Table of Contents:

THE SWITCH (gay lesbian)

ONE HEARTBREAKING SMILE (gay)

WHAT LOVE MAKES OF US (lesbian)

POWERS UNEXPECTED (gay)

THESE BOOTS (lesbian)

SOMETHING IN BETWEEN (gay)

AGATHOS DAIMON (GOOD SPIRIT)

copyright©2012 by j.e.Carlson

All rights reserved. No part of this book ay be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations

THE SWITCH

Kay and John had been friends since childhood. It was an odd match. If they hadn’t lived near each other, if they hadn’t been the only kids around for miles, if they hadn’t been the same age, maybe the friendship would never have blossomed They became close as siblings and just as apt to annoy and irritate each other as they were to have fun. When they were young the two ran wild -- always outside exploring, egging each other on, riding the horses, searching for frogs, toads, salamanders, lizards, snakes and whatever else they could find.

Kay was what they used to call a tomboy. She liked dares and she wasn’t afraid of much. Although John was as competitive, rough and reckless as Kay, he was nerdy too. He read a lot and learned more on his own than he ever did in school. Kay was really into animals. Domestic or wild, it didn’t matter to her. All beasts were objects of fascination. John liked animals too, but he did not have the patience that Kay had with her horses and dog -- obedience training, exercising, grooming -- that part was all boring to him.

After high school, Kay began studies at the community college to become a veterinarian. She enrolled in classes that would prepare her for med-school and university studies. John got a job in the printing industry and became a journeyman press operator.

No one would have guessed, as time passed that Kay would discover in college that she was attracted to women physically, emotionally and intellectually. And when John introduced Kay to his obviously gay friend, she was surprised but oddly pleased and relieved. Nothing about John was remotely feminine or gay except for his unusually long thick lashes and his lack of interest in dating. Now she could tell him without the trepidation she had felt before this unexpected revelation. When she finally did tell him, his surprise was equal to her own. “But what about Bill?” he asked.

She laughed. “That was in high school, John. Besides kissing Bill was like making out with an arm or a leg. No excitement whatsoever.”

The whole situation made them laugh and laugh. She hugged him like a brother. He hugged her back. “and what about that Brian guy you introduced me to?”

“Oh, that is over and done. He wasn’t really my type anyway.”

She giggled. “What is your type then?”

“Damned if I know. But it wasn’t him.”

When John had earned enough vacation time, Kay took a semester off. They had planned and decided that they would take a couple of the horses to the Olympic peninsula and spend some time on the trail. They both loved the wilderness but for different reasons. John liked the silence and reading under a kerosene lamp while Kay liked the riding and potential danger. At night while he read, she stared into the fire or sharpened hunting knives or something.

John didn’t plan on a formal education, but his intellectual interests were always in overdrive. Lately he had been studying ancient religion, dead languages and cultural history in general.

“What are you reading?” Kay asked. John handed her the book he was pouring over. She looked at the book and shook her head. “can’t even read the first word of the title! I don’t know how you could find something like that interesting.”

He crossed his eyes and made her laugh. “Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion,” he said. Prolegomena just means the beginning or preparation, a foundation for further study.”

“That is bizarre. Such a dry subject, all that old stuff, and how could a book that thick be only the beginning?”

“The old saying; One man's meat is another man's poison comes to mind.”

On the third morning they were out, John dismounted to take a piss. When he stepped into the underbrush to go, he saw something glinting through the pines. He could not make out what it was, so her zipped his pants up and walked a few more feet until he saw it. A beautiful alpine lake and a small stream. He told Kay.

“I don’t see any way down there. There is no trail for the horses,” she said.

“Well, you sheathed that stupid machete. Maybe it’ll be useful after all. I can see a meadow, let’s hack a way through this brush and explore.”

So they did. Both Kay and John were blown away by the beauty of the place. They unbridled the horses and let them browse the meadow. John and Kay sauntered lazily around the area. About three o’clock in the afternoon, they sat on an outcropping at the edge of the lake and ate granola bars. They dangled their legs from the rock shelf. The water was amazingly warm for a mountain lake.

Kay pointed toward the middle of it. “John. Did you see that?”

“What? I don’t see anything.”

“No, it’s gone now, but I was sure I saw a swimmer out there. Then he or she went under the water.” Her voice was excited.

“That’s weird, Kay,” he said. “It must have been a beaver or something.”

“Must have been an albino then.”

They both sat staring out into the lake. Then, not more than a few yards away, two heads breached the surface. John was startled and nearly jumped up. “Jesus!” he swore. Kay said nothing, but her eyes grew large.

The sun glinted off two golden heads. The swimmers were blonde and pale and it was hard to even see what they looked like. They swam nearer. If it weren’t for the fact that they were male and female, one might have mistaken them for identical twins. “Hello,” the girl said smiling up at them.

John replied with a tight voiced “hi.”

“Those are beautiful animals” the boy said, pointing to the meadow at the horses.

“Thanks,” Kay answered.

As the two strangers treaded water, John said, “Where did you come from?”

“We’re camped across the lake,” the girl said. “I’m Sapphie and this is Lucien.”

Kay answered. “Kay and John.”

“Nice to make your acquaintance,” Lucien said.

John laughed at the formal statement. “That is a long swim from the other shore.”

Sapphie smiled, “we practically live in this lake during the summer.” Then she looked at John. “Can we come out and join you?” As she said that, Lucien winked at Kay. Kay groaned inwardly. The last thing she wanted was some guy in the wilderness coming on to her.

They did not wait for an answer. They just put their hands on the rock and pulled themselves up. They were beautiful, but they were naked and both Kay and John tried to hide their embarrassment at the lack of modesty. Their perfection, though, did not escape John. Lucien could have been an Olympic athlete! His sister, or whatever, looked like a swimsuit model -- albeit without a swimsuit. Too bad he wasn’t into girls.

