Okay, I have the next updates for this waiting to be beta'd, people.

Also, I fixed some things in this chapter I totally spaced about fixing.

So, enjoy.

"Jim!" the bellow echoed across the house and jolted its intended awake, sending him flying off the bed. He landed with the dull smack of skin meeting wood flooring, followed shortly by a long, low groan. "JAMES!" This bellow sent him skidding across the floor and into the dresser, bringing the cluttered top down upon him.

"I'm UP!" he yelled back, pushing the mess of candles and keep-sake boxes off his prone form. He groaned again and dropped his head against the floor with a hard thump, hissing in pain. "And she actually wonders why I don't ever want to "hang" with her." He sat up and more knick knacks fell off of his chest, clattering to the floor.

Unsteadily he stood and looked around the room. It wasn't his, even though he'd been staying there for nearly a month now and it still didn't feel anything like familiar. Georgia was entirely different from anything he was used to. His aunts weren't like anything he was used to either, and he seriously doubted the sincerity of their relations. He was now considering them to be more of the "family" you say is related only because they won't leave you alone, but actually aren't related to at all. The thing that 'connected' them was the fact that, like his mother, they were witches, and he happened to be 'blessed' with magick, too; although he would rather put that all to chance than actually believe he was related to these psychos.

"I can hear you," Diana said from the doorway, giving him a dubious once over. She had steely grey hair and was the more severe of the two Wright sisters. She often expressed her distaste for him, and he replied in kind; the feeling was most definitely mutual. "Frankie was calling. She needs your help lifting the piano."

"What?" Jim balked, turning to send Diana an 'as if' expression. He brushed past her into the hallway, not bothering to dress. He had slept in his clothes the night before. "She cleaning behind that thing iagain/i? We did that two weeks ago! Could've sworn I won the 'There's No Such Thing as Dust Faeries' argument." He pounded down the stairs, two at a time, and burst into the kitchen, intent on feeding himself before moving any pianos.

"You are a selfish curd of a human being," Diana casually remarked as she followed him. She got to the cereal first, their eyes meeting in a tense staring contest before she conceded, handing him the box of Cocoa Puffs. Or rather, held it out and dropped it before he had fully reached across to grab it, making him fumble to catch it before it plummeted earthward. "Your mother should be ashamed, twenty years old and eating Cocoa Puffs?"

"It's too fucking early for this, Dee," he scowled as he poured the cereal into a bowl. "It's a Saturday. You know, normal people sleep in on these days and—you know—relax." He turned on his heel and marched over to the refrigerator, yanking it violently open.

"Thank the Mother we aren't normal," Diana said with distaste. She sighed, as if greatly burdened, and turned to leave. "Oh, by the way? We're out of milk." With that, she left the kitchen, and Jim wished it was her leaving his life instead as he slammed the fridge shut. Damn that woman. He stepped back from the fridge. There were two things he could do right now: A) go help Aunt Frankie move the piano again or B) escape into the woods and hope to be eaten by a rabid animal and never have to return to this place ever again.

Jim would take his odds with plan B. As quietly as he could, he grabbed provisions (a granola bar and canteen of water), then left out the back door. As soon as he was out of the gardens he broke out into a run. He heard Frankie bellow his name, the sound loud enough to make the tall grass around him flutter. He laughed aloud, grinning wide. He was free! At least for today, until he had to return to the house that night to sleep. But that was hours away, and not worth worrying about this soon.

The bright Georgia sun chased his heels until he reached the cool shade of the pine forest that surrounded his aunt's house. Georgia was different in other ways than just having his freaky aunts living in it. Iowa had never been like this, never been so full of life and green. It was way different here. Here there were pockets. Pockets that held thousands of secrets from a bubbling brook to the small burrow of a fox. Iowa had been open endless fields of yellow-brown. In Iowa, there was too much space. Too much space for Jim's thoughts to wander without boundaries, never encountering resistance and going on end forever. There his thoughts found dark new places because there was nothing to hold them back.

