I guess that if I had any self-confidence, I'd stop apologizing profusely every single time I post a fanfic, but, well, I don't and I can't, haha. So I apologize for the fact that this has lots of words yet no real plot, and I hope you don't mind either, dear reader. It's better than writing nothing, right?... at least I hope it is! It seems I just have a tendency to write vignettes instead of actual stories when it comes to fanfic, but I have to take inspiration wherever I find it. ;)

(And, not for the first time, my story happens to have a couple themes in common with a far superior fanfic very recently posted by Marianne Greenleaf, but I promise that all this is completely coincidental and that I wrote this before I ever saw hers, and apologize. Again.)

xxx

"You know, Marian, you never did tell me yet why you were so insistent on coming here for a picnic today," Harold Hill asked. True, it was a sunny, perfect day in late May, the kind of day when anybody might long to spend some time outside to enjoy such ideal weather – but his wife's demeanor ever since she had first suggested this outing had indicated that she was most certainly keeping some kind of secret from him about her true intentions. While Marian had promised earlier that she would explain her sudden enthusiasm to him when the time was right, all his attempts to inquire so far had been unsuccessful and had left her rather flustered.

Like right now, for instance – his lovely librarian fidgeted self-consciously on the blanket where they were reclining after their lunch, her eyes not meeting his and darting around the secluded clearing that was several miles outside of River City. A hint of color crept into her alabaster cheeks as she spoke at last, further betraying her uncertainty. "Well, I just loved being here when we came with the Washburns last month, but the whole time we were there, I was thinking –" She shook her head abruptly with a nervous giggle. "It's ridiculous. Oh, it is truly ridiculous. I can't believe I really thought this would be a good idea."

"I won't think it's ridiculous," he protested. "Can't you trust your own dear husband not to judge you?"

She glanced sidelong at him, her eyes narrowing just slightly in suspicion. "Don't laugh at me," she ordered – just as she pulled the hem of her skirt up in order to unlace her boots, an action that baffled Harold so thoroughly that he almost laughed. Of course, he quickly deemed laughing to have been the single worst thing he could have done in that moment, and he swallowed his surprise, setting his features into an expression of what he hoped was earnest sincerity.

"I promise I won't," he said, pressing a hand to his heart – though he realized just after he said it that he didn't know for sure if he could keep that promise. After all, it wasn't as if laughter were a voluntary action. But Harold Hill, legitimate music professor, upstanding citizen and devoted husband, did not break his promises for anything, and this one would be no exception, no matter what he had to do.

As she pulled down her stockings and deposited them primly beside her on the blanket, humor was currently the last thing on his mind, anyway. If her plan involved removing clothing, he could find no motivation to stop her. "Whatever you're doing, I highly approve," he noted, letting his hands explore her smooth, bare ankles and slide up to her calves, and though she rolled her eyes amiably at his completely predictable actions, she made no word of protest. He wouldn't have minded kissing his way up those legs right then, Harold thought, and he was just seconds away from giving in and doing so when Marian deftly slipped out of his embrace and stood up, thwarting his plan.

She took a few barefoot steps in the soft grass, and as she turned on her heel to face him, her lovely face was glowing with unrestrained joy as well as the early afternoon sunlight. He couldn't feel too disappointed about the loss of intimate proximity when he was afforded the chance to see her gaze back at him with that radiant smile of hers (which he was almost certain went unrivalled in all the world for sheer beauty – it was really too bad that she dismissed as flattery all his attempts to inform her thus!)

Harold could tell by the tapping of her feet that Marian was waiting impatiently for him to ask her what she was doing, and he almost wanted to subvert her expectations and throw her a remark that would draw them into one of their delightful little bouts of repartee, but he was honestly too curious to hold off.

"Well, are you going to tell me now?"

Marian nodded slowly, idly clicking her nails together. "As I was saying, I had an idea about this place when we first picnicked here with the Washburns. As isolated as this little nook is, I thought it might be a safe place to take some time off from being a responsible and proper lady," she declared, blushing a little sheepishly despite all of her boldness. "And all I wanted to do when we first came here a few weeks ago was to – remember, you mustn't laugh at me – to wade barefoot in the stream!"

Harold leaned forward on his arms, unable to keep from grinning at this unexpected and charming development. "So, you wanted to go on a picnic with me today simply because you wanted to run around outdoors with your shoes off?"

With a huff, she rolled her eyes. "You're laughing!"

"Not at you, darling. I'm only laughing because I find you utterly adorable." Already his fingers were unlacing his own shoes in a gesture of solidarity. "If I thought you ridiculous, I wouldn't be so eager to jump up and do the exact same thing, now, would I?"

"You would if you were ridiculous, too," she pointed out.

"Well, I think it's always been safe to say that I'm a lot more ridiculous than the sensible, responsible librarian." After hastily tossing his shoes and socks onto the blanket, as well as rolling his trousers up a few inches, the music professor jumped up to join her, relishing the feel of the grass beneath his own feet.

"Oh, all I ever am is responsible!" Marian laughed. "Sometimes I just need to let go and behave like a fool."

"Not a fool," he quickly corrected. "Something a lot lovelier than that." He considered her current stunningly gorgeous appearance – clad in pale pink, her golden tresses catching the sunlight, bare shapely legs and small feet surrounded by green spring grass – and searched for the appropriate fanciful title to ascribe to such a creature. "Maybe a fairy... yes, you'd make a perfect fairy."

Humoring him, she took a few light, twirling little steps, her skirt rippling around her legs. "All right, then, I'll see how it feels to be a fairy. I'd let my hair down if it wouldn't be next to impossible to restore it without a mirror... fairies probably don't wear their hair up," she mused. Pressing a hand to her upper abdomen, she added, "I don't know if it's possible to feel truly fairy-like while one is wearing a corset, either. But I'll try."

This time Marian let herself go even more, whirling around in her best approximation of a pirouette, and she laughed breathlessly as she stumbled sideways into Harold's arms. When she met his gaze again, her uncertainty was gone, her eyes flashing with mischief as she turned around and skipped toward the stream with long, unladylike strides, and it wasn't hard to believe that she might have been some sort of ethereal being. Harold had rather figured that he was well accustomed to every facet of his wife's being by now, but it was truly enchanting to see her so free and unrestrained, so impulsive, eager to embrace whatever life could give her – this, he felt, was the essence of the true Marian, this vivacious, passionate woman who was somehow as different from him as any person could be and yet exactly like him at the same time – and it was he, only he, who got to share in this lovely secret. Harold would have followed Marian anywhere that she led, especially when she did it with such boundless joy, and even the delight that he took from watching her from afar could not keep him from rushing to be by her side once again.

"It's cold!" he heard her gasp as her feet hit the water, and she quickly leapt up to sit on a nearby flat rock, swinging her legs so she could skim the surface of the stream with her toes but not submerge them entirely. "I think it might take me a few moments to adjust to the temperature. You might want to be a bit more careful, darling."