Sapphie sat right next to him. Very close - too close. The boy sat cross-legged looking at Kay. After the initial shock of that beautiful face, Kay avoided eye contact with Lucien. At the same time, John nonchalantly scooted a few inches away from Sapphie.

Saffie looked at them. “Why don’t you two swim with us?”

“I had been thinking of taking a dip,” John said. He looked at Kay and she shrugged.

The two pale strangers stood up and dove into the water. John stripped down and was about to dive in after them. “John!” Kay hissed. “I’m not getting in there naked!”

“Come in your underwear then.” He jumped off the rock shelf. Kay stood up and stepped out of her jeans. She had a tee shirt under a light button up. She threw the top layer on the ground and dove in.

As Kay entered the water she was thinking how stupid this was. Swimming with total strangers -- naked strangers no less! When Lucien got too close Kay decided this was really a bad idea. “I’m getting out,” she said. John noticed Lucien’s disappointment. When Lucien disappeared, then resurfaced near John and Sapphie, John said, “Look it was nice meeting you two but we probably aren’t the companions you are looking for.”

“What do you mean?” Lucien asked. “We aren’t looking for anything.”

“Um. Well, Kay and I . . …we aren’t . . .we’re both gay.”

The two beautiful strangers looked at each other and Lucien raised his eyebrows. “That’s okay,” Sapphie said. “No worries. But we will swim back to our camp and let you be.”

Later, by the fire, John said, “you have to admit, Kay, she was cool.”

“I guess,” Kay said with no enthusiasm. “but the whole thing was weird and I highly doubt I’d meet a nice lesbian out in the woods like that. To tell you the truth, I am still kind of uneasy.”

He chuckled. “I hate to admit this Kay, but I wouldn’t mind pairing up with that Lucien. Or sharing a sleeping bag. Wow, what a stud.”

“Don’t be gross!”

“Just sayin’.”

“Let’s pack up early and move on in the morning,” Kay said.

But that isn’t how it worked out. At dawn, as John and Kay sat having coffee, the two angelic creatures walked into their camp. Thankfully they were dressed this time. But their cut off jeans and shirts were not wet. John noticed that instantly. He was secretly pleased that they had shown up. Knowing John and Kay were gay hadn’t bothered them. That was cool.

“Your clothes are dry.” he said.

“We hiked over here when we saw you were leaving.”

“How could you know . . .”

Lucien cut him off. “She means we figured you were.”

Kay stood up. “I’m gonna go saddle the horses.”

“Let me help you,” Sapphie said. Kay rolled her eyes at John. But the two women walked off together, each hefting a saddle over their shoulder. John got up stiffly to take down the tent and pack up.

“What’s wrong?” Lucien asked.

“What do you mean?

The way you’re moving.”

John laughed. “Just kind of achy from the last couple days in the saddle, I guess.”

“But you rested yesterday.”

“Yeah, I don’t know why I still feel stiff and sore.” John looked toward Kay. The girls were laughing and smiling and talking. Well, that was a surprise. Kay didn’t open up very easily.

Lucien helped John fold up the tent and pack the gear. Then Lucien said. “Hey, John. Go over and lay on your stomach on the grass.”

“What!”

“Your shoulders and back. I can fix them for you.”

John turned and looked Lucien in the eye, trying to gauge his invitation. Lucien smiled and winked -- the same wink he had given Kay the day before. “Go ahead John.” he said, nodding toward the grass.

After a moments hesitation he did as Lucien suggested, found a soft area and lay on his stomach.

John felt Lucien’s hands on his ankles and legs. Almost immediately his body, from his waist down, completely relaxed. But it was his back and shoulders that pained him the most. Nevertheless, he was impressed that Lucien seemed to know exactly what to do. Lucien moved up to John’s back and shoulders. He straddled John’s waist and massaged his upper back and shoulders. An unexpected thought was hatching in John’s mind about Lucien and Sapphie. But he was enjoying this too much to think deeply at the moment.

“Oh my god!” John said. “I can’t believe it!”

“Believe what?”

The pain and stiffness are completely gone.”

Lucien laughed softly. “There’s nothing to be surprised about. And I can make you feel even better if you’ll let me.”

“How?”

Lucien rolled John over onto his back and smiled an angelic smile. “Like this.” He lowered his fact to John’s and kissed him on the mouth. John was so surprised that he propped himself up on his elbows as if to get up. He stuttered, “I . . .I . . .”

Lucien pushed him back. “It is alright! Relax.” then Lucien laid his whole body against John’s and somehow got his arms around him. John was powerless against the excitement rising in his body. He kissed him back. Then Lucien moved his mouth to John’s earlobe. As he licked and nibbled it, he whispered; “Say you love me.”

“What? Lucien I hardly know you!”

“Just say it. Please? Tell me you love me even if it isn’t true.”

“I love you,” John said without much feeling.

Lucien pushed harder against John’s body. “Say my name, too.”

“Lucien, I love you.” At the very moment he said it Lucien made a gasping moan and John felt the strangest, most wonderful sensation. He felt what seemed to be electricity flowing from Lucien into him. He could almost hear it hum and snap. The feeling was a bizarre, pure energy that made his hair stand on end -- but not with fear. The feeling was better than an orgasm. It undulated through him as he and Lucien made out. Lucien said. “say it again! Say it over and over.”

‘How can I?” he answered. “You keep plunging your tongue in my mouth.”

Lucien laughed. “Sorry. But please. I love the sound of my name on your tongue and I love your voice.”

Suddenly John got into it. “I love you, Lucien. I need you. Lucien, I want you. I love you.” Lucien threw his head back and made that sound again -- but much louder. The energy got stronger and John’s whole body shuddered in a kind of ecstasy. He’d never felt anything like it.

