Chapter 6: What Little Girls Are Made Of

FRED:

I lay with Auntie in post orgasmic splendor, holding her, stroking her back. She had collapsed on top of me, her breasts pressing into my lower chest, her face snuggled into the side of my neck. She sighed, brought her arms up between us, and propped her chin on the backs of her hands, staring up into my eyes.

"I was SO afraid last night," she told me dreamily. "Now, I feel silly." She paused. "I am very much in love with you, Professor Fielding."

"What on earth were you afraid of?" I asked.

"You."

"What did I ever do to make you afraid of me?"

"Just some more of that 'psychic shit' you don't believe in," she told me.

"What did you think I was going to do to you? Eat you?" I contemplated that. "Hmmm. Not a bad idea at that." I slid my hand down and squeezed her ass.

She laughed and then became serious. "You, Fred, are going to be the cause of my death."

I was truly taken aback. "Well, that's a hell of a thing thing to tell a new lover!"

"It really doesn't matter anymore," she told me pleasantly.

"It doesn't matter that I'm going to kill you?" I asked, exasperated.

She laughed out loud. "You're not going to KILL me!" she said.

"But you just said that you thought..."

"Oh, you don't understand at all! And it simply doesn't make any difference anymore, anyway. It's already been done! AND, I'm not afraid anymore!"

I breathed a ragged breath. Why did I always have to get involved with women that were ... odd? What was it about me that attracted them? Thankfully (or not), she chose to change the subject entirely.

"I've decided to grant you three wishes," she said, smiling.

I barked a laugh. "Wonderful! Do I have to tell you what they are now, or can I have a little time to think about them?"

"Oh," she answered, "I've already granted them. You don't have to tell ME what they are. I'm a psychic, you know."

I gave her my most patronizing look. "Oh yes, I know. Only a psychic would tell ME what MY wishes are."

"Don't be impertinent," she chided.

I started stroking her flawless bare back again. "Okay, okay. Please tell me, what were my three wishes?"

"Well, you never actually put them into words, but I know what they are. First of all, you have changed, my dear Fred."

I nodded, giving her a smirk. "Right. Changed how?"

She shrugged her naked shoulders. "Changed to the way you wanted to be."

I nodded and rolled my eyes. "Well ... thank you very much."

"You're welcome."

"And my second wish?"

"Your second wish is one of the greatest I could grant you," she said, smiling up at me. "I'm going to tell you how YOU can grant a wish for the one you love!"

"Okay," I nodded, "I get it. What is it that YOU want?"

"Not me, you fool ... though ... thank you; I love you, too."

"Who, then?"

"The person you love most in the whole world, of course."

"I don't like to categorize such things," I told her in a placating tone.

"You don't have to make a list ... you KNOW who it is. Everybody knows," she replied. I was a bit surprised to see that she appeared to be suddenly serious.

I found myself being serious, too. "Alright, then ... Brenda. In all this world, I love Brenda the most. I have from the first moment I laid eyes on her, I think. And from the day that she told me she was mine, I ... I became whole."

"Very good, lover," Auntie said, smiling again. "Now, what is it you could do for her that would make her happy ... happier than she's ever been? How could you change your relationship to make her truly content with her place in the world? With her place in your little harem? With her association with YOU?"

I blinked down at her. "I ... I ... don't know," I said quietly.

"Sure you do ... you've already done it for a very brief time. I can tell, just be looking at her. Think, Fred ... what wish could you grant her?"

"I could turn the bunch of bananas over," I said to myself out loud. Why hadn't I seen that? I had played a game ... a silly game ... in which Brenda had to be the "lowest slave" in the household, doing exactly what everyone else said, no matter how embarrassing. And she had LOVED it! She had THRIVED on it.

"I don't know what 'bananas' means," Auntie remarked, "but I think maybe you've figured it out. Whatever freedoms you have granted her, take them away, and she will be truly happy. Grant her that wish, Fred."

I shook my head at such a notion. Why did everything in my life have to SOUND so insane? I kept stroking that naked back, feeling those breasts pressed into my lower chest, but thinking about other things. Finally, I came back to the present. "Alright," I sighed. "That's a good wish, I have to admit. And my third one?"

"Ah ... that," she replied, suddenly looking sad. "That I will tell you the NEXT time you come to my island. I've already granted it, but I'll wait until then to reveal it to you."

"Right," I said, resorting back to my skeptical self. "That makes sense ... grant me a wish, don't let me pick what it is, and make me wait for it." But then I got serious again. "Why do you look so unhappy all of a sudden?"