Wondering if perhaps Marian was being a little too delicate, Harold neglected to heed her warning and stepped into the water up to his ankles – within seconds he had scrambled up onto the rock with her, and, though he tried to look nonchalant about the whole thing, his wife still smirked at him.

"You didn't believe me, did you?"

"Not quite," he admitted. "But I believe I paid the price for my error in judgment."

"As you should," she teased – and then pressed her cold foot to the back of his calf, making him jump.

"What's gotten into you today?" he laughed, wriggling out of the path of her merciless pursuit.

"I feel like I've been waiting to do something like this for years! It feels like a weight off my shoulders to be so alone, so free – so far away from anybody who'll be scandalized if I take off my hat, or, well, my shoes. I don't know if there's anything more freeing than telling a woman that, even just for a little while, she doesn't have to be a proper lady."

The professor nodded, a little unsure of how to respond as he certainly did not have the experience to truly identify with what she was feeling. "Well, I can't say that I don't get sick and tired of having to be a gentleman all the time."

"Being a lady is much harder than being a gentleman," Marian countered, much as he'd expected. "When you're a child, people already expect you to be more well-behaved because you're a girl – then one day out of nowhere it's skirts down, hair up, and suddenly every single thing you do from then on must be perfect. And it was only worse for me after the rumors started, for the only form of protest I could make was to be as unremittingly proper in every aspect of my life as I could possibly manage. I'm not saying that I don't appreciate having a society with rules and order and whatnot, but – being a lady can be exhausting!"

Harold, who was now extremely familiar with the passion and vibrancy that infused every aspect of his lovely librarian's personality – but that could be so well hidden beneath a prim exterior – could imagine how she must have struggled. Certainly there were some things about being a gentleman that he found very difficult (although, truth be told, the most agonizing of those restrictions for him had ceased to be a problem just as soon as they'd gotten married!), but, on the whole, nobody was expecting a man to stifle his personality just to be a part of polite society. At most, society asked that a gentleman refrained from certain jokes and remarks while in mixed company, but a man among other men was generally free to express himself as he wished. And, while neither would be considered particularly proper behavior, he knew that there'd be a lot more outrage over a woman wishing to run barefoot in the creek than a man.

"And," she continued, "while being with you has certainly encouraged me to be much bolder about breaking convention from time to time, that does not change the fact that it has been years since I've just been able to run outdoors if I wanted to."

"Far be it for me to stop you," Harold assured her, pulling her close to him and pressing his lips to her cheek. "There is something about this weather that just makes a fellow want to forget all his responsibilities, isn't there? Perhaps adults do themselves a real disservice by declaring themselves too old to play."

"I suspect that you've never felt that way, though," she said slyly, her eyes twinkling with mirth. "I've seen the way you play with my brother, after all – you enjoy battling imaginary pirates and escaping from imaginary labyrinths just as much as he does! Really, Harold, sometimes I'm still not sure that I understand you – how at the same time, you can be my strong, rugged, masculine husband –"

At being described in such a way, Harold couldn't resist delivering a hard love bite to the nape of his wife's neck with a little groan of approval – and though she giggled and gasped, she was able to regain her composure enough to deliver the counterpoint to her previous statement.

"– and yet so very childish!"

Harold shrugged and leaned his chin against her shoulder. "I'd say that I'm an equal advocate for the enjoyment of all pleasant things, whether that should be good music, good lovemaking, good food, or the more childish pleasures of, say, playing catch, running barefoot in shallow water..."

"And that's a good part of the reason why I couldn't help but fall in love with you," she confessed with quiet honesty, her tone suddenly serious. "I think you showed all of the townspeople how it wouldn't hurt to enjoy themselves sometimes, but especially me. I'd forgotten what it felt like to dance, to laugh, to have fun."

"But you, my dear, taught me that life is the most enjoyable when you have people that you really care about," Harold reminded her, unwilling as ever to allow her to give him all the credit for the happiness they'd found together. It was the sort of silly, lighthearted argument that they'd had a hundred times before, yet he could never help but engage in it; he didn't think he'd ever get over his disbelief that such a good-hearted, intelligent, beautiful woman had not only given her heart and her life to him so fully, but actually seemed to believe that he was as good as her or better. As hard as he tried and as much as he wanted to be the man that she believed him to be, Harold doubted that he would ever truly deserve something so precious and wonderful as Marian's love – it was, perhaps, his one true insecurity.

Seeming to know just where his mind was wandering to, the librarian gave him an encouraging smile and squeezed his hand tightly in her own. "There's no need to debate over which of us needed the other more, now. I've said it before, and I'll say it again – I think God must have made us especially for each other, knowing that neither one of us could do half as well on our own."

He'd never quite gotten over feeling a little uncomfortable whenever Marian brought God into their conversation – yet it still astonished him a little how quick he was to agree with her when she said such things. Harold hadn't been much inclined to think about God during his con man days. After all, if there were a God, He and Harold couldn't have been on very friendly terms, neither having ever done much for the other's benefit. But from the very night that Marian had confessed her unconditional love for him, the night when he realized that he'd finally met a woman that he couldn't and wouldn't live without, and, at the very same time, narrowly avoided a cruel and painful torture that could have easily resulted in his death, instead being inexplicably granted the opportunity to stay with his love forever, well, that seemed to him like the kind of miracle that could only have occurred through some sort of divine intervention. Maybe he wasn't half as steadfastly religious as Marian, maybe he couldn't quote the Bible and didn't see much of a point in attending Sunday sermons, but Harold truly believed that his dear little librarian's presence in his life was something God-given – whatever that might mean.

"That must be it, then," he answered truthfully, and he was gratified to see his wife beaming back at him. "How else could two people from such different lives chance to meet under such outrageous circumstances and make each other so happy? I have to think that it must have been God's way of getting the right someone with the right someone."

She nodded in earnest. "Oh, exactly! That's the perfect way to say it." Lowering her feet to the ground at last so she could stand up, only wincing briefly as the cold water rose up around her ankles, Marian tugged her husband's hand to invite him to join her. "Well, I thought you were eager to jump right into the water, weren't you? I think we're good and ready to go wading now."

Harold chuckled, shaking his head in disbelief. It was almost jarring how she'd segued from such intimate confessions to her earlier impetuous mood. "You can certainly change a subject fast, can't you?"

"Well, what we were talking about, before things turned so very serious, were the merits of having fun. And today, I intend to have fun," she informed him, tapping on the end of his nose with her index finger.

The music professor raised a teasing eyebrow at her. "I'm sorry that my opening up my heart to you proved to be such an inconvenience, Madam Librarian! Shall I refrain in the future?"

"Oh, stop," she scolded, tapping his nose again for good measure. "There's nothing more important to me than when we can talk like this, really talk. That's one thing that I've always wanted in a husband that hasn't changed a bit. But I'd like to have a chance to do more than just sit on this rock all day – before I lose my nerve and decide that I'm being ridiculous after all!"

