Chapter 4

"I had the house custom built for me, in my old life. I don't care much for windows. The one you can see on the back wall is new. My guess is that it's right over the sink," I said.

Her mouth actually dropped open when she stared at it. I could almost see wheels turning in her head.

"You're trying to tell me that it wasn't there this morning when you came looking for me?" she asked, sounding indignant with suspicion.

"In the first place, I didn't come looking for you. I just felt a powerful urge to saddle Jack and ride in that direction. I'd never felt anything like it before, but it practically forced me to go.

"As far as the window, when I built this house it only had two windows in it. A small one, placed near the top of the inner wall on each end. I wouldn't have put those in except that I wanted to be able to air the place out occasionally," I said.

"That's ridiculous in itself. It's like you were trying to build a cave," she said.

"You may not believe me, but you're not the first person to ever tell me that. Never the less, it's how I wanted things. I see now that some of my wishes have been countermanded."

"You're lying. It's plain to me now that you're lying. I don't know how you did this but I demand that you take me back to Dallas, at once. You have a truck in the garage there and I want you to take me back right now!" she said.

"You have no idea how much I wish I could do that for you, because I could drive back home after I dropped you off, but I can't," I said.

"And why not?"

"If you'll look a little more carefully, you'll see that while I have a perfectly serviceable vehicle, we're missing the little detail of a road," I said.

She was crestfallen when she saw I was right. I took this pause to unsaddle Jack and let him in with Francis. As I was doing it I got another powerful urge, that's the only way I can describe it.

I felt like I had to bring her over and show her the live stock accommodations, or Jack's and Francis' at least. I knew I was supposed to show her their feeding stalls and how to feed from inside the barn. She was still standing there staring at the house and every now and then looking for a road from my garage. I walked over to her.

"My name is, Chuck, by the way," I said.

"I am not pleased to meet you, Chuck, not in the least, but my name is Janet," she said.

"Well, I am pleased to meet you, Janet, and I need for you to come with me so I can show you a few things," I said.

I gave her the tour of the feed barn, put out oats for Jack and Francis and then put more hay in their mangers. I explained everything to her in no little detail.

Next we walked around the perimeter of the pens. I showed her what the feeding stalls looked like from the outside and I explained about the electric fence. I even showed her Elsie, Bevo, and their feeding arrangements - we fed them too. The urge faded after I finished with Jack and Francis and it was gone completely after her tour of Elsie's accommodations.

"That's all very interesting, but why show me? I don't intend to stay," she said.

"I don't know why, I just got another powerful urge to show you all that, specifically," I said.

"Now that's something I can understand, because I have a powerful urge to slap your jaws, repeatedly. Thankfully, I'm able to restrain it," she said.

I was tired of trying to talk to her, for now at least. I had other suspicions about the house and so I walked around it. She sat in my lawn chair, to sulk I guess.

The new window wasn't the only change. The whole damned house seemed bigger, considerably bigger, both longer and wider unless I missed my guess.

Of course there were more windows; women just love them. What I usually thought of as the living room wall was almost entirely window now. It was obvious that it didn't open and was actually a picture window, but it did have divided lights, and it's "blast door" as I'd come to call the steel covers, seemed to come up from below, even though I didn't know how.

Around at the front I now had a full-length front porch, it looked to be about ten feet wide, and a porch swing was hanging near its end. Another big picture window had been added also.

There was another window on the bedroom end of the house too, but it didn't go all the way across. It seemed to coincide with the bedroom, excluding my closet, but including practically the rest of the wall, and it went from very near the floor to very near the ceiling, I could see in and tell that much.

I knew I'd be in for a lot more surprises when I got inside.

"Are you through walking around your house, trying to convince me that it's all new to you?" she asked.

"Yes, I'm through for now, and it isn't all new to me, but a lot of it is. I'll have to say that they do good work," I said, but she wasn't amused.

"I'm sure you must be hungry and thirsty. Why don't we go inside and let me fix something to eat?" I asked.

"Fine."

As we approached the back door I saw that its blast door had changed too, and it apparently came up from the bottom now also. I figured that they probably all did now. They had been pretty ugly the old way. My stomach felt queasy for a second as I thought of what else might have happened inside. It had reason to.

The refrigerators were the first thing I noticed, one especially. They were no longer plain, and one of them had side-by-side doors now. It also had a through the door ice and water delivery setup. No doubt it could crush the ice also.

All the cabinets and basically everything in the kitchen looked new, and more feminine, and everything seemed to match. The new window was over the sink. The new sink I should say. Now it was a triple basin with an ornate faucet fixture, a sprayer on each side and even one of the extremely hot right this second hot water dispensers.

I could go on and on about the cook top being on an island in the middle of the now larger kitchen, or about the genuine used looking butcher block, or the startlingly expensive looking cozy seeming kitchen table with only two chairs, but I won't. It was a magazine kitchen now, the type you see pictures of in the women's magazine advertisements you might find in the doctor's office.

I could tell that Janet was impressed, in spite of her determination not to be. Hell, I was impressed. What I'd always called the living room, which I guess could be charitably called a den at best, was vastly improved and feminized too. It was more of a difference in detail than overall style though.

It now had furniture that actually looked like it belonged together, even though it had a masculine flavor, except for the rocker. I had never wanted a rocker in my life and had never owned one. Now, beside the overstuffed ranch flavored recliner there was a bentwood wicker rocker.

"My rocker! How did it get here? That's my rocker, from home," Janet said, nearly screaming.

I just stood there disgusted about acquiring a giant fireplace to replace my wood heater.

"This is my rocker," Janet said again, even more emphatically this time.

"It looks like a really nice one too," I said, not being able to think of anything else.

"And that's my knick-knack shelf too!" she added, pointing to the offending item which was hanging on the wall.

It was the biggest fucking knick-knack shelf I'd ever seen, and it was way overloaded. If the house hadn't been built so solidly and on a concrete slab I'm sure one good jump would have vibrated every single damned knick-knack off.

The appearance of some of her things had Janet in an exploring mood. She started off down the hall, toward the bedroom, and I followed her. In the bedroom I hardly recognized anything.

My first look gave me an even better appreciation of how much my little cabin had grown. In the big middle was a bed even larger than King Size. It was a four-poster and it even had a canopy. Everything was lacy and fluffy. We had a beautiful comforter, pillow shams, and all the trimmings. There was even a hand made quilt spread out on top of the comforter.