spoke, but he still didn't really have a clue what Kayla was talking about. It didn't matter. He tried to follow along and he got some of it, but she wasn't giving him enough, but that was alright to Josh. He was happy talking with her and if whatever she was on about was making her feel better, then as far as he was concerned, she could go on talking all night. Kayla continued, "The only good part was that I was able to afford to go back to college. Just when I thought that I'd never get out of that shitty job, my sister and her husband died, and I had to take care of Jilly as well. At least I was able to start a second career, but it's been a slow start. I'm glad I've got Jilly though. She keeps me sane." Kayla said, adding, "That's all I can tell you right now. If I feel like talking some more later, would that be all right with you?" Josh looked into her green eyes and said "Of course Kayla, that's fine. Talk if you want to, whenever you want to. Or not. It's up to you. I'll always listen." Kayla looked at him for a moment, "You weren't lying there looking very uncomfortable when I was here with you this morning. I'm a little curious about that." Josh smiled a little. "I was really uncomfortable just before you came, Kayla. I opened my eyes and saw Jilly there, and I had to figure out if I was under the sheet or what." He shrugged, "But after she was gone, I felt fine." "You weren't upset that I was here, were you?" "No," he smiled, "I was surprised to see you, and relieved that Jilly was on her way downstairs, because of the whole sense of awkwardness, but with just you and I here I was fine. I didn't even think to look for a weapon." Kayla grinned, "You didn't feel awkward with me standing there at all? So I could have just pulled up a chair and talked with you if I'd wanted to?" Josh looked a little confused. "Well now that you mention it, I guess I should have felt uncomfortable, really, but I didn't. You can talk to me about whatever's on your mind. I felt comfortable with you here. It was kind of like we knew each other in a way -- as nutty as that sounds, given the circumstances of yesterday." Kayla found that she liked what he'd just said. She supposed that it was pretty close to him telling her that he felt at least a little like she had that morning. She felt a very small temptation to tell him that she'd have paid money just to be able to lie next to him in bed and hug him for about five minutes, but she knew that as impulsive as she could sometimes get, even she wasn't that bold. Kayla stood up and leaned on the table with the fingers of one hand curled over his wrist. "I want to thank you for today. You made me feel welcome, and Jilly and I already feel like we kind of belong here a little bit. I had a great time with you in town today, and thank you for taking care of me when I felt faint, and thank you for being concerned over the way I've been behaving. I just need some time. I feel better here with you guys than I can remember feeling in a very long time. I want you to know that I think you're very sweet for being worried for me." She leaned in and kissed his cheek. "Good night, Josh." She grabbed the shirt, and walked down the stairs. He watched her go, completely fascinated. As she walked to the exit, Kayla had a hopeful and rather mischievous thought. She stopped at the doors, and said "Joshua, nothing personal, but you were working earlier in that heat too. You need to have a shower." Joshua blushed a little, and he said "Yeah, I know. Sorry about that. I'll have one in a minute. Good night." Kayla smiled at him and was gone. Her smile stayed on her face as she walked away. "I'm counting on it," she said under her breath, remembering their conversation earlier in the bunkhouse. "I don't have pay-per-view either, and a girl has to have dreams herself now and then." Joshua picked up his beer and quietly spoke to it. "Of course, I won't be able to stand up now for another ten minutes or so without breaking something, or tearing my jeans, or tipping the table over..." He'd meant none of it, and anyway, the bottle seemed unimpressed. Suddenly he remembered her kiss. He touched the spot and he realized that Kayla had kissed his scar. Nobody but his own mother had ever done that. He smiled to himself and sat back astounded. Kayla walked to the house with confused emotions. She found herself liking Josh more by the minute, but she really didn't think she stood a chance in the face of some pretty stiff and obviously determined competition around town. The thought came to her that Josh didn't seem to be at all interested in any of them, but he did seem attracted to her somehow, or so it seemed. She hoped it was more than concern for her. It might just be that he's a nice guy, but that's all, she thought. And then her fears came roaring back. Of course that's all it ever could be. One look at her, and he'd suddenly feel the need to go grocery shopping, alone. She stopped and physically gave her head a shake. Aunt Rose was right. She needed to face her demon somewhere, and this was the best possible place to do that. She would try for her OWN good, and if Joshua could help, fine. If it turned into anything later, that would be wonderful, but if not, well she was sure she'd live through it. She remembered that he was only there for a little while, and the thought made her a little sad, but there wasn't anything that could be done about it, so ... She smiled to herself for making the decision for herself, and went to the porch to grab the binoculars. "I wonder what's on TV tonight," she whispered, as she leaned out to check the reception. As she'd hoped, the binoculars really improved the picture quality. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 06 **What's in a kiss? A statement? A request? How about an acknowledgment of a deep-seated burning need? How about if it's a way of communicating that need? Ha, you're interested now, aren't you? This was inspired by the way that some women like to see a man on a hot day or in uh, heated circumstances. A lot of guys like to see a woman in the same circumstances too, just sayin'. So here you go, heat and sweat, hehe. Please vote if you feel so inclined, and I love comments, too. Thank God for stepladders and gravity. O_o ------------------ In the morning Josh was in the kitchen early. He sat at the table savoring his coffee and kidding around with Jillian. She'd already torn the knees of her older jeans and was sporting a Band-Aid on her elbow. Josh was proud of her. Rose had breakfast going, and called to Kayla to get moving. "I can only keep this boy's face out of the bacon for so long, Kayla, and then it'll be gone. He's been on good behavior up to now, but I've got to tell you that he's a human vacuum cleaner around food, especially after he's had his run." Kayla walked in, and sat down wishing them all a good morning. There was a moment of silence as they all stared at her. "What?" she asked. She was wearing Joshua's shirt loose over her jeans, and her hair was tied in a French braid, the ponytail still hanging a good distance down her back. Rose smiled "You know, I'm sure that I've seen that shirt someplace before, Joshua." Josh, for his part, kept looking at Kayla. He suddenly seemed to come to his senses. "What? Oh, sorry Rosie. I've never seen so much bare skin on this girl before. All of the blood in my head seems to have gone south for some reason. I mean, I can see almost her whole arms. Look!" He grinned. Kayla's mouth fell open, and Josh got a dishtowel swat on his shoulder for his trouble. All Rosie had to say to him was "Next one's the flyswatter." Josh said, "Yes Ma'am." Josh told Rosie that he'd given Kayla the shirt the evening before so that she might be a bit cooler painting, though he was sure that it had never looked that good on him. Rosie replied that Kayla must have been painting afterward then, because when she'd awoken, Kayla was wearing it for a nightshirt. Kayla's mouth opened in shock and mild embarrassment again. Before she could say anything, Josh looked grim suddenly and said, "I HATE that Penhold guy." Kayla laughed and added, "Well I don't. You know, he's really quite versatile!" "I've read that." said Rose "What's a versa-tile?" asked Jillian. "Do you run in the morning?" asked Kayla. "Yeah," replied Josh. "it blows out the cobwebs. You know, with your hair like that, you've got a certain Tomb Raider look to you somehow." Kayla laughed, "Well you can just keep dreaming. There are some differences. Like I'm not about to fall over because of the weight of my lips, and the character in the game's got a lot more up top than me, and she wears really tight shirts to keep the adolescent boys' little brains spinning." "That's where I was headed with this, hopefully." Josh kidded, keeping a wary eye on Rosie's dishrag. Josh and Kayla got right to work after breakfast. If they'd been asked beforehand, neither one would have admitted to being very enamored of painting. It was just something that needed to be done sometimes and the bunkhouse was really in need. But as they worked together, they enjoyed each other's company, and the work went quickly it seemed. As the temperature rose, they turned on the air conditioning. The thermostat was a rather crude affair, and so it was actually a bit on the cool side for a time. The cold caused Kayla's nipples to stiffen, and the effect was not lost on Josh. He noted that she had elected not to wear a bra because of the heat. He was in heaven. After some time, the smell of the latex paint was strong enough to force Josh to turn the cooling unit off, and run just the fan to keep a flow of air moving through the screen on the door. The temperature shot up fairly quickly after this, and by the time that they had the first coat finished, they each wore a sheen of sweat. Today, however, Josh kept an unobtrusive eye on Kayla, but never said a word about his concern for her, as he made sure that she stayed hydrated. They broke for lunch, sitting out on the porch while the first coat of paint dried. It seemed that Jilly couldn't keep her little backside off the bicycle saddle for any length of time. She was in heaven on her first very own bike pedaling around, and trying to mimic the sound of a motorcycle. During one of the short intervals that the sunlight could actually shine on the saddle, Jillian asked Kayla what the 'motorcycles on her hat' looked like so that she would know one if she saw it. Kayla said her uncle had liked to give her rides on one when she was little, but hadn't been on one since and that she often wished that she could ride one herself, but she couldn't answer Jilly's question. "They're just big, Jilly, the ones that I saw yesterday, and they all look so cool." Josh said that he had one, but that he hadn't brought it with him. Jillian had always thought that motorcycles of any sort were interesting to her, if not downright awesome. "Is yours one of these?" she asked indicating her hat. When Josh nodded, she told him that she'd have liked to have seen it. "Well," he smiled, "I do happen to know where there's a real old one that might be of help to both of you." He winked at Rose, and asked Jillian to come and walk with him. They set off together for the driving shed, Jillian's hand reaching up to take Joshua's. She kept looking ahead, but Joshua looked down at her, and then over his shoulder at the women. Rosie was giving him the thumbs up with a proud smile. Kayla's jaw fell open and her expression turned to a huge grin. When they got inside the shed, Joshua told her that she had actually been almost touching the motorcycle when she had been lost the other night, as they walked up to the old patrol bike. Jillian's eyes looked like they were about to leave her head. To Jilly, the most important thing was that it was a real motorcycle, and that it was really there. It was big and white and complicated. Two wheels, a million spokes, a windshield, saddlebags, and three headlights. That was all that mattered to her. She wondered for a moment how she had managed to walk in and out of the shed the previous morning and not seen a wondrous thing like that. The only thing missing was a spotlight shining down on it. Her jaw dropped and stayed there. "It's just an old police patrol bike," Josh said, "Rosie's husband Sam took really good care of her, and I do my best as well. It's about 70 years old, but it's the same kind that's on your hat. The engines were a lot smaller back then, and they were hand-shifters with a suicide clutch." Josh almost regretted what he'd said, because it brought a volley of questions from his young friend. He had to explain what the motor did and how the motion got to the back wheel. After that he had to define what a clutch was, what the word 'suicide' meant, and how it applied to the motorcycle. He tried to just gloss over it all, but he was amazed after a moment at how Jilly was taking it all in. Then he thought of himself when he was a kid and he understood. Then he asked the question. "Want to sit on it, Jilly?" Jillian couldn't even speak. She just nodded emphatically. Josh had to look away for a second so that he didn't laugh. She looked so sweet to him. Josh lifted her up after a minute, and sat her down on the seat. She tried to reach the handlebars, but it was a long stretch. She could only get to one while leaning on the tank with the other hand. Josh told her not to worry, that she would get there eventually. He told her that he would start it, and that if she wanted to, she could ride with him out to the yard. She nodded vigorously. He explained that she didn't need to be afraid of the sound, and that it would be a little loud inside the shed, but once it was outside, it would quiet down some. He told her that, because she was still a bit small, she would have to sit in front of him, and where to keep her hands. He also explained that the engine would heat up, and not to try to hug it with her legs, but she should hug the tank with her knees because it would help her to stay steady. He said that if it was all right with her, he would put his arm around her to hold her as well if that was ok. Jillian was fine with that. He lifted her back off, and prepared to start the old Harley. Jillian couldn't believe that this motorcycle was older that any of them. After a bit of fiddling, Josh folded out the kick-starter, and after three kicks, the old engine lit off, settling to a clattering lope. Josh got the bike up off the side stand, and asked Jillian to come to his side, but pointed to the engine parts that would now be getting hot. Josh put the old hand shifter into first gear while he held the clutch down and lifted Jillian onto the seat in front of him. He asked her if she was afraid at all. She yelled, "Just a little." He smiled and said that it was ok if she was. He asked her if she was ready, and she nodded. He explained that they would only go out of the shed, and around the yard twice, and that would be the end of her first ride, because that was all of the time that they would have before Kayla tried to kill him again. She laughed and nodded. Josh put his arm around Jillian's little waist, and pulled her to him gently. She seemed to relax into him. He took this as an encouraging sign and offered a small prayer to the ghosts of the founders of the company that had produced the bike that he didn't drop her. He fed it some gas, and gently let out the clutch. Kayla recognized the sound from her childhood. "Sam still had that running?" she asked Rose, who nodded. "Sam left it to Joshua," she smiled, "he knew that his old bike would be well taken care off in Josh's hands." A motion from the shed caught Kayla's attention. The old white patrol bike looked just as Kayla remembered it as they rolled out into the bright sunshine, but this time Sam's 'old girl' was proudly giving another generation a first taste. Jilly had rapture written all over her face. Josh looked so serious as he concentrated on keeping Jillian safe. He managed a smile after the first turn, but looked relieved when he pulled up after the second go-round. He told her to sit still for a second. Taking his arm from around her, he continued to hold down the clutch pedal, and shifted the bike into neutral. He put down the side stand, and held Jillian again as he eased it onto the stand. He lifted her off, and reminded her about the hot parts so that she wouldn't burn herself. She ran a few steps away, and turned around smiling from ear to ear. Kayla was smiling thankfully, as was Rose with shining eyes. Jillian was intently inspecting every part of the bike. Josh shut off the bike. He knew what would come next, so he stood next to her, answering one question after another. "Jilly, I just know that you're going to have a lot more questions later. If you can save them up for a little while, I'll answer every one, OK?" Jillian nodded, and Josh walked to the porch. When he looked up, he found himself looking at Kayla. "Josh, she could have been hurt." she said. Rosie had a look on her face that spoke volumes, mostly the ones having to do with her having been able to predict this response. Josh took a deep breath, held up his hand, and said,"Wait. I gave Jilly the safety talk, and told her what to stay away from. I wouldn't have done this if I weren't sure that I could. I wouldn't even have tried if it didn't have the old-fashioned pedal-operated clutch so I could hold on to her. I could not have been more careful. We rode only as far as she and I agreed to beforehand. I don't think that she was afraid, but I was. You know, as I was leaving here after Sam's funeral last year. I came very close to being killed by car when I pulled out of here. The driver was looking for the right driveway, and was going too fast. She almost hit me, but I got out of the way. I've never forgotten the front of that car, and since it's parked right over there, I'd very happily throw myself under those wheels TWICE before I let Jilly get hurt, believe me." He paused. "Now, you can kill me if you want to, but I've got something better in mind if you're up for a challenge. So what'll it be?" Rose said, "Kayla, I remember you said something to me about almost hitting some jerk biker." She was smiling mischievously. Kayla gasped, "Was that you? Oh, I – " Jillian giggled as she walked up the steps, She held out her arms and Josh knelt on one knee while Jilly hugged him for the ride. "Josh told me you were going to try to kill him again," she laughed at Kayla. "I still might kill him later." scowled Kayla "Save me, Jilly." Josh said. She kissed his cheek, and Kayla smirked. "That's really cheap, Jilly. You know I'm not going to hit him after that." "All right, what's your challenge?" Kayla asked evilly. "I dunno, I just had an idea. You said that you had always wanted to ride a bike. I could teach you to ride this one, but it's not a good idea for a number of reasons. Learning involves a little bit of bump and grind, and it's too tired and at over 540 pounds, it's too heavy, especially in this dirt, since it wasn't made for that. It's also a hand shifter with a suicide clutch, which compounds the difficulty. I think I know where I can get one that's easier to learn on. You can play with that, and graduate to this one when you're ready. There's more to my evil plan, but we're a bit too busy around here right now to go there. Now come on." he said as he took hold of her wrist and pulled her to her feet. "Where are we going?" demanded Kayla. "It's your turn." said Josh as he walked her to Sam's bike. He let go of her and folded out the kick-starter again. Once the bike was running, he slid forward on the saddle as far as he could go, and said, "Get on. This is going to hurt me more than it will you." Kayla laughed and sat down behind Josh. "It's been a long time since I was sitting on this bike. Where are we riding to?" she asked as she figured out where the places were to put her feet, now that she was all grown up. Josh answered, "Not far, and not fast. You ready?" She put her hands on his hips, "I hope this is as much fun as it used to be." He folded the side stand, and paddled the bike backward as much as their weight and the soft dirt would allow. Then he held down the clutch pedal, and put the machine into gear. Kayla held onto Josh, and felt the machine throbbing beneath her. The throbbing became more pronounced as he fed in some gas, and they began to move. He turned gently toward the driving shed, and headed in that direction. By the time they'd turned around to head back, Kayla was smiling. Rose saw the smile, and she and Jilly waved as they went past. Josh headed slowly down the driveway toward the main road. Kayla raised her arms up Josh's sides as she leaned forward against his back. Her left hand was over his solar plexus, and her right hand settled over his sternum. As she laid her head against his shoulder, she sighed as she felt a new warm tingle begin. She thought that she could get to like this. A lot. Josh felt her shifting, and wondered briefly what she was up to. When she settled against him, he smiled. He'd wanted so much for her to be able to relax. The end of the driveway approached slowly, and Josh rolled off the gas to make the turnaround. He was as gentle and careful as he'd been with Jillian. This was something that he didn't want to mess up. As they neared the porch on the way back, Kayla sat back and dropped her hands to his hips again. Josh stopped and held the machine stationary so that Kayla could dismount. Kayla got off, but noticed that Josh was studying the instrument cluster intently. She walked up and put her head near his to ask what the matter was. "Nothing." he said tightly. "I think I ought to put the bike back in the shed. I,...uh,... please ask Rosie to find Jilly a piece of light cardboard, some scissors, and two clothes pegs for when I get back." "Well, can't you give Jilly a ride into the shed?" asked Kayla, her forehead touching his temple slightly. "Uh, no." Josh interrupted. "That wouldn't be a good idea right now, trust me." Josh said between his teeth. He revved the engine slightly, and continued to stare at the stationary speedometer on the tank. "What's wrong – Ohh" she said, getting the clues, and noticing the bulge in the fabric of his jeans. Don't you move." she hissed in his ear. Turning to Rose, she relayed his request. When Rose nodded that she understood, she asked Jillian to help her look, and they went into the house together. Kayla climbed back onto the bike, and said to a very surprised Josh. "Ok, stud-muffin, off to the stable." Josh was speechless. As they headed for the shed, Kayla's hand wandered a little lower than it had been earlier, but not much, settling around his navel. He had enough problems already. In the shade of the shed's interior, Kayla got off as soon as they had stopped. Josh had it figured out and put it down to the different seating position and the vibration through the hard leather saddle in a different place. He shut the engine off and put the stand down. "I'm so sorry," he began. He was mortified. Kayla laughed. "That's all right. I'm sorry that it took me so long to clue in. You sure looked uncomfortable, but I got you out of it. You're safe now." She put one arm around his shoulder, and pulled his head toward her slightly as she gave him a light kiss there. Then she slapped him gently on the back as she walked away. "Come on back when you've got it together, we've still got another coat of paint to put on. I CAN see that you weren't lying, though." she giggled. "What wasn't I lying about?" asked Josh, mystified. "When you told me that you liked me." she laughed as she walked away. "Either that, or you've still got that flashlight." Josh began to laugh. When he was alone, he groaned as he got off the bike. Another shining Joshua moment, he decided. When Josh returned a few minutes later, Jillian showed him the things that he had asked for. He took the cardboard and cut a few squares quickly. He took one piece, grabbed the clothespins, and walked over to Jillian's bicycle. He clamped the cardboard to one of her front forks so that it touched the spokes. "Get on, and try out your new motor." He smiled at Jillian. She hopped on, and took off, laughing as the cardboard slapped the spokes. He walked over to the bunkhouse with a huge grin. ---------------------- The second coat of paint took longer because they wanted no mistakes. Afterward, they worked on the final coat for the trim and interior doors. Kayla was standing backwards halfway up the stepladder replacing the cover of a light fixture as Josh squeezed past. She found herself having a slightly hopeful thought about Josh when her feet slipped off the edge of the step. One of the most visceral autonomic reflexes present in every single living human is the fear of falling and Kayla reached automatically for the closest thing. Up until that instant, that 'closest thing' had been going past and he was just beginning a pleasant little momentary daydream of his own Josh reacted instantly and caught her, and she in turn reacted instinctively to the fall by slamming his back with one arm, and pulling herself against him with the other around his neck. The result was that she hugged his head to her chest, his face pushed into her left breast. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 06 One of his arms was against her lower back, his other arm supporting her backside. She still slipped slightly downward, and her legs instantly wrapped around Josh's ribcage. The fingers of both his hands splayed out widely, and he adjusted to the weight easily. "AAAh!" she cried. He could only manage one intellectual effort, and it came out as "MMMPHhh!" They were both sweaty, and though Josh's old shirt had managed to dodge paint drops all day, it was stuck to Kayla and was soaked through. He hadn't told her how much he'd been enjoying the effect. Now, while he absolutely couldn't believe what had happened, he began to search for a way to keep her from being overcome with the embarrassment that he was sure would arrive in another second. As charitable as the effort might have been, he couldn't think of a damn thing. Joshua's breath felt hot as he exhaled against Kayla's bosom in response to the pressure of her thighs on his ribs, and the effort to hold her up. There was no way that she could ignore the way that it felt, but she did at least realize that her fall had been stopped. Before Kayla could even begin to get flustered, her body took over. The way that she'd stopped had been a hell of a jolt. For that matter, the way that she hung there wasn't much better, from the messages that her nerve endings were blasting to her brain. Her clitoris was mashed very uncomfortably against the inside seam of her jeans, which were in turn pressed tightly to his tensed abdomen. It throbbed to her pulse, and without consciously willing it exactly, her hips automatically rolled once hard against him as she sought for a more comfortable position. The sensation shot through her like a red flare. She groaned as she lowered her forehead to rest on the top of his while she wondered in some amazement how this had all happened. She hung on tightly for the moment until the thrill faded and sanity returned, and with it came a great deal of embarrassment. Kayla's ears felt like they were on fire and she had no doubt that the color of her face had to be approaching that of her hair. "Uh, Josh, help me down." she whispered. He said something that she couldn't understand. His warm breath was a repeating thrill on her breast. He pulled back his head slightly as she looked down. She watched in fascination as his blue eyes looked up at her very slowly. He kissed her gently through the shirt, squeezing just slightly with his lips for a less than a second, and then releasing. His eyes never left hers as he began to lower her slowly. She had no idea how he could do that, but he did. She groaned softly as he carefully let her slide down the front of his body. Their eyes stayed locked as their faces lined up more or less with each other for a second, and neither one could read all that much from the other's hopeful but guarded look. As she descended, she swiveled her legs downward, marveling at his strength. The moment of unintended intimacy wasn't quite past, and Kayla realized that there were parts of her which now wanted a lot more. Her breasts were definitely telling her a few things as well as she rubbed her way down the front of him. When her mound reached the bulge in his jeans, she gasped at the sensation, and he groaned softly. Her interpretation put her at least a little at ease in the strangest way, as she recognized that his body was betraying him as well. They stood holding each other tightly for a moment, both enjoying the closeness, but wondering how to get out of this. Kayla was also very surprised. She'd gotten a strong impression that Josh hadn't just been taking advantage of his chance when he'd kissed her there. She sensed a lot more to it. It had been so carefully done, so deliberately and, she felt, very affectionately. She looked up into his eyes for a moment, and then she made a snap decision. They were near the doorway to what would be a storage room. She pulled him through roughly, and out of the direct line of sight of the outside door. The room had no window and the light was off. She did her best to slam him against the doorframe in the dimness of the storeroom. It wasn't dark in there - there was light coming through the doorway behind him to filter in softly, but to Kayla, ... It was dark enough. As his back hit the frame, he stared at her in shock. She pulled his head down to her and kissed him. A second later, her tongue found its way past his lips of its own volition. Kayla realized that she couldn't have prevented it to save her life. They both moaned quietly as he began to respond. Neither one knew both sides of it, but to him, Kayla's breath through her nose was warm and inviting. To her, his exhalations felt like hot blasts from a furnace against her cheek that threatened to drive her mad. Kayla knew that she had to do something quickly while she had a shred of control left to work with. She slowly broke the kiss and placed her head against his chest, holding herself tightly to him and listening to an incredibly strong heartbeat. His hand was wrapped halfway around the back of her head as his thumb stroked her ear. Both of them were fighting what they felt, struggling on the edges of control. In spite of anything which might have passed in their lives until this point, neither of them had ever felt anything like this before. At last, she said very softly. "Joshua, just listen to me. Don't speak yet and don't move. Just listen. We've got a very strange thing going on here. We're both confused, and – " His thumb stopped and she felt his body stiffen. He could hear the kiss-off coming from a mile away. He'd heard more than a few. So she had not gotten what he'd wanted her to know anyway, or it wasn't mutual. At least he had to give her credit since she had the sense to back off now. Josh had been prepared for it, as he felt his own self-control and shyness returning. He never initiated anything as a rule, and he was always prepared for this inevitable moment, since it always came. It just never came at him like a high-speed freight train. He was never what they wanted; just what they thought they had wanted for a moment. Nobody had ever understood that he wasn't really a moment kind of guy. For some, a moment might stretch to a night if he let it, but that was about all. He'd learned a long time ago that there were women who liked the way that he looked in a private moment, but they felt a lot differently once they'd thought about actually being seen in public with him. Finding himself strongly attracted to Kayla, and faced with a lucky break, he'd tried hard to put everything he had into kissing her nipple and risking her wrath if it came to that. He'd wanted to tell her something with one gesture. He might have been able to pull this off if they'd known each other for a lot longer, he thought. Something like this had just been a crazy stroke of luck far too soon. Then again, he thought, it was the way that his life ran. He wished now that it hadn't happened at all. He wished that he'd just felt the same about her as he felt about most of the women that he met. Polite. Distant. Safe. He preferred to stay on the periphery. He thought he could live less uncomfortably there. He thought that he could remain largely unnoticed there. It bought him nothing but it was the defense that he'd developed because of his looks. And of course, he was wrong. He sighed, cursing himself for letting his guard down long enough to care. He took his arms away from her as he interrupted. "Kayla it's ok, I shouldn't have done that, and I'm very sorr – " "nnNO!" she growled, holding him even tighter, she was NOT going to let him move away, Maybe not ever, she decided, if she heeded what her heart and body were telling her and kept her mind out of the damn equation for once. She had to make him understand this, even if she herself didn't really grasp it. She looked up. "I wasn't finished talking. I told you not to speak. Do you need written instructions? Jesus Murphy, Joshua, just do what I tell you to for once. Now put your arms around me again, and if you can reach, at least one of your hands had better end up on my ass." He moved to comply. "That's more like it." she said, "Much better. Now LISTEN, and don't screw this up with dumb interruptions. I don't think either one of us was ready for that. We're both confused, and it's pretty obvious that we're both needy too. Are you listening? Good. I believe our truce is still in effect, yes or no?" Josh's inhalation was too deep for a one-word reply, so before he could speak, she tried to shake him as she hissed, "Yes or no... One word, Josh." He exhaled, and she felt him nod and say "Yes." She closed her eyes and rested her forehead at the spot where his collarbones came together and tried to exhale out some of the tension in her chest. She couldn't look at him right then. Kayla needed to let him know that she'd gotten his message. 'Oh God please,' she prayed silently, 'let me get this right just this one time.' She moved her face to the right, searching until her lips brushed his nipple through his shirt. She kissed it softly, then opened her mouth and, as gently as she could, she imitated what he'd done earlier for just a moment. "It's alright, Josh," she whispered into his chest, "let's slow down a second, ... please don't let go. Just... hold on to me." She looked up into those blue eyes. "I get it, alright?" She opened her mouth slightly and kissed him there again as she looked into his eyes. Joshua sighed. He reached up and his hand on her head told her everything. "Don't move, ok?" she breathed, "I don't know about you, but I don't ever get any moments like this. Please don't disappear." His hand moved to her shoulder as she backed away half a step for a moment and looked at him. She knew at once that he needed to stay in contact with her. Josh was leaning back against the doorframe, his shirt still wet right through and she could see the details of his chest as though it was a topographic relief map right through the thin fabric by the weak light coming in from the side. Her eyes noticed the ridges of his abdomen. She could easily make out his nipples on those pectoral muscles as they moved with his breathing. She could even see the lines of those three strange ridges that crossed him from left to right. Over the neck of the shirt, she could see the tendons and muscles of his throat as she watched him draw breath. She felt a quiet groan leave her own throat. He looked as though he would have liked to be stuck with trying to decide between several choices, but they both knew that there were only two, and since he was breathing, that left only one and Kayla could see that he knew it just as she knew it in herself. Kayla stood and wiped a little of their saliva from her lips with the back of her wrist for a moment very slowly with a tiny smile. Josh thought that the smile spoke of her hunger for him, which of course, it did. She didn't mean it as a message, but the gesture and the motion almost drove him to his knees. She lowered her arm and shook her head at him with a slow smile. "I swear, Joshua, I've never been kissed like that in my whole life." She didn't know what sort of response she should have expected from him, but when he nodded with those lips open just a bit like that, ... Kayla thought that her heart could explode. He might not have been able to say it, but she knew it just the same. He'd never been kissed like that either. She was back in his arms in the span of a heartbeat. Kayla was pushing hard against him as they groaned into each other. For the moment, she was in total control and she couldn't believe her luck. For the moment at least, he was hers. Her right hand moved between them, pulling up his T-shirt. It was stuck to him and difficult to move. She used both hands. She had to. She desired, ... no, she wanted, ... 'Fuck it,' she thought, 'I need to feel his skin or I just might die'. Her hand slid over his chest and her nails lightly raked him there, hanging up momentarily on one of his scars Josh inhaled sharply. Kayla looked up, "Sorry." "It's ok," she heard him hiss. "Kayla, ..." She wanted to laugh at that one word from him and the way that it had sounded. He wasn't trying to tell her anything related to a sentence. He was saying one thing to her. She nodded with that same hungry smile that was driving him insane. "I know," she said. He groaned as he stared down at those flaming green eyes and reached for her. In another half-second, his old T-shirt was up as high as he could get it to go on her. Kayla laughed a little and pulled herself to him, dying to crush her breasts against him and wondering how he knew that. Josh just knew that he had to feel her skin on his. He was amazed at how good it felt to have Kayla against him. He certainly didn't categorize himself as the kind of man who really got around, but he couldn't think that there had ever been anyone ... God, in his entire life, there hadn't been one who felt this good to hold onto. They both knew it was near madness, and there were a whole pile of reasons not to even remain like this – not the least of which was a seven year-old girl who could come bounding in with a dog at any time. That thought, along with the possibility of the threat that Rose could also make an entrance "just to see how things were coming along" was about all that stopped them. They just enjoyed this together by some unspoken agreement. Laying her head back to his chest after a time, Kayla questioned her sanity as Josh kissed her ear. 'This guy isn't like anyone I've ever known,' she thought, She sighed and continued the thought. 'I actually WANT to do this, I can't believe it'. She whispered to him, "We can't go beyond this, so I'm not going to try, understand?" He moaned softly and nodded. "Ok, then," she began as she looked up at him and touched his face, "you don't have to do anything, just listen to me, ok? You made a promise to me yesterday, do you remember it?" He nodded with a sigh. "Good," she whispered. "It has nothing to do with what we're doing now, but if you meant it, please say it to me again. I need to hear it from you. If there's not enough blood getting to your brain or something, I'll step back until you think you can say it. Do I need to do that?" Josh whispered, "Whatever you and Jilly need, if I can, I'll help you." She sighed. "That's sounds so good, Josh. I've always been the kind of girl who doesn't need anybody, but right now, I'm finding that it's so good to hear you say that to me." She whispered, "Joshua listen to me, Jilly and I are better than we've ever been and a lot of that is because of you in just three days. I can't believe that I'm holding a man like you in my arms right now. I keep blinking, but you're still here every time I open my eyes. I have no idea where this is going, but I do know that I want very much to just be with you. It's right across town from how I usually am, but it's how I feel and I can't help it, Josh." She felt Joshua inhale slowly, for so long that she wondered when he would ever stop. His chest expanded with the intake. His heart slowed suddenly, and then she heard it stop. Her eyes flew open in alarm, and then it beat again even harder almost a second later. It thudded powerfully in his chest. Each beat moved her head. She heard him sigh. One of his hands moved to caress one of her breasts. He whispered, "No one's ever said anything like that to me. I'm not exactly used to being run over like this either." And with that, he undid the button on her jeans and pulled the zipper down. His hand was down her pants forcing the fabric away from her to give his fingers some room. Kayla wanted to jump back, away from him, but she just couldn't. She wanted to jump back, but she needed to stay in contact with Josh at the same time. She felt the warmth renewed down there, and her clitoris throbbed its desire again. She briefly feared his reaction when he found it. His fingers carefully went right on by, his rough palm grazing it lightly. She hissed in shock, and he froze. "I'm sorry, it's pretty big and sensitive," she apologized. Josh kissed the rim of her ear, and whispered, "So? I think it likes me. Just enjoy it before you come to your senses and want to kick the crap out of me for doing this." He licked her ear and she shuddered. "I just want to do this for you." Kayla could just manage. "Mm-hmm." His fingers swirled between her labia and she whimpered softly. He slowly wet two fingers there, one after the other, and brought them up side by side to cup her clitoris against them. He pressed gently, and she got the message, leaning into them. "Very gently, Joshua, or I'll fall down." she breathed as she rubbed her hand against the swell in his jeans. Joshua nodded, and they traded long gentle kisses. She was trying to find his zipper, but dammit, whenever she thought that she had it, he moved his hand a little differently and she lost her train of thought for the moment. "This is so nice." she murmured. "I wish that we could finish, you know?" asked Kayla. "I'd love to, but we can't here. I'm very happy with this." Joshua said. They stood for a few minutes moving slowly together in the heat, Kayla moaning softly, and both of them gasping sometimes. Finally Kayla told him that they had better stop soon, and they wound down slowly. At last they disengaged and pulled apart a little. The awkwardness didn't return. "How's that for a creative way to throw myself at you?" she smirked a little hopefully. "Thanks, Kayla." Josh said, "You can do that any time that you want, as long as you have my attention. 'Cause if you miss and I don't catch you..." He shook his head, not liking the thought. It caused her to laugh a little at the comic possibility, but when it was past, Kayla put her hand on his shoulder. "No," she said with a smile, "Thank you. I didn't intend for that to be any kind of a squish fest, but I'm sure glad that it worked out that way." She looked at him with a mixture of playfulness and a bit of hope, "Um, can you think of a place that we might go this evening? I think I'd really want to continue this, but I'm afraid that I have some conditions, if it's alright with you. It's going to sound silly, but I need to be sure that we won't get caught obviously, and the place has to be totally dark, pitch black. I hope you don't mind, but I feel the need to keep some things covered. If you can't see me, I'll feel a lot better." Josh said that he was certain he'd come up with a place. He kissed her very softly for a moment. "Didn't you think that I meant what I said about helping you and Jilly?" She nodded and kissed his throat for a moment, "I know enough about you to know that you meant it, "she said. "It's just that nobody usually helps me, and I usually don't care. I'm learning that just being stubborn isn't necessarily the best thing, and it's more complicated because I have Jilly to consider. Having my aunt's help and yours is a huge boost. I've never found that I could believe words like that, but somehow, when you said it, I knew that you were serious. That's why I needed to hear it again." Her hand slid around him as she pulled herself closer and let her nose and mouth nuzzle under his jaw. She couldn't fathom how right it felt to her to do this. She had a sense that there hadn't been many who'd been allowed to get this close. She wondered how she knew it. She could have spent the whole afternoon with her face here, breathing in his skin, and she had a suspicion that any others who had been with him before had missed out on this. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 06 Kayla slid her hand along the muscles just to the side of his spine. They felt like the cables on a suspension bridge to her. Kayla felt the sweaty stickiness of him, but didn't mind it a bit. She was more taken with the fascination of his warmth and the way that his skin allowed her to feel his strength right through it. The sensation amazed her. She said, "I need to know something. Didn't you think that you were taking a hell of a chance by kissing my boob like that? What if I wasn't in the mood?" Josh smiled at the newness of feeling her against his neck and how he could feel her words as well as hear her. "I wasn't certain that you were, but it was there and all, and it felt so good to me. I was afraid I'd never get another chance to let you know how I feel. Words wouldn't have worked. It was a risk, but some things are worth dying for, you know?" She chuckled as she leaned back to smile at him, "Ok, but what did you say just before that? I couldn't make it out." "I had that thought, and then I told myself." he said. Kayla was pulling herself up on him in a flash, kissing him for all she was worth. After the same hopeful attempts at love that any woman might find herself in, Kayla had been badly burned. Relationships which had come to her in her career had left her far on the other side of bitter. She'd never had much use for men as a rule after that, and certainly never willingly allowed one to get this close to her feelings. But Joshua seemed to be steadfast to her, a man who seemed completely unafraid of her. If her inner storms raged, she sensed that he was willing to withstand them – or at least give it a good try. No one had ever shown her this before. When he touched her, Kayla felt his calmness – and she certainly felt his comforting warmth. Now that there were no weapons involved. She realized that, inside his arms, she felt something that was far past unusual to her. A moment later, she decided that right here, she suddenly didn't need her own strength and will. She smiled as she finished the thought. She only needed his. The possibility that they might be able to lean on each other was a startling one, but it was tempered with the notion that he wasn't exactly a permanent resident on Rosie's ranch, and she now hoped that he might be persuaded to think about staying longer. Then again, she realized, it was still only the first blush here between them. There might be a body count yet before they were done. Just then Rosie called out, "Suppertime!" Kayla stepped back with a smile and pulled her shirt back down in the dark. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 07 **I know that I could have just added this to the last chapter, but I wanted them to stay a little separate in the mind of the reader. I've got to go write the next chapter now. I haven't really decided whether to stoke the flames or snuff them out, so it'll be a surprise to me too, I guess. O-o -------------------------- Josh yelled that they were just finishing up the trim, and that they'd be right over. Kayla had closed the door to the bathroom. When she emerged, Josh took his shirt off, and washed his face and hands quickly. Kayla threw him a towel, and watched as he dried off. There were some scars, almost parallel to each other at a slight angle off of horizontal on his front, one across each pectoral, and two more below, one very faint, the other a bit more pronounced through his six-pack. The top one lined up with one on his left bicep that she had noticed the day before in the cantina and in the loft. She couldn't imagine that they were related to his facial scar. These were regular scars, not burns, and she could see that they had been stitched. She'd wait to ask him though, in case he had some baggage attached to them. "I can't get over how your body moves." she said. "It's fascinating to watch". Josh smiled shyly and said that he felt much the same. "I could watch you move all day. Wait a minute! I have been watching you all day!" She laughed and called him a smart-ass, and told him they'd better get going before Aunt Rose came over with the flyswatter. They walked to the door, but Josh suddenly said, "Wait!" in alarm. Kayla froze, not knowing what to expect. Josh closed the gap between them, and gave her bottom a slight squeeze. "OK, I'm good." he sighed, passing her, and trotting out the door. Over dinner, they discussed how Kayla would like the sparse furnishings arranged. Josh pointed out that he'd never tried the kitchen appliances in there. They'd need to have something for heat as well since it wouldn't be warm all year. Jilly proudly displayed another Band-Aid, and Josh tousled her hair. She told him that the cardboard wasn't working on her bike as well. He explained that they didn't last too long, and he'd replace it for her after supper, and then show her how to do it for herself. Daisy sat on the porch, looking in. "Why can't Daisy come in here with us?" asked Jillian. Rose answered. "Because she's got to learn not to beg at the table. We were on the way to good mealtime manners with her, until you two showed up. Now I've got to start all over. Don't think I don't know that you've been sneaking her food under the table, Missy. If I didn't stay on top of her, she'd just reach over and take what she wanted, as big as she is. She's as bad as that one over there." she said indicating Joshua. Josh leaned down, and whispered to Jillian loudly. "Never mind, Jilly. I'm glad you're here. Before you and Kayla came, I had to eat out on the porch with Daisy. We always ended up fighting over the dog food, but she'd always win, and I'd have to settle for the crumbs that she missed. I get to eat in here with you now." Jillian laughed and giggled. Josh loved to hear that sound. When the three of them laughed, Josh couldn't imagine finer music. He noticed Rosie glaring at him. "You be careful, Joshua Taylor. I can make that dream come true, if you'd like." Josh straightened up immediately, and affected a stiff British accent. "You will notice Madam, that I am wearing my halo this evening." Rose countered immediately. "Well if that's a halo, it's slipping some. I thought it was just a dirty neck." Josh looked wounded. He noticed that Kayla was looking at him thoughtfully. Suddenly she reached into her pocket, and produced Josh's coin from the day before. "Jilly, she began, I completely forgot to give this to you. Josh gave it to me for you. It's from Canada. That's another country. What is it Josh? "It's a two dollar coin. Like it says there. About twenty years ago, there were a lot of one and two-dollar paper bills being made, and they just cost too much for how short a time they lasted. So they made a one-dollar coin because it would last longer. The first ones had a picture of a loon – that's like a strange, great big, pointy-nosed duck, Jilly. They live in some parts of the United States too. I think I have one of those coins here; I'll find it and give it to you as well. Because of the bird, people began to call it the 'loonie'." Jillian laughed. Josh went on; "So then they did the same thing for a two-dollar coin," he said pointing to the one that Jillian held, "but they didn't know what to call it. I thought that the answer was obvious – it should have been called the 'doubloon', but no, nobody ever listens to me. Instead, they called it the 'toonie'. That's a polar bear on the front." Jillian looked at the coin and said, "So it's two dollars?" Josh smiled. "It's worth two dollars in Canada. Almost nobody around here knows what Canadian money looks like. You can't spend it here, but you can save it because it looks more interesting than American money, I think." Jillian turned it over. "Who's this lady?" she asked. Josh explained, "That's Her Royal Highness Queen Elizabeth the Second." "She's the Queen of England, Jilly." said Kayla. "More to the point of why she's on Canadian money, she's also the Queen of Canada officially, though most Canadians don't even consider that. The business of running the place is handled by the Canadian parliament. There's even a Governor-General, and that person is there to represent the Queen's power." Josh said. Kayla spoke up. "There you go again. Will you just make a statement that DOESN'T bring me more questions? Yesterday was a whole day of riddles for me, Josh. Margarita joked with you and made out as if you were foreigner." She turned to Rose and whispered with a grin, "She also told me that he sleeps with polar bears!" Rose laughed and said, "Doesn't surprise me a bit." Josh said, "Well, you just have to pick your moment, you know? Compliment them about their fur, buy them a beer, maybe a case of Scotch..." Kayla turned back to Josh and said, "Very funny. I'm on the hunt for answers, mystery man. I'm a woman, and I warn you we're all detectives by nature, right?" she asked Jillian, who nodded. "I hope you don't mind, but I've been pumping Aunt Rose for info on you for three days. I'm trying to get all of the juicy pieces to your puzzle. She told me that you were married once." Josh smiled and said, "I was. Not to a polar bear, but close enough. I think she was a badger. I've got scars - " He pointed to his chest. Jillian shrieked and laughed. "Wait." cried Kayla. "I'm closing in! What was your wife's first name?" Josh scowled. "It'll come to me... I'm trying to remember... I think it was Doreen." "Janice? Aunt Rose said it was 'Janice'." "Yeah. It was Janice. So that's it then. Janice the badger." sighed Josh. Jillian laughed. He looked at Kayla a little accusingly. "Wait a minute here, Nosy Parker. Am I going to get my turn to ask YOU twenty questions too?" "Probably not." Kayla answered. "Well then," Josh joked. "I may not answer any more of yours, then." He turned his nose up, and looked toward Jillian. He gave her a wink, and she giggled. She thought this game was great fun. "And you told me that you go there once a year." Kayla stated, pointing to the coin. "Oh, at least –" Josh said. "And what the heck is that over your heart?" Kayla asked, pointing to a tattoo on Josh's chest. "It's beautiful really, but it's been driving me nuts since yesterday. And who is 'Patricia', or 'Patrice', or whatever that says? Inquiring minds need to know. You were married to 'Janice', but you thought enough of old 'Patrice' there to stitch her name into your hide. 'Pro Patrice'. I can only imagine what kind of pro." Kayla sniffed. Josh smiled. "I wasn't really trying to make a mystery out of it. You just didn't ask the right questions, and since you're so nosy, I thought I'd have a bit of fun with it. This is a leaf obviously, a red maple leaf. And it doesn't say 'Pro Patrice'. It says 'Pro Patria'. Latin. It means 'For Country'. I'm usually in Canada for almost all of the year because I live and work there, unless they send me someplace else. I come and visit whenever I can, usually for a couple of weeks here and there. But there are no polar bears in my neighborhood, though there might be a couple of drunken cougars the odd time on a Saturday night." "Same idea," he said, "you compliment their fur..." Rose and Kayla groaned. "That's why Margarita made all that noise about me being northern riff-raff and a foreigner, and that's why I joked that folks lock up the silver when I come to town. Doesn't matter where you go Kayla, some folks don't like foreigners. The maple leaf isn't a good enough clue, I guess, but it means a lot to me. So now you know my dark secret. I'm Canadian." Kayla thought for a minute. "Well that's not a bad thing..." she smiled Josh grinned. "I've never thought so either." "Why do they send you away?" asked Jillian. "They get mad at me sometimes." smiled Josh. "What does that mean, are you a secret agent or something?" asked Kayla. Josh thought that was hilarious. He laughed for a full minute. "A minute ago, I was sitting here facing a shrewd female detective." he chuckled, wiping a tear from his eye. "What happened to her? I want to see her again. Kayla, look at me. A secret agent has to be able to blend in. The best ones don't look like James Bond. They're instantly forgettable, if they're any good. This face is definitely not suitable material." "I like your face!" Jillian sprang to his defense. "That's not what I meant, but thanks, Jilly. Come on Kayla, If you had just met me for only two minutes, something about me would stand out in your mind." he said pointing to his scar. "You would remember me for this, not the color of my hair or how tall I might be, but for this alone. That's why I can't be James Bond." "Then I don't understand." said Kayla. "I think she's going to need to buy a vowel, Rosie." Josh said. Rose sighed as she rolled her eyes, "Some female detective you are. Joshua is a soldier." "Well, I used to be, " said Josh. Rose stared at him/ "What happened?" The humor in his face evaporated a little, "When I got back after Sam passed away, it made me take stock of my life. Back when I enlisted, my life was a complete train wreck. I didn't care if I was breathing or not. There were a few times that I'd have preferred to not be breathing, actually. I joined the Forces because they'd give me honest work, and some of it I might not even have to think about. They gave my life some structure, and I made some friends, and believed in what I was doing. I still very much believe in the job, too. But after Sam was gone, I started to think that I wanted to do something else with my life, move in a different direction. Without a university degree, there's only so much room for advancement and I'm not getting any younger. I thought I'd maybe settle down, but I don't know where. I just felt that it was time to move on, so I requested release. It takes months for that to happen. And just when I was making plans to come down this time, I was advised verbally of my formal release." Rose was shocked. "Joshua, why didn't you tell me?" He shrugged, "I figured that you have your own decisions to make right now. I see that you've made a few, and not that it's my place to tell you, but I concur with two very good ones." he said, indicating Kayla and Jillian. Rose had been studying his chest as well. "Those are new." She pointed at the scars there. Josh held up his hands, "I fell down." The women were both looking at the dagger tattoo and he didn't feel like talking about it, so he stood up to head off the question. "So, if we're done here, I'm going to start on the furniture moving, after I fix the motor on Jilly's bike. Come on, Peaches." Josh said to Jillian, as he headed back toward the bunkhouse. Jillian went along to see her new room as well, with Daisy following along. Kayla looked at Rose. "I'm not stupid. I've been having a lot of fun poking him for info and listening to him dodge around. I mean look at him. Most people can't buy that in a gym. I can see that he's probably never lifted a set of weights; he's actually DONE something someplace where he couldn't just put the bar back on the rack, drink from a water bottle, and then get back behind his desk, though I can't say that any soldiers that I've ever seen look quite like him. I just wanted to hear things from him directly. I like his voice, and his way of joking around. But what does he mean by all of that? What are 'the forces'? It sounds like he left something out to me." "Well I can see that you've been glancing more than casually." Rose chuckled. "They use different names where he comes from. Their military is called the 'Canadian Armed Forces'. And you're right, Kayla. He's not telling it all. And he didn't have that dagger on his arm last year, or those scars on his chest either. He's a proud man, and he's got a right as far as I'm concerned. But I think he's getting a bit lost, if he's found out that he doesn't have that place for himself anymore. I don't know what he's going to do now. Let's leave well enough alone for the time being." "Do you think he was serious about teaching me to ride Sam's bike?" asked Kayla. "Sure he is. He knew that Sam used to ride you around on it. He's seen the pictures. I've told him that between the two of you, you were the one who could never get enough of that thing. Marcia was never as thrilled as you were. He just didn't connect you to the photos when he met you." Rose said. "Aunt Rose, I've got to tell you something. When we were riding, just that little bit, I really enjoyed being with Josh." She laughed. "I couldn't believe that he was stuck there afterward though, not being able to stand up." she giggled, testing her aunt's reaction. Rose laughed and remarked, "I knew what was going on right away, honey. Sam used to come courting me on that machine of his. My folks never liked him because of it, but I didn't care. Sam was so different from all of the other boys. Never said too much, but if you learned to listen, his heart would tell you everything you needed to hear. That bike's got a lot of magic in it you know, and some tales to tell if it could talk. I knew beforehand what Josh's reaction might probably be. I can see that he cares about you a lot, so that was easier than predicting the weather. That problem used to happen to Sam all the time with me on the back too. It's got to do with the girl, and the way that it shakes, and where he's sitting. He used to have to ask me to fill it up with gas because he couldn't stand up without embarrassing himself. Of course, there were times when I helped his problem happen on purpose." she smiled. "He wanted to put another saddle on it for me, but I wouldn't hear of it." she giggled. "So he just moved the places for me to put my feet. We used to go off into the desert at night. Got up to all sorts of fun, too!" she finished with laughter and a tear. Kayla's eyebrows were up, and her mouth was open in a mix between shock and a smile. She'd heard some of the other female relations speak of Aunt Rose when she was a teenager. They hadn't been very charitable, and the tamest phrase they used was that she'd "always been wild". For her part, she'd always loved her aunt dearly. These revelations just made her love her even more, now that she'd had a glimpse of Rose's courage. She was a woman who had found a man who loved her like she wanted to be loved, and she didn't give a damn what anybody thought back in that day. The move into the bunkhouse didn't take very long at all. The truth was, Kayla and Jillian didn't have that much furniture, and everything they owned could fit into the trailer. They'd need some curtains and a couple of desks actually, because of Jillian's schoolwork, and Kayla's job. Those were just details that they had plenty of time for yet. Josh stood leaning against the door frame as Kayla asked Jillian where she'd like to sleep that night. Jillian indicated the couch in the house. She said that she'd like to sleep there for one more night because she didn't like the smell of the fresh paint. Kayla agreed that it was a good idea to get used to her new room when it didn't smell, but that she herself would be sleeping in the bunkhouse that night. She told Jillian in a whisper about Rose's snoring. Jillian laughed. Then Kayla mentioned that she and Joshua would be going out later on, and that she might be back late, though to herself she thought that they'd probably come back not that long after they'd left. She kept that part silent. Jillian looked at Kayla for a second, thinking, and then she asked. "Are you going out on a date with him?" Josh began to smile. Kayla wasn't sure how to answer. She'd had nothing to do with men in that regard since very shortly after Jillian came into her life. "Well, no... not exac –" Jillian sensed that she was on to something. "You are! You're going out on a date with Joshua!" Josh was trying hard not to laugh. "Ewwww!" Jillian exclaimed, screwing up her face in disgust. Kayla was smiling helplessly at Joshua, who had started to chuckle in spite of himself. She'd been cornered. "Are ya gonna kiss him?" Jillian demanded. Josh was now laughing quietly. Kayla began, "Jilly, when ladies and men go on a date, it's kind of the custom unless they find that they really don't like each other, that they kiss goodnight, so..." "EWWWW!" Jillian repeated, but with Kayla joining in. They laughed. Josh collapsed with laughter, and had to hold himself up against the doorframe. ------------- Josh had backed the SUV up to the driving shed. He worked in the back to remove Daisy's wire mesh. He was glad that it could go in and out without much fuss, but there were a couple of anchors that had to be unbolted. Afterward, he folded down the rear seats and used the shop vacuum cleaner to tidy up. He spread a sheet of heavy plastic out near the tailgate, and remembered there was some firewood that he wanted right close to the bunkhouse before closing it up. Just about the time that Jillian was bunked down on the couch for the night, he said goodnight to her and went upstairs for a shower. Kayla had her shower in the house and had just left Jillian and come out to the porch with a cup of tea in the early evening gloom. She looked over toward the shed. The light was on in the loft. She grabbed the binoculars, and willed Joshua to turn around. "Kayla Fraser! That's not very nice, is it?" Rose's voice came from the darkness of the porch on the far side. Kayla spun around so quickly that she almost threw the binoculars. "Wha – Aunt Rose, I was –" Kayla sputtered. Rose's voice was low so as not to disturb Jillian, "What you were doing, Kayla Fraser, was spying on Joshua, probably while he's undressed. You really shouldn't be doing that, should you?" Kayla's face felt like she was standing next to a roaring fire, even her ears were hot with embarrassment. "N-no. You're right, Aunt Rose." "Well, I can see how you would think it was very nice, actually. And I can't say as I wouldn't have done a thing like that myself back in my day, given the chance with a man like him. So I'm telling you right now, Kayla Fraser, you've got exactly ten minutes to stop that." Rose snapped. Kayla blinked. "Uh, Aunt Rose?" Rose said, "Well if he's fool enough to put that loft in, and then overlook the windows, he deserves it. I'll have to tell him to put some walls in though. Maybe by the end of next week." she said with a wink as she walked into the house to refill her tea. "I'm going to see what's on the television." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 07 "Me too. Thanks, Aunt Rose." Kayla chuckled as she lifted the binoculars again. Well, she thought, her aunt had only used two of her names that time. -------------- Kayla finished her tea, and decided to change her clothes. The shower in the bunkhouse still needed cleaning out, and she'd had her shower in Aunt Rose's bathroom, but she'd forgotten to take a change of clothes with her and she didn't want to wear her "work clothes" with Josh. She still had time... -------------- Josh walked to the house to grab the cooler that Kayla had said would be waiting there. Rose came out to hand it to him. He looked at her blankly. "Oh don't look so stunned, Joshua," she said, "Kayla told me that you two were going to take a drive out there tonight so you could show her Sam's spot. I know you've been going there a lot on your own. That's the only spot that he never told me about, I guess because he'd found it as a child, and it was personal for him. Joshua, Kayla and Jillian are all that's left of my blood kin. You're all three special and dear to me. I want to thank you for what you're doing for them." Josh smiled and replied, "I'm not doing anything for them that I don't want very much to be doing. I'd do it just because you asked me to, but I find that they've both dug into me so hard in such a short time, it's really my pleasure, Rosie." Rose walked over to him and kissed him. "You don't know it, I'm sure, but you're the best thing in all of our lives now." She sat down in a chair that faced the driving shed. "Rosie, what's Kayla's problem? I only know that she's hiding something about herself away from the world. I've tried to get her to open up, but though she's warmed up to me, she's still holding back. I want to help if I can, and I won't pressure her, but I won't know what she needs until she tells me." Josh said with concern in his voice. "Joshua honey, what she really needs is you. If my feelings are right, she is just on the edge of realizing that. What YOU need, if you'll pardon my being so blunt, is Kayla, and I think that you know that for yourself, because I can see it in your eyes. I've known you for years. I've watched you help many folks that were in a bind, myself included, but I've never seen you need to help someone so badly as when you look at her." Rose said. "Actually I've never seen you NEED anyone before I saw how you look at her. It's really sweet to see that. I don't know if she's told you anything, but when she was a child, Kayla had always dreamed to be a dancer or a model. She found that she's a bit on the short side to be a clotheshorse in that industry. They like tall, impossibly thin saplings. So she tried dancing, and she was good at it, but just wasn't catching the breaks. Then she got involved with a scum-bucket who suggested something to get herself noticed. She took his advice, and found that the change only made her a commodity to strip club owners. Nobody else would touch her. So she did that for a while, saving her money so that she could go back to school, but on the way she found that sometimes to get a job, a girl has to provide, shall we say, a different kind of performance. She'd die of shame if she knew I was telling you this. So you need to keep it to yourself. Joshua honey, are you listening?" Joshua said "Yes, Rosie. I'm listening intently. I can't imagine what it must have been like to be in a position like that. Go on, is there more?" Rose continued, "Kayla has been used by every man she's had a relationship with up to a point. She's found that to get through life, she's had to be a bitch, and she's developed a hard shell. When Marcia died, and Jillian landed in Kayla's arms, she threw her no-good boyfriend out, and decided that she wasn't ever going to trust another man, and that she'd raise Jillian as best she could. Her problem is that the change that she'd made to herself is now a constant reminder of her shattered dream and broken trust. I won't tell you what that reminder is; she'll have to do that. I think she believes that you'll have nothing to do with her once you know. I personally believe that she's wrong, but I haven't been able to convince her. It's become her cross to bear, and she reacts by covering it up more and more. If you can get that close Joshua, only the two of you can bring her out." At that instant, a light came on in the bunkhouse opposite. The light was from the open bathroom, but shone through the Kayla's door, and out through the as-yet dirty window. Kayla was changing in her room, and her silhouette was cast on the dusty glass. Joshua was mesmerized. He could see her shape, and it hit every single bell in his head related to 'What Joshua's Perfect Woman Should Look Like". He couldn't take his eyes off her. He certainly couldn't imagine what she hated about herself. Then for about a tenth of a second, the dirty glass gave him the faintest clue. Rose looked over at the window, and then at Joshua. She told him. "Joshua honey, you really shouldn't look. But since you can't see any detail, have fun for a few minutes as long as it lasts. Ok?" She got out of her chair. Joshua stared at her. "Is it going to take you that long to get the flyswatter?" Rose turned to walk into the house. "Have fun honey. I'll tell Kayla to do something about the window tomorrow, or maybe Wednesday or Friday if I remember. Oh, and you ought to think about putting walls up in the loft soon. She's been watching you buck naked for the last couple of nights with the binoculars. Good night." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 08 **I dunno how I do it, but I can write about the events which occur to a couple in a story chapter and do it in two pages. Somehow, I need at least twice that for one of their love scenes. ~shrug~ So, things warm up, but there are still issues, as I've said before. Kayla's been through a lot and as a result, she's a complicated girl. In my head, I see her as having grown up at least a little sheltered, no matter what she says. I think it would affect her outlook on some things, and I think that in spite of everything, her experience is likely just a little narrow. Also, I've got this irritating thought that I've used one of these scenes in another tale, but after looking, I couldn't find it. Doesn't matter, I suppose, but I thought Kayla deserved it. :) Anyway, if you've got your munchies ready, here we go. O_o -------------- "No," Josh said with a smile, "Sit on it. I mean, really just ease yourself back and sit right down on it. You know, then just wiggle around to get yourself settled and all and just enjoy it." He shook his head, "You're doing it all wrong." "Oh that just sounds so wrong," she began to laugh in a low voice "All right, Einstein." Kayla grinned at him, "Show me what I'm doing wrong then." "I already am," he grinned, "it looks a little nutty and you'll feel like a little kid, but if you want to get the benefit of the heat that's still in this boulder from the sun, just slide your butt right on back and sit next to me so that your legs dangle over the sides. You're just leaning against it like that. You won't feel much." She rolled her eyes but did as he instructed. "Oooh," she smiled a minute later, "this is really nice. Sorry for doubting." "I'm not as dumb as I look," he said. "No," she replied with a smirk, "You do look a lot dumber than you -- " "Forget it, "Kayla laughed, "That's too easy. You only said that to set me up and I'm trying to break some bad habits these days." Josh already had a fire going, and between the heat in the stones and the heat of the fire coming to their legs, the evening chill was already forgotten. "Hey," she said, "have you ever been in love, Josh? I mean, in real, deep, meaningful, long-haul love?" He smirked, "Well I thought I was once, but subsequent events proved my thoughts to be somewhat incorrect," he smiled ruefully. "You?" "I thought I was a few times out of the gate," Kayla answered, "but no. I don't know if it's the same for most women, but I'd pick myself up out of the dirt and wonder what went wrong. Usually, I'd guess that it was something that I did wrong, but then I'd see that he'd just been callous, or just a dick." She sighed, "Mostly just a dick, and not even a good one." She looked at Josh, "But I'd get my hopes up the next time, all the same. I try to read romance novels sometimes, and every once in a while, I think that the author is taking the couple there realistically, but I never really believe it. I keep thinking of my own experience, and they lose me right about there." She sipped her wine, "I suppose that the concept is important to hang onto, but there ought to be a disclaimer somewhere that says 'fictional events portrayed in this work may not coincide with the really lousy events relating to your own miserable existence.' He chuckled and nodded. "Well that would pretty much kill Hollywood right there too." Kayla was thinking back to what had happened to them earlier in the day. Part of it still seemed a little nuts to her, but she guessed that they both needed some of that, the way that they'd seemed to be so strongly attracted to each other. She decided that she liked it, and then wondered about that as well. There seemed to be a lot less of the awkwardness that one might expect, but then, she supposed that they'd both been around their own versions of the block, so to speak. Kayla really liked that they'd just suddenly seemed fine that close together. She didn't really know all of the categories that had to be addressed in her heart, but she knew that she liked what had happened. It had to count for something in at least a few categories somewhere. "I've got to ask you something, "Kayla said. "We seem to be able to talk pretty plainly to each other. That's like a whole new world to me. I don't know what it is, but I've always felt like we were speaking two different languages whenever I'd talk to a guy back in Phoenix, like the same words meant different things to the people in the conversation. I don't think it was the place, so I just always assumed that it was me." She put her arm around Josh. "So tell me -- if you can, what exactly was I supposed to get from your little message back there in the bunk house? I had the feeling that you were trying to tell me that you were attracted to me, but I also had the strong sense that there was more than that. I kind of thought that it was a lot more. I even thought that you might have been headed for the 'L' word, and that you'd figured out a way to dodge the disclaimer." He nodded, "I think I was. I guess this is where I look stupid, but I'll be honest, or -- at least as honest as I'm being with myself. I'm obviously attracted to you, Kayla, so much that the words don't really do it any justice, but yeah, ... I'd have to say that I was trying to suggest another feeling that I guess it isn't really the time for yet." He looked at her, "I mean, we've known each other for three days." He laughed quietly, "And if you subtract the time that we were yelling at each other, and the time that I was uh, ..." "Sulking?" Kayla asked with a warm little smirk. He laughed, "You can call it that if you want, I guess, but I'd have to say it was more time that was spent with me wondering what the hell had happened, and how you got that much out of me. I usually just get quiet at times like that." "Yeah," Kayla smiled a little ruefully, "I seem to have that effect on a lot of people. But I am working on it. Go on." "Well between all of that, plus time that went by while we were asleep, it doesn't leave much left, but I still feel like there's more than just attraction. It feels a lot warmer to me than that. And if you really knew me deep inside, you'd see that it's at least a little remarkable. I can't remember that I've felt like this before about somebody. Frankly, I just stopped thinking that the word applied to me." He sighed, "That probably points to some underdeveloped or immature aspect of my deep psyche or some such horseshit that's too complicated for me to grasp." Kayla laughed, "Don't look at me! I'm way too explosive to know what the hell I'M doing and why. I'm sure that I'd never be able to figure you out." She hugged him, and when he looked at her, she kissed him softly for a moment. "All that I can think is that we've both been around long enough to know how it goes. We're not exactly spring chickens here looking at a first chance. I just get the sense that I feel kind of hopeful when I'm next to you, and I guess that's at least good enough for me to want to step out of my bunker at least a little." Joshua smiled, "That's the word I was looking for." "What word is that?" Josh began to grin, "You don't even remember, do you? You just said all of that, and you don't remember the one word in the middle. I think I'm getting a handle on why women and men are so different." He saw that Kayla's expression had suddenly turned rather predatorial. There was just the barest hint in it that she was smiling. "What... word?" He grinned and shook his head, "Nope. I just found out something fundamental. You can't expect me to just give it up because you were talking so much that you forgot what you said." That was when Kayla discovered that Joshua was very ticklish in a few places. ------------------ "So you're saying that you feel hopeful?" she demanded quietly as she looked down from where she sat on him. He nodded with a sigh. "Poor baby," she cooed, as she reached to wipe the tear from his eye that his laughter had brought to him. "You should just answer me when I get like that. I wouldn't have to tickle you like that and you wouldn't have to laugh that hard, would you?" She looked around for a moment, and then back down at Joshua with a single nod. "I'm feeling hopeful too." "That's what you said before you pretended to forget so that you could make me laugh almost hard enough to lose my wine," he chuckled. "Come on," Kayla said as she gave in to the urge to run her hands over him a little, "I'm not THAT transparent, surely." "You telegraph your intent with your eyes, now that I know what to look for," he smiled. "Listen," she said, "you can't expect me to just attack you with my eyes closed." "I think it's an acquired skill." He said, "You just need to practice." "You're just trying to improve your chances," she grinned evilly. "I'm not saying." He stated flatly. Kayla began to chuckle wickedly as she raised her hand as though it was a claw. --------------------- Later on, they sat in the glow of the fire holding each other. After a time, Kayla asked Josh where they could go. Josh pointed at his truck. "Kayla, we don't have to do anything if you don't want to, but if you do, then the windows in the back over there are tinted pretty dark. You should hop in and see if it's dark enough for you to feel comfortable. If it's not, then we'll unzip the other sleeping bag, and you can stay under that. I'd personally prefer it if you could feel comfortable enough that we could get undressed, but everything is up to you, obviously." Kayla was doubtful, but she felt she needed to continue to climb out of her shell. She opened the tailgate and climbed inside. Josh closed it after her. It looked pitch black, but after two minutes, Kayla could just barely make out the outline of her hand if she held it in front of her face. She couldn't see the bracelet that she was wearing. She knocked on the glass, and Josh opened a rear door. "Josh, I think it's ok, but I think I'm going to take your advice about the other sleeping bag. Please get in here with me," she said. They kissed softly, bumping into each other in the darkness, and giggling. "It's kind of like back in the day, huh?" asked Kayla. Josh's tone was matter-of-fact as he replied; "I guess. Just a minute." He stepped out to get the cooler. Kayla thought about him, and decided that he probably hadn't had many chances for teenage romance with the effect of his disfigurement during adolescence. When Josh returned, they lay together fully clothed. Kayla asked, "Josh, I'm afraid that I'm about to sound like a young girl, but I need to ask this; would you ever lie to me? Please don't laugh, I can't even believe that I'm asking a man this, but it's you, and I guess that I'm wanting to believe that you're different." Josh was mindful of where Kayla's question might be coming from, so he was careful to speak with absolutely no trace of humor in his voice. "No, absolutely not. Not to a direct question. I might kid around when that's appropriate. I might be evasive for fun, like I have been to frustrate your inquisitiveness about me. I might even be evasive to avoid hurting you until I can figure out the best way to say something difficult, and then there's always the chance that I might say too little or too much if I'm being an idiot. That one happens a lot. But to a direct serious question, I will not lie to you. I will never lie to you." Kayla was silent for a minute. " Josh, I don't usually talk about myself, and I don't think I've ever wanted to open up to someone other than Aunt Rose or my sister before. But, ... I've also never felt what I felt with you today. I think I owe you some explanation -- " "You don't have to explain anything to me, Kayla. I'm taking you at face value for my part. I've only known you from last Friday, not who you were before that. So in my eyes, you're a brand new Kayla anyway. Hey, if you want to, you can forget anything that might have happened to you before, and start fresh, because I'll never ask you." Josh said simply. Kayla sighed. "There you go interrupting again. I think I have something to say anyway, because it's dark in here, and I want to. I guess I'm still blinking and waiting for you to disappear." "And I'm still here." Josh said. "I'll have to work on my delivery if the message was that hazy." he smiled in the darkness. "Since yesterday, I've noticed something in myself that's so unusual for me that I spent a long time puzzling over it. I finally figured out that it was something that I haven't felt for a very long time. I just thought that I was attracted to you. But earlier today, I realized that I'm falling for you. I don't understand it, given the way that I know I am, but there it is all the same, and I can't say that I'm exactly an expert at it. I just know how I feel. I spent most of our time today in the bunkhouse debating whether I was crazy or not. I don't have a long history of falling in love with anyone. I've only ever actually been in love with one woman before, and that was like open-heart surgery without anesthetic. ... When you slipped, and I caught you,...I suddenly wanted very much to let you know somehow. What I did was the only thing I could think of, I couldn't just TELL you that I'm falling with your boob in my face under the circumstances, so I tried really hard to tell you physically, but without overtones if possible. I've never met anyone like you before, so I can't actually believe that I'm feeling hopeful for myself. It just doesn't happen to me." He sighed heavily. "So there. All of my cards are there on the table. And yeah, you can pretty much guess that I feel like an idiot for being this forthright too." Kayla wanted to groan. He didn't know it, but he'd just made this a lot harder for her since she now couldn't see a way around it without hurting him at least a little. She nodded, "I'm feeling foolish too. I mean, I knew what I thought that you were saying, and I agree with you. I haven't had a great record in the romance department myself. I was acting from the heart. I was so afraid that you would have been gone in the next second, so I thought that if I was right in what I thought you were telling me, then I had very little time to tell you how I felt about you." She kissed him, "So I did my best -- as much as I dared to do. It's funny -- and a little sad, I guess, that kids can just blurt it out. Then they get hurt and get older and careful. I guess it's a miracle if you can ever tell somebody how you feel about them after a certain point." Josh sighed. "I wanted so badly to walk out because I'd let my guard down, and it was starting to hurt because I've gotten some 'I've got to have him, no wait, I don't want him, really' messages from women before. I have quick reflexes in everything else; it's just an extension of the same thing. But I really couldn't have gone anywhere just then because you were breaking my ribs. I can't remember being hugged that hard before." Kayla smiled. "I was suddenly terrified to let you go, Josh." She paused. "Joshua, I -- I want to say how I feel, but, ..." She frowned. "Oh, this is just stupid. We're not kids. Surely there has to come a time when you can just say what you mean." She looked at the outline of his head in the darkness and tried again resolutely. "Joshua, I really want to love you to death." She giggled a second later, "Ok, not in a literal sense, exactly. I think I would like to give it a serious try though and, you know, stop before you died." She looked at his outline in the darkness, a little glad that she wouldn't be able to see his face in a few minutes. "I really wish that I'd met you a long time ago. I feel a little like a key that was made for a lock, but was always kept on a keychain and never used until when it gets tried, it doesn't fit anymore because it's worn thin from being in somebody's pocket." She looked down. "Since we're laying our cards out on the table, there is something that you ought to know." Kayla thought for a second, and decided sadly that the time had come. "Here --", she said, "put the palm of your hand right here, and just hold it there without moving it at all. Can you do that? With absolutely no movement?" Josh nodded, and placed the palm of his left hand where she was directing it, though his eyebrows were approaching his hairline. She couldn't see, but she sensed his question. "What?" she asked, "All I got to feel was your crummy kneecap!" she laughed. She turned onto her back, leaned back on her elbows and smiled as she brought her legs together so that his hand was held snugly. "Mmm." With apologies to my own kneecaps, I think this is a much better way." she said, "Though if you had tried it the other day, I'd have done some real damage. Now, comfy? Good, because I sure am." she said. Kayla spoke. "When I was little, I wanted so badly to be a dancer, but I was only able to get some ballet and jazz lessons here and there, though I do have a lot of natural talent. As I got older I was foolish, because I didn't want to let the dream go. So I quit college early, and tried modeling. I'm not built for what they want, I'm too short, and so my possibilities were limited. I couldn't get enough work to live on, never mind live well. Don't move, Josh! I'm trusting you not to move a muscle." She continued, "I was living with a guy who was managing my career. I told you that I've done stupid things. I was such an idiot. I let him talk me into something that he led me to believe would make me more memorable, and therefore more hire-able. It worked out for what he really had in mind, but not for me. Once I'd figured that out, I got the hell away from that relationship as fast as I could, but the next one was much the same." She paused, gathering the courage to continue. Kayla took a deep breath. She was fairly certain that this would lead either to a drive back to the bunkhouse in silence, or that Josh would get pretty turned on. If that were the case, she'd help him only one time because she had indicated earlier that she would. Either way it would probably be the end, but she had to know. Even though she meant what she'd said to him, nobody had ever meant it when they'd said it to her anyway, so why prolong this? Finally, she spoke again. "I ended up working as a stripper. The money was good, and I saved a lot of it. But to me, it was like dancing in front of a big pit full of howling dogs. A lot of the other dancers thought it was funny and felt some pride from it. I just felt like a steak being dangled over them, and I had to play along. Didn't you ever go to a strip club Josh? They must have them where you come from, don't they?" I'm sure that you must have been to them lots of times with all of your soldier buddies." She looked down at the shape of the inside of his forearm leading to his wrist. Josh felt the verbal slap. "Sometimes I had to do more than dance for the managers, just to get hired. And I also needed to keep a meaty boyfriend dog around to keep me safe -- from all of the other dogs but him. About the only other things that he did for me was keep me hired in the better clubs and eat the food in the fridge so fast that I never had to clean it much. But I still needed to keep that dog fed, didn't I? I even let him talk me into being in a movie." She sighed, "I'm such a fool." She looked at him a little sadly, "Well, I thought you ought to know. You were making such nice sounds to me about how you feel about me, I'd think that it's only fair to tell you that I've been in a porn film." She looked away, "I talked to the other actresses and it was no big thing to them. I guess that I shouldn't have minded, since it was done pretty professionally. But underneath it all, it was still me being fucked by three men that I didn't even know, and I had to pretend that I loved it. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 08 My asshole boyfriend couldn't wait to get his hands on the money so that he could stuff it up his nose. He was already making arrangements for the next one. But Marcia came to drop off Jilly, since she and Bob were going away. I felt like shit anyway over what I'd done and with Marcia and Jilly on the way over, I just snapped and went nuts on him. I'm glad I did now." She chuckled, "The poor guy was making noises about calling the law on me. It was the wrong thing to say, I guess." She shrugged, "Anyway, he had time to think about why I might have been a little upset with him while he was at the hospital. I met Marcia and Jilly at the door and we went back to her place. They headed out, I looked after Jilly and looked for another apartment. I just didn't know that my sister and her husband wouldn't be coming back. They went off the road about four days later. When Jilly came to me, I decided that was the time to make the change that I'd been planning. I walked away from everything. I quit dancing, told my leech boyfriend that I'd kill him as soon as look at him, and I had another apartment in a day. I went back to college. I changed my whole life, Josh, but I've still got bad memories, and I can't undo what's done. So now you know MY dark secret, most of it anyway. You can take your hand away now." she said bitterly as she released his hand. She was furious with herself. Why had she done this? She had meant to just tell him, not to piss on him. He had just told her that he loved her, and that her past didn't matter at all to him. Wasn't that good enough? Why wasn't that good enough? And she just HAD to spit into the wind and ruin it! Now her tears would come again when she tried to sleep. What the hell was the matter with her? 'Fuck it, 'she thought. 'Who gives a shit anyway?' Josh didn't move, but he was quivering slightly. He wished that she hadn't had to tell him this because he felt its effect on her. He hoped that it had done her soul some good to get it out. His chest hurt. Kayla hissed, "I said to take your hand away. I'm done talking." Why did he always have to mess up when she told him what to do? He just said. "Lie back." Kayla smirked in the darkness. So the contestant had chosen Door Number Two, the quick fuck. Wonderful Joshua Taylor was just another asshole, like all of the other men. And everything he'd said was just bullshit after all. Not so different now, was he? Now he wanted his fun. "Oh." she said, "Here, let me help you, and we'll get done quicker." She started to sit up to undo her pants, but his hand came off her so quickly that she didn't see the shadow move, she only felt its absence and then its sudden very light presence against her breastbone. No impact, no pressure, his flat palm was keeping her from sitting up, and it was as immoveable as the ceiling of the SUV. Did he just want her to use her hand? She tried to reach, but he just said "No". Her heart felt constricted with sudden fear. What good would those self-defense classes be against a man like him? She had a thought to run somehow, but she didn't even know the way back to the bunkhouse. He spoke again evenly, and very gently. "Just lie back, Kayla. I want to -." She realized that he could probably kill her without much effort. "P-please, -" she began, I'm s- orry. Don't hurt me". The hand didn't move away, and it didn't push her down. It was just there. He dropped lower down onto his right side, his right forearm and hand suddenly supporting her shoulder blade, neck and head. His left hand then began to push her down very slowly. She couldn't move against it or change it's course. It just kept pushing slowly. She lay back down, as though she had any choice in the matter. Let him do his thing, then, she thought. She wouldn't look over at his shape, just hoping to get through it. She felt his body shift. His head was lower then hers... She swung her right fist to hit his head as hard as she could, but he had sensed her muscles tensing even before the movement began. In the darkness he caught it easily as if it were nothing more than a minor distraction that he had anticipated. Just as before, his hand was an immutable force. She couldn't move. She heard herself sob in despair. And then she heard Joshua begin to sob quietly as well. She stared in wonder at the top of his head. His face was against her breast. He just said, "Please Kayla, I -- I'm in love with you. I'm NOT going to hurt you. Please just stop!" Through her shirt, Joshua began to kiss her gently, his tears wetting the fabric more than his mouth. Kayla finally began to understand and she relaxed. The tension eased from her body, and with it, Josh's restraining force ebbed away instantly in response. He lifted his head. She could just make out his eyes; in the little that was to be seen in the darkness, all of the blue appeared to be running out of those eyes and down his face. He sniffled as he looked into her eyes. "You and I both have to stop this. Our reactions are just too fast. We doubt each other so quickly. I haven't lied to you. I'd never hurt you." She stared at him, and then accepted what he'd said. She touched her palm to his face. "Joshua, you're crying..." He pulled himself up slightly, "I've been to peeler bars. I don't much care if I get dragged there, but I don't like them because I can't give in to the illusion. The girl on stage isn't dancing for me and she's not coming home with me at the end of the evening, so what's the point? Even if she was, I wouldn't want it, because I don't know her. I'm just not like that. He shrugged, "I've never gone to one alone, but I've been with a bunch of guys when I couldn't really avoid it. I'm the one quietly drinking his beer at the back of the place and wishing I was somewhere else. As you said, I'm not a prude either - It's just never been my thing." He sniffled again and wiped his face. "I'm very sorry for what happened to you. It hurts me to hear it, because I can feel that how it hurts you to say it. That's why I'm crying, mostly." He let out a ragged breath. "I'm used to people who can't read me and don't like me. I usually couldn't care less what people think of me, because I can't change it anyway, so I don't try. This time I care more than anything. I can't even cover it with a pretense of anger Kayla, because I care about you. I'll keep telling you that until you believe me, or you show me that you don't want me, and I can see for myself that you mean it." he said. "Kayla, you can blink all night. I'm not going anywhere. I'm going to stay right here with you because this is where I want to be. I need to be here every time you blink. I need to be the first thing that you see every time that you open your eyes. Now please pay attention." he said, as he kissed her lips softly, then her forehead, and then finally he held her tightly to him as her dam finally broke and she wept while it all came out of her then in racking sobs. Joshua couldn't have said how he knew that it was that close to the surface in her, he just knew it. Kayla was where she'd been because her dream had let her down, not because she was there to make a good living. He didn't imagine that it was all that much of a difference, but he knew that it was to Kayla, and that was what mattered. She'd changed her life, but what she'd hated was still there. He held her and thought that he could relate at least a little. She cried for her ruined dream and the years of despair and bad choices made along the way. She cried for her dead father, though her parents hadn't spoken to her in years. She cried for Marcia, the only one who hadn't judged her. She cried for Sam, and the woman who still mourned him. She cried for little Jillian, who had been robbed of her parents, and had to live with her instead. Most of all she cried for herself, for every time that her trust had been trampled, for what she'd had to do to find work, and for the marks that she bore and couldn't be rid of. Her thoughts finally came to Joshua. She didn't drag herself over the coals so much as she knew that she'd misread him a few times now. He could be like cold steel, and yet she'd made him cry because she'd railed against, what? That he had offered her his heart when she couldn't get it through her head that anyone would care? That he'd found a way to tell her that wouldn't get mangled or become as empty as the mere words that people threw at each other with neither meaning or belief? Kayla found that thinking about him helped to calm her at least somewhat, so she decided to examine her feelings though she was still crying. What was it in him that she saw as bad when her brain came up with snap assumptions that were so wrong? Her heart was telling her that this was right. Why couldn't her brain get on-side? Joshua was still with her, upset simply because she was crying. He hurt because she was hurting and because she'd wounded him with her words, and how she had mistaken his intent. And his response was that he held her and stroked her back. The thought almost upset her more. Of all the things she had done, this had to be right up there because it was hurting them both and probably ruining the relationship that now seemed possible right in front of her behind his soft smile, and it was going to stop, she resolved, if she could only stop crying. Josh held her as she hyperventilated; telling her many times to inhale less, that he would stay with her. He kept her face close to his wonderful scarred chest, and pulled the sleeping bag over them to make her re-breathe the same air until she finally wound down. He reached forward to grab the tissue pack that he remembered was by the rear door. He hadn't looked at it since he'd put it there when he'd bought this pig. He hoped it wasn't too dusty. He grabbed it, and pulled it roughly, taking out several tissues and handing them to her. It took a second for her to find them, and she began to clean her face up. He did the same. For twenty minutes, they examined their feelings in silence. Kayla had never known a man like Joshua and she decided for herself, but thought that it was still likely a non-starter now. Josh looked over how he felt once more and nothing changed for him. They looked at each other's silhouettes in the darkness until he said simply, "Hi." "Um, I'm trying to choose my words carefully here and I hope that I don't say this wrong, "he sighed, "I still want to be here, Kayla, but if you want, we can go back." He heard her quiet gasp. "You - you're not put off?" "No," he said, "I just want you to feel better. I love being with you." She said, "Take off your clothes." There was a slight pause, and Josh answered, "I don't know..." Kayla felt disappointed. "You don't want to anymore?" But Josh was chuckling. "I still want to. I'm just thinking that I ought to open a door or something before we drown. All this water in here." They laughed together and the dark sense of confusion was gone. Kayla sat back to undo the button on her jeans and pull the zipper down. She tugged them off with her underwear at the same time, struggling only briefly with each leg. Josh was amazed at the fluidity of her movements. She undid his pants, told him to lift his butt, and grabbed the waistband of his jeans and shorts. She had his southern end naked before he could blink twice. "That was pretty slick." he commented. In reply, Kayla said, "Yeah well, Houdini could get out of locked chains, it's the same with me and clothes. Practice, practice, practice, you know?" She stopped as she thought about something. Josh worried about her feelings. "Kayla, it's ok. I won't look." Kayla giggled. "I was thinking about asking you to do that, but I'm feeling a lot better now. Besides, Josh, the most you can see is my outline." Her voice came to him in a quiet growl. "Now YOU lie back, Joshua Taylor. I may be smaller and lighter than you, but I swear I can do more damage to you in a heartbeat than any old Canadian badger can, and I don't give a shit WHAT her name is!" He began to protest, wanting to tell her, but she put her hand to his lips. She said, "There's a phrase that I'm looking for...it would work so well here, too... wait, it's coming to me, ... oh yes, THAT'S it!" Josh asked. "What?" Kayla leaned forward and kissed him. "Shut up." She straddled his hips and found that her head just brushed the liner of the ceiling if she didn't try to sit back. "You just do as you're told for once, and nobody's gonna get hurt." She tensed her thighs to hold herself up as she undid the buttons of Josh' shirt and pulled it open. She looked hard to reassure herself by trying to see his tattoos. Satisfied by their apparent absence in the dark, she opened her own shirt and took it off, as she began to grind her cheeks into him. The penis rising against her bottom signaled its agreement. She wiggled against it. "I haven't been with anyone in a couple of years, maybe you haven't either. I really want to make you happy right now, Joshua, but unless you've got a condom hidden around here someplace, you're going to have to let me run the show, ok?" All that Josh's brain could manage came out of his mouth when he said, "Mm-hmm". Josh told himself that she seemed to be having so much fun that he'd just keep his mouth shut and go with it. This was a moment that he wanted to remember forever. Kayla being happy. He rested his hands on her hips as she gyrated them. The range of movement that female hips were capable of had always amazed Joshua. He was certain that women came with some kind of ball bearing swivel in there. She leaned forward, and brought her breasts to his face. His manhood sprang free and slapped against his abdomen. "I believe there was something that you wanted to say." she sighed, holding the back of his head. He kissed her nipple slowly, and she hummed, pulling it back, "Again," she commanded, giving him only a few minutes each time. He complied. "Again," she said. "And again." "Other side," she ordered happily. He did as he was told, he wasn't stupid. She sighed "Three more...two more...one more...Oh, perfect... Ok, maybe just a couple more, mmm." She fretted for a second. All of her experience had consisted of trying to bring a man to a climax as quickly as possible because it was something that she'd been forced to do sometimes. Just the minimum necessary, and Quality Control had never been high on the list. Since she never enjoyed it, she tried not to think too much about it. Suddenly she had a desire to not only do this for him in the best way that she could manage, but she was surprised to find a desire in herself to enjoy it with him. She moved back to place her open labia along his hard penis, and began to stroke him with her movements. He groaned, and his breathing became deeper. Placing her hands on his shoulders, she leaned forward at the end of her travel, testing an idea that had crossed her mind. She found that she could touch the end of his penis with her clitoris. It sent a jolt up her spine, and caused Josh to say one of those deep thoughts that she loved him for. "UHh," he said. "Oh yeah," she sighed, as she concentrated on this new joy. She had always been ashamed if it, the way it protruded when she was aroused. It was handy that way when she masturbated, but many men seemed to be put off by it, not looking at it for more than one stare, and then pretending that it didn't exist. Her conclusion then was that it must be ugly. She was surprised when a faint hope crossed her mind that Joshua might not think so. She leaned down again and stopped, just wiggling herself in tiny circles, and then going back to the long strokes, alternating a few of each movement. She began to hum to herself again, hoping that whatever Joshua felt was good enough to continue this for a while. She guessed that it must be good for him when he began to touch her breasts, circling the nipples with his thumbs, and squeezing gently sometimes. He loved the way that she gasped then. Joshua was more than a little pleased. When she was happy and having fun she seemed like another woman. He was happy with the last Kayla. This one was much more carefree. He'd felt her clitoris earlier when he'd brushed past it with his hand. His attempt then to please her was based partly on some experience, and mostly on some quick and careful thought. But she'd come up with something now that he'd never dreamed of. "Where did you learn...ohh." was the best that he could do to express himself. "I ...uh... don't...kno-Ohw. I've never...do -- Uh-n this before." She stopped. "I just thought of it." she said, as she began again. Then she noticed that HE was humming, and happily joined in. They discovered that they could continue this for many minutes, though she found that the point of contact between them required more pressure as they became slick in that spot. "Oh Josh, I've got..." she groaned loudly, and then her body's autopilot kicked in. Their movements became more frantic. She was wet right down her thighs, and he was soaked too. He moaned as if in pain. This was far better than anything that she could have done for herself, and it sure beat every other time she'd been with a man. The fact that she cared for Joshua helped in her enjoyment of it in a huge way. She was grunting like some wild thing when Josh cried out, lifted her up with his hips, and froze for a long second as he pushed so hard against her. He squeezed her nipples harder at the same instant, and someplace deep within her the combination lit off a whole box of fireworks that she'd never really admitted to herself that she had. In her private moments, Kayla masturbated and liked to do that as much as anyone, she supposed. But with Joshua, she was somewhere that neither her toys or any other man had ever accompanied her to. She even had a thought that she shouldn't even be surprised, he was just that good to be with, like a friend that she'd never understood until now, and a lover that she just hadn't seen coming. She bucked and shrieked, and then lay down on him, to keep her opening away from his semen as she gasped. His hands clutched her bottom as she rubbed her clitoris cautiously along his shaft to prolong her orgasm as the third, fourth, fifth, and ninth of his surges sprayed hotly between them. She slowed and stopped after he did. She felt weak, but she was with it enough to enjoy the movement of her head on his chest as it heaved. It made her dizzy, but in a nice way. She thought she'd never heard a nicer sound than the thunder of his heart when she realized that she had been the cause of it. She was proud of herself. It hadn't been for one person because she had to do it. This was worth the sweat that it cost. She found his nipple at the same time that she noticed how nice it felt to slide around on him. Josh enjoyed her simple pleasure, but advised her, "Kayla, you do know what you're sliding in so happily, don't you? She sighed and said. "Yup, and I like it. I can't believe how much there is, and it's very special to me." She slid around some more, humming and giggling happily. He fought back a laugh at her absurdity because she'd probably get whiplash with her head on his chest like that if he laughed as hard as he felt like laughing. Besides, he loved the feeling too, and wanted her to continue for as long as she wanted. Nobody had ever done that before. He looked at the top of her head for a second and thought about it, but no answer came to him, so he had to ask. "Well, enjoy it, because in a minute, it won't be that slippery, and why is it so special?" She looked toward his head in the dark. "Because it came from you." She let that sink in for a second, and then realized that she had neglected his other nipple. She couldn't believe how happy she felt. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 08 They eventually peeled themselves apart, and lay on their sides facing each other. As they kissed, Kayla took Josh's hand and placed it back where it had been earlier. "It's completely soaked, but at least it's honest, and it likes you." she said. Josh tried to wrap his head around that statement since it made no sense. Suddenly he thought that he understood what she meant, and he smiled. "It's not as itchy as a polar bear's either," he sighed. Another round of giggles followed. He moved his hand softly, and his new little friend down there emerged to play again. "Gently Joshua, "she sighed. "Yes, I know Kayla. I don't know why, but you seem to have an irrational fear of falling down for some reason, even if you're already there." Kayla began to make apologetic noises about its size, but Josh simply said. "There's a phrase that I'm looking for...can you guess what it is? That's right. Shut up. I like it a lot, and since it sticks out that far, it makes some things a lot easier. I've never done what we just did like that. Your idea was incredible, and the size made it possible. I haven't seen it at full noon, but I think you ought to feel a little special that it's there." Kayla hadn't thought of that at all. Eventually, Josh eased her onto her back, and starting at her face, began to kiss and nibble his way south slowly as she spread and lifted her legs. When he arrived at her breasts, his penis was pressing against her bottom cheeks, and she reached down and pulled them apart so that it had somewhere to be. He rocked himself slowly, pressing gently against the smaller opening at the wrong angle. Kayla smiled, "That feels nice, how did you know I'd like that there?" Josh replied honestly, "Not a clue, but I've been getting some signals from my own equipment, so I guess I'm trying to keep it interested, and I'm hoping that you don't mind too much." Kayla sighed, "It's nice, Josh. I think a lot of girls wouldn't like that, but I sure do. I've always felt a little dirty about it, but sometimes I just know that I like this, though I've never gone farther. So now you know another dark secret." She had no idea why she'd just told him that. Josh didn't acknowledge the statement, and kept his focus on her breasts and until she began to apologize about their size as well. Joshua stopped abruptly. "Kayla, I've about had enough of your apologizing, as though you're sorry, that you'd love to offer me better, but unfortunately all you've got to give me is your substandard equipment. Different men like different kinds of women, though we're all pretty much pigs in that we'll take what we can get if it's warm and wet at the moment. Now I'm very sorry to have to tell you this Kayla, but you are everything that I've always ever wanted in a woman. I mean that. I know that you won't believe me, because women never believe what men tell them body-wise because they suspect that the men are lying to them anyway, and they're probably right in many cases. But I'm actually being honest here. I know that you're pretty hardheaded by your own admission, so I'm prepared to repeat this to you often: I love everything about your body. Understand? Everything. I could probably make love to your elbow. Here's another big secret - I'm actually not that fond of large boobs. I am not now, nor have I ever been someone who can only focus on a pair of tits, though that's pretty much what I'm doing at the moment, because I can't imagine that there are better ones to be found anywhere. I'm actually delighted with them. So in case I wasn't being clear, I just happen to be enjoying the flight. The only thing that I DON'T like is the intercom system, because I keep hearing static like this. Now could you please switch it back to the other channel? This one's too noisy, and I liked the other music better. And no, I wouldn't like a bag of peanuts Ma'am, and no thank you, I can find my own pillow." Kayla laughed softly, and said, "Ok, ok, I get it. You like my bod --" "Love you body." Josh growled. Kayla giggled, "Alright, you LOVE my body. Nobody's ever waxed so poetically over my little 34s before." "34..." he mused, "I don't know the metric equivalent, but that would be, let me see, 1.0 SBH. That's my favorite size!" "1.0...What's SBH?" she asked, as he nuzzled them affectionately. "What? Oh. Standard British Handful," he stated categorically, "Canada used to be a British colony, if you remember your history." She burst out laughing. "You make me laugh so much. Actually my boobs can't believe this, so could you please get back to work here?" Joshua was only too willing to comply and Kayla ran her fingers over his short hair as she held his head to her breasts. After a time, he worked his way down to where he found her erect clitoris had been waiting for him. He kissed and dragged his tongue around in a quick circumference. He was just about to kiss his delightful new friend, when he felt Kayla shift. Kayla's head was on a rolled up sleeping bag. She felt that he was perhaps doing something that he felt obligated to do for her, because she'd only ever performed the male equivalent when she'd had to. She wanted to tell him that it was fine, and that he wasn't obligated at all. She lifted her head to speak, but before she could say anything, she saw the shape of his head, and heard him snarl at her. "So help me God, Kayla Fraser, if you're going to apologize yet again, you'll find yourself walking back. Oh, and honey? The rattlesnakes are nocturnal. I'm having a ball here; this is better than the juice of a thousand Popsicles, only warmer. So you'd better get used to this, unless you really want me to stop." She sighed, and said. "Sorry, nobody's ever really..." "Come on, nobody ever?" Josh couldn't believe her. "Well, there was one boy who said he wanted to, back when I was in college the first time. But he didn't really do much, and then he left, and I never saw him again. ...I can't believe I'm talking about this!" she exclaimed. Joshua rested his head on her inner thigh, and said cheerfully, "You'll never have a more attentive audience, Kayla," and then he licked along the outside of her lips. She shivered. "Ooh, that was good. Anyway, you might as well know. I don't know how other women are when they're worked up, but I do know that when MY motor's running, there's no mistaking it. It's pretty obvious. You'd probably feel different about what you're doing if you could see it." Josh was feeling playful, so he just said. "Oh, I VERY much doubt that." He began to kiss her softly there, thinking about flower analogies that kept popping into his mind, as he started to make love to a part of her that he was certain had been overlooked by a lot of idiots along the way. He paid reverent attention to each set of lips there individually. He put a hundred miles on his tongue languidly, nibbling and sucking with great care. Her body put out more moisture than he'd ever known a woman to produce in his experience. He hadn't been around all that much as far as he was concerned, but he certainly felt that he'd found some honey now... Kayla responded to his attention by squirming, directing him without really knowing it. Josh had always prided himself on his attentiveness, so he just did what her movements signaled that she wanted. He stroked and gently pinched one nipple between two fingers. As he dragged it out, he made a very fervent wish that this wouldn't be a one-off event. He really wanted to get acquainted with the buttons on this game controller. Her legs lifted higher and, remembering what he'd heard her say, he licked lower. She responded instantly, and indicator lights began to blink in his mind. 'Maybe,' he thought, ... 'damn, maybe I can get her to fly.' He could never think of a good analogy for how a very few women in his experience could move in response to what he did. Since he always found himself thinking along the lines of a kite floating aloft, he called it flying. She was sopping wet everywhere, and he slowly teased her, alternating between his index, then his middle finger and then his thumb, getting them wet for minutes on end. She let out soft cries as her hips rose and fell, and she gasped and writhed. Her own hands moved to her nipples. He took that as a good sign. Both of his hands would be needed elsewhere soon. He chose his moment, and lightly loving that erect little clitoris, placed his middle finger at the lower opening. She froze, gasping, and then he began to insert the finger. She groaned. Before Kayla could decide on whether she wanted to protest, his finger was halfway in, still moving, and his index finger was at the upper pathway, and began its own entry there. She moaned, but before she could finish the exhalation, his thumb had joined it, and all three began to move. He applied gentle upward pressure, and Kayla inhaled through her teeth as she planted her feet. Now she only moved the way his fingers directed, her hips slowly rising off the sleeping bag in stages. Her body rose of its own volition. Joshua was both delighted, and filled with awe, as he realized that she would indeed 'fly' for him. He was astounded at the degree of control that he had, and it was only the first time. He merely suggested with his fingers, and followed along so that his connection to her was maintained. He mentally promised her that he would do his very best for her. And now, as he moved onto on his knees under her, he focused his attention on that lovely floral part that had tickled his nose earlier. In his mind, Kayla had become a little kite floating in the breeze of a summer sky. He moaned as he licked and sucked, his right arm straining, sweat pouring from him with the effort, fighting off the cramps he was beginning to feel in his forearm. Joshua softly patted and stroked her bottom with his left hand. He didn't know if she would notice, but he tried to offer her his gentle encouragement. He wanted to give her this so much. He had almost forgotten how long he'd waited for someone who could do this, and who was worth the work that it took. Kayla bucked quickly and called his name several times, sounding as though she were crying. Joshua was careful to allow her movements and still follow them. He began to lick quickly. She'd been wet before, but now a new flood of moisture issued from her, running past his chin and dripping from her cheeks onto his thighs and manhood as he willed Kayla's little kite higher. Her shoulders and feet were the only parts of her body that remained on the floor of the truck as she shrieked and moaned when her flight reached its zenith. She had begun to contract rhythmically, squeezing his fingers tightly. Recognizing this signpost, Josh stopped licking, and held her clitoris very gently with his teeth as he thrashed his tongue. She screamed long once. The cry raised the hair on the back of his head as Kayla's tone passed the top of her range, and faded out to a constrained hiss in her throat. Time stopped for him along with their breathing. His pulse was all that he heard. He noticed that one of her shoulders had left the sleeping bag. Her stomach rippled and her nipples stood as high as they ever would, her hands falling to the floor. His penis twitched painfully in a primal response to the scream and the final, most forceful wave of moisture as it ran off his chin and onto his genitals. The back and top of her head took her weight along with the remaining shoulder and her feet as her head arched back as far as it could go. For this long moment, her body was as rigid as a bar as it quivered in the air. He'd been here before, so long ago. Though he couldn't see from his viewpoint, he knew that her mouth was open, and her teeth were bared. The little kite in his mind had stopped and hung fluttering in the wind... Kayla slumped down and the weight of her hips landed squarely onto Joshua's waiting left hand as he exhaled. His bicep strained as he caught her fall and lowered her gently back down to the sleeping bag unconscious. He moved back to give her body room as he very softly kissed the flower several times because for the first time in so very long in his life, he'd really meant it. He'd put all of his love into this for her. His heart swelled with a sense of accomplishment. "How could anyone have missed finding a treasure like you?" he asked, as he slowly withdrew his fingers. He paused to listen to her breath for a second before he moved to place her body gently on its front, her face resting on her forearm, one leg out to the side. He wanted to make absolutely certain that her airway was clear. He placed his hand lightly on her back to make sure that she was breathing freely and flexed the cramps in his arm away. He gazed in awe and wonder at her beauty. This had to be the most beautiful creature in the known universe. Then he sat back on his heels as he began to count. Kayla's mind fluttered down in time with the actions of her eyelids. All that she could see were alternating flashes of red and blackness. She found herself in the dark in a position that she didn't remember being in, and she noticed some weight on the back of her left leg... and recurring warmth. "What ... happened? ...Joshua.?" "Present and correct, Ma'am." he answered. She began to ask him, "What are you do - ...Oooohh". "Just cleaning up. Part of the full service package, y'know?" he said very happily. "But Josh, that's my ...aaaaahh." "It certainly is, yes." He chuckled. "You put out more happy juice than I'd have ever believed possible. You're completely soaked even here, actually. So since I caused it, I feel it's my responsibility to --" "but Josh, what ha-aaapened?" she asked. Joshua was laughing now. "I'll explain in a minute what happened there, but I need to finish this really important job first. Should only take me another minute... or twenty. But hey, if you can't stop talking for that long, you just keep it up, because every time you speak, I'll do that again, because I love to hear what happens to your voice when I do." "I'm trying to-oooh think uhhh-of a long poem. It feels so nice." Josh laughed. "Oh please, do that. I really need an excuse to keep doing this. I do NOT want to stop." "Ohhhkay." She giggled. You let me kno-OHhhh when I'm cleaned up to your satisfa -Aaaaction." ------------------ "So I passed out?" she asked. She was lying on her side with her head propped on one arm. Joshua was sitting across from her with his arms around his legs. "Yes," Josh said. There's no English name for it as far as I know, but the French have a name for every damn thing. They call it 'le petit mort', the little death." "Do you always do that?" she was incredulous. "No, because if I could do that all the time, I'd never be lonely again, would I? There would be a long line of women beating a path to my door, and they'd all suddenly have found that they could now overlook my face. It has a lot more to do with you than me. I don't think a lot of women can do it at all, though I haven't had the opportunity to test my theory, which is a damn shame." Josh chuckled, "I've seen it before though. I've only ever had that effect on a woman one time during regular sex, and since we were pretty young, it scared the hell out of me. I thought I'd killed her. I thought that it was just my luck that the one time that I could get a girl to hold still for me, I'd done something wrong and fucked her to death." He chuckled. Kayla laughed with that music that he loved to hear. "I was able to do that to her orally many times, but I never got it down to a science on her. I used to think maybe that was why she left, because I couldn't do it every time. I've seen it only a few times after that. I can help it along if I think I see the signs. It takes a lot out of me, so it helps if I care about the woman. For me, it's not just physical. I can't explain it, but it's like I'm pushing with my mind because I have to really WANT it to happen for her. With you, it was very easy to do that because I love you, but I think that for most women, I'm just a regular dick. This is the first time that someone was as wet as you. You actually gushed on me, and do NOT apologize for it. It told me that I had done it well for you, and that's what I really wanted. Besides, it felt so good on me, like a reward. That's never happened before, so thank you for that." he said. Kayla told him to lie with her, and she kissed him deeply for a few minutes. "You need to understand some things, Joshua," she began, "First off, I really doubt that could have been the reason why she left you. I don't know why she did, and I couldn't care less. If I were to ever meet her, I'd have to thank her, because if she hadn't thrown you away, Sam and Aunt Rose, Jilly and I would never have known someone as wonderful as you. And right after thanking her, I'd knock her on her fat badger ass for making you hurt, because she's done you a lot of harm." Josh chuckled at the mental picture, and Kayla went on. "What? You think I'm not defensive about the people that I love? I thought I'd given you a glimpse of that." She stroked his cheek. "Now I'll admit that your scar is pretty striking at first glance, but I'm with Jilly on this; I like your face. A lot." She very pointedly kissed and then licked his scar for the entire length of it. "And finally, you're not a dick, you're somebody pretty special, and not just for that amazing ability, whether it's coming from you or me, and maybe it's a little of both. It doesn't matter. I'm not stupid enough to question my luck, because up till now, I haven't had a lot of it. And I believe that you love me because I'm sure I felt it just then, and there was no mistaking it in my mind. I finally really believe it. Actually, I KNOW it though I don't know why you would. I want to make sure that you're never lonely again if you'll let me. Now you lie down on your back, because you're not the only one who offers a full service package." "What are we doing now?" he asked. "Interpersonal banking." Kayla said. "You're going to make a deposit right at the same time that I make a withdrawal." She took hold of him and began to stroke. "Now don't go getting all official on me, and telling me that I have to swipe my card or I'll figure out a way to do that," she said, lying down with her head on his stomach. "Or maybe I'll get all flustered and try to insert it, though I'm sure that won't be necessary." She kissed him softly, and licked tentatively, working back the foreskin. With a soft sigh, she took him into her mouth. All of the things that Kayla had figured out to get a man emptied in as short a time as possible, she now used slowly to please Joshua. She knew her jaw was going to complain later, but she didn't care. She swirled her tongue, rotated her head, dragged her teeth against him gently, and with all of the love that she could put into it. The thing that surprised her was the sense of gratification and enjoyment that she derived from it. Until today, she'd hated this. Judging from his motions and the noises he was making, he couldn't possibly have enough of a mind left to form words. The thought almost caused her to laugh out loud, but she was able to dismiss it. She stroked his scrotum, and then began to move the contents around gently. He reacted to that sensation, so she carefully squeezed a little, and he appeared to be near the point where she thought she could keep him for a time. She slowed down, alternating where she put pressure. If she thought that he was cresting, she paused only a moment, and used a different technique or motion. He moved periodically, sometimes spreading his legs very slightly, and then bringing them back again. She waited for him to tense them. Whenever she felt the beginning of that, it signaled her to make a change. His legs began to tremble, and it was what she'd waited for. She lifted her head, and keeping her tongue moving in light contact, she asked him if he was ready. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 08 It sounded as though he was eating the sleeping bag. She took that as an affirmative response. Joshua was very near the end now. His heart hammered, and he could feel it in his temples. That old feeling began down deep that told him to expect his semen delivery shortly. He realized suddenly that he should have told Kayla that he didn't expect her to swallow. His mind was forming the message when he felt coolness, and then her wonderful tongue. She was asking him if he was ready? Oh, there is a God, after all. He put his hands on her head to carefully touch her hair. Kayla felt his hands, and for a brief moment was dismayed. Most of the men she'd known liked to make sure she couldn't stop when they spurted. Then she noticed that he was only lightly stroking her. Once again, Joshua had showed her how different he was, and she knew that he wouldn't force her to do anything that she wasn't comfortable with. She decided it was time to go to town. She renewed her efforts, knowing that he was close. She began to sigh and hum trying to coax his manhood into the gush, but as she did this, it felt so right, and she began to moan with small pleasure too. Kayla had noticed one detail earlier; how much Josh swelled just before his release. She'd felt that and was surprised at how nice that felt. The penis in her hand had turned very hard indeed. She made a mental note that if they got a chance at vaginal sex she would try to see if she could sense when he was about to let go if she could. She was determined to give them a chance at it soon, and for the present moment, to take whatever he could provide within the next seconds and not lose any. What she'd always just had to choke down had suddenly become precious to her. She struggled to keep him as he bucked, but then he cried out, and for a second, she thought he would levitate off the floor as she struggled to swallow everything. She wondered where he kept it all. It kept on going; she counted nine, no ten contractions before they became too weak to count. Kayla wanted it all, quickly pressing the heel of her palm hard against him under the scrotum, and pressed her finger just into the opening below that. He reacted instantly, spreading his legs as he gave her another few contractions, and some more of his seed with a loud groan. She told his manhood the same thing that she'd been telling his chest all night. She could feel that there was some of it at the corner of her mouth, and suddenly entertained an impish thought. 'Let's just see how he likes it.' she thought, and scooted to where his face was. "Clean up in aisle two!" she announced looking down at him, and she stuck her tongue deeply between his lips. There was no revulsion from him at all. He was chuckling. She was surprised. He licked her mouth, so she licked his, but then she stopped. "Wait, I don't want to miss this, I've got to check something out!" she said as she quickly lowered her head to his chest. The engine was still running fast, and she had to press slightly to keep her head on him, as it wound down. She waited, as his hands stroked her ass and head softly, and then... there it was. He began to inhale, and inhale, and was there going to be any oxygen left when he was done? The powerful heart slowed down and then... nothing. No heartbeat. She put her hand to his chest and counted at the last rate that she heard as she touched her lips to his mouth. He kissed her gently... On the tenth count, it restarted. Bang-BOOM Bang-BOOM. 'How the hell does he DO that, and why?' she wondered. She resolved to ask him sometime. For now, there was this nipple... He reveled in Kayla's joy in simple things. She liked to listen to his heart, of all things. He couldn't believe it. She had gone back to licking him as he stroked her thigh with one hand, and her head with the other, and then she spoke. "I used to hate doing this. I wanted to throw up, and sometimes did afterward." she said in the darkness. Joshua suddenly felt guilty that he hadn't stopped her. "Oh Kayla, I'm sorry. I wanted to tell you not to do that, that you didn't have to --" "I know. I did it because I suddenly wanted to very much. And I loved it. I wanted to get everything from you that time. That's NEVER happened before. Was I good?" she asked. "Nobody's ever done anything that good for me before. Thank you, Kayla. I love you." he said, more than a little surprised at how easily the words came, since he hadn't said anything like that in well over a decade. Kayla nodded, knowing that he'd meant it and made her own little declaration, "I love you too, Joshua. I hope you can stand more of that, because I really liked doing it for you, and for me too. This stuff usually makes me gag, because of the act, and because of the taste. But yours tastes great, and I don't get why, I mean besides that it's yours. That's a first too, it was important to me." Kayla told him. Josh smiled, and his humor returned. "Well, beside the fact that you've obviously got good taste in men, there are two things that it has going for it: it's non-fattening, -- " Kayla chuckled. "What's the second thing?" Josh smiled. "It's imported." She laughed, "I guess that's it." They dressed, and drove back with the defrost on full to clear the windows. At the ranch they had a beer and a cigarette together. Kayla got up and walked around the table to sit on Josh's lap. "Sorry, I just felt too far away over there." She touched his face and stroked his scar with her thumb. "So it doesn't matter to you, what I did before?" "No," he said, "I told you that, even before you told me everything. I also know that you really felt that you had to tell me." He smiled, "I've only got one little problem, but I guess that I can live with it. If I could have my wish, I'd like to be able to really see you when we're doing that, but I guess I can understand about you feeling like you want to hide." Kayla pulled his head to her chest and sighed. "You don't know it, but I am feeling a lot better. I'd never have been able to even do what we did only a couple of days ago. I just need some more time." She rubbed his head affectionately, "But I'm not clear on something. Did you really hate watching the peelers if you were there?" "No," he said, "it wasn't that. It all felt just so impersonal to me, Kayla. If there was something between the dancer and me it would be a lot different. I just didn't like the fact that I wasn't what she was dancing for, that's all." Kayla looked down and kissed his head for a moment, "Well, what if the dancer was a girl that you were involved with? What if she was dancing for you?" He chuckled, "Well I think that would be awesome. Nobody's ever done something like that for me before." Kayla laughed softly. She'd just found a solid reason to want to get past her shyness -- if only she knew beforehand that he could live with the way that she looked back there. She pushed his head back gently and leaned down to kiss him for a minute. "Don't give up hope, Josh," she chuckled, "I think it's safe to say that you've got a girlfriend -- who used to be a stripper. Give me a chance and some time. I might just amaze you yet." She looked a little uncomfortable, "This is so different for me," she said, "I find myself saying things that usually don't get said, but with you, I think that there isn't much that we can't talk over. Well, now that we can get past each other's thorns a little. So, different table, same cards. Do you still feel hopeful? Is this something that we should do?" Josh nodded, "I can't help the feeling that there's something about you and me that bypasses all of the usual barbed wire fences and pits full of tigers and I don't know how that works either, so I can only guess that it must be even worse for you." He smiled, "Yeah, I'm still hopeful. I guess I've never been this hopeful that something works, but you know there are so many things, like Jilly, this place here, how long I c -" Kayla had her hand over his mouth. "Stop, stop, stop, Josh. Never mind everything else for now. We just need to get one thing down here, not a thousand, or nothing could happen ever." She took a breath and tossed the coin in her mind right there as she kissed him softly for a moment. "Go, or no go?" She asked, starting the timer in her mind. "Go." He smiled. For a moment, Josh thought that she might just kiss him to death right there. --------- Josh offered her the use of his shower and she agreed, but insisted on showering alone, without him even seeing her, and also she wanted to dry him later. He smiled his agreement and followed her requests to the letter. After his shower, Kayla was already dressed, and as Josh stood before her naked, she toweled him dry. She kissed a lot of landscape, and then waited as he got dressed again so that he could walk her back to the bunkhouse. Their goodnight kiss took twenty-seven minutes. While Kayla was drying and kissing Josh, Rose put down the binoculars and went to bed. She felt happier than she'd been in a long time. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 09 **So just exactly what is Kayla's problem? Vote if you want to, and comments are always welcome. O_o --------------- Kayla was a bit slow getting up, and eventually Jillian wandered into her room to wake her. Kayla stretched as she sat up and hugged her niece. "Good morning, Jilly. I love you, honey." She looked over at Jillian's constant companion. "And I don't want to forget Daisy," she said, running her hand over Daisy's head and chest. Daisy licked her forearm in reply. Jillian kissed her, and said, "'Morning Kayla, I love you too." She looked at her aunt a little sideways. "What?" asked Kayla. "You don't usually hug me that tight every day. I like it, but you're acting weird." Jillian said. "I was thinking that I don't show you that I love you often enough. I'm going to do that more from now on," said Kayla. "I'm pretty lucky to have you." Jillian still looked at her aunt a little suspiciously. "You kissed him, didn't you?" Kayla nodded. Jillian screwed up her face, "That's just icky. You probably got his germs or something." Kayla chuckled, "Yes I did, honey, and it was pretty nice." She smiled and then laughed. "I got in so late last night that I just went to sleep, and since kissing Joshua goodnight was the last thing that I did before I went to bed, now you've got them too since you just kissed me." Kayla smirked with satisfaction. "So there." "EWWWwww! Jillian cried, and ran out of the room to let Kayla get dressed. Daisy followed after with furrowed skin on her forehead. She didn't know what the noise had been for, but it was probably going to mean fun. As she wandered to the house for breakfast, Kayla saw no sign of Joshua, and since he was missing from the table on the porch, she asked Rose where he was. "He's gone, honey. He got up and made some phone calls, and then he went for his run. He likes to do that before it gets warm, although sometimes he times it so that he is running in the heat, I don't know why." Rose answered, "Oh, I just remembered that you won't need curtains. I've got some in the attic. I'll bring them down, and I ought to be able to get them to fit those windows without too much fuss." Jillian finished her breakfast and wandered away to play with Daisy. Kayla dug in to her breakfast while her aunt went to the kitchen to pour herself another cup of coffee. She overfilled it and walked back out carefully as she sipped to lower the level. Rose sat down and looked at her niece, "So you and Joshua enjoyed yourselves?" she asked. Kayla wondered slightly at the inflection that her aunt had used. It didn't seem like so much of a question as much as a statement of fact. "Yes Aunt Rose, I had a wonderful time, once I got past my hair trigger. I don't know why I did it, but I hurt Josh with some things that I said." She worked at cutting a piece of bacon. "I actually made him cry. I felt awful about that. Anyway, he calmed me down, and then I really cried a lot, it seemed like everything just sort of came out then." Rose waited while her niece chewed and then Kayla continued. "I mean everything, and he just held me and cried with me, when he should have probably just taken the crazy lady back here and been done with me." Rose nodded. She'd known that her niece had been carrying a bit of a load recently. She sighed, hoping that Kayla would feel better now. It sure looked that way to her as Kayla went on. "He told me that he loves me, Aunt Rose. I guess I just couldn't accept that from anyone." She smiled, "I'm not sure why he would, but I know that he does, and ... I love him too," she said. "A lot." "I know, I saw him this morning." said Rose, smiling, "But did he help you with your problems, dear?" "Yes, and no." Kayla answered, "We made love and I never knew that anyone could do the things that he did to me. That was really wonderful, and the best part was that I actually wanted to." She sat back as though something had just come to her. "I think for the first time in my life, I really meant it, because I knew that he loves me. He loves me, Aunt Rose. No bullshit or deviousness. He makes me wonder how I ended up with the idiots that I've known until him. That's a strange thing to come to grips with, it's sure never happened to me before." "Well that's wonderful," Rose said, "and I'm so happy for the two of you, you don't know how much, but what I meant was, did he help you with your OTHER problem?" Kayla dipped a corner of her toast into an egg yolk. "He made me feel so much better, but even so, he didn't see anything. We were in his truck like a couple of teenagers, and that was fun, but the windows are dark, and I checked carefully first so that I knew that he couldn't see me." Kayla said. "I could just barely make out his shape. I couldn't see my bracelet or any of his tattoos, so I knew I was safe, and then I guess I just let go on him." She smiled at the thought. "It felt great to be able to do that. But it does leave me with a problem though. I love him and I trust him now, so I'm going to have to find a way to prepare him for what I look like in the light. And I've made the decision to do that." Kayla looked off to the horizon on her right a little as she thought. "It's not going to be easy, but if he can get past it, then I guess we've got a real shot. If he can't, I won't blame him, and I guess I'll have a few good memories." Kayla looked a bit wistful at the thought. "It will be his decision, and we'll both have to live with it, I guess." Rose looked a little uncomfortable but went ahead with her thought. "Kayla honey, I've told you before, that you're making far too much of it. You're carrying it around like it was a heavy weight. It's not bad, believe me, but it's up to you to decide how to proceed from here, since you're this close. If I can offer you some advice, be a little mindful toward Joshua. He's built strong shields to protect his feelings, and now that he loves you as you say, he's as vulnerable as you, ok? I think you saw that last night from what you're telling me. If he didn't care, there's no way that he would ever cry. I've seen him when he was smarting because some fool woman had misjudged him, and all it did was piss him off." Kayla nodded thoughtfully before sipping her coffee. "Ah, you mean me, right?" Rose continued, "No, Kayla. I think that you'd admit that you've fallen in love with him. I'm talking about something else. It has happened that unlike you, there have been a couple that have fallen in love AT him, trying to sweep him off his feet, so to speak. You'd think that might be a little funny to watch, but it's not. Some women like the bad boy type. A lot of women only think that they like bad boys and go after them." she said, her expression turning to a slight smirk. "And then they wonder why the bad boys that they wanted so badly just keep kicking them around. Well Joshua isn't like that, as you know, but he looks like the type to some. When one of them figured out that he's not a hard case in the road house out on the highway, well, it got ugly. Josh hadn't dropped his guard like he has now, and he gave that girl both barrels in the same public place where she had tried to ridicule him for trying to politely disengage himself. Her brother, the bouncer, took offense at Joshua's treatment of his sister's honour, which along with her modesty she never seemed to have missed before by the way. Josh tried to get clear and even apologized, but by then, that wasn't really what either of them wanted to hear. Anyway, the bouncer woke up at the opposite end of the bar. He hit Joshua only once, and Josh took it from there. It took Joshua two seconds to do that, too. Now they just leave him alone. I was very proud of him." she chuckled. "Um, I'm just thinking, Kayla, was there ever a time last night when Joshua was behind you?" "No, ... wait!" She thought about it. "Actually there was. Aunt Rose, I don't know if you can understand it, and I'm not sure that I can, but I kind of passed out. Josh said I was out for about three minutes. I remember that I was facing him, ...well sort of anyway, and then when I came to, I was on my front. I don't know how I got that way, but it doesn't matter. He couldn't see anything anyway." Rose smiled and explained, "Sam could do that to me sometimes. He told me that he tried to tell Joshua how to do that once. I guess it was as close as those two ever came to a father-son talk. But he told me that when he tried to explain it, Joshua told him that he already knew about it. And in that case, you're very lucky. Most men don't put much into what I think you were doing. He obviously does, because it's a lot of work for the man with no physical gratification. He must have put his heart into it." She smiled, "We must share more than a few genes, just as Joshua said on Friday, because it's a rare thing. The one thing that Sam taught Joshua was to make sure the woman could breathe. So Joshua must have turned you over as Sam told him to" she paused before she went on. "Did Joshua tell you that he loved you AFTER that point, or before?" asked Rose. "Both," answered Kayla, "Aunt Rose, what does that have to do with anything? I've told you I don't know how many times now that he couldn't see me!" Rose looked out at the mountains in the distance. She smiled warmly, and looked back at Kayla with moistened eyes. "Oh, it has everything to do with it. What it means honey, is that Joshua is already farther past your problem than you are. He's seen you." Kayla's face showed no comprehension, so Rose went on gently. "Believe me, if you just saw his outline, then there was enough light for that boy to read a roadmap. I've never been able to figure it out, but he's got eyes like a cat. Kayla, you don't need to tell him or show him. You can forget all about that problem of yours. Believe me honey; he could see ALL of you." Kayla looked like she was about to faint again. "All... of me?" "Joshua can see very well in the dark." Rose stated. "He...can?" Kayla's voice sounded very small. "And that means that he's fine with you. I also know that because I saw his face this morning. He had the stupidest sloppy grin that I've ever seen on him, and I'm close enough to being his mother to be able to tell why, especially after what you've told me that you two got up to." Rose laughed. "And it looks to me like all that running hasn't worn the grin off yet. What did you do to him, girl?" Kayla answered, "Huh? What do you mean?" "Here he comes up the drive now." Rose said as she stepped into the kitchen. Kayla looked over her shoulder, and saw that her aunt was right, Josh looked like a kid with a new puppy. She turned back as the storm clouds gathered. Jillian and Daisy wandered back to the porch to greet Joshua. She reached out to hug him, but recoiled just a little. "You're all sweaty," she said as she stood next to him. "I can't believe I was going to hug you. Yuck!" Josh looked confused as he sat down next to Kayla. "Hi!" he said. Kayla didn't acknowledge him. Josh watched Jillian continue to teach Daisy to fetch. She was now successful more than half of the time -- as long as what she was tossing couldn't possibly be construed as food. "Hey, that's pretty good. I was never able to do tha-" Josh was just turning to Kayla when he found that he was looking at two bright green slits, and a wonderfully even set of bared teeth. She had her left hand at his throat, and her right fist back to clock him. Jillian's game of fetch was suspended as she watched. "ROSE, Kayla's going to kill Josh again!" she called. "That's nice, honey. Now come in and help me with the dishes." Rose answered. "AWWWwwww?" Jillian protested in the way of all children as she went through the screen door. "Since this is the last minute of my life for some reason," Josh said, "I believe that I'm entitled to a last request." "You lied to me!" Kayla snapped. "You said that you couldn't see me." Josh gently shook his head -- as much as he was able to. "I did not lie to you. I told you that I never would. You didn't ask me if I could see you. I actually tried to tell you that I could see you, but you shushed me and told me to shut up before I could get it out. After that, you were having so much fun that I couldn't bring myself to tell you. Now, about my last request; temporarily, and only for less that ten seconds, trust me." Josh moved his right hand up and repositioned her grip on his throat. He slowly took her fist, and opened her first two fingers, to reposition the thumb. "Who taught you this crap?" he asked. "Put your thumb on the outside like this. Now you won't break it when you hit me, and another thing..." He gently pulled her fist toward his face, and moistly kissed it before pushing it back into position. "Ok. I'm good. You can hit me now." Josh said. "Kayla, what was that you were saying about love and trust a few minutes ago?" Rose asked sweetly through the window, "It sounded so nice, I thought maybe you could say it again. And there was something about you two having a real shot at something...Oh, and then there was something about your having a hair trigger too..." Kayla rolled her eyes, and said what she felt. "DAMMIT!" She slammed both fists on the table and hung her head. Her voice was much quieter a few seconds later. "What... what did you see?" Josh spoke at the same low level. "What I saw in the dark truck-" Kayla exhaled heavily, "Aunt Rose told me that you can see really well in the dark. Is this where you'll mislead me while you try to think of a way not to hurt me? Well I'm feeling pretty shitty and stupid right now. How much worse can it get?" she sobbed. Josh sighed. He leaned toward her head, and whispered to her as he stroked her back. "What I saw in the dark truck BEFORE you lost consciousness was the loveliest woman that I've ever seen in my whole life. If you want me to, I'll repeat that until this evening while sitting right here. I'll write it a thousand times if you want. And AFTER you were unconscious, I saw what you're trying to run from. For the record, my opinion did not change. You have a magnificent body, and if you never let me near you again, I want to thank you for last night. It meant the world to me. You felt free of shame. I enjoyed you just enjoying yourself. If you don't believe me, it's ok. I understand and hey, I can relate. But you never have to be ashamed in front of me. I love you Kayla." He kissed her ear. Kayla sobbed some more. "What would you know? I have to wear this until I die!" Joshua's voice was still soothing, and he spoke without reproach. "At least you can hide what you hate. I never could. You have to twist halfway around to even look at it in a mirror. I have to see what I hate every day, in the mirror when I shave, or in other people's eyes. I can't hide it. So I do know, don't I?" He sat back, and lit a cigarette as he stared at the wall. "If you really want to know, I'll tell you everything that I saw." She nodded her head, "I might as well hear it." He spoke low to keep it private, since he didn't know where Jillian was. "You are in your early thirties, a bit under five and a half feet tall, I'd say, and about two hundred yards of that is comprised of your wonderful legs. You weigh about one hundred and fifteen to one hundred and twenty pounds, with a fine, lithe build, and well-developed, strong musculature that you maintain by probably bi-weekly workouts, and while you do run on occasion, you're not that big on it. Your litheness, combined with some of your other features lends you a slightly otherworldly, almost elfin appearance that sets you apart from others. The overall effect is stunning. To most people, you appear as a walking dream or spell. Your ears are pierced, five times on the left, and seven times on the right, once through each lobe, the rest extending high up on the cartilage rim, far higher than is the conventional fashion. Some of those piercings are quite old. You have a slight scar about one half inch long in your right eyebrow, probably from a childhood injury that was stitched shut. It is not noticeable to the average person. You have straight perfect teeth set in a gorgeous mouth with lips that never require lipstick. You do not need to pluck your eyebrows. You have a pink birthmark just inside the scalp line over your right ear. Less than one tenth of one percent of the people that you've met in your lifetime have ever noticed it. You have the brightest green eyes that I have ever seen, one of three sets with which I am acquainted. The owners of those eyes are by far the most important people in my life. Your particular eyes are hauntingly intense, and when you look at me, I feel their light in my soul. You have a band of pale freckles across your nose. One day, I would very much like to count them." Kayla raised her head to stare at him. He sat facing forward, head lowered. His eyes were closed in concentration. "Your left breast is almost imperceptibly larger than your right, the same for your nipples. They are the most beautiful breasts that I have personally ever seen, though you suffer under the delusion that they are too small. The truth is that if they were larger with your build, you would resemble a Barbie doll, and then you wouldn't run at all. There is a scar about one inch long below your right kneecap. I haven't looked at it long enough to judge whether or not it came from a surgical procedure, and the last scar that I am aware of is located on your left palm, just under the knuckle of your little finger. There is a very slight blue discoloration there, indicating that you probably fell off your bicycle as a child, and embedded some gravel that the skin has grown over. Last evening, you were wearing a silver bracelet with a turquoise stone on your left wrist, and a matching ring on the index finger of your right hand." Kayla stared at her open left hand, and then looked back at Joshua. "There is a vine or stem, I think it is, that begins as a wrap above your pretty left ankle, and continues on a meandering course up the back of your left leg, working its way around almost to your left knee before doubling back and splitting off. One tendril ends just as it curves around the right side of your left knee about four inches above the point where it would be visible from the front on the other side before the split. The other main vine or stem continues up the back of your left thigh, over your left buttock, before crossing your lower back, and continuing as it parallels about two and one half inches to the right of your spine. This stem curves to the left after splitting off again. The left curve runs across your back, and downward, ending at the bottom of your left shoulder blade. Where the last split occurred, the vine curves over your right shoulder in a thin and graceful tendril that nestles in the hollow at the base of the right side of your beautiful neck." He felt her weight leaning against him. Kayla hung her head and quietly sobbed again. "On the stem, there are ten dark flowers, orchids, I think. Like everyone else, my night vision is monochromatic, so I cannot tell you the color of the flowers, however I feel that they are a deep purple. One on your left calf. One above your left knee on the back side. One just under your left bun, and there is one on the cheek itself. There are two at the small of your back; the right one is slightly higher. There are two more going up the right side of your back on the vine as it rises to the right of your spine. The second last of the dark flowers is at about the level of your right shoulder blade, but a little to the right of it, centered about four inches from your armpit. The last is over your left shoulder blade itself. I can't comment on the quality of the artwork, as there was not enough light for me to tell. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 09 There is another flower, the most lovely of them all, and this is the only one that is not an addition, rather it is the one that you were born with. You believe that it is ugly, and I disagree strongly. It is the one that you said that I would not be so interested in if I could see it. Since you now know that I could see it well, I can tell you that last evening, as now, I disagree with you. I can also tell you that what I was able to do for you gave me an intense feeling of pride. I was very happy." She took his left hand and held it tightly. He noticed that she had stopped crying. "Given the light conditions at the time, I would probably say that there is a great amount of detail that I could not see. Any fool would be impressed with your body markings. If the quality is what I estimate it to be, I would consider it to be a piece of living art. Looking past the art, your body is simply stunning to me, absolutely exquisite, and I could admire it by itself for hours if I were given that honor. It does not require the markings to enhance it. The markings tend to compliment your body; they work with it, and do not detract from it in the least. I don't know the artist's intent, other that I can see his vision. In that, he accomplished his goal. The fact that you feel shame about them makes me wish very much that I possessed the ability to remove them without harming the wonder of you, because you despise them for your own reasons. Whether you still love me and wish to continue to love me is irrelevant to this. If you want to fit into the community here, I'll help you as best I can to the degree that you desire my help, if you still desire it. I have to say this; loving you last night was my sincere pleasure, and if today marks the end, I can accept and respect your wishes, though in my opinion, you are not so much running from your markings, as you want to deny your past. A past that I am sure Rosie has told you to forget about. I echo that sentiment. You're not running from the marks, you're running from yourself, and the effect is the same. It cannot be done. You're torturing yourself needlessly. Believe me, Kayla, if I can't be anything else; I sincerely want to be your friend. I don't have many. Losing you now would break my heart, but regardless, I only want the best for you." He opened his eyes and took a swallow of her coffee. "That's what I saw," he said. "That's what I see." Kayla sat quietly for a few minutes, just leaning against him. At last she said, "Joshua, I still love you. I think I've loved you from your first kiss once I understood it. Something like this has NEVER happened to me before. I hated myself for making you cry. I just couldn't believe that you would want me. I don't want to end anything. I'm not an idiot. I just felt ashamed that you could see me when I felt safe in what I thought was almost pitch black. I meant what I did last night every bit as much as you did, and believe me; I feel the same way about it. I've never felt so much for someone before. I just didn't think that you could ever want me because of these things on me. I've misjudged you again, I'm sorry. I love you to death, and I'm sorry that I was upset. You are the most amazing man that I've ever met. Where have you been all my life? Did you figure out all of that in the truck last night?" Joshua smiled shyly at her. "I do love you, Kayla. I understand why you get upset. I really do understand. I'm not amazing; at least I don't see any brilliance. I'm usually doing dumb shit like every other guy, as far as I can tell." He chuckled, "Where have I been? Wishing that I knew who and where you were. I used to think that you were stuck on a desert island in the Pacific. There's supposed to be someone for every person, you know? I'd love you if those were scars on your back. I'd feel privileged to accompany you anywhere that you might want to go with me, covered or not. That whole long boring monologue was just simple observation over a few days. I notice things, that's all. I always have my whole life, plus I'm trained to do that. It's saved my ass more than once. I just notice details, or what's missing. My mind has a constant stream of observed crap running through it. All of what I said is true, but I can't pick up your birthmark or the eyebrow scar in the dark. The knee scar I just barely caught when I turned you over, and then felt for its size." He grinned at her, "I added some bullshit about your left breast being larger. As far as I can tell they're evenly matched, perfectly. But most people's left things are a little bigger to some degree than the right; hands, feet, boobs, etc. I just threw that in for a bit of color. The rest is true, and of course, I flavored it with my feeling and opinion." he said. "By the way, what are the flowers? I can see fairly well in the dark, but..." Kayla sighed. "They're orchids. Black orchids. I'll tell you about it sometime. In the meantime, thanks for being you. You're really helping me. I don't feel ashamed very much all of a sudden. I think you're proud of me for some reason, and I don't want to blow that. I'll work it out if you'll be there, ok?" He hugged her tightly. "I can't imagine any place I'd want to be but where you are. If you'd known me before, you'd see that this is a pretty big change for me." She smiled and nudged him. "I imagine it must be. You're quite a catch yourself, you know? I was proud to be seen with you in town the other day. Uh, aren't you going to eat breakfast?" "Well I'd like to, but Rosie is pretty much done making it, I'd guess," he said. Rose came bustling out of the kitchen at that instant with a plate of breakfast that she'd been keeping warm. "Here you go, Joshua. Enjoy it, you silver-tongued devil! You seem to have talked your way out of certain death." she laughed as she sat down opposite them. Kayla's mouth fell open. She looked at Josh, "Is it just me, or do you get the sense that about the only thing that Aunt Rose could be accused of is being a little too up on us, and what we do? It's like she'd been listening or something while you were praising my chest," she laughed. Josh was stuffing his mouth. "Hey, she'd like my mom, plus she kept breakfast for me. I'm certainly not going to make that accusation even if it had crossed my mind, uh, which it most certainly has not, I might add. If you wish to voice the thought, I'll watch to see if you get nailed with the flyswatter. I can handle poisonous snakes, but I fear that thing!" Rose ignored the jokes, "Alright, I'm going into town to get what I'll need to fix up the curtains that I have. Joshua, you take Kayla and Jillian, and get what you said you had to. We'll meet for lunch at the cantina at 12:30. We've already got a reservation. Kayla, how much of that you might want to show is up to you, but I'd suggest a women's T-shirt, open neck. Josh, take her to a place for that, and buy her a bit of a low-key necklace to match if you can decide on one, as I don't think she has anything like that. Jillian is going to need new jeans. I'll fix the ones that she's got on tonight, but try to make her look presentable for lunch, Kayla.If you agree with the shirt, and feel that you can handle it, wear it out of the store. And change your shoes. Joshua, a shower, and clean clothes, please. Thank God you've shaved this morning. We're going to lunch as a family today, since we're all so proud to be seen with each other. There'll be telephone lines humming all the way to the next county today, unless I miss my guess, so they can't be talking about your jeans with the ass ripped out of them. I'm leaving in about twenty minutes, so you guys get a move on." Josh stared at Rose, and said, "Um...so those are the orders of the day? Rose took a deep breath and replied, "Yep." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 10 **I've still got a way to go with this one, but I'd like to thank anyone who comments on my stories and takes the time to vote. O_o ------------------- Kayla felt better as she began to get ready to leave and she thought about the evening before. She tried to be objective and look everything over but she kept finding a little smile on her face. In spite of the speed of this and the oddness, she had found herself almost trying to fight off the feeling that she had. She tried to tell herself that this wasn't supposed to be happening. She'd never had a relationship begin the way that this one had. And for her to get intimate after three days wasn't anything like her track record either, but whenever she marveled at that, she had to chuckle and shrug to herself. 'What the hell?' she asked herself. Her track record up to this point had been one rolling train wreck after another, the times that she'd been careful and the very few times that she hadn't. How much worse could this one be? At least she was finding the courage in herself to give it a serious try. That alone was something. Kayla was still thinking as she prepared, but at the same time, she was still putting things away in their new places. There was an open cardboard box on the floor that she hadn't really gotten around to yet, and her foot brushed against it as she stood wondering about her hair. She decided to re-braid it and then thought about the evening again, just after she'd kissed Joshua goodnight. At first, she'd closed the door and leaned against the back of it for a minute, but then she realized how the posture was reminiscent of the way that a teenage girl might do the very same thing after saying goodnight to a boy that she really liked in a million cheesy movies. The thought had made her laugh to herself quietly and it got her away from the door in a hurry, She shook her head at her actions and just went to bed. That was when she'd had the dreams. One of them related to a fantasy that she'd had forever, though she was surprised – even while she was dreaming it – to see herself doing just what she'd always had a secret and very sensual wish to do. She'd thought of it before, but only when she was awake. This was new to her. But there had never been even one person that she'd had a relationship with or that she'd even known who seemed to fit what she'd imagined and for damn sure none of them were worth even trying to share it with, let alone admit it to. Anyway, the man in the fantasy had no face. She guessed that she'd never gotten far enough along in her fantasy to where he'd needed one. Well he had a face in that dream. That man now had a face and a name and that surprised her even more, since she really hadn't thought of the fantasy in months.. In the second dream, Kayla was sitting beside the ocean on a really nice deserted little beach all alone on a hot day. She knew that she'd been swimming, since her body was still covered in water droplets from the ocean. She'd never had this dream before. When she looked down at the droplets, she noticed that she was wearing a bikini with a floral pattern. Kayla even noticed that the overall tone was a warmish yellow, though there were plenty of green leaves in the pattern. The warm tone came from splashes of orange, here and there.. She was a little surprised. It wasn't really the first color and pattern that she'd have gone for, but that was what she had on. She hadn't worn a bikini in so long. As she remembered it fully awake now and hours later, she had to really try to figure out just how long it had been. In the dream, there was just the sound of the ocean breeze past her ears and the slow rhythm of the incoming waves, and every so often, she could hear the call of gulls out to sea, and birds from the jungle behind her. She had no idea where she was and it didn't matter to her in the dream. She remembered looking off to the side, along the strand, and she saw him walking along the wet sand with his hands in his pockets. The man was wearing jeans, as odd as it seemed to her, but he wore no shoes. He was just walking toward her with his head down, his pant legs wet almost to the knees, and his face hidden by the other incongruity about him. He was wearing a Stetson and it prevented her from seeing his features. Kayla remembered watching him walk and thinking that it was going to be just a little funny at some point. His path would take him right past her, less than ten feet away from her feet, and if he didn't look up in time, she thought that he might just trip over the large section of the driftwood tree trunk that she was sitting next to. But then she saw his chest and she just knew. In her dream, she called to Josh, but he didn't seem to hear her. She stood up and placed herself squarely in his path. When he reached her, he stopped maybe six feet away and looked at her. Kayla was frightened to death that he'd just look at her, push her aside and walk on - but he didn't. In Kayla's dream, he smiled just a tiny bit, while his eyes took on a look that told her in no uncertain terms how he wanted her. Kayla was still afraid, though not of his look. There were only two things that she could do, and one of them would reveal her shame to him. One of them was to walk closer, and the other was to walk away. She stepped closer and touched his cheek for a moment before she ran her hand down his chest slowly. When she'd gotten to below his navel, her hand slowed even more until she made him groan as it slid lower still and she felt his arm slip around her waist. He was trying to pull her to him, but she knew that this miracle had to end, so she placed her hand against his chest and pushed him away a little. Kayla remembered how she'd dragged her eyes slowly upward on him until they were looking into each other's eyes. She did her best to hold the look on her face and not let it slip so that he wouldn't see the dread that she felt. His arm fell away as she turned around. and began to walk away from him slowly with her heart in her throat. She remembered wanting to check – to see about a couple of things. She wanted to see if he followed. She wanted to turn her head far to the left and look down as she walked to see the green there, but she didn't dare. She knew that if it was there in the dream, then she'd be walking away alone. But she heard the slightly splashing cadence of his feet at the water's edge where he walked and knew that he followed her, so she turned left and continued on under the fronds of the nearest palms. That was where he caught up to her and Kayla's recollection of the dream ended with her in his arms. Kayla finished the braid and looked at her own face in the mirror. The dream had come to her before she knew that he'd seen the back of her. Now? She found herself wishing a little that she could have that dream again, but this time without the uncertainty that she'd felt. She felt the box against her ankle and looked down and her eye fell on her razor, and then she saw her aerosol can of men's shaving foam. A dollar seventy-nine, it still said on the price sticker. She must have gotten a hundred uses out of the thing. Now there's value. Kayla smiled as she sat on the edge of the old tub and turned on the water, already knowing something about the man who had seemed to just explode into her life somehow. Her next thought made her laugh a little. Josh wasn't interested in a landing strip. ------------------- Josh was feeling almost suburban as they shopped. It was a new experience to him to stand around while Kayla chose some things for Jillian, and then for herself. After that, Josh waited with Jillian while Kayla looked for a top. She'd worn a necklace of her own, a gold chain with a gold cross. She'd decided to keep the French braid in her hair purposely, ... She thought it was a little stupid, but she took the three tops that she'd thought might look good to a dressing room. She hung them up on one of the hooks there on the wall and just noticed another garment left behind by someone on the back side of the door, but thought nothing of it and closed the door to change. It wasn't until she went to look at herself in the mirror on the back of the door that she noticed that it was really two articles on separate hangers. She was looking at the top and the matching bottom that when combined made up a bikini. She smiled to herself and laid it aside carefully to try on the first of the tops that she was interested in. That took a minute and a half. It was really no contest and she made her choice quickly, but, ... Kayla's eyes went to the bikini. It wasn't even the thong type. It got just a little nutty then as Kayla recalled snippets of her conversations with her aunt. "Stop talking yourself under a rock." "You need to like yourself, Kayla." "You need to try. Something at least." Kayla wanted to shake her head and almost wondered where the tiny loudspeaker was. Just what the hell kind of sappy movie was she playing through her mind here anyway? She looked at the bikini again and wondered when they'd started selling the things in separate pieces since she hadn't bought one in so long. She shook her head and thought that they could sugar coat it any way that they wanted to, but it was nothing more than a money grab disguised as offering a woman flexibility or a better choice of sizes. But it was a little cute, she decided, and it had green leaves, though in a sort of bamboo-like pattern, not like the one in her dream at all, she told herself. Dang, and it even had little orange highlights in the yellow background. She held it up and wished that she could wear one again, but, ... She noticed that it was on sale, forty dollars marked down to fifteen for the bottom and ten for the top. She shook her head. No way. She knew that she could likely buy a nice one-piece for close to the same money in this very store, and not even on sale. She'd even seen them on her way to the dressing room. She looked at her face in the mirror and thought. Time – and years of workouts – had been good to her and she knew it full well. There were a lot of women her age who would kill to have her figure. And she had to hide it. Or did she? She looked at the label and the price tag. Kayla stared. Size eight. 'Well,' she thought, 'there's nobody here to laugh at me if I try it on.' It was only a bikini, not a backless gown, a cute bikini something like – no, pretty similar to the one that she'd been wearing in a pretty nice little dream and just her size. She put it on and took a breath before she looked. Kayla smiled as she checked herself out, but then she began to turn to see what the back of it looked like on her and then she remembered. She stopped still. She didn't want to look anymore. She didn't really want to see what she knew was back there. Kayla looked down and her hands began to move to take the pretty bikini off. She had no business even trying it on. But then she froze again and thought about it. She looked up and saw her own eyes blazing at herself in the mirror. 'What are you doing?' she thought to herself uncharacteristically, as if there weren't there enough reasons for a woman to feel self-conscious. Kayla told herself that she still had a nice body – a panther-kind of body at thirty-three years of age. She realized that she'd been covering herself up more and more these past few months, seeking to hide what was there – and she KNEW that it was all her. What was next, a tarpaulin? Enough was enough. "Fuck this noise.' she heard the words in her mind. She'd been good enough for Josh last night, and he had no problems with her today. If they had some sort of crazy chance together, then she had to stop throwing up roadblocks, she told herself, it could be much worse than something that she'd resented and hated herself for. The woman in the next dressing room looked up and wondered a little when she heard the laugh through the wall. She was sure that the other woman had gone in there alone ... Kayla was grinning as she changed back into her clothes. Now she had the real argument to get past – convincing herself that she had a place to wear it. That took another eight minutes, but at least she was admiring the way that she looked now. If he liked it, then maybe she ought to just get used to the idea. --------------------- Josh and Jillian passed some time while waiting by telling each other how bored they were. "The paint in my room was dry faster than this," she said. Josh replied that oceans have probably dried up quicker and Jilly laughed, but then she scowled just a little. "You hate waiting too? This isn't bad yet," Jilly said with a sour face, "I had to wait while Kayla picked a bra to buy. It took forEVer," She rolled her eyes in an exaggerated fashion, "I thought I was gonna die. And I could see the toy section, too. I asked if I could just go there to wait. But Kayla wouldn't let me." Joshua suddenly remembered shopping trips like that with his own mother years before. "I hear you, Jilly," he said, "I had some of those trips to the store myself. I think it's a lot harder when you're a kid, though, and if you could see the toy section from where you were, well, ..." He smiled down at her, "I think that's just cruel and unusual punishment." They laughed together; until Joshua pointed out that one day she herself would be shopping for her own clothes, and likely taking forever to do it as well. "A guy like me, "he said with a shrug, "well I'm just doomed to die waiting." "How come it takes so long, Josh?" she asked, looking up at him, "Does it take you that long to buy stuff?" "Nope," he grinned, "almost never, unless I've got to buy a suit or something. Ladies shop differently, Jilly. For something that they're going to wear and be seen in, it's important to them to make the right choices. Me, I figure out what I want or need, pick a place where the price ought to be not bad, go there, buy it, and I'm done. Like I said, one day, you'll be taking just as long – and maybe longer to buy your clothes." "Uh-uhh," she said, shaking her head, "I'm gonna be like you, Josh. I'm gonna live my whole life in jeans. I'm gonna – " Even Jillian stopped talking when she noticed that Kayla had stepped out of the dressing room wearing her new top. "Holy –" "Yeah, " Josh said with a smile as Kayla walked over to them carrying her own top and a few other purchases, "that's why women take so long, Jilly." He had absolutely no doubt that the entire store stopped dead. They returned to the bike dealership, and Josh bought Kayla a helmet for the lessons that he's booked over the phone that morning as a surprise. Jillian flitted around the showroom happily, and stared at the almost continuous stream of machines thundering in and out of the place. Jilly asked Josh if the one that he'd left at home was like any of the ones that she saw there, and he walked her over to the same model. She had only one word and it seemed to drag out of her mouth forever. "Awesome,..." was all she said in a whisper. Jillian made her pronouncement that it was the "right one" for him, and he laughed and tousled her hair. "The right one, Jilly, is one that you have enough money to buy. That's the first thing. Then you get to choose one from those that you like at the price that fits the money that you have." Joshua noted the looks that they got and enjoyed them. He'd never been that much for being prideful, but then in his book, there'd never been as much to be proud of. He felt as if he'd rented a family for the day. They called in at the building supply store where Josh ordered some materials from a list that he'd made earlier that morning. He saw a display and stopped, thinking hard. "What are you looking at?" Kayla asked as she walked over to where he stood. Josh pointed toward Jillian. She was looking at the display as well, but said nothing. "I just had an idea," he said. "Well, since the side of your head's not made of glass," she smiled, "how about you tell me what it is?" Josh smiled a little, "Rosie has an idea what she wants to try about putting in a little pond garden," he said, "We tried it last year. She didn't want to dig out something proper for a first try like with a rubber liner, so we put in one of these, but made of vinyl. The whole 'achieving the balance' thing is hard enough to do on her ranch, but Daisy ruined everything with her nails in a heartbeat." He shrugged, "Looking at these ones here, the plastic is hard. I could put that in easily and Daisy likely couldn't wreck it when she wades in. I was thinking about getting her one of these since they're on sale, but won't be when Rosie has the thought again. Rosie wouldn't really be able to do much with it until it cools off at least some, and in the meantime, I think I know a little girl who might like a shallow pool to cool off in." "I don't know," Kayla smiled, "I think there's almost enough room for a girl and her big goofy friend to splash around in on a hot day." "I'd still have to try to keep Daisy out, though it likely won't do any good," he said. "Daisy's not goofy. Who's talking about Daisy?" Kayla laughed, "But I'm beginning to have a little daydream about sitting in something like that to read if I threaten death and destruction to the first one who splashes me." Josh turned to her, "You're serious, Kayla?" "I dunno," she said, "try me." One of the largest models was added to the order. As they walked back to the truck, Josh paused to look in the window of the sporting goods store for several minutes. Jillian couldn't see what they were looking at, so Josh picked her up. Kayla was looking through the window as well, but she re-focused to look at their reflection for a moment before including herself in the picture as well. She liked what she saw and wondered for a few seconds if any of what was there might really be possible. She didn't really want to think too hard or long over it, but without realizing it, she had begun to smile a little and Joshua noticed. "What are you smiling at?" he asked her. Jillian was oblivious and kept staring at the things in the window. "Nothing," Kayla replied. "You'd probably freak out and run if I told you anyway." Josh looked at the reflection of them all standing there and nodded, "I get it. I don't know, Kayla. Maybe I might surprise us both." As they drove off, she asked, "What were you looking at all of the bow hunting stuff for? Do you hunt?" "No," explained Josh, "I don't have any problem with it, but I don't have an interest either. I've been thinking of taking up field archery. I don't have enough frustration in my life, and Rosie's got the space. I was just thinking back there that they might have, or be able to order a bow and stuff for me. They didn't have what I want in the window, though. I'm not into all those pulleys and attachments that they put on compound bows. I want to do something while I work my back, that is, when I'm not working my back around Rosie's ranch." he joked. "Have you ever done that before?" Kayla asked him. When he shook his head, she thought a moment, and spoke up. "I used to compete in high school. I could help you get started. Of course, I'd whip your butt score-wise once I got back into the swing." She looked over at him, "Are you sure that you can handle the embarrassment of that, Conan?" Josh's answer surprised her. "Kayla, how could I be embarrassed? I'd expect that if we each made a list of the things that we're good at, yours would be longer. Where does it say that one of us has to be inferior to the other? I'd be happy just to do that with you even if you just let me flounder around, but I'd love it if you could teach me." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 10 "Besides," he said, as he checked his side mirror before he signaled for a lane change, "I've already accepted my inferior role." They smirked at each other and agreed to check out the websites of the manufacturers whose brands were represented on the window when they got back. Jillian asked if she might learn as well, so they all had something to look forward to. The motion was carried. Josh said nothing for a few minutes afterward, but the thought of what he'd seen in the window had blown him away. That was when Josh stopped to think of some realities for a moment, but he tossed them, not wanting to ruin the day. Kayla asked if they were close to a particular drugstore, and Josh headed that way when she told him the name. Once inside, she asked him to help Jillian pick out some new books to color in, and maybe a storybook or two. "I haven't unpacked her PlayStation yet for a few reasons and reading is one of them. She needs to have something to read for comprehension skills, and I need to keep you both occupied for about ten minutes, ok?" she asked. Josh agreed, and he and Jillian set out on their assigned task. After a while, Kayla approached them with a bag of her purchases, and together they went back to the now very-interested clerk at the register to pay for the books. Joshua was puzzled by the look that they got from the clerk, and completely mystified when Kayla answered the look with a nod at her earlier purchase as she put her hand on Jillian's shoulder, and said to the clerk. "I've been thinking of winding down on these soon." She indicated the bag with her earlier purchases again. "I think we'll want to try and complete the set." She gave Jillian a slight hug as the clerk smiled widely. Jillian was oblivious to the conversation, as she tried successfully to get Josh to buy her a bit of candy. The clerk smiled and nodded as they walked away, but dove for the phone after the door closed behind them. Josh happily noted that wherever they walked, both Jillian and Kayla wanted to hold his hands. It was a great feeling. It felt like an instant family, and he suddenly felt even more of a desire for this one. In the truck on the way to the cantina, Josh asked what the drugstore thing had all been about. Kayla laughed. "I hope you don't mind, but I'll explain everything to you later," she said with a roll of her eyes toward Jillian. Walking into the cantina, they found Rose at a large table with Consuela Smith, her children, and Margarita with her brood. Introductions were quickly made, and Kayla and Jillian were soon absorbed into the group. Before very long, Jilly had made herself a pack of new friends, and Kayla looked as comfortable with Consuela and Margarita as though she'd grown up there and known them forever. Josh took the seat that Margarita pointed out to him on the opposite side of the table across from Kayla and wondered about his seating for a moment, but then forgot as he looked around. Consuela and Margarita were absolutely identical twins. They even had their hair cut exactly the same way and about the only visible differences were in the way that they dressed. Margarita went for what looked good, was fashionable, and often, she even went all the way into very trendy. But that wasn't Consuela at all. No way, not even a little. Consuela was into kitsch, and she loved to go for the vamp as often as not. Margarita was dressed well and comfortably. Consuela was comfortable deep into slinky and she made absolutely no bones about it. Kayla thought they were both amazing, and just like her sister, Consuela just hit it off with Kayla from the start. Kayla had absolutely no choice in it. Josh was forgotten as the women chatted. He supposed that they were addressing all of the lofty issues that women have always had to talk to one another about, things that lay outside the purview of mere males. He didn't mind. He loved just to watch the women in his life have a good time. He noticed a few glances and tilted heads here and there around the room, but couldn't have cared less. Bart Smith came in with his sister and her husband and sat down next to Josh. "We're here to rescue ya, buddy." He joked. Josh laughed, "And your lovely wife there had absolutely nothing to do with your being here at this time either, I suppose. Let's get a beer." Jose joined them. At one point, two women about Rose's age stopped by the table, and said hello to her. Josh saw that Rosie had given Kayla a bit of a significant glance, and Kayla smiled to Josh for a long moment as they had approached. Rosie made the required introductions, but Joshua noticed that she had neglected to specify that Jillian was Kayla's niece, only that Jillian was Rosie's great niece. It didn't matter to him, but he picked up on it just the same. The women left, and from where he was sitting, their conversation was animated as they walked away down the street. Now and then, a woman or two would filter in, to be welcomed by Margarita and her sister and Kayla would be introduced. Vacant chairs and tables were pulled over when the need arose, and eventually, their group took up almost all of the cantina but the booths. When they had a minute in the conversation, Margarita leaned over to Kayla and indicated Josh with her eyes. "So?" she smiled. "Have you gotten anywhere with Frosty yet?" Kayla blinked at her. Margarita laughed and hugged her as she said, "Oh come on, dish, Kayla!" Kayla smiled and was evasive. She didn't want to say anything that might embarrass him, and didn't know if Josh would have any difficulty with it anyway. She didn't think so, but wanted to play it safe. Besides, it had all been so quick; she still kept looking at him to see if he really was still there. Margarita wasn't letting go however. She sensed something. She thought that they looked to be well on the way to becoming an item, if they weren't already there. "Come on girl," she pumped gently, "if you won't say it, you know we'll just ask Josh. We do have some small power over him, you know. We've known him longer than Rosie!" Kayla laughed and told her to go ahead. She had wanted to watch his response anyway, though she didn't say it out loud. Margarita called to her sister who had wandered around to the other side of the table. "'Suela!" Consuela looked over and Margarita nodded, pointing at Kayla. "She won't give. Do it." Consuela nodded back with a slow smile at them both and she pushed her chair back as she got to her feet. Margarita took a sip of her beer and smiled a little knowingly at Kayla. She nodded once in her twin's direction, "You want to know something in this town and there's a man involved in any way, then you need to get my sister on it." She threw her head back a little and laughed, "You just watch this, right here." Consuela smiled mischievously as she stood up and strutted her blazing red platform spike heels over to stick her head right into the men's conversation. She said to Bart sweetly, "I'm so sorry Baby, but would you please pardon me? The Collective needs to know something. I'm sure you understand." Her husband chuckled at Josh. "Tough break bud, you're toast," Bart laughed, "I don't know what she's after here, but once she thinks she's caught a scent, there's no going back. She's gonna start quoting King Arthur or some shit in a minute." Consuela kissed her husband's cheek in a definite – and definitely hungry sort of way, both meaning it sincerely and for the appearance of the gesture for a long moment. When she pulled away, Bart could only grin and shake his head, "Whoa..." Then Consuela stood and strutted slowly all the way around Josh's chair and without an apparent thought to her outfit or to anything else, she poured herself slowly onto Josh's lap. Joshua's eyebrows rose as he laughed, asking Bart what had happened to his rescue. Bart shrugged, smiling. Consuela draped her arms around Joshua's neck, and a hush fell over the group as she began the interrogation. "Josh honey," she cooed, "Is there any truth to the evil, wicked, and nasty rumor going around that you might have beaten down the door of my new friend Kayla's bower and shall we say, uh, ...despoiled her virtue, you fine, ...strong, ...handsome, ...frostbitten, and maddeningly unattainable Viking?" Kayla was laughing. She couldn't believe this. Margarita told her, "My sister's a hopeless romantic. She has every episode of Hercules AND Xena. She lives for this stuff! Josh was the one who introduced her to Bart and that was like a fast-forward fairy tale. I think they still feed each other freakin' grapes." Bart looked as though he was talking to his beer, but he made sure that Josh could hear him. "Man," he said, "if that's how she's just starting out - right out of the gate, you'd better just take the bull by the tail and face the situation." He chuckled, "I dunno why, but I'll tell you right now, ..." He kept facing his beer, but Joshua noted that Bart's eyebrow was raised on the near side and Bart was really looking at him. "You got less chance than Custer." The expectant hush deepened as Consuela kissed Josh's cheek just in front of his ear, licked the rim of his ear lightly, and said, "You know, if you deny it, I'll just spread the word that it's still open season on you, and that you're still fair game, Honey." She pouted and almost groaned in a voice dripping with smoky sensuality, "It's really not the way I want to play this, but you'll leave me no choice, Josh, and I've got to know now. You understand, don't you, Honey?" She exaggerated her weary sigh and continued sadly, "And then poor Rita and I will just have to go back to defending your honor, and Baby? We're getting SO tired of ALWAYS having to fight SO hard to protect your fine and delectable-looking male ass." She stopped to look at her long painted nails for a moment as she considered. "You know what kind of mess we have to clean up around here every Sunday morning after you've been here." She looked to the ceiling for a moment as her face showed boredom with her feigned tasks. She pursed her blood-red lips and blew out for a second to indicate the tedium of the role that she'd mentioned. Looking at Josh once more, she began to count off her fingers as though she was working from a long list by heart. "Broken bottles, ..." "Broken tables, ..." "Broken spears, ..." "Splintered shields, ..." "Sometimes broken and splintered shieldMAIDENS..." To Joshua's amazement, there was a rather large cheer at that. He was a little embarrassed, but he enjoyed the huge laugh that Consuela had gotten, but she wasn't done yet. "The carnage is unreal, Honey. You think it's easy for the two of us to keep the skanks of this town off your sweet ass every time you decide to come in here? Huh! It's hard work, Josh, and not to make a fuss or anything, but Baby, the pay sucks. I just hate it when I have to chip my glossy nails in a brawl over you. I mean we love you but come ON, Josh!" Giggles rose from the crowd and Consuela worked it so well. She laid her cheek against his and grinned wickedly as she began to tighten the noose. "So what's the word, Baby? I've got to tell you, you two look like it's on, but I need to hear it from your own rugged, delicious and sexy lips." She wiggled her bottom and kissed his cheek again. "Come on Honey," she coaxed. "I can wait all night. Just ask my husband." There was laughter all around until Consuela stopped it. "Hey!" she said, and then she shifted gears down low so smoothly, "Don't laugh, uh-uh," she scolded as she waved her index finger back and forth, "He might have to wait a little too now and then, but my Bart always gets it done like nobody else ever could." She blew a kiss at her husband before looking at Josh expectantly. "Come on, Frosty, Say it." Josh had turned bright red. He didn't know what to say. He looked at Kayla. She was laughing and wiping tears from her cheek. She shrugged helplessly and turned up her palms. Josh had an idea and whispered in Consuela's ear for a full minute. She raised her eyebrows, and looked shocked, "Really?" Then she whispered quietly to him alone. "She's so beautiful, Josh. 'Rita told me on Saturday after you guys left, and she couldn't shut up about her for over an hour. We've been hoping you guys would come to your senses ever since." Then she kissed him softly, meaning every bit of it. Consuela turned and slipped off Josh. She adjusted her dress before she climbed onto her husband's lap. She smiled and kissed him, took his beer, and had a slow sip to drag the moment out dramatically. Margarita couldn't stand it. "SUELA! Dammit, for God's sake, will you just TELL us already!" Consuela considered the bottle in her hand with raised eyebrows for a moment. "I don't know why we never thought of it." She smiled a little. "It's so elegantly simple." She nodded to herself, "It's perfect." Looking up, she went on, "It seems our friend Kayla the warrior-maiden here drew down on him with a six-gun, and he came across." Holding the bottle aloft, she smirked as she said quietly, "The Viking is vanquished." The women cheered. Consuela grinned and laid her hand on Kayla's for a moment, "You know I'm just having fun, but damn, girl ... I've gotta hand it to you, mighty Kayla." The cry was echoed by all of the women in a toast. Kayla found herself laughing so hard that she couldn't possibly have been embarrassed. After a few minutes, Consuela came over, took Kayla's hand and leaned in close. "Congratulations! That was all in fun, and I hope you didn't mind me too much." Kayla was still laughing, "Hell no, Consuela, Josh may never be the same, but I loved it." "Good," Consuela nodded, "Now I'm only mostly kidding, but rumors fly faster than the word of God in this town. Until now, you were a whisper, a disturbing uncertainty. By sundown, you'll be a legend. So really now, come on, is it on with you guys or not? Josh told me to tell it that way, but it sounds to me like he's hooked." Kayla nodded, "I've never been in a relationship like this one's starting out to be, but yeah, we're trying it out." Consuela kissed Kayla's cheek. "We all love Joshua and Rita and I have a new friend now. Welcome to the Collective." Kayla wondered what that meant, but Consuela was already grinning, "Oh, you'll find out. We're like the female version of the Musketeers, but we dress better and there's girly drinks." Margarita echoed the sentiment, "Uh-huh, way more fun, too, plus we've got Consuela, the Latina version of Jessica Rabbit." She grinned and nodded toward Joshua. "He looks happier now than we've ever seen him before, so whatever you're doing, don't you dare stop." Her sister nodded, "I still can't believe it. Trust us, we know he's hard to get close to – he moves way too fast. I'd have thought that you'd need to at least wound him with the pistol to slow him down first. You know, a shot in the leg and you could have your way with him." Kayla looked from them to Josh and back to their faces, "I don't know. The way that he and I are both wired, it's a miracle that we didn't kill each other, and I'm only kidding a little. But who knows, really? We don't know a thing about how we're going to work this, but so far it's ok, though logically, it's just nuts. I just know that we seem to love being together, like both of us hate painting, but we had a blast when we did it together. This is either downright stupid, or it's perfect. It's just way too soon to tell." The twins smiled and Consuela spoke up, "Let me tell you something about Josh. If you've got him, he's yours. That's Josh. He looks more alive now, so it can't be a bad thing. Just take care of him, and he'll do the rest. By the way, I was kidding about being able to wait all night you know. Bart's still my weakness and I make sure he knows it too. I'm doing well if I can wait 20 minutes. And we've been together 7 years. Our courtship lasted, what 'Rita? One night?" Margarita laughed, "What the hell are you talking about? I'm counting from the time you met him until when you left here together. That was your courtship – 3 hours, tops. Bart's not your weakness. He's your addiction. You wanted romance on a primal level – and you got a romantic freight train!" Consuela smiled at them as she waggled her eyebrows, "Yeah, but what a way to go!" They all laughed. The food that Margarita and her sister had put together for everyone arrived from the kitchen, and they all set to it. The girls would occasionally remember someone that Kayla just had to meet, and the cell phones would appear. They stayed all afternoon as people of their acquaintance came and went. Some stayed. The kids were surprisingly well behaved, and there were only minor upsets now and again. By 7:30 it was time to leave. On the way back, Jillian was tired, but happy. Kayla just held Josh's hand, letting go when necessary, and smiling when he reached for it again right afterward. Back home, Jillian reanimated when Daisy came out of her pen, and the adults sat down for coffee and tea. Kayla happily pulled out the napkins where she'd written all of her new contact numbers, and began to organize them. "I've met so many people because of you today, Aunt Rose. First Consuela, and then the others who dropped by. You know what? I didn't feel too bad about my tattoos today either. I picked this top because it would show just a bit of it. I was feeling pretty brave in town, at least for me. Almost all of the women asked me about it, though I didn't tell them everything, and other than the two older ladies, nobody seemed to mind it, really. Thanks so much." Rose smiled and said that it hadn't been too difficult, all she'd really had to do was to suggest the idea to Joshua that morning before his run, and he had done the rest with a call to Margarita at her home. Kayla was shocked. "You did that?" Josh studied his cup shyly and said that Rosie's idea had started it. Neither of them wanted Kayla and Jillian to be stuck in the weeds with no friends. They'd felt that she needed to develop a network of friends to plug into, as well as begin to be a part of the local scene. Kayla was touched. Aside from Marcia, she hadn't had a real friend since high school. "Besides," Josh grumbled, "you're bound to get tired of talking to me sooner or later. Hey, what went on there back in the drugstore? You never told me." Rose excused herself to make herself another tea. "I've already heard about this, I think." she said. Kayla laughed as she put her bag of purchases on the table. "I hope you don't get mad at me, but with what you and Aunt Rose have been telling me about the way this town gossips, and what she said this morning about the phone lines buzzing, I thought I might like to sort of publicly make a statement, if you know what I mean. I made a call to my doctor in Phoenix, and had him fax a prescription to the store here. That's why I needed to go there. My aunt warned me about the tongue on that girl at the counter..." She looked a bit shy, and glancing at Josh, she began to pull things out of the bag. The first item was her prescription for birth control pills. Josh began to smile shyly as well. By the time she had retrieved all of the items but one, he was laughing with tears in his eyes. There were five boxes of condoms on the table. "Well, they didn't have the industrial size box, "she said with a shrug. "Now that I think of it, there is kind of an advantage to having a bunch of these." She smiled a little and affected a very nasal airheaded young girl voice as she touched the boxes with her fingertip one by one, "I'll keep one in my purse, and one in my nightstand, and you can keep one near your bed, and another in your truck, and, ..." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 10 "That's what you meant by 'completing the set'?" he laughed. "You know, "he said softly, "I may not necessarily approve of your way of making introductions there, Six-gun Sally, but I've got to admit I kind of like the way that you think." Kayla reminded him that he had said something about working his back. Josh looked at Kayla's prescription. "These take a few weeks to get underway on, right? Kayla, ..." "Hey," she said, reading his thought, "I'm not being foolish with either the use of these or what that delay might mean, Joshua. I know that we've got one big-assed set of decisions to make." She sighed, and kissed him for a moment. "I guess that I'm banking on us working something out in the long term, that's all. Maybe we're just being stupid, but I've been about everywhere else that you can be on the map. All I've gotten out of it has been a lot of hurt and a sore ass from kicking myself." "Ok," Joshua said, pretending to cross off a line in an imaginary notebook, "From what I've got here, stupid is about all that's left, Kayla. I've tried careful and cautious and all that one gets you is alone with no one to hold onto you at night." He nodded, the humor leaving his face, "This doesn't make a lot of sense to me either, but so far, this seems to be working for us, and I know that I'm a lot happier for just the last few days and you guys seem to be as well. We've got a couple more weeks to decide a lot of things, so if you're still in...." "Motion seconded and carried, " Kayla smiled a little as she put everything away. Joshua stood up and she put her arm around his waist. "Come on, Handsome, I've got to get Jilly into her bath and you can read to her after. She's been bugging me to ask you to anyway." "Are you, uh, trying to make this sound like endless everyday drudgery, or something?" Joshua looked at her with a little suspicion. "Not really," she said, "I guess that I'm trying to acclimatize you very carefully, a little at a time. You never know, my luck might just hold, and then it would all just be a huge shock to your system without this first. I don't want you to suddenly get the full view then. What good would that do?" Kayla led him on this way as they walked slowly to the bunkhouse. "Besides," she said, "from everything that I've ever read, the acquisition of a hopeful boyfriend by a single parent woman is something like buying a goldfish. They may not be very bright, but you can't just fill up the bowl with tap water and empty them out of the bag into it. You've gotta let them float around in the bag for a while. That way, they'll get to thinking that the little castle looks pretty nice compared to the little floating bag that they're in. I read that it's the same with a man. You've got short memories just like goldfish, apparently." "You play it right," she nodded, "and soon they're swimming around, happy and marveling at the castle every lap around the bowl." "I dunno," he said cautiously, "I might want a plant, and one of those bubble-stone things." She sighed wearily, "Ok, I guess I can do that." "And Dayglo gravel, too," he said seriously. "What?" she stopped and turned to stare at him, "there's no such thing." "Yes there is," Josh said adamantly, "I've seen pictures." Kayla rolled her eyes, "Fine, but I'm in charge of decorating the bowl, What else?" "Steak-flavored goldfish flakes." She began to laugh, "You're so full of shit." "Yeah," he said, "after I eat the flakes." Kayla pulled herself to him to kiss him. She kept her arms around him, but she looked up and shook her head. "What I've been doing here is raising the possibility of one kind of outcome – as unlikely as anything else, the way that my life goes, anyway. But I have a little girl to think about and not just me, so I guess that I sort of can't help it. I'm making all of these allusions and scary hints and I know you're not stupid, Josh." She smiled, "You're not afraid at all, are you, of anything that I've said?" He sighed, "No, I get it," he said, "You're trying to bait me into the horse collar with a carrot." She shook her head. "No, I was gonna use an apple to bait you," she said with a grin, "you're the one with the carrot. Don't they teach you this stuff where you come from?" "Not in Grade Three," he said, "or in Grade Four, either, none of the times that I was in them. What was the apple thing about? You're just trying to get out of the Dayglo gravel now. He kissed her and they stood for a long minute together before she felt his smile beginning. "What is it now?" she asked. Josh smirked, "You had your eyes closed the whole time." "Yeah," Kayla nodded," so?" "So I think I'm growing on you, that's all. You're not blinking anywhere near as often." She ran her hand along his pectoral muscle for a second, "What are these scars from?" "Razor wire," he said, "it's like barbed wire, but, ... " He shrugged, "it comes in long rolls. You stretch it out. Then you're not supposed to go near it, but I thought I saw something bright and shiny." Kayla kissed him again and took his hand to lead him onto the low porch of the bunkhouse, "I was only kidding about that goldfish thing," she said. "Look!" he said with a bright expression, "A castle!" "Shut up," she laughed. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 11 The more that I write of this, the more I get the feeling that the relative isolation of the ranch sort of makes the thing feel like a more old-fashioned sort of romance, but at the speed that this pair seem to set for themselves. It's a little odd to me, that's all. O_o ----------- They both wondered a little just how this was going to work between them. Kayla was cognizant that the whole domestic experience was not the way that a single, recently ex-soldier might have spent his evenings. At the same time, Joshua wondered about the very same thing from the opposite side. He didn't want to appear to be interested only in Kayla, since he also felt a lot for the child that came with this relationship - and he really wanted to know how to be the male figure to Jillian that Rosie had spoken of. In the meantime, Kayla and Rose had an invitation, and Kayla needed some advice. "I just don't know, Aunt Rose. If we go, it means that Josh would have to baby-sit Jilly. They haven't known each other for very long - heck, neither of us has." Rose rolled her eyes at her niece, "And I suppose that you're worried that he'll grow fur and fangs three minutes after we leave? Look Kayla, I hear the concern in your voice and I also know that you're not terribly worried, other than whether he's up to it. I get that. But you're forgetting that I've known him for a long time. The choice is yours, but if it were me, I wouldn't think on it much. I wouldn't ask him." Kayla looked at her aunt, her eyebrows rising. "You wouldn't?" "Nope," Rosie said with a shrug, "I'd just tell him that he's baby-sitting Jillian and that none of my houseplants had better get knocked over, either." ----------- Josh had never experienced the drama and the give and take that accompanied putting children to bed sometimes. He'd never thought about it before. He thought that you just told them to go to bed, and they went, something like his own childhood. Jillian was a very well-mannered and obedient little thing, but she was also bright, fun-loving, and talkative. She referred to Josh as the "new guy" and the term caused both of the adults to crank their heads around toward her the first time. Jillian looked at them both a little shyly and she said that she and Kayla were the "new girls" at Rosie's farm and in town and it would feel like that for her at school. But between them here, Josh was the new one. "I can't call him the new kid, can I?" As the "new guy", he was being spared a lot. He would have been willing to help if asked, but he had no idea what had to be done. There was the whole bath thing, which he was very thankful wasn't within his jurisdiction until for the first time in her life, Daisy suddenly felt an intense desire to reverse her normal motivation, and try to get into a bathtub since her buddy Jillian was obviously enjoying it. Kayla called to him for help, and when he arrived, Daisy had her forelegs in the tub, with Kayla straining mightily to keep the rest of her out. Jillian thought Daisy had a great idea, and was laughing and squealing, until Josh came around the corner, and then the squeals turned to panicked shrieks. Josh grabbed Daisy's collar and heaved her back while Kayla tried to talk Jillian down from the ceiling. He quickly asked Kayla if there was a spare towel, and was given with the same one that he'd used to cool her off the other day. Toweling Daisy's legs off, he muscled her out of the room and closed the door behind them. Jillian was very upset, and Josh felt badly for her. He wondered how he could reassure her, and decided that he probably couldn't. Kayla remembered that they'd lost Jillian's toothbrush somehow between Rose's house and the bunkhouse and mentioned it through the door as she continued to try to calm Jillian. Josh said that he had a new unopened one, and trotted to get it from the loft. As he left the bunkhouse, Rose asked him from the porch if anything was wrong. Josh replied, "Other than some damage at the upper range of my hearing, nothing's wrong that Wonder Woman in there can't handle. Daisy tried to get into the tub with Jilly. Kayla called me in to stop Daisy, and Jilly lost her mind." Rose laughed and said, "Glad I missed it then." When Josh returned, the bathroom door was open again and they waited expectantly for him, Jillian was in pajamas now and looking at him in a very wounded way. He dropped to one knee and presented the new toothbrush as though he was a knight, and it was his sword as he offered it to Jillian. "Here you are, Milady." Jillian took it after a second. She regarded both of them with suspicion, until he said. "Jilly, it's still in the wrapper from the store. It doesn't have my germs on it yet. I didn't get a chance to put any on it. Sheesh! It's yours now, ok?." Kayla looked as though she was just this side of laughter. "Fine." Jillian said, stonily. He returned to his magazine until Jillian came out twenty minutes later as though nothing had happened and asked him if he would like to read her new book to her. When he said yes, Jillian got up and she sat beside him on the couch. He read it to her as she leaned against him. She interrupted him for clarification on a couple of points, before asking him to put his arm around her. Josh glanced quickly at Kayla, and her nod spoke volumes. After the story, Jillian pronounced to Kayla that Josh was "a good reader", and asked him to tuck her into bed. Once she was in her bed, she hugged him, and asked for a kiss. As he was about to leave the room, Jillian asked him if he "saw anything". He paused as he turned and thought for a second. "Yes, I saw lots of things. I saw Daisy, the tub, the water, and some of it was in the air because you were freaking out. I saw bubbles, lots of bubbles, and more bath toys than I've ever seen in my life." He paused, looking uncertain. Jillian asked in a shaky voice, "Did you see... me?" Josh stated, "Well, no. I would have seen you; I was even looking for you to make sure that you weren't drowning, you know, because that's more important than trying to see your little pink butt." He drew an uncertain breath, "But there was this thing." "What do you mean 'thing'?" she asked, "What kind of thing?" Joshua shuddered visibly. "A big thing, it was in the way and I couldn't see around it. It was scary, I have to tell you. It was HUGE, and dark." Jillian was fascinated, "What was it?" Josh shrugged, "I dunno, but these horrible sounds were coming out of it, I thought my ears were going to bleed for sure!" Jillian couldn't help herself and giggled a little as he went on, "I've never been so scared of anything in my whole life!" he told her, his eyes wide. Jillian heard her aunt chuckle and smiled at her a little. Kayla stopped giggling and interjected dryly, "Uh, Jilly, that would have been your open mouth screaming the house down. It was probably open so wide, that Josh couldn't see you behind it." She was rolling her eyes. "AND don't do it again please, Josh can only take so much." "Josh?" Jillian asked, "Thanks for not looking. Good night. I love you." Joshua was more than a little astounded, but he didn't show much more than a warm smile as he said, "I love you too, Peaches. Good night, sweetheart. You sleep well." Rose met them at the front door. "I'll take over for a while." They thanked her, and Kayla said that they were "going for a walk or something". Rose chuckled, "Sure." As they walked away, Kayla said with a knowing smirk, "You saw everything, didn't you?" "Yup." he sighed sadly. "Peripheral vision?" she asked. "It's a curse sometimes" he groaned while rubbing his eyes with his fingers. Kayla smirked, "There was no way that you couldn't have seen her, and she knows that because we talked while you were getting the toothbrush. I told her that the world wouldn't end just because you had seen her tush for a second while you were getting Daisy out of there. I told Jilly that it was really a bad idea for Daisy to get into the tub with her and all of the reasons why, too. But it was important to her to ask anyway, and you reassured her. That's really what she was asking for, and you handled it perfectly. Have you ever considered fatherhood?" Kayla asked. "How do you mean?" asked Josh. Kayla spoke with some caution, "Well, I think you and I are getting kind of uh, involved, and I guess I want to make sure that you know what it is that you're getting into here with me. I'm part of a package deal." She watched his face carefully, and Josh smiled at her and slipped his arm around her shoulder. "I think you're the one looking for some reassurance now, and yes, I've considered that. We need to discuss a ton of things about all of our futures and I don't have ready answers for a lot of those things. But what you're asking is not in question as far as I'm concerned. I've fallen in love with you, but you didn't get to my heart first, 'mighty Kayla'. Jilly beat you to it. She had a lock on me the first night when I found her lost in the shed and picked her up. I've been getting little peeks at something that I've never known before the last few days, and while I know that there's a lot more to it than I've seen, I've decided that I like the idea a lot." He hugged her as they walked and kissed her head. He thought that he could feel her exhalation of relief, but he said nothing about it. "I'd guess that 'Bath Time' must seem like a daunting thing to a guy like you in a situation like this," she said, "and really, if there hadn't been that bit of excitement, there's not much to it and you don't have any involvement anyway. Around here," Kayla smirked, "I'd love to just be able to hose the dust off her and send her off to bed. It's not a huge deal like bathing a toddler, since she's not really little anymore. She has her bath, and I hang around and we just talk. Then she's into her jammies, we read a bit and that's it. I guess Daisy felt that she had to add a whole other dimension to things, that's all. We are going to have ourselves a talk about things, though," Kayla said, "I usually save things like that for our Movie Nights. I guess that we'd better have one soon, her and I." He looked at her, "Movie Nights?" "Yeah," she nodded, "It's just something that we came up with between us. We've always loved each other to bits forever, but with her parents gone suddenly, we were faced with a lot of strangeness, if you can imagine it, and we were both so upset over everything. I needed to find a way to connect with her a lot better and I wanted to do it quickly, so I just used something familiar that we'd done whenever she'd stayed with me before, and it's just evolved since then. We go to rent a movie together, have dinner, our baths, make popcorn, watch the movie and talk." Kayla looked at Joshua and laughed, "It's pure girl time, Josh, you'd feel your poor male soul slipping away from you in agony and boredom inside of about six minutes, but those silly movies and bowls of popcorn helped us bond. We couldn't stay as a kid and her aunt, she was too little, and so we're more like a kid and her mom. That's how we did it. We could have kept the aunt-kid thing if it had happened when Jilly was a teenager, but she was only four and a half. We both know that I'm not her mom, but for us, it works if we're somewhere between those two relationships. I've already made my adjustment, though. I consider her to be my daughter, plain and simple." They stepped into the shed, and Josh closed the doors. Kayla asked him if he could teach her how to see in the dark. "Ok," he began, "you'll need to practice afterward, every chance you get, but you will improve your night vision to some variable degree." he said. "The trick is not to try to see things, but to give them a chance to let themselves be seen by you. It's a more passive process. Think of it that way, and it will be easier. First off, recognize that the way that you look at things in the light, by looking directly at them, will work against you in the dark. The center of your field of vision is not as useful to you here. Don't try to see things, just be aware of the things that you see. You can see a million things at once peripherally. You have to learn to accept the information from that source. Does that make any sense?" "Yes, but it's weird" admitted Kayla. "You'll get used to it." Josh said, adding, "You should already be getting some information by now. Look at something here that you can see, like that handrail for the stairs. Can you see it by looking at it directly?" she nodded. "Ok then," he said, "Don't move your eyes, but notice that the rail above and below where you are looking is actually brighter. That's the dull spot in your night vision that contains the best receptors for daytime sight. You need to see around that. Also, don't shift the focal point as much as you do in the light. Passive, right? So now you lead us up the stairs, as slow as you need to go. Also remember that there are things that ought to be here, so make a mental checklist so that you're expecting to find them, such as Sam's bike, and you'll improve your chances of success." They set off, and Kayla was surprised how much she could actually see by the very dim light of the night sky through the windows. "How come I couldn't do this before?" she asked. "You could do it before", he said. "We're all equipped for it, we just don't need it much anymore the way that most of us live, so we're forgetting what we once knew instinctively." he said as they reached the loft. He went for the light switch, but she told him not to. She reached into the pocket of her jeans and pulled out a few of the condoms that she'd bought. Joshua looked at her and watched as she held the packets in her hand and considered them for a moment before looking over at him with a very soft grin that made him feel almost like a king. It wasn't the prospect of the evening that he faced, Joshua just felt very fortunate to know Kayla. He could feel it every time that she smiled at him. She slapped the packets down on the table and looked at him as she leaned forward a little. "There," she said, "just so you know what we're going to be doing tonight, Joshua, just so you know how I feel about you now." She chuckled a little as she pointed to them, "There's my hope, my offering, your new crazy woman's desire, and my god-damned need for you all at the same time. So tell me," she smirked, with a lot of those feelings in plain view to him, "are ya gonna come across, or do I need to get –" He shook his head, and Kayla could see the very same emotions in his own eyes. "You won't need a gun," he smiled. "Well that sure is a relief," she laughed, "But that wasn't what I was going to say. I was about to ask if I had to get down on my knees and beg." "Only if you want to," he smiled with that soft little boy's smile that made her loins ache now and then, "and maybe later." "What have you got to drink up here?" she asked. Josh shrugged, "Water, milk, beer, a couple of those spritzy wine drinks, ..." "Bingo!" she smiled, "Please get them. I've brought a tea candle," she said, looking around the loft in the dim light that filtered in through the dirty windows. "If I light it and put it there on the counter by the kitchen sink, we ought to be able to see well enough way over here." "I think that Aunt Rose could very well be watching right now for all I know, and I don't think I'd put it past her, so I want to put it over there. We ought to be able to see well by the glow, but she won't. I wanted to do it this way because tonight. I want you to be able to see me better. I've come a long way because of you, and I'm proud of myself for it," she smiled at him. Josh brought the drinks to the table while Kayla lit the candle. "Don't sit down just yet," she said as she turned back to him, "Take your clothes off and then sit. With the candle over here, I'm pretty sure that the wall casts that part in dark shadow, but I need to see to make sure. " She rolled her eyes, "I swear I'm gonna buy a porno movie or two to keep my aunt busy, and then I'm going to smear Vaseline all over the lenses of her binoculars while she's busy watching the movie." Joshua was amazed at the way that Kayla's clothes came off on her way over. Even her pants seemed to come off in a flash, pretty much. She carefully sat herself down on his lap and slowly pulled his head to her breast. "I keep finding more things about you that surprise me," she said as she kissed the top of his head, "little things that I fall in love with mostly, like the way that you smile just a tiny bit crookedly, and when you do, there's a really small little dimple that I look for on your cheek. It's not there every time, and that makes me look hard for it. I also like to watch everything in your arm move when you do something with your hands." They sat talking and sipping the drinks for a little while. The loft was still very warm from the heat of the day, and it caused them to sweat a little. Josh apologized for it, but Kayla shook her head and whispered into his ear, "I never used to feel this way, but now I just love it when we're sticky like this and we're alone together." She licked his ear and then lowered her head all the way down to his shoulder to softly bite his flesh before she licked and tasted him. "I don't mind the heat and I never really did here when I was a kid. I only wanted climate control and air conditioning in Phoenix once I was grown up." He heard her breath in his ear as she licked her way slowly up the side of his throat, "As nice and civilized as that is," she sighed, "I think it would take something away from it when we do this. I kind of figured that out last night. When we're together and against each other, it makes being with you so much better for me, Josh. When I'm with you just like this, a little sweat just makes it hotter in such a nice way." Kayla felt more of the heat in his breath as it came to her against her skin. It made her feel so alive and a rather primal, the way that he did that, and she had a sudden thought, wondering about the men in her past. She knew that what had been missing had been her fault, every bit as much as the failing had been theirs. There's attraction and then there's need, she decided. She'd just never known the difference before and she'd never been so drawn to any male before Josh. Add some hungering lust toward a man who says very little about his hunger, but shows his own need clearly in his eyes, ... Josh held her as he kissed and hungrily went after her nipples. He stopped suddenly and she watched those eyes lift toward her own again. He opened his mouth to release her hot flesh with a very soft pop and they looked at each other. Kayla groaned very softly at what she saw. When he did this, he looked so much like a quiet but hungry beast to her. At the same time, Kayla felt something like a smaller animal who wanted nothing more than to throw herself directly into the teeth of his craving, needing to feel his predation as much as he needed to give in to his longing for her. What Joshua saw twisted his heart every time. Her eyes seemed to glow so softly with that jade light that he so loved to want float toward. Those eyes looked at him with such uncertainty in one way, hesitant and hopeful as the light came to him from under those long bangs, as though she was peeking at him from some under some dense foliage. Her mouth was open a little as she breathed and he knew that he could only look at her for so long when she was looking back at him like this. If he didn't act within the very limited and well-defined period of time that his heart allowed him for moments such as this with her, well, ... A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 11 He felt as though he'd be lost again, only this time, there would never be a reprieve and he'd wander lost forever. The prospect was worse than death to him in a very real sense. He knew then just how he needed her. Their eyes remained locked as he eased her backwards. His hot tongue began to skate and slither upwards in long licks up her breastbone between her mounds. She couldn't help the sighs that escaped her. "God, I need to taste your skin," he hissed, "I can't get enough." Kayla wanted to laugh a little for the joy that she felt, but her breath was stolen from her when he slid his tongue under one breast to lick her sweat. She squirmed a little unconsciously from feeling his manhood pressing against her and Kayla gasped loudly once but it turned to soft whimpers shortly after as she lifted his chin and let him take her mouth. For long minutes, the only sound was their breathing as they inhaled and exhaled past each other's cheeks. Neither of them was normally very big on such wetness as they kissed, but it just wasn't important enough to think about just then and once in a while a drop of it would fall barely noticed between them. "Josh," she sobbed in her want of him, "I really need you now." She just remembered to grab one of the packets on the table. As they pulled apart and she stood up, she reached for his hand so that she could pull him toward his bed and he got up to follow. But they couldn't even get there. They were passing the single short wall that defined one side of his bathroom when Kayla couldn't help it anymore and she stopped for just a few more of his kisses. He gave in to what he felt a little later and began to kiss her throat. Joshua's bed was only another fifteen feet or so away, but, ... That was as far as they got. With their bodies pressed together, Kayla slid down him slowly as she held herself close to him, licking and tasting his skin, sucking the little of it that she could get into her mouth, nipping and biting him lightly. That lasted until she got to his pectoral muscles. Even in repose as he stood before her, they weren't all soft. Just under the skin, they were firm, another difference that she'd never known in a man before. Kayla had a thought and wanted to chuckle at herself. She hoped that something such as this would never end, but in any event, ... Accountants were now off her list. She ran her tongue along the topmost of his long scars, wanting to stop for a moment to tell him that it was alright, that she loved these parts of him for what they were, yet happy that this was a deep as his hurts had gone. She pulled him even closer as she thought that he'd been telling her much the same thing about the tattoos that she'd never wanted and had hated for so long. Then she was below them, pulling what she could of the more natural ridges of his abdominal muscles between her teeth as she nipped and sucked. She suddenly wanted to stop so that she could mimic the way that he'd looked up at her, but she found that she couldn't. She went higher to begin again. She was stuck where she was for a long minute as she licked the sweat from his chest wherever she felt that some of it might be in the shadows there. In this warm place and up this close to him, Kayla just gave in to the same addiction that he craved as well. He tasted so good to her that it helped her to get past the thought that she was making love to the maple leaf tattoo on his chest most often, but then her eye caught sight of his nipple and she was on it in a flash, loving the way that she could make him gasp and how his chest swelled out when he did. She realized that she was wet enough to leak down her leg in another minute, but she didn't care at all anymore as she slowly squatted in front of Joshua and held onto his thighs so that she'd stay stable. She lifted his erection higher so that she could press her face against him and lick his balls gently. She made one attempt at it, but realized that sucking one of his testicles into her mouth was something that she'd have preferred to do for him closer to the outset of this than where they were in this now. She licked her way higher and began to work him. Kayla knew that he could see it as she drooled some saliva onto her palm and used that on his shaft to while she took the head into her mouth and groaned. A minute of this was all that either of them could stand, so she pressed the packet with the condom into his hand and stood up while he struggled to open it. "The bed," he said uncertainly. "Oh God, I don't care," she hissed at him. She looked around and saw the counter. She backed against it and put her palms on the surface and in a second, she was sitting on it, her legs splayed widely and looking at him in a way that made him wonder if she could light the room a little if she just cranked up those flaming green eyes just one more notch. "I can't wait, Josh, please!" she said, "just come here for now and maybe we can get to the bed in a few minutes." With the condom in place, Kayla lifted her leg to get it onto his shoulder and they slid together slowly with a shared groan. Now that they were joined, they seemed to slow down a little as they looked at each other. Josh leaned forward and after a long kiss he smiled a little sheepishly. "I like this and how we got here," he smirked, "but really, I wonder if we couldn't have made it to the bed after all." She shook her head, "No we couldn't." He sighed and nodded, knowing that she was right. Kayla repositioned herself so that she had one hand free and she touched his face and stroked his cheek with her thumb. "It was all about getting here, Josh, where we are now. This is what I've wanted, you and me together. How fast or how hard is for a little while from now. Right now, we just need to be together this way, with no ranches or rattlesnakes or anything else." He nodded his agreement as he leaned his head forward to kiss the nearest of her breasts, loving the nipple slowly as she sighed. For reasons that he didn't really understand, what their hips were doing at the moment became a little like a romantic backdrop to the way that he enjoyed this for the tenderness of it. After a time, he began to thrust really slowly as they talked and it made them smile at each other whenever they pulled apart from their kisses. "I knew a woman where I used to work before we moved here," Kayla said quietly. "We were just coworkers and we usually had lunch together. One day, she just blurted something out to me. She told me that she and her husband were really best friends between them. I didn't know what she meant when she said that and I didn't believe a word of it, because I didn't really have anything to relate it to, I guess. Later on, I could see how strongly she felt about it, so then I just thought that either he was really snowing her, or that she must have been deluding herself." Kayla sighed with a smile after she wet her fingers with her tongue and began to play with her clitoris very gently. "But one day, I was eating lunch alone because she'd had a morning appointment and I looked out of the window. Her husband drove her in and I could see it as they just stood there talking in the parking lot for a few minutes. They'd been together for 11 years, and it was as plain as day how they loved each other. Neither one was much to look at, but that didn't matter obviously. They were in love, sure, but I could see that they were very close friends as well. It was nice to see, since up til then, I didn't believe that it was possible." Josh was a bit confused, "What wasn't possible, to be in love?" "Yes," Kayla nodded, "Not so much that, Josh, to be friends with a man, true friends, and on top of that to be lovers as well." Kayla's leg began to threaten to cramp up on her a little, so she asked for a change in their position. She bent over the edge of the counter so that he could take her from behind. There had been a second reason for it and Kayla wasn't disappointed. She asked, and he told her that he could see her tattoos fairly well. As they thrusted towards each other, she felt his fingers trace the outlines of the vine on her wherever he could reach and it made her shiver now and then. "I think that I knew her husband," Josh said after a few minutes. Kayla knew that it wasn't possible, but she understood what he was telling her. He'd met a couple something like the one that she'd known. Kayla felt happy that they understood each other. "I want to be a friend like that to you," he said and she nodded as her breasts swung under her chest. Kayla sighed and whispered just loud enough so that he could hear her. "You already are, Joshua." Kayla grabbed a towel that sat folded on the counter and pulled it to her as she leaned lower and placed her forearms on the towel so that she could rest her cheek against it. As Josh took her hips in his hands, she reached between her legs and touched her clitoris as his thighs began to slap against her bottom. -------------------- It had taken some time, but they were in his bed at last. They lay together in the dark and quiet of the afterglow, Kayla with her head on Joshua's chest, and his fingers stroked her ear. His heart still pounded. Kayla smiled at him "Hate to get all corny on you, but I just adore you, Josh. I just wanted you to know that." His arm went to her right shoulder blade, and "IT" began to happen again. She'd waited for this tonight, hoping that it would happen. His chest started to expand slowly. She listened intently to his heart slowing. The powerful beat stopped. She counted four, no, five missed beats before her head was jarred by the stronger beating as it picked up again. "What IS that?" Kayla asked. "Mm? What is what?" he asked lazily. "Your heart. You do that after every time. You can stop your heart. Why? What do you do it for?" He chuckled, "Why do you need to know? Does being in love with you mean that I'll have absolutely no secrets left from you?" "Oh, absolutely none," she sighed, "I've already decided that I want to keep you. I need to know all that there is to know about you, care and feeding-wise. You're mine, and I take good care of my toys." Her eyes brightened as a thought came to her, "Do you come with a manual? I wouldn't have to pester you with questions if I could just read up on you a little." She watched in the low light as he thought about it. "I think I did come with a manual, but I guess the previous owner must have thrown it away when she moved out. It was a pretty thin booklet, actually. There's not much to know anyway, since most of the systems are automatic. It covered some basics, like minimum fuel requirements, what all of my buttons do, how to adjust the mirrors, how to set my cruise control, temperature settings, and a few warnings." "Warnings?" she asked, "What kind of warnings?" "You know, not to over-inflate me, not to leave me outside in the rain or snow for too long, and if I get dirty, to wash me carefully with mild soap and a soft cloth, and how to polish me." She giggled. "I must be doing at least a couple of things wrong, then. I really want to wash you myself one time, but I'm afraid that if I do anything like that, you'll just activate your stick shift or something. Actually it seems that EVERYTHING I do activates the stick shift and your lotion dispenser system. That's why I'm asking about your heart. Do you stop it on purpose, or is that just the self-leveling feature of your suspension system? You seem to have a few options that I've never seen before. Is that a love-making feature that I'm using the wrong way, or what?" She raised her pretty head to look at him. Josh smiled warmly at her. "What do you want to hear? I kind of like the self-leveling feature idea, but what I think you want to hear is that it's some kind of mysterious Far-Eastern Tantric sexual thing that I do." Kayla laughed. "Yeah, now THAT'S what I'm talking about." "Sorry to disappoint you, babe. It's actually nothing at all. It's just something that I do sometimes. I always liked to do that to the medical officers back home. They'd be there with the blood pressure cuff, and stethoscope and I'd do that for fun." He chuckled, "They'd just go nuts," "I can only do that when I'm relaxed, and I guess I've been doing it after we make love because it feels good to me then. I do it because I feel very much loved by you." Kayla looked a little disappointed. "Oh great. I make you feel good and the engine shuts off! Jesus Murphy, that's what I mean. I'm scared to do anything now. I'll do something wrong, and your engine will seize, or your bumper will fall off, and all your oil will run out, or you'll eject a CD or something... So it's really nothing I need to worry about then?" "Nope," he smiled, "actually, my heart doesn't really stop at all. When I inhale like that, it's really just so that I can exhale as I relax more, because I'm really content. The inhalation creates a lot more room in my chest cavity, and my heart just has a bit more space temporarily, and it can fill with more blood than usual. There's just a long beat as it's filling. It's only a temporary thing, and it still beats after it's filled. That's why the pulses afterward are stronger, because I've finished the inhalation, the space is gone, and now the extra blood has got to go. That's it. No magic, no power-assisted seat cushions or anything. If it means anything, I guess it means that I'm very happy. I don't know how to purr." "Well I'd be interested in a power seat warming option if you come with that." she smiled. "I do have that option, but if you sit there it tends to-" She laughed. "I know. Another of the four hundred things that activate the stick shift. I'm really very glad that I make you happy. That sounds silly, but I mean it. I'm playing a little with the idea of making a life's work out of doing just that." Kayla got out of the bed and walked to the table to get their drinks. Joshua's gaze followed her amazing backside around the dark room until she came back with them and got back into bed. "See what I mean?" she exclaimed, "I wasn't even here and look what happened while I was gone!" He chuckled, "Oh come on, you must have come across that feature before me." She looked a bit uncertain. "No, not really. I mean not like that. What's this feature called?" He sighed, as though it was rather boring to him to tell her of his features, "It's part of the docking guidance system. Target acquisition is initiated by any of several means, could be visual, radar, like if I think about you, or even proximity, like if you're very close. After initial acquisition and lock, guidance switches over mostly to heat-seeking mode and the tactile sensor arrays take over at really close range." "Uh,... which was it that time?" she asked, as she took him in her hand. He sighed again, "Visual. My night vision system is on. I...ohhh,...watched your lovely butt for a second, and the system armed itself." Kayla laughed softly. "So you're saying that all I have to do is walk across the room, and you've automatically got a missile lock on my ass?" "Well yeah, pretty much," he nodded. "I have a lot of built-in automated systems." He looked serious for a second. "I can override it if you want me to..." "Hell no, " she smiled as his fingers began to trace along her vaginal lips softly. "I wanted to compliment you earlier, "he said, "I like how you've shaved here." Kayla sighed, loving the feeling. "I had kind of a clue that you came with all this neat stuff anyway," she said as she tore open another condom package to put it on for him. "Just scream if I hurt you," she chuckled. "Getting back to why I shaved for you," Kayla grinned, "You know, with all of this heat–sensitive equipment you have, I just knew that you wouldn't really need much in the way of runway markers." She chuckled as she lay back smiling at him, "You're cleared for the instrument approach on the active runway. Fly straight in, number one for landing. Be advised of just a little bit of tenderness due to razor burn on the left side of the runway and try to stay light on the controls, Honey." She made him laugh for a moment as he positioned himself and they connected. "I just love that docking guidance system of yours, "she smiled as she put her legs around him. "Where did you learn those terms, Kayla? I'm a little curious now." "My favorite computer simulator," she said, "everything's there. I guess I just picked up on the terminology, and since you were using it, hey..." ---------------- They'd wound down a bit, both of them feeling a little spent and tired, since it had been a long day, so they'd just spent a while holding onto each other and talking. "I think we're about out of time. My aunt will think we've skipped town or something if we don't get back soon. Let's just do this for a few minutes more" Kayla said. They got up to shower together a few minutes later, and Josh accompanied Kayla back to the bunkhouse. Rose met them with a smile, and mentioned that she was getting worried that the coyotes might be coming in closer at night since she was having no trouble hearing them at all now. Kayla thanked her for babysitting Jillian, and they went inside. Once the door was closed, they collapsed into each other with the giggles. "That was a bit embarrassing," remarked a smiling Kayla a few minutes later as she brought out some tea that she'd made for them, "It's s little like being a teenager and slinking around. We're going to have to do something, but I have no idea. " "Neither do I," Josh said thoughtfully, "Rosie obviously knows what we're up to, and I'm sure she doesn't really mind, but you're right. We have to make some changes, somehow." Kayla changed the subject. "Rita and Consuella asked me to join their lady's poker night the evening after next. I was thinking about taking my aunt along. Would you mind being without me for a whole evening, Josh? Think you can handle Jilly?" Joshua laughed softly. "Sure. I'd love to, I just hope that I can keep her amused. I'm also sensing an ulterior motive, though. What gives?" "I just think that we seem to be going along pretty fast. I don't want to leave my girl in the dust. She needs to spend time with you, and you need some kid time, if you're as serious about the package deal as you said you were." Josh thought it over briefly. "Ok, but this time I have conditions. I get free choice about what we do, as long as it's safe, and I decide what we eat for dinner." Kayla laughed "Deal!" They finished their tea, and he got up to go. -------------- Jillian stood peeping through her barely opened bedroom door. She liked it when they were together. She watched them kiss goodnight, and scampered back to her bed. Kayla noticed that her door was ajar and looked in. She cleared her throat. "Alright Miss Super Spy, what did you hear?" Jillian giggled, "How did you know that I wasn't asleep?" Kayla walked over and sat on the bed. "I may not be a mom, but I'm close enough for you. I can tell if you're asleep or not. I've spent enough time watching you sleep to have learned a trick or two." She stroked Jillian's head. "Kayla, I still miss my mom and dad a lot, but you're my mom now. That's how I feel. You take care of me more than my mom did, and Daddy was always too busy for me." Kayla blinked hard a few times before she spoke. "Jilly, I don't think that's true. Your mom was my sister, and my best friend in the whole world. I knew how she felt about you. Your dad worked very hard at his job, but I know that he loved you too. I wish I could bring them back to you. Thanks for thinking of me as your mom. I don't think of you as my niece anymore. To me, you're my daughter. It's that simple to me." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 11 She stroked Jillian's cheek with her thumb. "So while you were snooping, which you shouldn't do, by the way, what did you hear?" Jillian's eyes brightened. "Josh is going to baby-sit me. That's gonna be cool. I can't wait." She became thoughtful again after a few seconds. "Kayla, are you guys in love? Is Josh going to be my dad or something?" Kayla smiled warmly. "I don't know yet, Jilly, we love each other. I love him very much, and one of the bazillion reasons why is that I know that he loves you a lot too. He told me that he had such a good time when we were together today. He felt like he suddenly had a family of his own, that you and I were his family. Not many men feel that way if the lady that they're dating has a child, but Josh sure does. I think that he might become your new dad, but it's too early to tell, really. Grownups don't usually fall in love this quickly, Jilly. We've learned to be careful. Joshua and I are going so fast, it's hard to believe. But he tells me, and shows me that he loves me, and I had a hard time believing him at first, but now I'm sure that he's being honest. And I know for sure that he loves you very much." "Kayla, you're not hiding your tattoos so much. Has he seen them? You were always afraid to let anybody see them." asked Jillian. "Yes, he's seen them, all of them. He told me that I'm not ugly. He thinks that I'm beautiful. I think that he needs glasses. He can see them or not see them, and he likes me just the same. Oh, I wanted to tell you about me going out the night after next, but since you're such a snoop, I might as well tell you now. Yes, Josh will baby-sit you. I need you to be good for him. He's never been in a situation like this, so he needs to learn how very quickly. He's never done this before, I guess. You just remember to behave yourself, and I'm sure you guys will have a great time. Now you'd better get back to sleep, Miss Nosy, and I expect good behavior out of you tomorrow at Margarita's while you're visiting, and if I don't get it, I won't go out the night after next, and we'll just have to practice our printing, won't we? So goodnight, Jilly, sleep tight, I love you very much." Kayla kissed Jillian, then pulled back in shock. "Oh no! I just thought of something, Oh dear!" Jillian's eyes widened. "What Kayla? what's wrong?" Kayla held her hand to her mouth. "I just remembered. Josh kissed you goodnight earlier. Then he kissed ME goodnight just five minutes ago, and I've just kissed you! We're gonna need a wire brush or something to scrub his germs off your face now. Ewwww." She laughed. "You're nuts, Kayla. I like his germs now, anyway. Goodnight, I love you very much, and I love Joshua too." she said as Kayla walked to the door. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 12 Kayla sat in the chair at the table that passed for Josh's desk and looked around in the late-morning light as some of his music blasted and thumped through the old building around her. He'd told her to grab whatever music that she wanted from his CDs and his laptop for her MP3 player and she was sifting through his Counting Crows CDs at the moment, looking for a tune that he'd played in the truck the other day. She smiled when she found it and a second later "American Girls" was on. She'd asked him why he liked that one, and he'd replied that she would find that he liked songs because he liked them , mostly, and that there was almost never a tendency toward songs that "meant something" to him, though it did happen now and then. She sat forward as she browsed suddenly. He must have had everything that ZZ-Top had ever recorded. Other than their top 40 hits, she'd never really given them a listen, so she switched CDs and sat back with her finger on the song selector of the player and sipped her coffee for a few minutes. Browsing his MP3s, she found that he'd put everything there as well, and in another few minutes, she found a few things that she hurried to copy onto her player. When she was done for the moment, she sat back as "Tramp" came from the speakers and she enjoyed the slower, slightly hypnotic tempo for a moment and then she got up to dance a little to it. Daisy looked up at her, but didn't seem interested enough to want to get up. She looked out through the dirty windows of the shed. She was all alone on the ranch, mostly. After breakfast, Rose had taken Jilly to spend most of the day with Consuella and Margarita's kids at Margarita's place. Daisy was lying on the floor there beside her and Josh was out on the old four-wheeler that he'd found in another shed the week before. Rose told him to go ahead and see if it was usable, since she hadn't thought of it after Sam had passed on and Josh had it running in no time. He was off fixing some of the fence in a far-off corner of the ranch. She looked around herself some more and had to smile. A little over a week ago, they'd almost been at each other's throats. Now she found him there in her mind quite often. She saw an open pack of Canadian cigarettes on the desk next to a framed photo and she bent down a little to look at the picture. It was an old family shot, taken when Josh was a teenager. Since the scar there looked much as she knew it, she judged that he must have been sixteen or so. His family looked like really nice people in the way that all people look when they're forced to hold still for one of these things. The photo was taken outside and she could see snow everywhere in the background. Kayla thought that Josh's mother was a lovely woman, and his father looked somewhat like him and had most of Josh's build, but he was in a suit, so there wasn't that much more about him to tell by. But there was another individual there in that picture, a man, and Kayla knew almost with dead certainty then that Josh had a brother. He looked to be somewhat older, obviously, and he was in uniform with a beret on his head. Kayla looked closely and shook her head in a bit of wonder. Whoever this was, he looked a lot closer to how Josh looked now, though she guessed that he might have been about a decade younger than Josh at the time. She smiled to herself and then at his mother. The woman obviously knew how to build great-looking sons... She stared at Josh. He had long hair then, and it was something to see him like this. It almost made her want to laugh a little. Depending on the position that she was in and how she held her head, her own dark red hair was long enough for her to feel it as it brushed against her ass. She couldn't see it from the angle of this frontal shot, but she had a pretty strong notion that his hair had been just as long then or very near to it. Kayla grinned as she reached of the pack. She lit one of his cigarettes and stared at the picture some more, wondering about the lives of all of them. She took another draw on the smoke and looked at it for a second. It tasted like a cigarette, but it was different, blander somehow. She smiled at that as she remembered when she'd asked him about it a couple of days before. He'd joked that it was a reflection of his people. She told him that she didn't know, but the one that she knew tended to be full of crap now and then. Not far from the photo, she saw his wallet sitting next to his passports. He carried his current one and several older and expired ones as well. She felt the urge, and even though she was confident that if she'd asked, he'd have told her to go on ahead and look through it if she wanted to, she didn't touch the wallet. She hadn't asked, and that was that. But those passports, ... Josh had told her that until a little after 9/11, Americans and Canadians had shared the longest undefended border in the world and that both could pass fairly freely back and forth without much fuss, but that now they needed passports. That made her a little sad somehow as she picked up the thin booklets and in another few minutes, she knew where he had been. She saw the dates, and guessed at the visits to the United States to visit Rose and Sam. It was the other places that came to her eye -- Cambodia, Bosnia several times, East Timor, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Haiti twice, Afghanistan three times, she noted as she wondered to herself. Kayla wanted to make a joke to herself that at least he hadn't been to Bangkok, Thailand, but she knew that he hadn't been in any of those far-off places for fun. She was about to put the little pile back when she noticed the thin envelope of photos from a photo-developing outlet that had lain under the passports. It was a little old and worn. She was very careful as she removed the group of photos. She couldn't guess about most of the people in the shots and what Josh's relationship with them might have been, but she saw him in a few and she smiled. He was wearing combat fatigues in most of them, though the coloring changed now and then. In some of the older ones, it was just a drab green. In a few others, there was a sort of green camouflage theme, and in the newer ones, it was a desert mottling. It was the same for the weapons that she saw in a few of the pictures. In the older ones, there was a rifle that she had no idea about, but in the newer ones, he looked to have much the same rifle as American troops used. Most of the shots showed no weapons at all. He just looked to be caught goofing in a moment while he worked at something else. The odd thing to her was that in almost every shot, he was wearing what looked to be the same dark red beret. It looked as though it could have been edited in to every picture, though she knew that it wasn't the case. In a couple, there was a floppy hat there on his head. When she'd been through the pile, she replaced them in the envelope and put it back where it had been and went back to selecting music files from his laptop. As she browsed, she thought about looking around at the other files there, but she decided against it. He probably wouldn't have an issue with it if she did, but she already felt as though she'd been snooping enough in his life, well for now, anyway. They had an agreement. What had been in their lives was past. It would always be there, and they'd agreed that the past wasn't the focus so much as the present was, since they'd decided to try to forge something of a future for themselves out of all of this somehow if they could, and that was more than enough for Kayla. The wading pool from the supply store sat in the yard, looking something like a strange oddity. It was brightly-colored, but it was surrounded by slat fencing. Josh had joked at how the guy at the place had stared at him, since Josh had no other way to describe it when he'd asked for "snow fence". He explained that the stuff was used where he came from to line roads with so that blowing snow didn't pile up so much on the road itself, but the man did get the idea and had something like that. The fence was to keep Daisy out of the pool, though both Jillian and Daisy took the installation of it to be something of a personal affront. Rose had shrugged and said that it was that way or no way at all, so Jillian had accepted it. Josh had found some patio lanterns and the thing looked really weird after that, but Kayla had agreed that in the evening, it could look pretty festive. Kayla had filled it right before breakfast and she now waited for it to warm up a little from the sun. She had a plan for today that she hadn't told anyone about. She smiled to herself as she finished the cigarette and put it out in the ashtray. She unplugged her player and shut everything down to walk back to the bunkhouse. She decided that she wanted to browse his music some more a little later, and she now wanted to buy some of the ZZ-Top CDs for herself. She liked the convenience of MP3s, but the file compression took a lot of the range away, and her ears were good enough to really notice it. In a few minutes back in the bunkhouse, she's burned a CD to at least listen to in the car -- or on her old CD player by the "pool", she smirked. It took her a long minute when push came right down to shove, but a half-hour later, Kayla walked out of the house wearing her sunglasses, her old Stetson, and her little bikini -- the first one that she'd worn in so long. She carried a towel, a cold can of Diet Coke, and a novel that she'd bought and never got far into. Since she was beginning to believe in the possibility that such a thing as a romance might actually be able to exist now, she couldn't see why it couldn't happen in the pages of a book either. Once she'd slathered on some sunscreen and settled herself comfortably, she decided that it might not be a South Pacific island, but it wasn't bad. That was how Josh found her an hour later. Kayla heard him coming and thought a few things over as she watched him park the four-wheeler and get off. For her, time seemed to move into a sort of slow-motion mode as she watched him. He pulled his T-shirt over his head and looked at it a little sadly before putting his old cowboy hat back on his head. The work of the morning had soaked the shirt through and it also wore a little of the dirt of the job as well. He was sweating buckets and he wanted a drink of water, and after that, all that he wanted was a cup of coffee and maybe a cigarette, though he decided that the last thing wasn't really a limiting factor since he had to walk all the way to the shed to get one. He began to walk toward the house. Kayla knew that he likely hadn't seen her yet, so she watched him in a bit of awe. It didn't matter to her one little bit that they'd been with each other as much as they could manage it over the past few days, and if they weren't in each other's arms, they were just together, often with Jilly doing whatever it was that they did. Every time that she looked at Joshua -- even if he sat cross-legged on the floor playing with Jilly and her PlayStation, she always had the same thought come to her sooner or later. She smirked as she admitted it to herself while she watched him walk nearer in the midday heat. It was mostly sooner. She could see the sweat that he'd worn under his shirt glisten just a little, even though the sunlight had already begun its struggle to dry it while his body made more to cool him. The way that his body moved as he walked could drive her just a little insane, she admitted. Joshua was over a hundred feet away, and she could already feel the changes in her body beginning. This wasn't the pleasant secluded beach in her dream, but that didn't matter and Josh wasn't the only one with a target acquisition system. Like every woman alive, Kayla had her own built right in for times such as this, for the right man, and if this one wasn't the right man, ... She was amazed at him and how much she loved and wanted him right here and now. He wasn't even aware of her and he was just walking, she knew, but it still all came down to the one feeling to Kayla and she just whispered it to herself. "Mother of God, ..." She watched as he took the wet shirt, wiped his face, and tried to wipe some of the new sweat from his chest. Her eyes followed the motion and she saw the way that the tendons in his arm rippled as he did it, and how his pectoral muscles gave and bounced just a little as they came right back after he'd wiped them just as he'd taken another step. If he did that again, she was sure that she'd scream. Kayla smiled to herself and decided that beach or no beach, this was close enough. She quickly selected a song that she'd heard just a minute before. She'd liked it enough to have listened to it three times now. She wondered how far down inside herself she would have to reach for the motions, but she decided that for this one man -- the one that she must surely have been born for, the way it seemed to her right then -- she thought that she could manage this easily. The song was from a concert. She found it and cranked the old CD player, hoping that the distortion wasn't too bad as she turned it to face in Josh's direction. Josh looked ahead when he heard a sound that seemed pretty incongruous in this place -- the sound of a concert crowd cheering. He stared in the direction of the snow fence as Kayla stood up and walked to get out of the little enclosure after quickly putting on a pair of straw-colored, wide-heeled pumps that she'd need for this. The beat had begun as she stepped away into the open and began to strut toward him in time to the rhythm. He couldn't believe it and his jaw dropped open slowly. Kayla wearing a bikini. What the hell ...? The intro stopped and Kayla's arms went up as she threw her hips into the four rapid crescendos. She started walking again as the song resumed with a slow guitar riff. His poor old sopping wet T-shirt fell forgotten from his fingers into the dust. She danced and strutted nearer with a smile that faded and was replaced with a wanton sort of look, stopping once to grind her hips downward as though she was doing a pole dance. At the bottom of the move, she recognized a line that she'd liked and mouthed the words that she could remember to herself as she danced. "Quit my job, I'm a lazy slob Never lift a finger 'cept for my heartthrob. I'm a sinpusher, hangin' on the DL..." The four crescendos came again and she threw herself deeper into the tune by hitting every one. When she'd tossed her long mane in the middle of standing up again, she smiled just a little at him and her hands reached up behind her. She maintained her connection to the rhythm with her motions and one of her feet rocked sideways just a little in the dirt to do it so that to him, her body pulsed a little as he stared with a growing smile. She picked up on a line that she knew and mouthed the words again. "I just want a little bit no, I guess I want it all." The chorus came again, but Kayla just mouthed the words to the refrain by the band. "Down low... How low can you go?" The top was off in an instant as the guitar lead began and Kayla brought her empty hand up to rub one of her breasts seductively and she pursed her lips into a sweet little kiss to let him know that this was all just for him as she turned and pranced away to the music. Twenty feet farther, and she reached for the ties on her bikini bottom and in one motion, it was gone as though it had just disappeared as she ground down again, her hips undulating back and forth as he caught sight of her fingers between her legs as she beckoned him just once before running her fingers along her groove. 'Now that', he thought to himself, 'is the true meaning of naked splendour.' Kayla hadn't planned on it, but she was really into the thing now, so she bent as far forward as she could to clasp her ankle for an instant so that he could see what she had for him there between her legs and she was on her way back up before her hair had found the dirt. But in the middle of that, Kayla felt some pride in herself for really the first time in all of the times that she'd danced, because she could see that he was following her. Well that was good, she thought, because this time, she meant it. She tried to remember how the solo ended as she danced. It came to her just in time to fall to her knees and bob in time to the music as though she was in the coital act with an unseen partner below her, tossing her hair back as she mimicked what she wanted from Josh. She rotated her hips in a long corkscrew path as she rose to strut away a little more during the final verse, but she stopped to writhe before him for the final chorus, thrusting her hips at a line of it. "I'm a sinpusher, hangin' on the DL --push, push, push." She danced off toward the shed doors, a little disappointed that she was leaving the music behind her. When the last set of those crescendos came to her once more, she sank down, throwing her hips hard at every one, four times until she was squatting as the band held the last note. When the song was over and the audience on the audio track cheered, Kayla turned and giggled at Josh before she ran into the shed and up the stairs to the loft. He found her kneeling on his bed with her head on his pillow and her hand holding out a condom from where she reached back between her legs. He struggled with his pants as her voice came to him plaintively, begging him to hurry. Josh admired her beauty as they settled into a slow rhythm, moving blissfully for a long while. Kayla sighed and asked him if he'd liked to see her dancing for him. "Uh-huh, "he said, "thank you so much for that, Kayla. That was really special." "It was for me too, " she smiled back at him, "I never focused on anyone's face when I used to do that. I'd look right through them every time, but I sure liked seeing you watching me, and I loved doing that for you." He idly traced the outlines of the orchids that he could reach, and Kayla didn't mind, she actually liked his appreciation of them. Her orgasms came to her quickly in succession in the heat of the loft. She cried out each time to let him know, and he pressed himself to her as hard as he could to help her. She hummed in between them almost continually. Josh loved it, but he couldn't remember hearing his own name quite so often before. Josh suggested that they change positions, and she gladly complied. They began on their sides, but it wasn't long before she rolled them onto her back. "Before you ask me where that came from, I had some dreams the other night." He stopped to listen to her, moving very slowly a little at a time, so that he could listen to what she was saying, and also just to hear it when she groaned a little. He loved to run his hands over the front of her softly, just above the point of triggering Kayla's ticklishness. It had taken a few tries, but she found that she enjoyed it now. She called it teasing her. He always smiled impishly and said that he was only being polite and appreciative. "I saw us on a beach someplace and at the start of it, I was wearing a bikini. We went to the cantina the next day and I found my bikini hanging behind the change-room door. It fit me and it was even on sale, so ,..." "Thank you for buying it, "Josh smiled, "it looks so good on you." She thanked him and said, "And I also had a dream about a fantasy of mine, but I'll tell it to you later, because I think that you're the one." "I'm the one?" he asked, not getting it. "Uh-huh, "she said as she began to urge him to go harder, "Later, Josh, ... I'll tell you, ... later. It means a lot to me to even say it, and if you're, ..." The rest was forgotten and lost in his kisses. He didn't know shit about her dream or her fantasy, though he hoped that she'd tell it better later. All that he knew was that she'd said that he might be the one. That was all that he needed to hear for now. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 12 When their urgency wouldn't let them go on much longer, he took her shoulders in his hands from beneath her, and began to pound into her, and she rocked to match his thrusts, grunting loudly. Joshua needed his climax very badly by then, so he shifted his grip, suddenly planted his knees, and lifted her bodily from the bed. Kayla hung on and tried to envelop his body as if that were possible. He thanked somebody -- he wasn't really sure who a moment later -- that they fit like this so that he could pull this off. He held her tightly and leaned back as the rush of it hit him. Josh groaned loudly as he came, holding her a little past upright and worrying a little about the possibility of a leg cramp, and Kayla cried out with her cheek against his jaw as she came with him, shuddering violently. She'd never done this before and the shock of how he'd been able to lift her like this and how it felt had tossed her right off the table as far as where she'd been before. She was just thrown fast forward into a fast-rising climax that surprised her. They held this position as he emptied himself into the condom. Kayla had tried to keep herself a bit elevated in his grasp once she found that in this position he was actually touching her cervix. But at the end she found that she didn't care for the last strokes if she moved herself differently just a bit because he wasn't trying to pound into her like this. As she tried to savor the feeling, she closed her mouth on the muscles of his throat lightly, savoring how primeval this felt to her. When they were like this, she was becoming more and more certain that they'd been made for each other. She'd never fit this well with anyone on any level. She was amazed at his upper body strength when he lowered her gently, and settled his weight on her carefully. He kissed the top of her head, and shushed her, whispering, "Quiet honey, you'll wake the neighbors." The absurdity of his remark caused Kayla to laugh, and Josh groaned in discomfort as he found himself ejected rather forcefully and he rolled off her carefully to try to quickly find some space for himself as he removed the condom. She apologized, "Sorry, but you sounded so funny when you said that." "It's ok," Josh said with a groan. "I was in here this morning, looking for music," Kayla said, "That's how I came up with music to dance for you to." Josh nodded with a smile, "I liked your choice." "I didn't really mean to, but I found a few things that I'd like to ask you about." Josh looked perturbed, "We're not going over the polar bear episodes again, are we?" "No," Kayla smiled, "and we're going to leave the drunken cougar episodes alone as well." "Oh, thank God," he looked much happier as he heaved a sigh of relief. "So what's up then?" "I found a family photo," Kayla smiled, "your hair was as long as mine. I think the whole barbarian look could work for you." She kissed Joshua softly. Josh nodded, "That was taken not long after the bandages from the last operation for my burn came off. Before that, there was still a bit of a hamburger look. You won't find any of me when I was younger than that, other than a very few that were taken from my good side." "I dunno," she said, "I think that maybe I like the left side a little better," Kayla said as she slid her hand over his chest for a moment and continued after she began to speak. "Well, I'm only half-kidding about the Barbarian thing. You could grow your hair and make a living as a romance cover model." "Uh-huh, a right-side only model and an old one at that, " he snorted his disagreement quietly and then he stretched with his arm over his head. Kayla didn't want to tickle him, so she stroked her palm over his pecs once before allowing her hand to slide over the edge of his ribcage to glide down the deep slope to his navel. "Who was the other man in the uniform?" Josh grinned, "That's my brother Cale. He lives in a little town north of Toronto. We don't see each other very much these days, so when we get together, there's usually some involvement by the local constabulary that has to do with broken windows, revelry, drunken brawling, and a night in jail. It's an expensive hobby, so we don't do it very much anymore." He turned his head to face her, "I think you'd like him." Kayla laughed and nodded, "How much older than you is he?" "Nine years, almost," Josh sighed, "Hey, wait a minute; you're not interested in him, are you? God, I hate it when he steals girls from me." She laughed, "I'm not interested in him, I was just --" "Oh sure," Josh smiled, failing to look serious, "you lead me on, and even dance naked for me, all the while, you're trying to get to my brother. Well, you're out of luck. I don't have his new number. He got all pissed at me for throwing his last phone into a pond, and he won't give me his number now. I can tell he's serious about it, because he never calls me on it so that I can't see his number." "I'm almost afraid to ask," she smiled, "but why did you throw his phone?" "I'm not certain now," Josh replied, "but I must have had a good reason, I'm pretty sure. I wouldn't just do anything like that. Christ, I'd need to be blind drunk to do something like that." Kayla was finding that she felt a little nervous about what might have been a hint, so she chose her question carefully. "How um,... how often do you get drunk, Josh?" "Other than when Cale and I get together, I never get drunk. It's been, I dunno, five years, I think. Tell me, do you think I might have a problem?" He was able to hold the serious expression for only a minute before Kayla's stare wore him down and he laughed. "I'm beginning to think that you don't have a drinking problem," she said with a smirk, "I think you have a problem with your brother." "Well, I wouldn't even have that, if he wasn't so pissy about letting me use his phone." Josh's eyes lit up. "Now I remember. I hadn't seen him in a couple of years and we were sitting in a bar having a drink and catching up. His phone kept going off every few minutes, so I asked if I could borrow it and the idiot actually gave it to me. Anyway, I was just going to shut the damn thing off when it rang again in my hand and I answered it. The next thing I knew, some woman was on the line shrieking at me and calling me all sorts of evil things. It took me a while to get her to the point where I could even get a word in edgewise. She settled down as soon as she figured out that I wasn't Cale and then she went straight into asking me if I was single and what I looked like. Anyway, I spoke to her very calmly and suggested that she find just a little soothing pleasure to help her to improve her outlook on things, that's all." Kayla found herself chuckling and she just had to know now. "Well," Josh said, "it was a bit out of character for me, I'll grant you, but I was there with my brother, you know? Anyway, I didn't really think through what I'd suggested. It turns out that what I said is anatomically impossible for a single human to do without some sort of stick or something like that and I guess that she didn't really understand my accent or something. She seemed to be having difficulty believing me when I told her emphatically that it would help her." "Josh, "Kayla chuckled, "you don't have an accent." "Well not NOW," he said, "but I'd been drinking. So when I tried to give her detailed instructions, she just yelled louder at me, and I noticed that her voice over the phone was just ruining the ambiance of the bar and everything, so I went outside and threw the phone far enough so that nobody would be disturbed." He shrugged, "I kind of muffed my throw and it went into the pond. Well, I was a little drunk, and, ...." Kayla had to hear the end of this now. "And what?" He shrugged again, "And how was I to know that it was his ex-wife? It was an honest mistake, I mean, anyone might have done the same thing. If I'd have known who she was, it would have been way different, and Cale wouldn't have gotten upset with me. Well maybe not AS upset as he got, anyway, when I told him that I felt very sorry that he'd had to wake up to something that sounded like a really nasal-sounding chainsaw every morning." Josh looked up at the ceiling for a moment and sighed as Kayla laughed into his pillow, "I probably should have stopped before I said that she'd always been a self-entitled and really sour foul-mouthed bitch who spent his child support payments trying to find herself another paycheck like him for when the money ran out. That was when he hit me. He heard Kayla as her laughter began again. "Oh God," she whimpered into the pillow, "I think I have to pee." But Joshua went straight on. "Well, how was I to know that he was still in love with her? He didn't tell me that he'd just spent six months trying to get back with her, did he? If she hadn't kept calling him to give him hell over something, Cale might have gotten a chance to tell me that. I'd have known who it was then and told her myself. I've never had problem telling her where to go. Apparently, after that, she knew where to stick it too, so I think she owes me." Kayla's face hit his pillow again and he could just make out her shrieking laughter. He sighed again, "And then this idiot hit me for hitting his windshield with the phone, if you can imagine it. It probably wouldn't have gone into the pond at all if the guy had just parked somewhere else. But Cale straightened him out right quick and decked him with one shot." Kayla was almost sobbing when she lifted her head, "Uh, why, Josh?" He stared at her a little mystified. "Well for hitting me, of course. It's a really bad idea to try to come between Cale and I when we're scrapping. Shit, even Dad left us alone to work it out once we grew up some. So then Cale went back to hitting me and the next thing I knew, the cops were there. We had a bit of a talk while we were handcuffed in the back of the cruiser and he told me that I was right, but I just should have shut the phone off and I agreed with him. He got a new phone, but he called her from a payphone to tell her what he should have told her years before. It took two years, but now Cale and I exchange best wishes to each other at Christmas via email, so I think he's coming around a little." Kayla was on her side holding her ribs for a few minutes. It was a long while before the images playing through her mind would allow her to catch her breath and wipe her eyes. Josh looked over at her there next to him and found himself falling in love with her all over again. "I think you're right," she said finally as she got a little of her breath back, "I'd probably like him." "See." Josh smiled and nodded, "I knew it." "I found your passports," she said quietly a few minutes later. "Why do you carry the old ones?" He shrugged, "I don't need to. I just keep them all together so that I can carry my life history in one hand. I think they want you to turn the old ones in now, but hey, it's my life. They can go get their own lives." Kayla looked at him for a few minutes. Her eyes went from his face to several of his features and scars. "What did you do in those places?" He sounded a little distant when he finally spoke. "Different places, different missions. Some were as an observer for UN operations, like to make sure that the parties were really doing what they'd said that they would. It's a little like trying to keep two kids who were fighting apart in a schoolyard after they've promised to stop thumping on each other, but you know that if you look away, it'll just start all over again. Other times, it was peacekeeping. Same thing, but we're there armed to make sure of it. The last few times, it was combat and I'd rather leave all of them in those little books right now, if you don't mind too much, Kayla. I have trouble thinking about all of that while I'm this close to someone I love in a place like this. I need more time between what's here and what was there, and some of it I can't really talk about anyway." He looked at her and smiled a little, "I'm not trying to be evasive or anything. If you want, I'll tell you the unit that I was in and you can look up the public side of the missions on the net. I'll write down the address for the regiment's website for you, or you can just look it up in my bookmarks if you want." "I never thought about it much before," she said smiling, "but you looked pretty good in a uniform. Not the fancy ones so much as the regular ones in most of the pictures that I saw." "I never felt really comfortable in a dress uniform," he nodded, "it's too hard making sure that you haven't got anything messed up. I just always preferred work dress or combats, so I could just roll up my sleeves and get to work with a lot less fuss." They moved toward each other and stayed there, kissing and embracing each other for a time. He whispered in her ear, "Tell me about your fantasy, Kayla." She didn't answer right away, as she enjoyed the moment. After a while, she said simply, "Lions." "Lions?" he asked. "Yes. I once saw a photograph that I found to be very moving. It was of two lions making love. There was so much strength and power evident in their lovemaking that it touched me somehow. They both appeared to be roaring, for all I know they might just have been panting, but it looked so good to me, Josh. They were the rulers of their land, and she was the queen, and the king was driving them both in pleasure. It's a mental image that always gets me wet just thinking about it. I often imagine myself as that lioness, being serviced by my king, and feeling so regal and powerful." "That's a pretty powerful image, "Josh said, "But honey, didn't we just do that?" Kayla smiled. "Yes and no." "Ok, I'm confused." Josh replied. Kayla grinned, "The 'yes' part to my answer, is that YES, we've made love in the equivalent human position, which I love. But women are not lionesses. That position requires me to have my face lowered, closer to the dirt, if you get what I'm saying with respect to my lion image. Both are submissive to their males, but the human position is less noble to me, though I do love it. It just doesn't fit with my lion idea. So NO, we didn't just do that. I want my head to be higher than that position allows when I'm kneeling, that's all." Josh nodded and thought a bit, and said "Kayla honey, It's been a long morning, and I checked half my IQ back out there in the dust when I saw you take your bikini off. I think I forgot it to pick it back up." Kayla sighed as she went on, while Josh played very delicately with her clitoris. She was amazed that he could do that without it feeling too much to be pleasurable, but she stopped his hand so that she could say everything. She whispered, "You'll have to bear with me for a little while longer, Josh. My fantasy is also a bit of a dream for me. I think you're the one, but it's way too early for us to even talk about the whole thing. Once I do tell you, you'll understand why, and then it will be up to you, really." The swell of him in her hand told her that the thought of it was at least somewhat interesting to him. He pressed harder on her as well. "Come on, Kayla, it's me. Say it so that I can understand, and I'll help you no matter what it is. If I'm so special to you, then tell me." Kayla thought about it and nodded, "You're right. I just feel really self-conscious trying to tell you. The place is as important to me as the guy -- you. And all of it relates to the act, which is that I'd like to try it in a different place with you, but it has to be within the context of the other things. I want to feel like that lioness that I saw. I guess you could call this a nutty Kayla alert, but it's important to me in a few ways. I've never done that for real before with anyone, though I've always had the thought of it. So if we do this, I soppose that I'm offering you a different virginity and a place to actually leave your semen inside me, at least until the pills begin to work. There's more to it in terms of why it's important to me," she said, kissing him for a moment, "It's the act, in that place -- since it must be outside, and since I want to feel like the queen of all that I survey -- and I don't just mean from here to your desk," she smiled. "I'd like some sort of vista, if it's possible." She looked at Josh, and she could see that he was thinking about it. "There's more," she said cautiously. He rolled onto his back, pulling her onto him. "Holy cow," he said, "More,... Go on, honey. I need to know what I need to do for you." Kayla looked at him and swallowed hard, wondering if this was anywhere near the time to mention this. But then, she supposed, none of the rest of the way that this had gone between them had been anything like what she'd ever had an idea about. They'd seemed to just land on the track with the gas pedal mashed down and away that went. "As it stands, Joshua," she said quietly, "we can go in a few different directions, the way that we are here. It's still not too late to change course. We can even get all the way to the 'M' word like this without much effort, I don't know for sure. Ask me the right way and at the right time, and I'll agree, I know that I would, if that's what you wanted from me, and you do your best for Jilly and me." Josh looked at her and knew what she was saying. He drew a breath, "Go on." "I guess that I'm saying that if you agree to do this with me in the right place, and the right way, well, as crazy as it might sound, that -- to me -- is like saying the same thing, only without a ring. What I'm saying is that I'll for damn sure mean it if we do that, and I can't see myself doing that with anyone else, so if we like it, we'll do that more, but the first time, ..." She looked away, blinking a little, but turning back to him quickly, "You'd better mean it if you agree because I'll be saying forever if we do that. The ring can come before then or not long after, but right then, to me, it'll be just as important as the stand-up thing, and maybe more. I've had this fantasy for a long time. I knew even then that if I had somebody like that for me, then that man was the one -- I just never saw his face until the other night when I dreamed of it." He noticed that Kayla looked just a little upset. "And yes," she said, regretting it all now, "I know it's a stupid idea." Kayla began to pull away and lift herself off him, but she couldn't. "I'll let you up if that's really what you want in just a minute, Kayla," Josh said. "I'm leaning toward this in a big way, but you can't forget the million other things here." Kayla began to struggle, since her interpretation of the way that he'd begun told her that she'd been an idiot in telling him something that she carried so deeply. "Just hear me out," he said, "and then you can kill me, or knee me in the pills or go and cry and feel stupid. But that's not what I need from you right now." "Oh, yeah? " she said through her teeth from the effort as she fought against him, "tell me your last wish then." "I want to marry you," he said quietly. He'd have said it a little louder if it weren't for the long gray clouds on the horizon of his mind. Kayla struggled on for another half-second before she froze. The signs of her fight in her face disappeared and she stared into Joshua's eyes. Kayla was almost afraid to blink, "Did you just say, ..." "Yes," he said, "I did, but I have a big problem. Half of my problem is the dump-truck full of issues that we've got with vacations, jobs, tiny little details like our different nationalities, what Rosie is going to do with this place, and that sort of thing. And the other half of my problem is a girl that I'm in love with who still has both a blindingly fast reaction reflex and the desire that she maintains to kill me with some sort of regularity." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 12 Kayla moved herself up far enough to look down into his face. She looked for a long moment and then she leaned down to kiss him very softly, meaning every second of it. She laid her head on his chest and said, "Tell me." He drew a breath, doing his best to push the clouds away and wondering why they'd chosen this moment to seem to need to make their appearance, "I want to get something settled about this place, Kayla. Once I know that, I need to figure out what I'm going to do to earn a living, since, - once my last month's pay and my vacation pay runs out, I'm unemployed and broke, other than what I've got in the bank. Since I love you and Jilly, can you maybe see why something like this would bother a man like me?" Right then, inside his mind and all the way into his heart, the gray clouds let go and it began to rain. Cold, forceful, and wind-driven rain, pushed by a wind a thousand miles deep out of the prairies, the November kind that finds every gap in a man's clothing and carries a chill that lasts long after a hot bath because it was just on the verge of freezing into sleet when it found him. "If I didn't have those swords hanging over my head, I'd be ready to do whatever you wanted. I think that I understand the significance of what you've told me, but how can I offer anything right now? I can't agree like this." Before she could say anything -- before she could even think of anything to say, Joshua eased her off of him and Kayla found herself lying on her front on his bed as he walked to his desk, lit a cigarette, and sat down heavily. Kayla was confused, "Josh? What just happened here?" He looked out through the dirty glass and shook his head. "The reality of our situation just landed on my chest, and the irony has just become more than I think I can bear. For once in my life, I've actually fallen in love so hard that I can't even think straight, and I can't even afford to play." He looked down at the flooring and fell silent. When he didn't move for over a minute, Kayla began to feel uncomfortable. Then she felt something else. "Put that thing out," she said flatly. Josh looked up with a slightly surprised expression, as though he'd thought that he'd been alone here. "How the hell is it possible that you can go all over the world to places that I've barely ever heard of and you can't follow directions?" Kayla asked, "Joshua, I'm not big on this, but if you love me -- if you love any sensitive part of your own body, then come back to bed." He didn't move. He only looked at her sadly. Kayla wondered if he could still understand her. "Joshua, please,..." she said quietly, "I'm begging now. Please come back here to me. You already feel like you're three thousand miles away. We need to talk, but even before that I need to tell you something. Please? I'll get on my knees if you want, but please come here." Josh suddenly came back to himself and the image that he saw in his mind of Kayla on her knees was too much for him. He looked at the cigarette in his hand going largely unsmoked and he turned to stab it out viciously in the ashtray. He stood up and he walked to her. It was only about four steps, but in that second and a bit, she had time to admire him and to decide some things as she felt for him and how he might feel as well as how she felt too. Kayla's resolve hardened to something approaching steel as she waited for him to get settled. She stood up and stepped to the top of the bed, grabbing his pillow to place it lengthwise against the headboard. His blue eyes followed her motions. "Lie back," she said, and it wasn't a request. When he'd complied, Kayla stepped back to where she'd been and slapped his ankles apart. He moved them. "More," It was all that she said. Seeing the space that she wanted, Kayla climbed onto the bed and positioned herself. There was a bit of awkwardness over what to do with his genitals, but she solved it by pointing his penis toward him and being careful with how she positioned her ribcage so as not to put too much weight on his testicles while allowing his manhood to nestle in between them as much as possible. She wished at least for the moment that she was a little larger, but then she remembered what he'd told her about her tits, so she surmised that they would have to do. She settled her upper body weight onto her elbows on either side of his hips, deciding that if she was crushing anything, that he'd point it out to her. Joshua said nothing. Kayla thought for a moment. "Listen to me, Josh. I might not know all of the details of your life, but I'm just learning, aren't I? I do know enough about you to tell you that I want you. I want you in my life. I don't know how I managed it, but it seems to me that ever since I got out of high school, all that I've ever done is make bad choices and the wrong decisions every fucking time. I've had lots of time to think it over, and I still don't know how it's possible for me to have done that. I mean, even if you flip a coin, you're bound to come up heads at least some of the time, but that never happened to me. In all of that time, only two things have gone well for me. One of them is a beautiful little girl and the other is a slightly scuffed-up but otherwise wonderful man, and I can't think that I did anything to deserve either one of them." She looked hard at him. "But I'm not about to question the only luck that I've ever had, or just walk away because I don't know how it's going to work. The fact here is that it has been working." Her eyes fell to his abdomen. "All I know is that, for the first time that I can even remember, I'm not unhappy. I'm not murderous, or mean-spirited, or bitchy, or snarly, I'm happy," she said, her voice beginning to crack as she looked up at his face. "And that's all your fault," she croaked. "I know that there are so many things in front of us. I know that there are going to be issues because of where we're from, and what Aunt Rose is going to do with this place, but,.." She sobbed for a moment and then her eyes blazed wetly at him, "I don't fucking care! I need you, Joshua, that's all I know. None of it makes sense, but you and I are the same somehow. We're just different in how we face the world. I'm probably just louder about it than you are. But that doesn't change what's between us. I even know that I'm the girl of your dreams, if you want to call it that. I still can't imagine why, but you've told me enough so that even I have to get the message sometime, and I know that you were made for me, as far as I'm concerned. All of the men that I've ever been with just want to lie on me or grab me and grunt while they bang away until they squirt. That's it. Done. That's all they know. And then they tell themselves that they're great lovers. It's not even about me to them and I know that. They actually believe what they tell themselves! Josh, for the first time in my life, I've made love to somebody and meant it because you did. I love how we slow right down to almost nothing and we talk, Josh! We talk to each other and we're still screwing. I love how it feels when I look into your eyes while you're inside me and I know that I'll need that from you forever, because there's nobody like that for me. Not like you, Joshua, and I know that you feel the same way about me. Neither one of us can help it and we'd be even more stupid if we throw this away now." She sniffled and wiped her tears for a moment and her voice became a broken whisper. "Don't pull back now, Joshua. I don't care what we have to do. I'll pack up Jilly and follow you if I have to. I'll move to Canada, I don't care, anything. You said that you liked the feeling of having a family. Well I hate to pull this card out of the deck now, but what do you think Jilly wants? If she was here right now, ..." Kayla looked at them both and shook her head a little, "Well once she got her eyes back into her head, she'd tell you that she likes the idea too. She's already asked me if you'll be her father. I know the way that she thinks. It's not totally relevant to you and me, but it couldn't be more relevant to her. Joshua, since her parents died, that girl has never even looked at a man, other than to maybe make sure that he wasn't about to step on her, never mind look a man in the eye. So maybe you can figure out what you might mean to her when she holds your hand or wants to kiss you goodnight. That's never happened before. But what's between us is what has to be there first before she gets what she wants out of this, and I can't imagine going on without you." She shook her head, "Shit, and it's only been less than two weeks! For God's sake, Josh, don't give up. We'll figure something out. Look, I just received the papers yesterday, the first mail that I've gotten since we moved here." She sniffled, "I haven't told her that it's done yet, but I've adopted Jilly. I was going to tell her, but she came up with how she still misses her parents and that just made me decide to choose a better time to tell her, though it's what she told me that she wanted back in Phoenix. As far as the world is concerned, I'm not really her aunt anymore, and her last name is now Fraser because I'm her mother now. That took a long while, so I really don't care if I have to adopt my very own Canadian goldfish if it comes down to stupid papers because I'd do anything now." She stopped as a thought came to her. Joshua had been sitting back and staring at Kayla. He knew that she was right. He hadn't actually given up on anything, but he had been feeling very overwhelmed when it had hit him. Right now, he felt even more overwhelmed but in a very different way. He watched Kayla as she struggled with something that she wanted to say, her lovely face lost in thought as she seemed to be looking at his navel or something. Her long red hair spilled around her head and he could feel it whenever she moved just a little. There was no choice in anything for him and he knew it. She was the one for him, and if she wasn't there was just no point anymore, was there? "I'm not giving up, Kayla," he said quietly, "I was just feeling flattened by everything." He exhaled, "I don't think that I can be accused of being a genius, but I'm not stupid either." "Alright then," Kayla whispered as she looked up at him, "You're mine, right?" Josh had to refocus. "Huh?" "I said, you're my man, aren't you? I'm asking you if I have your scarred and beat-up heart. Or is that too hard a question for you now?" He nodded, "I've never thought in those terms befo -- " He nodded. "Yes," he said, "I'm yours if I've got you, and I think you've already said that." She smiled just a little for the first time since this had begun and she nodded once, "Oh, I'm your girl, Joshua, don't you worry about that." She moved herself around a little experimentally and found that she could just kiss the end of his penis. She did that once slowly in spite of the lingering taste left behind by the condom. "Do you know why I just did that?" she smiled. "For all of the reasons that you might expect, Josh. But also, I did it because I can't help but want to. I've never had the inclination with anyone else, to tell you the truth, but with you, I just can't help but want to. So we have a million things in front of us. Most of them, we don't even know yet because we haven't identified them, let alone think of how to overcome them. But I'm a logical girl when I'm not crazy, so I'll deal with what I can identify as an issue first and then I guess that I'll work outward from there." She looked down, struggling again. The absurdity was almost sublime and ludicrous at the same instant when she realized that she was looking down at the his penis there between her breasts. Then again, she thought, there was this side of it as well, and it changed nothing. She looked up. "Marry me." There was a pause while Joshua made sure that he'd heard it. "I mean," she said, "Joshua, will you marry me?" "Yes." He replied instantly, "but wh-" "Never mind for now. You said something like that before, but I'm being very definite here," Kayla smiled in reply, "This is the first thing that I think we need to nail down. It doesn't matter what we decide to do or where we'll live. I just wanted to be sure of that one thing. Now that I have your answer, I can move forward myself. We'll have a talk with Rose at dinner tonight, and that'll be a start, at least. Now I don't have to worry so much about Jilly's feelings and whether you'll disappear -- even though I already knew that you're not that type." She crawled up onto him slowly, "So now that we're clear on that one little detail, I want each of us to make some promises to the other. I've seen for myself how a marriage becomes a drag while I've listened to some of the women at work, and I just know that at least some of that unhappiness is due to failed expectations. I just don't think that they knew that there might be someone else who was disappointed besides them. So I think I want to tell you my hope that what we have doesn't fade, at least not much, and I promise you that I want and need a really good life with you out of bed and in it. Say you'll do your best and I think that we can move ahead to figure the rest of this out." The promises took a little while and there was some demonstration required from both sides of it. Afterward, they were just thinking that they had better get up and decide what the overall options might be for them when the phone on Josh's desk began to ring. It was a second number on Rose's line and she only activated it with the phone company when Josh was there. They looked at each other. Josh ran down the very short list of people who he had even had a chance to give this number to and it came down pretty much to Rose herself. Kayla got up to answer it. The conversation was short, and it had been Rose who'd called. "Aunt Rose is bringing home dinner, and Jilly's staying the night at Margarita's. I'll have to go and pick her up in the morning before Margarita heads off to open the cantina. My aunt told me not to do anything stupid." Josh was a little confused, "Huh? What does that mean?" Kayla smirked, "It means that we'll have to pick this up again later, since she's on her way, and I'm really beginning to wonder about my aunt and whether she's got this place wired or something." She smiled a little crookedly as she came back to bed, "She told me to keep using condoms and not to forget, no matter how carried away you and I get." She reached across Joshua and hung halfway off the bed. The sight of the orchid on that one cheek was more than he could withstand and he made her laugh with his kisses there and the direction that they seemed to be headed in. She amazed him with her subdued but still very pleasing squeal and he filed the detail away, now knowing a place where she was very ticklish. Kayla rolled back onto the bed and almost ended up lying on his front, but she grinned as she held a condom packet aloft. "Come on, she said, "we've got just about enough time to follow instructions." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 13 Rose's mouth dropped open. "Poker? I thought it was just supposed to be a social sort of get-together." The three of them sat at the table in the loft surrounded by containers of the Chinese food that Rose had brought home. "Yeah," Kayla smiled, "That's what it'll be. It's just going to have a poker game as the focal point, that's all." Rose shook her head, "I haven't played poker in donkey's years. I doubt I can remember how. Why do you want me to go? I can take care of Jillian while you and Joshua go." exclaimed Rose over the table as she decided whether or not to try one of the other dishes. "Rosie," Josh explained, "I can't go. It's a lady's poker night. I don't qualify. And even if I was allowed to go, I wouldn't understand all of the stuff that you guys talk about anyway. All that comparative, exponential superwoman stuff." he said with a smile. "Way above my head." He grinned, "I'll look after the Jilly and Daisy while the two of you have some fun, ok? What's the worst thing that could happen?" Rose looked at Josh evenly, "The volunteer Fire Department is number three on the speed-dial on the house phone." Kayla threw in her plea as well. "C'mon Aunt Rose. It sounds like fun, and I don't know the first thing about it. I need you to keep me from losing my shirt." "And I'll pay you fifty bucks if she comes home without it." Josh's laughter was cut short by Kayla's elbow in his ribs. He winced, "Not that kind of poker, huh?" "Alright, I'll go. It does sound like fun anyway." Rose said as she made her choice from among the various dishes. "Think you can handle them both, Joshua? Jillian and Daisy?" "I'll be ok, neither of them needs diapers, so that's the hard part done, right?" Josh gave his best clueless grin. The women groaned. "Anyway Rosie, you guys ought to have a nice evening out. Neither of you have gone anywhere besides the cantina since Kayla and Jilly arrived and you're both on vacation, and ..., " He lowered his voice, even though Kayla was sitting right next to him, "Kayla wants me to spend some time with Jilly and vice versa. She wants to see whether Jilly can keep me in line or not." "Well I don't see why she couldn't, "Rose said, "She's seven, after all." "Ow. That's a bit harsh, isn't it?" Josh asked in a wounded way. "I've told you before, Joshua, but you just don't listen. You always make these self-depreciating remarks. All you do is put yourself down, and it doesn't suit you. You leave the gate open long enough, boy, something's just bound to walk in." She nodded, "That's all I'm saying." "So what's on the agenda for you and Jilly?" Kyla asked, "You could always just play one of her PlayStation games for the whole time, but I was hoping for something a little imaginative from you." Josh thought back to what had happened a few days before when he'd been around the back of the driving shed to get some hose. He'd walked by a square projection in the structure that stuck out and though he'd been by there a hundred times, he'd suddenly stopped and looked back at it, wondering. Later on, he'd been in the shed and seen nothing that fit that thing. There was no room there, only a wall behind Sam's big old tool boxes. He'd walked back outside and looked again. Coming back into the shed, he'd stared at the lines on the wall and moved the toolboxes aside .When he'd opened the doors that he'd found, they led him to that room. And what was in it. He'd been busy ever since, and he'd gotten a few things together. Baby-sitting Jilly was just the thing. Kayla had said that they ought to spend time together, and while Josh could pass an evening playing on a game system, what he had in mind would be a lot more fun for Jilly. He might even enjoy it as well. "Well I do have something in mind," he said, "but I can't tell you what it is. I know that if I do, you'll give me a ton of perfectly logical reasons against it and I'll end up losing at anything that we play for the whole evening, so don't even ask. We'll have more fun my way." The conversation ran to what had transpired between Joshua and Kayla earlier and Rose just stared from one to the other. "So you want to get engaged? Is that what you're telling me?" "Yeah," Joshua nodded, "The way that we saw it, there wasn't enough for us to worry about." "What are you going to do about a ring, Josh?" Rose was thinking that, under the circumstances, she could lend him the engagement ring that Sam had given her a long time ago, at least until he could get her something better. "I dunno, "he said, with a shrug, "I was thinking that I ought to practice alternating between looking overcome with joy and blushing shyly for when Kayla puts it onto my hand. She's the one who proposed." Kayla was about to counter that Josh had broached the subject first, but her aunt was laughing too hard. When she could manage a sentence, Rose just grinned at Kayla, "That's my girl." Rose thought for a minute and said, "Well, if that's how it's going to be, then I think that you ought to give some thought to it -- and then some thought to Jillian. She's had some kind of rough ride for a life that most kids never do. I'm not sure what to advise, to tell you the truth. But if you're serious, it might be better to just involve her, and depending on what she shows you, it might just be best to start living it." "What do you mean. Aunt Rose?" Kayla asked. "Well for starters, Kayla, if she seems to be alright with it, then you ought to think hard about just dusting your man there off and moving him into your home, "Rose said, "But see how the next couple of days go and tell her what you've got in mind, anyway." They discussed what could be done with the ranch and there were several options. Rose sat and felt a little overwhelmed until Josh held up his hand. "Listen. The fact of the matter is that it basically comes down to running the place or selling it. You've said that you wouldn't mind trying to get it to go, but Rosie, I have no idea about that." He got up from the table and walked to his desk, "But I do have an idea about asking somebody that I know and trust. If it's not a big imposition, I'd like for him to come out for a few days and look. He'll be able to tell us what's what at the very least." He rolled his eyes, mostly for his own benefit, "He's always been able to set me straight -- no matter if I wanted his advice or not." Josh smiled as he picked up the phone, and then decided that he didn't feel like squishing the receiver to his ear for very long in the loft, so he punched the speakerphone button and set the receiver down. He stretched to grab his wallet and fished out his long distance card. Kayla and Rose looked at each other and then at Josh as he punched the second listing on his speed dial and then all of the required subsequent digits, finally adding the number that he wanted. He glanced at them and sipped his beer. "Who are you calling?" Kayla asked him. He lit a cigarette and inspected his fingernails. "An old friend of mine." The other end picked up at the fourth ring. The voice sounded like a human rock crusher. "Brisebois. Go ahead." Josh smiled. "Hey, Jim! You still haven't learned any telephone manners after all this time on civvy street. I'm surprised that Bell will still let you use the system at all, frankly" he said cheerfully. "Taylor! Is that you? You ignorant, misbegotten, illegitimate spawn of an albino ape and a confused syphilitic sheep! How the hell are you?" The gravel voice on the other end began to chuckle. Rose and Kayla exchanged glances, their eyebrows climbing. Josh laughed. "I'm so pleased that somebody still loves me, Jim. How are you doing these days? What's the weather like back in T.O.?" There was a grunt from the speaker. "I'm not in Toronto. You know I live in Vaughn, you stupid shit. I'm ok, I guess. I'm bored out of my fucking mind is all. The weather here sucks. Hot, sticky, the same shit every year. Where are you? Out in the desert again, last I heard. Why you go there when you can have all the heat you want for free right here is beyond me. Then again, you always were eight cylinders running on five." Josh was looking down, shaking his head with a smile. He'd forgotten the way that they'd bantered sometimes, and with the phone on speaker, ... He just knew there would be hell to pay for this somewhere. He opened the small fridge and took out two beers. He opened them and handed them to the astonished women. "I love you too. See, the reason that I'm here, and not there, is that out here, I can have the hot without the sticky. It's dry here, y'know? Sweat actually dries here and keeps you cooler. It's a wonderful invention that they call an arid climate. You ought to try it sometime." Josh snorted, "And you call me stupid. Hey, I was wondering. If you're sufficiently bored, why not come and visit me? The beer's ok here, and the company is pretty grand too. Now before you answer in the mellifluous fashion that has made you famous all over the globe, I must point out that two of the finest-looking women in the entire state of New Mexico are sitting in front of me, and you're on speakerphone." Rose and Kayla smiled and chuckled. "Taylor," the voice growled, "what's this about? I'm listening, and you know I have a short attention span." Josh leaned against the edge of the desk. "Jim, I have a small problem." The roaring laughter out of the phone reminded Kayla of tires spinning on a dirt road. "Now that is an understatement if I've ever heard one, Taylor. That's one hell of an oversimplification," Jim chuckled, "but hey, a journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step, they say. At least you recognize a tiny part of your trouble. So what's gone wrong THIS time?" Josh sighed as he spoke, "My friend has an old ranch. I'd love to help her with it, but I don't know shit about this stuff, and I can't even tell her if it's viable. It hasn't been worked in years as far as I can tell." "That's it?" the voice sounded a little disappointed, "That's what you called me and woke me out of a pleasant little daydream for? Shit, your life sure has slowed down to a crawl, then." Josh grinned mischievously, "Well there is more..." "Ok, NOW we're getting someplace," the voice rumbled, "Go on." Josh smiled, "Well I keep trying to get milk out of the wrong animal, too. Apparently there are two kinds of cattle. I never read the manual. The ones I pick either just want to kill me, or follow me home. I can't imagine what's wrong." There was a long sigh down the wire. "Nothing's changed, I see," the voice said, "The root of any of your problems is always the same thing, Taylor. You're a lazy shit. I know you so well. You took one look at a herd of cattle and decided to take what looks to you to be the easy way out. Rather than try to tangle with one udder and four teats, you're hanging onto one big thing and it's the wrong one. Now that I've solved your difficulty, is there anything else that I can do for you today?" "Seriously, if you can come down for a week to advise us," Joshua said, "I'll put you up and kick for half the fare. I can promise a change of scene, some nightlife in town, you get to ride my 1942 Harley, and you get to see my vapid, smiling face. Oh, and I do know where they hide the women around here. What do you think?" "You want me to go there to teach you how to milk a cow?" "No," Josh said dryly, "I need your help and advice on how to tell if this ranch can run, and maybe how to begin to do that so that my friend doesn't have to sell it. Milking a cow can't really be all that hard, can it?" There was a groan. "Taylor, I'm trying to put this in words that you might understand. Cattle - the female variety -- do not, as a rule, respond favorably to requests that they just pour their milk into the bucket for you, no matter how sweetly you might ask them." "Well, what if you -- " "No, "the weary voice added, "not even if you compliment them, Taylor." Rose and Kayla began to laugh. The sound of it caused the owner of the voice to remember that there were others present. "How many head of cattle are there now?" the voice asked wearily. "None yet," Josh replied, "but --" "Thank God," came the reply, "You're serious? You need to know about getting a cattle operation going?" "I'm serious," exhaled Josh, "What do you think?" There was a slow chuckle out of the speaker for a moment before Brisebois answered. "I think you're nuts, but then I've always maintained that position whenever anybody mentions you in passing. But if you're serious and need an opinion, I'm there, seeing as it's you. I can't stand this place in summer. I need a break from the boredom. At least I can go there and kill you in peace without the distraction of paperwork for once. Give me details." Kayla and Rose had no idea what Josh was talking about, but sipped their beer in silence for the next ten minutes as Joshua gave the man directions. At last they were about done. The voice on the phone sighed tiredly, "Taylor, are there really two women with you now?" "Yes." Turning to them, he said "Say hello to Jim, girls." "Hello Jim." They chirped in unison. The voice sounded even more tired and resigned. "Ladies, please allow me to apologize for my language at the outset of this conversation. I did not know that you were listening. Joshua has once again proven with his innate and unique ability why he is such a walking endorsement for birth control. He's talked me into going there, and I'd like very much to apologize to you both in person when I arrive if I might be allowed that honor. My language was uncalled for and unconscionable. Please keep him in good spirits and health for me until then. I absolutely need him to be in fine shape when I crush his worthless skull for this. Taylor, are you still there? Pick up the receiver." Joshua picked up the receiver, and the speaker was cut off. "Still here, Jim." Josh replied. The voice lost most of its gravel, and softened. "Josh, just humor me here for a minute. I'm playing a hunch. Are you involved with anybody there, and is she present?" "Jim, what?" Josh asked, "Yes, and yes." "American national? Are there dependents?" "Yes," Josh replied, "What's this pertaining to?" "I need to tell you what I've heard Joshua. There's a warning order coming down. Soon." Joshua's face froze, still holding the grin that he had, but he stared at the night sky through the windows at the far end of the loft for a second. Then he said quietly, "I just got back. Ok, if you can, I'd appreciate it if you could check on my status before you leave. Right now would be a bad time, and I was only advised verbally." He could hear the older man's smile as she spoke. "Where did you think I was going with this? I'll do better than that. I'll try to advise somebody of your change of dependent status when I get back. I think that I can get the forms for you to fill out while I'm there, but I'm not sure. I'll need names and personal info when I get there. Now put me back on speakerphone." Josh complied, and sat back. "Go Jim." There was a pause before Brisebois's voice picked up cheerily. "Uh, Taylor has informed me that one of you is in some small way what he might -- purely in a fit of fantasy - define as a 'significant other'. If this is correct, and not a figment of his diseased mind, please identify yourself to me if you would be so kind." Kayla stepped forward looking at Josh, who smiled to her and nodded for her to speak. "Hello, uh, Jim, I'm Kayla Fraser. How are you?" Brisebois chuckled happily. "I am fine Ms. Fraser, however I am truly sorry. I have for years tried to shield the women of the world from our young Mr. Taylor. Unfortunately, he is an adult, and I can no longer hold him back as effectively as I once could. He has chosen to cross an international border to prey upon defenseless elements of fine American femininity such as yourself. I look forward very much to meeting you, Ma'am. You must be very courageous indeed. Taylor!" "Yes Dad." laughed Josh The growl was back in that voice instantly, "There is no way, Taylor, that you can stop me from going to see you now. I absolutely need to meet the young lady who surely has the bravest heart of any woman on the planet, one who has taken the place in your heart that I thought would always belong to your own right hand," he chuckled quietly. Kayla and Rose burst out in laughter. "I'll see what I can do, Josh, but I'll need info when I get there, as I said. And some kind of map of the place could prove to be of use. You remember what they are? Maps are pieces of paper that show a two-dimensional symbolic depiction of an area of land. See what you can come up with and have it ready. Out." Josh said. "Bye Jim." The line went dead. Rose walked closer to Josh and said, "What was that all about?" Kayla asked, "Who was that, Josh?" Josh remained fixated on a small moonlit cloud for a second before he came back to himself. "I'm sorry, what?" Josh still leaned against the desk looking at something beyond the horizon. As Kayla and Rose sat down again, he looked at them both and smiled. "That was an old friend of mine, Jim Brisebois. When I took a release, he opted for retirement, since he has the time in. He's the meanest man I've ever known. That's why I love him so much, I guess. I wanted to ask you first Rosie, but then I decided that he can stay with me in the loft while he's here. He'll think it's a palace anyway. I invited him for his ability. Now hear me out Rosie, ok?" Josh pulled on his beer, and went on. "You're stuck with a decision that you need to make about this place. You can live here, but it's not doing anything to earn its keep, and I think there are still taxes to be paid regardless, so it might as well be doing something for you. To make it go in any way will need advice and organizational skills that I can't provide. I can do the grunt work, but that's pretty much it. Jim comes from ranching stock out west back home, so he'll know what has to happen to make it work, or even if it can be made to work. The other main talent that he has lies in strategic ability. He's got a real knack for turning hopeless shit into a plan. I've invited him down because I really want to see him again for one, and he could use a break from the boredom of retirement that I suspected has been bothering him. That conversation confirmed to me that I was right. So he'll be here in a few days. I want to show him the place if that's all right with you, and he can provide you with a good assessment to help you in your decision. If you decide to work this ranch, he can also help with all kinds of useful advice, and I'm hoping, put together a plan with you to achieve the best chance at success on the start up. Forgive me for being forward with all of this, but you don't seem to be making any real move toward a decision here, and the place needs to be doing something besides growing weeds. It's only for a week. If you're put off by him at all, I'll just keep him hidden away, ok?" They all looked at each other for a few seconds. Rose spoke first with a sigh. "You're right Joshua. I have been procrastinating. I was hoping that a miracle would happen if I could get us all here. I do need to come up with something soon, or just sell it." Josh reached across the table, and grasped her arm as he smiled at them. "A miracle has happened. I'm happy and so are Kayla and Jilly. But I also know my limitations. You had a great idea and I thank you for it." He winked at Kayla. "We just need to figure out how to get it to lift off and fly. Jim can help a lot with that. There are so many things that we need to figure out. With his help, we might have a few less to worry about for now." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 13 Kayla spoke with concern in her voice. "Josh, he sounded pretty rough to me, -" Josh laughed. "He can be. He can be one mean son of a bitch, but then I tend to put off a lot of people at first glance myself, don't I? And anyway, he won't be that way to you. Underneath, he's the best person that you'd ever want to meet. He's the absolute perfect gentleman, and he has the biggest heart I've ever known. When he gets off that plane though, I'll be wearing earplugs. He might even want to kill me, depending on the prevailing wind direction, temperature, and other atmospheric conditions at the time. I never could predict what would set him off on me, but I've cheated death so far, haven't I? As soon as he gets one look at this place, he'll come around pretty quick and get on board. He was already beginning to champ at the bit even on the phone. I just don't know if I'll survive it once he hits his stride." "Joshua what's wrong?" Kayla asked. "It looks to me like something's bothering you." He kissed her and sighed. Looking back toward the horizon, he said. "Nothing for now. It's another thing that I don't want to talk about. Please don't ask me about it now. That other stuff you heard was me filling him in that I now have somebody that I want listed as my dependents. I still have papers there for things like life insurance. That way, if I get run over by a bus, they'll actually have to pay somebody, I guess." "Who was your beneficiary until now, Joshua?" Rose asked. "Well, I really didn't have anybody when I enlisted, so I just made my Mom the beneficiary, since she had to put up with me. When she died, I just switched it over to you, Rosie." Rose was touched, "Well thank you for the thought, Josh, but you change that, as that man said. If you two are serious, then I think you know what you ought to do in case something awful happens." Kayla was shaking her head, but Joshua grinned, "Well, if you're going to put up a fuss about it, then Daisy will be a rich hound some day." ---------------------- Rose had gotten up and walked down the stairs from the loft after bidding Josh and Kayla goodnight before she'd walked together with Daisy through the darkness. They'd passed through the halo of the light that shone down from the single fixture on the front of the barn, back into the gathering darkness that grew around them as they left that halo behind and neared the house. She'd opened the door and Daisy had gone in ahead of her to look for her waterbowl and have a drink before lying down at the foot of Rose's bed to let out the characteristic loud groan that she made whenever she was about ready to sleep. As she'd done for more than three hundred and sixty-eight nights in a row since her husband's death, Rose prepared to go to sleep alone. She went through all of the same motions that she'd made every other night since then. There was only one difference tonight and she had no explanation for it at all. Tonight, she'd been about to put on her nightgown and get into the bed alone again, but she didn't. She'd undressed just as she had on all of those other nights, but for once, she'd just stood and looked at herself in the mirror by the soft glow of the light on her nightstand. She'd smirked a little at herself, thinking that it could be a lot worse, but that was about it as far as her thoughts went. Rose would never have been the kind that had much of a real thought about it, but whether she was able to admit it to herself or not, the fact was that Rose had once been a beautiful little girl who'd grown into a beautiful young woman once upon a time. Her Sam had told her so several hundred thousand times at least, but she'd always just fluffed it off, happy that he'd thought so, but never believing it. She'd allowed herself to admit that she'd been a little pretty and that was as far as she ever went. She'd never see it, but Rose was still lovely. The only difference was that tonight, she just felt a little differently, that was all. Tonight, post-menopausal or not, Rose had gotten into bed naked and she had no idea why, not that it mattered one bit. Rose looked at the ceiling from her bed. She was incredibly happy, and felt more positive about the fate of the ranch now, though she still had no idea about anything. She knew that Kayla and Jillian would be fine with Josh no matter what happened, though the prospect of the arrival of the strange man that he'd spoken to left her a little unsettled somehow. She discarded the feeling finally after telling herself that Josh had known the man for a long time and the apparent roughness of the first part of the call was easily attributed to just the joking that came from the old friendship of a comrade-at-arms. If Joshua said that he was alright, then that would be good enough for her if he came out to look around and offer suggestions, though she couldn't understand how much knowledge the man might have, since Josh said that twenty years was enough time to retire on for that occupation if one was careful. She began to think of her own life. She'd been happy for many years with Sam. He was all that she'd ever needed, all that she'd ever wanted. But now he was gone, and she was alone in her bed. She felt a tear form in her eye. She was thankful for the years that they'd had, but had lately begun to long for her own fulfillment again. She'd gladly give anything to have her Sam back, anything that she had to give for just a night in those arms and being loved by him again. She wondered what she was expected to do now. Was she supposed to just grow old and die feeling this alone? How was it supposed to go for her, she wondered. She didn't feel old and dried up, but she felt an inkling of the danger of it, for some unknown reason. Rose thought about some of the women that she knew who were around her own age. Some of them had found other men after something like this, some hadn't. The tear rolled down her cheek as she squeezed her closed eyes shut in a moment of mental pain when it came to her that her body wasn't ready to be ignored and forgotten yet, just as her mind needed to be appreciated as well. The trouble was, there wasn't anyone, and even if there was, she'd feel guilty about the thought of it. And even if she could get herself past all of the things and issues that she knew would raise their heads, ... Rose Marriott didn't think that she had the will or the drive, or whatever word she might use when she really meant the courage to try again. Her hand began to drift over her thigh until it found her dampness, and she began to trace her own outline there, partly remembering, wholeheartedly longing. ------------------ Kayla was surprised. Really pleased, but also very surprised. She and Joshua had begun after Rose had gone and they'd burned their way through a couple of more condoms. After a lot of talk and laughter, they'd ended up with her lying on his front. When his manhood had shown its interest once more, she'd surprised them both by changing her position so that she held it against her snugly and just moved and thrusted against him slowly until they'd both come. It hadn't happened at anywhere near the same time, but it had happened nonetheless. The second climax had been the cause of her amazement, since Josh had wet his finger in his semen and helped her along by inserting it into her ass at an opportune moment. She grinned at him afterward since he was chuckling. "What?" "I dunno," he said, "that was another first for me. I've never heard my name as a very long one-syllable sound like that before." "Well, I don't know your middle name, do I? If I did, I might have been able to string them all together," she said, "So what is it?" "What is what?" he asked cautiously. "Your middle name, "she said, "I need to know it now. What is it?" "Listen," he said, "I don't know your middle name either and-" "Harriet" "What?" "You heard me," she said, "My middle name is Harriet." "You're joking," Josh said. "No, I'm not," Kayla replied, "Now what's your middle name, Josh? I've freaking proposed to you, and you accepted. I think that I'm entitled to at least know the middle name of the man I'm going to marry. Now, you either tell it to me, or I'll give you another first while you're asleep tonight. You've got the same hole that I do there, and I might just want to see what it is you call out if you won't tell me your middle name." He thought it over and developed a bit of a worried look, but finally, he just looked ashamed and said it. "Earle. My second name is Earle." Kayla did her best, but ended up in a convulsed ball of laughter a minute later anyway. "Thank you," she said, "I know that took a lot out of you and I'm very sorry that I laughed. I actually feel bad for doing that, but I just couldn't help it. I might have had a chance to hold it together if you hadn't made such a big deal over it." "I didn't make a big deal out of it," he said. "Yeah," she chuckled, "you're right. I guess I was just prepared for you to make a big deal out of it. I really didn't expect you to just give in that easily. It just shows me how --" "How wonderful I am?" he asked. "Uh, no," she said, "How easily manipulated you are," she laughed, "Harriet isn't my middle name at all." Josh grinned, but said nothing. He figured that he'd have to find out what her middle name was sometime, and he could always get by with 'Earle', since it was his second name, after all. He'd just never tell her that his third name was Stanley. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 14 ***We continue now with Kayla and Joshua. 0_- ------------------- "Where are we going, Josh?" Jillian asked as they drove down the road. She sat in the back seat so that she could be near Daisy who was behind her wire mesh again. "Well, we're going to get something to eat, and I need to make a stop first. I usually just poke along because I'm cheap, and I like to save gas, but I don't know which car the girls will be taking. Rosie drives slow, and Kayla is probably a speed demon" he said as they slowed coming into town. They pulled up at the florist shop, and Josh cracked the windows down a few inches each for Daisy as they got out. Inside, he picked up two potted arrangements and a small potted flower for Jillian. They were back on the road in five minutes. Having been successful in his getaway, Josh headed for a drive-through and treated them to a dinner that he was certain that Jillian had seldom had before. She was very pleased. "Thanks Josh, this is great!" she exclaimed. "I always wanted to try this." Josh looked at her, "You've never been to one of these restaurants before?" "You mean where you stay in your car and get the food from a window?" Jillian asked. He nodded and she shook her head, "I see the commercials on TV, but Kayla always says that we have to save our money and they cost too much. How come you just didn't cook dinner for us?" He winked at her as they ate, "Well Jilly, first off, I'm just a lazy guy. Second, and probably more important, I can cook for myself, I just don't know if you would survive my cooking, 'cause I like you and all, and thirdly, just for fun." Afterward, they just drove around talking for a while. Jillian was thrilled. When they got back, Josh sat on the porch steps as Jilly ran around with Daisy. When she came back to him needing a breather, she found him smiling. "Come on," he grinned, "There's something that you need to see before it gets too dark." When he'd pushed the tool chest out of the way and turned on the shed lights, he opened the doors and Jilly stared with her mouth open. Josh thought that just that one second was worth all of the careful wrenching that he'd done over the past few days and the pain in the ass that it had been to keep this little secret from everyone -- most especially from Jillian. In the dim incandescent lighting that shone in from behind them, she stood staring at an old motorcycle -- another one. She spun in place, her hair flying in an arc around her head as she looked to make sure that the first one was still there before she looked in front of her again. It was old and tired -- and dusty as anything, but it was there, all the same. "How come it has three wheels?" she asked, looking at the sidecar. "So it doesn't fall over if you forget to put the stand down before you get off?" he asked, "That really embarrassing when it happens, and it can hurt a little when you find yourself under the bike like that." Jillian giggled. "This one's got a sidecar," he smiled, "I think they made it for when you need to give a little girl a ride and you don't want to have to be afraid that she'll fall off or burn her leg on the exhaust. It's still a little dusty, but it does run and I was wondering if you'd like a ride this evening." She gave him another of those moments where he fell in love with her again right there, just for the way that she looked at that instant. "Oh Josh," she sighed in a quiet little voice, "Can we? Please?" "Sure," he smiled, "I just have to put in the seat that I re-stuffed and fixed up after I almost broke my neck trying to vacuum and sweep all of the mouse poop out of it. I kept coming back to check, and the old tires are still holding air. We can't go out on the roads, since it's not licensed yet, but I thought that maybe we could tootle around a little. So I think that you ought to go grab your bike helmet Jilly, and while you're gone, I'll try to get it going." He'd been looking at the bike at that moment, and hearing nothing from her, he looked over and saw that he was already alone, so he pushed it out into the main part of the shed and from there out into the late long rays of the early evening light. Josh was a little amazed that it started on the second kick, since it hadn't been anywhere near this enthusiastic to be roused from its long slumber back in the shed earlier. Jilly came flying back as she got her helmet strapped on and he cautioned her about the way that she had to be prepared for a little jostling. He lifted her to get her in and she beamed at him as he got on. The old Harley's engine clattered louder as Josh fed it some gas, and drove off. They drove around the yard a little as Daisy ran around them barking in her deep voice. After a few laps down the drive and back, Josh apologized to Daisy as he put her tether on, promising not to be gone long. She watched unhappily as Josh drove up the slope and around the bend with Jillian waving to her happily as she sat in the sidecar. Josh was careful to keep it slow as they bounced along a little until they were near some standing boulders where he slowed to a stop, but left the engine idling for a minute before he shut it off, hoping that it would start again later. He scanned the ground for snakes before he lifted Jillian out. "Hey, come over here, I want to show you something cool. Did Kayla ever talk about her uncle Sam? I think you came to his funeral last year" said Josh. Jillian nodded. "I never met him, but Kayla told me that she loved him a lot." "Well this was his favorite spot in the whole world. He found it when he was a boy, and always loved to come here. Just sit right here, and face this way. Here, come sit next to me. Now close your eyes, and listen to the wind." "Is that the wind? It sounds like it's almost talking." Jillian said. "I know. I think it has something to do with those rocks bouncing the sound back at us" Josh said. After a minute more, he suggested that they'd better be getting back soon, so they saddled up and puttered back. After negotiating the incline down to the yard, they got in a few more laps before Josh pulled up in front of the house and shut it off again. As the evening came on, Josh went inside to get them some milk and a few cookies. As he was about to come back through the screen door, he saw Jillian sitting on the top step beside her playmate with her back to him. Daisy towered over the little girl, and looked down at her listening intently as she spoke quietly of her hope that Josh would stay. The words that he overheard constricted his throat, and his eyes began to fill. He stepped quickly back into the kitchen. When he was sure that he had his act together, he opened a lower cupboard, and kicked a pot gently to make a bit of noise, before he walked out onto the porch. They chatted about all sorts of things together. Jillian was most interested about riding motorcycles. Josh told her why he liked them, and assured her that it wasn't all that difficult, but he stressed the importance of safety and staying watchful on the road since most car drivers usually weren't paying attention a lot of the time. As he tucked her into bed a little later, she thanked him for all of the fun that they'd had together, and then became rather introspective suddenly. "Josh," she began, "I love you a lot. I don't have my daddy anymore. Kayla loves you too. She's like my mom now. Do you think that you and Kayla will stay together? I'd like that, because then I'd have parents again." Joshua was stuck for a minute, and composed his thoughts as he hugged her tightly. "Jilly, I'd like that very much. I didn't know how much I needed you all. It's been a big surprise to me. I don't know about a lot of things right now. There are so many things that all of the grownups need to think about very soon. But I want you to know one thing. You are so important to me. I love you too. You just don't know how much because I can't say the right words to tell you. You just need to know that I do, ok? I don't know what will happen; maybe we can be a family. I kind of want that to happen a lot, but it's too early right now to make that decision since it's not just up to me, and there's more than just myself and your aunt involved. Let's just keep on wishing for now, ok?" She nodded, and they kissed each other goodnight. Josh went into the other room and stared out the window into nothing for a long time. When he was certain that Jillian was asleep, he walked back to the SUV and retrieved their purchases from the florist. He placed one on the kitchen table in the house, one he placed on the dresser in Kayla's bedroom, and he snuck into Jillian's room to place her small plant on her nightstand. He lit a cigarette as he sat on the step looking at the old Harley with its sidecar. ---------------------------- Rose and Kayla arrived at Margarita's home, and she fussed over them as they entered. Kayla gave her the flowers that they'd brought along as a gift when they entered her kitchen. Kayla had met almost all of the players present with two exceptions. Consuela and Margarita's mother was there to the pleasure of both Kayla and especially Rose. After they were introduced, Rita introduced the interested looking stranger to them. Maggie Griffin worked at the grocery store, and was a regular for these poker evenings, a confirmed member of the 'collective' as Consuela called the group. She was very pleased to meet Kayla, and laughed as she sat down at the table. "You can't imagine how happy I am to meet you! I was there the other day when you came in with Joshua, but I don't think you saw me. I was the one who actually kept doing what I get paid to do. I'm also the only girl in the place who doesn't lose her mind and get all stupid when he walks in," she laughed. "I've spoken to him before, but not often. I never get a chance, really. I usually get pushed out of the way as soon as the Snotties spot him. I guess I'm immune or something. I always thought that he was just a nice guy who comes in once in a blue moon to do some shopping. I didn't think that he needed to be tackled or anything." She sipped her beer as everyone laughed. "God, I wish I could find a better job. I don't fit in there, and I can't stand those women. Hey, I heard that you're dating him, and I'm so glad for that. Maybe now they'll talk about somebody else for a change. Till now, every time he's in town, it's the same thing." Kayla laughed with the rest of them. "I'm pleased to meet you too, Maggie. I was afraid that somebody was going to tip over a shelf full of canned vegetables on me in there the other day. That was so strange. The girl at the checkout looked like she wanted to shoot me or something." Maggie finished her sip, and lowered the bottle. "Ah, actually, she did." The whole room erupted in laughter. Maggie continued. "When they all heard that you guys were 'official'. I thought they were gonna hang black wreathes on the door or something. I've seen more joy in the place when they announce a tornado watch. So is it true?" Kayla smiled and nodded. "Well that's great! I'm happy for you." Maggie said. "Some of them were saying that you were some slinky out of town bitch who came to steal 'their' Joshua. I also heard that you were his wife, and that this is the first time that you came around and that you'd brought 'his kid' along too, though I thought that was a pretty rude way for the Snotties to say it, not that there's much class there anyway." Kayla looked over and spoke with a trace of defensiveness in her voice, though her smile remained genuine. "Maggie, Jillian is my sister's daughter. I took over raising her when she was orphaned. I've already adopted her officially. She means the world to me, and we both just love Josh to death. I'll admit that I did a thing or two that day that might have led a few of the pointy noses in this town to conclude what you heard, but I really don't give a shit what they think. I'll neither confirm nor deny that rumor if it comes to me, but that's the truth of it. She's not his daughter, but I know that she'd love to be. I'm very happy right now, and if it goes the way I hope it does, well, let's just see." Consuela leaned on Kayla's shoulder at that point. "Uh, wait a minute here, Miss Living Legend, what kind of things did you do, exactly? I mean Rita and I know because Rosie told us, and then we peed ourselves, but the rest of the collective need to hear it for their benefit and entertainment. We pride ourselves in sharing our triumphs, you know." Kayla looked a little uncomfortably at the rest of them, but smiled sweetly as she explained. "Nothing, really. I had my prescription of BC pills filled at the drugstore, and bought a ton of condoms." The room erupted in gales of laughter. Once it had slowed a bit, Kayla went on. "The clerk looked a little slow on the uptake, so to be sure that she got the message, I dragged Jilly and Josh back to the counter to pay for some of Jilly's stuff. and then I explained that we were thinking about having another child. I didn't put it that way exactly. Josh had no idea what I was talking about." They all had tears in their eyes now, laughing and chuckling. Margarita held up a palm and struggled to speak. "Wait. I just gotta know this: Did you explain it to Josh?" Kayla shrugged, and said "Well yeah, I did later that night after we all got home. He knew something went on in the store, and asked me about it as we were on the way to the cantina. I told him that I hoped he wouldn't get mad, and promised to tell him later." Consuela jumped in, "So? Was he mad, or what?" "No," Kayla answered, "he laughed a little when I showed him the prescription,..." Rose interjected. "I heard him fall down and pee himself laughing when she dragged all the condoms out of the bag one box at a time," she said as she held up five fingers, "I took that as a good sign." The room shook again. As they settled in to play, they exchanged pleasantries and their own, less harmful brand of gossip, and the evening passed quickly. The subject to of Josh's phone call was brought forward near the end after several of the ladies had gone home. "So he's bringing this friend of his down to help my aunt decide if the ranch could be made to run again," Kayla related, "I'm not that thrilled with it. He had the foulest mouth I've ever heard on anybody when he recognized Josh, though to be fair, he didn't know that we were listening, and he really smoothed out after he did know. He asked me if it was true that Josh and I were together, and that it wasn't just a fantasy of his. He was pretty charming after that. I've learned enough in the past little while to try not to pre-judge him, and Josh said that he could really help my aunt." The three women connected to the cantina were enthusiastic, and said that they couldn't wait to meet Josh's friend. They pleaded with Kayla to be sure that Josh brought him in during his stay as they broke up for the night. ------------------------- On the drive back, Kayla's mind was churning over some details, and they didn't speak very much other than to express their enjoyment of the evening as a whole. As they pulled in, Josh stepped out of the bunkhouse, and asked if they had enjoyed their evening. He also told them that his own had gone well, and that Jillian had dropped off to sleep quickly. "Where did the sidecar come from?" Kayla asked, and before he could answer, she said, "This isn't Sam's old bike, is it?" Rose smiled, "No, this is the other one that Sam bought to use for spare parts. In all of the years since, I've never seen it again after he put it away someplace, and I know that it's never run since. How did you do it?" Josh shrugged, "A lot of elbow grease cleaning the crud out of the carburetor, some new fuel lines and the battery out of the other one. It'll need tires most of all, but they still make them in that size." Kayla was putting things together and she was just about to ask if the evening had included a ride for Jilly when she noticed the sand still clinging to the spot where some oil had dripped onto the rim of the front wheel. "The sand isn't deep here," she said, "Where did you -- " "Help me in, Kayla," Rose said, "I've never had a ride in a sidecar in my life. You'll give me a ride around the yard, won't you, Josh?" He nodded and smiled, wondering what would keep him alive after it ended, but as Kayla helped her aunt get into the sidecar, Rose whispered to her. "He's gone to a lot of work and trouble to make a little girl happy. I'm sure that she survived the ride. Stop looking like you're about to skin him for this." Kayla blinked and then she nodded with a sigh, "You're right, Aunt Rose." Rose said nothing after, but she nodded once with what might be termed as a significant glance as Josh folded out the kickstarter. As they pulled away following the dim glow of the headlamp, Jilly walked out of the house and stood with Kayla. "Please don't yell at Josh, Kayla. We had a lot of fun and he made me wear my helmet and everything." Kayla smiled down at Jilly and decided that she'd been ready to get upset over nothing and everyone had seen it coming but her, "If you're going to keep riding with him," she said with a nod, "We'll need to get you a better helmet." When Josh came back and after helping Rose out of the sidecar, Kayla put Jillian back to bed and Rose went into the house after saying goodnight. Kayla looked around and wondered where Josh had gotten to. Her head turned toward the shed as she heard him put down the tailgate on his SUV and she could just see him move to sit on it. As she turned in that direction, she saw the flare of his old lighter as he lit a cigarette and she walked over. "You here to kill me for riding Jilly around?" he asked. She shook her head, "No. I think that you must have gone to a lot of trouble for Jilly. How can I be mad at that? But I can see that something's changed. You're getting that look again. What's wrong, Josh?" Before he could answer, she felt the cause of her upset rising and this time, she knew what it was based on. "What's gotten into you? A few days ago, the only problem that you and I had was how we could arrange to fuck each other's brains out without being too obvious about it. I was under the impression that we'd decided, and that we were going to have to figure out some answers to things that could stand in the way of our becoming a family. I was pretty sure that you had the same thoughts since we seem to be on a mutual wavelength. Jilly and I both want that so much. I know that there's something really bothering you. I'm sorry Joshua. I'm in love with you, and I'm not going to let go, ever. I've never been this in love before. By comparison, I've never been happy before if this is what it's like. I think that I need you around so that I can breathe properly. Please don't tell me that I can't have you now. That wouldn't surprise me the way that my life runs, but I need to know. Please tell me what's wrong? There was more to that phone call than we heard, I saw your face! What's changed?" Joshua's body lost its tension. "Jim is well-connected even in retirement. He hears everything before it becomes official. He told me that he had heard that there was a warning order coming soon. They never bothered me before, I looked forward to them." He sighed, "Jilly told me tonight that she wants you and me to be together. She wants me to be her father." He looked up at nothing but the stars for a moment as he spoke quietly, "I can't think of anything in the world that I'd rather be than her father and your husband." Kayla's heart floated free in her chest. "Joshua, we both want that too. But what's wrong with that? I don't understand what your friend told you." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 14 Josh took a long breath. "Before I left to come here, I was advised verbally that my release was official. I never saw any documentation, though I imagined that it might be waiting in my mailbox at home by now. If a warning order comes down for my regiment, it signals preparation for impending deployment. If the release is NOT official, I can be recalled with a phone call. If they decide to do that, they'll probably contact me to notify me of it. I don't have a problem with the job; I never have, though the last time felt like I was dead but walking right at the end." Kayla felt her heart fall in her rib cage. "Does that mean that we can't be married or something? Won't they allow that?" Joshua held her away from him so that he could look into her eyes. "Of course they'd allow it; they couldn't stop it anyway." He sighed heavily, but he did smile. "Hey, you're fussing over what you don't know, so let's work on what we do know. If you'll have me as your husband, I'd marry you tomorrow. But I might still be a soldier for a time. Can you handle that? Can Jilly handle that? Is that what you want?" Kayla looked at him, and nodded through her tears. "More than anything in the world. I don't give a damn what we have to do, either. I want to be your wife if you'll have me and all of my snap decisions." Josh looked into the greenest eyes that he'd ever seen for three seconds. And then he smiled, "Then let's do it." They held on to each other for several silent minutes. Joshua spoke first. "I think we'd better tell somebody." Kayla smiled "Yes, I think that there's a little girl who wouldn't forgive us if we didn't wake her up to tell her this news." Kayla was happy and afraid at the same time. She wasn't sure what this all meant to them, but she knew without a doubt that she wanted to be Joshua's wife and the mother of his children; Jilly, and whoever might show up afterward. She woke Jillian, and asked her to come to the house with her. Jillian was afraid that something was wrong, but relaxed when she saw how happy her aunt was. Joshua began after they were all seated. "I don't know how to say this in the proper order, so if I get messed up, forgive me. Rose, you already know some of this, but what I didn't say was that Jim told me in that phone call that there's probably going to be a warning order coming down for my regiment soon. I might be recalled, I don't know. I've been struggling all day with what used to be a really easy thing for me. Jim may have more information for me when he arrives. I hope so. I need to know one way or the other. In the meantime, Kayla and I have made a decision, and if she's good with it and if Jilly is ok with it as well, then I am too." He smiled at Kayla, "Go ahead, honey, your turn." Kayla looked at Jillian and Rose, and said "I have no idea what we're getting into. This is all so fast, I don't know what to think. But I do know a couple of things. Joshua's fallen in love with you Jilly, and he wants to be your father. And he's fallen in love with me, and he wants to be my husband. I don't think I could stand it if I DON'T marry him, but if this happens, then we'll be an instant family, so Jilly, if you want this, you have to tell us so we can decide if it's the right thing to do." Jillian couldn't believe what she'd heard. They were asking her what she wanted? She screeched and flew into their arms where she began to cry on impact. They held her tightly, and Rose went to look for some Kleenex. As soon as she thought that she had a little control, Jillian sobbed at Joshua. "Josh, I really want you to be my dad. Please marry my ... mom." Jillian had said it that way because it was what she wanted and because it was how she felt. It had surprised her when it came up in her, but that was what she wanted to say. He held them tightly and said, "Alright Jilly, if you want to be my daughter that badly...I could never say no to a pretty girl, and God, there are two of you. I'm lost." Josh turned to Rose. "I don't know how to handle a lot of the things that are going to come up thick and fast from here on in. I do know that Jim will be able to help with a lot of it. Kayla, how soon do you want to get married?" Kayla thought about it quickly. "Josh, as far as I'm concerned we can do this tomorrow, but I just had one of my quick ideas. I don't need a huge wedding, and we don't really have the money or the time to set it up either. Please let me finish before you tell me what's wrong with this, ok? Aunt Rose can give me away. I think Jim means a lot to you, so if he has no problem with it, he can be your best man. Jilly can be the flower girl, and we'll figure out what to do with the others. If that's ok, I'd be happy if we could get married this week, next week, whenever." Rose grabbed Joshua's hand and placed something into it. Josh and Kayla stared at a very pretty old ring. Rose smiled, "I think you'll need this. Sam gave it to me when we were starting out. None of us were expecting this, and I know that neither of you have much money. Will it be alright?" Josh looked at Rose and said, "If this was bought for you by Sam, I'd be honored to use it. Thank you Rosie." He grinned at Kayla and held out his hand. It took her a second, but then she smirked, "I already asked you to marry me and you accepted." He nodded, "So then I think that you have to put the ring on my finger at this point, don't you?" "I suppose I could," she said as she considered, and then she grinned, "No. It won't fit on any of your fingers anyway. You put the ring on me, ok?" Jillian looked confused and Rose rolled her eyes, "Somebody put the ring on somebody, please..." Josh stood up, and sat Jillian on his chair before he got down on one knee and asked Kayla. "Please Kayla, would you be my wife? Will you marry me?" For reasons that she didn't understand, Kayla burst into tears then, but she smiled through them and answered him. "There was a time when I was Jilly's age that I knew what I'd say it this ever happened to me, ... so here goes. Yes Joshua. A thousand times over and a thousand times at once - yes." He slipped the ring onto her hand and kissed her long enough for Jillian to yawn. "Josh, if you're going to be my dad now, could you... could you sleep in our house with us instead of in the shed?" Kayla grinned at her, "I think that we'll need a bigger bed soon, but for now, I think that I can squeeze over to make a little room for him in mine, Jilly. Just promise not to come flying into the room in the morning without knocking to jump on the bed until we can get a bigger one, ok?" --------------------------- Jim Brisebois was quietly pissed off. He hated any part of commercial airline travel, preferring military transport by a huge margin. You didn't have to submit to the continual screwing around; you just had to put up with the normal hurry-up-and-wait that went with the life. They thought they'd given him a bit of a tough time at Pearson International. The only tough time about it for him was to keep from succumbing to his urge to tie the agents into elaborate knots physically. He sighed. Pencil-necked weasels were the same the world over. Feeling incredibly cramped in his seat, he looked out of the window idly. Taylor had needed help, and he'd gladly do whatever he needed for him. The list of people in his world who could make him get off his ass and jump on a plane on the basis of one sketchy phone call with no air of urgency or threat of impending death was pretty short indeed. Besides, he was bored. Retirement wasn't going well for him. Endless days of nothing and sameness in an unbroken string. He'd already thought of jumping back in a reserve role, but the thought of it seemed hopeless. Good people there, but not enough hard people, and you had to be careful not to break any of their limbs off because it was frowned upon. He caught the eye of the stewardess and asked how long until arrival. Based on her reply, he told her that he needed to place a phone call. If Taylor didn't pick up, he's just have to rent a car and kill him when he got there. He smiled at the thought. Again. -------------------------- The little girl was running to him across the market once more. Even in his dreams he had the sense of impending disaster. She ran up to him with that smiling little face. She opened her mouth to speak, but he heard only a buzz as she disappeared. Josh opened his eyes. His cell was vibrating on his belt. He gently disengaged his hand from Kayla's breast where she'd trapped it, and reached behind him. She didn't awaken. He opened the phone, and whispered, "Hello?" He could hear Jim's smile over the line. "Did I catch you at a bad time, kid?" Brisebois spoke softly, "They tell me I'm just over an hour and a half out. How about a ride? I'm on an Air Canada flight." Josh whispered, "I'll be there, Jim." He heard the click and closed the phone. It only took him ten minutes to get out of bed, leave Kayla with a kiss on her sleeping cheek, and drive quietly out to the main road. He'd seen Daisy's eyes glitter at him through the screen door of the house. You couldn't put anything past her watch, he thought, he just hoped that she'd remain quiet. ---------------------------- As they left Albuquerque, Josh's ribs were still smarting from the bear hug of Jim's greeting. Sometimes it could be hard to tell which was more of a threat to his life; his joy or his wrath. "So let me get this straight," Jim began, "It's an old ranch, hasn't been worked since Christ was a corporal, and she's thinking of starting it up again, but she's never seen it working? Does she know what's involved?" "She's a ranch girl herself from way back, but other than the chores and work that she had to do from childhood, she hasn't done any ranching for herself, though she's not afraid to try. She flies a desk 9 to 5," Josh told him. "We don't know if it's viable, if so, she could always start up with some help, and sell it, or just sell it now. We need your insight for that. It belonged to her late husband's family, though we'd have to ask her when it was last running. I've known them for 9 years, and I've never seen it run." Brisebois nodded thoughtfully. "Sounds masochistic to me. So what are you into these days, kid?" He listened to Josh's recounting of his time since his arrival the month before right up to the events of the previous evening. He silently weighed everything, and then gave Josh his carefully considered opinion. "You're out of your fucking mind Taylor. You DO know that, right?" Joshua smiled. "Oh, absolutely. Would you be my best man?" Brisebois exhaled. "Boy, I can see for myself that you've got it bad. I presume that you've given some small thought to what all of this could possibly entail. Of course I'd be happy to do this for you. Now if we've got all of the sticky shit out of the way, what's the water like?" Josh thought about it. "I don't know. I never really looked into whether there's enough places to water the cattle overall, or anything like that." "Well that's important. And you're not thinking about it is an illustration pointing to why you will always be a dumb fuck," Brisebois grinned, "but that wasn't why I asked the question. I figure that if YOU'VE been drinking it, I don't want any. Look what it's done to you!" He laughed as he looked out of the window into the pre-dawn darkness. "I got my arrangements to come here made real quick, almost too easily. I had a nap at home, and even slept a bit on the plane. Now I'm cramped and stiff." Josh smiled over at him. "We're almost there. Let's get your stuff set up in the loft, and then how about a run? It's almost time for mine anyway." He grinned at Jim's grunt of approval. They pulled up to the shed, and Josh pointed out the few amenities of the loft as they both changed into running gear. Since that consisted of shorts, shoes, and a sweat shirt, it didn't take long until they walked silently through the yard in the darkness and picked up the pace down the drive as the gloom began to fade. --------------------------- Rose was in the bathroom as Daisy gave her soft warning. She heard the SUV glide up to the shed, and walked out as the loft lights came on. Grabbing the binoculars, she stared in disbelief at the scene in the optics. Two strong men dressed, then completely naked, and then dressed again looking as though there were going jogging -- all inside of 30 seconds. "Oh my,..." When the light went out twenty seconds later, she stepped back into the kitchen, and well back from the screen door. She held onto Daisy's collar to keep her still. She was aware of their passing only because Daisy signaled it with quiet cough, though she heard them begin to run. --------------------------- An hour and a half later, Josh and Jim walked back down the drive. The day was already showing signs of being a scorcher and their sweatshirts hung limply from their hands. Jim's eyes surveyed the landscape as they went. "It's a bit different geography from what I'm used to, and a lot higher elevation," he said, "but so far I don't see anything going against the idea. I'll need to walk the land myself to get a better view in my mind and -- Jesus! What the fuck is THAT?" He stopped to stare ahead. Josh followed his gaze. Daisy stood a hundred and fifty feet away, blocking their path. She recognized Josh, but hadn't made up her mind about the stranger. She had watched their approach, and had taken a defensive spot to block the drive. She began to run directly at them. Brisebois turned to Josh, "You keep a war dog or something?" Josh chuckled. "That's the puppy. She's ok. Just relax." Daisy arrived and wagged her great tail as Josh fussed over her, and then gave Brisebois a quick inspection. Deciding that she liked what she saw, she jumped up to welcome him as well. Jim received her kisses with resignation. He'd always loved large dogs, though he hadn't had one since his own childhood. He hugged her and laughed, wiping his face with his shirt. Satisfied now, Daisy dropped back down and trotted happily back to where she'd stood earlier. She looked back and barked once deeply as the men continued to walk. A small girl came from the other building and walked to Daisy. She put her hand on the dog's side, and looked to see what her friend had barked at. Jim stared at the prettiest little pixie that he was sure he'd ever seen. A beautiful woman emerged from the same door and walked over to the little girl. She looked toward them and smiled warmly. Jim's eyes opened wider as a slow smile began to curl his lip. "Oh, Josh," was just off his lips, when a motion to the left caught his eye, and he glanced there reflexively. A woman near his own age walked out onto the porch and looked at them, a tentative smile on her lovely face. Jim Brisebois was struck dumb. For one of the very few times in his life, he had no words ready to pass his lips. They were, the three of them, simply the most beautiful females that he'd ever seen in his life, and all cut from the same bolt of heavenly fabric. They could have been the same creature portrayed at different periods of the same life. Deep red hair worn long on all three; and he could see their light green eyes from where he stood transfixed. Rose looked toward them with no small measure of wonder. Mr. Brisebois appeared to be an older version of Joshua, though as the moment lingered, she could see some differences. He stood an inch or so shorter, his chest and shoulders were slightly broader, and he had some chest hair that trailed lower. His pectoral muscles glistened with his sweat. There was no washboard stomach, but what she saw there looked to be made of flesh-toned iron. He had larger biceps and they looked to have more girth than her own thighs, she noticed - and then immediately wondered at herself where that comparison had come from. Other than his salt and pepper eyebrows, there was absolutely no hair on his head. She realized that she was staring and recovered instantly. "There's breakfast....", she said. And the spell was broken. The pixie shouted "Josh!", and ran over to them. The woman next to her turned her smile toward her older version. Rose saw her niece mouth the word "WOW" to her and felt herself blush instantly. Josh grinned at Jim, and looking down, he muttered, "Uh, it's an arid climate here, MWO. If you keep drooling like that we'll have to notify the state EPA of a spill." Jim took the hint, and grinned back as Jillian was swept up into Joshua's arms. She kissed him before hugging him tightly. "Good morning, Daddy! Thanks for bringing in the flower." Brisebois was certain he could feel his younger friend's heart pound through the ground under his feet. Josh set Jillian down, and holding her hand began his introductions. "Jim, this is my brand new daughter, Jillian Fraser. Jilly, meet Jim Brisebois. He's my very dear friend when he's not mad at me." Jillian squinted up at him, and said "Hello, Mr. Brise ... bois. Why are there so many people who want to kill Josh? My aun- my mom tries to kill him every day." Jim smiled and said, "I dunno. I've tried every once in a while to kill him for years, Jillian, though I hope you know that I'm just joking. Joshua has a rare gift like that. I used to be his boss, now he's my friend, and I don't try so hard anymore. " They walked toward the porch, the men using their sweatshirts to wipe off their sweat. "Jim Brisebois, please meet Rose Marriott. She owns this place where I've been coming every year. She's been like a mother to me, and has been my friend along with her late husband Sam for a long time now." Josh smiled, "and this is my lovely fiancee, Kayla Fraser." He paused for a split second before continuing, "Ladies, this is my very best friend Jim. He's retired from our military, where he was often a mentor to me, when he wasn't busy being the worst nightmare that I could ever imagine." Jim squeezed Kayla's hand gently, before bowing to Rose as he took her hand to kiss it lightly. "I am very, very pleased and feel myself very honored to make your acquaintances. Would I be correct to assume that you both were party to my conversation with Joshua the other day?" They both nodded, smiling. Jim looked down sadly. "Please forgive my language. It's a stupid male custom for us to be a touch crude in our own greetings amongst ourselves. I had no idea that anyone else was listening, I am truly sorry for that. Kayla, I want you to know that I believe that you must have a very brave heart indeed for loving my friend. I sat on the plane thinking of ways to warn you off diplomatically when we met, but I can see now that you should have no trouble keeping him docile. He is much more domesticated now than I've ever seen him. Overall, that's a very good thing. Um, try to keep him away from sharp objects, firearms, or anything even remotely explosive." Kayla laughed a little and tilted her head, "Sharp objects?" "In any crowd, "Jim sighed a little conspiratorially as he pointed, "there's always one kid who runs with scissors." He turned to Josh. "Taylor, I feel that I owe you an apology as well. I can now overlook your incredible lack of manners not warning me sooner that there were ladies present when you called me." He turned to the women. "I called Joshua from the plane as I was approaching Albuquerque, and he was kind enough to pick me up at the airport. On the way here, he told me of your situation, and of his own. I spent the majority of the drive doing what I am certain that most mentors would do in this type of situation. I have been bellowing at him every word for 'stupid' in my considerable vocabulary. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 14 Joshua, forgive me please. I can now see for myself that you never had a chance. The three of you are absolutely lovely. Is this some sort of tribe?" Josh smirked as he surveyed the effect that his friend was having. They melted instantly before Jim excused himself for a moment and trotted to the loft. He returned and presented Jillian with all of the denominations of Canadian coins, including the 2 dollar one that she already had. Jilly was thrilled and sat happily examining her new treasures. Jim explained the significance of each of the illustrations. During the meal, Jim asked many questions about their circumstances, and Rose in particular about the ranch, its features, what she knew of its history. He asked Josh if they could drive through it afterward. When they were done, Jim walked back to the loft to grab his binoculars and GPS. Rose turned to Josh. "Do all of you look like that? Lord almighty, how do the women ever let you out of the country? You aren't related, but you both have the same eyes, though his are kind of a steel grey to your blue. They're piercing like yours, but just as warm somehow. Does he have tattoos as well? Is he, um..." Josh laughed. "In the order that you asked: No, we don't all look the same. Jim's just always been keen on fitness. We're a very multicultural country these days, and we come in all shapes, sizes, colors, and flavors. We're like a great big Baskin Robbins or something. Our women are just like yourselves; after a little while, they get tired of us and welcome any chance to get rid of us, just kidding. I'm glad you're so enamored with his eyes, I can remember many times when they took up my entire field of view because I'd screwed something up beyond recognition, and I can assure you that they didn't look all that warm then. I still see them in my nightmares, and they're a lot colder, the way I'm used to seeing them. Unless he's hiding something from me, he doesn't have any tattoos, and I've seen pretty much all of him on occasion, since in our previous occupation, there can sometimes be a lack of privacy. Lastly, and if you love me, you'll never tell him that I told you this, but his marriage ended six years ago when we were rotated back unexpectedly, and he thought he'd surprise his wife. They'd been married twenty years and I know that he thought the sun rose and set over her. Instead, he found that she'd chosen our deployment as the time to leave him. We were driving back together and I wondered why the door stayed open after he'd gone inside. I found him standing in their empty house with her chicken-shit note. Everybody's different in that situation, but I knew how he felt. After that, he just made his adjustment. He can be a very hard man if you don't know him, but inside, he's pure gold." Josh walked off to change. They talked as Jim dressed and Josh showered. "So Rose is uh, widowed. How long?" Josh grinned at the soap in his hand. "Sam died a year ago, Jim. She's a very strong woman. I know that she misses him, but I get the feeling that she's been pretty lonely when none of us are around. Kayla and Jilly had planned to stay anyway, and she's perked up some now that she's not alone. Can I connect some dots for you, or should I just shut my mouth now?" Jim felt slightly foolish. "No, Joshua. You and I have always spoken our minds to one another. I'd appreciate your assessment." "Thanks for that. I just wasn't sure that you'd want to hear it." Josh said. "Those three, all of them, are as full of life as they appear. Each one has been kicked hard by circumstance, but with soft encouragement, they grab life by the balls and hang on for the ride. It's a common trait that they share, maybe it's part of that wonderful gene kit that they seem to have. Rose is a widow, but she's not dead. I don't know what she'd admit to herself, but I do know that she's got what looks like something of a polite interest in you. I'm pretty sure that she likes what she sees, an-" He paused in mid-sentence. "And what?" Brisebois asked. "I just had an idea." Jim groaned. "You know, you used to have the occasional pretty good idea now and then. Lately, I'm afraid of them, your last idea being to get married suddenly." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 15 ***Kayla learns about the last tattoo. 0_o ------------------- No matter what Jim said after -- no matter what threat was used, or even polite questioning, as much of a surprise as that was to Josh that it would be attempted, there was no answer forthcoming when Jim asked what Josh's idea had been. The best that he got was something as vague as if he'd asked for the exact date of the second coming of Christ. "It's just something that I was thinking with regard to Kayla and I," Josh said, "It doesn't concern you at all, Jim." Brisebois had finally just shrugged, "Do you really think that after my whole long life and the things that I've done, that I don't know bullshit when I hear it? Alright," he said raising his hands in a placating gesture, "OK, you won't talk. But when it hits the fan, Josh old buddy, it just might hurt." "All I'm saying," he grinned maliciously. ----------------------------- Rose stared as she looked at the set of keys dangling from Josh's fingers. "What -- what do you need me for?" she asked Jim, "If I knew how to make this place go, I'd already have started." "You've lived here for a long time," Josh said, "You know where everything is. I've only ridden the perimeter fence to fix it some, but I don't know the features of the land. I think it would save us some time if you went with Jim to show him the place. I'm sure that he could roll around and discover everything by himself, but that takes time." "Well it wouldn't take quite as much time if you'd been able to get me that map that I requested," Brisebois tossed in. "Rose hasn't been able to find the original survey," Josh tossed right back, "C'mon, Rosie. I could go with him, but it would just be the blind leading the ... uh, .... learned and wise one," he smiled carefully. "Besides, he'd only make me drive and he'd bitch about every little bump." Jim looked at Josh with old storm clouds gathering on his brow as he sighed heavily, "Taylor, I remind you about that urban warfare course at Shiloh when you swerved to the right and took us right off the road and broke an axle. I got a freely-bleeding lump on my head out of it and about a day and a half of paperwork just for fun afterwards." "I told you," Josh protested, "I thought that I'd seen the trigger of a roadside bomb; you know the flash-bang things they used in that course?" Jim nodded, "Yes, cleverly disguised to look like a flattened paper coffee cup. I remember." "Yeah," Josh countered, "but out there? What was a coffee cup doing out there, miles from anywhere?" "I dunno," the older man said, "but it wasn't anything other than what it looked like, was it? Unless," he mused aloud, "Unless it was placed there very craftily by the course instructors, so that the less-bright among us would jerk the wheel to avoid it and break an axle in the rocks." Brisebois suddenly looked concerned, "I think this is significant, because it indicates something which might be used against us." "What do you mean?" Josh asked. "Well how the hell would those people have known otherwise that they didn't need the expense of actual training explosives there that day? They didn't need any, did they? They knew you'd be coming by and hell, a coffee cup was good enough then, right, Taylor?" Kayla looked down, trying to hide her smile as Jim turned, "Please Rose, get me the hell away from Josh before I remember any more highlights. I'll be good. I promise I'll be good." Rose had to smile then and she just shrugged, "Alright, just let me get some jeans and boots on." -------------------------- Jim and Rose stood by the fender of the Ford. He was making sketches on the pad on the hood, and checking his GPS, noting elevations, and distances. It was all Greek to Rose, but she was enjoying the day. Jim was all that Josh had said; polite, courteous and thoughtful. She found that he was rather nice to look at as well, though he did seem to have a second sense about it and she found that her glances had to be really surreptitious and above all, quick. She was able to get a few longer looks when he grabbed his cell. When Josh picked up, he said. "Taylor. Is there Internet access here? Ok, how about a printer? Good. I need something of a topographic view, tremendous detail isn't important, but I need the features. If you can't do that, don't sweat it. I've got my laptop, and I have mapping software on it for my GPS...." He listened for a moment as Josh asked about rattlesnakes. "Rattlesnakes? Yeah," Jim growled, "we saw a couple, but I barked at them, and they buggered off. I don't have time to tiptoe around every one. I just stomp my foot and yell." Rose grinned at that, though it had only happened twice -- and it had worked. "We're gonna break for lunch in a minute. Later." That evening, Rose found herself even more impressed when Jim had asked if he could help with dinner that evening. She'd thought that it meant that he'd offered to help out and she'd agreed just because he was a lot of fun to be with and it also saved Josh from his ire, though there wasn't any more of that at all. They were only going to have hamburgers, but Brisbois had surprised her -- well, amazed her, actually, when she'd turned around to find him mixing all sorts of things into the ground beef; things that she'd never have had the thought of tossing in. She asked and Jim had only shrugged as she watched him make up the patties. When the grille was hot, he'd just taken over that chore as well, and though she'd been cooking up hamburgers for years on end, she couldn't recall ever tasting a better burger anywhere in her life. "I see you're getting on well," Kayla smiled as they watched Jim work the grille, "Nice to see you enjoying yourself." Rose smiled, "I am at that. I meet people in my job," she smiled and she shrugged a little then, "I sometimes even get asked out, but to tell you the truth, it's hard to accept. It's only been a year, Kayla. Besides, most of the men that I see don't look to be as much fun as I'm having right now." Kayla nodded, "I get it. But you ought to maybe think a little. I sure don't mean anything, and I hope that you don't take it the wrong way, but Aunt Rose, Jim's only going to be here for a week or so. And I'm not implying anything either," she said, "I just wanted to mention it. I can't offer much but ... maybe you ought to think about yourself for a change, but I think that if you could ask him, Sam would tell you to try for a little happiness, you know?" Rose nodded as she watched, trying to see if Jim was cooking the patties thoroughly without being too obvious about it but after a minute of it, he noticed and they laughed about it. When she asked, he'd smiled and said that he'd learned from the owner of a Dairy Queen many years ago how to cook patties repeatedly to perfection, and as far as the ingredients went, he'd be pleased to write down everything that he'd used later. Later on, Jim sat with the others out on the porch as he waited for his USB GPS module to acquire satellite fixes for his laptop. Rose watched as he studied the topographic map that Josh had been able to pull off the net and compared it with what they'd seen as she looked and felt a little regret that they wouldn't need to drive out again the next day for something -- he'd been that much fun to be with. But then he frowned at a few things, circling them with a pencil and making a few notes. She was about to ask when he turned to her, "Would it be a large imposition if I asked you to come with me again tomorrow, Rose? This is looking rather good to me, but there are a few things here that we didn't see and I'd really like to check -- that is, if you wouldn't mind." Rose laughed a little, "I was trying to think of something -- some part of this old place that I hadn't shown you yet. I'd love to, Jim." With that settled, Josh showed his friend the two old Harleys. Jim was astounded and insisted that Josh prove to him that at least one of them could start and run. "Hey, you want to take this one out for a little ride before it gets dark?" Josh asked, "I put the battery back in it, since I had it out the other day to run the sidecar rig for Jilly." Jim shook his head, "I rode one like this donkey's years ago and it was old then. Maybe tomorrow, Joshua, I don't know the roads around here." "Aunt Rose does," Kayla grinned, holding up a helmet with an innocent smile. Rose stared in a shock and then looked at Jim. "Well if I had a guide ..." he smiled. Rose laughed, "Fine, I'll take this as a challenge then. Just make sure you've got your phone, Jim," she said as she threw her leg over the bike and looked at him levelly, "Well?" ------------------------- The next day, they drove on in Josh's truck until they came to a little copse of trees on a hilltop that overlooked a small valley. Sitting under the trees with the cooler, they chatted over lunch. Rose looked at him. They'd been having a wonderful time, laughing and joking, and actually getting things done, too. His questions had drawn a lot of information out of her that was important to him for his eventual advice to her. Most of it she just knew, but didn't realize its importance as to whether the ranch could work or not. He told her the reason for each of his questions, and indicated how the answers fit for him. There was a lot about him that she liked. He knew his mind, and the world be damned. She just wondered how it would go if she held a divergent opinion to his own. It was an interesting thought. "Jim, why do you often call Joshua only by his last name?" He smiled a bit shyly at that. She liked it on him, probably because it was a side of him that stayed hidden to most people. Most people only got the cast iron front end. She felt a bit special to be allowed to see it. "Um, I think it's because I'm an old fart," he said. She smiled, and he continued. "In the work that we did before, only our surnames are on our uniforms. We meet as strangers, and never use first names on the job. So once I had a young guy under my command named Taylor. I didn't care about his first name unless I happened to have another Taylor, in which case he'd become 'Taylor J'. Now Joshua and I ended up working together a lot, and we became personal friends eventually. But old habits die hard. I call him Taylor, or 'Sergeant' and he doesn't mind, and he calls me 'MWO, or 'Master Warrant', and I don't mind. It's easy to fall back on our previous relationship titles, even though we don't have need for them any longer. I suspect that it might bother you though. I won't mention it to Joshua, but I'll make an effort to change my habit for you, would that be alright?" Rose smiled, "Thanks, I understand. It's just that I see him as a son, and you can appreciate a mother's view, right?" Brisebois laughed quietly. "I certainly can. The view of mothers in general has been sadly neglected throughout the history of the world. There would be a lot less war if the mothers of the world had their say." Rose was stunned. "That's so nice to hear from you, but if you'll forgive me, it's a strangely peaceful way for a soldier to speak." Jim looked at her. "Why would you say that? Rose, I don't like war. I was a professional soldier. I'm Canadian, but I lied about my age a long time ago and enlisted voluntarily in your United States Marine Corps." "Why?" Rose interjected and he shrugged, "Well for one thing, at the time, they didn't ask me all that many pointed questions. I was young and I wanted to see a bit of the world and ... adventure, you know? Anyway, I fought two tours in Vietnam. Afterward, I came back home and enlisted there. I've been a soldier all of my life and have trained many, many others such as your Joshua. By the way, he's also my Joshua, because I love him as my own son, that's why I was always hard on him. I've taught them how to do their jobs, but I've also taught them my simple philosophy. There is no one who desires peace more than a soldier. If you ask him in a private moment, I'm sure that he'd tell you the same thing. And if he doesn't, you let me know, and I'll wring his neck until he gets it right." He smiled warmly. Rose was surprised. He seemed to be such a hard and gruff man on the outside, but there was real sensitivity there if you took the trouble to look for it. She liked that a lot. A diamond in the rough who was a shining jewel on the inside, but only the privileged could get a look at it. "This is the best view overall of the land," Rose said pointing, "I like to come here to try to think of ideas. Lately I've been trying to have ideas about saving the place, mostly. I'm afraid I'm going to lose it." She looked down then but Jim had noticed the subtle change in her voice. He leaned over to her and gently lifted her chin. Her eyes were awash in the green of her irises, and he felt his heart being twisted in his chest. To him, Rose was a vision of complete loveliness. Strong, but kind, and very intelligent -- all wrapped up in wit and horse sense. He'd looked a long time for one like her and until now, it had been his considered opinion that they didn't exist. And now he could see that she felt hopelessness. He resolved to help her for her own sake if he could manage it at all. If she wanted this place to run, he'd do whatever he could for her. It wasn't just because Joshua had asked him now. "Rose, please listen to me. I don't have enough information yet, I've only been here a day and a bit. But so far, I don't really see a reason relating to the land itself that would prevent the operation. I want to map out the pastures some more, and locate the water. If we get that done today, and I think we're pretty much there, I'll be looking at operational aspects tomorrow with you and Josh. I think that's good news for now." Rose blinked at him and felt some hope. Jim continued softly. "Now that's still speculation yet, but it's looking good to me so far. And speaking of that, as long as I'm here to give my personal opinion and all, well ... I think you're beautiful. Rose, I could look at you all day long, but my preference is that while I'm doing it, that you stop crying if you could. It would make the job just that much more pleasant for me." He smiled and she began to smile weakly back at him. "Also, though I have had a couple of chances to tell him, it seems that something is always going on here and I've forgotten twice at least, but I think I have some good news for Kayla and Jillian, and for Joshua." he grinned. "His release has been officially formalized. They could technically recall him within a time period, but I don't see that happening, except in circumstances of dire need. Unless we're invaded or something, he's out." Rose felt her heart leap in her chest. "Really? Do you mean it?" she asked. Jim looked at her curiously. "Rose, why would I lie about a thing like that? I know that he's like a son to you, and I told you that he's like a son to me, an-" Rose was on him instantly. She kissed him in joy over the relief that she felt at first, laughing as she did, but it soon gave way to something else that they both felt urgently. They stopped after a few minutes when she looked at him sheepishly. "I'm sorry. I got carried away. Please don't think..." Jim looked at the loveliest woman that he could ever imagine. "Rose, stop it. I don't think that you got carried away. Not yet, anyway, though carrying you away is a lovely thought, I'll admit. You were happy at my news and you kissed me. I responded because I really like you. You're so beautiful to me. I think those were the best kisses I can ever remember, and I'm an old fart!" They laughed together, and she pushed him back until he was lying down. She looked down on him, and said, "Um, Jim... WE are old farts together, and I don't care about that if you don't. I think you're just wonderful. Josh told me some of his stories, and I'm sure they were pretty watered down for my benefit because he didn't want me to worry. But I detected a common element in a lot of them. There was someone that he looked to for guidance if he needed it. I knew it was you watching over him if you could while still doing the job. Thank you for that." She kissed him for it. She kissed him for a lot of reasons, lastly just because she really liked to kiss him. She paused for a second or so when Sam crossed her mind, but she realized that Kayla had been right. If Sam knew about this, he wouldn't mind. He'd want his widow to be happy, just as she herself would if the situation were reversed. She continued after realizing that she wanted this, and that this man really appealed to her in many ways. Jim stopped suddenly, and she looked up at him. "What's wrong?" she asked. "Nothing Rose, I was just wondering how far we ought to go. I was thinking of leaving that up to you. What do you think?" he asked as he kissed her one more time. "I think that you ought to use your binoculars and figure out if there's any way that anybody can see us here." She grinned at him and chuckled. "Beautiful, smart, and a good field tactician," he said with admiration, "What a combination," he said as he began to scan their perimeter. "Well, I don't know about the first part of that," Rose smiled shyly, "but there was a time when I guess I used to be pretty good in a field," she chuckled, "Us farm girls usually are." "I knew there was a reason I should have stayed on the farm," he laughed as he finished looking, "There's no way that any-" He lowered the binoculars and stared at her, knowing that she'd just made what to her just had to be one very hard choice to make indeed. "Am I alright?" she asked uncertainly. She was lying naked on the blanket in front of him. ----------------------------------- Josh and Kayla had begun to wonder what had happened to them. Together, they had discussed calling Jim's cell, but had no real justification. Rose knew the land and the hazards, and Jim was an old soldier. They asked each other what trouble they could have gotten into. Each time they vocalized their concerns to each other, they ended up grinning and chuckling. At last, Josh climbed up the rickety windmill with the binoculars. "Can you see them Josh? Kayla asked from the ground. Josh looked along the distant ridge, "No -- uh, yeah." "Are they driving back?" she asked, and he said, "Nooo, no they're not." "Well, what are they doing? Having a chit chat or what?" she wanted to know. But then she paused, "No..." Josh looked down and shrugged, "Well, yeah." He felt the vibrations in the tower. He was about to look down again when Kayla got to the top on the other side. "You know we shouldn't be doing this right now for a couple of very good reasons, right?" he asked. "If this doesn't collapse, all they'd need to do is look this way. They've got binoculars too." "Oh, absolutely." she said, "Gimme the binoculars! Where?" He pointed in the general direction as he handed them over and said "Slide along the ridge line going left until you see a small stand of trees in front of it. Got it? There are two groups, see them? Can you spot my truck there? You might have to rest the field glasses against the frame here to steady them, it's pretty far out. Ok, divide the distance from the trees to the truck into three, and look one third of the distance from the trees. What do you see?" "I see the trees," she said, "and the truck. Ok, one third from the trees to the truck. I see...something moving." "Look hard at what's moving. All of the things in view ought to be vertical, the trees, the grass, you know? There's only one thing that I saw that was horizontal, and doesn't fit in the scene. Use your imagination." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 15 "I see it," she said, "but I'm not sure what I'm seeing there." "Uh ...that's your aunt's knee and leg down to her foot." he said feeling silly. "I see... Oh, my, God ..." Josh watched Kayla's little smile for a moment, "Well go Aunt Rose," she said in a soft voice. She lowered the glasses and they both laughed. Josh was worried about the tower. Since he was heavier, he climbed down. After a time, Kayla told Josh that she could see them standing, putting clothes on. Josh nodded, and opened his cell phone as she climbed down. "Brisebois. Go ahead." Josh smiled. "Jim, we're thinking of getting supper ready, and need to know if you guys are planning on coming back in anytime soon." There was a pause while he conferred with Rose. "We ought to be there in about a half hour. What's for supper?" "I dunno yet. Kayla's' cooking, and I'll assist. You still like steak that's squirming, if that's what she decides on?" "Yes." Jim smiled. Ok, Bye." Josh closed the phone as Kayla walked over looking at the rust on her hands from the tower. He smiled, looking at the phone. "I'm kind of glad we don't have any oysters." When Kayla grinned at him, he said, "Look babe, two things; one, we shouldn't climb that thing. It's not safe, and two, we can't say one word to them that we know what they were doing. Nothing. You're safe, but I'm not. You have no idea how that man can inflict pain." She laughed, and said that she wouldn't say anything anyway. "And there's Aunt Rose to think of," she said, "if I know her at all, what she was doing must have been a real trial for her to decide, so I'm sure not going to say a word." Josh thought a moment before he nodded, "Yeah, the last thing that she needs now is to feel badly . Now I'm sorry that I saw them at all." "I think I did have a good idea though, "Josh grinned, "when I told him that Rosie would be the best person to show him the place." Kayla nodded, "Another thing that we don't dare talk about, huh?" Together they set about dinner. "What did you mean when you said 'squirming'?" Kayla asked. "He gets disappointed if what he eats isn't still twitching. It's not pretty." Josh chuckled. "By the way, what did you think of where they were?" Kayla looked at him. "What do you mean? I really liked your instructions to help me find them. It was like having a look into how you think, to look for what doesn't belong, or is missing. I really enjoyed that." Josh smiled at her. "I'm worried now. I don't want to give away all of my secrets. But that wasn't what I asked you. Tell me about the place." He was trying to encourage her thinking. She frowned, sure that he was trying to illustrate something for her. "Well, it looks pleasant. Shady, with some grass under the trees, I think. But that's hard to tell because we're below it. How am I doing?" "You're doing fine," he coaxed, "especially since you saw that the elevation makes it obscure. I've been there a few times. The copse of trees there is a great place to reflect, and watch the clouds roll past. You can see most of the ranch's land from there. A pretty regal view, you could say." "What does that mean, 'a regal view'? That's a clumsy turn of phrase. What are you trying to teach me now?" Looking out at the yard, he saw Jillian replacing the cardboard noisemaker on her bike. She had it down now. Joshua rolled his eyes at Kayla, and chuckled. "Only a few days ago, you were calling ME stupid." He finished chopping vegetables, and dried his hands. "I'm not trying to teach you anything now. I'm trying to get you to imagine something with me. Without the truck in the scene, I'd never have spotted them. On the other side of those trees, is a place to park out of sight from here." Josh slid his hand down the back of Kayla's jeans. It was a bit tough to get past the waistband, but he did it. He caressed her bottom gently for a moment before he whispered into her ear almost silently so that she had to listen hard to catch the words. "That hilltop offers a regal view to someone who might want to look out across the land and maybe become a lioness queen, I think." Kayla's eyes lit up as she turned leaning against him. "Aunt Rose did warn me that you were incredibly observant," she purred at him. "Tell me more." He smiled shyly. "We ought to take a drive there soon to scope it out better. They might want to go there again as well, so we'll need to pick the time for our reconnaissance when they're not there, if they do go back. It's a nice spot." "Would anyone be able to see us there?" Kayla was intrigued. Josh shrugged. "Jet fighters maybe, but they don't come around here much, and they move too fast to be able to see much ground detail if they're low. That leaves just spy satellites and aliens." She smiled. "How about if we go there at night?" "Then we probably wouldn't be the only ones mating there," he said, "that's where the coyotes go. I've heard them up there at night." "Ok, let's see if it would be a good place for the daytime" she grinned. "But you forgot one detail." Kayla kissed him. "We still need to see if we can actually do this physically. Practice makes perfect." After dinner, Rose and Jim sat on one side of the porch table as he went over his accumulated data. They were involved in some serious discussions. Kayla watched Josh running around laughing with Jillian on his shoulders, and Daisy chasing them. He looked like he could do that all day. Kayla did sometimes sneak a glance at the older two, and smiled as she noticed that they seemed to have gotten pretty friendly. And they both enjoyed tea. On one of her trips back from the kitchen with some refills, she noticed that even though their talks were fairly involved, they often held hands under the table. She wondered what that was about, but since her aunt seemed pretty chipper, she'd content herself to watch a while to see where it went. "Excuse me Jim." Kayla began, "Josh said something about him possibly being recalled. if he has to go back, where would he be sent? Unless it's someplace in the far north of Canada, I would at least like to visit him" Kayla said. Jim looked up. "If that were to happen, he'd go to Afghanistan, Kayla." "Afghanistan?" "Yes. That's where the deployment would be to. Josh's been there twice already. Normally, he's always been a ready to go guy, always looked forward to an overseas posting. But the last time, he changed and became more withdrawn," Jim said quietly. Kayla sat down slowly. "Jim, I want to marry him much more than I want to live without him. My Aunt has noticed that he's been a little different this time as well. Please tell me what happened to him. I want to know,... please?" Jim exhaled. "Short official version -- an IED was detonated in a village as his unit was passing through. There were two fatalities, both Afghani nationals. Other than cuts and scrapes, the worst off on our side was Josh. End of story." "But that's not the whole thing, is it?" she asked, "Please tell me what happened." Brisebois looked over, "Kayla, I'm just an old soldier. I've seen all kinds of awful shit. I'd really like to leave it alone. Are you sure you need to know?" She nodded. Rose was listening intently. He sighed. "Man is the cruelest animal in the garden, most often to his own kind. One of my worst nightmares is a picture that I cannot erase from my mind. He was with a large patrol passing through that small village, and I was along with them, since there were two groups, one of them Josh's, but they were teamed together. The insurgents had chosen to explode a charge as we were passing through the center of it. They could have done that anywhere else, but decided that the people there needed to know who was boss, I guess, so that they could see that they weren't safe. When the charge went off, Joshua was thrown some distance. We took some cuts and scrapes, but nobody in the patrol was hurt except Josh, and that wasn't serious. He had landed against some razor wire. You might have noticed the scars from it on his chest and left arm. I still don't know what happened to his body armor, it was just gone, though I guess it had served its purpose. I saw him down and ran to pull him out of the wire. He shook his head, and yelled instructions to his people in case there was a follow-up ambush. Then he noticed a tiny hand under some debris. He cleared it away, and uncovered a little girl from the village next to the body of her mother, I guess. She couldn't have been more than 5 or 6. The other sergeant radioed for help for the villagers as Josh held that dying child in his arms. He spoke to her softly and told her that she was beautiful, and then he kissed her bloody face. He knew she couldn't understand him, and that she was fading out. Her blood ran down his front to his knees. She was already beyond any help that we could give her." Jim looked into the distance for a moment before he came back to himself, "I'm sorry. Anyway uh.., the little girl smiled at him, then reached up and touched that scar on his face; I heard her voice when she spoke to him. She didn't even cry. A few seconds later, her hand fell back down and she was gone. I looked at him, and his face just crumpled. His head came back up and he screamed with everything he had. All of the arteries and tendons in his neck stood out. It was like his soul was leaving him. Then he began to cry." The old soldier exhaled. "I've served the armed forces of two countries on five continents, and fought everything from people to forest fires. The single, most painful image that I cannot ever forget is seeing my friend Joshua standing there holding her tiny broken body to his chest, and watching him cry for her as her blood dripped off his arms into the dirt. Our interpreter told me that the girl had called him 'fereshteh'. It means angel. I guess that's what she thought that he was. Some of her female relatives took her body from him, and Josh kissed her again as we left. After that, he only responded to questions in monosyllables. He looked like he wasn't with it at all. I was concerned for him. I'd never seen Josh like that." He sighed again. "You wanted to know, so you might as well hear the rest. About ten minutes later we tried to bring them to us. I called in artillery fire on the likely exit routes, and we had elements outside the village pushing them back in so that they couldn't run from us easily this time. Josh's people had been teamed to the other group, and were checking on some houses while he and I watched the street behind them. We heard footsteps from around the corner. As we went around the building, I twisted my ankle and fell. Joshua ran around the corner fully, and ran into three of them. I was looking up at a young man pointing his rifle at me with a grin. He saw Josh and the grin disappeared as he began to raise his rifle toward him. Josh stitched him where he stood, 3 rounds in the chest and he shot the other two before they could turn their backs to run. When shit starts to fly, men react differently. That's why good training is so important, so that they fall back on it and continue to function. Everybody is usually scared, and that's normal, but they keep going. Everybody's different. Some men even get pretty hot in a firefight, but Joshua doesn't. He turns very cold and hard, but he's always efficient and professional. A few of the village women had been following us at a distance after watching him cry. There was a lot of dust hanging in the air. Our 150 millimeter shells were screaming in and crashing outside the village, and occasionally there was some steel from that flying down the street we had turned at. You could hear it skittering off of everything, but Josh didn't notice it, and I'm sure that he didn't care anyway. Josh walked back to me to see if I was ok. He wasn't crouching and he didn't run over to me. He walked. He just didn't give a damn about anything. When he saw that I was getting back up, I got a look at the fury in Joshua's face and the look in his eyes. They looked like blue glass. He could see that I was alright, but he looked as though he didn't know me. His facial scar looked like it was on fire and his shirt hung away from him in ribbons. His entire chest was exposed. He was covered in blood; the little girl's mixed with his own. He looked like the angel of death on earth to me and I felt chills on my neck. I remember that he wasn't crying anymore." It's always important to retain objective, but inside me, I believe that it had become personal for him, but I can't say that with any certainty since there are no facts which point to it. Other than looking pissed, he didn't look as though he was anything but rational He looked at his rifle, changed the magazine, and ran off when he heard more footsteps and voices up the road. It turned out that he'd been spotted, standing at the intersection of two roads, and they began shooting at him. He saw another of them and then he was running that way after asking me to get word to the others. By the time that any of the others got there, he was gone. I lost track of him for most of an hour. He didn't respond to calls on the group channel because his radio was gone in the explosion. I didn't think I'd ever see him alive again. I don't know any more of what happened. Josh says that he came back when he was certain that we wouldn't be attacked from that direction and he'd gone all the way to the edge of the place before he came back. That's all that I know. He could account for every single round out of his rifle and the story added up. There were a couple more bodies and they'd obviously been engaged in attacking when they were killed. Every shot accounted for." Jim shrugged, "It's my very personal opinion that something happened, but I don't know what it was and he won't say more than what he said then. His story makes sense for a man who got caught up in a firefight because his blood was up. As far as I know, the only thing that he did wrong was that he stepped away without a radio -- and I set the stage when I put his men with the other group. The problem that I have with it all is that I know him. I've never seen him do anything like that before or since. It's not like him. The men of that village wouldn't come near him after that. I don't think that they thought he was human." Rose and Kayla looked at Joshua as he spun around holding little Jillian in the air. The two were laughing. He hugged her to his chest, and ran from Daisy as she barked and tore after them. "I know that he used to have nightmares about that incident, maybe he still does. I would prefer that you don't mention what I've said to you. Everything that he said in the after-action meetings checked out. He won't talk about what he remembers other than what he said then. About a week afterward, one of the women who had seen everything approached him alone. She was very young and shy, and quite beautiful. She'd found his beret, and had come to return it to him. The interpreter told us that she was the dead girl's cousin, and that she wanted to show Josh her cousin's grave. Through her, he found out that her name had been, 'Boosah', or 'Kiss'. It's written in the tattoo on his right arm. He went with her to visit it with a few men as security on our next trip through. But things had changed then. Nobody in that village would go near him. Most barely looked at him. The only one who was always there was the cousin. She always looked for him and only smiled very carefully. It's probably just as well that he couldn't understand why, he'd have been embarrassed to hell," he chuckled before becoming serious. "Kayla, you're a lovely, beautiful woman, all three of you are captivating. Rose and I both have known him long enough separately to understand that while Joshua has given you his heart quickly, he doesn't do that lightly. If you marry him, I can say without a doubt that nothing will ever happen to that little pixie over there, not while he's breathing, anyway. Do you still want to do this after what I've said? Are you sure that he's what you want?" Kayla was staring at the connectors at the back of his laptop. She didn't answer right away. She composed her reply with a deep breath, and looked up. "I've never liked soldiers. I always thought that they liked war and killing, or they were just playing tough boy. I never gave them a thought, ever. I guessed what Joshua must have been as soon as I saw him. Maybe that's why I reacted to him the way that I did at first. I also learned later that he wasn't like my preconception at all. He just did what he believed in. I guess he saw his purpose there. Because of you both, I've had to revise my opinion of people like you and him, though I know that there are assholes everywhere in every occupation. Mr. Brisebois, in spite of myself, I've fallen in love with him, though it sure got off to a rough start, and we certainly never intended it. But I love him more than anything I could ever imagine, and despite everything that I've said and done to him that he didn't deserve, he loves me. I keep thinking that this must be a dream. I don't know what I did to deserve his love, but he sure has mine. I know what that means to him, too. So my answer to you is yes. I still want him. I want to be his wife so much it hurts. Jilly already accepts him as her father. That's what she really wants from him, a father's love, and you can see that he gives it freely to her. He's all that I want, how could I want more than him and Jilly?" She sighed, "If he has to go back there, then we'll wait for him if he has to walk and swim all the way back, because he told me that he would always come back to me, as long as he's alive. And though I have grown skeptical of anything that most men say, I'll believe anything that he tells me, because he's shown me that I can believe in him. And I do believe in him. So, yes, I still want him very much." She smiled at him. "I like you a lot, Jim. I'm sure that when you weren't making his life miserable, you were looking out for him if you could. I know that because I noticed that it was you who pulled him out of that wire. I'm sorry that I didn't leave it alone when you asked me to. I can see that you're still affected by it. I never considered what it must be like to have to go somewhere because you've been sent. You don't even get to choose who you have to fight, or why. That means that I also have to revise the way that I regard our own soldiers. I think that they aren't appreciated enough. But I'm not sorry to have heard what happened. It's a piece of very sad history, but it shows me again what kind of man he is. He's the kind of man that I want beside me forever." Jim Brisebois smiled at her warmly. "I can see why he loves you so much, you know, or at least I've seen glimpses of it. Anyway, I tore a couple of pieces off of him for it over couple of hours afterwards. I told him that I need leaders who lead, not fight their own wars, and he reminded me with respect that we had been alone there, and that he had taken the fight to the enemy after he knew that I was more or less alright. He said that I wasn't exactly capable of more than a slow limp, so he didn't want me to try to keep up with him." He looked at Joshua, who was running and trying to stay just ahead of his new daughter so that when the time was right, she would catch him. The moment came, and he even looked surprised as she caught him, jumped up as much as she could, and rode him down into the dirt. She didn't notice how careful he was to be sure that he bore the brunt of it. As Josh got up and dusted himself off, Jim called him over. "I've got something to say to all of you, but especially to Kayla and Joshua. I've held on to it partly under the pretense of not having had time to tell anyone yet." he winked at Rose. "I stopped by the regiment's offices before I left to grab the forms that we spoke of and I've brought them along with me. We can fill them out any time before I leave, and I'll deliver them personally to the clerks there who still fear me. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 15 I've also determined that your release is indeed finalized." He reached into his briefcase for a pile of folders and pulled out a copy. "Here it is; you're not affected by the warning order, subject to the emergency recall provision for a time. I think that this news simplifies a few things for you both." Josh, Kayla and Rose stared at it. Jillian looked slightly bored. Kayla's mouth fell open, and she looked up at Joshua. Before the wheels in her head could reach the next conclusion and cause her to wonder if he'd still marry her quickly or at all, he kissed her and said, "Hey, a deal's a deal. Don't even THINK about trying to get out of marrying me. You're still in charge of the timetable though." He kissed her again and she began to cry. Rose threw her arms around Jim and hugged him tightly, only kissing him on release. Daisy barked at Jillian, who went to continue playing with her. Kayla still sat in shock, tears in her eyes. Joshua nudged her. "I'm beginning to worry about you, honey. I've never seen you go this long without speaking, or yelling at me, or trying to kill me, or something." He pulled her to her feet, put his arms around her, and kissed her again. "Maybe a little mouth-to-mouth, what do you think?" She threw her arms around his neck, kissed him, and hugged him tightly, whispering, "I'm not doubting you. I'm still afraid to stop blinking, baby. Do you really still want to marry me?" He kissed her ear, and whispered. "Yes, I'm hoping sooner rather than later since I'm afraid that you might change your mind once you get time to think about it or see how I fold my laundry." She said, "Josh, I'll never change my mind. Do you think Jim will agree to be your best man?" Josh chuckled. "He already has. I asked him as we were leaving Albuquerque." She kissed him. "God, you're fantastic. I can't believe that nobody's claimed you before me." "That's because, as Consuela says, nobody's ever tried using a firearm on me before. Those that did weren't after my body like you were either. And speaking of focusing media attention.." He pulled out his cell phone and handed it to Kayla. "'Suela is 5 on my speed dial, and Rita is 6. See if you can get them to come out here tonight, or at least one of them. Don't tell them what's up. I need to see their faces when you do. Wish I could have a camera ready for the reaction." Kayla sat down to dial, and Josh filled Jim in on their friends. A few minutes later however, Kayla noticed that Josh was silent as he walked slowly toward the bunkhouse. She intercepted him as he went through the door. "What is it?" she asked looking up into his eyes. "He told you, didn't he?" Josh didn't know whether to be ashamed, angry, sad, or all of the above. "He doesn't know it, but I've been around him long enough to hear the bullshit shovel scraping." Kayla gently pushed him back against the wall. She kissed him and asked him to listen to her for a minute. "Please don't be angry with him. It's my fault. I actually asked him foolishly where you would be sent because we'd want to come and visit you if we could and he told me why that wouldn't be possible. I picked up on something that he said and pried it out of him though he asked me not to. He also told me that the girl's name is on the dagger. I wanted to ask you what was on the dagger tattoo before now. Please tell me Joshua, why does the dagger represent her? I don't get it, and now that I know some of her story, I really want to know the rest." Josh sighed and looked away. "I used to see her sometimes when we were passing through that village. We'd hand out candy to the kids to make their day. She was too little and shy, so I used to walk over to her to hand her a piece, and I'd stay there with her until she'd eaten a lot of it so that nobody could take it away from her. She would lean against my leg for a minute. Her mother used to thank me with her smile." He spoke slowly and quietly, "She was such a pretty little thing. Always smiling, even before she saw us. I see her almost every night, and I've had a lot of time to think it through. I'm sure the device was there because they knew that I'd stop. I sentenced those two to death because I wanted a little kid to have a candy and in doing that a few times I showed them a pattern that they could exploit. How could a mother and child deserve that? Who can do that just to fuck up innocent people?" Kayla laid her head against his chest. She felt the muscles begin to tighten. This would hurt him to say, she knew. "That morning as we approached, I noticed that I couldn't see anybody on the north side of the village. I was thinking that over as we went through, and then I heard Boosah's voice and turned around. She was running to me smiling, but she was the only kid in sight. All kinds of alarm bells were going off in my head. I turned to shout a warning, and she ran around to face me, then the charge went off Boosah was ripped up pretty badly. When I picked her up, I could see that there was no hope at all. She opened her eyes and saw me, so I did my best to comfort her." He wanted to weep for the thousandth time, but he didn't. "The dagger doesn't represent Boosah. She was a little sweetheart, bright and lively like a fairy who had nothing, but she was happy anyway. Now she's just a ghost in my head. I was the only one who'd ever noticed her. She was so small. She always looked for me. She died because of me for a piece of candy." He hung his head. Kayla looked up at him as her own eyes filled, and suggested that they go into the bedroom and sit on the bed. "I'm shorter than you. If we keep standing, I'll drown first." She took his hand and led the way. "What happened afterward?" she asked and he looked up for a long moment. "I -- I'm not really ready to talk about it anymore, Kayla. I'd rather leave it alone. They're in my sleep now. That's as far away as I can push them." Kayla nodded. "You let me turn my demon loose on you, and it helped me to tell you everything. Maybe I can help you sleep better too. Tell me everything whenever you think that you can. I owe you that, Josh." "I remember coming back from the outskirts of the village," he said. "I listened, but there was no more firing going on. I couldn't remember when our artillery had stopped. Must have been a long time before then. There wasn't much left of my shirt, so I tried to take the rest of it off, but I suddenly didn't care. Something hurt on my shoulder. There was a small shard of shrapnel stuck in it, just sitting there. I looked at it and pulled it out so I could get the sleeve off. It must have been there from the beginning. The skin on my chest stung like hornets had been at it, and I really wanted a cigarette but my hands had started to shake, and my smokes were soaked with blood anyway. Those were the first things that I could remember feeling since the blast. I smelled like a slaughter house, I was covered in blood, piss, shit, and who knows what. I remembered that when I was a kid, I used to catch hell if I played in a puddle. What would my mother think if she could have seen me then? I pissed against a wall, and walked back to find Jim and my guys. People stared at me; nobody came close to me. I looked down at my rifle. It was as filthy as the rest of me. I don't know why, but I found that satisfying, and I remember smiling at that. One girl came up to me, but just looked. It was like she wanted to say something, and of course she couldn't. I met her again the next week when she gave me back my beret. I think that she must have had it before, but I guess that I must have looked awful and she lost her nerve or something. She was Boosah's cousin. Jim came limping up with a couple of medics, but I waved them off, and talked to the other sergeant to find out what had gone on, but I really didn't give a fuck anymore, once I knew that everybody was alright." He exhaled heavily, and his tears dripped from his nose and chin as he fell silent. Kayla spoke quietly, "I think Boosah loved you because of your kindness to her. I think you were an angel to her before that day. Was there any sign of their activities around that village later?" Josh sighed. "No events. We must have gotten all or most of them or they booked for a while. I know a lot of the men were afraid of me personally, not that I'd give a shit. I guess they thought I was a ghost. I don't know about now, they might be back." She kissed him softly. "I'm sure that your little friend and her mom are in a far better place. Don't carry this, Joshua. They wouldn't want you to. I don't want you to. You don't deserve to feel like you're bad guy in any of this. Tell me about her cousin." Josh looked up, "We couldn't understand each other, but she wanted me to see Boosah's grave. I was always happy to see her, I still worry about her. Kayla, do you still want to marry me, now that you know all of this?" He looked down. "Did Boosah's cousin want to marry you?" she asked. "Kayla, she was 19 years old." Kayla sighed with exasperation, but she smiled at him. "Joshua, I adore you, but sometimes you are just so thick...You sure can't think like any woman, that's for sure. Did Boosah's cousin want to marry you? Do you think that she was attracted to you beyond just gratitude for your concern? Think about her position in that place. Do you think that maybe she saw a warrior who was still human enough to cry? Could it just somehow be vaguely possible that she would have been fiercely proud to have been lucky enough to be your wife in a quiet little daydream? Do you think that this EVER occurred to her while she was waiting for you to come back so that MAYBE she could look at an angel one more time for a few seconds and hope that he would smile at her again?" Kayla reached over and grabbed his face so that he was looking at her eyes. "I think you're a rare person these days, which is why she held a hope to marry you, and trust me, handsome, deep down in her young heart and in that place, she did. And those are the same reasons why I want to marry you, plus a whole lot of other ones. I do want to marry you Joshua, The answer to all of the above is yes... And now I absolutely HAVE to marry you, because I'm sure that until now, you'd never have strung all those dots together. So if I don't marry you now," she said wanting to get him to feel a bit better, "you'll probably just run right back there and marry her." She pretended to look annoyed with herself. "Why the heck did I have to tell you all that? I must be stupid or something...Like I need MORE competition. Just please tell me that you didn't compliment her fur or buy her a beer. Yeah, I know it's not allowed there, and that's a small mercy." Josh chuckled. "I don't think I'd have had to buy her anything, but I didn't have anything to give her father which is the way it works there. Are you trying to cheer me up or something?" She giggled, "Well just this once, I didn't feel like killing you, so I'd say you're growing on me. And um, ...by the way...we'll need to talk about what we want, but I need to gently remind you that I'm not 19 anymore, and though I'm looking forward to about a year of being on the pill and all... my clock is ticking. If you decide that you want me to have your babies, I'm open to many, many things, but there's one thing that's absolutely never going to come into question between us, Josh. Just telling you now,..." "What, Kayla?" "I'm thinking of a quiet honor as a way for little Boosah to live on." She slid her fingertip thoughtfully along the blade on his tattoo. "I already have at least one of the names picked out for the first girl. Now go and take a shower. The girls are coming, and I don't want them to think that I don't even care enough about you to at least give you a dusting now and then." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 16 ***More of the twins in this chapter. 0_o ---------------- Rita saw the '59 Chevy as it pulled into her driveway. She thanked her mother again for agreeing to baby-sit on such short notice and walked out of the house. Consuela's convertible started again with a low rumble, as Margarita got in and searched for the seat belt. "You know, this is pretty cool, 'Suela. I think you got the better husband. All Jose can build for me is a faster way to get fat!" Consuela laughed as she backed out, and dropped the pink flake Chevy into Drive. "Bart's been building my new baby up for over a year. It's finally finished. The ghost flame job was only done a week ago. I haven't gone very far with it, but I just love it to death. It wasn't easy, you know. I had to give him a lot of uh, inspiration to keep him on the job!" They both laughed as the small block eight cylinder thrummed. Rita admired her sister's style, since every day it was the same, but different and even better. Consuela wore a leopard skin patterned dress in her usual slinky preference. They both maintained their long black hair in a classic Cleopatra cut that really suited them, and gave them a very Aztec princess look overall. Everything else about Consuela was classic kitsch, right out of the fifties or early sixties, but she leaned way closer to Betty Paige than Marylyn Monroe. Back when they were single, neither of them had ever wanted for male attention. If they strutted their stuff, boys would fall down in the next county. Rita had fallen for Jose because she admired his strong, quiet character, charming good looks and she knew that he'd never hurt her, so she'd quietly coaxed him into chasing her until she'd caught him. It took longer than she'd have imagined possible, but he was worth it. He was the perfect match for her. To her delight, she found that he was a great cook, and had connections in the wine and beer trades. A match made in heaven. Consuela had been much harder to bring down. She loved to be chased, and was the classic flirt, but she'd had no interest in any of the multitude of potential suitors in the greater Santa Fe area. She'd clubbed constantly and flitted from the arm of one boyfriend to that of another. Truth be told, she'd never found any of them to have what she was looking for. Her only other problem was that she herself didn't know what exactly appealed to her other than the constant attention. --------------------------- Back when the twins were both single, they had just started up their cantina, and one of their first customers was a quiet, young man on vacation. He wanted to try their food, but really wanted a coffee first. Both of them had nearly collided in the kitchen getting it for him. They couldn't believe that he'd come in alone. Since there weren't any other customers, they both sat down at the table after he said he was happy for the company. They were happy to have him, and they spent the evening becoming friends. They learned that he wouldn't be around for long, so they shrugged as the romance possibility flew out of the window, but joked with him that if he ever wanted to see a real honest-to-goodness, knock-down, drag-out Southwestern-style catfight, all that he had to do was to tell both of them at once that he was available. He looked at them with a smile, "Wow, are you guys that competitive? I mean, I can see that you're twins and all, but..." Joshua thought they were incredible, so warm and friendly. Once the long-term mating possibilities had been dispensed with, there was no tension between them. As far as he was concerned, he wasn't really looking for that anyway. But he was always open to making a new friend, and here were two lively twins that seemed to actually like him just for his own sake. It was a switch from the girls that he'd normally run across at that point in his life. His face just put off a lot of folks, and the girls that were strongly attracted to him found the attraction fading when he remained a gentleman and treated them well. Then there were the ones who were REALLY attracted to him, but changed their minds since the "dangerous" mark on his face couldn't be taken off conveniently while they dragged him to social functions and such. After all, what would people think? "Competitive?" smiled Rita, "No, not really. We usually like completely different types of men. You're just the first one that we BOTH want at the same time." Josh couldn't believe the way they talked. He felt as though they were including him in their circle, and speaking with the same frankness that they used when talking to their girlfriends, instead of the different speech patterns that women usually adopt when speaking with men. It felt refreshing to him to be allowed the privilege. "Anyway, if you suddenly do become available within say, 500 miles of here. I'M the one who ought to get first dibs on you, since I'm the oldest, and have more maturity" she giggled. "Oldest?" Consuela rolled her eyes, "Well, yeah, by 16 minutes, you old cow. You're only the older one because you were closest to the door! I'd have gotten out first if your fat ass hadn't been blocking the exit sign." She turned to him, adopting a severely glamorous sex-kitten affectation, "And by the way baby?" her voice dripped honey at him, "I'd go 600 miles for you" she purred, "and through the desert, too. What do you say, sugar?" Josh laughed so hard at the performance that he couldn't catch his breath. At last, he smiled and said "You have no idea how much it hurts me to have to tell you this, but due to the conditions of my employer, it's gonna take more than a thousand miles, and through the opposite of the desert,... I'm from way up North." "Oh SHIT", Rita moaned, "is that where you're from? Well, you're put together well enough to make the trip almost worthwhile. How many more are there like you?" They all laughed and his dinner was forgotten for over an hour, until at last the girls shrugged at each other, and closed the cantina early. They all ate together, and Josh and Margarita eventually adjourned to his motel room together because she was the oldest, she said, though to Josh's amazement, it had been settled with a coin toss right in front of him. The next evening, they talked long into the night, before Consuela had her turn. Since then, they remained the closest of friends. They called him 'the Viking' because of his looks, and the cold climate that their imaginations had enhanced, joking that they couldn't understand why there were so few people up there, since there couldn't be all THAT much to do during the nights. For his part, Josh usually didn't try to mess with anyone's preconceptions about where he was from. It made for better jokes that way. "What do you mean they like to watch hockey?" Consuela was incredulous, "Why would you want to watch a stupid game when you could be screwing like bunnies?" "Well, I'm immune to it, but I've often asked myself the same question, "Joshua said, "but after some careful research, I found that mostly just the guys watch hockey, and they only do that because the girls are occupied with something else entirely." "What?" asked Rita. "They watch American television programming." Josh said. "Oh." They both said in unison. "Well, what do YOU do for relief from the incredible sexual tension in the cold, dark winter while the girls are cuddled up to their TV sets, baby?" Consuela asked. "Well there's always the Palmer sisters..." smiled Josh. "No, no, no, I know!" announced Rita. They turned to her. "He fucks polar bears!" The girls laughed and Josh did his best to look uncomfortable, as though they now knew his darkest secret. "Shhh!" laughed Joshua, "somebody might hear you, and if wind of it gets back home, well, let's just say that female caribou can get murderously jealous." He winked. Rita smiled, "Nope. I can just see you trying to hump a polar bear with your pants around your ankles in a blizzard..." she smiled, "And if THAT ain't true romance..." And with that, a legend was born. They looked forward to his return every year. By the second year, Rita had just married Jose. Consuela still hadn't found anyone that she really wanted, but she did enjoy Joshua's affections when he visited. For them it was just a couple of dear friends helping each other out. To himself though, Josh could have seen his way toward making it permanent, but there were just his occupational demands, the distance, and their fledgling diner standing in the way. That and the matter of a green card, he chuckled to himself. Anyway, by then, they all were too set into their friendship for anything long-term to happen, and he wasn't looking for anything but some good friends. And they had become his closest female friends. Consuela had finally figured out what she really wanted in a man, at least. She complained bitterly to him that the men that she dated the rest of the time all seemed to be variations on the same theme. "Nobody stands out, Josh," she told him in bed one evening as she traced her fingers over his chest, "I don't want some pencil-dick lady's man that reeks of, I dunno, crappy cologne. I want a man. Period. A REAL one, too, who can carry me off like it ain't no thing, not even be out of breath. Somebody who would treat me right because he loves me and appreciates me, and what I'd do for him, and I don't mean with money. God, I NEED a man who can sweep me off my feet and lay me onto my back. I'd kill for one like that. I want to start living my own romance with a man who thinks about me whenever he's not slaying dragons, or killing evil wizards or some shit like that. Can you bring any friends down next time, baby?" she joked. "Oh, and I can't STAND all the jerks in their Accu-Lexas, and that's all that I see around here, shitty silver ones. Them and fucking' Beemer drivers. What an attitude. Like I'm supposed to get wet when I see them or something because of the shitbucket, mass-produced toy wheels they drive, and offer to blow them if I could just have a ride in it. Fat chance, boys, keep working the little stick, cause you won't have this Latina. But I do know the kind of man I want does exist though, I sometimes get a glance at this HUNK in a tricked out, late 50's Chevy Apache pickup, red flake paint with flames. He looks smokin' hot to me, but in a very relaxed way, y'know? Like he's just happy he's alive another day, and doesn't give a flying fuck about stock options. I never get a chance to catch his eye, though. His big, handsome face, he looks like he doesn't have a care in the world. I bet he could eat walnuts like I eat grapes. Arms like my waist and a forty acre chest. Baby, just drive me off someplace and do me right there in the back, I won't give a shit, just as long as those arms are around me so I can't get away. Not that I'd want to," she chuckled, "but I just like the thought, you know? Jesus, I bet he doesn't even need a jack to change a tire. Probably just sits on the ground, lifts the car with his knee and spins off the lug nuts between his thumb and index finger. No way a side of prime beef like him is single though," she sighed wistfully. ---------------------------- The girls always welcomed him into their homes or the diner. He became a part of their social network, but they always looked out for his interests, waving off anyone that they knew was just looking at him for the "rough" appeal that they'd read into him. They knew it wasn't there. At the same time, they longed for his happiness. They couldn't understand why he'd never found anyone for himself. Josh himself just wasn't looking. He'd given up long before. Josh met Bart Smith when his bike had died in front of Bart's speed & paint shop. The fuel filter had clogged completely, choking on some garbage gas. Bart drove him to the closest dealership and they returned with a new filter. Together, they cleaned the tank and replaced the fuel lines, striking up a friendship as they went. The conversation turned to women, Josh mentioning that he found the girls in the Southwest to be very lovely, and mostly pretty friendly, well those that weren't outright afraid of him. Bart couldn't agree. "I see what yer sayin', Josh," he said looking at Joshua's face, "but I ain't found one who wants a big mule like me. I'm pretty shy around 'em. Never could get past that. Guys with slick and expensive rides have to peel 'em out off the doors. They seem to be attracted to money for some reason, "he grinned, shaking his head. "There is this one girl that I've seen around, though. Looks like a Mexican goddess. Man, eyes like - what's that stuff called,... onyx. Beautiful as anything, and cute as a button when she smiles or laughs. Seen her by herself sometimes in a copper-colored '69 big-block Nova. Sounds like it'd rip up a drag strip if it only had some tweakin'. I'd love to meet her, but she's always with a fella in a Mercedes or somethin', so I don't imagine I'd have much of a chance with her. She's probably married anyhow. I'll stick to what I know; cars. Girls are a mystery to me." He shrugged. "Sure do like the way she looks, though," he smiled a little self-consciously, "if I could only flag her down, and knew what to say to her." A light bulb went on in Josh's skull right then. He was pretty certain he knew who his new friend was talking about. When they were done, Bart refused any payment for the work, saying that he'd enjoyed doing it for Josh, and he was just poking around, getting his garage ready to open the following week. Josh insisted that they go for a beer, and asked Bart to follow him, since he knew the perfect place. Riding down the road, Josh smiled when he remembered Consuela's words as he glanced in his mirrors. "...HUNK in a tricked out, late 50's Chevy Apache pickup, Red flake paint with flames." He began to chuckle. "Suela, darlin', you forgot to mention the honkin' big triple chromed grille!" he laughed. Consuela was idly looking out the front window when she heard a bike like Josh's slowing down. She saw him pull up to park in front of the next shop and smiled, they always had fun together. Damn, he was such a nice guy, what would it take to find him a really good woman to sit behind him on that thing? Then she heard the rumble of a large V8 through headers, and saw the flames on the side as it slowed to pull up behind Josh. "Holy shit!" She couldn't believe it. She was trying to quickly come up with a pretense to come out of the cantina's door and speak to Josh, maybe she could think up a reason to talk to the gorgeous rock crusher who owned that truck. Just as she was headed to the door, she froze. Josh was talking to him! And they were coming to her cantina! She shot back toward the kitchen. Rita looked at her with raised eyebrows. As she passed Rita, Consuela squeaked "OH MY GOD!" and dashed to the employee's washroom to check herself out. Rita looked curiously toward the door as it opened and Josh came in with a BIG guy. She looked at the truck parked out front, and laughed. How many times had she heard her twin gush whenever she'd seen that truck and the guy in it? She was beginning to think 'Suela had made him up. She had no idea how Josh had worked this, but she just knew this wasn't an accident. She hustled into the kitchen and grabbed Jose. Explaining very briefly, she grabbed a piece of paper and wrote on it, as Jose looked toward Josh, and smiled as they sat at a booth. Joshua never sat at a booth. He walked over to them and took their order, passing him the note and his pen. Bart was admiring the cantina. He'd seen the place before in passing, and had wanted to look in, but had never done it. This looked like a place where he could relax. He liked it immediately. While Bart was looking around, Josh turned over the note. It read: "She's seen you come in, and she's freaking in the bathroom. How do you want to handle this? – Rita" He quickly wrote his reply: "Wave at me when you've pried her out of it. I'll do the rest. – J." He folded the note, and handed it to Jose. He looked up into Bart's' questioning eyes. "I know the folks who own this place. Just wanted to say hi, that's all." A few minutes later, Rita waved frantically. Josh excused himself and walked back to grab the beer. He came back holding the bottles by the neck, with one of the girls on each of his arms. Consuela, who'd never been at a loss for words since learning to speak, was for the first time since high school, actually nervous about meeting a man. Josh whispered to her "'Suela, get a grip. You look like you're about to piss your pants. Now come on, he didn't know we were coming here, but sweetheart, I do know he'd love to meet you." Bart was wondering what had happened to Josh and their beer. He turned to look over his shoulder and his mouth fell open as they arrived at the table. There were TWO of them! He blinked twice. "Bart, I'd like very much for you to meet Consuela, and her sister Margarita. They're the founders of this place. Margarita here is married to Jose, who took our order a few minutes ago. They're the ones with the Mercedes." Bart's eyebrows rose as he registered the thought. "Consuela drives the Nova." Bart and 'Suela smiled self-consciously at each other, as each of the girls shook his paw. Josh put the bottles down, and grabbing Consuela's shoulders, he guided her to the side of the booth opposite Bart. She offered no resistance as she stood on shaking knees. Once she was seated, he slid in beside her to block her only escape route. Then he winked at Rita, who smiled back delightedly. Bart looked at him every few seconds, unsure of himself. Since neither of them appeared to be capable of speech, Josh took a sip of his beer, and smiled at Bart. "Hey, I'm not kidding here, before you and I met, she told me that she'd seen you, but couldn't catch your eye. When I broke down at your place, I had no clue that you were who she was talking about. But when I saw your truck, I just knew." They turned toward each other and smiled shyly. Josh looked at Rita and shrugged. She chuckled. "She's never been quiet this long in her whole life." Josh looked back at them. "Ok, let's try this, 'Suela, I think you'll recall that you told me what a killer Apache you'd been admiring whenever you saw it around, but had never gotten a chance to see it close up. Bart, you told me that there was a certain '69 Nova that you'd like to get a look at. It seems to me that you're both car freaks. I think that's something that you have in common, so that would be the logical place to start your conversation." He smiled at them both. "If you'll excuse me, I think I'll need to help Rita this evening, right Bart?" He stood up and clapped his hand on Bart's shoulder. Bart didn't take his gaze off the dark eyes in front of him. He just nodded. Josh grabbed his beer and walked back to the kitchen with Rita. She put her arm around him, and hugged him as they walked. "She's such a romantic fool, and this is like a fairy tale. You are a sly dog, and I love you for it." They didn't really need Josh to help out, but he washed some dishes, and tried to pitch in anyway. Jose and Rita watched as discreetly as possible as Bart and Consuela began to relax with each other. After twenty minutes, Consuela came back to get them each a beer. Her eyes were shining and she hugged Josh. "Thanks, baby, thank you so much! He's fantastic! Can I keep him?" Josh grinned, "Sure. As far as I know, he's even housebroken. 'Suela, he feels a bit awkward around beautiful women. I do know that he's wanted to meet you for a long time, but he saw Rita with Jose, and thought you were married. Try to help him over any rough spots, and you should be fine. He looks like his folks just gave him a shiny new red wagon for his birthday. Good luck." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 16 She ran back to the booth, sliding in beside Bart. A short while later, they were outside, as Bart showed an admiring Consuela his truck before they walked around back to look at her Nova. An hour after that, Josh was riding back to the ranch. The next evening, Josh stopped by the cantina. Rita grinned at him. Josh looked surprised. "What? Where's 'Suela? Do you think they hit it off?" Rita laughed, and then whispered in his ear, "She's in heaven. This is the first time she's had to take a night off. They did a bit more than hit it off, honey. She said she's never been nailed to a bed that hard in her life! She told me that she was too stiff to walk today. Bart's like a locomotive, and apparently –" she took his arm by the wrist, and held it up to his face. His eyes widened. "Who'd have ever guessed?" Josh chuckled, "I suddenly feel inadequate somehow" he said with a grin. Rita laughed. "You know we're kind of petite, her and I, and he's, well, you know, a big man. They had a bit of trouble hooking up uh, physically, but once they did,... He's afraid that his neighbors are going to complain about the noise" she giggled. "She told me that they sort of finished with her on top of him. I'm still having fun with the pictures in my head. When they couldn't do that anymore, she just lay down on top of him under his big arms, and went to sleep on his chest. She told me to tell you that now she understands you a lot better." Josh stood there uncomprehending, his eyebrows knitted together. "What do you mean?" She laughed, "Well, now that she's been to bed with a bear..." Rita giggled, "She's so happy! Josh, you're amazing. How did you DO that?" Josh shrugged, "Just dumb luck. My bike broke down and Bart helped me out. The only thing that 'Suela didn't tell me about that truck was the license number. I mean when we drove to the bike shop to get a filter, I kind of clued in. That's the only Apache I've ever seen. While I was talking to Bart, we kind of became friends; he's very likeable. And in the middle of the usual bullshit that us Neanderthals talk about, the subject of women came up – like THAT never happens – and out of the blue, he mentioned that he'd spotted your sister several times. He thought she was fascinating, but never thought he'd ever get a chance to meet her, and didn't think that she'd give him the time of day if he did. So since he wouldn't take my money as payment, I thought he'd let me buy him a beer, and of course I knew exactly where to go. I hope this works for them both." Bart and Consuela were instantly inseparable, and were married a month later. She continued to run the cantina with Jose and Rita, and Bart's speed shop got off the ground without a backward glance. He had to hire several staff as business picked up, and the glossy ads that ran in custom car magazines all over the country featured his lovely wife with some of the shop's latest works. On the weekends, they campaigned her Nova at drag strips all over the state, and as far away as Arizona, and California if Consuela could get away from the cantina. Bart drove the truck there and back and Consuela drove once the Nova was on the track. ----------------------------- Joshua stood in the shower of the bunkhouse getting dust out of his pores that he and Jillian had ground in with their play earlier. He felt better than he had for a long time about that day in the village. He smiled and thought that he and Kayla seemed to be able to work out each other's demons and ghosts for each other. It felt as though they got along like they'd already been together for years by intuition, when they weren't second-guessing each other, and most important to them both, they already felt like a family together. That was a strange and pleasant thought for him. He realized that they were actually proud of one another. And then there was Jillian, the little girl who'd had no parents, and suddenly had found that a new family was sprouting around her. He smiled. She was such a blast, and had already figured out that life is a contact sport. Though at her age and size, she looked as delicate as a dandelion puff, but he was sure that she was tougher than any 8 year old boy that he ever knew, and he'd grudgingly added himself when he was at that age to the list. She had great coordination, excellent reflexes, and demon speed for a little kid. Then again, with those magic genes of theirs, her little legs would probably reach her ears in a week and a half, and she'd be running with him down the road in the morning before long. He couldn't wait for that. He wondered what traditional male sports he could get her into just to rock somebody's establishment. She'd only been in his life for a week and some, and he felt such pride in her. He wondered if she'd like fishing. He decided to get her a baseball glove to work on her eye-hand coordination. What was really satisfying to him was that she was rapidly gaining self-confidence. That was so good to see... The shower curtain was suddenly pulled aside. She was giggling at him impishly. "AHA!" She said triumphantly. "Now we're even! Now I get to see YOUR pink butt-" Josh was trying to figure out what she was talking about. He looked down at her face as she began to look lower on him. The look of triumph faded, as her mouth fell open, and her eyebrows went up. He suddenly realized that this just might be the first look that she'd ever gotten at a naked male of any age. He had no idea, and certainly had no frame of reference. "KAYL-..MOM!" And she was off, running out of the bathroom, and colliding with Kayla as she was walked by. Josh didn't know what would happen next, but this family life stuff sure appeared to have its moments for entertainment. He pulled the shower curtain closed and began to chuckle as he rinsed the soap off the back of his ears and neck. "Jilly! I think you were spying on Joshua! That's not nice at all." Josh could swear from the sound of her voice that she was having a tough time keeping a straight face. Jillian was protesting her innocence, but Kayla reasoned out loud that if the bathroom door had been closed, and the shower curtains had been closed then it would have been impossible for her to have seen anything, unless of course she had been peeking again. Peeking again? Josh wondered what that was about. Their voices came into the bathroom. "Anyway, since you seem to suddenly be that interested in your dad, I also seem to remember that you had gotten all dusty too from running around outside with him an-." "I was waiting for him to finish so I could have a bath," Jillian said solemnly, "I guess I got tired of waiting." That sounded a little sniffy, he thought. Kayla gave Jillian a knowing smirk, "Well, Miss Pointy-Nose, since you're feeling nosy AND you're in such a hurry, why don't you just get in there with him, then?" Kayla's hand appeared at the edge of the curtain. What was she doing? Josh couldn't believe this. "No..." Jillian sounded aghast. "We'd be saving water...." The curtains began to slide open. "NOOO!!" Now she sounded terrified. "You know, I ought to toss you in there with him just because you've been such a snoop. I could get your clothes washed at the same time, and you could tickle his feet." "n-n-NO ...Is he ticklish?" Kayla laughed, "Oh, NOW you're interested." Josh shut the water off. Nobody was going to tickle his feet. "Aww, I was having a lot of fun with this," Kayla protested. Josh chuckled, "I know. But if it had gone on much longer, Jilly wouldn't have enough hot water for her bath, and by the time you got her fingernails pried off the doorframe to toss her into the shower with me, which by the way, I'd feel uncomfortable about, we'd still have run out. Never mind the effect on me. That would be the same as tossing a cat into a full bathtub. I'd have bled to death." "Whew," breathed Jillian, "that was close." Josh reached through the shower curtains to grab a towel. Jillian shrieked and fled out of the room. Kayla collapsed on the floor in laughter. "What's that about? All she saw was my arm! She can't see my arm, now?" Josh was getting uncomfortable. "Look Kayla, maybe I ought to just use the shower in the loft from now on. She's obviously not ready to have me around." Kayla smiled at him. "Give me a minute. I think her prank just didn't go the way that she wanted it to. Now she's just getting silly. Dry off, and put something on." Jillian's voice sounded sad and reproachful from her room where she sat with a pillow to her face. "Stop laughing at me!" Kayla got up and followed the moans. Josh began to towel off. He put the plug into the tub, and turned the water on for her bath as he heard Kayla's voice sounding conciliatory. "You should stop freaking out all the time, Jilly. It's only a big deal if you make it one. If we're going to live together as a family, we're all going to have to adjust. Give him some space when he's in the bathroom, and he'll give you some too. By the way, what did you think would happen if you saw him naked? Did your hair catch fire?" Kayla asked. "No." "Did your skin melt?" "No." "Did your eyeballs fall out?" "No." Jillian giggled. Josh was in the bedroom pulling on a pair of jeans as Kayla led Jillian back to the bathroom. "You shouldn't have opened the curtain with him in there. It's really not polite. He would never have done that to you. He's having to adjust to having a little girl in his life all of a sudden. That's very new to him just like it's new for you to have him around. He's the still same great guy that you've had fun with all day, just cleaner for once." "Thanks." said Josh from the bedroom. "It's just that he looks so...weird." she said. "Thanks," said Josh. Kayla chuckled, "Well I've seen him naked a couple of times, and I think he's kind of cute, actually. Anyway Jilly, now you've made him feel bad, and he didn't do anything wrong. You started all of this. Don't do that again, ok? You're just going to have to get used to having him around here." She helped Jillian undress and get into the tub. "Ok, so relax. I know he looks all weird and everything without his clothes, but he's your dad now. That's what you wanted was a dad, I remember, and pretty soon you're going to be stuck with him. He's ok, you know? I know he's still in training to be a father, but I think he'd be the best father that you could ever want. Don't forget this is strange for him too." Jillian nodded a little uncertainly before Kayla went on, "You should apologize to him when you get out of the tub." "No." Jillian said determinedly. She looked around and decided that there were enough bubbles and toys to keep her hidden. "I want to do it now. Jo- uh, Dad?" Josh walked to the doorway with just his jeans on. He looked at Kayla who nodded. "What, Jilly?" he said as he walked into the room. "I'm sorry for peeking," Jilly said before she sighed, "and for freaking out." He sat cross-legged on the floor by the tub. "It's ok, Peaches, I just felt bad for you. I know I'm not a very pretty sight. And you can call me either name, whatever you feel comfortable with. It's fine with me." he said. She held on to the side of the tub facing him. "What are those?" she asked pointing to his chest. "Just some scars. My skin got torn up, and when it healed, those marks were left." he said. "Will they always be there?" "Yes." "Um... what was the other thing I saw?" Kayla stepped up to the plate. "Jilly, I don't think any of us are ready for that talk yet." She rolled her eyes, "I know he's not. You and I can talk about that later. For now, since I guess you've never seen a boy before, it's just what all boys have. That's what they pee with." "Ewww. I hate boys." She wrinkled the other prettiest nose he'd ever seen. "I'll remind you that you said that one day." Josh grinned, as he started pushing a plastic boat around. Kayla smiled at her. "I think he's trying get you to play with your bath toys. He's such a big kid." She rubbed the blonde stubble on his head. Josh and Jillian got into pushing the toys around, and making noises, while Kayla sat on the toilet lid laughing at them until the water began to cool. She thought that they looked so good together. It was such a strange thing. None of them had started out with each other, but they sure felt like they all belonged to one another anyway. They were becoming a family, and she felt very thankful for that. She handed Josh a towel, and he did his best to inspect the ceiling while holding the towel open. "What are you looking at, Josh? Jillian asked him. "I'm looking at anything BUT you, Peaches" he said. Kayla fished Jillian out of the tub. He wrapped her up in the towel loosely, and Kayla began to towel her off as she leaned into Josh and she hugged his neck tightly. He kept his gaze on the ceiling. Kayla wrapped her up again before she ran out on the way to her room. "Thanks, Daddy!" she giggled. Josh sat in amazement. He was always thrilled when she hugged him. It was the greatest feeling in the world to have her call him her dad. He didn't notice that she'd soaked him. "You weren't actually going to put her in the shower with me, were you?" Josh asked as he stood up. "No way." Kayla said quietly, "But I did want to introduce a possible consequence to her actions this one time. I also wanted to use the opportunity that she provided to get her to loosen up a little. She's learning from us that she's really wanted; that she's a part of us, and we don't want her to stay in the corner. You go out of your way to include her. That's a huge thing for her," she said quietly, "Her father was always distant to her. That's why you as a male are such a strange new animal to her. I'm sure that you've already given her more human contact than he ever did. For my part, you can keep it up because I can see her self-confidence growing by leaps and bounds in such a short time. There's nothing wrong with being shy, but I was afraid that she was becoming painfully shy because of me, and she had no father figure in her life to give her a safe spot to work outward from. By the way, you look like you peed all over yourself thanks to her hug" she smiled. "That's ok, it'll dry quickly" he said. "Let me get her ready for bed. Would you read to her again? She loves that." Josh nodded, smiling. "I love that too." ----------------- "So what's with Kayla? What did she tell you?" Rita asked, as they hit the outskirts. "Check this out," Consuela said as she coaxed the dual carbs open with her foot. The rear tires chirped for a second, and they shot ahead, hitting the posted limit in a few seconds. Rita nodded her approval. "So? Did you hear anything?" "No, all that she told me was that they had a problem that you and I could maybe help them with. I was afraid that something serious had happened, but she told me to relax, and that they just need our advice and maybe some help with something else. I don't know what to think. She told me nothing's wrong between them, so I'm relieved at that. What did she tell you?" Consuela asked, the bright plastic bangles on her arm clattered as she removed her sunglasses as the sun hit the horizon. "Same thing pretty much. I've been worried for them a bit too. They're just so perfect. I don't want anything to go wrong for them." They swung out to pass a sleek black Jimmy pickup with a couple of imitation cowboys in it. The reaction was instant and the truck pulled alongside as the guy in the passenger seat lowered his window to try to convince them to stop – or ask where they were headed – or about a half-dozen other things which the wind took away as fast as he said them. "Fuck." Consuela exclaimed as she reached to arm the nitrous system and open the exhaust dumps. The light on the dash came on, and she hit the pedal. The Chevy roared as it wound out, and the guys suddenly found their jaws in their laps, breathing blue tire smoke as Consuela lifted her arm from the top edge of the door and extended a single finger. Rita laughed. ------------------------ They didn't get far into the book before Jillian faded out. She'd spent another day screaming around and she was tired out. Kayla stood admiring the two of them on the couch, Jillian's head was against his chest, and he had his arm around her. Kayla crouched down, and nudged the little girl. "Hey, Josh is going to put you in bed now, ok?" Jillian nodded contentedly as Joshua carefully picked her up and carried her to her bed, where they both kissed her goodnight. They were about to walk out of the door as the girls pulled in. Rita ran over to the man sitting at the porch table. He had turned around at their arrival, his back washed in the soft glow of a laptop screen. "So what's so urgent and important that you need our help? Have you both forgotten where to stick that thing already?" Kayla began to laugh, and Josh cleared his throat. "Hi guys. Had your vision checked lately? They spun around and stared. "Who? –" Turning back, they saw the man stand up, as a very amused Rose emerged through the kitchen screen door with two more cups of tea. Josh chuckled, "Rita Gonzales, and Consuela Smith, I'd like to introduce you to Jim Brisebois, my best friend." The girls recovered quickly, but Rita's face felt a bit of heat from her blush. Jim walked off the porch and extended his had. "Joshua has told me a bit about you. I'm so glad to meet you both." The introductions out of the way, Josh explained what Jim had come down for and Kayla related why she and Rose had been concerned about the possibility that Josh might have been recalled as they stepped onto the porch. Rose turned on the porch light, and the sisters stared at Jim. "My God, Josh. You guys look like you're related. For a second, I thought that Josh looked suddenly bigger across the back and had shaved his head." Rita laughed. "Hey, really, what was so all-fired important, anyway?" Josh looked at Kayla. She smiled, "Well, it's looking like I'm not going to be needing that old pistol anymore. Josh has asked Jim to be his best man, and –" The twins literally lost their minds for a few seconds. "You're getting MARRIED?" 'OH MY GOD!" They hugged Josh, and Kayla, and even Rose and Jim couldn't escape their joy and excitement. After several minutes, Jillian wandered over sleepily, and Rita even picked her up and hugged her too. "We're sorry that we woke you, sweetheart. We just got carried away because you're going to be a family now. That's such good news." She kissed Jillian, and put her down so that Kayla could lead her back to bed. Rose led the way back to the porch. When Rita returned, the twins smiled over at her. "So if you're getting married, what's the problem that you wouldn't mention?" Rita asked. Josh shrugged, "I'd have thought that getting even a simple wedding together in a matter of a couple of days would be a problem." "Pfft, no," Rita snorted, "We can handle it." "Yeah," Consuela said with a soft look on her face as she stepped a little closer and turned Josh's head with her light touch on his chin, "We love you guys, but there's the other thing." "What other thing?" Rita asked. "This marks the end of an era," Consuela said solemnly and with just the right amount of wistfulness, "the passing of an age. Our Viking's getting hitched. I can't let that go by without something to mark it." "Uh-uh," Margarita smirked, "No funeral pyres, Brunhilda, and no smashing of glasses either." "How about a roast boar then? Give me about a half hour and a phone and I'll fill the joint with shieldmaidens." Consuela laughed, "C'mon Rita, Jesus where's your sense of ceremony?" A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 16 "I keep it in the same drawer with the fire insurance policy," her twin snapped as Kayla laughed, though she did like the idea of the theme. Kayla grinned, "Well there is the moment of my ultimate victory," she laughed as she turned to hug Josh and placer her hand on his chest, "I mean, how many times can it ever happen in my life when I find a guy who'll drop his pants for me, and all I have to do is threaten him with a gun? I mean come on,..." Jim chuckled, "Kayla, did you ever think of offering him money? I'm sure he'd have been happy with a quarter. I know him pretty well; he'd have been yours if you'd waved half a Popsicle at him." Amid the laughter, Josh looked thoughtful. "Lord, what's happened to me? I used to have ethics and morals. Now I'm just easy AND cheap" he scowled, "I've been trying just to keep it at easy." Kayla looked at the twins, "So is there a way? Because we still need to get married at least a little fast. That's what we both really want, and Jim is only here for a week. I don't even know if we can do that, or where to book a place on such short notice. I was wondering if we could book your place for the reception. We don't know that many people around here, so it doesn't have to be a huge thing, and that's not really what I ever wanted anyway for a wedding, not that I ever expected to get married, even. I guess I'm asking for help." The twins were happy to oblige their friends, but before Josh knew it, really, they were in planning mode. The transformation had been instant and seamless. "I was going to ask how everything was starting to look to you, Jim," Rose said, but then she sighed with a smile, But I also want to watch as this wedding comes together here. I just know I can help in it someplace." She looked at the groom in this. "You were right Joshua. He really is the planning type. But let's just break that stuff off and put it on hold for a time. We'll worry about the wedding first, and then see where we need to focus." "You're right," Jim smiled, "that is the real reason that I'm here to begin with. We'll get back into that in the morning. I really like what I'm seeing here with regard to the operation of this place." He realized that they were all waiting for some other kernel of wisdom from him, and having nothing, he turned to the assembled women with a grin, "Ok, carry on." Rita laughed, "For a second there, I thought it was gonna be something important." They began their discussions as though the men weren't even present. Josh smiled at Jim, who shrugged. After determining what they could accomplish within the time span, the women broke it up and decided which tasks they would each handle. Consuela smiled. "This is wonderful. I feel like I'm a part of YOUR fairy tale romance. We're going to have a lot of fun doing this!" "Yeah," Rita grinned ruefully, "before we all fall down in exhaustion. And can actually find the time to enjoy the part we're playing, 'Suela. We might be happy if we can get the time to catch our breath" She turned to Kayla and hugged her. "My sister and I have been friends with Josh for a long time now, and you know we love him dearly. There were always two things that bothered us;. the short time that we had together with him when he could be here, and the fact that he never found someone to love him. I'm hoping that you guys don't end up leaving to stay in Canada, because we love you and Jilly now. But if you do, at least we'll know that he's going to be happy with you." Consuela looked at Kayla. "'Rita spoke for my heart as well. I do hope that you stay here. We're happy for him, and you. We're delighted that you seem to fit right in here. You're both good people, and no matter what happens, you're our friend now too." Kayla smiled, and wiped her eyes. "You don't know what that means to me. I haven't really had a friend in years, and certainly none since my sister died. I just isolated myself from people. Now all of a sudden, I'm surrounded with people who wish us well. It's a little overwhelming to have you guys not just as acquaintances that I met through Josh, but real friends. Thank you both." Josh and Jim had grabbed a flashlight, and were under the hood of Consuella's car admiring Bart's handiwork. Josh whispered, "You know, I know those girls really well, I've always loved the way that once you're their friend, you have their hearts. From the first time I met them, they've treated me not as a GUY friend, ... well they did sometimes, but mostly they talk to me like I'm in the circle, you know? For right now though, I'm glad we're over here. They look like they're all going to need a tissue any minute." Rose walked back onto the porch with a Kleenex box in her hand, and they both nearly collapsed in their attempts to cover their quiet laughter by sticking their heads farther into the engine compartment. Jim smiled, "They are truly warm girls, You were so lucky to find this place. One day, I'd really like you to tell me how all of this started. I mean, I'd see it when you'd place your leave request, and I just thought you'd found yourself a fuck buddy someplace. I should have known you were just being yourself in a place that you liked to be in." "I met them the first year," said Josh, "I only get to see them a few days a year, but we've always been really close. We email the rest of the time." They straightened up as the twins approached after the group broke up for the night. "Hey!" Consuela said with a smirk as she and her sister came nearer, "Why is it always the same thing with guys? You see a girl you like, and the next thing she knows, you're trying to get your head up her skirt. That's my baby, Josh. Couldn't you have just asked?" Jim expressed his admiration for Bart's work, and Consuela proudly pointed out a lot of the other hidden features. Eventually, Jim bid them goodnight, and walked to the porch. The girls asked Josh if they could speak to him for a minute. Consuela began a little quietly, "Baby, we are SO happy for you guys! We're going to do everything that we can so that you two can pull this off, trust us." Dropping her voice lower, she said, "Josh, honey, we have a question, and if it weren't you and our friendship, we'd never even ask. Even so, you can tell us to go to Hell, but we're asking as old friends, and we just want to ask you one thing – is Kayla, ... uh, well, is she ..." Rita leaned in, "Oh for God's sake, Suela. Is Kayla good for you in bed? That's all we want to know. It's none of our business, but we used to be close, right? I want to be sure that my old friend is happy." Josh didn't hesitate. He smiled warmly at his friends. "Hey, it's me, remember? You can stop getting squirmy. We're like the three musketeers. The answer is yes. By luck or love, I don't know, she can do things that knock my socks off, and they land in the hamper." They thanked him, and he leaned into the car to kiss them after they got in. "I love you both so much. Say hi to your guys for me." Consuela started the car and turned it around. When it was halfway down the drive, he turned and looked back. "How do you want to play this? Do you want to just walk over, or do you want me to hunt you down in the dark? I do know where you are, but I could give you say, a count of ten if you want." Josh heard her soft footsteps approach. "How did you know I was there?" Kayla asked him as she kissed him. "You were on the porch, then you weren't, and I started paying attention. I guessed that you'd try to sneak around a little, so I waited until I heard you for sure, which was when you stubbed your toe coming around the back of the bunkhouse." Kayla chuckled, "If you knew that I was there, why did you continue?" He shrugged, "I know you. I wanted you to understand that there was something earnest going on, not something covert, which you would have been chewing on later. You and I are together now. I don't ever want there to be secrets between us." "Which one did you sleep with?" she asked. "Would it matter to you? Which one do you think?" He turned to her. "If you ask me a direct question with a name, I won't lie." "I figured it out yesterday evening. I guess it doesn't matter, really," Kayla said, "as long as it's over, and you're faithful to me." He smiled. "I don't need to know your history unless it's important, or you think it's important enough for me to know. Everything else that went before, -" He shrugged. She put her arms around his waist. "That's fine, ...so do I have to ask if it's over, and if you're faithful to me as direct questions?" "No. They're my closest female friends after you, because I do consider you to be my friend beyond what we have. Apart from me, your two best friends just drove home, and they really are that. There's nothing going on between either of them and me. They're very happily married. And I am faithful to you. If you don't know this about me, then you haven't been paying attention. I don't have the capability to be in love with somebody and screw around. I'm not wired that way and I'm not bright enough. I can appreciate that your experience with men in general might indicate otherwise to you, but until you push me away awfully hard, I'm all yours," he looked directly into the jade of her eyes, "and I'm yours only." They walked slowly to stand in front of the bunkhouse. Kayla suddenly turned playful. "Hey, there's one thing that I just GOTTA know, the one that you slept with, -" "Kayla, " "Hey, it's just a woman's pride thing," she teased. "No." "Was she really good in bed?" she leaned against him and tickled his ribs lightly. "I'm not answering you." He grinned in spite of the serious tone that he knew was crumbling. "Oh, come ON, Josh. It's important to me," she giggled, hopping up and down in front of him just as Jillian would. Her hair looked like it was hopping a beat behind her own. Josh loved her so. He wondered if she could possibly look any cuter. She was suddenly the pixie that she must have been during her own childhood. "Not answering." He smiled. "I already know there's another question behind this one, so forget it." "Ok, I'll cut to the chase," Kayla knew that she needed to shift gears now. She kind of, sort of wanted the answer, but it really wasn't important. She just enjoyed the game. Kayla suddenly affected a child's uncertainty. Her green eyes grew large and liquid under sad and fearful eyebrows. Her lower lip protruded just slightly, and it quivered. Josh knew he was up against one of the most fearsome weapons in her feminine arsenal. He only hoped that he was equal to this test. He voice became tiny and faltered a bit. "Was,...was she,...better than... me?" "Listen," Josh said, rolling his eyes, "I believe that they conceded your superiority publicly only a few days ago in the cantina." "No, no, that was for show, and it related to me WINNING your heart. That's not what I'm asking." Josh sighed as he held her, "Well I would have thought that being proclaimed as the 'Mighty Kayla' would have counted for something. Didn't that appeal to your woman's pride, you powerful, mighty, Viking-vanquishing warrior maiden, you?" She leaned into him, her face turned up awaiting his kiss. After a long moment, her lips lightly grazed his as she purred softly. "You have no idea,..." After another long kiss, she jabbed her fingers into his ribs to tickle him, and ran into the bunkhouse giggling softly. As he came through the door, she was waiting for him, and stopped him with a hand firmly cupping his genitals, squeezing softly. Her other hand went to the back of his head to pull him to her. She kissed him hard, and then licked his scar before her lips tickled his ear. She whispered softly to him. "I know that we pretty much own each other already, Joshua. I wasn't worried about you. What happened years ago isn't my concern. I don't have to know your past, though I wouldn't mind learning what you'd share with me, and that's not the same thing. I've already learned that I can't make assumptions about you because that's just dangerous, and you're full of delicious surprises. I don't need to ask anymore anyway. By the way that you've been speaking, I now know that you made love with both of them at some time before they were married, and I think that given the chance, you could have chosen one of them, but you didn't. I believe that if they were both single today that you still would choose me. I know that much about you already. I know that you need me, just like I need you. That's MY woman's pride, and I love you so much..." But she stopped there, and Josh looked at her a little curiously. Kayla broke into a grin and she whispered as she pointed around him through the screen door, "The fish is rising to the bait." -------------------------- Jim was in the loft putting his gear away. He went over everything that he'd found out about the place in his mind. There was nothing so far that would stop a successful start up, but he knew that he'd only gotten a couple of days in. Rose walked onto the porch with a cup of tea. Glancing over at the shed windows, she set her cup on the railing, and picked up the binoculars. Across from her, and behind the bunkhouse screen door, Josh and Kayla smiled to each other, and Josh carefully opened the door. The hinges rotated silently in the grease that he had applied to them today. Kayla was eagerly waiting as she watched Rose. Jim undressed and adjusted the water temperature. When he was satisfied, he stepped through the shower curtain. Rose lowered the binoculars, knowing that he would be out of sight for the duration. She turned to have a sip of her tea. "Rose Marriott, that's not very nice." Kayla said. Rose almost leapt out of her skin in shock. Josh and Kayla sat smiling on the top step of the porch in front of her. She was stuck, not knowing what to say, and feeling foolish beyond words. Kayla looked at her reproachfully and said in a soft stern voice, "Though I could see how you'd think it was very nice, and I can't say as I wouldn't have been tempted myself in a similar situation in my day with a man like him." Joshua turned to her. "Speaking from personal experience, Rosie, it's really hard for a guy with wide shoulders to scrub his own back...especially if that young miscreant Taylor has taken the back scrubber away...." Joshua handed her a back scrubber and they both kissed her cheek as they walked back to the bunkhouse. Over her shoulder, Kayla giggled, "I'll give you just 10 minutes to get into that shower with him." Rose couldn't believe what she was hearing. He grinned at her, "He's going to notice that it's gone any minute now... Good night." He closed both the screen, and main doors. Rose stood with her mouth open looking at the bunkhouse door. She turned, and looked at the loft. A slow smile came to her lips, as she chuckled softly. "Oh, you're both devils.." She walked to the shed. When she got to the loft, she paused, considering. After a moment, she decided that she could either be very proper about this, and go back to wait in the house to take him into her arms when he returned, or she could just go back to being the happy farm girl again that she'd found still existed that afternoon. Her clothes were off in an instant and she walked to the shower. "Jim? Would you like me to scrub your back?" she asked softly. Josh and Kayla didn't really need the field glasses. They'd come back out and stood smiling in the big yard as Rose made her choice. As she stepped into the shower with Jim, they walked back to the bunkhouse with their arms around each other. A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 17 ***I struggled with the category for this, but finally decided that if I kept it down to a little shy fumbling, it might fly. I really didn't want one chapter of a story in a different category - though if I feel like it later, I still might put something together for Sam and Siobhan, I dunno. If you're bothered by it, just skip ahead, ok? 0_o --------------- Siobhan looked out through the expanse of glass in the converted old sun-room at the snowy countryside all around her as she stood with her arm around Sam and feeling the weight of the arm which now rested on her shoulders. She considered the past thirty-six hours and thought of it all as something of a minor miracle for the way that it had happened. She'd gotten up in her little rented cottage in Yorkshire, taken a quick shower -- as though there were any other kind to take there, gotten dressed to travel, and scooped up the two suitcases and one carry-on bag which now amounted to her entire life as she made ready to leave her internship and life experiment behind her to go home. That internship had been a resounding success, which she supposed that she could take away as a victory, but the experiment had been a dismal failure in the way that it pointed to the cause of the other reason that she'd gone there in the first place. Two years, she thought, two years in another place doing the things that she'd set out to do, but there was the other thing. Other than the people which her work brought her into daily contact with, she'd met no one, pretty much, and it indicated that perhaps it hadn't been the experiment of trying to break out of the shell that she had been born into and grown up in so much as it pointed to the fact that it was her who was the failure. She'd tried and tried, but Siobhan had never mastered the ability to meet people and make friends to any degree, and she lived a very lonely existence for it. Mastered? Hell, she'd never even been able to learn the basics, other than being polite and trying to look friendly. Two years there and she was still alone. Two years of living in the English countryside with excursions to London, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dublin, Stockholm, Cologne, and yes, even to Paris once. She'd tried to look on the bright side and thought to the few times when she'd actually gotten laid while she was there, but those were only three liaisons and not the relationships which she found herself pining to have even once in her life. Those had amounted to little more than pick-ups that she'd allowed and quick fucks, and not one of them had been even a little enjoyable unless you were the man. Her body did appeal to the men who had bedded her, but she already knew that they wanted only that from her -- not that they were that great themselves. She was more than a little certain that with a dark room, a latex glove with lube smeared over it and a sound track of her pretending to moan playing as a loop, it would suffice for them while she'd get nothing more than deeper melancholy and darkening despair. She remembered the time that she'd almost broken down and cried in her misery one afternoon while working at the clinic where she was interning at about the halfway point. A rather bellicose old landowner had brought in his foul-tempered looking English Mastiff, saying that he didn't imagine that anyone there would be able to get the beast's toenails clipped properly in any sort of short order, so he'd be back to pick up the monster later that afternoon. "You can sedate him if you must," he'd said in the speech of the locals, "I'd rather that it weren't necessary, but 'e won't take kindly to the treatment -- 'e never has -- so good luck to yer, Miss." Siobhan gave it a go and she did manage to get the nails clipped to an acceptable length, but in the course of that, she learned that Ajax was a horny thing, and all of the wrestling which was required -- and that was what it had been, if not nearly mortal combat at moments - gave him enough of a chance for his nose to determine that she was a female. Some lamp lit dimly in his tiny brain and then it became more of a mating attempt on his part. After that, he didn't give all that much of a damn about worrying over his nails; he was bent on shoving that drooling snout into her crotch and at one point, it looked as though he was trying to manage a lot more of a carnal indiscretion with her, but her fist driven into the top of his stone-hard head ( since nothing else was working) settled him back to looking murderous and he allowed his nails to be clipped at last. The whole thing had been supremely embarrassing to Siobhan in light of the fact that it had taken her and a male intern to get it done. Well, not really. The male intern in question had been scared shitless of Ajax. Harold was a thin and nervous-looking young man who'd grown up in the shadow of his mother's affluence and as men go, to Siobhan's mind at least, he lacked many of the things that set them apart from people of her gender, having little to no upper body strength or strength of any kind -- inside him or out. He seemed to prefer the care and upkeep of canaries to anything larger than a Shi tsu and she wondered what he was doing there interning at a practice whose business was an even mix of semi-urban and agricultural. He spent most of his time during any shift with her flipping his hair out of his eyes and pouting over something. As far as helping her, he'd been less than useless, being quite obviously in fear of a large, though muzzled canine and he did little more than watch and squirm uncomfortably when Siobhan had gotten fairly well pinned in a corner while old Ajax tried to mount her. She'd realized then that Harold didn't have a clue about handling large animals and before it went farther than her having to look at that pink thing bobbing the air before her and dragging over her skirt, she'd acted. It had only happened because Harold was afraid and she'd mistakenly assumed that he was actually trying to hold the animal when really, it was all that he could do to lay his hands on the beast and keep them there in light and trembling contact. "You were supposed to restrain him," she'd said, seething as she worked to cut the toenails, and it looked as though even the beast didn't have the stones to do more than lie there compliant in the face of her wrath by then. "When exactly were you going to do a thing to help me?" One look at his face and she knew that he'd never had to do anything such as this. Being a girl off a farm, she'd learned long ago that you don't show a bullish animal like Ajax any fear. "You handle them with friendliness and firm kindness, most of all with certainty," she'd hissed angrily at Harold, "You don't stand there shaking on the other side of the room with a stiff little willy while he tries to rape me." He'd looked at her with no answer whatsoever, which irritated Siobhan even more, so she'd tossed the conversational knife, being angry enough for it by then. "Or were you waiting for a chance at seconds, Harold?" she'd snarled quietly in her anger, "Which one of us did you fancy, me or Ajax? My money's on him." Harold's pouting mouth had fallen open then and as he turned beet red, he left hurriedly while she finished the job alone. Siobhan had to endure a sit-down with their superior and Harold for it afterward, since Harold had lodged a complaint. Siobhan was mortified again, but she did something far out of character for her then and told the senior partner of the firm exactly what had happened, laying it out clearly that she'd managed to get it done without any aid from Harold at all. Siobhan knew that she was more often just a mouse in situations such as this -- but she'd come thousands of miles for this internship, and she was determined to do well, especially this far into it. "I've been told by Harold that you struck the Mastiff which was here to have his nails clipped," Andrews said, "How do you respond?" Siobhan nodded, "I weigh a hundred and twenty-three pounds," she'd said, electing to say it in the Imperial form for the larger numbers than if she'd gone with the metric, "Ajax weighs in at one hundred sixty-two since we'd just weighed him and he has four feet to my two. I was losing and Harold did nothing but stand there shaking with an erection in his pants despite my repeated requests and pleas for help. Since it was plain that he was more engrossed in watching, I did what I had to." "Which was?" the tall and lanky old vet asked. "Doctor Andrews, I grew up on a farm with horses and cattle," Siobhan said, "I was in a corner -- a bad place to be. I could see that I wasn't going to get any help, so I drew an 'X' between his eyes and his ears in my head and I drove the dog hard with my fist. He went down like a bag of sand with his legs in all directions. After that, I grabbed his muzzle and I firmly rolled him onto his side, telling him that we -- meaning me -- were going to cut his nails then -- right there on the floor. Ajax was fine afterward, my hand still hurts, and I have a ruined skirt to show for all of Harold's help." "I did not ... have an erection!" Harold hissed, "That didn't happen." "Please don't make me request that we look at the security footage together," the old vet said dryly, "I've already seen it once. I have no desire to comb through it frame by frame in order to determine whether or not you were aroused." Harold shut up and sat with his thin arms crossed as he pouted. "It doesn't sound to me as though you were in much if any fear yourself," the man said to Siobhan, "Why?" "To a big boy like Ajax," she said, "it's about domination and taking your place -- or being put in it. You don't show fear then. And anyway, he was muzzled so it wasn't as though I was terrified. I had no intent to hurt him in any way. I just wanted to get his attention in a manner that he'd understand so that he would give up his attempts. The only thing was that firm words hadn't worked at all. So I put him in his place -- before things got ridiculous. After clipping his nails, Ajax would do anything for me and wanted to follow me around being well-behaved as though he was my own dog. I even found that I liked him. Once we got our pecking order straight between us, I wouldn't have minded having him for a companion at all, since he talks to me about as much as any of the other interns here, but at least he likes me. If Harold has a suggestion as to what he believes that I should have done while he stared at Ajax' erect penis, I'd love to hear it," she said. "Then I'd like to hear his reasons for not doing whatever he'd suggest himself in order to help me. I'd also like to hear his apology to me, though I can see that I won't hear any of those things from him." Andrews raised one finger at Harold in warning, "I have seen the video. I would advise you to remain silent at this point." Harold did nothing but glower and of course, pout at that. "I'll make a notation that Harold has shown himself to be somewhat less than able to deal with larger animals, and not for the first time," the old vet remarked, looking at Harold with a touch of disdain. "There are larger creatures in the world which might require our care than even feisty Pomeranians and savage parakeets, Harold. You might wish to consider this in your future plans. You will accompany me tomorrow, by the way. We must try to determine if a prize draft mare is pregnant on behalf of the owner of the sire so that he can be paid. Your arms look to be long and thin enough for it when you reach in to feel, since that is the way that it is done. It's also one of the reasons why I use interns for it, since they need to know this and it also provides an excellent opportunity to separate the wheat from the chaff as it were, since the examination places the veterinarian's face about a handsbreadth away from the animal's anus." Harold looked as though he was about to lose his lunch, but Andrews ignored what he saw. "And if she likes you," he grinned, "she'll contract firmly enough to make you feel your pulse in your fingertips. Another reason to recommend the use of interns," he smiled. "And Miss Mac Domhnaill," he said, "well done and I am sorry about your skirt." But when she'd found herself alone for a few minutes afterward, it came t her that what Ajax had in his mind was exactly what she'd settled for with any of the men that she'd met -- either there or at home -- minus the smiles and the attempts at being witty in a pub. Right then, Siobhan had almost started to cry. So much for romance. She almost broke down then, but she was looking at another few hours on duty and so she'd managed to hold it back. She sighed afterward. At least Ajax had licked her hand. The fallout from that episode had been two-fold. Siobhan didn't know why, but now most of the other interns seemed to think that she had an in with the senior doctor, and they had even less to do with her, if that were possible. The other thing was that since that incident, Ajax loved her and caused more trouble when he was brought in to have his nails clipped or for a bath of just a checkup. He now associated going to the clinic with seeing Siobhan again and a dog his size and weight if he had a want to look everywhere for the one human that he looked forward to seeing, well there were interesting incidents. Siobhan would be in the middle of something with another animal, and then she'd hear the frenzied attempts by another intern to exert control. The door would fly open then and Ajax would drag the intern in and stand ready to be fussed over by the only person who did that for him. Even his owner was impressed, "You've got some way about yer, Miss, to make him want to see yer as much as he does. 