Certainly not wanting her to reach that conclusion, Harold stepped into the stream as well. "All right, your wish is my command. Now, what do you have in mind, my lady?"

Pulling up her skirt gingerly with one hand, she took a few light, skipping steps through the water. "Oh, it's really nothing in particular. It's just... an experience I need to have, I guess." She stopped a few yards away and twisted her feet back and forth until she sank a little deeper into her own footprints. "I think I'd forgotten how sand feels beneath my feet, it's been so long! It's really very nice."

A certain thought occurred to Harold in that moment – it was not the first time that he'd had this thought, but he had never actually voiced it aloud before. "You've never seen the ocean, have you, dear?"

"No, of course not," Marian responded, a little wistful at the thought. "Why do you ask?"

"Well, I just thought that someday, I ought to take you to see it. It's not the kind of thing that any person should miss out on, especially not somebody with as great an appreciation for beauty as you have."

"Wanderlust, Professor?" she inquired, cocking her head with a knowing smile as she walked back toward him. "I should have known you'd be inclined to travel someday."

He supposed that perhaps she wasn't entirely wrong, but he'd certainly never thought of it that way. "Only if I can take you with me, though. It's not the traveling that's the important part – it's being with you that's most important in my life now, and I think that should include showing you new places as long as I have the means and opportunity to do so. And it's not that I desire to travel on anything more than a temporary basis. River City will always be our home, but that doesn't mean that we can't take a second honeymoon someday, or maybe a third, or a fourth – I intend to be married to you forever and ever, you know, so one honeymoon really doesn't do justice to such a marriage!"

She laughed at that, kicking at the water so little waves splashed against his legs. "If you think we'll find the time and money for it, then I won't protest such extravagance!" Then Marian looked right up at him, all teasing gone from her expression as she gazed at him with sincere love and gratitude shining in her eyes. "But I really would love to see the ocean, you know."

Harold knew that he was being more than a little grandiose and melodramatic, but he was suddenly desperate to let her know the extent of what he was willing to do for her, how much he wanted to give her. "I want you to have everything," he blurted gracelessly. "That's all I've ever wanted for you, ever since the moment that I finally realized I loved you. I don't know, I see how happy it makes you just to do this simple thing here today, and I want you to have all of that, to have everything in the world that you'll ever want or need out of life."

"Oh, Harold, I already have everything as long as I have you." Marian appeared on the verge of bursting into tears, and for a moment he feared that he'd gone too far, that he'd once again brought too much seriousness into her lighthearted mood. But in spite of her welling eyes, she glowed tremulously. "I ask you for a picnic and you promise me the ocean – and yet you say that you're no white knight!" she marveled.

"Well, I need to have some redeeming qualities to make up for my lack of modesty, quietness, literary know-how, whatever else you hoped the man you'd love would be like..."

Marian was quick to dismiss his self-effacement with a wave of her hand, her playful mood already returning once again. "I prefer you greatly to my silly imaginary white knight, though. Now that I think about it, he was really a terrible bore."

In enthusiastic agreement, Harold scoffed derisively at the hypothetical man who could never pose him any competition even if he'd had the audacity to actually exist. "I'm sure. I'll bet you never dreamed up a day like this with him, did you?" As proof of how much more exciting he was, he splashed a little water on the librarian's legs, and she jumped back with a little giggle – before stepping right back up to him, standing on her tiptoes, and gazing defiantly into his eyes.

"Oh, I never dreamed up a lot of things before I met you, Professor," she teased. "Certainly no other man but you could ever have made married life nearly as enjoyable as you do..."

Startled but greatly pleased by her unexpectedly provocative reply to such an innocent question, Harold repaid her in the only way he could think of. Sliding his hands down to her backside, he fondled her there with an unabashed squeeze – and though he'd taken this liberty purely in jest, he couldn't help but grin as he reveled in the feel of her warm, familiar curves against his hands.

"Professor Hill!" Marian gasped, leaping back with a breathless giggle and teasingly swatting his hands away.

"I don't think you minded that much," he protested with a wag of his finger.

Her nose crinkled charmingly as a mischievous smile lit her gorgeous features. Hiking her skirt up around her knees, the librarian turned on her heel darted off through the water, tossing a challenging glance back over her shoulder at him. "Maybe if you can catch me, you'll find out!" she called.

And again she was the fairy, the nymph, the goddess that he'd seen her as earlier, ripples and splashes of water radiating out from her footfalls, golden tresses escaping from her chignon to fly out behind her, and Harold almost just wanted to stand still and observe his beautiful librarian in her utter, joyful abandon. But he knew there was a game being played here, and that Marian would be quite disappointed if he didn't join in with her; eventually, she'd stop running if she wasn't being chased. Anyway, she'd made it quite clear several times that what she wanted more than anything today was to kick up her heels and let loose, and no matter how many poetic and saccharine sentiments she brought into his mind, now was not the time to dwell on them. They were going to make today worth remembering.

Marian must have been aware of when he'd started moving, because she increased her pace with a girlish giggle and began to weave from side to side as if to thwart any attempts he might make to grab her. A few times, she looked back to judge how far away he was, both nervous and excited that she would be caught, and her face was charmingly flushed from her exertion. As he pursued her, Harold quickly made up his mind that the instant he caught up to her, he was going to sweep her up in his arms and kiss those pinkened cheeks – where that would lead, he wasn't entirely certain, but they could cross that bridge when they came to it – and he gave up holding back on her, taking longer strides to close the gap between them.

And then, all of a sudden, Harold could see her balance slipping.

As the librarian stumbled back, he seemed to see it play out in half time, and the only thought in his mind was that he needed to do anything he could to stop her from hitting the water. He rushed over as fast as his legs could carry him and caught her in his arms, and he could feel her lean into him gratefully for just a moment before the sudden dull pain of a rock beneath his bare foot sent him reeling, and the two of them fell in opposite directions – Marian on the safety of the shore, Harold sprawled gracelessly in the shallow water.

"Oh my goodness!" Marian cried in anguish, clapping a hand to her mouth. "Oh, Harold, I am so, so sorry."

Although he'd landed fairly hard, the music professor quickly judged that he'd hurt nothing but his pride, but before he could reassure his wife, she darted back into the water and reached out to help him up – although, sweet as her concern was, he couldn't help but notice that her assistance was doing more to drench the hem of her skirt and the cuffs of her blouse than to provide him with any needed help.

"Are you all right?" she asked as she took his hands, her hazel eyes wide with panic.

"I'm absolutely fine. Can't say the same for my clothes, though," he answered. "Damn it," Harold grumbled under his breath as he stood up and felt the weight of the cold water soaking through all his layers of clothing to his skin, and for once his strait-laced wife did not look the least bit affected by his cursing; she looked as though she might have sworn herself, if she could have brought herself to do it. Instead, she simply bit her lip hard and pulled him onto dry land.