When Kay and Sapphie walked into camp, they were holding hands. How weird, he thought -- at least for Kay. It was so out of character. John looked toward the horses. The saddles and other tack were on the ground. Sapphie seemed even more beautiful. As if that were possible. He looked over at Lucien who was sitting beside him. He had the same glow about him. Sapphie smiled widely at Lucien. Lucien smiled in return and nodded his head slightly.

Lucien and Sapphie made as if to leave. Kay said. “Why are you going?”

Sapphie kissed Kay lightly and said, “It’s okay. We will be back again.”

Lucien embraced John. “If you come here again, later in the summer or maybe next year, we will be here waiting for you.” Both John and Kay protested, but the two beautiful people left without looking back. They disappeared into the trees.

John was too embarrassed to tell Kay what had passed between himself and Lucien. Something similar took place between Kay and Sapphie. Both friends were dying to talk about it, but both held back. What happened was so uncharacteristic, especially for Kay, that they felt too uncomfortable revealing their experience. Eventually though, the subject came floating to the surface and John told her. He left out some of it though.

Kay listened to John without interrupting. “Wow,” she said. “that’s kind of what happened to me. I might as well be blunt. We made love -- sort of. She did things that I’d never imagined, and I felt she was putting out some sort of energy, too, like you said about Lucien.”

Finally John said, “did she ask you to say something that seemed . . .unusual?”

John watched Kay’s face redden. “Um, yeah, she did.”

“Was it something like ‘I love you’?”

Kay’s head snapped toward John in surprise. “Yeah she did -- sort of. I mean that and some other things.

“Because Lucien did the same to me. That’s when the feeling was strongest. It felt like electricity, but it felt good. Really good.”

“And you went along with it?” John asked.

“Not at first, no. But things started to heat up . . . .”

When they stopped to eat something, John said; “I don’t think they are human. Well, not exactly that. They are more than human. Oh, I don’t know what I’m trying to say. But they aren’t like us.”

Kay furrowed her brow. “Of course they’re human!”

“When we stop for the night, I’ll show you something I read last night. It’s kind of ironic that I was just at a place in the book that described beings that could be what Lucien and Sapphie might be.”

“Like what,” Kay said. She was hesitant and suspicious of his thoughts on the subject.

“Spirits of place. Guardians or something. The Roman’s called them Genius Loci. I think that the Greeks referred to them as Eudamiones or something. I can’t remember the word right now.”

“That’s interesting, John, but all that stuff is myth and religious superstition, isn’t it?”

“Anyhow,” he continued, not answering the question, “These spirits of place used to require something from anyone passing through or entering their boundaries. Some sort of devotion, or offering which made them stronger. But they were supposedly friendly and with good intentions to those who had good intentions toward them.”

Kay laughed. “Like love?”

“Maybe,” he said. They rode on and he said no more. He didn’t even bring the subject up that night in camp or the following day. After that they were quiet for most of the trek. Both were thinking about their unlikely union with the two beautiful people they had encountered in the lake and how strangely they had been effected.

Two or three days later on , they camped about a mile from the lake. By firelight John said, “Listen to this Kay.” He opened up his book to a bookmarked page. “these spirits are not fabulous immortals, but things which are utterly nonhuman and non-moral which bring a person bliss or tear their life to shreds without a break in their own serenity. They feed on the adoration of those who come into contact with them.”

Kay listened and made no comment. Finally she said. “Do you thing they’ll sti8ll be there when we ride past?”

“I don’t know.”

The trail skirted the lake from above. There were too many pines to really see it. Without a word Kay and John dismounted and waded through the brush and into the trees. The crunched through to the other side and found a vantage point where they could see the entire lake from short to shore.

At first they saw nothing and both were disappointed. Then Kay pointed toward the rock where they had sat days before. “John, look!”

There they were, the two figures. The sun glinted off of them as it would a mirror. It was hard to really make them out. Then they heard laughter as the two figures dove into the lake. “Should we go down?” Kay asked.

John put his arm out in front of Kay as if to black her. “Wait,” he said. “Let’s just watch them for a bit.”

The two bright strangers swam to the center of the lake and submerged. A kind of fog, like you’d see from dry ice, rose from where they had gone under. Kay and John stood and watched, waiting for them to emerge. After a couple of minutes Kay said, “Do you think they drowned?”

“No way,” he answered. “They’re good swimmers and I didn’t see any struggle or splashing around.” Let’s sit down. They sat on the dry pine needles from a Ponderosa Pine, and continued to monitor the lake. After a good ten minutes had passed, John said, “Let’s go. They aren’t coming up. We’ll come back next month before it starts getting cold up here. It not, then next year.”

So the two perplexed friends rode on -- a little broken hearted. Kay didn’t want to leave, didn’t want to wait a whole year. At any rate, they felt strangely, unusually, content -- mentally and physically strong. Renewed. In fact they felt better than they ever imagined they could, and John had a sneaking suspicion that their ephemeral lovers felt that way too.

ONE HEARTBREAKING SMILE

I was twenty-seven years old when I was attacked on a street in Prague I shouldn’t have been walking around late at night, especially in those times. Very old cities sometimes harbor evil and Prague was already an old city in the eighteenth century. Underneath the grandeur; the towers, castles, cathedrals and aged cobblestone streets may lurk an age old hunger. A hunger that, like near starvation, demands to be fed. I was meant to have been a snack for a monster. As he bit down on the tender flesh between my jaw and shoulder blade, he was frightened away by something that I couldn’t see.

I am far away from that place now. I haven’t seen the city of my childhood for many years. I am now in the midst of a vast green wilderness. All around me trees drip moss. -- different species cover the forest floor and take over anything that doesn’t move. The ferns are large and varied, often bent over and heavy with dew, or the frequent and unpredictable downpours. If it were not for the cooler weather a person might believe that they were in the midst of a Southern bayou, or Cajun backwater. But, no, this is a place of four distinct seasons. When winter enters the woods all the spent leaves fall. Only pine, fir and cedar stay green and keep watch for Spring.

