Chapter 23

Paul’s turn:

So we’re at the café for dinner – me, my doll, the Smiths and the Badens. Me and my famous wife.

And the question. Larry’s wife Nicole. “I realize it’s kind of personal, but the news is out about that age thing. How’d you two end up together?”

I paused, thinking of how I was going to either dodge or answer and Barb dove right in.

“I was walking down the beach road and saw a guy sitting under his cabin typing. I had to ask...”

“So it was just chance?”

“Not exactly,” Barb answered. “I was living with my grandparents. Paul was about the only other occupant who lived there full-time. It’s a beach community. Lots of cabins, mostly weekenders and people doing a week or two vacation. Paul didn’t mind me talking his ear off...”

“Did you know how old she was?” Larry asked.

“Well, she didn’t walk up to me and say ‘Hi, I’m fourteen and we need to be married,’ exactly,” I said. “She was interested in me saying I was a writer and we talked, she got interested. School started and she knew by that time I was an engineer, so naturally when math was a problem, I was the solution.”

“Gramma and Grampa met ‘im right after I did,” Barb said.

“I insisted. No way I was going to surprise them with being a teen girl’s adult friend.”

Barb giggled. “He wasn’t a boyfriend. Yet. That took a while. He helped me get started writing. Took me to a writers’ group meeting or two. I saw how he was with other people. We kinda grew on each other.”

“Next thing I know,” I said, “she said that we were close and people like us should be married. Her grandmother clerked for an attorney, so she knew some people in legal circles, including a judge who’d solved that problem before.”

“Gramma and Grampa approved,” Barb chirped. “I approved. Paul approved after he found out he wouldn’t end up in jail. So here we are. We don’t make a big deal about it because as right as WE think it might be, there are a lot of people who think I’m a deluded, exploited child.”

“Yeah, I resemble that remark,” Larry said. “When the word first got out, I asked myself, then I remembered having dinner with y’all. You do a poor job of looking exploited.”

“You would have had to overhear one of his math tutoring sessions when we first got started. I was a mediocre public school student. He exploited me until I passed up the teachers.”

“That goes way past exploitation and goes right into abuse,” Nicole snorted.

“I guess I can see that point of view,” Barb smiled, “But it opened up something for me. I got curious and I got determined to NOT be stopped.”

The conversation shifted away from Barb’s youth to topics around work and home, and finally, meals finished, we eased away towards home – ‘home’ for us being our cozy little travel trailer.

The meal was as much social as sustenance. Conversation continued for a while afterward before we made our way home.

Barb’s turn:

Sitting in the truck, Paul looked over at me and smiled. “You’re pretty sure you’re it, aren’t you?!?”

“I am. I got all your buttons pushed. Red hair, SHORT red hair. Blue eyes. Freckles.” I shook my head. “Although it IS time for a haircut. And I AM just the right size. We fit together well.”

“Indeed we do. What brought up this subject line?”

“I just watched how you interact with others. You do well. Makes me glad I got YOU.”

“I’m glad you got me, too. And that ‘hair’ thing? You can let it grow if you want...”

“You told me early in this thing between us that me shaking my head drove you nuts. I like having that power at my fingertips.”

He laughed. “You know I absolutely adore you, huh?”

“That’s my opinion.”

We pulled into the little RV park, went into the trailer. I got first shower. Was in my pajamas when Paul finished shaving and came to the living area to join me in a sofa made for cuddling. A good amount of cuddling took place before I looked at him.

“Either we move this to the bed where I can REALLY do you, or we postpone this and I do a little writing.”

He sighed. “I need to write, too. This last few days has been a whirlwind.”

I don’t fight fair. Or maybe it’s not a fight at all. There’s a part of me that became self-aware concurrent with the relationship that grew between us. My hand slid down inside the waistband of his pajamas. “Just one little squeeze, okay? It’s a promise.”

I admit to having second thoughts as we disengage and I drag out my laptop, but as a famous person once said, “Writers write.”

