Episode 35

The next morning, Kelly rose early and packed several items in a backpack and walked back up to the cabin. Entering quietly, she walked up the stairs just enough so that her head just surpassed the floor ... Jill and I were still fast asleep; Jill curled up in my arms. Smiling, she went back down and, unpacking the supplies she had brought, started preparing an elaborate breakfast.

Kelly usually ate vegetarian and, when the three of us ate together, the meals had most often been vegetarian as well, even though neither Jill nor I adhered to that way of life. Today was an exception, however, and it was the smell of frying bacon that first woke me. As I stirred, trying to identify the odor, Jill woke as well.

"Bacon!" she said, surprised.

"And toast," I added.

We rose quickly and ran down the stairs to the kitchenette.

"Kelly?! What are you doing? I thought you were vegetarian."

"I am. But I have a. confession to make ... and a favor to ask of you. I was hoping that by making a really traditional, cholesterol-loaded, American breakfast, I'd butter you up so that you'd at least listen to me without tearing my head off."

"Oh... ?" Both Jill and I were suspicious.

"Yeah ... why don't you go for a quick dip in the pond to wake up while I pour the coffee and serve the eggs? We can talk afterwards."

We were back five minutes later, shaking the water out of our hair. In the meantime, Kelly had laid the table, poured the coffee, buttered the toast and had served two large plates of bacon and eggs to her models. She, herself, had limited herself to eggs only.

While we were eating, Kelly started speaking. "I might as well begin; delaying it will not make it any easier..."

"Let me start by the confession ... Last night, after I left you, I had an idea for a pose ... I came back here to get my sketch book and I saw you..."

"..."

"I mean ... I saw you making love ... It was the most beautiful, the tenderest gesture I have ever seen in my life. I want to ... I NEED to recreate it in a sculpture ... I want you to pose for me, making love, so that I may capture that feeling..."

"NO! No way!" we yelled in unison.

"You don't understand ... it is exactly THAT what I've been looking for ... what I've needed to convey ... from the time we started on this project."

"Let me be perfectly blunt, Kelly ... I can go along with the statues and the paintings ... business is business and when you think about it, there really isn't any difference between the poses we've been doing and any of the Greek statues of two thousand years ago or of the statues that used to hold up clocks and lamps during Victorian times but I think that I speak for Jill, as well, when I say that there is no way ... no way IN HELL that a statue of Jill and me making love will ever, EVER sit on a shelf in Barbara's sex shop. Is that clear?"

Kelly waved that away. "I don't care about Barbara ... I've got more than enough stuff to get her to wet her britches, if you'll permit me to be so crude. For the last two weeks, I've been working for myself, trying to say something about the beauty of physical love that has escaped me for years. I thought I had it yesterday and you saw how that turned out. No ... this is for me ... and for you two, as well. If you let me do it; I'll give it to you as a wedding present. Please ... would you please at least let me try... ?"

Jill was intrigued. "Tell me more, Kelly."

"Hey! Wait a minute! You're not saying you're going along..."

"Let me finish, Joe ... please? I totally agree with you about not wanting that statuette in Barbara's shop so that she can sell more porn. But what we have together is NOT porn; it's not fake ... it's real. It's as real as love can be ... I wouldn't mind in the least to have something to ... I don't know ... to glorify what I feel about you; to have something I could see, I could touch and say... 'You see ... this is how I feel about you'."

"Well ... if you put it that way..."

Kelly heaved a sigh when she was at last finished, "Here is it. Gods, it's striking ... it's..."

She couldn't think of any words to complete her thoughts. Jill and I collapsed onto the floor; laying there for the longest time.

"I'll leave you two alone if you want," stated Kelly "Thank you ... thank you ever so much for allowing me this privilege..." as she left and went down the stairs to go outside. Tears were flowing freely from her eyes.

After a few more minutes Jill got up first and I followed. "That's awesome. It's the most amazing thing that I ever saw," I said.

Jill hugged him, "Thank you, Joe ... I know this couldn't have been the easiest thing for you. But I'm so grateful that you ... I mean that we did it."