A tear came to her eye. "You're going to be angry with me. I ... I think you're going to hate me a little."

Women! Why did they all have to be so melodramatic? "Nothing you can say is going to make me hate you. Tell me."

"You have to leave," she said simply.

I sighed. "Yes, I guess it is time to go back to my own room."

"No ... I mean you have to leave the island. You have to leave today."

I frowned, wrinkling my brow, trying to figure it out. "You want me to leave you?"

"No, no," she implored. "I don't WANT you to ... but you HAVE to! You have to take your girls and leave today. It's imperative! Please don't ask me why! I'll explain it all when you come back, later this year. I'll tell you then, and it might make sense to you ... maybe. But you would NEVER understand if I told you now. You can think me mad, if you want ... or odd, or abnormal or egocentric, or whatever you'd like. Please don't make me explain further. Just go, please." She was really crying now.

I thought of a dozen things to say, but at the very least, the only thing they would have accomplished was to make her cry harder. At the worst, they would have taken a situation I disliked and made it even more hurtful ... for both of us. I wrapped my arms around her naked body while she sobbed, and I thought a hundred thoughts. But I said nothing. I just held her.

WILLIE:

I didn't know what was going on. I HATE it when something happens, and I don't know why ... or in this case, even what! All I knew was that we were leaving the island!

I had run into the house looking for Frederick, almost overwhelmed with guilt about what I had done with Daddy John during the night. I HAD to tell him! I HAD to seek his forgiveness ... or at least his counsel. But when I ran into our bedroom, I found Dee there, packing.

"I don't KNOW what happened," she told me. "I came in here to ask Fred to forgive ... I mean to tell him that I ... Oh, Willie, I DID something last night, and I should TELL him about it! But before I could tell him, he told me to pack! He said that we were leaving today ... right away!"

And then Brenda came in, looking sort of frightened. "Where's Freddy?" she asked us. "I have to see him right away! I have to talk to him about ... about ... something that happened last night." She looked at Dee. "Why are you packing?"

And so, the insane night gave way to an insane day. I thought that Fred and Auntie must have had some sort of horrific fight, but when I found them in the kitchen, they seemed all lovey-dovey, as if everything was alright. I begged Auntie to let us stay. I mean, I'd only been back for two days, and it just didn't seem FAIR that they'd make me leave again so soon, but she told me that I'd be coming back lots of times (when she said that, she cast a sort of dopey, infatuated look at Frederick). Oh, I HATE it when I don't know what's going on!

Mr. Smurd was bringing out a new kid, she told us, and should be arriving any minute (Mr. Smurd had a boat in Barbados, and brought supplies to the island from time to time). I was used to "new kids" showing up. They all had psychic abilities of some sort, and they came here looking for guidance and counseling from Auntie. Some were teenagers; others were very young. I remember once when a baby was brought here because things kept floating around her crib ... rattles and toys and baby bottles and stuff, sort of hovering in the air above her. Cute little kid, too. Anyway, we were going to go back on Mr. Smurd's boat, just as soon as he had refueled and had gotten something to eat, which he always did when he came.

And so, I went back to our room to help pack things up. Dee was busy with the baby, and we were all sort of lost in our own thoughts. I looked down at the dock in the lagoon and saw the boat pull in and some people start up the trail.

When Frederick came in, we all tried to talk to him at once; each, seemingly, with our own urgent problem to discuss with him, but he told us that we would all talk later, after we had gotten started on our trip back to Illinois. We gathered up all of our stuff and moved it into the living room, arriving just as Raul brought in a man and a little girl, about five years old. Auntie rose from her favorite chair to meet them. Mama Ann came in, too. As usual, after the introductions (which included us -- much to the confusion this new gentleman), Auntie turned her attention solely to the little girl, making friends, which, in Auntie's case, is VERY easy to do.

The man, however, kept butting in, telling us all how the little girl could "see" things in a crystal ball ... how she could see the future! "Show them, Juanita! Show them what you can do! Show them what you can see!"

Little Juanita was having none of it. She had just made a new friend, and if there was some sort of "friendship scale" for little kids, Auntie would be right up there at the top. "No, Daddy. Not now," she told him, accepting a small stuffed bear from Auntie.

The man turned nasty. "Listen, you little brat!" he snarled, grabbing the girl by the shoulder and spinning her around to face him. "Show these people what you can do! Don't argue! Sometimes, you're just like your bitch of a mother! If you ruin this for me, so help me, I'll kill you!" And he struck the girl across the face.

