Chapter 11
TEAGAN'S BIRTHDAY GIFT
House spent the next two days with his mom taking her out to eat, to the swap meet, and to the Starlight Opera to see Oklahoma and, in general, just lying around doing nothing.
"I'll be going tomorrow." He told her. "I have to drive back up to San Francisco for my seminar." It was a lie; he still had nine days before the seminar began, but he was feeling antsy and a couple of times he and his mom had sniped at each other. It was time to get going.
When he left, his Mom gave him a care package full of food and a small styrofoam cooler to put drinks in. House said something awkward about trying to make it back for Christmas and they both smiled. His mother hung on to his neck, not wanting her only baby to go. "Mom, I need the neck, can I have it back?" She kissed him and he gave her a kiss back. "I love you Mom." And she could see he did.
He didn't know where he was going until he got on route 5 going north. He figured it would be the quickest route to Groveland and then to Aspen Valley. The trip took ten hours. It would have taken nine, but House had to stop to walk off a cramp and eat lunch. He wondered if she could feel him when he got to Groveland. Only twenty miles to Aspen Valley. His heart was racing.
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It was my birthday and my neighbors were giving me a party that afternoon at the lodge. We had hamburgers, fries and lots of booze. They each gave me money because they knew the trip back east had tapped me out. It was incredibly kind of them and I was almost in tears. I had to keep the gate up during the party, because of all the tourists milling around the lodge. But still, I kept thinking that Greg was close. It seemed impossible considering he had just told me a few nights ago that he was at his mother's house in San Diego.
I got up and danced with Fred, my next door neighbor and former owner of Molly. Fred grew marijuana up around Hetch Hetchy and harvested it during the late summer. Sometimes I'd go up with Fred and we would pick it together. He always gave me a good stash of dope for the winter. The Rangers and Sheriffs all knew what Fred did for a living, but he sold locally and only to adults, so they didn't bother him. Fred wasn't handsome, but he wasn't ugly. He had the face of a character actor, someone you wouldn't notice in a crowd.
We were all laughing and having a great time when everyone looked behind me. I turned and he was standing there leaning on his cane.
"Excuse me, is this where I get the prostate exam?"
Everyone laughed. I ran over and hugged him. He bent down and gave me a kiss, a deep one.
"Did you come just for my birthday party?" It hadn't registered that he had come just to be with me. I really thought he was there to celebrate my birthday and then he would be on his way.
"Birthdays are boring. I came back for the Blackberry Jam."
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Despite the fact that House was House and acted like House, the mountain community liked him. They were all used to odd personalities. You don't live in Aspen Valley and isolate yourself from the rest of the world if you are normal. Everyone on the mountain had a tale to tell. The party ended at ten and House gave Teagan a ride to her cabin. They got out and Molly welcomed House back to the mountains. He petted her and then put his arm around Teagan as they climbed the porch and entered the house.
"It's good to be back. I kept thinking about Molly the whole time I was gone. I just needed to see her again." House said with a straight face.
"That dog grows on you."
They started taking off each other's clothes as fast as they could, House being frustrated by the little hook on her blouse. She undid it for him and he managed the rest of the buttons by himself. He looked at her body like it was the Venus de Milo and he kissed her up and down. They had sex in a position that gave House a lot of pleasure and took the pressure off his bad leg. When he came, he laughed at how good it felt. He didn't leave Teagan hanging; he made sure she was happy too. Spent and satisfied, they grabbed each other and held on as if there was an earthquake. Teagan was happier than she had been in years. She refused to get her hopes up, but it felt good to know he had come back, she had meant something to someone again.
House knew he was crazy. By coming back he was sending signals that this relationship meant something to him. It did, but as he told his Mom, "Fundamentally, it won't work." He saw how much she enjoyed her community and how much they enjoyed her. It was unlikely that she would come back to Princeton with him and he certainly didn't see him living in Hicksville. Still they could have the next nine days together and that would have to do.
In the morning Teagan was up stoking the fire and making Blackberry Jam. He came out to the kitchen scratching and yawning.
"What are you doing up so early?" His voice sounded annoyed more than anything.
"I have to use these berries while they're fresh to make the jam. I have about three more hours and then we can do something. But I really need to get this jam to market."
"What do you mean, "to market?""