As soon as they were out of the water, she hastily pulled off his drenched suit coat and bowtie, although there was nothing that could be done about the rest of his clothes while still remaining reasonably decent. After shaking and wringing out a fair amount of the water – rendering her own clothing even more disheveled in the process – she laid them gingerly next to the picnic blanket, where she sat down beside them.

"Is it all right if I sit down, too?" Harold asked, vaguely amused at the speed and efficiency with which the librarian had taken control of the entire situation.

She gazed up at his still-dripping form, dismay showing clearly on her face, as if she'd just remembered that he was there and that her actions had not actually solved everything. "Of course!" she exclaimed, nearly throwing her arms around him as he joined her on the picnic blanket. Thinking better of it, she instead pulled the relatively dry handkerchief from the breast pocket of his coat and did her best to wipe the water from his face and neck.

"This is my fault, this is all my fault," Marian fretted as she patted down his damp curls, and Harold noted with alarm that her eyes were brimming with tears. He'd become quite accustomed to the librarian's sometimes wildly variable temperament – she was passionate in all her emotions, after all, not just the positive ones – but this seemed extreme even for her.

"Sweetheart, a little water isn't the end of the world. I'll be just fine. I'm just happy that it didn't happen to you – it's a lot harder for a woman's clothes to withstand such a dunk, I suspect!"

She shook her head vehemently, and when she spoke, her words were clipped and edged with bitterness. "But I shouldn't have been anywhere near that stream to begin with, and if I hadn't been, you wouldn't have been either. I guess there are reasons why a proper, responsible lady ought not convince her husband to go running barefoot in the water with her... reasons why a grown adult can't just act like a child whenever she wishes."

An unpleasant coldness sank into Harold's stomach that had nothing to do with the chill of his saturated clothes. Few things were more distressing to him than to see Marian retreat back into that guarded shell of rigid propriety, especially knowing how far she had come from that place, how happy she was to finally be free of it.

Clasping her hands in his own, Harold pleaded with her. "Really, Marian, it hurts me to hear you say that a lot more than it hurts me to end up a little wet. There's nothing that makes me happier than to see you so – so carefree and self-assured. I know how it hurt you to repress that side of yourself in the past, like you talked about earlier, and I don't want you thinking that you have to do that again."

"I wouldn't feel the need to if the implications were only for the two of us in private, but because of my foolish decision, you're going to have to be seen in public like this. I might have gone and ruined both our reputations."

"Nobody's reputation was ever ruined by a little water!" He realized that such a sweeping statement could not actually be proven, but it sounded plausible – and in their particular case, anyway, it would definitely be true. "Little accidents and mistakes are going to happen now and again, darling, especially when we choose to live in the moment and enjoy ourselves, but as long as nobody's hurt, there's no harm done."

The librarian shrugged listlessly. "At the very least, I guess I've ruined this afternoon for you. I suspect that I've gone and made today worth remembering for all the wrong reasons," she sighed.

Harold couldn't help but think her reaction was severely disproportionate – could she really think him so priggish as to regard a little blemish on an otherwise picturesque day as some kind of life-altering catastrophe? It seemed to him like she was confusing him with that terrible bore of a white knight again.

"I've had worse days, darling, and far worse encounters with water," he reminded her with a wry smile. "Did I ever tell you about the time I had to dive in a lake to get a farmer with a shotgun off my tail after he realized that his steam-powered tractor was never going to show up?"

"No," she gasped, grasping his hand tightly in sympathy. "Harold, that sounds just awful! You weren't hurt, were you?"

For a moment Harold regretted that he'd said anything about it, as the last thing he'd wanted was to distress her even further. But he couldn't just dismiss the subject now – it seemed unconscionable to blindly accept such sweet compassion for a misfortune in which he'd unquestionably been the villain. "No, I got away all right – I was well accustomed to running and hiding by any method possible in those days. But it's not like I didn't deserve it –"

"Not to be shot!" she insisted, her voice wavering with her indignation.

He grimaced as he considered that. "Maybe not for that specific crime, but for the sum of all of them, I'd say I had it coming."

"Please don't talk like that, please," she begged, almost hurting him with how hard she was gripping his hand. "I just can't stand to hear it – we both know that you've changed now. There's nothing to be gained from dwelling on things that are over and done with."

"Oh, no, darling, please don't cry." Harold hurried to embrace her, kissing her cheeks and lightly tracing her wedding and engagement rings with his thumb to remind her of the life that they now shared. He chastised himself for being so foolish as to express such sentiments aloud – if it had pained him to hear Marian contemplate the merits of a puritanical ban on enjoyment, how the hell did he think it wouldn't hurt her to hear her husband contemplating the merits of his own murder? "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to go down such an unpleasant avenue as that. I suppose it's easy to say these things about myself, but I always forget how it must sound to you. At the time it was something truly horrifying, that's for sure, but I can almost laugh about it now because it was so long ago – you, of course, are just hearing this now. I don't tell you these things to traumatize you, sweetheart, just to offer you a little perspective on what's really worth getting torn up over!"

Marian let out a breath and loosened her grip on his hand a little, tenderly stroking his palm with her fingers. "You're right, I know. Seeing you fall down into that stream felt like the worst thing in the world in that moment – I don't know, I was so certain that you'd be angry with me, that I'd ruined everything, that I was just waiting for it to happen, even after you'd told me otherwise." She glanced up at him with a hint of a coy smile. "A lot like you still expect me to reject you because of what you were in the past, hm, no matter how many times I tell you that I love you and trust you and forgive you – no questions asked?"

"Point taken," Harold responded softly.

"And... I didn't mean to upset you, either. Harold, with what I said. I've changed now, too, and I don't want to go back to worrying about every little thing that people say. I had a taste of that last month with the fiasco about Mrs. Appleton, and I can't stand living that way. As long as you're not upset, that's all that matters."

"I told you I'm not upset. The way you reacted, one might have thought that your actions had led me to take a tumble off a steep cliff and break both my legs!"

He watched in amusement as her eyes grew enormous at the thought. "That – that didn't ever happen to you, did it?" she asked in restrained horror.

"Not that one, no," he assured her with a laugh, pressing his lips softly to her temple. "Merely a hypothetical predicament... but clearly I need to learn how to shut my mouth, sometimes!"

She instantly smiled in relief. "Oh, thank goodness. So... you truly don't blame me?"

Though he'd been certain that he would have succeeded in reassuring her by now, Marian's continued self-doubt did not surprise him in the least, so Harold did his best to maintain his patience. "Not at all. If it can be blamed on anything, it was the rock that I tripped over, but I can't regret the lovely time we had today leading up to that minor mishap. Promise me you won't let this stop you from behaving just as you might like, if the mood strikes you?"

His wife breathed in deeply and gazed at their verdant surroundings, as if trying to remind herself of why she'd felt so jubilant earlier, and it seemed to be working. "I won't. I don't want to give up that feeling."

"That's fortunate. I wouldn't want this to be the first and last time that I got to witness River City's one and only fairy-librarian..."

