Chapter 4: Good Morning

"Oh that's better. Why is it when your starving you get full faster?" I ask leaning back in my chair.

"No idea." Kevin said finishing off his iced water.

"Why don't you stay here tonight?" I asked.

"Hm?" He said pushing back his dinner plate, not a bean left on it.

"Tonight, it's late, we're tired, you'd only have to come back in the morning. Only logical to stay here tonight."

"Oh? Yes. I suppose so. " Kevin kept his eyes on his plate.

"Want more?" I asked, wondering how graceful I was going to be refilling it.

Kevin turned from his plate to me. He stared at me a while, taking in my disheveled appearance.

"Food?" he asked with a grin. "No. I'm fine."

I am not going to blush I am not going to blush, I told myself even as I felt my cheeks go pink.

"I guess I shouldn't have sent Pat to bed so quick." I stood up on my foot and began to hop down the hall. "This way to my room, I think Dad still had some clothes that just may fit." I said in-between hops.

"Hm." Came from directly behind me.

I wasn't prepared to be swept off my feet a second time. I squeaked.

"I know, I know, faster." I said resigned. "End of the hall, up the stairs." I directed. " End of this hall, on right." We entered my room and he paused. "Bathroom, there." I pointed again.

Once I was arranged sitting on the lid of the toilet seat he stood and looked down at me. I made an effort not to look at the crotch that was inches from my face. And failed. Yet again I blushed.

"Umm ok. Well. I umm there." I sighed and pointed out the door. "In my room, far closet is where I've placed some things yet to be packed. On the shelf folded is where I've put ... things. See if anything fits? I'll take a shower. There is a shower in the hallway to the right. If you need anything..."

"I'll make do." To my shock he leaned down and kissed my nose and quickly shut the bathroom door behind him.

"I ... ah ... yes." It was going to be a long night.

I heard the shower in the hall cut on long before I was ready for my own. My under clothes were still damp, making the jeans harder to get off, and I couldn't stand up right, then I'd banged my elbow on the sink. My skin had chafed on the inside of my thighs. It took much cussing and work to get undressed and in the shower. But once in ... ahhhh.

I put gobs and gobs of conditioner in my hair and worked it through, pulling and disentangling my knotted hair. I washed my body with the pure joy of being clean and fresh again. I didn't stop till finally the hot water heater was empty., which I'd never done before. Dad had put in a huge hot water heater, he said with two women there was never enough to go around.

"Ahh." I said when finally turning off the tap.

"Feel good?" Kevin's voice coming from the door jam nearly caused me to fall.

"Ow! Damn!" I had put my foot down briefly. "Yes it did. Damn it." I cursed. "What in Lincoln's closet are you doing here again?" I hissed through my teeth as pain shot up my nerves, the throbbing was back, with a passion.

"Waiting for you." Kevin was refraining from comment on my method of cursing just now.

A fluffy white towel was thrust between the curtain and wall. I snatched it and peeked out at him, glaring.

"I could of waited till you opened the curtain." He said with humor, but he'd decided not to push his luck.

"Hm." I took his own grunted sound and used it myself this time. He was wearing a pair of sweat pants, baggie and soft looking. That was it. His chest was bared and his toes were bare. I'd bet that he didn't have his briefs on now. I jerked my head back in the shower again.

"Just how were you going to step out?" he asked.

"Same way I got in, sit on the edge." I pushed the shower curtain aside, the towel now toga style, wrapped around me.

"This way is faster." Kevin warned.

"Kevin!" There was no place to back up to, I didn't want to yell and wake up Patrica. "No!" I hissed. There wasn't anything on under my towel and picking me up... !!!

"Oh hush." He said sounding very logical indeed as he hoisted me once more in his arms. "I'm beginning to like playing the part of the hero.

"Hero is it? If it wasn't for you this wouldn't have happened! and and..." My mind once again was racing ahead of me.

I was picked up, regardless of what I wanted, my arms wrapped around his neck, one of his under my wet knees, the other behind my back. The towel rode up baring my ass and other things, at least he couldn't see, I thought just as we walked in front of my dresser, with it's mirror. Oh God!

"Kevin, put me down, now!" I ground out between my teeth.

And he did. He laid me down on my bed. Thankfully I'd never been one to make my bed and I snatched up the sheets and covered myself from neck to toes. I twisted and worked my way to the edge of the bed where I sat staring at him. How could anyone be so brass as to...

"Kevin, you've got to stop carrying me." I glared at him.

"I did." He said simply and knelt down in front of me. "Now let me see..."

"I think you've seen enough!" I said, a death grip on the sheets.

Kevin rested one arm on the bed next to me and his laughing eyes met mine.

"Oh? For a woman who skinny dips regularly in public I'd think you wouldn't be this shy."

His eyes, green. A light green with flecks of yellow gold em them. Light long lashes framed them.

