River looked around the dinner table at her family. Kaylee was still eating in small portions so that her food stayed down. Simon's birthday just passed, Jayne's was the next week, and they were already making plans for Christmas. Angel had been on Serenity for nearly a year already. She was walking, running, and babbling in half-coherent sentences. She understood questions and seemed to have some precognitive abilities that were just waiting to develop fully as she grew. She knew everyone's name and looked at them when asked who they were. Except…

"She doesn't call you anything," River observed.

"Huh?" Jayne looked at River and saw she was staring at Angel. "Whatcha mean?"

"Angel-baby! Angel," River caught her daughter's attention. She pointed to Simon. "Who's that?"

"Unuh Sime," Angel said.

Simon grinned and handed his niece a breadstick from the basket—regardless of the fact that she already had one in her fist. Kaylee tisked. "You are not going to be bribing our baby, you know that."

"I'm not bribing her. I'm using the rewards system," he said.

River pointed to Kaylee. "Who's that?"

"Ahn Tay," Angel said around one of her breadsticks.

"Who's that?" River pointed to the little boy across from her.

"Dewey."

"That?"

"Ahn Zo."

River pointed again.

"Ananan-nan." Angel squished up her face. Pretty Lady's name was the hardest. Too many "an's."

"That?"

"Tapum No!"

Mal tossed his chopsticks onto his plate as the crew's laughter echoed in the room. "That's it, ain't it? I'm gonna be known as 'Captain No.'"

River turned Angel's attention to the man on the other side of her highchair. "Who's that?"

Angel grinned, but she said nothing.

"Angel, who is that?" River persisted. "What's his name?"

Jayne began to get worried for it seemed River was right. "Say Jayne."

"Bread?" She offered the mushy, half-eaten cylinder of carbohydrates.

" C'mon. Jayne," he urged. "Ain't that hard. Just say 'Jayne.'"

Kaylee called down the table, "Angel? Can you say 'Daddy?' Da-ddy?"

"Eew!" Dewey exclaimed.

The girl giggled so hard she bent over her tray. Simon cringed, though most of the others joined in Angel's laughter. River was silent, and Jayne scoffed. "See? Even she knows that's ridiculous."

When he looked again at Angel, he found her giving him a look. It was one that he recognized from River's face. It was a look that said, "I know something you don't know, and when you figure it out, you're going to feel like an idiot." He really didn't like that look, and it was creepy seeing it on Angel's little face.

"Eat'cher dinner," he grumbled.

&&&

Kaylee was up early to get breakfast. She found that if she got something in her stomach first thing that she didn't get sick later in the day. When she came down into the mess, River and Angel were already awake and about.

"Mornin', River!" Kaylee greeted her sister-in-law.

River jumped, and dropped Angel's cereal bowl. She smoothed her hands over her hair and rolled her lips in embarrassment as she bent to retrieve the bowl.

Kaylee rushed over to her side. "River, you okay?"

"Yes, yes, I'm fine. You surprised me."

"Don't think I ever seen you surprised before."

River brought the bowl over to Angel in her highchair. "I'm just distracted this morning."

"It's not…ya know, a bad day or headed toward a bad day, right, 'cause I thought you had couple months to go before—"

"No," River assured her. "Not a bad day. I just had a strange dream last night and…." She shook her head. "I'm just distracted."

"What kinda dream?" Kaylee went to get a bowl of cereal for herself. "It wasn't a dream about somethin' that's gonna happen, right? Like you're seein' the future?"

River turned bright pink, and walked to get Angel's cereal. "No. Fairly certain it was not prophetic."

"Oh," Kaylee cooed. "One of those dreams, huh? Now don't go bein' embarrassed. Everybody has sex dreams; ain't no shame in it."

"Yes, but…I don't, or haven't, anyway. First…s-sex dream that I know was mine and not one I stumbled into."

When she came back and poured her daughter's cereal, Kaylee asked, "So? What kinda sex dream was it?"

River's brows creased, and she shook her head.

Kaylee took the seat next to Angel so that the two women could talk over breakfast. "Was it a celebrity sex dream? I have this recurring one where I meet that actor who plays the deposed Prince Cho from As the Worlds Turn at a fancy party and we sneak off into a dark hallway and we just go at each other." River giggled but shook her head. "Well, was it a faceless stranger sex dream? Those can be fun. Or was it somebody you know? 'Cause those can either be good or completely creepy."

River ducked her head as her face heated up again.

Kaylee squealed. "It was Jayne!"

