Previously on "If you like Pina Coladas…"
This story will not be continued as one recent reviewer told me to "shove it up my..." and I know you can probably guess the rest. I personally feel that a comment such as this is unexceptable and since this story is not a priority of mine and I feel I don't deserve such treatment for any reason whatsoever I am choosing to discontinue this story. This is the second comment of this nature I have received in my fic reviews and it is very disheartening. Please, don't swear at me. I don't appreciate it and I'm sure no one else wants to read you pointless rudeness either. I'm sorry to anyone who wrote me those very nice reviews, and very appreciative, but that was really the straw on the camels back; as it were.
Now…
Okay, since this is the story that I've gotten the most kind reviews on (albeit it's quite an irony since they're in respose to some VERY negative reviews…) I've decided to continue. A kind reader even went out of their way to email me, a practice I promote to the extreme! So here it is, chapter two.
Erika was never a fan of tea, but it had prescribed by the herbalist earlier that day, and she threw caution to the wind, and it felt, her sanity too. On a whim she had entered the store she passed almost daily on her walk and the towering racks of exotic jarred herbs and shining jade buddahs that grinned at her as if they knew everything she didn't, called to her everytime she passed, but she'd been to timid to cross the threshold, as it were, and enter the doors of the strange store. This time was different.
She'd entered the ad almost two days ago and hadn't heard a thing. It was depressing. If she couldn't find someone in the flesh or in print, it would seem she'd never find anyone. So, on the wings of whimsy, and a bit of foul wind, she took the first step.
The moment she entered a wave of rich scented air buffeted her. Foreign scents of jasmine and warm grassy smells seeped into her senses and she felt almost instantly calm. The small chime over the door tingled agreeably and she took a sweeping look of the store. Displays dripping with wooden prayer beads and shelves of books on meditation and aromtherpy as well as hundreds of other studies she'd known about but never knew there was such interest in to warrant a book stared back at her. She was staring with fascination into a pair of glaring glass eyes attached to an ornamented dragon head, when a soft but probing voice broke through the silence behind her.
"I know what it is! I see you everyday." She whirled around to see a small, gray haired man who looked much like the Buddha's in the window grinning at her and sucking on the end of a long pipe. "You walk by everyday, I see you. I think to myself, she's in love. Am I right?"
"Ah, no. Quite the opposite actually." She laughed obligingly, but felt a little anxious at the suddenly personal conversation. "I'm sorry. I'm just looking." The old man waved her aside, the smoke from his pipe curling around his hand as it upset the air.
"I know what then, you're needing love then. Aggravated." Erika pulled her light coat in at her neck in outrage. The man was all but declaring her sexually frustrated.
"I'm really just looking!" She insisted. The man was having none of it.
"Here, I make you this, very special. I like you. I don't make this just for anyone." He hefted himself up and pulled out several jars, mixing them deftly.
"I'm honored!" Her outrage shown as clearly as she let it.
He handed her a small brown package and winked, quick describing the proper way to prepare it and hurrying her out the door and refusing her offers of payment as well as her refusals of the product itself.
"It bring you good luck, good love."
Now she eyed the concoction warily. Certainly, there was something to be said about the curative properties of alternative medicine, scientifically it'd been show in many studies. Now, wither those effects where more of a placebo like occurrence where it was more up to the believer than the medicine itself to provide those cures was still in debate. The thing was, if it worked or not, she didn't have a thing that needed to be cured. She was in perfect health.
She took a tentative sip. In an instant she began gagging. Not only was the mixture noxious in taste and smell, the water was too hot and scaled her tongue and the back of her throat. Holding her tongue out her of her mouth and rushing to the faucet she quickly poured herself a glass of cold water and drank it even more quickly, relishing each relieving gulp. She turned and looked at offending cup angrily.
"That stupid…" but before she could finish cursing the tea, she grabbed her throat and moaned. "My voice!"