But it is summer now. I feel good. I’m physically mentally and emotionally at ease. I’ve had years to reconcile myself to the circumstances of my endless existence. I am as the celestial spheres in the night sky. Time has little meaning. I am simply here in the now. The worry and trouble of human life; the appointments and obligations the grief, hope and fears the doubts and irritations and the capacity for the deep love of others. These things do not find their way into me. But, like anyone else alive or undead, my mind sometimes plays out faded memories of long ago. I dislike that.

These days everything I need, I have, at least up until now. . I gave up wanting things (personal possessions, souvenirs and the like) years ago. A recent event however has upset my untroubled mind. It has morphed back into curiosity, desire and anticipation. It was because of an unexpected meeting in this green wilderness. Yes, I met him by accident. I was sitting on a wooded hill on the edge of a precipice that overlooked a beautiful alpine valley. I heard someone coming on one of the trails, and instead of running away, I simply sat quietly and still, willing the person to continue on. Behind me I heard the someone stop, I didn’t turn. After a little while of quietness, a man softly cleared his throat.

I still did not turn. Finally he said in a low smooth voice, “Hello.”

“Hello,” I answered, continuing to look out over the cliff.

He tried again. “Are you all right?”

I turned and stared at him. “Yes. Of course.” He was a very handsome young man -- a little younger, maybe, than I was before I was bitten.

“Oh. Well, I just thought . . .” He didn’t finish his sentence, only mumbled something to himself. Then he said, “Um, my name is Todd.”

“I see,” I said. “That’s fine.”

After another long silence he said, “and your name?”

“I’ve had several,” I muttered. He laughed at this. It was a pleasant sound and I looked at him more closely. Not just handsome -- something more than that. He was well built and had a nice scent. He would be easy to track. I hadn’t seen this kind of ghostly but masculine beauty for years and years. His smile was disarming, unthreatening, very open and friendly. I smiled back.

Todd was wearing a large backpack and had a mixed breed dog with him. It growled and wagged its tail at the same time. “Okay. If you’re alright then, I’ll be on my way.” He looked at the dog. “C’mon, Merlin, let’s go.”

I looked back at my view, but when I knew they were going on, I turned and watched them hike further into the woods. I followed. I don’t know quite what it was about him that awakened my interest, but it was a sensation that was virtually new to me.

I had decided years ago not to live off human life. That wasn’t what I wanted. It wasn’t his blood that caused me to follow.

He was very attentive to his dog and she was very in tune with him. Every few minutes the dog would run back to wherever he was. It amused me and I chuckled quietly. At that moment I saw a potential meal in the forest to the west and decided to hunt. I would have to let the beautiful stranger continue without my curious eyes upon him. Just as I tackled my prey, the dog came leaping through the underbrush. I bore the creature no ill will, in fact I rather liked it, but I gave it a warning growl and it tilted its head at me, whined a little and then ran back from where it came.

After I drank my fill, I found a soft mossy area and fell asleep -- or what passed as sleep. Sleep and Death are brothers and I never knew if I was under the spell of Thanatos or Hypnos or if both brothers held my head under the water when the sun shone. Later, when I woke up, I ran down to a nearby glacier lake to swim and wash off the dust and dirt that had collected on my skin. Just as I came out dripping wet I heard the dog barking frantically and the struggling grunt of a human. It could only be the man named Todd.

With preternatural speed I was upon them within seconds. A mountain lion had been stalking them and was now on Todd’s back with its fangs at the base of his scalp. I grabbed the cat by the nape of it’s neck. It turned and hissed at me but again tried to sink its teeth into Todd -- itwasn’t the kind of animal that would relinquish its grip. I attacked its hind quarters until it let go of Todd and when it turned on me I hissed and bore my own fangs, face to face. It looked angry but confused and fearful. I grabbed its long tail and flung the beast into the bush. It howled and took off into the woods like a bat out of hell. Todd’s dog hid behind my legs overwhelmed by fear for his master and fear of the huge cat.

Todd lay on the ground, face down. His neck was bleeding profusely, and he didn’t move. Finally he pushed his limp body into a sitting position and put his hand on the back of his neck. He looked up at me. “What happened?”

“You were attacked by a mountain lion. I think you’ll need medical help.”

“I have a first aid kit in my pack.”

He did indeed and it was a very good one for a portable pack. I poured the entire small bottle of hydrogen peroxide over the wound. A lot of it ran down his shirt but the gash bubbled. I ripped up one of his shirts and wrapped it tightly around his neck. I hoped it would stanch the wound. Good thing, too. I had just had my fill of the red stuff earlier so I wasn’t tempted. “I’d stitch it up if I had a needle and thread.” I murmured.

“Oh, I’ve got that. I always carry it in a watertight bag along with my compass and matches.”

“You are serious about this hiking business, I guess. Well, lucky for us.”

As I stitched up the wound Todd said, “I know I was attacked, but what happened? I mean, how did I get loose from it?”

“It ran off when I came running up the trail. I don’t know why?”

“But your arm,” he said. “You’ve been scratched and torn.”

I looked at my forearm and saw he was right. It had already stopped bleeding and I could feel the tingle of healing. “It’s nothing.”

Todd looked at me in disbelief and I could read the suspicion in his face. Using whatever power my kind has to manipulate the thoughts and memories of humans, I looked him in the eye. “Todd, you don’t remember this wound on my arm. Everything that has happened since the cat attacked you is a blur. You’re not interested in remembering.” I finished my stitching and put the needle and thread in his hand. Then I walked away -- just disappeared. I was nothing to him anyway. Just some craxy kid in the wilderness without a pack. So, there was no reason at all for me to stay.

I have found over the years that the sunlight down not bother me as much here in the woods. It also helps that I rarely feed on people. Something in human blood exacerbates the sun’s effect on the undead like me. At least that is the way it seems in my experience.

