19. Chapter 19
Chapter nineteen
Charles
Morning comes, and I awake in an old camper where everyone is sleeping. Kate is still curled against my good side, and it is the best feeling I’d had since, well, ever. I’m tempted just to stay in bed with her, but there is work to do. I carefully extricate myself, doing my best not to wake her. But she rolls and stretches, plastering her length against me. “Hold that thought,” I say. “I’ll be right back.
I use the facilities. James and I had done some good planning in this old rig, and he has kept it up-to-date since he sometimes uses it to check on remote holdings. The composting toilet is set up to divide liquids from solids, and a tight-seal waste can stood ready to receive toilet paper and similar items. But the shower isn’t hooked up.
I rummage in the medicine cabinet and drawers, find a box of personal towelettes, and do the best I could by way of cleanup. I leave the tub of towelettes where Kate can find them and hurry back to her.
She kisses me and unselfconsciously hurries to the tiny bathroom. I pull the blankets up over me. The morning is chilly, and I can hear rain on the roof of the camper. When Kate returns, I lift the edge of the covers, welcoming her back in. Thanks to Kate’s massage, or perhaps just to the few hours of rest she had given me, my hip seems to have popped back into place and isn’t giving me any trouble. The warmth and comfort of her warms me to my soul, easing other hurts – internal ones – that I hadn’t even realized I had.
I return her kiss, gently at first, then with increasing passion. She tastes so good, like strawberries, perhaps. The lemon-coconut scent of her hair surrounds me. I run my hands down her back, relishing the texture of her soft skin, then delighting in the way her ass cheek perfectly fits into my hand. I have to spread my fingers a little wider than I thought; she is soft padded velvet over supple muscle, athletic yet feminine. I draw her in against me, and she responds to my touch with enthusiasm.
I feel so good, so alive, that I take the chance that my hip will behave and gently roll her onto her back and slide over her. I tease her entrance with the tip of my penis, mentally thanking my old drill sergeant for the many hours of push-ups and yoga planks that gave me control over my body. Kate tries to capture me, but I withhold the object of her desire, lying down on my good side, skin-to-skin against her. She is so beautiful! I brush my fingers over her entrance. She is already wet, and so ready for me. I slide my fingers inside her and kiss her long and deep, feeling her muscles clench around my digits.
“We won’t have long,” she whispers, “Cece will be up. And I want you. I want you right now, before I have to share you with everyone and all the things that need to be done!”
“Your wish is my command,” I whisper back. I had no more desire to be interrupted than she did. I ease back up over her, and slowly ease my length inside her. Her eyes open wide, and she gives a sharp intake of breath but makes no other sound. But I feel her increase in tension, as she tilts her hips to meet me.
Then I am lost in the feel of her, her scent compounding of her shampoo, her arousal, and her. My awareness becomes hyper-focused, narrowing down to the center of our mutual pleasure, as we find our rhythm. She matches me, stroke for stroke, wrapping her legs about me to give me better access. Even in the throes of passion, she retains enough awareness to be silent. Only a hoarse intake of breath, shuddering tension and subsequent relaxation tells me that she has reached her climax. Her muscles hug me, and I follow after her in a cascade of ecstasy.
Rain continues to pound on the roof. I ease myself down beside her, wishing we could stay there forever. But I know my daughter will be up soon, and her brother will be knocking on our door. I kiss her again, then whisper in her ear, “To be continued.” Then I slip out of bed and retire to the miniscule bath to clean up and get dressed. Kate slips past me as I come out, lifting her face for a quick kiss. I oblige, then say a little hoarsely, “Careful there, or we’ll wind up back in bed.”
She giggles, as I had intended her to, and goes on to take her turn at the facilities, such as they were. We’d need to see about water, sewer, and power for everyone – and soon.
Dressed, I step to the door and open it. In the distance, I can hear the sound of rushing water. It irritates me that it continues raining. I’m not sure why it should, but it did. We’d already managed through one storm. Now, I have people who need a day or two of sunny weather to regroup and be safe. But that is weather for you. It never pays attention to people’s needs.
James, wearing a yellow rain slicker, rain hat, and fishing boots, comes walking toward me from the direction of the sound of the rushing water. “The creek’s up,” he says. “We need to move everyone to higher ground. How much land do you have here?”
“You should know,” I replied. “You helped me buy it. There’s three hundred acres. The stream cuts diagonally across it. The highest point is a little town called Spindizzy. You should recall it because I had a devil of a time buying it. I had to lease part of it back to the owners to get their consent.”
“Yeah, I remember that now,” James says. “You aren’t going to get a warm welcome up that way.”
“No,” I agree, “Likely not. Is there anything they need? Medical clinic? Fire department? Post office? How can I sweeten the deal so that moving a small village next door to them isn’t going to cause a riot?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” James drawls casually, “Give back ownership of their town?”