The pilot looked up. "How…?"

"You blush that hard, but you don't looked grossed out, so it can't be Simon, Mal, or—ew—Badger. Besides, who else would you be dreaming about?"

She blushed again. "Thought I was hiding it." Both of them laughed. "Sometimes," River admitted, "I have to sit on my hands to keep from touching him. Have to keep from putting my head on his shoulder. There are days when all I want it to wrap up in him, put my face in his neck and smell him."

"Oh, sweetie, I know how that is." She leaned over the highchair and kissed River's cheek. When she sat back down, Kaylee pushed with a wicked smirk. "Well, was it good?"

River's eyes widened, and she shook her head at Kaylee.

"Was what good?" Mal asked. He stepped into the mess and headed for the kitchen. "Nobody made coffee?"

"If you make coffee, I'm gonna hafta leave." Kaylee warned. "The smell makes my stomach wonky."

Mal muttered about pregnant women on his ship. Kaylee turned back to River, and said, "So?"

River looked at Mal then back at Kaylee with wide eyes and shook her head again.

"Oh, Cap don't care."

"I care," River protested. "Don't want my surrogate parental figure knowing about…that."

Mal frowned at them. "This is obviously something I would cringe and hope to have my memory erased if I heard, so I'm just gonna go on up to the bridge now."

"See ya later, Cap'n." Kaylee waved to him as he walked back out of the mess and up the stairs to the bridge. Once he was out of earshot, she turned back to her friend. "You were saying?"

River shook her head at Kaylee's audacity. "It was…good. I don't remember much about the dream, how it progressed from beginning to end, but the end was…." She frowned. "Even in my own dream he wouldn't kiss me. I have nothing on which to base the waist-down portion of the activity, so it faded out, but I stared and stared at his mouth above mine. I never wanted anything in my life so much as I wanted that kiss."

"Men are so stupid," Kaylee commiserated. "Even in dreams they can't get their act together."

They laughed at the lack of humor in that truth.

"Any idea what Jayne thinks about you?"

"He thinks I'm pretty. Always thought that. He no longer desires to see me leave the ship. He does not loathe me anymore. But beyond that I don't have any data. He hates the idea of me getting in his head, and I refuse to invade his mind because of it. Can only hear what he broadcasts, but he is so quiet compared to others."

"Jayne's quiet?"

"His thoughts are direct," River explained. "The surface thoughts are linear and systematic. Everything else in there is buried deep. Guilt or anger has made him loud in the past, but overall he is quiet. It's nice."

"You gonna make a move?"

"No!"

Angel shook a fistful of soggy cereal. "No, no, no, no!"

River used a napkin to take to take the bits of cereal out of Angel's fist. "Food is for eating, not shaking."

Kaylee watched River clean Angel's hands, and she could hardly wait until her own baby was born. At only three months, she wasn't showing yet, but she started feeling little flutters in her belly already. She hated to admit it, but sometimes she got jealous of River and Zoë. They had their Mom Club, and Kaylee couldn't wait to be part of it.

"So, what are you doing when we land on Boros?" Kaylee changed the subject.

"Baby supplies," River said. "Also toothpaste, shampoo, and stain remover. Never realized how messy motherhood could be. You?"

"Me an' Simon are gonna go look at baby stuff," she gushed. "I'm gonna see if I can find a baby name book. Never too early to start throwin' out possibilities."

"May I make a suggestion?" River asked.

"Sure, sweetie."

"Avoid naming your child after naturally occurring geologic or aquatic formations."

"Oh, you!"

"Or giving your child a gender inappropriate name; it only leads to trouble."

Both women were laughing when Jayne entered. River avoided meeting his eyes. She was sure she would end up giving herself away if he could see her eyes. One look, and he'd know—which was impossible since he was not a Reader, and as he was not known to be observant about females' feelings other than in regards to—except this sort of was in regards to—so she was perfectly rational in avoiding his direct gaze. Kaylee wasn't dealing with these problems, however, and she greeted him when he walked it.

"Speak'a the devil. We was just talkin' about you, Jayne."

"Sayin' anything nice?" he asked while he, too, looked for food and coffee.

"River was just givin' me advice on what not to name my baby. She asked that I make sure I don't give my child a gender inappropriate name."

"Har-har," he grumbled and sent a glare to the back of River's head.

