Author's Note. I've been trying to decide if I want to hold out on this chapter or not, and ultimately decided not to. However, it'll be the last chapter until the ALTA follow-up, Exeunt, is up. Next chapter just has too many spoilers, and I think the whole storyline actually reads better if the events are read chronologically.

Disclaimer. The characters of The Mummy are the property of Universal Studios. The title and chapter titles are taken from the song "It Ain't Me, Babe" by Johnny Cash (because what could be more fitting than a Johnny Cash song for the Americans?), originally written by Bob Dylan. The ranch and setting take a heavy cue from the film Giant. As far as I know, Blackbird, Texas is a town of my own invention.

IT AIN'T ME, BABE

promise never to part.

The Fireman's Dance: Blackbird, Texas, 1940

David Daniels was on his third beer, and he was feeling good.

He loved the Fireman's Dance in Blackbird. He'd loved it since he was a little kid, sneaking sips of punch from the bowl and begging another root beer or cream soda off of his pops. It had always been the only thing there really was to do in a town that size, and most everyone looked forward to it. Too many of Jemima's fancy trips often took them out of the country during the dance, but this year he put his foot down. It hadn't taken much effort, really. Between the kids' begging and his unwillingness to entertain a discussion, Jemima had at last threw up her hands and said, Oh well to the Caribbean, then!

Ain't you seen enough and had enough 'a this world, Jem? Let's sit our asses down for five goddamn minutes and stay home.

She'd rolled her eyes - her pretty, startling eyes - but she had a smile on her face. And he smiled to himself, just thinking about her and that irritated expression on her face. Sometimes he liked to get her goat. Sometimes he liked to rile her. She was damn cute when she was riled, and he couldn't help but to tease her now and then.

She was thirty-six now, and she looked exactly the same to him as she had when they were married. He had a tendency to forget she was so young when they got married, since she was already a widow with a child. And everything about Jemima was mature. She'd carried herself like she was thirty and talked like she was thirty and he'd forgotten that she'd actually just barely broken into her twenties when they met. She looked thirty then and she looked thirty now, thin and poised and dark blonde, with a cigarette hanging between her fingers.

He supposed things were different about her, even if he really didn't think she'd aged. She was stylish; she'd always been stylish. And her hair was longer now. Her skirts were shorter now. She looked like a movie star. Like she'd stepped off of a damn movie poster. She always had.

She sat there next to him with her legs crossed, rocking one foot to the music that was playing. She stole little drags from a dying cigarette, and stared at something that wasn't there at all. And then she noticed he was watching her.

"What's the matter?" she asked. A Southern accent is infectious, but she'd stayed stubborn against it. She spoke prim and English, though perhaps softer than she used to. She might not have known what had slipped away.

He smiled and shook his head. "Nothin', baby. Nothin' at all."

She nodded, a little smirk creeping in the corner of her mouth. She glanced at him and nodded at the dancefloor. "Are you aware that your fourteen-year-old daughter is having a dance?"

Dave frowned, immediately straightening in his seat and unabashedly searching the dancefloor for Betsy. Jemima giggled.

"Darling, you're being terribly obvious."

"I'm her father," he retorted. "I can be as obvious as I want."

She was giggling again, but the sound of her laughter faded as his eyes settled on someone entirely different from his already-too-pretty teenaged girl. Someone he hadn't seen a while.

Quite a while.

He didn't know why, but his hand shook a little as he reached for his beer and took a deep gulp.

"What's the matter, darling?" Jemima's teasing voice broke through his surprise. "Is she dancing with a devil? Just an absolute devil?"

"Mind if we sit with ya'll?"

David tore his gaze away, glancing up irritably at his sister and brother-in-law. Before anyone could answer, Naomi plopped in a chair, and Bernard kicked another one away from the table so that he'd have room to sit, too. He had a plate of pie balanced in each hand, and open beers in the crook of one arm.

"Naomi, is that who I think it is?"

His sister frowned, following his pointing finger to the person across the room. She stared with curious, squinting eyes for a moment before her mouth opened in surprise.

"Well I'll be," she said at last, just barely above a whisper.

Jemima looked between both of them in confusion. "Who are you talking about? What's going on?"

Naomi picked up one of the beers Bernard had put on the table and took a gulp. She gestured with the bottle in her hand. "You see that girl there with the black hair - well, ain't exactly a girl - but you see her, right? 'Bout our age - well, more like my age - "

Jemima scouted out the mysterious person and turned quickly back to Naomi. "Yes, of course. What about her?"

"That's Cara Lee McCoy."

