Chapter Three- Love

Over the next few weeks, Once-ler tried to sell his Thneed and each time, he came home with no sales and an even deeper sense of discouragement. He spent hours in the tent, coming up with new sales pitches, more uses for the Thneed but went to bed at night even more stressed. Most days after trying to think of new strategies, he alleviated his anxiety and anger by paying attention to Olivia. He watched her run and play with the barbaloots, climb the Trufulla trees to hang out with the swamy swans by their nests and play poker with the Lorax, always seeming to win.

It was one day while watching Olivia skip rocks in the river that Once-ler made a very disturbing, yet exciting revelation: His attraction to Olivia was moving beyond platonic more and more each day. It was getting harder to keep himself distant from her; her presence drew him from the craziness of the Thneed and back to the real word of the forest and his surroundings. As the Hummingfish praised Olivia for a particular long series of skips, he lowered the flap on the window of his tent and went back to the drawing board for the Thneed, ignoring the inner protest of taking his eyes off her.

One particular morning, as the sky turned gray with rain, Olivia came to the tent dressed in a raincoat wearing a purple dress and bright red rain boots.

"Mind if I ride the storm out in here?" She asked. Once-ler smiled and let her in. As the rain fell outside, Olivia and Once-ler shared some pancakes with a pot of coffee at his table.

"So who do you live with in town?" Once-ler asked, pouring syrup over his pancakes.

"My aunt Hattie." He heard an undertone of bitterness in Olivia's voice.

"You two get along?" He asked casually.

"Not really." Olivia said. "You can tell I disappoint her. " Her statement was oddly matter of fact, as if they were just talking about the news.

"Why do you disappoint her?"

"Because when other girls were going shopping, going to the movies on the weekends and wearing makeup, I was playing in the dirt with the animals and singing nonsensical songs to them." Olivia scoffed. "She also didn't really want me after my parents died. She was recovering from a bitter divorce, and I was just added burden to her situation." Her eyes turned dark as she studied her coffee, swirling the contents around in the mug quietly. Once-ler could tell he hit a nerve with her; he cleared his throat.

"You know, she and my mom should talk." He teased lightly. "My mom considers me the weird child out of my brothers and I." Once-ler swallowed, and looked down at his pancakes, stuffing his mouth full. He couldn't believe he brought up his mother and brothers of all people. Olivia reached over for the syrup as Once-ler reached to hand it to her. Their fingers brushed and they each pulled back quickly, shocked by the quick contact. Once-ler's fingers burned where she touched him. He fought to keep a straight face as they ate the rest of their meal in silence. When the rain finally passed, Olivia awkwardly thanked him and quickly left without another word.

As the days passed, Olivia watched as the Once-ler paced in his tent, throwing papers and objects and looking utterly exhausted. He didn't know it, but on the days when she stayed in town, she watched him in the town square singing about his Thneed. Her heart ached every time she watched him go back to the forest with nothing sold.

She didn't bring up those days when she went to visit him; mostly, they kept the subjects they talked about very superficial and safe. It wasn't very often, but sometimes, they would walk for hours through the groves of trees. They ate Trufulla fruit, spent time with the animals and just talked. Weeks passed, and Olivia found herself going home at night and sitting at the window, wishing for the sun to rise faster so she could get back to the forest…and to Once-ler. She smiled, laying her head on the windowsill. She was starting to really fall for him, and she couldn't even stop herself.

One morning, she was strumming her guitar by his window again, muttering some new lyrics.

"That song new?" Once-ler came out of the tent.

"Yeah." Olivia wrote on her pad again. Some pages fell out of the book to the ground.

"Why don't you get a new pad?" Once-ler asked, picking up some of the pages. The way she wrote songs was certainly unique: she wrote her songs from the top corner of the page down, with lines and arrows pointing every direction. How in the world, he thought, does she read this?

"Eh…I don't know, I'm just attached to this one, I guess." She wrote furiously, stopping briefly to look up at him.

"Hmm." Once-ler handed back the pages and Olivia walked off to her usual rock to sit down and sort them. After a couple of seconds, he went back into the tent and started to look through his drawers. He knew he had one somewhere…

As Olivia was preparing to sing to the animals, Once-ler came and sat, holding a baby barbaloot in his lap. Lorax smiled.

"Beanpole! You finally decided to join us!" Once-ler smiled, and looked at Olivia, who was smiling knowingly back at him. She started to play. He enjoyed watching the animals sing along with her songs and the Lorax doing his usual conducting with his long furry finger. Before anyone knew it, the day was over and the animals each retreated to their resting places, quietly humming and singing Olivia's songs.

Olivia slung her guitar around her body and started back toward the fence to town. Now was his chance.

"Olivia!" Once-ler called, jogging over to her. "I found something in my tent that you might like." He was holding a notebook in his hands. It was small and sturdy, with a deep olive green colored cover and a heavy spiral to keep it all together.

"Once-ler…" She looked speechless. "You didn't have to do this."

"I know, but…" he smiled sheepishly. "you need it more than me." She looked up at him, and without warning, stood up on her toes and kissed his cheek gently.

"Thank you." She whispered in his ear. She turned and walked away with the notebook clutched to her chest, grinning as much as her face could handle. Once-ler turned and went back toward the tent, hiding his own smile.

He lay in bed, looking toward the dark ceiling. Immediately, as if on cue, thoughts of Olivia started to fill his mind and senses. He could smell her hair, feel the softness of her skin, and hear her gentle voice. His mind pulled a song of hers to the forefront and he started to hum it, thinking about what she would look like if she was in his tent singing to him.

He sighed deeply, falling into a restful sleep. He couldn't deny it anymore. He was falling completely and madly in love with Olivia.

NOTE: New chapter, yay! Also, I would like to reply to bellechat:

Originally, Olivia was going to be living in the forest all of the time; I designed her first conversation with Once-ler to lean that direction. But after some thought, I decided her living in Greenville would give her character more depth and give me more material to work with. I figured their talk was opened-ended enough that I could change it around.

Anyways, thanks for any reviews!

GW