Chapter 11

John’s turn:

This waking up next to an angel is good – a thing to get used to. Dim light. Early morning. Laura laying there asleep. Ordinary brown-haired girl. Millions of ‘em, maybe billions. This one’s mine.

Just the motion of me getting out of bed is enough to wake her. I’m already in the bathroom. Sleeping bottomless, I can take care of peeing by myself. She’s hopping on one foot behind me, though.

“You could use the other bathroom.”

“I’m afraid I’ll leave a trail.”

I stepped aside, flipping the toilet seat down.

“Thank you.” She sat and I heard the gush as she relieved her bladder.

“You were serious.”

“Yeahhhh...”

After that, breakfast, then on the road. Morning’s task is to begin upgrading the assets to turn the acreage into a working farmlet.

Last night’s discussion included a tractor with a few implements and a two-seat ATV with a little cargo bed. We were going to look for the ATV today, this morning.

I could get used to having my own personal driver. Laura looks good, confident, as I examine her profile.

“You’re staring.”

“Worshiping. There’s a difference.”

“To you. Makes me kinda nervous.”

“Sorry.”

“You do that a lot.”

“You’ll catch me doing it for the rest of your life.”

She smiled. “I do that to you, too, you know.”

“You’re more subtle than I am.”

“Last night. We were watching that history program. You were engrossed in it. I watched YOU watch it.”

“Maybe we’ll grow out of it.”

“I hope not. Mom and Dad haven’t.”

“I kinda get that from visiting them. We’ll do that. If you don’t wake up one day and say ‘What am I doing with this OLD dude?’.”

“If you thought that, you wouldn’t be here. If I thought that, neither would I. Long haul, Buster Brown.”

“Buster Brown? Where’d that come from?”

“Gramma. Something about a kid, selling shoes. Her phrase, though.”

“Because you can’t remember my REAL name?”

Snicker. “Yeah. Ol’ Whatsisname. My fiancé.” We both laughed. It might be within the bounds of a ‘whirlwind courtship’ but since the day before the hurricane we’ve been with each other 99.9% of the time and I’d found nothing that I’d change, right down to her howls the time I left the toilet seat up before my accident. I deserved that. Now I can claim ‘disability’.

Previous incident:

“Takes ONE hand to put the stupid seat down.”

“Didja get your hair wet?” I snickered unwisely.

Hissed “animal”.

“In my defense I have not had to contend with female presence in my household before.”

“You could benefit from civilizing influence.”

So I’m becoming civilized.

And traveling with Laura is fun. We navigated to an equipment dealership, examined the particular model we’d researched on the Internet, got an obligatory test ride. These people have their act together. If you’re buying off-road equipment a test spin around a paved parking lot is a waste.

A buyer with a broken arm is a waste, too. The sales guy’s eyes flicked back and forth between me and Laura.

“Let ‘er try it. Heaven knows, she’s got more experience in ‘em.”

I watched them work their way around the test area, topping little rises, a section of whoop-de-dos, an off-camber slope.

They came back.

“Well?” I asked.

Laura looked at me, then the sales guy. “Runs great with no load. Wonder what it’d do with a hundred fifty pounds in the bed?”

Their next run was with five bags of oil absorbent from their shop. Two hundred fifty pounds. Another run around the demonstration track. Laura was still smiling. “Go for it,” she told me.

The sales guy grinned. “Let’s go do the paperwork.”

“Let’s do the paperwork for a trailer, too,” I said.

“It’ll fit in the bed of the truck,” Laura countered.

“I don’t like that. Trailer.”

“Yes, master.”

An hour later we had the new ATV on a trailer behind the truck. Our destination was my office. Soon to be Laura’s office.

Towing the trailer, she parked the truck off to the side out of the way and we walked in the back door of the office building, courtesy of my scan-card.

We knocked on Pete’s door, announcing our arrival.

He started with a smile. “You’re not here, you’re off on short-term disability. Go hide in your office. I’ll take Laura across the street to the south building and get her paperwork done.”

“Be careful, baby,” I told her. “Half the people in that office are crazy.”

“I’ll be good,” she said, “and treat them like little ‘special’ kids.”

Pete laughed. “Now you’re copying MY management style. Uh, John’s got a hook on his wall to hang his rubber headgear.”

“Careful, buddy,” I told Pete. “I’m a helpless cripple with HR on speed dial.”

I fielded a few emails, made a couple of phone calls, idling away my waiting time. After almost an hour, Laura appeared, Pete right behind her.