"I was alone, it's just as private as a bath is."

"Hm." He said with a grin. That sound telling me just how private my current bath had been.

"Or normally is!"

"Your ankle." He said, pointing at my foot.

"What about it?" What had that to do with my bath? Or his eyes? Or his smile. He seemed always to have a smile, white even teeth peeking out like now.

"I want to see your ankle, you do remember you twisted it right?" He was laughing at me now.

"Bloody infernal man." I muttered as I blushed, but snatched the sheet off of my leg with a rough jerk.

He tilted his head down, his one hand cradled the bottom of my foot, the other lightly pressed the skin of the swollen area, careful not to press too deep. I looked at the top of his head, light brown? Medium? It was hard to tell while it was wet. He'd just combed it back. It appeared to be cut short but growing out, starting to creep down the back of his neck. His ears just covered, how would he look dry? I realized I hadn't remembered seeing him dry. When I met him outside; was it just hours ago? I had been in no mood to notice anything. Then of course in the water he'd been wet. And still later, at dinner it was only food that I noticed.

I was just reaching up to push a lock of his hair off his ear when his eyes appeared.

I blinked, caught?

"Hm?" The sound kinda rumbled from the back of his throat, one eye brow raised.

"Hmmm?" I repeated, mine more of a hum.

He smiled, a long lazy broad assed smile which said he knew I hadn't been listening, and why.

"I said..." He paused, making a point of repeating himself. "I think it shouldn't be wrapped for now, the swelling's already far along. But you should have ice on it. Have you an ice bag?"

He'd said all that and I missed it? Pull it together Girl!

"Actually yes. There is a first aid kit down in the kitchen, in the tall cabinet by the fridge. There should be a breakable instant one there."

He was gone before I'd finished speaking. Oh what a view from the back. What was a man like that doing here?

"Oh please, pull it together." I hissed to myself jerking the towel from under the sheet. I threw it to the other side of the room. "It hasn't been that long since you've had sex." I scolded myself and slid back on the bed, plumping the pillows and adjusting one so my ankle rested propped up. I laid back and straightened the sheets. Then remembered I hadn't combed my own hair. I sighed. It had been a very long time since I'd had sex my mind felt compelled to remind me.

"Here we go." Kevin said and I heard a 'pop' as he punched the ice pack. He sat on the bed and carefully laid the ice over the ankle. I winced. Twisting he looked back at me. "What else?"

"A comb?" I asked sounding like a child asking for a bed time story, and feeling like it too.

Without a word he walked into the bathroom, and switched off the bedroom light before coming back to the bed. The room was only lit from the bathroom light.

"There, you relax." He said sitting on the bed again.

He handed me the comb and sat watching as I combed my hair. It seemed a very intimate thing to do. Lie in bed, nude, with only the light from the bathroom on, while he watched me comb my damp hair. I finished as quickly as I could and sat it on the bedside table.

"There is umm." my voice sounded loud. I cleared my throat and lowered it. "The guest room was turned into storage last year. Patricia has the other room. I fear the only thing left is the sofa." I whispered.

"Hm." Kevin made no move to leave.

"There are linen's in the closet in the hall..." my voice trailed off. I knew he wasn't going anywhere.

"Patricia, how is she taking ... things." he asked, I knew he referred to our earlier conversation.

"Oh." I said grateful he changed the subject that I had no idea how to deal with.

"At six she didn't know what was going on, why I was sad, why we came here for vacation, when Grandma and Gramps weren't here. I explained it, but death ... it isn't easy. She's grown a lot since we've been here."

"No, I expect deaths not easy no matter what age." He said softly.

He moved, stretching out his legs, propped up on one elbow, looking at me while we talked. I told him of the adjustments we'd made, getting her in school here, how it just so happened she hadn't started school at 'home' yet. She'd made friends quickly and adapted. Allen had spent more time at home then here, his job and things kept him there. Quickly, too quickly they'd grown apart. She'd always thought there was something wrong with their marriage if they could fall apart so quickly, so quietly, so completely.

"Patricia didn't have trouble after she started to consider this home. For a while it bothered it her Allen was so far away, but now, it's just a fact. An amazing ability to see things as they are. Fact is Dad lives there, we live here. Ok." I said trying to describe how easy it in fact had been with Pat.

"What did you name her Patricia?" Kevin lowered his head to a folded forearm tucked under his ear.

"Oh, that." I smiled. "I had gone in for my sonogram, the Doctor said he honestly couldn't tell if it was a boy or girl. She had her hands down and her legs tightly closed and refused to be moved. He had pressed on my stomach and she would move only a little and usually just her head. But the doctor said he thought it was a boy. I'd gone home thinking 'boy'. John Patrick was to be his name. When later I was handed a girl..." I gave Kevin a sleepy smile. "John Patrick turned into Patricia Joan."