Evan and Nancy showed up shortly afterwards, and we were all still hanging around in the kitchen. Sort of strung out all over, in chairs, and

leaning against counters. There were several conversations going on all at the same time.

Hannah had taken tamales out of the oven, and, before everybody started sitting down around the table, she asked Daniel

if he wanted to go upstairs and wake Jill, so she could eat with us.

"Or we can put a plate back for her, if you think she'd rather eat later," Hannah was saying.

Daniel said he'd go up and see, and when he'd gone out of the kitchen, Guthrie reached for a tamale, and said,

"I wanna get a look at this chick."

"Guthrie," Hannah remonstrated, and even though she didn't say specifically, Guthrie knew what she meant.

"Okay," he said, "Girl, then. I wanna get a look at this girl."

"How long's Daniel gonna stay?" Evan asked.

"I don't know," Hannah said, looking at Adam. "He didn't really say. Did he say anything to any of you?" She looked around

the table, and Brian and Adam both shook their heads.

"He hasn't said anything to me about it yet," Crane said.

"At least a week, though," I said, looking down the table at Adam. "Because Ford's going to come home on the weekend, right, Adam?"

"That's the plan, I think," Adam said.

"We'll just ask him when he comes back down," Crane said.

When Daniel came back, he was by himself. He slid into his chair at the table.

"She'll be down after a bit," he said, and reached for a tamale.

"Did she get some rest?" Hannah asked him.

"Yeah. She said she did."

"That's good," Hannah said, and then I saw her give Adam sort of a look that spoke without words.

"How long you get to stay around?" Adam asked him.

"Well," Daniel said, around his mouthful of tamale, "That's not really set in stone right now. I just thought-we'd sort

of play it by ear, ya know?"

"Right," Adam said. "Well, that works."

"Yeah. I wanna take Jill around-introduce her to some people, and show her some of the sights around here. And, I want her

to get to know all of you," Daniel said.

There were some nods of assent around the table at his statement, and then Brian, blunt as always, said, "So, you got some

vacation time comin', from the place you're playin' at regular?"

"The Palamino Club," Daniel supplied. "Yeah. Sort of."

Even I thought that was a weird answer, and I waited for Brian to continue his questions.

"What's 'sort of'?" Brian demanded, not disappointing me. "You got vacation time or not?"

"I'm takin' some time off from there," Daniel said.

Nobody said anything for a few moments. I knew in the summer that when Daniel had been home, he'd been on a sort of

a hiatus or whatever from the club. Then, he'd gone back to Nashville at the end of the summer, and signed another contract

to keep playing there.

"What about Red?" I asked him, from across the table. "Is he gonna play for someone else until you go back to The Palamino Club?"

"I don't know for sure," Daniel said.

Guthrie and I exchanged a quick look between us. We're both really fond of Red, well, the whole family is, and apparently

Guthrie thought that Daniel's answer was less than satisfactory. (Just like I did).

"How come you don't know what Red's doin'?" Guthrie demanded.

"We haven't discussed all the details," Daniel said.

The details of what? That was what Guthrie and I were both thinking.

After that, though, the conversation turned to a leaky faucet at Evan and Nancy's cabin, and then, in the midst of

that, Jill made her entrance. Well, I call it an entrance. She stood at the doorway of the kitchen. She'd come down the other

stairs and thru the living room, instead of taking the back stairs. But, I guess maybe she didn't know about the quicker way

to get to the kitchen.

And, it was an entrance. Because she stood there, waiting for everybody to notice her. At least, that's how it seemed to me,

later on, when I had time to think over the events of the evening. Every single male McFadden stood up, too, when she come into

the kitchen. Even Guthrie.

"Hey," Daniel said, getting up quickly, and going over to where she stood. She was wearing jeans and a lacy white shirt that showed

a bit of her belly. Her very, very flat belly.

"Hello, everyone," she said, with a deep Southern accent.

Daniel wrapped an arm around her waist, and turned to face the table full of McFaddens. "Let's see, you met Adam and Hannah, earlier,

and Brian, right? And Clare?"

"Yes. And Crane, and Evan," Jill said.

"Okay, so the rest of the bunch here-this is Nancy," Daniel said, pointing towards Nancy. "Evan's wife."

