A/N: BABE! R & S Happily ever after!
In Sizzling Sixteen, Stephanie muses abut Ranger's other women. He must have some, right? The man has a life? So this was a response to a writing group challenge to write about Ranger's "Other Women". The Ranger here is my Mercenary Ranger, see my other fics if you're confused or need to know more.
I am posting it as a one-shot but there are other vignettes in my series [always R & S HEA), so ...? And it appears tonight because the next book is coming out soon, will Ranger move on? Or?
And because even tho it isn't the Fourth of July, today was a perfect summer holiday day at the beach. Enjoy!
Standard fanfic disclaimers apply; including to thanks to The Boss (Springsteen) for publishing his lyrics online.
This is for us, T! enjoy
This story references Madame Marie who is in a song by Bruce Springsteen, Fourth of July Asbury Park (Sandy)...Complete lyrics are at the end of the story.
"...you can see 'em dressed like stars in all the cheap little seashore bars
Well the cops finally busted Madame Marie for tellin' fortunes better than they do
This boardwalk life for me is through
You know you ought to quit this scene too
Sandy the aurora is risin' behind us
The pier lights our carnival life forever
Love me tonight for I may never see you again..."
Fourth of July, Asbury Park
.
.
Other Women: Marie
.
[Marie pov]
Hot Saturday night, the seaside boardwalk in Perth Amboy, New Jersey. I am sitting in my booth reading fortunes for drunk tourists and starry-eyes teenagers. Here on the boardwalk I am known as Madame Marie, the gypsy woman.
There's a bit of a stir on the main drag, and a man walks into the arcade. He is excruciatingly handsome, dressed in black combats and an old grey t-shirt that says ARMY. His hair is cut very short but he still wears large diamond ear studs. His weapons are invisible but I know they are somewhere on his beautiful body. His eyes are shadowed, his aura is - extreme.
Figuratively and literally. Both. All.
Ranger. From thirty feet away, we lock eyes, and the bustle of the crowd fades to nothing around us.
Okay I'm a psychic but it doesn't take ESP to know the boy is finally in love.
I remember meeting this man, all those years ago. He had a different name then, but I'd never tell. He was with a bunch of other young soldiers, having a night out before deployment.
He was so beautiful, well, he still is - though he's now even bigger and tougher and colder. Our eyes met then too through the drawn-aside beaded curtains of my fortune telling booth. The others jostled him aside and one by one I took their ten dollars and promised them they'd be rich and live forever.
He was last. He dropped a ten dollar bill in front of my crystal ball and said, "I'll catch up with you guys later." We were left alone.
I didn't take his hand. The silence dragged out, then I asked, "You can see?"
"Sometimes."
"But precognition is not your main talent..."
"No."
I waited.
"But I know they won't all be rich or live forever," he added.
I shrugged. "Should I give you a reading?"
"No. But..." His eyes enjoyed my body, lingered on my low-cut gypsy blouse. "After your shift, can I buy you a beer?"
I gently shoved the ten dollar bill back across the table. He picked it up and stuffed it in his pocket. "Sure, soldier."
... ... ...
Later...
His almost black eyes swept over me. It was midnight and the boardwalk was black and silent except for the seabirds still calling overhead. He said, "You look different."
I had changed into shorts and a tank top, sandals. I shrugged. "I'm not always a gypsy fortune teller."
"No? What, then"
A college grad student, a single mother, a cocktail waitress, whoever I had to be for myself and my daughter to survive. "A woman." I trailed a hand down his shoulder, brushed across his rock hard abs, rested on his belt buckle.
He said, "Under the boardwalk?" Faint skepticism in his voice.
"Oh please, that's an urban myth. Come to my booth, there's a lovely sofa...and no sand."
At dawn he rolled away from me and silently dressed in his oddly unmarked military uniform. I sat and watched him, winding my long curly black hair into a knot to cool my sweaty throat. He said quietly, "I know I'm one of the ones who will come back, Marie."
"I'll be here-" I said, using the name he gave me in a secret whisper. I'm a psychic, secrets and lies have little meaning in my world.
I smiled at him then and again many times over the years since, when he appeared in my booth on hot summer nights. And I smiled at him now. I didn't need ESP to know he'd come tonight to say farewell. His loyalty now was the sole property of the woman he loved. She owned him, heart and soul.
He didn't ask if we could stay friends. Of course we could. Would.
The man called Ranger gave me a faint smile, an even fainter nod, and turned away. In seconds the crowd swallowed him up, as if he had never been. As if, perhaps, he was never real.
Be careful. I love you.
I refuse to cry. I think, Maybe he'll be back? Someday?
the end
Fourth of July: Asbury Park (Sandy) by Bruce Springsteen
Sandy the fireworks are hailin' over Little Eden tonight
Forcin' a light into all those stoned-out faces left stranded on this Fourth of July
Down in town the circuit's full with switchblade lovers so fast so shiny so sharp
And the wizards play down on Pinball Way on the boardwalk way past dark
And the boys from the casino dance with their shirts open like Latin lovers along the shore
Chasin' all them silly New York girls
Sandy the aurora is risin' behind us
The pier lights our carnival life forever
Love me tonight for I may never see you again
Hey Sandy girl
Now the greasers they tramp the streets or get busted for trying to sleep on the beach all night
Them boys in their spiked high heels ah Sandy their skins are so white
And me I just got tired of hangin' in them dusty arcades bangin' them pleasure machines
Chasin' the factory girls underneath the boardwalk where they promise to unsnap their jeans
And you know that tilt-a-whirl down on the south beach drag
I got on it last night and my shirt got caught
And that Joey kept me spinnin' I didn't think I'd ever get off
Oh Sandy the aurora is risin' behind us
The pier lights our carnival life on the water
Runnin' down the beach at night with my boss's daughter
Well he ain't my boss no more Sandy
Sandy, the angels have lost our desire for us
I spoke to 'em just last night and they said they won't set themselves on fire for us anymore
Every summer when the weather gets hot they ride that road down from heaven on their Harleys they come and they go
And you can see 'em dressed like stars in all the cheap little seashore bars parked making love with their babies out on the Kokomo
Well the cops finally busted Madame Marie for tellin' fortunes better than they do
This boardwalk life for me is through
You know you ought to quit this scene too
Sandy the aurora's rising behind us, the pier lights our carnival life forever
Oh love me tonight and I promise I'll love you forever
Copyright © 1973 Bruce Springsteen (ASCAP)