“James!” I exclaim. “It was a ghost town. About one house in twenty was occupied, and there were hardly more than one hundred dwellings in the first place. I just bought the property last year. With a little more time, I can make it into a thriving community again.”
“Well, you see,” James says, “That’s one of your blind spots, Chief. I can hear a lot of ‘I’ and ‘me’ in that statement, and not much ‘they’ and ‘them.’ Have you asked those last twenty inhabitants what they really want?”
I fold my arms, the rain soaking my hair and dripping in rivulets into my collar. “I suppose you have?”
James gives a wry smile. “Didn’t need to. One of the residents is a local sports hero who heads up the volunteer fire and rescue. An older couple who runs the post office are my great-uncle and great-aunt on Mom’s side of the family. I didn’t realize when you wanted to acquire some acreage in Kansas that you were going to buy up a whole town. ”
“Well, shit,” I say. “Why didn’t you say so when I purchased it?”
James looks troubled. “Because it is a ghost town, and it’s going to fall apart soon if no one does anything about it. I know you’ve been grieving, but the folks there are beginning to wonder if anything is going to change.”
Charles sighs. He had loved being a recluse with his daughter and her nanny. But it seems that the world has moved on, pandemic or not, while he had been sequestered in his penthouse. “Are there any buildings that are sound? What about utilities?”
“Well, the old GoGetters grocery might be alright. It was a sort of department store and farmer’s market. It was closed just about five years ago when the last heir passed away, and some city slicker bought up the location.” James gives Charles a toothy grin. “It isn’t tornado safe, though.”
I blow a drop of water off my nose. “Well, hell,” I say.
Kate says from behind me, “Guys! Cece’s going to wake up soon. Let me out so I can walk Gidget. She swears she’s about to burst.”
I step aside, amazed at how put together and proper Kate looks, considering what we’d been doing only a short while ago. She continually gives me more reasons to be amazed. I am too busy ogling her to pay attention to where I am stepping, and I wind up ankle deep in a rain puddle. Gidget, then Kate, make a similar splashdown. Gidget pulls her unfortunate human tagalong to slightly higher ground before doing her business.
“Is the old grocery store parking lot paved?” I ask, surveying the haphazard arrangement of vehicles.
“Yeah,” James says.
“Then let’s get these people to higher ground before we have to get a bus or tow them out.”
“On it, Chief,” James says. “The truck is still hitched up. Can you get the camper, Cece, and Kate up-slope before it really cuts loose?”
I turn around to tell Kate what is going on, but she cuts past me, saying, “I’ll get things battened down and get everyone into the pickup cab.”
By the time I have the camper braces lifted, Kate is strapping Cece into the car seat. She has the cat carrier backpack strapped to her shoulders, and Gidget sits in the passenger seat.
“Where are we headed?” she asks, as I get in.
“An old grocery store parking lot in Spindizzy,” I reply.
“Great! We can stop in and see Aunt Ninny and Uncle Toohot.”
“Who?” I ask, wondering if I’d heard correctly.
“Oh, those aren’t their real names,” she explains. “They are Alice and Richard Smith, Mom’s sister and brother-in-law. At some point, she said that he was just too hot to handle, and someone else told her she was a ninny to think so — and they’ve been Aunt Ninny and Uncle Toohot to us kids ever since.”
“I suppose they encouraged it?” I ask.
“Oh, of course! At every possible chance. They run the post office in Spindizzy — or they did until someone bought everything out.”
I sighed. “I bought it,” I say. “It was becoming a ghost town. As far as I know, the post office is still operating, and a Mr. and Mrs. Smith are in charge of it.”
Kate stares at me in the rearview mirror. She is on the bench seat, tucking a blanket around Cece. “You bought it?”
“Yeah,” I say. “Me and the corporation. It’s a good location, it already has water wells, municipal utilities, and a post office. It just needs some kind of industry and a few more citizens. Best of all, it’s got a paved parking lot where we can get these people set up before all the cars and vans sink out of sight in the mud.”
She just continues to stare.
“Dammit, Kate, did I leave another country gate open?”
“Don’t swear in front of your daughter,” she reprimands. “And, yeah, you kind of did.” There is an angry edge to her voice that I don’t like. More than that, I realize that it hurts to have her upset with me.
Several things run through my mind to say, most of them involving words that Cece shouldn’t learn and repeat. Finally, I say, “How?”
Kate turns to Cece, handing her a sippy cup of juice and securing a lunch package where my daughter can reach it. “You ok?” she asks.
“Yes!” Cece declares. “I’m a big girl, I can feed myself!”
“All right,” Kate says. “I’m going upfront to talk to your daddy.”
Kate climbs between the seats, pops Gidget in the back, and settles herself in the passenger seat. “What had you planned to do with the place?”
“I really hadn’t decided,” I say. “I’d just acquired it when Em got sick. I had some ideas, but she was a high priority for me, and then there was settling you in with Cece. I just hadn’t gotten back around to even thinking about it. Modernize the housing, put in something that earns money, that kind of thing.”