Jemima shrugged, her face still as puzzled as before. "Who's Cara Lee McCoy?"

Who, indeed. Speaking of people who hadn't changed a bit since the last time Dave had seen them.

Her hair was still so shiny and black, and even at this distance, he could see her eyes were as vibrant and blue-green as they ever were. She was laughing her easy, musical laugh and against his will, he smiled to see that dimple - deep and sweet - in the pit of her cheek. His throat felt dry.

Cara Lee McCoy.

Everyone rushed her first name in their easy accents, and said it like some kind of contrived adjective, "carolly." Like they were describing a song. That hymn felt kinda carolly, didn't it? That's how she was. Bright and lyrical and promising, like Christmas Eve. Cara Lee. Sweet and lovely. He'd loved her his whole life, the way young men love pretty girls. His whole life up til then, he'd loved her. Head over heels. Out of breath. In love.

They went out together, back when they were teenagers. They went out even though she swore she never would. You're no good, Dave Daniels, she'd giggled with those adorable dimples flashing and offered him a wink, and anyway, you ain't my type. Dave had never taken no from anybody, and he wasn't about to start with an irresistible beauty like Cara Lee. He'd have her, one way or another. And the more she turned him down, the more he wanted her, until at last he wore her down to an exasperated yes. Yes, Dave. Fine. But you best enjoy yourself. I ain't goin' on another with you.

They were out til after midnight, kissing hot and frantic and breathless because they were young and alive. No one had ever been more young and alive than them.

You're gonna marry me, Cara Lee.

I ain't.

You are too, and you know it. You know it, don't ya?

Dave...I known it my whole life. I mean all of my life. All of it.

He really hadn't meant anything sleeping with Jemima in Egypt. It was just a little...a little nothing. Just two people meaninglessly enjoying themselves. They were grown ups. It was the Twenties. So why not? Jemima had never given him any reason to think she wanted more than to fool around. And Dave was a man. He had a right to a bit of fun. He wasn't married to Cara Lee. Not yet. Soon enough it would be them - just the two of them. But he wasn't married and he didn't owe anybody an explanation. He loved Cara Lee, of course. He loved her. But he wasn't married and he didn't owe her an explanation.

Just the same, she expected one when he came back from Egypt with a pregnant new wife.

He hadn't had much in the way of explanations to offer, and she took his defensive flustering with a coolness that he never admitted hurt. And that was all. She'd never been in want for beaus, and she married some...somebody from Houston and moved off, presumably to forget him.

Maybe so he could forget her.

Regardless she wasn't in Blackbird, and Dave had other things to worry about. He had a new son and then a new daughter and a beautiful, clever wife whom everybody liked, even if her proper Englishness seemed peculiar sometimes. He had a good life. His rigs were coming in and the money was more than covering the hit the Depression was taking on most everybody else. He was keeping folks employed and the whole town was grateful for him and Burns and Henderson being there. Things were good. He didn't need Cara Lee for things to be good.

But suddenly here she was again, like a vision out of a dream. She met his eyes across the way, and smiled. He didn't know why his body suddenly become stiff and uncomfortable when she started towards their table.

He didn't need Cara Lee for things to be good.

He didn't.

But just the same he felt a kind of gaping in his gut that irritated him, and he found himself frowning when she arrived, out of breath.

"I thought that was you, Dave!"

He took a nonchalant gulp of his beer. "Yep. It's me."

Those dimples. "I thought so. How you been?"

He shrugged. "Fine."

He could feel Jemima eyeing him disapprovingly for being so blatantly rude, but he ignored her.

"Is this your wife?"

"Yes," Jemima jumped in cheerily. "I'm Jemima."

"Cara Lee Carver."

Dave let out a snort. "It's Carver now, is it?"

She met his eyes with quizzical amusement. "Yes. Saw a broad-shouldered youngin' over yonder; figured he must be yours."

Burns chuckled quietly to himself, and Dave blew a raspberry dismissively. Jemima swatted him, but she couldn't keep from giggling herself. Naomi was the first one composed enough to say:

"Honey, you got the wrong boy!"

Cara Lee frowned in confusion. "Ain't it him over there? Good-lookin' with the dark hair?"

Jemima and Naomi sat up a little in their seats to see who she was indicating; Dave didn't even glance up.

"I can damn well guarantee you got the wrong kid."

Burns chuckled, shaking his head. "Don't think nobody's ever called Benji broad-shouldered."

Or good-looking, waited the words no one would dare say aloud.

Jemima glanced at him, a little smirk in her mouth but a kind of defensiveness in her gaze. "Now Bernard, he's only fifteen..."

