Gentle readers, I love how that sounds by the way, it is so old fashioned, it is as if this were an literary installment written in the Victorian era, well ahem, I digress. My last chapter certainly created a lot of confusion and it was entirely due to my limitations as a writer. I hate to have to beg your sufferance because of that but in this case I will. Please forgive my novice efforts. This latest installment (heh) should clear everything up.
Rose looked up at Kate with a shocked expression on her face. "What do you mean, if you had known, you wouldn't have come?
Kate's head was hanging down, she was feeling the deep comfort of Rose's comb sliding through her now smooth and shining hair, and it was loosening her normally taciturn tongue. "Rose, if I had really faced this rather large fact" Kate gestured toward her abdomen, "I guess not so large yet," Kate smiled, "I couldn't have ever come. What I did to get here was very dangerous; it was a completely foolish risk to take. I was very careful Rose, to come alone. I have to say, for a while there I really did not think that I would make it. That was my choice to make, it was my life on the line, no one else's. I can live with that. But the risk wasn't mine to take for this child, I'm so dumb and blind and stubborn. I couldn't see beyond the one thought of getting here."
Rose placed her comforting hand on Kate's shoulder. "Well Kate, if you ask me, it is a darn good thing that you didn't know." Rose shifted her weight to face Kate and she tipped the younger woman's chin up with her forefinger and faced her squarely, narrowing her eyes. "Are you not happy for this? I am sorry to be intrusive, but is it not Jack's child? Is that why you are so upset?"
Kate looked up at Rose with tears in her eyes, she shook her head impatiently, when would she ever be done with crying. "Oh Rose, it is Jack's." Kate gave the barest trace of a smile at her memories. "Rose, I have never wanted anything more in my life than to have Jack's child. It's just that I feel so stupid and wrong that here this baby is", Kate tenderly placed her hands upon her stomach, "and I almost killed it by coming here."
Rose began to put away her comb and the homemade tonic and she shook her finger at Kate, chiding her gently but firmly. "You can be pretty unrealistic, do you know that? It seems to me that you always let yourself be the first person that you throw under the train. Step back now, honey. Just look at this as if you weren't the center of this particular story." Rose shook her head and muttered as if to herself, "So much is wrong with this world because of an extraordinary lack of imagination! Now, Kate I want you to imagine for one minute that you were someone else. Would you blame them so much? Would you call them stupid? Or, would you see them for what they were; desperate to save the person that they love. Use your common sense, honey." Rose put her hands on Kate's shoulders. "You didn't know. Kate, you did not know. It is best that you didn't know. You came, you saved Jack's life." Rose took her hands off of Kate's shoulders and placed her right hand very gently over Kate's hands on her stomach. "Now you're here and Jack's here and this child is here." Rose stopped for a moment and nodded her head emphatically. "This child, who I am very excited to meet some day, is here. This, Kate, is a time for rejoicing, not recriminations." Rose smiled down at Kate and gathered her up in a very brisk hug. Kate smiled and returned it with her whole heart.
Jack looked up from his seat by the fire and watched Rose and Kate's approach from the jungle. Dusk was still settling and Jack saw the light of Kate's torch reflecting upon her hair and skin, creating a warm glow that seemed to come from within her. Jack did a double take, Kate seemed to grow more beautiful every time he saw her. The first time he met her in that clearing so long ago, dazed and confused and rubbing her wrists, even in his condition at the time, the first thing he noticed about her was how pretty she was. Jack wondered to himself, did he just see her differently now or was she really so much more than she had been? The Kate that he saw before him tonight across Rose and Bernard's carefully tended fire was almost ethereal in her beauty.
Jack was well enough to be sitting up and he shifted his body to the side, making room upon the log where he sat. He waved his hand toward Kate inviting her to sit. As she settled herself, Jack turned toward Kate and tucked a stray lock of her hair tenderly behind her ear and then let his fingers trace a sensuous line down the curve of her neck. The intimacy of the gesture intensified the heat of the fire for Kate and she looked up and into Jack's darkened eyes.
"You smell nice, Kate." Jack took in a deep breath and ducked his head toward Kate and whispered quietly in her ear, "I've missed you."
Kate felt the warm breath behind Jack's whispered words and it was all she could do to suppress a moan from escaping her throat. She tilted her head towards Jack and leaned into him, she placed her hand over his lingering fingers and gently guided them towards her mouth, barely brushing her lips over them before releasing them from her grasp. She whispered back, "I've missed you too." She looked toward Bernard and Rose and gave her head an imperceptible shake. Jack smiled warmly in response and nodded once in a subtle motion, a secret gesture just for Kate, full of promise.
"Well, I think that it's time for a story before we all turn in." Jack placed his hands on his knees and leaned forward, and looked at Rose and Bernard across the fire and then let his eyes settle back upon Kate.
"What'll it be Jack, Little Red Riding Hood or The Three Little Pigs or maybe that one about Abu Hassam?" Bernard spoke up.
"You always tell that one, Bernard, not again!" Rose couldn't resist teasing her husband; it was one of the abiding temptations of her life.
Bernard looked at Rose and huffed in protest. "Abu Hassam and his Famous, oh well you know it anyway, it's one of the best stories known to man."
"Rose, I was more thinking about a little story about a young woman and a journey, a journey to an island." Jack let his words trail off and he turned pointedly toward Kate.
Kate began to feel everyone's eyes turn in her direction.
She swallowed hard, "That sounds like a good story, Jack, but I think that you would all prefer to hear the one about the Three Billy Goats Gruff, you know the one with the bridge and the Ogre? Listen, we can even act it out, we have just the right amount of people. Jack you be papa, Rose can be mama and Bernard can be Billy, I will take the hit this time and be the ogre." Kate laughed and tried to deflect Jack's curiosity for just a little longer.
"Kate you can hardly be the ogre, you're not old enough or large enough, it'll have to be me." Bernard played along, his soft heart reached out to her, he could tell that she was getting uncomfortable.
"I'm a good actress, Bernard, and it's quite dark." Kate laughed weakly and tried to continue the joke. She turned and looked at Jack's very serious face and realized that it was not going to work. He was not amused, not at all.
"Kate." Kate could hear that familiar rumble in his voice and she knew that he had decided that he must hear her story. His horns were out and he would stubbornly resist all of her attempts to deny him.
"Jack, it's a pretty long story and you're tired." Let's just turn in." Kate made one last desperate effort to avoid his question.
"Kate." Jack's voice carried within it just the hint of a plea, he knew that he could not make her tell him her story but with that one word he could convey to her that he simply needed to know.
Kate looked up at Jack and realized in that moment that she couldn't keep secrets from him any longer, they had to be done with that, they had to move beyond it.
"All right, Jack." Kate leaned back and looked at him, Rose and Bernard , they were all leaning in, intent on hearing every word. She put her weight on the heels of her hands and stretched her body before her, bracing herself for the reactions that she knew her tale would generate. She straightened her back and plunged in.
"This story begins about two weeks ago, when I held in my hands this tiny plane." Kate pulled the plane out of her pocket and showed it to her rapt and somewhat surprised audience. It glistened in the firelight.