“I’m official, now,” she giggled. “Treat me gently or I’ll call HR.”

“Already corrupted,” I told Pete.

“You’re the one who recruited ‘er.”

“Hey, yeah, okay ... Isn’t there a finder’s fee for that?”

“I already got the paperwork started,” Laura laughed. “First official act.”

“I like the way you work. Of course, you gotta stay six months before they pay me.”

“I’ll be here.”

We walked back out to the truck. “Let’s go take our new toy home.”

She grinned. “You think you’re giving me that thing for a wedding present?”

“The thought hadn’t crossed my mind, baby. But since you mention it...”

“I want a bigger tractor.”

“We have a tractor.”

“Bigger. That’s a recreational tractor. We’re gonna have to manage that pasture and our little tractor’s not really up to the task. You can do it, but seriously, the job would be almost a career.”

“You sound like you’ve got something in mind.”

“I do.”

“I defer to your knowledge.”

“We’ll have TWO incomes, baby.”

“Money wasn’t on my mind.”

“Should be.”

“Thinking of nothing but love...”

“Saturday.”

“I know.”

“You gotta know, buddy boy, that I really am looking forward to it. But you know – ‘virgin on her wedding night’. We...” she giggled, “ ... pretty much have free rein over everything up to that one little thing...”

“Calling it a little thing does wonders for my male self-esteem.”

Snicker. “You KNOW better. And change ‘thing’ to ‘event’. Feel better now?”

“Indulge me, little one.”

“Only if you promise to indulge me right back.”

“Two or three for one...”

The giggle again. “You’re talking about ORGASMS! You old DOG!”

“It could be about orgasms,” I said, “if that where your mind is...”

“Could be. Celebration of success just might involve some sort of physical validation activity.”

Now I’m anticipating. Quick reflection back to the day before the storm when I DIDN’T look at Laura and think ‘John, you’re gonna go crazy anticipating how the two of you will mesh’. And we do mesh.

I questioned her about the prospect of working in an office.

“Baby,” she said, like she was repeating a lesson to a toddler, because we’ve had this conversation before, “I’ve spent twelve years of my life sitting at a desk. I can do this.”

“It’s realsies, baby doll. Our annual budget’s several million dollars.”

Giggle. “Any way we can, like, siphon off just a tad?”

“I asked that question. They said they already do that and it’s called ‘salary’.”

“That’s no fun...”

I laughed. “Neither is prison...”

“I was thinking of a beach house in Brazil...”

“You do realize that down there they have centipedes the size of weenie dogs...”

“I’m a country girl. I regard rat-killin’ as appropriate entertainment for the odd evening. Bugs don’t bother me.”

“Bot-flies...”

“Seen ‘em.”

“You’re hard to top...”

“It’s not a contest. If you wanted a mindless bimbo...”

“Nope. No bimbo. And a mind is a big selling point.”

“I’m glad, you know. I’m kinda light in the ‘tits’ department.”

“You’re perfect in the tits department, and you KNOW it.” I dunno why a woman would even start this conversation. I adore her.

And she caught on to my annoyance.

“Just making sure, love. Don’t want you raiding our accounts and sending me in for a boob job.”

I laughed. “Darlin’, I practically worship you just like you are.”

“All over a package of Oreos.”

“Gotta start somewhere.”

Home. I’m really feeling attached to the new place. Well, the house is new, anyway, but I find a feeling of permanence when we pull across the cattleguard onto MY land.

Make that ‘our land’.

Some of the cattle lift their head, acknowledging our noise.

“Can you get that gate?” Laura says, stopping at the gate that leads into the barn area.

I can do a gate. It’s latched, not locked. The cattle haven’t figured out how to open it, but I have. I swing the gate open for Laura to drive the truck and trailer through, closing it behind her. We off-loaded our new ATV and pushed the trailer alongside the barn.

“C”mon,” she laughed. “Lemme show you the place!”

“It’s MY place.”

“OUR place now, and I need you to open gates.”

“Glad I serve a function.”

“Just one of many that I find useful, buddy!”

We had a conversation about the barn. I sort of share it with Clay Lofton. Truth is, he uses it a lot more than I do. He runs ten head of cattle on the place and in return for my letting him have the run of the place, he keeps the fences up and stops the pasture from getting overrun by brush and invasive trees.

“We’ll have to talk with him about it,” I said. “Your dad’s bringing feed for his cattle...”

“MY cattle,” she corrected.

“Yours?”

“Yep. Wedding present.”

“Wow!” I laughed. “FIVE cows AND you!”

“What’s so funny?”