Introduction: Agreement

It was during the late autumn, when things were generally winding down for the winter. Craig's crops were fewer and far between. The animals were sleepy and quick to turn in for the day. The bar was certainly busier.

Gill was flustered with her wooing; something she'd found altogether charming in the beginning but was fast becoming wearisome. It was starting to feel less like shyness and more like indifference now. His work ethic that had once quickly developed her respect was becoming the mistress to her jealous lover. So Sundae Inn was rewarded with another familiar to drink tonight.

She mused over her blueberry fizz that she hadn't really been serious about Gill. He'd just been easy to connect with amid the whole saving-the-island-with-magical-rainbows thing. Which is more than can be said for the average guy.

"Hey Luke, did you know I made a rainbow today?"

"Way to be."

"Huh?"

"I make rainbows every day! Me and my axe!"

That shiny optimism in him seemed to immediately mistake her statement of fact as some life metaphor for happiness. She envied it but wouldn't ever attempt to press the issue further. Sure, make rainbows every day. She was trying.

And then Owen:

"See that rainbow?"

"Yeah."

"I know where it came from."

"Oh, did you hear the story from my sister? Pretty cute huh?"

Cue darling Chloe weaving her elaborate story about an epic battle between witch and wizard finally solved by the Goddess and the power of love creating a rainbow that only lovers could cross, complete with voices and expressive little pink-gloved hands.

It really was cute. Perhaps true. But Angela once again walked home alone with the absence of that something. The other half of her heart? A pat on the back? A friend? If the sprites had a bit more life in them she might have talked with them excitedly, late into the night. Eager to meet their goddess who haunted her dreams with her ethereal beauty. But they could only wait for her power to be revived, sleeping deep in the earth until it woke them. There was only Angela.

Not that she sulked. She was a natural-born worker who strives for perfection. Sometimes she took it too far.

Jin says: "you must rest when you are tired or you will get very sick."

"I haven't got time to rest."

"What are you rushing for? You have your whole young life ahead of you…"

The doctor had sad eyes some days. Once she'd wanted to fix that. She took Jin to her first ever Firefly Festival and was enchanted by his strong quiet wisdom. The next day when she could wait no longer to see him she stepped upon a tender moment between him and Anissa, Souffle farm's eldest. In a week they were married and Jin's sadness seemed painted over, so she did the same. If he couldn't wait for her to heal him then she wouldn't allow herself to taste that bitterness. She did rest after that, if only to avoid that hospital bed and his too kind words again.

She was a young woman with a thirsty heart, but she needed to take a step back from the hunt. The loneliness was an open-wound but one she could hide for the most part and she definitely didn't want some wolf to swoop in after a taste of it. She had her expectations of romance.

But, a moment of weakness, her second blueberry fizz brought no further meaning to the evening. Her third, however, was pushed across the bare counter by smooth fingers that had clearly not belonged to Hayden but were too masculine to be Cathy's. She looked up from the glass and her eyes met Chase: beautiful, driven, sharp-tongued Chase who could win the cooking contest without battling an eyelash and not even stay to collect his prize. He would smile at you one second and the sky would go rosy the next he'd declare his disinterest and walk away. At least he was honest.

"You look cheery," in other words, using our clever reverse-sarcasm translator: You look like crap.

"Hi Chase." Simple. I wasn't hunting anymore, remember. And I was in a pretty pitiable mood.

"We don't often get the young pretty types drowning their sorrows here." He was still digging.

"Hamilton doesn't look a day over eighteen, and you know it." My joke was not even granted a courtesy laugh.

"Hm, yeah. Astonishing wit aside, what brings you to the soliloquy-corner?" I scanned my side of the bar shortly. He was right; I was well and truly drinking alone and taking audience up with the air. I sighed. When I met his gaze again I was surprised. Not by the slightly raised eyebrow or the small curl in his lip as if to say 'see, I'm always right.' but by his eyes which were brilliantly purple and earnest, wordlessly beseeching me to confide in him. And they were beginning to convince me.

"Okay. Sure." I said out loud. Not really to answer him, not even to myself, but to those eyes that were asking. It was also to buy time to find the words for my soliloquy. However, I'm not very poetic, "I think there's something wrong with me, but I can't decide what it is or what I should do about it or who I should tell. I think all the people on this island are interacting with me on a two-dimensional field and no one will ever see that third secret side of me, therefore the only recognition I can seek is from my goat or from…" I thought better of throwing mention of the Goddess out and making myself appear even crazier to a man I hardly know, "a dream."

"I'm here for a reason. I thought it was to farm, but it turns out to be much greater. Except I can't share it with anyone in case, heaven forbid, they start giving me that exact look you're giving me now every time I pass them on the street." I guess he must have had some humility in him because he managed to shake the expression away. I could understand it; it wasn't just boy troubles, I had unloaded a years-worth of insecurity on him. We shared a rare moment of awkwardness.

"Well" he laughed finally, pulling a rag across the bar-top. "This is sort of beyond my degree. I'm only a cook you know." I released my breath. Had I been hoping for more? From the guy who cares for nothing but food but doesn't even like to taste his own dishes? My mouth went sour, regretful, but as I was about to turn away from him in an act of defiance he spoke again, quieter this time, "just a two-dimensional cook."