Still, I am more sluggish from dawn till dusk. Everything is clearer during the night. And when she rolls in and swallows the wilderness, I feel safe and secure and glad I am what I am. I never have been like those fictional vampires, tortured and pining over my soul. I awoke from a peaceful slumber at twilight. I wouldn’t have to feed for a few days and I usually spent the night watching the creatures which did not show their little faces in the daylight.

But tonight I was haunted by Todd’s handsome face. It was extremely irritating that this man was drawing me closer to the human involvement I had forsaken. I imagined that he had most likely started making his way down the trail to wherever he started his hike. But his scent was up the trail not down. I virtually flew along the trail and within an hour at my speed, I smelled a campfire.

There he was, sitting by the fire, reading a book and eating dried fruit. Merlin sat at attention in front of him intently watching her master’s hand to mouth movements. She was salivating over the sweetness she knew he was chewing. His tent wasn’t big, but it was not one of those one-man pup tents either. The shirt was no longer around his neck. He had wrapped and taped gauze around it.

I stayed in the shadows and watched for a long time. Finally (and I’m not sure why) I made myself known. I cleared my throat. Not surprisingly Todd jumped to his feet dropping his book and turning over the loose stump he’d been sitting on. Merlin barked as I walked out of the night. She wagged her tail and ran to greet me. It wasn’t usual for animals to be attracted to me. Maybe she knew I liked her.

“What the hell!” he stuttered. “Where did you come from? Are you camped around here?”

I shrugged, “Out for a walk.”

“Out for a walk! Our for a walk? Miles from civilization and you are out walking around.” He looked incredulous. He was annoyed by my answer. “Who are you?”

“I was named Honza, but nowadays they call me Jon. I live out here, Todd.”

Todd looked confused. “You have a cabin here somewhere?”

“You might say that,” I answered. “But I roam around a lot.”

“Sorry,” he said petulantly, “but I don’t believe you. I come up to these mountains all the time and I’ve never seen you.”

“Believe what you like,” I retorted. “Mind if I sit with you a bit?”

“Oh sure. By all means.” He was being sarcastic now. “Just wander in from the dark and sit down to chat.” But I sat down and ignored his tone. We were silent for sometime, looking into the fire. I could feel his eyes on me as I watched the flames. I looked over at him and smiled.

“Okay,” he said, determined to find the truth. “I know who you are, now let me ask what you are.”

“A free and independent guy who loves the outdoors and who occasionally gets lonely.”

“And you’re lonely now. That’s why I keep running into you.”

“Your lucky day,” I said.

He stared at me stoically for a moment, then laughed. “You hungry? I can rustle up something.”

I’m on a diet.”

He laughed again. I liked the sound of his laugh as much as I liked his voice. “Okay, so what do you eat out here and where do you keep your clothes and supplies?”

The question slightly irritated me. “I don’t need anything, Todd. I’m not like you.”

“No, you sure aren’t! he said sarcastically. We looked at each other. A stare down? I smiled at him and a wide grim spread across his face.

“I’m serious, I’m not like you. I’m not really alive like you. I’m not warm like you.”

He thought I was joking -- “You’re too beautiful not to be human . . . and brave to.”

I couldn’t believe he said that. Was it just a simple compliment or . . .? Something like warmth flowed through me. It was a strange and unusual sensation. I closed my eyes and savored it. He gave me an amused look and chuckled. We sat for a long time and I knew he did not believe me. Didn’t believe that I wasn’t exactly what I appeared to be. So I stopped trying to tell him the truth. Neither of us spoke and I realized he didn’t know what to say or what to do about me.

“Look,” he said. “ If you need shelter tonight. If you’re really that lonely, take my tent. I can sleep out here next to the fire.”

“I’m fine,” I said. If he’d have asked me to share his tent instead of take his tent, I might have considered a little dalliance in the sleeping bag. But he didn’t say that I was entertaining thoughts that wouldn’t occur to him . . .probably. When he got up to relieve himself I decided to go. No sense making him any more uncomfortable than I already had. I walked out of his camp and into the darkness. A few minutes later I heard him calling my name. I smiled. I hoped I’d see him again someday.

A few miles down the mountain was a parking lot for hikers -- just a square of gravel really. I asked a woman there what day it was. “Friday,” she said. Normally I could not care less. But I cared now. I decided to make a trip into civilization soon to buy a watch and maybe some new clothes. Two days later I was there standing amid the trees waiting for Todd to come back to either the car or the jeep parked there. I was perfectly content to wait. I was assuming that he would return to go back to whatever work he did. I could sit for days without moving if I chose, but after waiting a day and a night, I was rewarded. Todd and Maxi came down the path. Todd loaded his pack and gear into the back of the black jeep

I walked over to the jeep. He looked up, surprised. “Will you be coming back,” I asked.

“I wasn’t planning on it, but I might. I have a week off at the end of the month. Will you be up here?”

“I told you,” I said, “this is where I live.”

“Yeah right,” he smiled. “Where did you go the other night anyhow?”

“Oh, I decided to leave you alone with Merlin. I assume that you come up here to hike and enjoy the solitude.”

“I do. But I like your company. You’re a strange one, but I like you.”

“Yes, I am different, aren’t I?” I chuckled. Then he told me when he would return, I patted Merlin and watched the two head down the dirt and gravel road. It was dry out and the dust billowed from the tires so that the jeep seemed to disappear in a fog.”

******************************

I caught up with him two weeks later. I stood outside his camp for awhile just watching him set up his tent. It was dusk and the light was fading fast as he made a fire and sprayed himself with mosquito repellant. I had forgotten that, like me, mosquitoes survived on blood, and the living found them truly irritating and the itch resulting of their bite insufferable.

Finally I walked in. He saw me and his eyes lit up. He was such a handsome beautiful man. I smiled at him and said his name. Inexplicably his face and neck instantly turned red in the firelight. The smile that broke across his face at that moment was heartbreaking. I felt something like love or yearning. I felt as though I was home. I felt, for the first time I could remember, not just content but happy.