I never saw it coming. It's not the sort of thing I ever expected him to do. In the blink of an eye, Frederick had strode the three steps to the man, filled his fists with the guy's lapels, hoisted him about six inches off the ground, and just kept walking until the man's back slammed against the living room wall. A hanging needlepoint picture shook and fell to the floor. The guy's eyes were as big saucers and his arms sort of flopped out and back against his sides.

"Don't. Hit. The little. Girl," Frederick said between clenched teeth. We all stood, aghast.

"Ann," Auntie said sweetly, "would you mind getting Sr. Jimenez a nice cup of tea? You know the kind I mean."

"Um ... certainly, Auntie. Please, Senior, let's go into the kitchen for a nice cup of tea."

But Frederick still held the man aloft by his lapels, glowering at him. Dee and I both stepped forward at the same time. She took hold of Frederick's left arm with both of her hands, while I placed both of my hands on his right. "Fred," Dee implored, "let him go. Ann's going to make him a cup of tea!"

This surprised me. How did Dee know about Ann's tea? "Yes, Frederick," I said. "Ann's tea will help. It always does."

Frederick finally took his murderous eyes off the man's face and looked questioningly from Dee to me. Finally, he heaved a sigh and set the man down. "You're not going to hit the little girl again, are you, pal?" he asked in an uncharacteristically stern voice.

"I give you my word, sir," the man stuttered, "I didn't hurt my daughter, and I have no intention of doing so. I was just making a point, you know? Sometimes," he shrugged, "they just don't listen, you know? You have to get their attention."

I could tell that Frederick was contemplating seizing the guy again, but Dee and I were urging him back across the room. Ann took Mr. Jimenez' hand and led him out into the kitchen.

"What the hell is all this talk about tea?" Frederick asked, looking at the two of us.

"Ann's tea is rather special," Auntie told him, while picking up the crying little girl and putting her on her lap. "I guarantee you, Fred, Sr. Jimenez will never strike his daughter again. And his relationship with his wife is about to undergo a marked improvement, as well. Ann has a tea for just about everything."

Frederick nodded and took a breath. "Okay," he told her. "If Ann has some kind of 'don't-hit-the-little-girl' tea, then I'm all for it."

FRED:

The aftermath of our last night and morning on Auntie's island left us all a little shell-shocked, I have to admit. I don't know what made me do it, but, after having each of the girls plead for some time alone with me to admit to some terrible sin, I wound up making them wait until we were all together in a hotel room in Barbados, and then forcing a public confession. We were, after all, a family, and there were no secrets among us.

I had half-expected some sort of liaison between Brenda and Raul. There had been "looks" between them, and Brenda was so very innocent that a seduction was easily imagined. It only made sense that she believed herself to blame. That's just the way she is.

"Ann and Dee" sort of threw me for a loop. Dee had never really had any lesbian notions until I started screwing with her pretty little head, but her devotion to the lady was irrefutable, and once again, I had to admit that her "sin" was certainly no more onerous than my own actions with our hostess.

But a sexual liaison between Jonathan and his adopted daughter was something that I NEVER saw coming! Was that island some sort of modern-day Sodom and Gomorrah? I'd never heard of so many sexual aberrations since San Francisco in the Sixties! Talk about free love!

I confessed my "sins," as well, though, of course, the girls didn't see it that way. And, oh man, I missed Auntie! The whole thing seemed like some kind of dream, but the memories were sharp and vivid and achingly real.

As I kissed her goodbye, Auntie had told me that she wanted us all back on the island for another visit in October, and even though I was still pretty upset about the whole "you have to leave now" routine, I gave her my word that we would see her then.

DEE:

Two things happened just before we left Auntie's Island. First, I snuck back to the kitchen to say goodbye to Ann. We were almost alone in the room. (Senior Jimenez sat at the kitchen table with a totally blank look in his eyes and an empty teacup in front of him.) I held her and told her that we had to leave; and she hugged me and kissed me passionately and said that, yes, she had heard, but didn't understand why Auntie wanted us gone. We cried.

And secondly, as we were just about to board the boat, Auntie took me aside and asked me to promise her that I would not stop breastfeeding Lizzy until she was a year and a half old. I asked her why, but she wouldn't tell me. But, of course, I gave her my word. A year and a half! I don't think my breasts are EVER going to be the same again!