Her good humor returning, Marian giggled at the strange image he'd conjured up for her. "The one who keeps the fairy books, I presume? And what are those like?"

"Very small, I'm sure. You read them with a magnifying glass."

"Harold, you are ridiculous," she laughed, shoving against his shoulder so he lost his balance.

Swiftly catching himself on his other arm, Harold pointed a triumphant finger in the air. "Then I've succeeded! You had such fun being 'ridiculous' earlier, you see, so I was trying to recapture the mood."

"An excellent plan." She leaned back on her arm a little, as if trying to prove to him that she had relaxed about the whole thing. Harold could tell that she was still worrying, however, and mere seconds later, she turned toward him in concern again, asking him, "Are you terribly uncomfortable, though?"

The music professor hurriedly searched for a response that would not further discourage his preoccupied wife – he was almost dizzy from trying to follow her changing moods today. "There's not a cloud in the sky, so I'm hoping the sun will do its work in short order," he told her, ignoring the fact that they had deliberately chosen this picnic spot because it was shady and relatively enclosed. The alcove was gloriously dappled with patches of sun shining through leaves, adding to its ethereal loveliness, but it wasn't exactly the kind of sunlight that would dry his clothes quickly.

Marian had clearly seen right through his avoidance of the question, and she frowned sympathetically. "Wet clothes are just awful, though. You shouldn't have to sit around soaked to the skin like that... and though the sun should eventually dry your outer garments, it could take hours for all your clothes to dry." She sighed in resignation. "If we could just get you home, even to the music emporium, you could change them, but I don't see how we could avoid anybody seeing us and raising an awful fuss. I just don't know what we can do other than wait, and wait." Helplessly, she wrung out his brown bowtie a few times, the most effective action she could take in the face of so much water.

On a subconscious level, his wife's lament about the unpleasantness of wet clothes had made him even more acutely aware of the terrible, heavy clamminess of his clothing, and he found it difficult to bear. Fidgeting in discomfort, he unfastened some of the top buttons of his shirt so he could more easily pull the damp material away from his skin. As he did so, Marian's eyebrows raised in startled alarm – although Harold couldn't help but notice, with no small measure of self-satisfaction, that she was unable to hide her frank interest in his revealed chest.

"Don't worry, I'm not planning on making a spectacle of public indecency... not that we're exactly in public, all the way out here. I'm just seeing if I can get a little more comfortable, although doing so while keeping reasonably covered doesn't seem like much of a possibility. If anything, my trousers and drawers are the worst, and there really isn't any way I can get away with taking those off..."

"Unless you intend to take off all your clothes and wrap up in the picnic blanket until you dry," she laughed, a charming blush rapidly coloring her cheeks as she realized how suggestively her innocent remark had come across.

"I'd be careful with making suggestions like that, my dear little librarian," Harold told her with a smirk. "You know I'm never averse to the idea of taking off all my clothes. But, you know, I've got an even better idea – why don't I take off all my clothes and yours, and we can snuggle up in that picnic blanket together..."

It had only been intended as a joke, the inevitable response to that too-easy volley she'd just lobbed his way, but a rush of arousal ran through him as he contemplated that situation, and suddenly all he could think of was having her soft feminine body pressed up close against him, his hands exploring her luscious curves while she sighed and moaned and reciprocated with her own skillful caresses... It was not something that would be too wise to dwell on, given that it would probably be a good while before he could bring those fantasies into reality. They were many miles from home, after all, and the prospect of waiting for his clothes to dry meant that they might not be able to head back to town for hours.

At the very least, he expected to have his unruly lusts tempered a little when Marian inevitably spurned his advances in scandalized mortification, but to his complete shock, she did not instantly rebuff him with a witty and scolding remark. Instead, she seemed outright flustered, her breath catching in her throat a little.

"We couldn't do that, Harold," she told him, her voice faltering a little. "You know we couldn't."

If she had seemed genuinely dismayed by this, Harold would have backed off immediately, but her refusal was halfhearted, disappointed – it was as if she was waiting for him to talk her out of it, and, against all his better judgment, he rather wanted to do so. He certainly knew that he was capable of it, especially because she seemed so little inclined to resist.

She said couldn't, not shouldn't... I can work with 'couldn't', the scheming part of his brain worked out immediately – and then he was instantly disturbed by the fact that he'd even had this thought.

The one thing that he had never wanted to do in their marriage was to coerce her – seduce her, absolutely, but coercion was something entirely different. His caution in this arena meant that, despite his eagerness to introduce his wife to all the wonderful delights of the bedroom, he never did any new thing with her before clarifying several times that it was truly something she desired – which had, on a couple of occasions, actually made her a little irritated with his apparent distrust of her judgment. But it wasn't that he didn't trust Marian's ability to make her own decisions. It was just that ever since he'd been a teenager, he had been perfecting that ignoble masculine art of using his eyes, his voice, his smile to smooth away reluctance, to push aside well-founded apprehensions, to draw out enthusiasm where there was only hesitation... skills that had served him very well over the last several decades and that now made him vaguely ill to contemplate. One of his greatest fears with Marian was that, in a moment of heated passion, he might fall back into that old pattern and convince her to do something that she would regret, and it was something that he tried vigilantly to avoid.

Still, as angry as he was with himself for thinking so callously, Marian couldn't have possibly known what he'd thought, so he first set about correcting what he'd actually said.

"I'm sorry, darling, I didn't mean to say anything to make you uncomfortable –"

But she quickly silenced him with an urgent kiss before placing the tips of her fingers to his lips to prevent him from arguing further. "I'm not uncomfortable. I'm thinking."

"About?" he murmured.

Her brow furrowed a little, and she closed her eyes briefly. "About why I'm not uncomfortable, I suppose. I should be... it would be safer if I were." It seemed as though time might have stopped as her words sank into Harold's mind, and he was caught between feeling thrilled by her adventurous impulses and feeling terribly apprehensive that he still might be at risk of coercing her.

"I wouldn't want you to feel uncomfortable," he assured her, though he was still not sure that she even wanted this sort of assurance. He could see the internal struggle in her eyes, and felt that it might be best for him to remain silent and let her talk, given the circumstances.

"I've thought about this," Marian confessed with a shaky sigh. "I've thought about what it would be like for us to be – together – outdoors." There were few things that excited him more than when she revealed to him the passionate desires that mirrored his own, the fantasies that it seemed her innocent mind shouldn't be capable of, and Harold felt his heart slamming in his chest at her confession.

"You weren't thinking that when we first came here today?" he asked incredulously – while Marian was not averse to seductive schemes, he found it hard to believe that she'd want to be the driving force behind taking their lovemaking out of the confines of four walls for the first time. After all, she'd been embarrassed just to reveal to him her desire to wade in the stream!

"No, heavens no! But I am now. And maybe because I don't feel like being a lady right now, maybe because nothing today has gone according to plan, but I know it would be just wonderful."

