Title: They Will Know Us By Our Kin
Author: Heather-Lass
Summary: The naturalist Heather O'Toole is here, and she's not what anybody expected. But they still welcome her openly, especially her mother and grandfather. Things are developing between her and David but they've hit a bit of rough patch.
Disclaimer: All the Christy characters are property of the Marshell/LeSourd (did I get that right?) estate, etc, etc, etc. The naturalist character is of my own creation but with some real life folk singer. Heather Alexander. Because she rocks. So yeah.
Author's Note:
Chapter 7: Out of the Dark, Into the Light
David and Heather approached the light in silence. The tunnel was very narrow to start with because of the rocks that had fallen down. They moved very slowly and did not touch the walls or ceiling for fear of another cave-in.
"Uggh! What is this stuff?" David grimaced in disgust at the substance speckling the floor.
"Bat guano." Heather grinned. "I bet a cave this size has a pretty good size colony. The cave-in probably scared them away for now."
"I still don't like it. I suppose guano's your scientific term for excre-…"
"Shhh," Heather motioned at him. "Do you hear that?"
"Hello? A voice called faintly from the lit end of the tunnel.
"Christy!" They both cried and hurried their pace.
"When they were closer, Heather called, "how did you find this end?"
"The bats," Christy laughed. "Neil and the children weren't making much progress so Ruby Mae and I tried to find the other entrance. It wasn't too hard."
David and Heather finally emerged and Ruby Mae raced to Heather. "Oh, are you alright? We were so worried, we were. Doc and Miz Christy espec'lly. You're all dirty." She wrinkled up her freckled nose.
"You're not exactly clean yourself, you know." She turned to Christy to see her being vigorously embraced by David! David noticed and forced himself out of Christy's arms and Christy ran to give Heather a hug. But Heather could tell that it had been David who had initiated the hug, not Christy.
David offered his arm to Heather, but she gave him a fake smile and said, "I'm quite capable, I assure you Reverend Grantland."
Ruby Mae smirked because she knew exactly why Heather was mad. She grabbed Heather's arm and lead her back down to the pool, leaving Christy turning red and David in a state of confusion. After all, he WAS a MAN.
"Didn't I tell you to watch out?" Ruby Mae whispered. "Preacher was smitten by Miz Christy and was spittin' mad when Doc MacNeill stole 'er away. 'Course that was months and months ago. After the typhoid and the Doc findin' God, David was much nicer towards Doc and he and Christy were friends-like again. I thought he got over lovin' her but maybe I was wrong."
Over the next few days, Heather grew more and more distant towards David, and the entire mission staff noticed. David was clueless as to what he had done; Christy thought Heather's fiery temper was too much although, she did understand; and Ruby Mae, who thought Heather was entirely in the right, gave him evil glares when he wasn't looking and sickly sweet smiles when he was. Heater avoided David when she could and the rest of the time called him Reverend Grantland while avoiding his eyes.
The children, who didn't know what had happened or were too little to understand, delighted in the adults' "amusing antics". TO be able to hold and carry a grudge for a very long time was a mark of determination and clan honor among the cove folks and they were very proud to do so. This, of course, was something the mission workers had tried to reverse since it went against the Christian ideals of "repentance" and "forgiveness".
After about a week, David – who was still very confused – decided to ask someone about Heather's odd behavior. To make matters more amusing, it was Christy he chose to first ask.
The perfect opportunity came on one of the days when David came to school to teach Bible verses, Latin and higher math. Heather was spending the day with Neil and the Spencers being shown where rare and special plants grew. Over the last few weeks since she had came, Heather had found a close brother-sister type kinship with Neil as the only other cove native who had left and went to college. They spent hours discussing scientific ideologies that were far over everyone else's heads, with the exception of maybe Alice.
Alice herself preferred to let the young people solve their own problems and took the opportunity of having extra help at the mission to spend much needed more time ministering in Raven's Gap and Cataleechie. She was often not seen for days at a time.
So Heather was not at school to overhear David's conversation with Christy. David was glad for this because he still didn't know why Heather was mad at him, but he knew it had to do with Christy and he didn't want to make the situation worse. Christy didn't want Heather to misinterpret things again, which would cause her famous redhead temper to flare up.
"Why is Heather mad at me?" David whispered. "What did I do?"
"David, you're so thick." Christy replied. "Think about when she first got mad at you."
"After we were in the cave."
"Exactly. And do you know why?"
"No."
"Think about what you did. How you acted. Figure it out, you're smart. And I'm not going to help you on this one." At that, she walked away to help one of the children leaving David still confused as ever.
"Women," he muttered to himself. "They just can't be understood."
When Heather got home that night, Christy told her about the conversation she'd had with David. "I don't know why he was that thick Heather, but he really has no idea why you're so upset with him."
"Maybe I should tell him."
"No, not yet. He's an adult and a male. He has to learn this lesson eventually. It's you he likes, I know it. It will turn out alright, I promise."
"What it he doesn't ever figure it out? What if he gives up?"
"You draw his interest and then play coy. And we'll get Neil to talk to him. But not just yet."
"Oh I just hate men sometimes!"
"Me too Heather, me too."
End of Chapter 7
Next Up: Chapter 8: Girl Talk – Some conversations between Christy, Heather and Fairlight on the matter of romance, men and life in general.
Author's Note: What did you think of that? Arg. This thing is getting hard to write even though I have the rest of the plot planned out. Five chapters left, I think. This one didn't have a lot of dialogue, I'm sorry. The next one will though.
