A/N: Chappie 2, the return of CLEMENTINE! Yay! Mystery story, could possibly get a bit more confusing from here on in.
Chapter Two: A New Story
Mort saved the word document and shut the computer down. Clementine shouts up to him.
"Are you done? Can we go now?" Mort looks over the banister at her.
"Sure." He takes the stairs two at a time and looks at his wife. She was wearing cropped pants and a halter top, and looking lovely, carrying a pale frilly parasol.
"Where did you get that?" Mort asks, looking at it.
"Do you say that in disgust?" Clementine asks, folding the parasol up.
"It looks, very late eighteenth century," Mort decides as he holds open the door for her.
"Mort, I can open doors for myself now," she says. Mort knew she was right.
Several months ago, Clementine had a near-death experience in a Las Vegas casino. Simone, who had a personality like Shooter, had tried to kill her, and died falling out of a several storey window. Since then, Mort had always done his best to stop Clementine coming into contact with anything possibly dangerous, and Clementine was fed-up of it.
"I just want to look after you, you know that," says Mort. Clementine takes his hand.
"I know."
"You've come close to death twice now, I don't want it to happen again."
That was true, apart from someone trying to garrotte her in the casino, Shooter himself had tried to drown Clementine previous to that, in an episode where Clementine and Mort both ended up in hospital nearly dead.
"I know. Now are we going to go boating on the lake or aren't we?" she says, raising her voice a little, with a hint of impatience in it.
"Yes we are," says Mort, as he locks the door and heads out to the jetty where there's a row boat and oars. Clementine steps in with her parasol open above her head, rocking the boat slightly. Mort follows her, picking up the oars and taking a few pulls out into the lake.
"You know in Venice, Italy, the men rowing the boats sing to the ladies in the boat," says Clementine.
"They're not boats, they're gondolas, and we're not in Italy, we're on Tashmore Lake enjoying a quiet, warm afternoon. You don't really want to hear me sing, do you?" asks Mort.
"No," says Clementine and Mort looks a little relieved. "I've heard it before."
"When?" asks Mort, taking them both into the middle of the lake.
"When you're in the shower," explains Clementine, as if it was so simple a child of three could have worked it out.
"Right, I didn't know you listened in on my shower times," says Mort, smiling.
"Well, only once, and the singing put me off doing it again," says Clementine, blushing.
"I know what to do now to get rid of you. Venice, it's a nice name for a girl," says Mort. "We'll have to name our daughter that."
"Kids?" asks Clementine.
"Well, I, erm, I," Mort is lost for words.
"Yeah, I know what you er," replies his wife. "Alright, what else do you like?"
"Well, I like, for guys, Barkley and Phoenix," Clementine wrinkles her nose. "And for girls, Levi, Harley, and Icing. I've put them all in my new story, eventually I'm going to kill them all off, but what do you think of the names?"
"Harley, that's probably the nicest. You know what name I like?" Mort shakes his head. "Lily. For a girl."
"Lily?" asks Mort in disgust. "Silly Lily." Clementine reaches out to hit him but only succeeds in tipping the boat a little.
"Yes I suppose so," says Mort. "Or Lilly pad."
"Morton Rainey. One more snide comment and I shall poke you with my parasol."