He walked closer to where I stood and said, quietly and calmly, “I don’t know what you are. I don’t care. You saved my life and you are beautiful. I can feel your lonely spirit. I think, maybe, we need each other.”

There would be time enough to explain everything to him. I felt instinctively that nothing would frighten or scare away this bold and loving heart. But I wanted to make sure I understood him. I know it was not the right thing to ask a modern man, but I did, and put it in the form of a statement. “You are informing me then, that not only do you want my company, but you are homosexual as well.”

“I didn’t think so,” he said, “but maybe I have been all along. Or maybe it is just you. All I know at this moment is that I feel a little embarrassed by the question and happy at the same time.” He gave me an uncertain but hopeful look.

I took two steps forward and took his shoulders in my hands. He flushed red again. I embraced him and felt as though I was embracing true life -- something I was forced to forsake so long ago. I felt the romance of it, the hopefulness of it, the capacity for devoted and love that I had forgotten. I looked into his eyes and saw a reason for my existence, damned as it was. He put his face against my neck and gently bit it. I laughed. He had no idea how ironic that was -- that it was he biting me rather than the other way around.

As I stated at the beginning of this story. “Everything I need, I have.” apparently I was unaware of one need I had not satisfied -- until that glowing moment

THE END

WHAT LOVE MAKES OF US

I’d been working at the Space Needle for almost four years. I was tired of it. A person can get pretty burnt out working in a tourist trap. I wasn’t sure which were craziest, my co-workers or the guests. But I sometimes became so irritated cleaning up after tourists that I came close to yelling at them. Of course I couldn’t do that. With the economy the way it was, I was lucky to have a job at all. There just wasn’t anything else out there for me. So it was either quit (which I couldn’t afford to do) or take a vacation. It was June, so I scheduled two weeks off for the following month.

I have to admit, there were a few guests that I found as interesting as others were annoying. There were many Japanese visitors as well as East Indians, Ukrainians, Middle-Easterners and, oh people from all over the world. Not too many Seattle natives weren’t all that interested in paying the fee to ride up for the view or to eat at the relatively spendy restaurant. Sometimes I helped out on the Sky-deck half way up the Needle during events and banquets, but mostly I was on the observation deck floor. It is there that I met Julie.

I was wiping down a table. She sat down before I was finished. “Thanks,” she said, as if I had cleaned it especially for her. I chuckled and said she was welcome. There was something about her that I immediately liked. I thought to myself that she seemed like one of those people who are really cool but don’t know it. . As I started to walk away, she said, “Hey, what’s your name?”

“Gretchen,” I said.

“Thanks again, Gretchen. I’m Julie.”

I smiled and nodded and went back to the concession and coffee bar to help Floyd. It was Saturday and sunny so the place was full. There was a line at the counter. I could feel Julie’s eyes on me. Then she stood up and got in line. There goes her table, I thought to myself. someone will claim it before she even gets to the bar. I was wrong. She ordered a cappuccino and the table was still free. “Go sit down,” I told her. “I’ll bring it to you.”

“Thanks!”

That was the extent of our conversation. She sat for a long time, not paying much attention to the view. She was people watching, and from the corner of my eye I was aware that she was still watching me too. I was a celibate Lesbian, inexperienced and without much time or inclination to look for a girlfriend. Maybe it was because Julie showed interest in me that my own interest was aroused. At any rate, I doubted she was lesbian. She looked too feminine, yet not girly girl either. But you can’t really tell much about a person from a very brief encounter. The way we had smiled at one another from a distance that afternoon was kind of idiotic and it embarrassed me a little.

To my surprise I saw her two days later. As the days passed she began to come up more and more and always greeted me by name. It got so that I was disappointed when she did not show up. Still, I couldn’t understand how anyone could afford coming up to the observation deck so often. One day, when there was a long lull in customers, she came up to the counter and started a conversation. She tried anyway. She asked me what I did on my days off. After a while, she told me about her horses. I told her I had worked on a thoroughbred ranch for a few years. So, at least we had that interest in common.

“Where do you live,” I asked. “I mean you couldn’t have much room for horses around the city.”

“No. I have a ranch out past Goldbar -- about forty miles east of Everett.”

“Really,” I said in disbelief. “You drive all the way here just to sit by the window and sip cappuccino?”

Her smile dropped in disappointment. “You think that is why I am here so often?” When I shrugged, she continued. “I come here in hopes of getting to know you. I’m sorry if it offends you, but I thought . . .”

“Thought what?” I said. I didn’t want to offend her so I tried to smile. “No, no I’m glad you come for that reason. But why me?”

Now it was her turn to shrug. “I’m not sure, but you were friendly to me when I first came up here and it made me aware of your presence. So I watched you and decided I really liked the way you interacted with people and the way you carried yourself. I thought you’d be worth getting to know.”

I was flattered and strangely elated all at once. “But you’re spending a lot of time and money just to meet an uninteresting person like me.”

She leaned over as if to whisper something to me. “I think you’re more than worth it.” I said nothing, but I felt my face flush red.

I began to see more of her on the observation deck and, when I could, I took my breaks at her table. Little by little we got to know each other. She was younger than me, but somehow seemed more sophisticated. I don’t mean smarter, but certainly more knowledgeable about the world. We talked about our interests and she asked me lots of questions. I answered as best I could but she rarely answered mine with any detail. When I told her about working on a Thoroughbred ranch and then as a groom at Kentucky Downs for a year, she was impressed.

“That is ironic, you know. Since I own a horse ranch. And it was a thoroughbred ranch when I moved in but, like I told you earlier, I own mostly quarter horses now. The only thoroughbreds I kept were some of the old ones -- retired from racing. Why don’t you come and visit the place sometime?”

“Oh, that would be awesome!” I gushed.