"Oh, you don't need to convince me, sweetheart," he murmured, his voice low and ardent. "I've wanted you everywhere and every way since the moment I first saw you."

Her reactions to his bold declaration were unmistakably erotic, her fingers curling at her sides, breath quickening and heat rising visibly behind her cheeks and eyes, and he felt powerless to do anything but to pull her in for a long, delicious kiss – although he was careful not to crush her against him as fiercely as he desired to, lest he render her clothing just as unpleasantly water-logged as his own. Her unreserved willingness shocked him –scared him, in a way, as he had been rather counting on her resistance to prevent him from taking things too far. Not, as they had agreed, that there was any particular reason that they shouldn't or couldn't make love out here, but Harold was aware that to do such a thing completely on a whim, without any plan for the possible complications, would not be the smartest idea. This picnic had already led to a sufficient amount of clothing-related mishaps, after all, even without casting any of their garments aside.

But it seemed like it would be easy, so very easy, to yield to that temptation and transform this pleasant May afternoon into one of pure ecstasy – just a few layers of fabric were preventing them from taking this encounter a lot further, and would it really do so much harm to just take them away? It really couldn't be good for his skin to keep these wet clothes on, anyway.

If he were thinking realistically, though, he had to acknowledge that taking them off would do nothing to improve their messy and wrinkled condition, and, as much as the prospect of an open-air romp with his beautiful wife thrilled him, Harold absolutely refused to take her back into town in a state that would raise the slightest suspicion of such activities. He could think of several things that they could do in order to engage in such a tryst while maintaining their dignity and appearance, but they were equipped for precisely none of these at the moment. Whatever happened, the professor resolved that he simply could not allow this encounter to reach its logical conclusion today, or he'd be breaking his all-important promise to always honor and protect his beloved librarian.

Harold laughed a little as they broke apart, trying to lighten the mood to avert the very real possibility of abandoning reason and giving himself over to that ever-present all-consuming desire for her.

"Well, that's one way to get my clothes dry – to heat me up and steam the water out," he teased, his lips pressed against her neck because he still lacked the willpower to break away entirely. He nearly had to bite his tongue to keep from making a joke about how the continuance of such activities might, for her, result in a much different kind of wetness – that might be crossing one line too far, he suspected, especially as his intent was to de-escalate this situation.

Then he felt her bare leg brush against his and remembered all too vividly that neither one of them was wearing shoes or stockings, and, without thinking about what he was doing, he slipped a hand gently along her calf, causing her to shiver slightly.

"I suppose we should stop," he sighed, while making no move whatsoever to do so – in fact, he slid his hand higher up until he reached the lacy hem of her drawers just above her knee.

"He says, with his hand up my skirt," she retorted in an amused whisper.

"Shall I remove it?"

"No need."

Now her motions were deliberate, tickling and teasing his bare leg with her toes, and he couldn't help but laugh, even as a powerful pang of desire made him shudder slightly. As much as he enjoyed seeing his wife in her innocent, unconscious sensuality, like earlier when she'd been running in the stream, there was such an undeniable allure to her enticing him knowingly. It was incredible to see how far she'd come in only five months as his wife, really. Maybe in a certain sense, she was still quite inexperienced, yet within their first week of marriage he had already made love to her more times than with any other woman he'd ever been with. In terms of making love with him, she was far and away the most experienced woman in the world, a true expert, as was he for her. Harold liked that thought very much.

But he still couldn't read her mind, and he searched frantically for the right, carefully-worded question that could ease his worries.

"Marian, you're not just feeling this way because you want to make up for what happened earlier, are you?"

"Is it so hard to believe that I just want to enjoy being here with you?" she asked with a shy smile, her fingers running gently through the hair on the back of his neck. "I think that as we've been here for nearly two hours and not a single person has interrupted us – I can trust that we truly are alone and may conduct ourselves however we wish. And when we're alone together – oh, not even alone, just together – there's always some part of my mind that's aware of how much I want you."

Harold wasn't sure that he could answer that statement with anything less than a full-on demonstration of his amorous feelings – because of course he felt the exact same way, of course he was driven to distraction several times a day at the thought of the next time he could be with her in bed (or maybe on a sofa or a desk or pressed against a wall or anywhere else she'd allow it), and he'd always wondered if it didn't make him a bit of a cad to be having these thoughts in the middle of the most innocent activities – but knowing that she might be thinking that way as well was too much.

He drew in a deep, ragged breath. There was simply no way that he was going to win this battle against his desires, not now. "Marian..." he started haltingly, but he found himself unable to force out any other words.

But in that moment, his dear little librarian wasn't asking for any; she merely leaned into him, no longer caring in the least that his wet clothes were touching her own, her upturned face flushed with unabashed womanly desire, and breathed the most tantalizing words from her full crimson lips: "Please, Harold, just kiss me."

There was no strength left in him to resist that delectable invitation, and he pulled her flush against his chest and covered her lips with his own, all the concerns of his conscience quickly fleeing his mind as he luxuriated in their renewed embrace. Although moments ago her demeanor had been all surrender, it was difficult to say who was leading and who was following. His passionate wife matched each of his impulses with equal fervor, their tongues and later their hips finding each other at the same moment, all as naturally as if they had planned it.

Then Marian startled him once again when, just as their embrace grew a little more heated, she tugged firmly on the lapels of his shirt, urging him down until they were lying on the blanket together. He broke their kiss and pulled back for a second, needing to see her, but he had barely a moment to take in the pleased expression on her beautiful face before she wrapped her arms around him still more tightly and pulled his body right back to hers, leaving no doubt about what she really wanted.

As the minutes passed slowly in perfect bliss, hands trailing languidly along each other's bodies while their mouths moved together, Harold wanted nothing more than to caress his wife's bare skin instead of merely perceiving her luscious warmth through the fabric of her clothes. Yet despite all the enthusiasm she had shown him, he remained cautious. It was a confusing situation that he'd never really faced before, he thought – while he had, many times during their courtship, successfully resisted the temptation to push a situation further no matter how badly he had wanted to do so, he and Marian were certainly not a courting couple anymore, and there was no need to worry about protecting her virtue or overstepping any boundaries. And, while he was determined that he could not allow them to go too far under these circumstances, that hardly meant that they had to keep things completely chaste. Testing her response, he ran his fingertips along her neckline, and, when she unhesitatingly sighed her approval, Harold gave himself permission to make their canoodling into something just a little bit heavier.

As he undid just a few of the pearlescent buttons on her pink blouse to reveal the very tops of her breasts above her corset, he sternly resolved that he would undress her no further than that – but he didn't stop himself from burying his face in that revealed décolletage, breathing in her glorious soap-and-flowers scent and making her gasp and tremble with his kisses, twist in his arms and press closer...

But no more, he reminded himself. Still, his hand was already resting on her thigh, and if he just slid it a few more inches, not to really do anything, not even to go beneath her drawers, but just to feel if she was aroused as he was, as he thought she must have been – well, that wouldn't be doing any harm.