"Hello," Jill said.

"Hi. It's nice to meet you," Nancy said.

Jill gave a brief nod, and then looked towards Guthrie and I. Waiting for Daniel, I guessed.

"This is my youngest brother and my sister. Guthrie, and Harlie," Daniel introduced us.

"Hi," Guthrie said, and I echoed with my own, "Hi."

Jill gave another nod to us, and Daniel led her over to the table, pulling out the empty chair beside his own. Jill sat down and

then after that, Daniel did too. All the other guys sat down again, as well.

"You're real tall, aren't ya?" Jill said, giving Guthrie a wide smile. I thought I'd never seen such perfect, white, straight

teeth before.

"Yeah," Guthrie said, looking half-embarrassed, and half-pleased. "I guess I am."

Jill's eyes lit onto me next. "I can't believe Daniel calls you by that nickname. Squirt, isn't it?"

"Yeah," I said, wondering what she meant.

"You shouldn't let him do it," Jill said. "You're so grown up-I would have thought you were about ten the way he

talks about you."

I wasn't sure if she was complimenting me, or insulting me. And, just how exactly was it that Daniel talked about me to her?

I looked at Daniel, and raised my eyebrows at him in question.

Daniel just grinned at me, and then wrapped his arm around Jill's shoulders. "She'll always be 'squirt' to me. There's no

changin' that now."

"Daniel says you were able to get some rest," Hannah said then, to Jill.

"I was. Thanks for the use of your bedroom," Jill answered.

"Help yourself," Hannah said, gesturing to the plates of food.

"I'm not really hungry," Jill said. "I will have some iced tea, though." Crane pushed the pitcher closer, and Jill poured

some into the glass in front of her.

Hannah was asking Jill if there were certain things that she especially liked to eat, or things that she didn't like. While that

was going on, I was studying her. She was pretty, like Hannah had said earlier. But, not drop-dead gorgeous, like Clare and

Ivy. She was more average looking. Well, truthfully, she was above average. She was real petite. Her hair was dark, long and straight,

like I'd always wished that mine was. Instead of the massive amount of curls that I had.

"Oh, I'll eat just about anything," Jill was saying.

When we were finished with supper, Hannah said we'd just stack the dishes, and she and Adam would do them later.

So, everybody went into the living room after that. Crane asked Jill some questions, about where she'd grown up at, and

about her family, but, for the most part, Jill seemed to brush off any questions. She said she was from Georgia, (hence the heavy

Southern accent), and had been in Nashville for a very short time. The queries about her family, though, she glossed over.

"My family's still down in Georgia," she said. "What's left of them, anyway." She turned her attention to Nancy, and began

asking about the line cabin.

"Daniel says it was in awful condition before, but that it's just adorable now," Jill was saying.

I personally didn't think that Daniel had said that anything was adorable. I mean, he just didn't talk that way. That was a

chick word, as Guthrie would say.

"It's really nice, now," Nancy said, in answer. "Evan and I love it."

"That's just great. I can't wait to see it," Jill said.

"Sure," Nancy said. "We'll figure out an evening-I work most of this week."

"Do you plan on continuing to work?" Jill asked her. "Now that you're married, I mean?"

Nancy was, at first, a bit surprised at the question. I could tell. She looked to her right at Evan, sitting beside her on the couch,

and then back to Jill. "Probably," Nancy said. "There's a lot that Evan and I need to do, and I don't mind working at the

feed store."

I thought it was nosy of Jill to ask that. I mean, none of us had even asked Nancy that question. That was her and Evan's business. And,

Jill had only just met us all, including Nancy. I told myself she was probably trying to be friendly. I'd stayed sort of quiet, trying to

observe her without being too noticeable about it.

I was sitting next to Guthrie on the floor, and when Crane got up at one point, he stopped beside the two of us.

"You two have homework? If so, you'd better get to it," he said.

"I've got some English," Guthrie said, with a sigh.

"How about you, peanut?" he asked me.

"I have a little," I said. It was more than a little. And, I knew that Crane knew that, too. And, that I knew that he knew.

"Well, say your goodnights, and get started on it. Both of you," he said.