I took her up on her offer to visit her property and see the old racers and all. I was already in awe when we drove down the long tree lined drive. Then the sight of the old mansion . . . I was blown away. There was another house about a quarter mile from the main one. That house was much older and smaller. Then near that was a large barn, pastures, paddocks and what looked like a racetrack in the distance. “Wow!”

She smiled. “Don’t be fooled by the spread. I live very frugally and don’t use most of the space. I don’t even use the big house. I live in the old one up ahead.” She was quiet for a few moments as if weighing something in her mind. Then she said, “I inherited this place along with a fortune. I could live off the interest alone. If it weren’t for that,” she continued, “I’d be living in a small apartment and struggling to survive.”

I thought she was probably exaggerating but I kept my mouth shut. Later we took a tour of the ‘spread’ as she called it. She had a couple of workers that I met who lived on the lower floor of the big house. Sunil, an East Indian man who was the only groom and caretaker, and a Ukrainian girl named Ina who took care of unnamed things.

Julie claimed she preferred austerity to ostentation. I thought that was bullshit since she could have sold the place. The main house itself and the long tree lined drive were the epitome of ostentation. The whole thing screamed money and ease of living. I kept my private judgments to myself and just enjoyed the tour the animals, the day. After all it wouldn’t matter to me whether she was rich or poor. I liked her a lot. I found that she had a great sense of humor -- dry and witty but hysterical if you understood her sarcasm and irony.

“Let me introduce you to two of my riding horses. If you want we can ride tomorrow.”

“Sure!” I said enthusiastically. “But I didn’t bring boots or anything.”

“I’ve got several pair that you can have.”

The fact that she would offer me something of her own to wear made me all goose-bumpy and special. She didn’t say borrow. She said have. I realized that I wanted to be important to her. I guess I really did want love, though I had convinced myself otherwise. No one had cared for me in any capacity for such a long time. The idea of changing that was possibly within my grasp and it made me feel warm and hopeful.

She introduced me to Raja and Tinkerbelle, who were very friendly and came to meet me at the fence. Julie pointed toward the middle of the pasture where another horse stood. “And that is Little Joe,” she said. “He is an appaloosa and seems to be very proud of himself for it. He acts as though he doesn’t care what is going on around here. But it is all a ruse. He is very interested. He’ll be slowly grazing this way so he can get a bit closer to check you out.”

I noticed a couple of cats sitting on the edge of the hayloft looking down at us. The way they were sitting there made me laugh. Julie looked up to see what I was looking at. “those are two of the barn cats. Ricky and Lucy. They are always together. Lucy is spayed, and Ricky neutered, but I know there is some hanky-panky going on.”

I laughed, “how do you know that?”

“I’ve seen them occasionally behind one of the outbuildings sharing lolling around together and sharing a cigarette -- and you know what that means.”

I laughed loudly, “Well, the sneaky little fuckers!”

That evening we sat by a fire and talked. She asked me lots of questions about my life, my past, my future plans. Although I answered each of her questions as best I could, she told me nothing about herself which was odd in my opinion. Most people like to talk about themselves and personal information is usually reciprocal. She did tell me a few dirty jokes and laughed at my reaction to them.

Finally she got up and made us something to eat. I don’t even remember what. We ate and then had a couple of beers. It was wonderful there, but somehow we ended up on the floor. Julie sitting with her back against the sofa and me with my head on her lap as she stroked my hair. Eventually she bent down and put her lips on mine. I liked it. I liked it a lot. We made out for a while and when she took my hand and placed it inside her clothes, I was shocked, but willingly went along with her as far as she wanted to go. She gasped softly.

“Oh!” I said, “are my hands cold?”

“No. In fact they are warm” she breathed. “It’s just that I haven’t been touched for so very long.”

So that was how Julie and I came to find ourselves in a long lingering relationship. It was warm and caring and affectionate. Most importantly it never became stale or boring. We shared her bed and sometimes mine. The dovetailing of our personalities was easy. Our personalities, different as they were, gave us the ability to prolong a kind of emotional foreplay. That kind of thing would often last all day when we were together and by evening we were both so hot for each other that it nearly hurt. All she had to do was gently bite a nipple or touch my vagina and I came. But of course it didn’t stop there. When we tried other things and really got into it, we both experienced multiple orgasms. I wonder how we had energy to function after nights of lovemaking.

One day she suggested that I give notice to my apt manager and move in with her. The subject had been mentioned before, but our bond was very strong by this point. It was tempting. “The only thing is that I will be too far away from work.”

“Stop working then, Sweetie.”

I just stared at her wondering how in the world she thought I could do that. “What do you mean? I have to make a living.”

“You don’t have to work anymore. I’ll take care of you. And if you get bored, you can work here on the ranch with Sunil. Ina always appreciates help too. I sometimes work with her when I need a distraction.”

“Well, I don’t know. Let me think about it, Jules.” The idea frightened me for a number of reasons. Mainly I wondered, if our relationship soured and I had to leave, it might be hard to find another job in this economy. Not to mention that potential employers are suspicious of large periods of time with no work record..

But in the end I did move onto the ranch. By the time I had made the decision and acted on it, I was so happy that all fears were long forgotten. Even though we shared a bed, I moved my own bed and furniture into another bedroom. I could write there or read or meditate or exercise or just be alone on rainy depressing days. We did have little disagreements that could be characterized as spats and having a door of my own to slam loudly might come in handy. We hadn’t had a real knock-down-drag-out fight yet and although I couldn’t imagine that we ever would, I had to be realistic. Everyone does at some point and generally it is with someone you live with or someone you love.

As time passed I saddled up Tinkerbelle and rode almost every day. It was fun to explore the land. There were pastures and forests and a river on the property. I sometimes followed deer trails through the woods, if they were old enough and well trampled down. Sometimes Julie joined me on Raja, but just as often not. She had a huge garden and an orchard that kept her busy even in winter. Nothing much grew at that time of year, but she tilled and pruned and mulched and whatever. I was only interested in those things during the summer. I liked fresh fruits and vegetables. I suppose if I’d had a penchant for grubs and worms and things in the soil, I probably would have spent time with her out there in the cold months.