Burns held up his hands. "Hey. I know. Didn't mean nothin' by it. I'm just sayin' - "

She stared back at him calmly. "I know what you're saying."

Dave sighed, his eyes twinkling with something like amusement. "You done woke the mama bear, Burns."

Jemima swatted him but turned her attention to Cara Lee. "Regardless, the short of it is, that isn't our son." She scanned the dance floor with a frown increasing between her eyes. "Where is Benjamin...?"

The words had barely left her mouth before a gunshot rang out overhead, and a woman screamed, and loud above all of the commotion, someone else bellowed:

"I don't care if you the son 'a Dave Daniels, John D. Rockefeller, or the Almighty God, you gonna keep your quick little fingers away from my pockets or you'll be losin' 'em, you hear me, boy?"

Jemima gasped, turning desperately to Dave, her eyes darting wide and frantic between him and the scene forming on the suddenly vacant dance floor.

"My word," Cara Lee murmured.

Dave sucked in a deep breath, anger pounding hot and oppressive as a summer afternoon through his whole body. He could almost not think for the blood-colored emotion pumping between his ears.

Because goddamn Benji.

Honest to God, goddamn that little prick of a son.

Dave heaved himself out of the chair, his hand on his holster. He was only vaguely aware of Burns trailing him. At some point, Henderson must have joined, too, because there he was to his right, hanging just far enough back too keep things from looking too much like an all-out brawl.

In the space that had cleared on the floor, Benjamin stood in his stooped, nervous way, hands held up in surrender, eyes wide and cowardly and pitiful. He turned his skinny face to Dave, but couldn't be too relieved at the look in his father's face. Dave saw his Adam's apple jerk nervously, and actively fought the urge to clock him square on the jaw.

Standing just a little too close to him was Festus Black, a drunk and a gambler, who also happened to sharecrop on the only spit of the Daniels' land worth picking at.

"What the hell's goin' on here?" Dave demanded.

Festus had a permanent lazy eye, and it stared at him crazily until the other had a chance to find his glare, too.

"Mr. Daniels, I know he's your son and all, but ain't nobody got a mind to abide a thief!"

"I didn't take nothin'!" Benjamin said in a tone that whined, pointing accusingly at Festus. "Least nothin' that wasn't mine to begin with!"

"Easy now, ya'll," the slow, rumbling voice of Sheriff Longmont rolled in. He situated himself in between Festus and Benjamin, but hung back a little from Dave. He didn't dare step in front of the esteemed but short-tempered Mr. Daniels. "Let's sort this out like gentlemen..."

Festus sniffed. "Squirrelly som'bitch took m' wallet clean outta my pocket! Emptied it, an' I caught him sneakin' it back in again!"

Dave twitched with agitation; Longmont raised his eyebrows. "You got the empty wallet there, Festus?"

He dug a beat-up leather wallet out of his pocket and handed it to the sheriff, muttering all the while about how it was empty now, twenty-three bucks in there, and it's empty now...Longmont flipped through it.

Dave eyed his son.

He loved Benji. Of course he did. He was his boy, and he loved him. But goddamn it, if he had to sort through another of his messes, he was going to have to shoot him. It wasn't that he was a bad kid, Dave knew. He was just...just getting to that age. That rebellious teen age, and unlike Lionel - who'd chosen to act out in a way that made sense to Dave, by staying out too late and sneaking beer with the rest of the high school football team - Benji had settled himself down at any and every poker game that would abide a snot-nosed kid playing with them. He was only fifteen, and most of the roughnecks didn't have any patience playing cards with a fifteen-year-old, but seeing as how he was a Daniels, they all figured he had pockets lined with gold and oil, and they usually tolerated him if it meant they could take him for all he was worth.

More like all Dave was worth.

It wasn't like Benji had ever worked a day in his life, and so far he had no intentions of working, either. He had no interest in anything except card-playing and worrying his mother sick sneaking out at all hours to whatever seedy little place and seedy little people would play with him. Which was, of course, another thing.

This wasn't the first time Dave had had to swoop in and rescue Benji with his brawn and his money (mostly his money), but this was probably the first time he was having to do it in front of Jemima, and had he room for any thoughts other than pummeling his son, he might have been dreading that conversation with his wife already.

"He was cheatin'!" Benji said, loud and complaining.

"Was not!"

"Was so! Had cards fallin' out his sleeves like autumn leaves!"

Longmont snorted, giving the boy an incredulous look. "How 'bout you save that poetry talk for Mrs. Longmont's English class. It'd keep you outta trouble."