After I'd been upstairs for a while, Crane came upstairs to check on me. And, I'm assuming, on Guthrie, too.

He stood in my half-open doorway. "How's it going?" he asked. "Anything you need help with?"

"I'm almost finished," I said. "If you want to check my trig, you can."

"If I want to, huh?" he asked, teasing.

"If you would. Please," I amended.

Crane sat down on the bed, and began looking over my math homework. I sat up straight, stretching my back muscles.

"Is everybody still downstairs?" I asked.

"Uh huh," Crane said, not looking up from the math paper.

He finished, and flicked the paper with his fingers. "Six, nine and eighteen are wrong. See what you can do."

"Okay," I said, taking it from him, and circling the three problems with my pen.

Daniel was standing at the doorway now. "Homework finished?" he asked.

"The same as finished," I said, shoving the math sheet into the textbook, and motioning to him with my hand to come in.

Daniel came in, and Crane said, "I need to make a phone call." He tapped my math book. "Get those three fixed before class tomorrow."

"I will," I said. He smiled at me, and stood up, and then rubbed Daniel's shoulder as he passed by.

"Sit down, Daniel," I ordered.

In response, Daniel came and plopped down beside me on the bed with the full force of his weight, causing my

book and papers to bounce around.

"Okay. I sat," he said, and I laughed.

Daniel leaned back so that he was half-lying down, resting his weight on his elbow. "How's the job with Ivy?" he asked.

"It's good."

"Big brother's pretty interested in Ivy, it seems like," Daniel said.

"I think so," I agreed. "Ivy cares a lot about him. I know that."

"Crane deserves to be happy."

"Yeah. He does," I said. I was studying Daniel as he lounged there, beside me. I brought my knees up to my chest, and

wrapped my arms around them. I was getting ready to ask Daniel, straight out, some things about Jill, but he beat me to

the punch.

"So, how's it goin' with Kenny?" he asked. "When I was here for the wedding you two had just made some decisions, right? Still

a couple?"

"Uh huh," I said.

"How is that?" he asked, looking at me with a serious expression now.

"Kenny's nice. I like him," I said, simply. "We have fun."

"He's not drinkin' anymore, like he was last summer," Daniel said, and it wasn't a question. More of a statement.

I shook my head. "He's not."

"I knew he wouldn't be, or the door would have been barred against him," Daniel said. "You've got a lot of

people watchin' out for ya."

"That's an understatement," I said.

He raised his eyebrow at me in challenge, but I moved on.

"Do you talk about me as though I'm ten?" I asked, raising my own eyebrow, and referring to what Jill had said earlier.

Daniel gave me a half-smile. "Maybe," he said. "I don't mean to do it. I'm not tryin' to insult ya or anything."

"Oh, I know that," I said, airily. "I'm just teasing you."

We exchanged a companionable smile and I spoke up. "How long have you known Jill?"

"Two weeks tomorrow," Daniel said.

"Two weeks?" I asked, and I guess I looked shocked, because he grinned, and said, "Well, we've been official for two weeks,

is I guess what I should say. She knew me before that, she says."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"She says she's heard me sing for the last couple of months, and that she was at the show almost every weekend to listen.

She never came up to introduce herself or anything. Until a couple of weeks ago."

"Oh," I said, thinking that she sounded like a music groupie. Daniel had had his share of those in the past, I knew that. And,

that was just the ones that I knew about. There had probably been far more that I didn't know about. Things that Daniel hadn't

seen fit to tell me.

"Two weeks isn't very long," I felt obliged to point out. I tried to say it gently.

"Nope. It's not."

I wanted to ask Daniel why he'd brought her home, to California, after only dating her for two weeks. I mean, taking someone

around the family at all, and especially a longer visit like this one was to be, well that spoke of seriousness.

"We ran into each other," Daniel was saying. "Literally. I was done with the last set one night, and I came around the corner

and-bam, she was coming from the other way and I nearly knocked her down."

"Wow," I said.

"Yeah," he said, with this small smile. "She spilled her drink all over me."

I smiled back at him, because he just looked so darn happy. The expression on his face was again, very similar to the

expression that Ivy had on her face earlier when speaking about Crane.

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