"This is one of the ways that I make money. I make pies and jams from the Blackberries. I sell them and from the profit I buy food for the winter. Usually I have a little vegetable plot to grow food for canning, but I was gone during the time to plant it. So this winter I'm not going to have any canned food to live off of and I'm low on money from the trip. The cost of the room in Princeton and the food was a lot for me."
"You make all your money off of blackberry products?" He was shocked.
"No. I wait tables when one of the lodge owners or workers gets sick or has to go somewhere. I clean the campground, the bathrooms and the little laundry when they need someone. I help the Rangers sometimes and I get paid $10 an hour to give out information or clean their Ranger's cabins. I do all kinds of things. Sometimes I even work in the Yosemite hotels."
"You're a highly educated woman and you're cleaning bathrooms?" House was almost angry.
"Greg, I'm a psychologist living among nothing but misfits, and none of them want to be fixed or they wouldn't be living here. I do what I have to do to stay alive."
"But what about your voodoo...why not do a few consulting jobs and live off of them for the rest of the year?"
"Didn't you see what happened to me in Princeton? I can't do that on a regular basis. Telepathy and dreams are one thing. But remote viewing and clairvoyance, when I have to push to do it, just wipes me out. Most of the people want me to find someone and that's the toughest thing to do physically and psychologically."
"If you need money I can pay you each time we have sex for services rendered. What do you think is fair? A quarter per screw?" He smiled like an evil elf. "I figure at the rate we're going you'll make a fortune."
"Next you'll be telling me that you should get paid for your services!" she slapped his arm.
"Well now that you mentioned it."
He went back to bed while she wrestled with cooking the jam, adding just the right sugar and some other secret ingredients like a smidgeon of nutmeg and a little honey. She spooned the jam into sterile jars, poured wax on top of the jam, let it cool and then screwed on the mason jar top. She had two dozen jars of jam ready to sell. She drove them up to the lodge and then got back just in time to have wake up sex with Greg.
"Come on, you need to walk. You've been doing a lot of sitting. We're going to go up to Carrion Falls." She packed a back pack with snacks, fruit, water and juice. She added her camera, a small first aid kit, a space blanket and whistle.
He watched her and said, "Are you some kind of boy scout?"
"I've had to use each of these things at one time or another out on a hike, so don't give me any lip. Hand me that bear bell."
"Bear bell?"
"They've had a lot of bear sightings this year so you ring the bell every so often and the bears tend to run away. They don't like confrontation any more than you do."
"But I love confrontation."
"Not with a 500 pound bear."
"You have a point."
They drove to the trailhead and parked. A truck of Forest Rangers went by and she waved. They stopped. "Hey Teag, good to have you back. We'll put you on the work roster for next month, ok?"
"Sounds great Tom, thanks." They took off and she grabbed the backpack and her walking stick and they started hiking into the forest along a beautiful river that raced by. It had been an unusually wet winter and all the rivers were running higher than normal as the snowpack melted slowly up around the Alpine Region of the Tioga Pass.
House had trouble navigating at first but he soon got his balance and was doing well on the uneven surface. They were making good time; House wasn't holding them back at all. He felt younger, like when he used to do this without even thinking twice. He and Wilson used to go camp in the Smokeys, hiking every day they were there. He looked around at the scenery as Teagan forged ahead. The forest was green and quiet except for the occasional mosquito and the sound of the river. It was calming.
They hit a part in the trail that required some climbing. Without batting an eye, Teagan took House's cane and turned it around, handing him the hook and pulling him up the rocks with just enough force that he could manage the rest of the climb by himself. He liked that she didn't treat him like a cripple. She helped him with the pain, but otherwise she ignored the chunk that was missing from his thigh.
They hiked about two hours with several rests and then finally reached Carrion Falls. There were several downed logs laying in the river and stretching out to rocks in the middle of the rushing water. She traversed them like they were a paved highway. He didn't dare follow. She looked up the river at the falls and then turned to him with a grin. "Man, I love this!"
He could see that she did. She was in her element. There were no thoughts trying to crowd hers out, just the sound of the water rushing by. Walking the rocks and logs with ease, she found her way back to him. She made him pose for several photos with the falls in the background and then she set the camera up to take a timed photo of them as she hung onto his arm and faced the camera with a happy smile.