'E tolerates me, yeah, and he does what I tell him, but I only 'ave ter say. 'Let's go, Ajax and get yer nails clipped' and e's away, pullin' me to car. I think I could save meself some petrol if I just hitched 'in up and let 'im go." A monster like an English Mastiff is not a pretty dog to a lot of people, but since they'd gotten things straight between them, Siobhan liked Ajax and looked forward to his visits. It brought her the only relationship that she'd had there with anyone, and she found the old man to be as gruff as his dog at the outset, but a good person to know and to chat with when he came, since he was always very interested in Siobhan and where she'd come from. The trip to London for the flight home had been little more than her sitting in a small bus with a few others whose terms had expired. The farther south they went, the more their numbers dwindled as some of them were dropped off. The others did little more than reinforce the way that she felt. Whenever she looked around, they were laughing and joking while she sat apart and alone. Just like always. It felt a lot worse after they'd all found their way in the Departures area. More of the same laughing and joking while she was mostly ignored. Thankfully her flight boarded first. A quick look back and she saw that nobody was looking at her as she stood up to walk to the gate where he flight would be boarding soon. No one even noticed her at all. The flight back was nothing -- so it fit right in with the rest of her life, she supposed -- one long nothing. Then there was the worry about being picked up and it looked for a moment like not even her ride had been bothered to come and get her. But then she saw Sam, running the length of the Arrivals hall to look for her and the rest of her day had been amazing. She found that she loved being with Sam, no matter where they were to that point. The night before hadn't been too awkward, since they were each a little drunk and Siobhan was edging into exhaustion by then. But once in the bed with Sam against her, she'd been happy. She wondered about that now -- on top of what her great-grandmother had said. She'd seen none of it in her lifetime, but she was aware that the two women had carried on a life-long love in this very room and elsewhere. It hadn't been a big deal to her family then, it had just been accepted that it was there and going on. She looked up at Sam a little uncertainly, "I've never been with a girl, though with the history of my family, I'd be lying if I said that something like that has never crossed my mind. Have you ever --" "One time," Sam smiled, "I never did find somebody in those coffee shops late at night -- well, nobody that I'd really want to get to know much, but I did meet this one girl once. I slept with her, too." Siobhan blinked, "How was it?" Sam chuckled, "As far as sex and fireworks," she grinned, "it was pretty boring. Though to be fair, that hadn't been the intent. We just slept together, and that part was fantastic. I'm not really sure that I'd even know what to do with another girl, but I think that I'd at least like to try it one time with that girl again -- if you think that you can stay awake." Siobhan stared for a second and then she smiled, "Oh, you meant me. I liked it too, Sam. But I don't want to jump into bed and carry on -- sorry, but I'm pretty gun-shy these days, and this is all a little weird to me, and I'm saying that as an understatement. Yesterday morning -- where I was, anyway, I was feeling as lost and alone as I ever did; maybe even more so. I come here, meet you and everything is different -- just like that. Today it's gone from that to real plans of a business starting faster than I'd ever think possible and the girl I met is going to be a partner in a bigger business than Mom and I ever talked about. Holy ..." She looked outside then and Sam found herself admiring Siobhan for a moment. "It feels weird to me too, Siobhan, but I do like you an awful lot. Maybe it's just coming out of me living like a hermit most of the time, I dunno, but I like just being around you. You're a little mysterious to me and I like that too." Siobhan turned then and after a moment where she just stood looking at Sam, she put her arms around her and smiled, "Fine. I'll try to keep up the mystery if I can. Right now, since there's nobody here and before I lose my nerve, I just want to hug you for a minute. I think that's safe, right?" Sam nodded and they just stood there in an embrace for a little while. ---------------------- They decided on a walk then, down the road and around the corner to the old house, so that they could drive back in Sam's truck with their things, though they did stay long enough to sit with old Sile and have tea and she looked at them for a bit before she called her granddaughter over, "Call the senior's complex" she said, "I find that in the middle of all of this, I'm not in much of a hurry to go back. I'm beginning to feel as though I might be a little useful to the girls, so I'll just sleep in the room where Da and I used to sleep before he died." Sylvia was delighted and they changed their plans for dinner on the spot. After dinner and the clean-up, Cale and Sylvia left to go back to his home down the road and Sile sat with the girls in the room that she'd given them for a time just talking about their plans. She asked Siobhan if she was ready to guide things in the way of their family and Siobhan nodded a little uncomfortably since Sam was sitting right there, listening. "Don't worry on my account," Sam grinned, "You guys talk about what you want to, it's all over my head, and hey, if it helps at all, just go for it. I can keep myself busy, now that I found the anvil and the hammers in the shed." She fished in the breast pocket of her shirt for a moment and she came up with a scrap of paper which she held up with a chuckle, "I asked my Dad for a tape measure back as his place and while you guys were all talking in some language that he and I didn't get, I took measurements of that pot holder and everything to make mulled mead. If I find just a little band iron and a piece of hot-rolled steel, I'll be happy." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 17 Siobhan got up and walked to the kitchen, coming back with an old pot in only a minute. "I haven't seen this one used for anything in years," she grinned, "So if you need a pot ... " Sam thanked her and got up to put her boots on, and the others felt a lot more at ease not having to feel as though they weren't including Sam. Sam found the light switch in the shed and in only minutes, she'd found everything that she thought she'd need. The small forge was heated by propane and there was a big-assed cylinder hooked up and when she'd hefted it, She'd found that it was almost full. She cut the metal that she'd need and away she went as she got the flame lit. Once she'd begun, Sam didn't want to stop for anything, since she was having her brand of fun making something. She started with the band to go around the pot and with that fitted, she just got into measuring out the stubby legs and figuring out a way to hang it if it had to be hung up, cutting some black iron for that. Looking it over, she thought that the "feet" ought to be splayed out a little and the next thing she knew, she was pounding them out the way that she saw them in her mind. The little room was near an outside door and she could feel the cold of that, but with the fire hot, both in the forge and inside of her, she worked up a bit of a sweat in no time. Sam looked around. There was no one there of course, but she was into this now and so she unbuttoned her flannel shirt and hung it up on a nail. The rest, she beat out wearing just her sportsbra under the apron that she'd found there. She felt better temperature-wise, and she just went to town. Sile had gone to bed and Siobhan waited for a little while before she decided to wander out to see what Sam was up to. When she walked into the large building, she could hear the heavy beat of a hammer on metal from the door. She closed it after her and walked in past the farm equipment there which was waiting to see warm sunlight again. When she got to the doorway of the room where the sounds were coming from, she froze. Sam was happy. Even from where Siobhan stood, the warmth of the room hitting her face, she could see the way that Sam felt. There was a slight little pleased-looking smile on Sam's face as she worked, as though she felt happy to be alive and felt the gentle push of each pulse from her heart that doing this required of her and she was glad of it. The hammer rang on the iron and the anvil in a timeless rhythm every bit as old as the secret of working metal in this way. Siobhan watched as Sam's muscles drove the hammer again and again; over and over the hammer rang in a double-beat just like a human heart and at about the same pace as one. PING-ping, PING- ping, PING-ping, on and on. She could see Sam's bicep swelling as she called up the strength for another stroke, only to relax in the short time in between beats. She watched as Sam's tendons grew taught in her arm, shoulder, and neck, and in the short intervals between, Siobhan caught glimpses of veins and arteries in those arms where she'd never seen them before. But they were evident now, required as they were to move Sam's blood around in her body. If she kept her eyes trained on only one spot in space, Siobhan's gaze would be in just the right place to see the Viking long ship on her bicep swell a little in the center -- almost as though the sail billowed in response to a gust of wind. She wondered if that had been the intent of the tattoo and its placement, but after a moment she guessed that it couldn't have been predicted by the artist when it had been done. There were beads of sweat forming on Samantha's brow now. Siobhan watched as they ran into her friend's eyebrows. She wondered what would happen if the capacity to hold sweat in them was exceeded, but she saw the answer in only a little while longer. Sam shook her head, not missing a beat and Siobhan watched the droplets fly from her. She hadn't meant it by any means, but it was then that Siobhan realized with a start that she'd grown a little aroused at seeing all of this. It confused and confounded her, since she'd never have thought that seeing something such as this could do that to her and she fought it down after that. And she stepped forward when Sam noticed her and laid the hammer down. "Almost finished," she grinned, "I just need to drill the holes for the rivets and then put them in and peen them over. We do have mead, right?" Siobhan nodded with a smile, "Yeah. Are you just going to leave it plain like this?" Sam shook her head, "I want to do a little engraving, just for the hell of it. But I don't know what to add to it yet." Siobhan stepped closer and grasped the handle of the hammer that Sam had been using. She lifted it, but it was awkward and heavy as anything to her. "I don't know how you can do it. I was watching you for a while. I might be able to hit something once with it, but over and over like that? No way." "You get used to it after a while," Sam grinned, "and there is a little secret to it all. The most work is in lifting it. You only drive it a little and then once it's moving, you mostly direct it and let the weight of the hammer do the work. That's why it's heavy in the first place." "Would you do me a favor in a little while?" Siobhan asked, "Not any time really soon, but I think I'd really like to ask you to make something for me -- that is, if you could, and if it's not a huge thing to do." "Sure Sis," Sam nodded, smiling as she wiped her brow with the back of her hand, "What do you need?" "I need a sword," Siobhan said, "for what I do. It's ceremonial and spiritual mostly, but it needs to be real enough to have some strength to the metal like a real sword. I was going to buy one, and then work my want into it, but it would be better if I made it myself. I can't do that, obviously. But if you made it and I worked my wishes into it as it was being crafted, I think that would be even better -- that it had some of you and me in it. Sile's is in our room, but these things are personal, and I'd never use hers. Can you do that, and um, ... would you?" Sam turned and shut off the propane for the forge. "Sure," she smiled, "I'd do that just to watch you do your thing. But if you want this to be anything other than purely something that you - I dunno, wave around in a vague way, I'll need some better steel. I have books on swordmaking. I was gonna make one myself, just for fun. Now I've got a reason." She quenched the piece that she'd been working and began to set everything together. With a spring punch, she marked where the rivets had to go and then she used a proper punch and a small hammer to make dimples to guide the drill. In a few minutes, she had the last of the rivets in place and tapped to peen the end over so that it stayed. "C'mon, Siobhan. Do me a favor and wash out the pot, since I put my grimy prints all over it while I have a shower and get this sweat off." She buttoned her shirt on loosely using only two buttons and they turned to walk away together. "It's thirsty work, this blacksmithy stuff, and I discovered last night that I really like that mead that you and your mom made." ----------------------------- "That's what I'd like, anyway," Siobhan smiled a little nervously, almost wanting to try to take her words back now that she'd made the effort to get it out of herself. They were sitting in 'their' room on the floor in front of the hearth and it was late. One of the things that Siobhan had made certain to ask Sile was whether the fireplace in the room worked. Sile had shrugged and said that she guessed so, though it hadn't seen any use over the last few years. She remembered having it cleaned, so she thought that it ought to work fine. The fire crackled as it had for the past two hours as they'd hung the mead pot off to the side so that the flames would warm it after Siobhan had added everything. They'd talked a lot of things over as far as their plans went and they were a little drunk again. "Really?" Sam asked. "I think I'd like that too," she said, "but I'd also like to hear your reasons." Siobhan shrugged, "I ... I just really liked it. Once I got to sleep, I slept better than I can remember in a long time. I know I must sound like some kind of creepy twerp for saying it, but I just, ... I really felt good sleeping like that." She looked over very uncertainly, "Please tell me that I'm not a creepy twerp." Sam chuckled, "You're no more of one than I am, I guess, Siobhan. I'd be lying if I tried to tell you that I didn't enjoy that as well. Maybe we're both twerps and maybe we both belong in our own conflicted closets or something, but it was nice." Siobhan laughed a little, "Hey, can I hang out in your closet sometimes?" Sam laughed a little, "Ok, but I think I'd rather hang out in yours. The way that I see it, yours has got to have more cool stuff in it." She had a thought and then looked a little uncomfortable, "I just remembered something. I don't know what you normally sleep in. I usually don't wear anything to bed -- though I guess I'd better start." Siobhan shook her head, "No. That's not the idea. What's the sense if you can't sleep the way that you feel best? I usually wear something, but I wasn't wearing much last night and it felt pretty good to me. But wouldn't that make us ... " "Two women who like to sleep against each other, I guess. Oh, who gives a shit?" Sam chuckled, "I dunno, Siobhan, but I think we're talking about this because we both liked it. That's all the reason that I think we need. We're all grown up and I think that entitles us to do whatever we want. It's a little weird to me, and by the way that we're talking like this, I'd say that it must be the same for you. All I know is that I really liked it. I love being near you more and more. I know we're not gonna do anything -- unless it's a full moon and the lesbian fairy drops by for a visit." Siobhan laughed her ass off at that, "I'm having this little scene play in my head now. The lesbian fairy skips in through a crack in the door while we're sleeping and bonks us on our heads with a wand and the next thing we know, we're off hating men and doing whatever lesbians do in their spare time. I just can't get a clear picture in my mind." "Of what?" Sam laughed, "Getting bonked on the head with a wand?" Siobhan laughed louder then, "No. I mean what he looks like." "He?" Sam was tilting her head now, "What HE looks like?" "Well yeah," Siobhan laughed, "Whoever he works for, they're an equal-opportunity employer." "Just what kind of wand was he waving in your perverted little mind, anyway?" Sam asked, but Siobhan had no answer and only shrugged. "It doesn't matter anyway," she said, "from what I know, we both like men." "Oh do we?" Sam chuckled wickedly, "So I suppose that you'd really like some guy crawling all over you with his octopus hands at work as he lies on you, trying to get you to let him in, or how about when he fucks you from behind and slaps your ass while he hollers 'Giddyup' about twenty time too many? Is that what you want?" Siobhan blinked at Sam, "Well, um, yes." Sam put her arm around Siobhan with a knowing nod, "Yeah," she sighed, "Me too. Anyway, if we're gonna do this perverted thing, I guess I'm in -- as long as there are ground rules." Now it was Siobhan who looked a little askance at Sam, "Ground rules? Like what?" "Ok," Sam grinned, "First off, flopping is allowed. I call it as my inalienable right, since I don't think that I can help it." She grinned then, "Your turn." "Well, "Siobhan smiled, "then I get to snuggle close if I want to. That felt great." "Fine," Sam countered, "If anything goes wrong, there's two beds in here. If either one of us gets uncomfortable or just wants to sleep alone, she goes to that bed and there's no hard feelings, but an explanation must be given the next day. I like you more than I've liked anybody as a friend in my whole life, so I don't want to have this fucked up over a misunderstanding -- and by the way, I think I snore sometimes." "You do," Siobhan nodded, "But it wasn't like you were cutting down trees or anything. I think I can live with it. Actually, I think it's cute, the way that you snore softly. Any more rules?" Sam looked down for a moment as she gathered what to her required some courage. "I ... I'm not gonna make this sound like a rule or anything, but ... well, sometime, I think that I'd really like it if I could kiss you. I really wanted to do that last night while you were sleeping. I don't think I want to get into anything heavy, but ... I think that I'd like that." Siobhan smiled and nodded, "You can kiss me, Sam. If we're in bed and alone in the dark, I'd be lying if I said that it's never crossed my mind. I ... I've never felt this way about anyone before, so ... yes. I think I'd be fine with that. Hey, what if ... "She looked across the room, wondering how to even broach what was in her mind then. "Shit, I know what I want to ask. I just ... I don't really know how." She looked over, "What I did last night ..." "Most definitely allowed," Sam nodded, "We're a couple of healthy women. If you feel the need, hey, just use the other bed, but ... I think that I'd really like it if we made that another firm right, and unless I'm sleeping and you wake me up seventeen times a night, or I wake you that way, I ... well, I don't think that I'd mind all that much if you need or want to frig a little while we're together." "Really?" Siobhan asked. "Yeah," Sam said quietly, "I liked it when you did that. I don't know if I could with you lying there and all, but ..." "I think that I'd want you to at some point," Siobhan said as she poured them another cup of mead, "That way it wouldn't just be me wallowing in my perversion." "What fucking perversion?" Sam asked a little indignantly, "It's your God-given right to play with yourself, I think. Anyway, I don't think I'd mind. That's all I'm saying." "I learned a couple of different names for that when I was in Yorkshire," Siobhan said a little knowingly, "Just things that others called it, 'jilling' was one and 'flicking your bean' was another one." "See?" Sam laughed, "Knowing you is even educational." Their laughs faded then as they looked at each other for a moment. "I can't believe that we're talking about this," Sam said quietly. Siobhan nodded, "Me either, but I think there is something here between us somehow. I don't understand it, but I do like it because I like you. When were you thinking of wanting to kiss me?" Sam blinked for a second, "I don't know, I hadn't even gotten around to writing it down on my day-planner yet. After that, all I've gotta do is get up a little nerve." Siobhan set her cup down and got to her knees. "Knowing you is wonderful," she said, "After two years of being ignored by snobs where I was, it was a little hard for someone like me to bear. I expected to come back and have more nothing. But I have somebody who lets me call her my big sister and she feels that way to me, and I've never had a friend like you. All that I've ever had were acquaintances, really." She put her arms around Sam's neck very slowly, as if she was afraid that Sam would jump up and bolt out of the room as she closed the distance and hugged her tightly. "Thank you, Sam." Sam sat mesmerized for just a second, and then she reached for Siobhan. "Anytime, and thank you for making me feel like I have a sister too and a family." They drew apart after a moment and Sam saw that odd look in Siobhan's face again. There was enough light there before the hearth to see Siobhan's face well, and she knew that nothing had changed in reality, but to her, the eyes that she was looking into had turned a little darker, and the beautiful face was still beautiful, only now there was that enigmatic little smile there again. "God, you're doing that again," she said, "I love it when I see that in your face -- whatever it is." "I dunno what you're seeing," Siobhan smiled a little more, "But I'm seeing somebody who said that they'd like to kiss me, ... and I guess I'm feeling hopeful that we don't have to get into bed before I get your first one." Sam pulled Siobhan closer and their lips met. Their eyes closed and Siobhan sighed. For a first kiss with anyone -- for both of them -- it lasted a long time. When they pulled apart, they were smiling and they put their foreheads together. There was nothing which needed saying really, so they were silent. Sam pulled Siobhan close and hugged her tightly as she inhaled the soft scent of her hair. "This will work, won't it?" she whispered. "Yes," Siobhan sighed from against her ear, "You feel so good to hold onto. Like nothing is wrong in the world, and even if it was, I'm safe here with you." "There really isn't a crack or a gap in the door, or anything like that, is there?" Sam sighed back, "I love this, but if I see a little guy waving anything at me now ... " She exhaled and Siobhan felt it as a thrill before Sam finished the thought, "I don't think we need him anyway. I don't feel like that, but I do know that I need you a lot. Just like this ... I've never felt this way." They let go then and looked at each other in the glow of the hearth. Sam came to a decision then and she undid her shirt and began to remove it. "What are you doing?" Siobhan asked, with that same little smile, looking curious but a little delighted at the same time. Sam shrugged, "Fuck, I don't know," she said, "Right now, what I really want is to feel your skin against me. I'm a little warm here and I guess I'm hoping that if I take this off, you'll get the idea." Siobhan chuckled, "I've had the idea since I watched you pound out the metal in the shed, Sam." She leaned back a little and pulled her sweater over her head. They knelt facing each other in pants, Siobhan in her bra and Sam with the clean sports bra that she'd put on after her shower. She reached over and touched Siobhan's shoulder, just dragging her fingertips over the skin lightly and Siobhan leaned her head over to feel the tops of her fingers against her cheek a little. Sam drew her hand back a moment later and they looked at each other again. "Well, here goes," Sam said with a shrug as she pulled her sports bra over her head. She looked at the place where she'd set her shirt, placing her bra there as well, not really sure about this or what Siobhan's reaction might be. Neither of them moved for a second, but then Sam felt Siobhan's fingers against her chin. "It's ok," she said, "I'm nervous too -- and I haven't got anything as nice as you do." She took her hand back and reached back to undo her bra then. Sam looked over and shook her head as Siobhan added her bra to the pile. "You are so wrong..." After a long glance, they leaned into each other and the feeling to them was something beyond words for either one. "Ok, there is no way that we're not sleeping naked," Sam announced softly, "I'm making that a hard rule right fucking now." "But Sam," Siobhan almost whispered, "I don't know about this. I don't really know what I want or anything." "Neither do I." Samantha said quietly, "I don't know if I want to go there either. But I do know that I loved sleeping close to you and I want that. If we can do that without any clothes, I'd want that too, even if we don't do anything. Can you do that?" Siobhan looked at Sam and nodded after a second, "I can try." "Good," Sam smiled as she hugged Siobhan again, "That's all I need. I don't mind being confused and even a little embarrassed, as long as I've got you to hold on to." "Why would you be embarrassed?" Siobhan asked, "You're the one with all of the confidence between us. I'm a little confused now. I don't get it." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 17 "Because," Sam said looking away a little, "you're beautiful, and I'm not. I might just barely make it all the way to mildly pretty on my best day." Siobhan scowled a little, "You're a fucking idiot," she said, "You're so beautiful that I don't mind standing near you when we're someplace together, like I feel entitled to be there, and with a little luck, a little of the way you look will rub off on me like the way that your confidence seems to. I think it's kind of like standing near the glow of a special light. I just have to look better when I'm near you. I had the feeling that we almost blew up a few pacemakers in the senior's complex." Sam laughed then, imagining it, "Oh I don't think I'd want to be known as one of the girls who red-lined a bunch of pacemakers. Anyway, I thought they were looking at you. I was kind of proud to be with you. I'm all musclebound." "You're fucking gorgeous," Siobhan said, "so just shut up about barely being pretty. What an absurd thing to say." She looked at Sam for a second, "You've got an awesome body. You're fit and ... " she grabbed Sam's bicep for a moment and she laughed, "So lovely and at the same time, I'd bet that you could crush a Volkwagen with one hand." "Now we're just getting stupid," Sam laughed, "which is the idea, I guess," she said as she looked into her cup of mead. "Come on, Sis. Let's get to bed. We'll get the nerves out of the way and I'm getting a little tired." -------------------------- That was about the end of their big decision. They just undressed the rest of the way and got into bed. After a little more joking and some long kisses, they just settled into an embrace and went to sleep. During the night, Siobhan awoke briefly to find Sam's breast very close to her face and after a little thought, she kissed it for a moment, and since that brought no complaint from Sam, she decided and took another large step when she opened her mouth and sucked the nipple for a moment or two. She was about to stop when she heard Sam sigh. "Please don't stop just yet," Sam whispered and Siobhan looked up to see Sam looking at her. She nodded a little and went back to it very gently as Sam pulled them closer together. They both fell asleep a little later and in the morning they just knew that they had nothing to be afraid of anymore. They both liked men just as they always had, but when they were alone, they could admit that they loved each other and that was the end of the discussion. The next night, they began to trade little touches and caresses and it became an expression of their need for each other. There was something beautiful in it for them. If one felt herself getting close, she'd just let the other one know and then a little more effort was put into it, but there was no real drive to go beyond that. It was what they each admitted to the other, but they were both caught in a little lie then, because they did want it to go farther; they were both just afraid to ruin something so nice and stayed stuck at that point for a little while. ------------------------- At the end of January, Sam was on the carpeted floor in front of the TV late one night. She sat cross-legged as she played a video game. Siobhan sat next to her paying a bit of attention because she did like to watch as Sam played, always in a small bit of awe since the way that Sam played was much the same as she lived her life, Siobhan had learned -- right up front and balls out. Siobhan would have at least wanted to take a look before stepping into anything, even in a video game. She had her laptop open and she was going through her email when she noted the arrival of a message from the firm where she'd interned. "Oh no," she said quietly, "old Mr. Mallard has died. He was about the only person besides the staff at that place who ever spoke to me. He was a nice man and ... " Sam kept on playing, though she was paying attention, "And? And what? You guys drive me a little crazy, they way that you all never finish a damn sentence." She found a spot where she could at least stop running her character in the game for a moment and she looked over to see Siobhan sitting looking over the top of the laptop screen at nothing. "Hey, are you ok?" Siobhan looked over in a great deal of shock, "Mr. Mallard had a dog, Ajax. He's being kept at the vet's until they reach me. Mr. Mallard has willed Ajax to me." "But that's in England," Sam said just as her character was set upon by three succubi and killed, "How can you ... do you want the dog?" Siobhan sat with a pair of tears just forming in her eyes for a moment, "It says that the executor has funds set aside to ship Ajax to Toronto. If I want him, I have a week to respond before Ajax is put down. Nobody wants him. Besides his owner, I'm the only friend he's ever had. What do I do?" Sam looked at Siobhan, "Well judging by the way that you look at the moment," she smiled, "I think that you say yes, if you want him." That was how they found themselves at Toronto Pearson International again four days later. "What kind of dog is he?" Sam asked, and when Siobhan said "He's an English --" Sam interrupted then and said, "Never mind. I think I'd rather that it was a surprise. It doesn't matter to me, really. You want him and that's enough for me to know. Besides," she grinned a little, "he's an English something. So now I get to guess, don't I? I get to kill a little time and try to guess if he's an English bulldog, or setter, or spaniel, or some damn thing. Who the fuck names their dog after a brand of cleaner anyway?" "He's not named after that," Siobhan smirked, "Next to Achilles, Ajax was the most important warrior on their side of the Trojan war." "I don't know anything about all that," Sam said, "I just know about cleaning bathrooms. What's taking so long?" A handler called Siobhan's name and they were summoned to an office in the freight section. "There's a tariff on the import of livestock," the man said, "We're trying to assess his value." Sam looked for a second as though she wanted to respond in a manner which might not be conducive to them getting Ajax cleared so Siobhan stepped up to the plate. "I've just come back from a two year internship in Yorkshire. I met this animal there. His owner has passed away and the executor has offered him to me, and if I don't take him, he was to be put down. You want to assess is worth? Just open whatever container he's been travelling in and he'll show you pretty quick. Most people wouldn't want anything to do with a dog like him." The man looked over, "Why do you want him then?" "Because we like each other," Siobhan said, "and I've got a farm for him to run around on. How much do I have to pay to get him sprung?" When she heard the amount of the import fee, she shook her head, "I'd almost like to ask you to try to justify that." "Many people purchase and import dogs for the purpose of breeding them," the man began. "With respect," Siobhan said, holding her own tongue in check now as she peeled off the bills, "the last time that I saw him, he weighed about one sixty-eight. Who the hell has a bitch that size? Dogs only do it one way, and the girl has to hold the male up for that. His mating options are a little limited, I'd say." The direction of the talk was making the man a little uneasy, but just then, Ajax had been released, and they were called into a pickup area. "Here's your dog," a second man said. Sam looked, but all that she saw was a large shipping crate for animals. One look through one of the openings told Siobhan that Ajax had been heavily sedated and lay on the floor of it. Sam tried to peek inside, but without any familiar frame of reference, the dark shape in the dark crate interior didn't look like anything recognizable to her. It took a bit of doing, but after a while, they were off, headed home with the crate in the back of the van that Siobhan had rented. "One hundred and sixty-eight?" Sam asked, "Pounds? I thought we were here to get a dog. Is he part pony or what? And I still don't see why we just couldn't have borrowed Dad's truck for this. He's got fur, hasn't he?" "He's never been in any cold weather like this, and an hour and a half in the bed of a pickup ..." "Ok," Sam grinned, "I get it." Ajax was beginning to stir by the time they were on the concession road a little way from the farm and Siobhan was fuming a little. "What the fuck did they give him? He's been out all this time, all that time before for the flight and the dicking around before that. I hope they didn't go too far. His poor liver and kidneys." When they pulled into the main yard, Siobhan was out the passenger door in a flash and around the back, opening the doors. There was shifting in the crate as she did. "Help me get this thing open," she said to Sam and they worked at it together. "Hang on Ajax," she said, "You're home now." It took the animal a little while to recognize Siobhan's voice, but then he began to work on gaining his freedom with a will. A minute later, they looked in at a huge dog who looked like he'd been dragged all the way from England. Ajax wasn't really with it, but he was beginning to look a little happier, now that he recognized Siobhan. Sam stared, "This uh, ... this Ajax character in the Trojan war, ... I'm guessing that he was a, you know, a big guy." "Colossal, according to the mythology," Siobhan smiled, "the mightiest of all the Achaeans and cousin of Achilles. Come on, Ajax," Siobhan coaxed, "You need a pee and, "she sniffed, "a bath something awful, you poor thing." Just getting him down to the ground went all wrong. Ajax wasn't hurt in the fall though; he'd had the cushion of Siobhan and Sam whom he pretty much flattened under him. While Siobhan guided him in his attempts to stand, Sam stepped to the front of the van and came back holding out the most plain donut that the coffee shop sold. She hadn't told Siobhan why she wanted it when they'd stopped and it had lain forgotten in its little paper bag, but now it was in the air in front of that huge head. "Here you go, Ajax," Sam said, "Welcome to Canada." "What are you doing?" Siobhan asked, "I'm not going to have him eating donuts. That's --" "Oh shut up," Sam grinned, "The flight and the sedative didn't do him in. This won't either. I just want to make friends. I don't know if they still do it, but if you went to Hawaii, they gave you one of those lei things when you showed up to welcome you. I think that when you get to anywhere they ought to give you something just for showing up. Like if you go to Cancun, they oughta just hand you a mojito right there at the airport, or maybe a margarita, you know? And a coupon for the taxi to the hotel. Wouldn't want anybody renting a car like that." "So you think that when people come here, they should get a donut?" Siobhan asked, laughing. "Fuck yeah," Sam grinned, "A donut, an extra large coffee, a fucking touque, and a free gallon of windshield washer antifreeze." "What about if they show up in the summer?" "Ok then," Sam expounded, her finger in the air, "they STILL get the donut, an iced cappuccino, still get the freaking touque, 'cause next month it's back to winter, and they also get the summer windshield washer stuff because there's no sense in the rest of us buying it since it'll freeze solid before we ever use it, and they get a free tennis racket for the mosquitoes. Plus, every fifth flight gets diverted to Baffin Island at random intervals." Siobhan grinned, "There's nobody on Baffin Island." "Well yeah ... that's why," Sam said, "They do that often enough, somebody's bound to stay." Ajax regarded the donut and then looked up at Sam. Siobhan didn't know what might have been exchanged between them at that instant, but the way that Ajax took the proffered treat left it clear to her that some decision had been reached. The only thing that Ajax hadn't done was nod and express his thanks. Siobhan was quick to put down Ajax' water bowl and fill it from the jug that she'd brought. After five minutes of getting his legs back under him, Ajax was a happy -- though huge -- dog, ambling around, sniffing everything in sight and peeing on about every other thing in sight. Every couple of minutes, he'd stop and look back at Siobhan before coming back at a walk to be fussed over a little, as though he couldn't believe that he still had this one friend. The first day was a trial, since the dog's system responded to the time change and the different water a little badly, but the next day, Ajax was like a completely different dog and just like Siobhan remembered him. He took a little time to come around to Sam, but by then, it was plain that he was thankful to them both and in her, he found someone who accepted him and Siobhan remarked on it. Sam smirked, "Come on," she said as she rubbed his head, "he's so fucking handsome -- now that he's clean -- and he's happy to be alive after what he's been through. I can't believe how well-behaved he is. He always looks like he's having these deep thoughts all the time when I look at him, too. This," she grinned as she sat on the edge of the bed with her arm around the dog's neck -- and he was sitting on the floor -- "this is a girl's dog. You can talk to him and if he doesn't understand, well he hides the fact a lot better than any man I've ever known." Siobhan nodded, chuckling as she walked over to bend down and kiss Ajax' head, "I know. He's our boy. Biggest kid in the sandbox." For such a large animal, Ajax was obviously doing his best to try to fit into their lives. He liked Sylvia and Cale instantly, though he did look at Cale as someone who he might be a little hopeful to play with. Siobhan had found an ancient soccer ball of hers from when she was a kid. The thing was half deflated, but Ajax could take it in his mouth and act like an absolute idiot in his attempts to get Cale to try to take it from him. All of that faded instantly when he'd been brought to meet Sile. Ajax looked to be mindful of her age and relative frailty and he was on his very best behavior as she looked at him and said something which he seemed to listen to very closely, tilting his head as she spoke to him. After that, if the two of them wanted or needed to go somewhere without Ajax, he was happy to be left as Sile's companion. Siobhan came into the room late one evening and did her best to keep from laughing. Sam was lying on the bed on her front, playing a video game with Alax lying next to her with his shoulder on the back of one of her legs and his head on her bum, snoring -- and if there was one thing that the dog excelled at it was sawing wood. She tiptoed to the other side and sat next to Sam, "You guys look so cute together like that, like he wouldn't dream of sleeping anywhere else." Ajax opened his eyes, - just barely, as though the effort was almost too much for him and he regarded Siobhan for a moment. The best that he could do was flop his tail against the bed twice and groan loudly as he closed his eyes again. "He's a sneaky bastard," Sam smirked, "He acts like he just wants to be near you, and that's how he sucks you in. If you fall for that, then he's up against you. If you don't say anything then, he rolls onto you and then it's too late. Do you have any idea how freaking heavy his head is when it's on your ass?" Siobhan handed Sam the cup of tea that she'd brought her and just sat sipping hers as she watched Sam play. After a minute, her eye fell on a bookcase directly opposite from her. It was one of the ones that she hadn't even gotten a chance to take a look at, but now she saw that a pair of books were leaning a little toward each other and if she looked between them, she could see something on the shelf behind them. A little curious now, she got up and walked over, mindful not to get in Sam's line of sight to her game. Kneeling, she removed the books and saw a pair of wooden boxes which were locked and a dusty shoebox. She removed everything and looked. The name on the old cardboard shoebox was from a chain of shoe stores which she surmised had gone out of business and had disappeared off the face of the earth long before she'd been born, and when she opened it, she found four VHS cassettes inside. "What've you got?" Sam asked, still playing. "Whoa, ..."was the extent of Siobhan's reply as she looked at the label on each tape. "Well are you gonna tell me?" Sam asked. Siobhan looked from the shoebox in her hands to Sam and blinked, "I think these are pornos." Sam's double-take exceeded the length of time in which she had to act and she cursed quietly as her character fell victim to a pack of ghouls in her game. "Lemme see!" Siobhan brought the box over, "We can't even watch them," she said a little sadly, "I haven't seen a VHS machine since I was a kid." "Neither have I," Sam grinned, "until last week. There's one on the top shelf of my closet where I found it, and if it doesn't work, we can just go to the hock shop in town and see if they have one. What's in the wooden boxes?" "I dunno," Siobhan shrugged, "They're locked." She looked up, "I found some old keys in the desk." She was gone and back in seconds. "Well you're not going to sit there with the boxes and the keys and not open them, are you?" "I kind of feel like it would be snooping," Siobhan said. "Nope," Sam grinned, "We were told that everything in this room is ours now. That gives us license to snoop all we want." But by then she was watching Siobhan walk away toward Sam's closet. "Have you ever worked one of these?" Siobhan asked as she brought the machine over. Sam shrugged, "How hard can it be? Give me a second to get out from under my buddy here and I'll get it hooked up. As they fast-forwarded through the first one, Siobhan said, "This is a little wrong to me. " She looked sat Sam and said, "I could watch this stuff if I was alone, no trouble. If I was with somebody -- well, anybody but you, I guess, I'd feel really uncomfortable." "But not with me?" Sam asked, "Then what's wrong?" "I dunno," Siobhan said a little quietly as she leaned against Sam, "I think I'd like more of a proper look, you know, where we sit and watch from beginning to end and talk and -- " "And popcorn," Sam smirked with a nod. "I get it now. I think that you want to make a bit of a night of it where nothing's a big deal. I know just how I'd want this. We go rent some movies in town, get some wine and snacks and just sit on the bed. I've wanted to do that before." "And when we get tired of the regular movies," Siobhan said, "we can turn the VHS on and look at these. They're old, so they've just got to be at least a little corny. I kind of hope so anyway. I sure hope they're not just fucking. I've got videos on my laptop of animals that I took when I was at the clinic in England. We'd have to go out and see why old Mrs, Snodgress' cocker spaniel couldn't get pregnant." "You're joking," Sam said, laughing, "What other ones do you have?" "Nothing much," Siobhan laughed, "it wasn't like I was the local animal pornographer or anything. Though I do have one of a pair of Shire horses going at it. The video doesn't really do them any justice at all. You imagine that you're standing near two animals who are feeling amorous and each one weighs well over two and a half thousand pounds. Seeing something like that going on can be a little ... " "Awe-inspiring?" Sam chuckled. "I was going to say frightening," Siobhan smirked, "though the mare sure looked to be having a great time. She just stood there looking back at her boy now and then. If a horse can look pleased, then that's sure what I was looking at. But the sounds of their breathing and the way that he slapped and banged into her..." A Red Leaf & Ten Orchids Ch. 17 They sat in silence for a moment before Sam looked over, "You got a little wet watching that, didn't you?" "Oh fuck, yes," Siobhan said, not taking her eyes off the screen, "I couldn't help it." "I thought so," Sam smiled into her mug of tea, "and before you ask, "I've seen regular horses do it before, and I know what I was thinking then. It wasn't supposed to happen, but I guess some fool left her mare a little too close and upwind of a stallion for a minute longer than they needed to decide on true love or something like that. It was at a rodeo and the pandemonium and carnage was unreal. But the horseys got it done, I'll tell you that." Siobhan looked over, "You like rodeos?" "Sure," Sam grinned, "I love 'em. I just wish there were more to go to, but there aren't many in this part of the country. Why?" "Nothing much," Siobhan smirked, "I guess I just never figured you to be the type. I mean, I know you like horses, but ..." "I do like the horses, "Sam laughed, "but I like the men there even better!" --------------------------------- The next day they were in town with Ajax along. He looked as though he didn't know which one of them he ought to be walking next to for a while, before he just settled in to walking between them. The first time that Siobhan almost had her arm dislocated because the dog had seen a cat in a store window was enough for her. Ajax was good, but he had his limits. She looked up and saw that it was the new pet shop. Sam went in and came back a moment later with a grin, "Yup, they're good with him coming inside. We just gotta give them a sec to get Tixie there to go somewhere else. When they emerged a few minutes later, Ajax had two collars -- the one that he always wore and a metal one with a few inward-facing little prods to remind him if he pulled hard. He didn't care; he'd seen the big-assed rawhide bone that Siobhan had bought. It was in a plastic bag now, but he knew that it was there. When they got back, they decided to make something special out of the evening. Siobhan was thinking about brushing her teeth in front of the mirror in the upstairs bathroom when Sam breezed in, apologizing and begging that she had to pee. "Sam," Siobhan sighed, "if it wasn't you, I'd tell you to kiss my ass. I just want you to know that." "Well if it wasn't you," the taller one chuckled, "I'd tell you to fuck off and die. I have to pee that much. And you ought to be at least a little careful. You've just had a shower, and if you don't know me by now, well I just love a challenge." Siobhan made Sam laugh as she turned with toothpaste froth around her lips in a bit of shock. "Yood reewy do vat?" she asked around the toothbrush still in her mouth. "Oh probably," Sam laughed, "You're all clean and I'm looking at the sweetest ass right now. You want to test me?" She reached for the toilet tissue, not missing a beat as she wiped, "You just step back from the counter a little and lean forward." She laughed at the saucer-eyes that she saw looking back at her before Siobhan went back to brushing her teeth. As she tried to pass her, Siobhan was against her giggling a little. "What are you doing?" she asked. "Spitting," Siobhan said just after the fact, "and you told me to step back a little." Siobhan's eyes widened again a second later, "What -- what are you doing back there?" Sam laughed as she placed her hands, "Kissing your ass, what did you think I was gonna do, look to see if you're hiding the TV remote back here? I haven't seen it since last night, now that I think about it." Siobhan laughed nervously and she was about to tell Sam to stop fooling around when she froze and looked back, before she ran the edge of her hand over the mirror on the wall beside her. Sam was actually doing what she'd threatened to do. Siobhan tried to find her voice, but then she felt Sam's tongue and all that came out was a groan for a moment before Sam was beside her with a grin. "Well?" "You're a fruitcake," Siobhan said, "a completely whacked, nut-filled fruitcake, but I love you anyway." "I'd have though that you'd have liked that," Sam said a little disappointed. "Uh-huh, I did," Siobhan smiled, "but you stopped. That was really nice." "Well I didn't think that you'd want me to go on for too long," Sam said with a shrug, "We're not sure that Sile has gone to bed yet. So you did like it then?" "Yes," Siobhan said, "just when I think that I know you, you do something like that." She rolled her eyes wearily, "Fine, I give you permission to do that whenever you want to. Just have your shower now, ok?" ------------------------------- They sat on the bed together watching the second of the movies which they'd rented. Popcorn was in abundance, but it was Ajax who seemed to be getting most of it as he stood on the floor by the bottom of the bed with his front half on it and his forelegs between their legs. He amazed them more that the chick-flick on the screen as he seemed to never miss whenever one of them tossed him a kernel of popcorn. "This is the perfect girl's movie," Siobhan said, "it's got everything, but it's not getting to me somehow." "That's because it's a bit too much of everything on the list," Sam said, "I'm actually a little annoyed with it. I think I feel insulted at their attempts to pull heartstrings here. I didn't even boohoo very much at the sad part. I've been having way more fun watching our big kid here, "she smirked, "He never misses. He even gets both pieces whenever we toss some at the same time. It's like Ajax has some kind of popcorn magnet in his mouth." "He does," Siobhan nodded, "It's called a vacuum. He opens that mouth and I can almost feel my hair move then. Popcorn doesn't have a chance against that." She got up, "We're both pretty bored if his eating popcorn can hold our interest. I'm gonna put on one of the tapes." As the opening for the first one got underway, Sam reached over and ran her butter-covered finger over Siobhan's nipple in tiny circles. To her amazement, Siobhan lifted Sam's hand and moved it to her mound. ""You're wasting good butter," she said, not taking her eyes off the screen. By the time that the player began to rewind the tape, having reached the end, the two of them both wore a bit of butter on them here and there and Sam's breasts were a pair of slippery messes which glistened in the light of the TV. Some of the sheen was transferred to Siobhan's front as they shared their slow kisses. "You know," Sam chuckled a little as she stopped to look at Siobhan, "my poor brain keeps getting these conflicting signals." "How do you mean?" Siobhan asked. "Ajax," Sam shrugged, "he's had all the popcorn and he's still there on the bed watching us. I probably wouldn't mind, but he's breathing like at least half of my boyfriends used to when we were fooling around. My brain is confused now. I'm hearing him pant like a steam locomotive, but at the same time, I'm getting these soft and fantastic kisses from you." Siobhan giggled and ordered Ajax to lie down somewhere, which he did with a loud groan. "Better?" Siobhan asked, and Sam nodded, "Perfect." They traded kisses for a while longer before Sam pushed up onto her knees and Siobhan looked up quizzically. "We've only watched one movie and I think we must have seen at least nine women get fucked by twenty-seven men, give or take," Sam smiled, "so now, I think I'd really like to fuck you." "Well, that'll be worth watching," Siobhan smiled as she looked at Sam's body, "cause unless you're hiding something from me somehow -- and remember that I've been feeling you up as well here, I don't see how you're gonna do it, though I am uh, ... receptive at the moment." Sam moved Siobhan's legs apart and moved forward as she dipped her fingers into the remains of the butter in the large bowl there on the bed. "Just watch me," she smiled as her fingers began to slide over Siobhan's labia. She loved to see the way that Siobhan looked surprised and aroused at the same time, and it wasn't long before she was looking at the expression that she loved to see on that sweet face. "I'm in love with my adopted sister," she smiled as her hands moistened the pretty breasts for a while before she went back to working Siobhan's lips, teasing and even pulling them to let them slip from her slick fingers time and again as Siobhan began to move all over the place. "Oh God, "Siobhan hissed, "I love you, Sam. This is so good." After a minute, Sam sighed, "Yeah well, it might be so good," she smiled down, "but it's not the way that I wanted to fuck you. Get up and turn around." Siobhan didn't really get it, but she did what was asked, "What now?" Sam laughed a little as her hand went right back to it, "Well, since I can't reach under you, baby, I think I'll need for you to lie on your front for me with your amazing ass in the air before I break my wrist or something." Siobhan groaned and Sam watched as she moved her hips in a searching manner, "Come on," she coaxed, "lift your ass for me, Sis. Show me what you want me to work on for you." Siobhan shook her head in a bit of shyness, but Sam moved her fingers is a different way and without really being able to help herself, Siobhan pulled her knees forward and her hips seemed to rise of their own accord. Sam's response was instant as she ran her fingers in and out, twisting them and humping her mound against her own hand as it worked in and out of Siobhan. Feeling it now, Siobhan began to thrust backward as well. "Oh fuck," she sighed as she looked back, "I love this!" "I hate it when I see a movie and the guy talks shit to the girl," Sam said, "but for right now, baby-girl, I'm your man and you are my happy little bitch aren't you?" "Fuck yeah," Siobhan said, "I'm ... whatever you say. Just don't ... just ... don't stop." She threw herself backwards and Sam had to caution her, "This isn't a dick here, "she said , "take it easy and let me do this, honey. I will stop after you snap my fingers. That hurt a little." "S-sorry." Siobhan moaned, "Ohh Sam, ... ohhhh, ... fuck me. Please fuck me." Sam laid her hand onto Siobhan's back, partially to try to control her a little. "I love you Sis," she said in a hoarse-sounding whisper, "I won't leave you hanging. Just stop holding back. It's me. I want you to come for me. Just ... let ... go." Siobhan began to shake and Sam worked her even harder then. Siobhan buried her face into her pillow and cried out twice loudly before she thrust back a little more gently and a lot slower, trying to get everything that she could take from this. At last, she fell forward onto the bed and felt Sam lie down beside her. "Thanks, Sam," Siobhan smiled, "I know that it says something about my sorry sex life up to now, but you've just given me the best orgasm of my life." Sam looked a little sad, "I don't think that I did all that much but help you. Do any of the guys that you've been with live here? I mean, in town?" "At least one," Siobhan said, "unless he's moved since I left. Why?" "Nothing," Sam smiled angelically, "I just had the urge to kill somebody, that's all." She slid down a little and looked over, "So if I did something nice for you, could you please bring those fantastic boobies over here?" Siobhan moved then and as she felt Sam beginning to kiss her breasts, she sighed and hung on to Sam's head pulling her a little and running her fingers through her hair. Sam waited a little and then she reached for the bowl behind her. When she felt her fingers against the rim, she dipped them into the little pool of melted butter at the bottom and before it was really even noticed, she slid them between Siobhan's cheeks and set them to work, teasing and slipping the tips one at time in and out of her friend's anus. It got her a lot of delightful wriggling from Siobhan and that was all that she'd wanted. "Are we there yet?" Siobhan asked. Sam opened her eyes from the pleasant way that this all felt to her. "What? What do you mean? For a second there, I might have been dozing off and it was like we were kids in the back seat on a long car ride." "I meant," Siobhan said, "are we ... you know." "Nope," Sam smiled against the breast in her face, "not in my book, anyway. Why?" "Well what do we have to do to get to that place?" Siobhan asked, "I'm curious." Sam thought about it for a moment, "I think that to qualify in my head, we'd have to do the sixty-nine thing at least one time, and I don't think you're-" "Awesome," Siobhan smirked as she pushed herself up, "I'm so glad that we weren't there yet." "What are you doing?" Sam asked in a little confusion, "Why are you glad? Don't you think that you'd ever --" "I'm turning around," Siobhan chuckled, "I'm so glad that I didn't miss it when we got there -- according to my big sister, Sam. Have you ever done this before?" "N-no," Sam replied as she watched Siobhan's leg pass over her head. "Good," Siobhan smiled as she reached for the bowl and then ran her dripping fingers over Sam's cleft. Sam hadn't even had the chance to groan once before Siobhan lowered her face and began. ----------------------------------- The joint business began and the old farm was a beehive of activity for a long while, as much of the lower floor of the house was remodelled to serve its new roles. As spring warmed the land once more, Sylvia began to take in horses which needed boarding and she was busy from dawn till dusk with students. Sam split her time between her own business and Siobhan's practice as well as helping Sylvia. It got a little easier when Sylvia's parents came home from Florida and for the first time in years, they felt really needed -- largely because they were. The fallout from Sylvia's marriage was acrimonious, mostly because the takeover of the business was thwarted for a time. With Paul divested of his position by a vote taken by the same board of directors which he'd installed, the way was clear for a sellout to a different acquisition interest, and Sylvia found herself with a different set of partners altogether, a firm which specialized in active investments, rather than just the buying up of businesses in order to reap the gain from their closure and dissolution. Life had become rather interesting indeed. But she lived with Cale in the old farmhouse, as smitten with him as she'd ever been and more. The way that the two of them seemed to fit when they made love was a revelation and there had been the occasional day where, the needs of the horses and his work schedule aside, they just kept coming back to bed -- now that they'd found it, Cale had pointed out. At the moment, they all sat in the living room in the house at the farm and worked through a long list of the things which still needed to be done as the combined businesses took off. While he made a few notes as Sylvia spoke about the remodelling coming to a close and the holdbacks on the contracts needing to be paid, his cell phone cheeped to indicate a text message and he fished it out. He looked up and saw Sylvia's eyebrows rise in a silent question. "It's from my brother, Josh," he said. Siobhan looked at Sam, "You have an uncle?" "I haven't seen him since I was little," Sam said, "What's up, Dad?" He looked down at the phone and scratched his head, "Your uncle Josh is getting married." He looked over at Sylvia, "Better get out there and buy a lottery ticket. If Joshua is getting married, then anything's possible." "When?" Sylvia asked, "Where?" "I'll have to call," Cale said, "I've been meaning to and we missed at Christmas." "Well go ahead and call!" Sylvia grinned, "Use the phone right over there. What's he like?" Cale got up to go to the phone. "He's a bit younger than me and he looks better to most women than I do," Cale smiled, "especially after they've had a few drinks."