RJ was laying in his broken-down bed (he was hard on bed frames and springs) staring up at the ceiling, which was unusual for him. He usually kept busy with his hands or the animals or helping Tiny with the garden or fixing something. His mother banged on the door, saying sweetly, "Rufus dear, could ya come down? We have company."

"And I care why," came the impertinent response.

"It's a girrrl," she trilled. "And she wants to talk to yewww."

A girl? What halfway decent girl would come alone to THIS house of her own accord? He mumbled assent and rummaged around for a shirt to put on, finally locating a semi-clean checkered flannel shirt with the sleeves torn off. His arms were so big they busted out of them anyways and sauntered downstairs.

Waiting for him was a tall slender female with dark shoulder-length hair wearing a light blue one-piece summer dress curiously paired with some muddy workboots. "Howdy," she calls warmly, her voice low-pitched and assured, strange coming from her wispy silouhette. "My name is Pam Tiller. Yore the tow-truck guy, ain't you?" Rufus nods his head in the affirmative. "You fix stuff, too, right?" Another nod. Chewing her supple lower lip she finally speaks again. "Well, I was wondering if you could come have a look at Dad's haybailer, it's acting all ganky and none of us knows much about 'em. I can pay you well; we had a good turnaround at the auction." Her family sold high quality beef cattle.

All RJ knew was that he really, really wanted to suck on that lightly glossed lower lip, and some more body parts besides. But of course no pretty lady would be here to check him out, it just had to be business. Sighing, RJ tells her he could go out there tomorrow morning since he wasn't doing anything then. Brightening, Pam's face was lit up with a beauty that almost took his breath away. "Thank ye so much," she burbles, taking his huge, bear-paw hand in her own delicate one and squeezing it. She was outside starting up the old Plymouth she drove before RJ could say anything else.

"RJ, I think she likes you," Eve giggles. Now she was known as Mother Firefly, Rufus being called Rufus T. Firefly by the imaginative Otis who named them all. Johnny, or Cutter, was called the Marx character J.T. Spaulding, an apt name for the clown character he'd resurrected.

"Ma, don't start," he turned to go back up to his room.

Mother, following him in her hip-swinging way says to his back, "Oh come on, Rufus, surely you need a girlfriend by now!"

"Haven't seen ya around much," Otis said idly, working on the raccoon he'd stuffed. Taxidermy was something he and RJ surprisingly had in common and Otis had been teaching the large man all sorts of things.

"I've been busy."

"I hear it's a broad," the pale man glanced up with his icy eyes, a thick eyebrow raised.

Damn that Vera-Ellen, Rufus thought. She can't keep nothing to herself. RJ didn't reply but went looking for the tools he originally came to find.

"I've seen her runnin' after those big Herefords her daddy raises. Nice, kinda skinny but nice. So you stickin' it to her or what?"

"Shut up, Otis," he growls.

"She'd make a fine specimen, I'd love to try my skills on her instead of dogs, coons an' jackalopes."

Rufus Jr. was on Otis before he could bat another faded eyeball and had him by the throat. "I don't ask for much you cocky prick," he hissed in Otis' surprised face. "An' I work more'n ten people round here. So you can back...the fuck...off."

Otis didn't offer any resistance but cracked a crooked-toothed grin at the much-bigger man. "Don't worry, RJ. I wouldn't think of messin' up yer lil honey. 'Less she does ye wrong."

The cowherd girl Pam seemed to take an interest in RJ's likes and didn't even shrink away from Otto, who had taken to wearing a leather mask to cover his self-consciousness. Rufus didn't know what to do, she was completely innocent and had no idea of the true nature of the Fireflys. Eve was sugary whenever the young lady was about and she knew of the matriarch's 'business' but remained unopinionated on the subject as of yet.

Curiosity was what drove her initially, that and true need to get a problem with the haybailer solved. But she was intrigued by the dark-haired behemoth of few words, and attracted as well. She pulled up the dusty driveway one particularly hot day and stepped out of her vehicle. She was wearing rolled-up jeans and a thin cotton blouse with the sleeves rolled up, dark brown hair back in a ponytail. Long slim neck, long arms, long legs, everything was lanky about her but she still managed to be quite pretty in a down-home way. "Hi, Tiny," she called, her big hearty voice always a startling contrast to her appearance. The deformed giant shuffled toward her, smiling. He lifted his big mangled hand in salute.

"Where's RJ," she asked the towering man. Tiny pointed toward a car up on slats not far, a man under it working intently. "Thanks," she said, putting a smile on Otto's scarred face. He enjoyed her prescence.

"Ruuufus," she singsonged as she moved closer to the jacked-up car.

"Hi," he said, frugal as ever with speech. He crawled out from under the automobile and wiped the grease from his hands. Pam leapt into his prodigious arms, giggling. "Let's go for a walk," she suggested. He grunted his agreement.

"RJ," she said thoughtfully as they strolled the field behind the farmhouse. "Why can't I get more than two words outta you most days? Sometimes I can get a good conversation from ya, but I just don't get it."

He shrugged and pondered it a moment. "Never had reason to say much, I guess," he replies. "Ain't very smart like Otis or funny like Angel or Grampa."

"I think yer interesting," she says, stopping on the old dog trail and looking up at him.