While Jayne grumbled behind her, River sent eye messages to Kaylee. During her friendship with the mechanic, River discovered that you didn't need to be telepathic or have Reader abilities to communicate without words. She'd seen girls do this in her classes growing up, but she was never in on it. It took some interesting miscommunications before River got the hang of it, but now she was fluent enough that with the use of a few intense looks and some brow raising she told Kaylee, "Don't make him look over here now! Mortification will ensue!"

Kaylee said out loud, "Don't you need to go up to the bridge and prep for landin', River?"

She gave a few significant looks of her own, and River shook her head. Kaylee nodded. River silently pleaded, and Kaylee shooed with her eyebrows. She leaned over and whispered to the younger woman, "Go on. I'm gonna stay here and see if I can get him to tell me how he feels aboutcha."

Finally, River agreed, and when Angel was finished eating, she took the baby up to the bridge in preparation for landing in three hours. As soon as River was out of the room Kaylee sidled over to the stovetop/counter where Jayne was mixing batter for pancakes. She smiled when he looked up.

"What?" he asked. Her smile was just a little too bright.

"Nothin'. Just wonderin' what you was gonna do when we hit dirt. Everybody else has plans. Thought I'd be sociable and ask what yours are. Me an' Simon are gonna go look at baby stuff. I heard the Cap and Inara have a date after we get the goods to Shepherd Johansson at the clinic."

Jayne poured a scoopful of better into the pan and waited for her to continue. When she didn't, he asked, "What about River and Angel?"

"So she's 'River' now?" Kaylee pried.

"That's her name."

"Yeah, but you never used to use it," she said. Brushing past that fact, she answered, "River has her own shopping to do. So what did you say you were going to do?"

"I dunno." He shrugged. "Prob'ly wait 'til I'm there and see what there is to do."

"What, no big plans to go find some trim or get stinkin' drunk?"

Jayne narrowed his eyes. "Well, not off the top of my head. What's it to you?"

"Just wonderin', sheesh!" Kaylee put up her hands in surrender. She turned to leave, but turned back a second after. "One last question."

"What is it?" he snapped. All he was trying to do was get breakfast, and he was getting grilled by a nosey mechanic.

"You an' River—what's goin' on?"

He froze mid-pancake-flip. "Whatta ya mean?"

"You're around each other all the time, you get on so well, an' you're so much nicer when you're around her. I'm wonderin' why that is."

"We ain't around each other all the time," he protested, furiously flipping his pancakes over. "We get on okay, is all, an' I ain't nice no matter who I'm with. Now can I get on with my meal or are you gonna keep this interrogation goin' while I eat?"

"No need to get snippy," Kaylee said, but for someone who'd gotten snapped at, she looked awfully pleased with herself. "I'm goin'. Just gotta put my bowl in the sink."

Jayne kept glaring until she left the room. His scowl melted into contemplation—something Jayne did more and more often since River got to Serenity. Not that he was thinking on her all the time. More about things related to her. At first he thought about ways to get her off the ship, then it was about his selfishness and if that was really how he wanted to be remembered. He thought about guilt, and guns, and fighting, and death, and savior warrior-angels, and mothers, and God, and torture, and grace, and age, and it was all because of her.

He thought he was being sneaky about it, but he did think on her every once in a while in the ways Kaylee insinuated. Her fighting was undeniably a thing of beauty. The image of her in the Maidenhead kicking that thug toward him then twisting her leg around and kicking a man behind her—around a column, no less—popped into his mind at odd times. Some of those times were inappropriate, but he couldn't get over that she never took her eyes off him for those few seconds. She said she didn't remember anything about it, but he did. He remembered her eyes. There was still something of the girl in there when she whirled around that bar because he saw the same look when she trained before dinner. He made excuses to go to the bay to watch her.

But River wasn't to be thought of like that. She was too…too everything. Too young for one, and too smart to bother with him for another. Not that he really thought about her like that. He didn't. It was an accident when she invaded his private time in his bunk. It was especially awkward during those shocking little intrusions when he was with a woman. It made him stutter his pace, and have to find something else to think on quick.

What was the word? He heard the Shepherd use it once. Sac…sacrosanct. That was it. Untouchable and holy. That was River Tam in a nutshell.

Jayne finished off his pancakes and went down to the bay to load the crates of gen-seed and unregistered embryonic cattle and sheep in little cryo-boxes bought to strengthen the failing herds on Boros. Then maybe he'd get in some weights before he had to weapon up for the job. And he promised himself that all the while he would not be thinking on holy virgins or crazy girls.