Here, though, in Georgia, it was different. Jim liked this different. His father would have called it a "diversion tactic" and, yeah, he wasn't afraid to admit that it was. Didn't mean he couldn't like it. He was sick of the dark places. Right now, he wasn't sure where he was going. His feet carried him past the breach of trees and deep into the cool of the forest. It was still hot, but less so, and yet the humidity still found its way. It seeped in under his shirt until sweat was pooling in every crevice of his body, and Jim relished the feeling of the cool wind blowing across his over sensitized skin. Today he was going to let fate guide him; see where he got carried when he stopped trying to control it.

Fate almost got him hit by a car. He jumped over a low cluster of bushes and straight into a dirt road. Red dust billowed up from under his feet and he looked up suddenly, straight into the shocked face of the man behind the wheel of the old Ford bearing down on him. The truck's horn screamed through the quiet forest, and the tires crunched against the dirt, kicking it upwards as they spun around and away from Jim. Through all this all Jim could do was stare, dumbfounded, like a fucking deer in head lights. The truck skidded to a halt barely a foot away, the passenger door nearly smacking into his side.

All at once, Jim's senses came back full force. The massive dog in the back of the truck was barking its head off at Jim and there was the echoing slam of a car door. Jim stepped back, wary of the dog, and looked over the hood of the truck at the man who was coming around it. The very, very angry man coming around the truck who was definitely big enough to righteously kick Jim's ass.

"Look, man, I am so fucking sorry," he said hastily, looking up and straight into intense green eyes. Something struck a chord in him, like a sledgehammer, and he stumbled even though he wasn't even walking. The man's arms shot out to steady him and suddenly there were hands on his face and those green eyes were looking into his own searchingly.

"You're not high or drunk," was the gruff assessment as the hands roughly let go of him. Jim wasn't sure how he didn't continue stumbling, his soul resonating deep inside him. "So what the fuck are you doing jumping in front of moving vehicles like you are?" The look he was getting was all suspicious and mistrusting.

"No," he said, holding up a hand, even though this was the wrong response entirely. He couldn't get over the feeling he was getting. "What's your name?" He leaned closer, trying to get a better look at the man's eyes. Regrettably, the man leant away, so Jim settled for looking at the rest of the man. And what a rest it was.

"I'm Doctor McCoy," McCoy answered. He was beginning to look like reconsidering the earlier assessment that Jim wasn't pumped with some sort of drug. "The town physician." His tone seemed to suggest that Jim was supposed to already know all this. "Who the hell are you?"

Jim held out his hand. "Kirk, Jim Kirk," he announced, delighted when McCoy took his hand. Their touch sent a jolt through him which McCoy undoubtedly felt as well, if the wide-eyed gaping look was anything to go by. "The Wright sisters are my aunts. I just came down to stay here about a month ago."

Recognition settled into McCoy's face but he didn't look up from his hand, which he had begun to critically look over. "You're the one that beat the shit outta Douglas and his gang," he mumbled. "Shoulda known you'd be with them crazed sisters." Finally those green eyes darted back up and met with his. Jim's soul did a funny little jig inside him again.

"Yeah, that was me," Jim admitted with a careless shrug. He looked back at McCoy's truck and then back to the man himself. "Were you headed somepla---"

"Oh shit!" McCoy cursed, darting back around the truck. "I gotta go, kid." He hopped back into the old Ford and leaned across the seats to look out the passenger window at Jim. "I'll see ya around town and we'll get to talkin' about those aunts of yers, okay?" Without confirmation or warning, the doctor peeled off down the dirt path, leaving Jim behind in a storm of red dirt.

He coughed and waved a hand through the air. 'Oh, great,' he thought, as he looked down at himself; he was now covered in red dust. "Well," he sighed aloud, looking up at the canopy of leaves above. "At least it gives me a reason to shower today."

*

Jim didn't return to the house until around sunset. He had taken a shower in the old cabin just on the edge of the Wright property. It wasn't good for much else, and Jim often made good use of it. It wasn't fit for sleeping, unfortunately, as it had a rather unruly ghost who would flip the mattress on you at night. Jim had found that out the hard way.

"Something happened to you," was breathed in his ear as he was yanked through the door. He gasped and jumped away. Before him stood the smug visage of his "cousin" Nyota. Funny thing about Nyota was that she was the adopted daughter of Diana, had the same no-nonsense attitude but, was made even worse by the fact she was half her mother's age and gorgeous. Jim thought Nyota was a million times better in comparison to Diana, even though Nyota pretended she hated him. "I can sense it."