I studied him at length, but the window to the earnestness I'd seen in his eyes before had fallen closed with the shutters of a smile. A smile that said nothing only pulled his lips in a strict unassuming curve. That same one that had charmed much of the island's female population but now only appeared empty and dull.

Another week passed with much avoiding of island life. I would cater to the animals, water the crop rows, collect scant material and forage, and spend the rest of the afternoon in solitude. I admit it was getting quite pathetic.

She met Toby fishing from the dock at the lake one day. She joined in but caught nothing and she had little else to do when he moved under Ben's tree and promptly fell asleep. She sat beside him and cast another line; however the fish seemed to be as lost as she was. She wondered briefly as her gaze rested on Toby's gentle breathing whether this counted as human interaction or not. She left before he woke up.

And the story begins again in the same bar: this time over a dish of bouillabaisse that the two-dimensional cook could just barely bring himself to serve me. I couldn't tell exactly what his problem was, whether he was just loathe to serve at all or if I had dearly insulted him last time. Either way, the plate dropped in front of me from his towel-protected hand and he disappeared back into the kitchen without so much as a hello. Why was he serving anyway? Maya was wandering around looking ever the space-cadet and examining the floorboards on the other side of the room. Even Cathy was here on dish duty.

My fork flicked at the food for a minute before I decided to eat. If it was poisoned I might be released from this monotonous misery that I had sunken into so willingly. It was delicious and completely worth dying for, but instead of death came another little surprise hidden inside the neat even slice of my bread roll: a note. I took it between my fingers and felt its warmth. From the kitchen I caught Chase's eye and he gave me no response whatsoever; that in itself was enough for me. A little snort of laughter escaped. It was like high school all over again.

I peeled the paper apart and read carefully:

Meet at the square.

That was all. Like some kind of conspiracy movie in which we were the only ones to survive so long as we kept our wits about us. Meet here, do as I say and you'll stay alive. Didn't that type usually end in some kind of poorly thought out sexual romp? If there was ever a sequel the love interest was sure to have changed. Perhaps I was over thinking this? Maybe that was exactly what he was trying to do. I couldn't read him, I didn't know what to expect, and it was somewhat exciting.

Maybe that's why I went.

It was past just after midnight when he showed. I'd been waiting on the bench for about an hour with nothing better to fill my time. In the moonlight he looked as pretty as a girl except when he approached me his serious demeanor and tall leanness made my heart stumble. I was caught in his shadow.

"Did you like it?" his eyes bore into mine.

I was worried by my own breathiness, "did I like what?"

"My food, of course." He set his knuckles against his slim waist haughtily, as if I was wasting the time he requested of me.

"y-yes!" I chirped rapidly. It had actually been a little bit of happiness in my otherwise dismal week. Each flavor harmonizing perfectly, my dull hunger replaced with sweet satisfaction.

"So what were you hiding for?" He was smirking now. My answer clearly the one he'd wanted. "I've been waiting for you all week long." He took my arm, completely heedless of my feelings and towed me back into town.

I was floundering for words, which was quite unlike me, but I didn't dislike the change. I felt in a trance, and I think he knew. His hand skimmed down the bare flesh of my forearm and then threaded with mine. His eyes were shining playfully, "Don't worry, I don't bite." We were heading for his home.

I was trembling; I was terrified. My heart was pounding like a drum. It happened so fast that I didn't really have the chance to react. I'd been caught by the wolf.

"At first I didn't want anything to do with you." Chase set a steaming cup of tea in front of me. Not some gourmet stuff, just a bag on a string in a mug of hot water; mint it smelled like.

"Thanks very much," For the tea and the consideration.

He ignored my quip, "You seemed as dreamy as the rest of them. But then I realized that you actually meant what you'd said." When he saw that my face remained blank he reminded me, "the dimensional thing. About never seeing the whole picture." His lips curled into a smile that was lopsided and roguish.

"Oh." I blushed remembering the moment; pouring my heart out to strangers in a bar was not something I was planning to make a habit of.

He sat opposite me at the table with a matching mug of tea, "then while you were avoiding me, you were always on my mind."

I was flattered at the same time that he was flattering himself; he wasn't the only one I'd been avoiding. Right? I had to clear my throat before answering in case my voice came out anything other than confident, "I never pictured you as the type to want what he can't have." I gave him a coy smile, trying to regain my foothold on the situation.

His expression remained closed, "Always have been." The unspoken suggestion that there was a lot I didn't know about him failed to escape me.

"But why-"

"I want to find your third secret side." His raw honesty gave me shivers. "Will you let me try, Angela?"

He hardly had to ask, by now I was so far under his spell that he could have demanded it of me and I would have nodded bewilderedly in consent. But instead he offered on one hand his genuine desire to know me and on the other the chance to flee should I want it. He was like a child waiting to be told right from wrong. It won me over; it made the answer very simple.

"Yes."

A/N: that really did happen while I was pursuing Jin. I had no idea how the rival system worked and it was a harsh learning curve, but I suppose its made for some interesting back-story here.

Thanks for reading, I hope I've hooked you in for more.