"I think yer pretty interestin, too," he said with warmth, holding her to him. "I can't figger you out, though."

She laughed at that, then led him to the shade of a massive tree and sat down. "Good," she said pertly. "C'mere, ya lug." He plopped beside her, staring at her small breasts defined through the thin cotton blouse, molded to her form from sweat.

He leaned forward and kissed her, covering her lean form with his own muscular one, thinking in the back of his mind that he might crush her but she didn't complain, only kissed him back with as much fervor. He undid the buttons on her shirt and pushed her bra aside to nuzzle her small but well-formed breasts. She pulled the tight t-shirt over his head and ran her palms over his back, feeling the bunched, powerful muscles under his tanned skin. "Ahhh...RJ...my mysterious Rufus...," she moaned under his caresses.

He soon lost himself in her embrace, her arms, legs and vagina walls all welcome him.

Pressed against her on the leafy ground he took her, if you would call something being given freely that, but he plunged into her and she rocked with him, clinging to him with arms and long thin legs like she was drowning and he was her buoy. His own cries mingled with hers, he surprised himself with his strained vocalizations as he rode the crest of excitement. He felt her shudder beneath him as his own breath and pace quickened and realized she had her second orgasm and he felt his own come upon him, his life essence spewing out in a torrent and he collapsed boneless on her.

"RJ...heh...yore suffocatin me, dear..."

"Sorry," he mumbled, raising up and falling over beside her. He felt good. Tired, but good.

Some days after that...

RJ was shovelling meatloaf, peas and carrots into his face at suppertime; Pam was digging in almost as fast. He wondered where she put it all--he was several inches taller and a hundred or so pounds heavier than her. Angel Baby was asking what Pam used to make her hair look so smooth while Grampa Hugo was making a mess all over the table, floor, and himself. He'd reached the stage in his life where he was old, tired, cranky, and just plain old didn't give a shit.

"So when're you and that oaf grandson o' mine gettin married," he asked her amid chewing meatloaf.

"Ummm...," she said, choking on milk.

"Shut up, Grampa," complained Rufus.

"Let's not be embarrassin the lil' lady," chastised Eve. "Come on sweetie, eat up, you need some more meat on your bones!"

"What's in this meatloaf, it's awful good," praised the guest, eager to change the subject. "I'd like to get the recipe."

"Oh, you could say it's a family secret," Mother Firefly giggled. "We know prime meat. But o'course you understand a good cut of meat, yerself."

A thin shadow fell across Rufus and Pam's plate, causing both to look up.

"Hi Otis," chirped Vera-Ellen.

"Otis, how good of you to join us," purred Mama, obviously pleased. "It's truly a family gatherin, now. I made some o' my special meatloaf."

"Well, I can't miss entertainin' company," he said in his rough-hewn voice, which matched his raggedy, angular appearance.

He scooted a chair to the other side of Pam and got himself a plate of food. "So, you know meat, do ya," he asked her.

"Well, my family does breed cattle. Longhorns, Herefords, Black Angus."

"Ah," he breathes while eating. Sometimes he'd forget to eat, there was always so much to do, so many people to kill, er, make into art. "So you love that meat." RJ rolled his eyes. "Is my brother meaty enough for ya?"

Baby giggled and milk came out her nose, then she giggled some more.

"Sure, I like em big an' beefy," she said, staring right at the pale madman. "I like somethin I can sink my teeth into."

"Damn, I dunno if I'm hungry or horny now," declared Hugo.

Otis leaned toward the tall girl, smiling. "Would you like to see some of my work," he asked sweetly.

"What is it you do," she asked back coquettishly.

"Taxidermy. I stuff things. I'm also an artist."

"Taxidermy? Like deer and things?"

"I could stuff somethin for ya. Beaver, maybe," he put a bony hand on her knee. Without flinching she took her fork and unobtrusively jabbed the top of his hand with it. He also didn't flinch but removed the appendage from her person and resumed eating.

"Bah, shut up and eat yer food," groused Hugo.

"Mind yore own business, Hugo," warned Otis.

"Fuck the hell off!"

"You worthless piece o' shit, com'ere and I'll show you fuck the hell off," Otis spat. Hugo's response landed next to Otis' hand, the one that had just been forked, in the form of a steak knife that embedded itself the surface of the old solid oak dinner table. Otis started to get up and Eve restrained him. Rufus looked from one to the other in dismay and Pam began laughing. She'd seen her father and brothers do the same thing to each other.

"So where's Sugar Britches," asked Otis. He watched RJ as he worked on the tractor.

"Pam? Her an' Baby went into town. Girl stuff like shopping I guess."

"Yanno...I kinda like her," the longhaired heathen mused.

"Otis...," intoned Rufus, his great darkhaired head poking up to eye Otis. The two men were very different and both stubborn, but they were part of a surprisingly loving (albeit psychotic) family.

"I was serious. She's quite the sassy thing. Was you thinking of...y'know, marrying her?" Otis was attempting to breach the subject of, 'How are we going to let her be part of the family without getting in trouble or killing her?'

Sighing, Rufus replies, "I don't know if I'll ever get married. I'd never have time for anything with a wife and younguns runnin around. 'Sides, she's a real sweet girl."