Wither it was something in what she'd drank or effect of the scalding her voice had been knocked a few notes lower than normal, and it was scratchy and hurt with every syllable.
And at that moment the phone rang.
"Hello," she muttered unhappily into the receiver.
"Um, hi." A male voice sounded on the other side, instantly peaking her attention. There was silence for a bit as Erika sat and glared angrily at nothing in particular.
"May I help you?" Her tone was more curt than she meant it to be, but she was in no mood for sudden callers.
"Ah, yeah, it's about your ad." Her eyes went wide. "You know, in the paper."
"I'm aware…" Erika's voice faded off. The moment had come, and she had no idea how to deal with it. Normally, she might've prepared something, some sort of mental dialogue or something, but deep down she'd been sure no one would've responded. She'd been a bit depressed that it had turned out that way earlier, but not surprised.
Silence reigned on the line.
"Well, I thought we'd… um, meet." He broke the quite. "The restaurant on fifth and oak? At eight?"
"Eight?" She muttered, dazed. The pain in throat was dull compared to the ringing in her head. "Perfect…I'll wear a white orchid?"
White orchid? Where was she getting this from? she thought.
"Sure, that'll be fine. So… you like puzzles?" He was trying to start up a conversation but she just nodded at the phone.
"Uh huh." And in a daze she hung up, and walked over to her tea, picking up the concoction and mindlessly devouring the entire cooled cup.
She had a date.
Dwayne hung up the phone and stared at it letting the shock flow from his body. That was abrupt.
"She turned you down?" Jo looked at him over her cup of coffee and grinned. "Too bad."
"No, I'm meeting her tomorrow." He shrugged and dug his hands into his pockets. "I tried to get her talking but, she just hung up."
"Probably your overwhelming charm." Mac grunted a laugh and crossed his arms over his chest and eyed Dwayne from his seat at the 'kitchen' table. "Strange bird."
"Yeah, I'd say." Dwayne walked past the table and headed to his quarters.
"She sound okay at least?" Garth piped in.
"Yeah," Dwayne thought back to the throaty voice. "Gorgeous, actually. But you can't tell them all by how they sound."
"Don't I know it!" Mac chirped with a gritty gaffaw.
"No. You don't. Shut up Mac" Jo rolled her eyes and Dwayne moved out of the room to settle into bed for the night as best he could.
He wouldn't have admitted it, but her voice really had gotten to him. Like sandpaper and velvet. He was nervous, and sleeping that night would be more of a chore than a rest.
"Rusty, I don't know what you've gone and done to yourself this time." Dr. Slate tsked lightly at the squirming robot. "I got dragged all the way out here for some gum?"
"Aw, I swear I didn't mean to." Rusty had gone and gotten bubble gum stuck in his main neural relays. Never mind how he'd gotten it there, or how he'd gotten the gum in the first place; but it was a problem. The boy robot couldn't function well enough to fly back to Quark and could hardly stand as it was. The worst thing was something was malfunctioning so badly that his verbal programs were periodically sputtering, resulting in something magnificently similar to turrets. Every so often the little red innocent kid would let out a string of curses to rival the most seasoned sailor.
"I want to know where you learned all those… things!" She pulled at a wad of pink goo and winced as the kid let out another string of vile verbage.
"Don't look at me!" Mac protested even before Erika could shoot him accusing glance. He'd been trying his best to poke around in the kid to see what was wrong when she'd arrived, being called in after he realized he had no idea what he was looking at.
"I really am sorry, I can't help it!" Rusty looked so close to tearing up, if it were possible, that Doctor Slate felt something tug at her emotions.
"Oh Rusty!" She admonished while resisting the urge to give him a hug. "I'm almost done, you'll be fine in a minute." She offered, settling for a motherly pat on his shoulder.
"Is that the kid I heard?" Duane suddenly appeared in the doorway with a shocked grin on his features. "It's terrifying." Another stream of scalding syllables set forth from the boys lips. "Oh wow, it is him!"