Benji flinched, crossing his arms over his chest nervously. He glanced up at Dave for a moment, but quickly retreated to his shoes.

"I want my twenty-three dollars," Festus was saying.

Benji kicked at a rock on the floor. "Won it, fair and square."

Longmont heaved a sigh, looking at Dave in something like weariness, or boredom. Probably boredom. "If you'll give 'im the dough, I'll let you handle your boy at home. Won't book him or nothin'."

Dave's jaw flexed, and he stared hard at his son as he told the sheriff, "Oh, believe me, he'll wish you'd booked him after I get through with him."

Longmont snorted. "I figgered so."

Benji gulped, twitching there anxiously as Dave picked out a few bills and handed them over to Festus. He glanced up at his father with wide, desperate eyes, but Dave didn't give him a moment to use them for mercy. He took hold of Benji's ear with a ferocity that made the boy yelp, and dragged him all the way to the table before finally letting go. He gave him a terse shove in Jemima's direction, and told him:

"You go wait in the car with your mother. I'll get to you in a minute."

Benji trembled and nodded his head, scurrying along beside Jemima into the night. Dave met her upset gaze only briefly before turning his attention to the party. He glanced around agitatedly, his hands on his hips, and then turned to Naomi and demanded:

"Where's Betsy and Lionel? They somehow miss their brother causin' the biggest ruckus this town's ever seen?"

"I don't know about the biggest," Cara Lee's voice piped up, teasing but sweet. He could see that dimple out of the corner of his eye, and she gave him a wink. "As I recall, you caused a ruckus or two back in the day."

Dave shook his head, too aggravated to indulge her flirtation. He let out a loud sigh, turning his attention to Naomi again.

"You seen 'em or what?"

Naomi raised her eyebrows, meeting his irritable glare evenly. "Honey, they ain't my kids." She took a sip of her beer. "But I think I saw Betsy over by the punch bowl, and Lionel...well. It's been a bit now, but last I saw he was wanderin' yonder with Mabel Dubois."

Cara Lee giggled, and Dave glanced up at the sky. "Now why couldn't my boy get into that kinda trouble 'stead 'a this?"

"If he's a thing like you, he'll be gettin' into it soon enough," Cara Lee said in a voice that was too quiet to be playful. Dave glanced down and met her eyes, green and blue as ever. He heard her suck back a little breath, and he tried not to notice the way she was looking at him, the same way she'd looked at him the first night they'd made love. Hot and frantic and out of breath.

"You go tend to that son," Naomi said pointedly, glancing between them. Dave looked away and met her chiding face with defensive eyes. "Bernard and me'll take them other two home."

Dave nodded his head. "Alright." His gaze drifted back to Cara Lee again. "Nice seein' you again."

She offered him a sad smile. "Always, Dave. Always nice seein' you."

He sighed and trudged away, reminded with a spine-tingling jolt of the situation with Benji waiting in the car. He didn't want to deal with his son. He'd much rather be sitting at that table with Cara Lee, maybe having a dance...just for old time's sake, of course. Just for old time's sake...

He swung open the car door and settled into his seat, glaring back at Benji through the rearview mirror.

"Where are Lionel and Betsy?" Jemima asked.

Dave told her that Naomi and Bernard were bringing them home, and started the car. They drove in silence down the road back to the ranch. Dave was vaguely aware of Jemima sniffling now and then, and dabbing at her eyes. He tried not to be irritated with her, too. Of course she was going to be upset over Benji. Mothers and boys...it was a whole thing. He'd disappointed his own mother enough as a teenager to know. Of course she was upset.

He just didn't have the gumption for this anymore. Cara Lee's eyes and dimples and quiet, lilting voice had consumed him, clouding his mind in a haze of old memories the whole way back to the ranch. And as they pulled up to the house and got of the car, he found he didn't care about Benji and the card game anymore. He didn't care and he didn't want to deal with it. So what if the boy played cards? Dave could give him a hearty walloping, and he'd just go and do it again. And anyway, Festus probably had been cheating. He was known to cheat. It had cost Dave twenty-three dollars, but so what? That was small change for him, and God knows he'd thrown more money at stupider things.

He got out of the car and walked inside, hearing Benji's nervous, creeping footsteps behind him all the way down the hall and into the kitchen. He heard Jemima let out a sigh as he opened the liquor cabinet and poured himself a drink, and he could feel her eyeing him persistently. He took a sip of bourbon, and she lost her patience.

"Well, young man? What have you got to say for yourself?" she demanded.

Benji jerked a shrug and mumbled, "I told you, he was cheatin'..."