&&&

Kaylee poked her head into the bridge and got River's attention. The girl looked back at her from the co-pilot's chair that she always took when both she and Mal were flying.

"Did you?" River asked.

Kaylee grinned. "It's mutual."

River's face reddened as her expression teetered between horror, relief, and excitement, and she hung her head to let her hair slide down and hide her face. She fiddled her fingers on her lap and wondered what she would say to Jayne the next time she saw him.

&&&

Brains were stupid things, Jayne decided. They thought too much. They went in circles, or they got stuck. And of course they always got stuck on the thing a body was trying their very hardest not to think on.

He thought on River while he was loading the Mule. He thought on her when he went to the bench to lift. He thought on her while he chose weapons for the job: only the small, easily concealable ones since the cargo was going to the church through a Shepherd—but better safe than dead. He managed not to think on her while he and Mal and Zoë were delivering the goods, but he could feel her fluttering about the edges of his mind. Now that they were back in the ship and everyone was getting ready for their few free hours dirtside, his thoughts circled right back around, and he wondered what River was planning to do today.

While Jayne swore on a stack of Bibles that he was still the overall lecherous hump he always had been, he hadn't actually been to see a whore or picked up a woman twice in the last five months. It wasn't that he didn't get the urge, but there seemed to be something off when he was with them. Ever since before the Doc and little Kaylee's wedding, when ever he was with a woman he always left feeling more wound up than before the sexing.

He finished helping Zoë re-hang the Mule in the bay, and headed down to the passenger lounge to use the head. The first thing he heard was Angel's voice as she babbled words from where she stood at the little coffee table, and scribbled on a piece of River's drawing paper with a yellow crayon. Sitting on the far end of the couch, her head propped up on her hand, River stared off into the shadows under the stairs. She was in that short, layered pink skirt she liked so much, and a long-sleeved T-shirt that wasn't quite pink or brown, but it made her skin look soft and warm to touch.

And he wondered as he hesitated on the stairs, when Joseph looked at Mary if all he saw was a girl. A girl who was special, no doubt, maybe a little crazy for talking about being visited by angels and hearing voices out of nowhere, a girl who was getting him in a whole heap of trouble, but just a girl never the less.

River heard a grunt on the stairs and jolted back into the present from where her mind wandered to. She was making plans for what to say to Jayne when she saw him, but her very capable imagination took over, fueled by last nights dream, and suddenly her thoughts weren't so much about talking. When she looked up and found the object of her ponderings entering the lounge she quickly sat up straight and looked anywhere but at his face, and Jayne did the same. Both were too busy hiding themselves to notice the other.

"I was just, uh…." Jayne pointed to the bathroom door.

"Oh. Yes. I'm… with Angel."

Loquacious, River, she scolded herself. Try a whole sentence next time.

"I'm waiting until the Captain gives the affirmative order so that I can commence my purchasing excursion in Lydontown: a trade town with a population of two thousand in the city proper, seventeen houses of vending, one post office, one train station, and three trade posts encompassed in a 2.49 square mile land area. Not that any of those statistics are actually important."

Well done. Go from grammar-deficient half sentences to outright babbling. She mentally shook herself.

"Yeah." Jayne nodded. He cleared his throat. "I heard you'n Angel are goin' into town for some supplies."

"Correct. I am out of a few things for Angel, and Zoë, and Inara have also requested I pick up a few things for them since they will not have a chance."

"Why can't Zoë get her own stuff?"

"She and Dewey are remaining onboard to oversee waste removal and fresh water intake at the dock."

Jayne grimaced. Septic duty was the one everyone avoided as much as they could. But if Zoë was staying here, Mal and Inara had a date, Kaylee and Simon were doing their thing, and they asked River to get stuff for them… "Are you gonna be able to carry all that stuff you're gettin' and lug Angel around, too?"

"I—" River cut off her 'I'll manage' since it was an opening for her to invite him to spend more time with her. "I didn't think of that."

Some genius she was. "Well, I guess somebody has to come along an' lug the bags, an' you know Mal'll make me do it anyway, so's I might as well volunteer now."

"You don't have to," River assured him, "but I would appreciate it." She tried a look that her mother used to get River's father to do things for her. She could remember Regan's voice when she leaned down to whisper to her daughter, Make them feel like heroes. Men love to think they're doing something for you that you can't do yourself.

"Just gimme a minute, an' I'll meetcha out there," he muttered.

"Thank you, Jayne."

River grinned when the door to the toilet facilities shut. This was going to be a good day!