He gave her a suspicious look before turning around to send one around the dark house. "Where are the sinister sisters?" he asked. "I won't say anything if they're around." Nyota looked exasperated and rolled her eyes.

"They're out to dinner or something, I'm not sure," she said suddenly turning to head into the kitchen. "But you better tell me what happened or I'll turn you impotent."

"You would never," Jim said as if completely aghast and jumped up to sit on the kitchen counter. Nyota gave him a look that said 'try me' before sitting on the island opposite him. "Alright, alright, she-devil junior. I…" he licked his lips, trying to search for the right words, "almost got run over by this doctor."

"Doctor McCoy," Nyota said, impatiently nodding her head. "I know ithat/i, but what happened when you did?"

He frowned, annoyed with her know-it-all act. "I don't know," he snapped, leaning back against the cabinets. "We…connected or something. It was weird."

Her eyes lit up and she leaned forward, hands braced on either side of her hips. "Yeah?" she asked, a little breathless. "What did it feel like?"

Jim bit his lip as he considered his answer. He was compelled to lie to her, to give her an unsatisfying answer just to teach her for meddling, but she'd never buy it. However, he was still a little raw from the entire ordeal and talking about it honestly with Nyota was like putting sand in the wound. "It was," he began slowly. "Like he hit my soul with his truck. I think…" he sighed quietly, figuring he might as well go all the way with his honesty, "I think he felt it, too."

Nyota squirmed in delight, hopping off the counter and crossing the distance between them quickly. "Is he like what you wished for?" she asked hopefully as she took his hands in hers.

He sat up straighter. "What do you mean?" She was going into unwanted territory now and Jim tried to back track. Nyota looked annoyed as she squeezed his hands tight.

"You know damn well what I mean, James," she said conspiratorially. "I did it with my mum, too. I know it's a tradition in our family and your mum had to have done it with you. Is he what you wished for?"

Honestly, Jim wasn't sure. That had been so long ago and the time with his mother then had been so brief. He remembered writing it down on a photo, what he'd wished for, but didn't know what had happened to that list. "I don't remember it, entirely," he admitted carefully, not meeting her eyes. "But he did have green eyes like I asked. Except, I don't remember asking for a man." Jim scowled. Yeah, that had definitely not been in the criteria, that he could be sure of. "Maybe he's just destined to be my best friend or something," he surmised. "I mean, how do we even really know?"

Nyota shook Jim's hands, gripping them tight in her own. "iWe just know/i," she insisted. Jim still wasn't so sure. She gave up on further trying to convince him though, and whirled away with a wave of black hair. Jim scowled and pretended that her disappointment didn't burn inside him.

*

Sunday saw Jim rising late in the day and heading straight for the town. Whether or not the aunts had arrived home last night he knew not. When he'd gotten up, the house had been shockingly empty. Not even Nyota or the cats were around. So Jim had just grabbed and an apple and left. He had other things on his mind than the whims of the Wright women.

"Town," as everyone called it, barely lived up to its title. It technically wasn't a town at all; just the strip of necessary shops along a paved road with one traffic light. On this street was the school, the drugstore, the grocer, the hardware store, and the diner. All necessities of country-living. Jim bitched about the microscopic proportions of the place, but secretly loved it. Sundays were the best days to be in town because it was deserted. All the residents were elsewhere, sitting in neat rows on wooden pews and singing hymns. All that meant to Jim was that they were anywhere but where they could bother him, and that was just the way he liked it.

Since arriving here, Jim had acquired, through the means of odd jobs, a small dirt bike. It was what took him between the town and his house or anywhere out of the reasonable limits of walking. The old Honda was reliable, if a bit on the wear and tear side, and he loved it. Apparently it had been blessed once to boot, so it came as something of a shock when he nearly crashed into a parked truck after entering town. For some reason, the brakes didn't work the first, second or third time he'd pulled on them. When they finally did work, he was already using his legs to drag himself to a stop. If they hadn't, he'd have become an unsightly dent in the side of the blue Ford.

The side of the very familiar blue Ford. Jim groaned and got off his bike. He couldn't believe his luck, just when he was starting to think---

"Jim Kirk," was the gruff assessment from the diner's steps. Jim turned and looked up into the scowl of one Dr. McCoy with a sigh.