Princess Donnabella is having an argument with her dragon in the story. Apparently as dragons mature, they feel a growing affinity for gold and that’s presenting an issue for Donnabella and Jerry in the story. Yes, there’s a few strands of Mimsy’s emporium in the scene.

I don’t know what’s going on in Paul’s head because he’s ripping along, typing at full speed, and that’s pretty fast for him. He’s in his zone, so I say nothing and dive back into my own story. We’re still learning each other’s idiosyncrasies.

I leave Donnabella explaining to her dragon why he can’t just arbitrarily TAKE gold for his hoard when I see Paul in the corner of my eye as he shuts his laptop.

“Bed time,” I tell him, “one of us needs to reward the other for a pleasant evening of social interaction.”

“This time,” he grinned, “I get to reward YOU.”

I squealed gleefully as I stripped out of my pajamas.

Rewarded, indeed.

The next morning I was still juicy from falling asleep in my post-orgasmic glow. The alarm went off. I rolled over to face my Paul. He kissed my nose, something he’s done from early on. He knows it charms me. I reach down. Yep. Hard.

What a way to start the day.

Breakfast shared, then Paul was on his way to work. I got the kitchen straightened, then I put in an hour on the keyboard before the text came in to go meet Mimsy.

We made our way to the shop, driving through the town’s donut shop, waiting in line to get a half-dozen of our favorites. Coffee? We do that at the shop.

Haircuts. She has, naturally, a local shop that takes care of her. “She can fix you up, too. Just trim you back a few weeks, or give you something different.”

“I’ve been this for years,” I said. “I can’t think of anything more practical that I really would like.”

“Practical...” Mimsy repeated.

“I like ‘practical’. I get up, two minutes with a brush, and I’m ready to go, and Paul swears he adores it. Observations of his reactions back up his statements.” I giggled. “Sometimes he gets crazy.”

“Jody always complains about the time I spend fixing myself up for him. He swears I’m best on Saturday morning...”

I snorted. “I notice you don’t get out early on Saturdays.”

Smile crossed her face. “No, no ... Saturday mornings are kinda special. So ... haircut?”

“You have somebody you trust, obviously.”

“Oh, yes ... Another small-town success story. Cliney Davis was a year behind me in high school. Has her own shop. A couple of other women rent space with her. Apparently she does well enough to support her single life. Or she got enough from three divorces.”

“Maybe a bit of both,” I said.

“Yeah. That,” Mimsy answered.

We opened the shop, fired up the coffee pot, broke out the donuts. I sat down behind Mimsy as she went through the eBay messages. More little successes.

“I’ve had this thing on my shelf for years,” she said, laughing.

We already had things boxed. Easy job, printing out and affixing labels, then calling for pickup.

Back to the trials of Donnabella.

Paul’s turn:

Ah, I remember now. Just because one put an adequate design together and sent a detailed list of specifications to vendors does NOT mean that’s what shows up on your site. I hired a ‘known quantity’ contractor to provide me with expertise to check out and commission the electrical power side of things

Now I’m standing front of a line-up of medium voltage switchgear, alternating my eyes between the ‘issued for construction’ drawings we’d sent and the knowing fingertip of the lead technician pointing at wires connected to a terminal strip.

“All wrong,” he said. “Consistently wrong. And you said they did testing before it left the factory.”

“That’s what they say.”

“They couldn’t have. This is wrong. Won’t work.”

“Let’s document it, then give me an estimate of what it takes for YOU to fix it. I’ll call them and offer them an option to send their people out to make it right, or to let you fix it...”

“That’s an adder. Not our original scope of work.”

“Naturally. Give me your price so I can offer you as option 2.” I mentally came up with my own number. A day’s slip in the schedule. I have enough leeway to cover that, but too many hurdles ... Oh, well, at least I have documentation that it’s not MY fault. That’s small consolation if we don’t meet deadlines though. I took my golf cart back to my office and got on the phone.

An hour and a half and a flurry of emails later things worked out as I supposed. I rode back out to the substation and told the technician to get his people started. I buzzed down there to watch them kick off the project, got treated to a few “this ain’t the worst I ever saw” tales. I knew most of them to be true.