"Oh gosh! Oh gosh, oh gosh. I'm so sorry!!!" Now he looked as if he really were bawling and Erika's mothering instincts set in. She quickly pulled the kid to her and glared at Dwanye.
"Leave him alone will you?!" She was amazed at how Rusty clung to her. "Someone gave him gum, and that's what's causing this whole mess in the first place."
"That would be me." Dwanye offered. "Didn't know the kid couldn't handle it. I thought it would be a nice gift."
"It wasn't," she snapped, and then groaned as her throat snapped back. It was still sore from last night. Rusty heard her pain and pushed back at her to look up.
"Are you okay, Doc?"
"Yeah, just a slight problem with some tea last night. Nothing to be worried about." She waved aside the concern, still peeved, and went back to work on the last bit of bubble gum. Extracting it she held it up and looked accusingly at Dwayne. "How?"
"Don't look at me. I'm just the administrator, not the agitator."
"I'd say you're a little of both!" She huffed and stood, brushing herself off and patting Rusty's head closed.
"So the kid got a little gum in his hair. Most kids do."
"He's not most kids!" She fumed. "This one happens to be mine!"
"The governments actually." Dwayne pointed out, but it only seemed to make her madder. There was something about the Doc mad that got to him. Something he couldn't quite name.
Her mouth opened and closed soundlessly. He was right about Rusty, but it seemed to pain her more than she wanted to say.
"Need a ride back doc?" Garth quipped in from his spot where he was tinkering with a slightly important looking part that might of attached to some slightly important looking machinery.
"What time is it?" She pulled a loose bit of hair back and tried to regain the strands of her composure that remained.
"Almost five." Garth checked his watch. "Got a hot date tonight."
"Yes." She said quickly, without thinking and then pulled her lips together tightly eyes wide. She suddenly felt like swearing herself. "I mean, maybe."
"What's a hot date?" Rusty tugged at the hem of her sterile lab coat. "It's the twenty third, and it's cold out." He observed pointedly.
"I'll explain later Rusty." Slate said quickly as the heat in her collar became uncomfortable.
"Hey, the doc's got herself a gentle man friend!" Mac clapped his hands and rubbed them together excitedly. "Didn't know that you had time to experiment outside of the lab, doc."
"Who is this mystery man? Some Noble laureate? I bet his big, thick black-rimmed plastic glasses are a real turn on." Dwayne couldn't resist teasing. Slate looked at him and wanted nothing more than to wipe that smirk off his face. For some reason she defended the man she'd never met against the lieutenant.
"On the contrary, he's very handsome." She lied. "Perhaps not terribly intelligent, but for a doctor of English, one can't expect too much."
"English, huh?" Dwayne leaned on the wall and continued to smirk. He didn't know why, but seeing the doc flustered was worth being a complete ass. "I bet he's a real kick at parties, what with his dissertations on postmodern French dialogues."
"South American poetic trends, but we don't really discuss that too often." She played it cool, and lied like a champ. There was no stopping the manufactured man that rolled off the production line now. "He's actually a fascinating conversationalist."
"I bet" Mac took his turn at looking nonplussed.
"He is!" She defended the figment of her imagination. "He's a wonderful man, really! A perfect gentleman."
Dwanye snorted.
"I bet he loves children and kittens too?"
"Well, now that you mention it."
"Ha!" He threw his head back and walked out the door, leaving a baffled Erika staring after him.
"Well, I'm happy for you." Garth was at her side, patting her shoulder confidently. "Let's get you back to shore side, so we can get you ready."
"Thank you," she hardly acknowledged him as she got into her seat, still looking at the door where Dwayne had just departed from.
"Hey Mac," Rusty looked at the codger questioningly. "What's a date?"
"A dried prune." He said with a grin.
"really?" Rusty
"No. It's kissy stuff."
"ewwwww…"