"Yeah," he huffed, shuffling his bike backwards and kicking down the stand. "Not been my best two days." That earned him a snort, at least, and it was good to know the country doctor was capable of an emotion besides annoyed and more annoyed. "I guess we're meeting in town a little earlier than either of us expected."

McCoy shrugged and took a sip from his mug. "Eh," he answered and Jim interpreted that as 'let bygones be bygones.' "That's fate for ya." The man considered Jim for a second before waving him to follow. "I'll buy you some hash and grits if you keep your mouth shut long enough for me to talk to you."

Jim figured that was a fair enough trade and hurried up the steps, following the doctor. The diner wasn't anything more than what it implied. It had no name beyond 'the diner' (with no capitalization needed here, sir, don't chya worry one bit about it) and its interior reflected many years in this dubious business. Each booth told its own story, and Jim was pretty sure the one McCoy chose had bullet holes in the cushions. Whatever McCoy had to say didn't seem immediately important so Jim turned away from the holes to pour himself some coffee.

"So, kid—"

"Jim," he automatically corrected.

McCoy had the nerve to look annoyed before acquiescing. "iJim/i," he restated, "What brings you here to stay with your aunts?"

A multitude of rude, immature, and downright nasty responses crowded in line, each eager for Jim to pick one. But he didn't. He pursed his lips and considered the dark depths of his coffee. In actuality, he wasn't making the decision not to use the inappropriate responses. No, something was literally holding him back and sealing his lips from doing anything resembling ilying/i to McCoy. It was both infuriating and intriguing all at once. So, naturally, Jim hated it.

"I," he began; then stopped, and began again. "I don't have anywhere else to go." Was the best he could manage without turning himself into the sob story he never wanted to be. "The Wrights are my mother's sisters, so here I am." He made a weak expansive gesture with his hand.

McCoy was doing that 'consider yourself considered' look again, which made his eyebrow dart upward and turn at an angle that did funny things to Jim's gut. He shifted nervously in his seat under the scrutiny. The doctor looked ready to say something, but then the diner's only waitress decided this was her prime opportunity to come ask their orders. Jim loved—he glanced hastily at her nametag—Janice immediately. Whatever McCoy had been prepared to say was lost with their orders as the blonde woman shimmied off. Awkward silence descended over their booth like a rain cloud.

Jim fidgeted as he always did when he was nervous. McCoy just stared sullenly into his coffee. It took Jim a moment before he realized the other man was brooding about something. "What's the matter with you?" he asked bluntly, without thinking.

"Excuse me?" McCoy responded, looking a little put upon. "I'm not sure I know you that well."

"I'm from Iowa, my middle name is Tiberius," Jim said, ticking the things off on his fingers. "My favorite colour is gold, I hate the smell of lilac and I'm actually here because I'm too chicken-shit to actually run away for real." Jim clamped his mouth down immediately after the last one, not having intended on going that far. He hoped it wasn't obvious, but he sure felt more than just obvious around McCoy─he felt goddamned exposed. "That good enough for us no longer being strangers?" he asked, trying to recover.

McCoy, on the other hand, looked completely shocked by all this. If he noticed Jim's regret he didn't show it. Instead he just fidgeted a little nervously himself, cleared his throat and then sat up straighter. "It's my daughter," he explained seriously. "And my divorce, and my ex-wife." He shut his mouth and glared out the window. Jim thought that was all he was going to say, something completely inadequate to make up for his slip up, but McCoy continued. "The ex is using my daughter against me," he snorted, but the sound was anything but amused. "And there's nothing I can do about it." Hazel-green looked up into Jim's sky-blue and the energy between them shifted. It crackled between them and suddenly the sugar and cream cups were spilling over and their coffee began to boil. Their gazes broke and the pandemonium settled, both looking down at the mess with surprised expressions.

"I should go," McCoy said hurriedly, and climbed out of the booth as if burned. He dug his wallet out of his back pocket and threw money down onto the table. "Here, this should cover it—No, I insist, really, okay? Now, I gotta go. I'll see you around, Jim." With that and not a glance back, McCoy was out the door. Jim turned and watched through the window as he got into the Ford truck and all but peeled out.