They sat down and ate lunch. As he was chewing he thought of something he had wanted to ask her, "The other night I was thinking of you." She gave him a look of surprise, "Don't get excited, I was also thinking of the gas my Mom's cooking gives me. Anyway, I was thinking of you and I thought you answered me. I was ..."
"You were screaming at me. I couldn't sleep."
He went pale. "You heard me? It really was you?"
"Duh? Did you think Princess Di was talking to you? Greg, once I've been intimate with someone the signal is like a radio; it can be easily transmitted and received. It sounds stupid, but we get on the same wavelength. It's not just having sex; it's being close to someone. I can communicate with Naomi. But after awhile if you don't use it, you lose it."
"Can I communicate with others, am I psychic now?" He asked enthusiastically.
"We're all psychic but unless you know how to develop it and use it, you probably won't be communicating with too many people."
"Can I read your thoughts?" he asked with a little grin.
"Only if I want to send them to you."
"Bummer."
They got back to the cabin around five in the afternoon and sat down around the fireplace. He realized that there was nothing to do but read, play games, go for walks or work. Teagan went into the kitchen to stoke the fire again so she could put the kettle on the stove for tea.
When she got back out to the living room she saw him in the easy chair sleeping with a book on his chest. He looked exhausted; she knew she was. She let him sleep for an hour while she went out and cut firewood out of a log one of her neighbors had dropped off in her yard while they were gone. When he woke up he heard the sound of an ax and went out to see this small woman hacking at this twelve foot log. He wasn't sure he could do any better, since he wasn't very well balanced with his leg, but she looked like she could use a break.
He went up to her and put his hand out for the ax. He stuck his right foot under the log itself to keep his balance and then started chopping. It was working. He managed to cut up several feet of log before she said that was enough for the day. He was glad, he was tired.
"Are you hungry?"She asked.
"Yeah."
"Okay, I'll go in and rummage up some dinner."
"Sounds good."
They stayed inside and she cooked chicken and dumplings, one of his favorite dishes. He was full and ready to watch some TV, but there was no TV. He picked up his book, but she came out from the kitchen with her hands on her hips.
"You need to get your butt in there and do the dishes. I'm not going to wait on you hand and foot."
"Don't you have a dishwasher?" He joked with her while he got up to do her bidding.
After the dishes were done, they both settled down to read books. Around ten she got up and went into bed, he followed. They talked a few minutes about books that they had read and which ones had actually meant something to them then fell asleep spooning each other. Around midnight Molly went crazy barking in her deep, deep register at some perceived threat outside. Teagan yelled at her to be quiet but she wouldn't shut up. Teagan got up and made her way to the front door and then turned back to get a flashlight after hearing something. House limped without his cane to the front door.
Teagan came back with a large flashlight. "Molly, stay. Stay." Teagan opened the door and Molly shot past her into the night barking. "Molly, Molly, Come back Molly." She heard a sound and immediately knew what was going on.
"What was that?" House looked at her his eyes large and round.
She turned on the flashlight and went out on the porch and shone the light in the direction of the barking dog. Caught in the bright halogen light was a fully grown male black bear up on its hind legs and rather annoyed with Molly.
"Here, hold this." She handed the flashlight to House. She ran inside and grabbed a pot and a big metal spoon. She ran past House and out to where Molly was barking."
"Teagan! For God's sake are you crazy? Get back here." House was nervous and scared; he was trying to figure how he could save the dog and the ornery woman from the bear. The bear was not happy with Molly and now he was not happy with Teagan.
House figured that the all the bear could see was dinner banging a pot and pan at him and yelling, "Scat, scat...Greg, shine the light right into his eyes." She kept banging and before long the bear was scurrying away, off to a neighbor's house. "Molly, get your butt inside, get!" She was looking down at the dog and pointing at the house.
When she came back in she put the pot and spoon away. House turned off the flashlight and looked at her like she had just returned from Mars. "Could you be any crazier? Why not just let him walk around?"
"Because they keep coming back and if you do leave something out that you want, they'll destroy it. Didn't you see the scratch marks on the tool shed? If I hadn't gone out he would have taken the door and the frame down. He'll think twice before coming to my house."
"Is your life always this exciting?"
"Nah, it's really boring."