So he did just that, spurred on by the motions of her own soft hands as they unbuttoned his damp shirt and pressed against his bare chest. Following the line of her leg all the way up, proceeding just a little too slowly so as to entice her exquisite pleading whimpers, Harold cupped her with his palm through her drawers, and found just what he was looking for, wet heat evident even through the layer of fabric – just that small contact was enough to drive her wild for more, and she pressed back against him with her hips and her entire body, breathing his name in his ear, fingers tangled in his hair.

No further than this, the voice in the back of his mind demanded, but it seemed almost a formality at this point, words that he heard but barely understood. He couldn't even remember why he had set this restriction in the first place. Hell, they were married, had been for nearly six months, and Marian had made it very clear that she wanted this, so what was the problem? And he was close, so very close, to being able to touch her in the way that they were both dying for, and one of her hands was already trailing down his stomach as well...

What finally snapped him back to his senses was, ironically, the very thing that should have made him lose his mind entirely – Marian, now desperate for his touch, wrapped her leg eagerly around his hip, and he again took in the sight of that same sweet, bare leg that had intoxicated him so to begin with. The sight of a blade of grass clinging to her smooth white skin suddenly brought his attention to those other uncharacteristic imperfections of her appearance... the hem of her skirt still hanging heavy with water (even if he had pushed it up somewhere around her hips), tendrils of her hair falling every which way out of her intricate hairdo, the slightest hints of grass stains on her feet.. and her state couldn't have been even half as disheveled as his own. The picnic blanket, which he had half-teasingly suggested that they use to keep any amorous activity tidy and discreet, was useless for such purposes after it had been employed to help soak up the water in his drenched clothes – even if he stripped entirely naked, that blanket would do nothing now to keep either of them dry. And, really, had he really been about to caress her so intimately with hands that had been flat on the riverbed not half an hour before?

Disentangling himself from their embrace perhaps a little too abruptly, knowing that anything less than a clean break would send him right back into her arms in an instant, he pulled her skirt back down and smoothed it, his breathing labored. He could feel his pulse pounding in several parts of his body, and he felt that a second dunk in the stream might serve him well right now, but somehow he worked up the will to say, "Marian, darling, I'm sorry. We need to stop."

The librarian stared back at him in stunned disbelief, kiss-swollen lips slightly parted and desire-darkened eyes still blazing with ardor, and Harold pushed back the absurd sense of pride that he felt in knowing that she'd wanted him that badly – it was really not the time to be focused on such things. As glorious as it would have been to engage in such a delight spontaneously, Harold knew a plan that wouldn't work when he encountered one. He hated having to disappoint her when she had been so daringly forward (and he certainly wasn't enthusiastic about having to disappoint himself, either), as that was the kind of confident behavior for which he wanted to show his unequivocal support and approval, lest she fall back into doubting herself. He figured that it would be best to simply explain his reasoning to her as clearly as possible so she would be less likely to interpret it as a rejection. However, he didn't get the chance.

"No, we don't!" Marian exclaimed in frustration, and then shrank back a little, looking shocked at her own outburst. "I mean, not on my account, I hope, here when you just said that I should feel free to flout the rules when the moment strikes. When I said yes, I meant it!"

He'd suspected that he might get such a response, and rushed to reassure her that he was not questioning her decision. "I know you did, but it's not that – I've realized that this isn't quite practical –"

"But isn't that why it's exciting?" she protested, her hands finding their way to his lapels once more.

He gently covered her hands with his own before she could get too far. "Darling, I don't mean it in the way you think. We've already made such a mess of ourselves – by no fault of yours – and I don't think it'd be wise to risk anymore, or to engage in such activities when we're not exactly clean. Or, at least, I'm not. I think our priority right now should be going home and getting washed up."

"So you really don't – want to?" she asked, abashed to the point where she was having a difficult time finding the words to speak. "You said you did." Her eyes fell, almost accusingly, to the conspicuous bulge at the front of his trousers that had been pressed firmly against her mere moments before, and Harold rushed to fold his suit coat in his lap, for the first and only time in their married life not wishing to provide such a flagrant display.

"Of course I want this, Marian," he stated vehemently. "I want to do this so badly that I don't know how I'm managing to sit here talking to you like this instead of making love to you right now, but I know it would be a mistake to go through with it. It's unfortunate enough that we've already ruined our clothes with water, and the last thing we need is to bring grass and dirt into the equation! I'd make love to you anywhere and everywhere, but the one thing that I will not do is make you look indecent. You deserve better than a frantic tumble on the ground like this, sweetheart."

Harold watched her reaction carefully, hoping that he'd been able to convince her without offending her in any way – and then her eyes fell on those same grass stains that had so alarmed him a minute before, her fingers plucked disapprovingly at her sodden skirt hem, and all at once she seemed to understand completely.

"All – all right. Yes, you're right," Marian answered with a blush, scrambling for the stockings that she'd carelessly tossed aside and rolling them back up her legs. "It's lucky for us that you were thinking clearly enough – despite, um, everything – to realize that." Although she was clearly as chagrined as he was that they'd had to cut things so excruciatingly short, he could see affection softening her expression as well. "And if realizing that was enough to make you stop, however little you wanted to do so, then I'd venture to say that you are a certain kind of white knight, indeed."

Harold grinned at this dubious distinction. "A certain kind – so, the kind who isn't above starting such outdoor shenanigans, but who knows when to put a stop to them?"

"That's the only kind I'd want nowadays," she answered, her eyes twinkling. As she refastened the buttons of her shirtwaist, she brushed ineffectually at the darkened spots of water that were still visible there and shook her head, which in turn caused a few more curls to spring loose from their pins. "Going back into town looking as frightful as this will be an adventure in itself!"

"You don't look frightful, though – I look frightful," the music professor laughed, wincing a little as he shrugged back into his damp suit coat.

"At any other time, I'd say you were flattering me, but I'm not sure I can argue with that," his wife told him, a mischievous smile turning the corners of her lovely mouth.

With a hand pressed to his chest in mock affront, Harold shook his head defeatedly. "If a man can't count on his own wife to tell him he looks handsome, who will?"

"He could look in the mirror and tell himself, as he always does," Marian offered, stifling a giggle.

"Why, Madam Librarian, I do no such thing!"

"Please. When you've fixed your hair and your hat and your tie just right, you don't think I notice the way you grin at yourself? Lucky for you, I find it quite endearing."

Donning his straw hat at a rakish angle – fortunately, his hair had remained mostly untouched by the water – Harold gave her that confident grin of which she'd spoken. "Well, how do I look now, darling? Presentable?"

"To the casual observer, I suppose, if the casual observer were not in a terribly observant mood." Before he could protest, Marian leaned up and kissed him lightly on the lips. "Still more handsome than any other man in the world, though."