"And that gives you a free license to pick his pocket like a common thief?" she nearly shouted, her voice straining through a strangely desperate sob. "Is that the sort of person you are?"

Dave heaved a sigh. "Oh, for Christ's sake, Jem..."

Her eyes snapped to his, wide and furious. "I beg your pardon! Do you really mean to tell me I'm the only one disturbed by this behavior?"

He was too weary to roll his eyes. "Jesus, it ain't like he's some kinda...criminal mastermind here. Festus was three sheets to the wind. A toddler coulda pulled the shirt off his back and he wouldn'ta known it."

Jemima's eyes narrowed. "Don't dismiss what he's done."

Benji's glance shifted warily between his parents. "He was cheatin'..." he mumbled plaintively again.

Jemima huffed, turning her glare to him furiously. "I don't care if he robbed you blind and gave you a black eye! That is not the way people in this family behave!"

Dave let out a loud, dismissive sigh. "Now don't start with that..."

"With what?"

He met her eyes evenly. "Boy's gotta defend himself. Can't tell him not to do somethin', let 'im get pushed around. Man's gotta take a stand - "

"Really?" she said with a sudden air of British coolness. She stared down her nose at him like a proper aristocrat. "Then perhaps you might explain to me how sneaking Mr. Black's wallet out of his pocket and stealing back his money constitutes any manner of 'taking a stand.'"

Dave's eyes hardened. He definitely wasn't in the mood for her blue-blooded airs, and that fancy vocabulary she liked to pull out every now and then to win an argument. His mouth set in a scowl, and he turned sharply to Benji.

"You go on to sleep. I'm done with you."

Benji looked confused, but didn't lose a moment scurrying out of the room before his mother started protesting. Dave let out a long sigh and took a much-needed gulp of bourbon, letting it drown out Jemima's furious shock.

"...I mean, what on earth is the matter with you?"

He glanced up at her with dull eyes. "Honey, this is hardly the worst of it."

Jemima's eyes widened. "And I suppose you just...let him go on his way those times, as well."

"Nope," he muttered into his glass. "Usually wallop 'im pretty good."

"Then why does he keep doing it?" she asked, her voice losing its edge to sad desperation. She dropped into a kitchen chair, holding her head in her hand.

Dave shrugged, feeling the twinge of sympathy at seeing her sitting there like that. For a moment he wished he had beat Benji instead. "I don't know, honey. I reckon 'cause he's too skinny to play sports and too ugly to dally with girls."

"Don't call him ugly."

He let out a surrendering sigh. "Sorry, honey. I forget you're sensitive about that. Your side 'a the family and all."

"That's not the only reason," she said, more to herself than to him. She met his eyes seriously. "I don't want him to think that...that the only girls he's handsome enough for are the bad ones."

Dave let out a snort. "Boys don't think that way, Jem."

"Perhaps not."

She sighed wearily, blinking away her tears. She stared at a far-off spot on the floor. He offered her a sad smile, and reached across the table for her hand. "Lemme get you a drink."

She nodded weakly.

"I don't want him to be a criminal," she said.

Dave found an old-fashioned glass and pulled out the bourbon. "He ain't gonna be a criminal."

"I don't want him to be like - "

She stopped abruptly, her teeth clicking as she clamped her mouth shut. He turned and looked at her curiously. She met his eyes and gave him a stiff shrug.

"I just don't want him to be a criminal is all."

Dave shook his head and filled up her glass. "You're blowin' this way outta proportion."

Jemima let out a sigh and nodded her head. He brought her the drink, and she sucked it in gratefully. He sat down at the table with her, sloshing the rest of his drink around in his glass. When she at last put hers back down on the table, she looked a little better.

"So who was that woman?" she asked after a moment, a fresh (if forced) smile on her face. "That...Cara Lee something-or-other?"

Dave cleared his throat in a way he hoped was nonchalant. He scratched the back of his neck. "Oh...nobody. She was nobody."

Jemima watched him, her eyebrows raised incredulously. She had a little smirk tucked in the corner of her mouth. "You know, we've been happily married for fifteen years now. It's alright if she was your sweetheart. Did the two of you have a torrid affair? Just an absolutely, scandalously torrid affair?"

He stared into his glass, and felt her playful smile fade against the side of his face. He should have just told her, right away, that Cara Lee was his sweetheart back in high school. That that was all. But the seconds dragged on between them, and a kind of suspicion was lurking in his wife's eyes. He should have just told her so, right then. But he couldn't quite find the right way to lie to her. So he sat there in silence. And took a drink from his glass.

"She was nobody," he said again quietly.