She rolls her eyes at me. “Those are just crumbling old houses to you, but to a lot of people who live not too far away, those are the places where their grandparents lived, or their favorite aunt or uncle. Even though most people don’t have jobs close enough to move back in, those are ancestral homes — just as much as if they were castles in Scotland.”
We pass flooded fields and rows of windmills. The silence in the truck stretches to uncomfortable proportions .
“Why is it named Spindizzy?” I ask, hoping to get her talking again.
“See those windmills?” she says, nodding toward the rows and rows of towers, some so vintage in style Don Quixote would have recognized them; some are quite modern.
“Yeah?” I raised an eyebrow at her.
“That’s how the town gets its name. You wouldn’t think it today, but Kansas can get super dry in the summer. The older windmills are pumping water, and the newer ones are producing power. It isn’t enough . . .” She stops talking and looks out the window.
I can fill in the blanks. The families who had owned the properties — often with years of back taxes on them, bank liens, and more, had hoped they could earn enough working in some city or other to return. And I’d destroyed that hope.
I groan. “I really have stepped in it, haven’t I?”
“Yeah,” Kate says. “But you didn’t know.”
I feel relief wash over me, for I heard forgiveness in her tones. Somehow, that is important. Far more important to me than any other opinion has ever been before.
“What shall we make of it, my Dainty Kate?” I ask.
She catches the reference. “Do you think me a shrew in need of taming?”
“No,” I shake my head, “Only when I’ve done something outrageously citified and stupid. Seriously, how can I fix this?”
“Don’t start by bulldozing down all those houses,” she says. “At least give people a chance to come get things out of them. Or maybe set up a city museum or something.”
“The agent I sent out here to look at it before the corporation bought it said that most of the places were riddled with termites, and could not be reclaimed,” I say.
“Just go slow,” Kate coaxes, “Give the former residents a chance to have some say. ”
“All right,” I say. “There isn’t much going on in the way of construction anywhere right now. We can give it some time. Meanwhile, maybe we can go through the records, and see which places lack possible heirs, and if any of them are sound enough to use. I’ve got a caravan of 3000 or so people who need a place to get out of the rain.”
“GoGetters grocery should have a solid roof,” Kate says. “Dad was on the board of directors when it was part of the farming coop. James wasn’t very happy about it, but Mom approved the sale of the store property. She, Aunt Ninny, and Uncle TooHot were influential in getting the rest of the board to sell.”
If I hadn’t been driving, I would have stuck my finger in my ear and rooted around in there to see if I had some kind of blockage or a malfunctioning hearing aid.
“So, Miss Daughter of Propertied Landowners, what other surprise assets do you have?”
“None,” she assures me. “I received a cash settlement that I spent on going to college. James inherited the farm. Mom officially has lifetime residency, but she and Dad moved into an assisted living facility because Dad was becoming a danger to himself and others. The rest of the money from the sale was put into a trust for Aunt Ninny and Uncle Toohot. Social Security barely covers rent these days.”
“Oh.” I have no idea what else to say. I can see that she is staring out the window, looking a little sad.
“So, yeah,” she says, “I really am exactly as advertised: a poor college student, on the cusp of getting my degree. When the farm makes a profit, which it has not for a long time, I get a share. You saved me from living on my brother’s charity.”
“Oh, Kate,” I say, desperate to erase the sadness I heard in her tones, “You rescued me. I . . .” Again the words hover on my lips, but I am afraid to say them. I am terrified that “I love you” will scare her away, or maybe scare me away. It is hard to tell the difference. “I was wallowing. Drowning. Manuela was doing her best to hold things together, and she’s brilliant. But think. . . where would Cece and I have been if you hadn’t arrived in the nick of time?”
Kate laughs, as I’d hoped she would. “You’d have been knee deep in dog poop with nothing to wear that didn’t smell like cat pee, and eating room service food because you couldn’t find the pantry.”
I laugh, too, at her description of our fate without her. “Exactly. More than that, Kate, you center me. You help keep me steady. I wouldn’t be able to move today without that lovely massage you gave me last night. And . . .”
“And little pitchers have big ears,” Kate cautions, tipping her head meaningfully toward the back seat.
The homily elicits another soft chuckle from me. “So they do. Trust me, Kate. I’m glad that being with me has value for you, but you’ve given far more than you’ve received.”
“I love Miss Kate. And she loves me,” Cece pipes up from the backseat.
“So she does,” I say, thinking of Emily’s last instruction to find someone who would love Cece. I hold out my hand to Kate. She lays her hand in mine and squeezes gently.
Then she says in her most quelling schoolteacher voice, “Eyes on the road, Mr. Charles. Hands on the wheel.”
“Yes, Ma’am,” I reply, feeling happier than I had in months. Maybe even in years.