As secure as he'd always been in his own attractiveness, Harold had to admit that such a compliment from Marian always gave him a rather foolish rush of joy. Even after almost a year of being in love, it still shocked him sometimes how utterly soft and sentimental this woman could make him, how she could instantly reduce him from glib smugness to boyish besottedness; he had no defenses from her, nor did he desire any.

"You're awfully sweet, dear," he replied simply, kissing her cheeks and the tip of her nose, and she sighed with delight, nestling her golden head against his shoulder. Little moments like that could leave him every bit as blissful as if he'd actually had the chance to make love to her – not that he didn't still intend to do just that as soon as it could be arranged. Truth be told, his clothes probably could have used a little more drying off before they risked going back out into public, but there was an unspoken charge between the two of them now that made getting home seem like an urgent necessity.

They passed the next few minutes of preparing to leave in comfortable, contented silence, but after they had folded up the blanket and began making their way back toward the road, Marian turned to him suddenly and spoke. "Well, I suppose since we have the motorcar –" she began, and Harold's mind, still racing through the tantalizing possibilities of how they might spend the rest of their afternoon, immediately interpreted the simple statement in a manner which he was quite sure that she had not intended.

Harold simply couldn't resist sharing a hint of the delicious image that had just come unbidden into his mind, and he shamelessly cut her off in mid-sentence. "Mm, we do have the motorcar, don't we? Now, that could be fun..." He let his voice drop to a low rumble and his fingers wrap possessively around her wrist, leaving no room for doubt about his amorous imaginings.

Now his wife responded with that familiar shocked gasp that he'd been expecting earlier. "Harold, that belongs to the livery! You mean to say that you could just bring that back to Marcellus with a straight face after –"

"Just a little joke, my darling," he rushed to assure her, kissing her fingers gently before meeting her eyes with a devious grin on his face. "Mostly a joke."

"At least we wouldn't have to worry about grass or dirt in the motorcar," Marian mused – and then promptly flushed scarlet when she realized what she had said. Eyes quickly widening in embarrassment, she pressed her fingers to her lips. "I didn't mean – that we should –"

"Oh, I like the way you think, though," he told her, grinning irrepressibly. "I'll have to add that to the list of places I intend to have you."

Marian blinked once, a little startled at his blunt carnality, but she quickly regained her footing, raising her eyebrows at him in flirtatious mischief. "Where else is on that list, Professor?"

"The list is one word, and the word is 'everywhere'," Harold proclaimed, making her blush even more fiercely, much to his satisfaction. "But if you want me to be more specific, I'd say that this lovely little alcove here has just earned itself a high-ranking spot – I think we'll have to plan another picnic very soon, this time where neither one of us ends up swimming." He thought that it might be best to refrain from informing his wife that her library topped this imaginary list and always had... he didn't want to shock her too much in one day!

The librarian broke into a pleased grin at the idea of that proposed outing. "We'll have to plan what to do so that both of us can look perfectly presentable heading back into town, of course."

"Yes – I promise we won't ever raise a hint of suspicion about however wonderful of a time we've had out here. Unlike today," he joked with a gesture toward his clothes, "when we'll be lucky if less than ten people point and laugh at me before we make it home."

"Well, as I was trying to say, because we do have the motorcar – for its intended purpose, mind – we can at least get most of the way home without drawing too much attention to your clothes, as at least we won't have to walk all that far. I'm afraid it won't be the most comfortable trip home for you, however."

"I can get through it, I'm sure. I'll just have to get right out of these wet things as soon as we get home, and I'll be fine in no time." Drawing her close with an arm around her waist, he purred in her ear, "Especially if we continue on with what we've started out here."

Years and years spent scheming meant that Harold could always envision the best possible outcome for every less-than-ideal situation, and he was already planning how he could spin the afternoon to make it far superior to their thwarted outdoor tryst. Maybe a little delay could actually make things even more exciting, he thought optimistically. After all, there was always something immensely satisfying about finally making love to Marian after having been denied the opportunity for any period of time – especially if he could keep her all hot and bothered over it in the meantime. Hardly anything was quite so erotic to him as his usually-sensible Marian driven frantic with sheer, wanton need, and he doubted that it would be all that difficult to push her there, given how much pent-up desire she still carried from their unresolved embrace a few minutes ago.

"You may think that the rest of the day was ruined for us by my little dive, but the day's hardly half over. There's plenty of time for us to redeem it. Neither one of us has anywhere we have to be, and within fifteen minutes, we could be home. We'll have to start with a bath, of course..."

"You mean together?" Marian asked, her hazel eyes dancing as she twirled an unruly lock of his dark hair around her finger.

He raised his eyebrows at her as though he could barely believe that she had to ask that question. "What fun would that be if it weren't?"

"Seems like we can't escape from water today, then," she noted wryly, although she couldn't hide the desire in her gaze.

"Hmm, but hot water's a lot better than cold."

"I can hardly argue with that." Marian shivered slightly as a breeze swept over them, and Harold was unfortunately reminded that it would not, in fact, be helpful to drape his coat over her shoulders. But they were just reaching the car, and he took the opportunity to back her up against it, one last chance to set the scene for their afternoon delight. If nothing else could warm his poor wife who was trapped in those chilly, damp clothes, Harold knew how to make sure that her thoughts would.

He wanted to fix an image in her mind, to make it so she wouldn't possibly be able to think about anything else, to put her through a sort of delicious torment so she'd be more than aching for him by the time they got home. Eager to watch her melt, he gave her the most seductively smoldering look he could manage while he told her exactly what was on his mind in that low voice that he knew she could never resist. "So, a hot bath to begin with, and then anything, positively anything that you can dream of and maybe a thing or two that you can't yet, we'll do it. At home, we have a great deal more options than whatever we could manage out here, anyway. We can take our sweet time – take all of our clothes off, and kiss and touch each other everywhere, make love over and over in every way that we could possibly want, perhaps take a break just for dinner and then do it all again... you'd like that, wouldn't you, my dear little librarian?"

"Yes, I – I would," she breathed, dazed and blushing, and he could tell from the catch in her breathing and the dreamy haze in her eyes that, in her mind, she was already there. He was tempted to delve even deeper into his descriptions, wanted to coax her with words that were strong enough that she'd be able to feel it instead of just picturing, and it was only the practicality of remaining in a reasonably fit state to drive that kept him from doing so – he wasn't sure how much longer he could go on talking like that and still remain in possession of his wits. Harold may have considered himself a master of seduction, but he also knew that it took little more than a look from Marian to seduce him right back.

So, instead, he simply feigned more composure than he felt, so he could remain, for the time being, collected and in control. "I suspected as much. We'd better get going then," he told his wife with a cocky grin, taking her hand and pulling her along beside him through the trees and back toward the road. Already she was trembling a little at his touch – yes, it would be well worth the wait when he could finally take her in his arms after all this buildup.

Harold felt immensely grateful for the speed that the motorcar would afford them in getting home. They had a long, delightful afternoon ahead of them – and he didn't want to waste any time in getting started.