In Summer and Spring, the days seemed to go on forever and I loved every second of being a part of the place and the land. One year I asked her if she’d mind if I got a dog or a pig or a sheep or something. She looked at me so strangely when I asked and then burst out laughing. “There’s quite a difference in those animals. A sheep or a pig! Oh my god, you are just too funny. Where did you come up with such an idea?” She laughed and laughed which kind of made me mad, but I tried to laugh with her. “It is fine with me if you want to get yourself a little buddy. A dog could run along with you when you take the horse out, but a pig or a sheep would have to stay behind.”

“Pigs can run.” I said.

She was drinking a coke and nearly spewed it all over the floor when I said that. “Yeah, if you want to get a wild boar or some kind of African warthog!” After she stopped laughing, she said, “Oh my god, Gretchen, the sheep. It reminds me of a bad joke. Bad, but I’ll tell you anyway. Oh, and it is a gay joke. You know I have nothing against gay men. In fact my best friend in college was gay. But anyway, I wouldn’t tell this to just anyone.”

I sighed. “All right. Go ahead. What’s the joke?”

“Okay, but first off, do you know what a mutton puncher is?” Assuming I didn’t, she said, “it’s a sheep rancher that loves his sheep just a little too much, if you know what I mean.”

“That’s disgusting.”

She laughed and went on. “So this Montana sheep herder stops to pick up a hitchhiker. The hitchhiker is gay. Well, they are driving along listening to country music or who-knows-what. Pretty soon they come across a sheep caught in a barbed wire fence by the edge of the road. ‘oh, the poor thing.’ the gay guy says. So the Montana guy pulls over, gets out of the car, drops his pants and starts doing the sheep! ‘hey,’ the mutton puncher says, ‘you wanna try?’ The gay guy answers ‘Yeah, I would, but I don’t think I can get all tangled up in the fence like that.’”

After my initial shock, I started laughing so hard I practically had to sit on the ground. “Oh, Jules, that is awful!”

“I know! That’s why I love it. And it is a perfect example of how people can get all fouled up about another person’s meaning.”

“I’m sure there are better ways to get that message across though,” I said laughingly. “Where did you even hear that joke?”

“My gay friend in college! He liked any nasty joke he heard.” He was very sophisticated in his ribaldry.”

“huh?”

“Never mind. Let’s go eat,” she said, “and talk about pigs, sheep and dogs.”

Everything ends. That is my motto nowadays. Nothing lasts forever and life is filled with sorrow as well as happiness. We just never know which is coming next. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

I found a dog, a one year old mix at the animal shelter in Everett. I named her Maggie Mae. A little later I bought myself a piglet. It was supposedly a small bread, like a Vietnamese potbelly, only a bit bigger. Julie suggested I name him “Little Wart.” Short for warthog. Maggie took to Little Wart right away. She was still pretty young herself and the piglet was stout and feisty. The two formed one of those unusual animal friendships that you sometimes see on TV. They played so hard that they usually wore each other out. Then they’d lay in the grass together and sleep. So cute.

As it turned out I was right about pigs running. Maybe this was an exception, but Little Wart could almost keep up with Maggie. That little guy’s short legs would move so fast that you could hardly make them out when he ran. What a character. Course he couldn’t keep up with a galloping horse, or even a trotting one for that matter, but Tinkerbelle and I took our time when we first led the youngsters out for a walk. As time passed and the two animals grew and matured, Little Wart stayed slim and fit, but he didn’t always choose to go with us. When he heard or saw us returning, though, he would often run halfway to meet us. I was never sure how he knew we were coming before we were even in sight of the house.

It was a particularly warm day at the end of July. We packed up a tent and sleeping bags and food, strapped them behind our saddles and rode off toward the grove of pines about five miles up the property. I didn’t want to leave Little wart, so I picked him up and he rode with me. He was completely calm and seemed to enjoy this new way of traveling. He sat in front of me just like a dog. Maggie trotted along with us. Blue sky, green fields and trees and the woman I loved beside me. I was ridiculously happy.

We followed a trail that flanked the river. The bank was too high to get down to the beach safely, so we traveled on. The trail rose to quite a height. I’d been here before, of course, but the high cliff in this stretch always made me nervous. The trail finally began to slope down the little mountain bluff and after a while we reached a nice beach on the banks of the South Fork. The mosquitoes had been really irritating and annoying through the pine and fir, but the river bank was too exposed and warm for them to bother us -- except perhaps later that night.

Later, as we sat by the fire and talked, I asked her why she never talked about her past. I said, “you never really answer any of my questions either.” I’d been asking her things from time to time over the past two years and her answers were always vague, ambiguous, never direct. “You could be a politician the way you evade questions,” I said..

“Because when I talk about my life or even think about my earlier days, I get really sad. I hate that feeling. I don’t want to breathe life into the past.”

“Okay,” I said, “I’m sorry. I am just curious because I love you and I want to know everything about you.”

For a moment she stared into the fire looking very contemplative. Then she seemed to make a decision. “No, you are right. We’ve been together long enough that I know I can trust you. I owe it to you, really. I finally feel safe and loved enough to face it. I love you so much, Gretch.”

Julie rarely said I love you so directly. I felt all warm inside hearing her say it now. Of course I was sure of our feelings for one another, but there is something special about hearing it said aloud by a voice you love.

So she began talking and by the time she was finished I was practically in tears. The short version, without details, is that she’d been raped by her father for years. When she reached a certain age, she got pregnant by him. Her mother refused to believe the truth and blamed Julie for being a little slut, whoring around like a cat in heat and letting some boy screw her. Julie wanted an abortion, for obvious reasons, but her mom wouldn’t hear of it.

At five months she had a miscarriage. As if that wasn’t enough, her father tried to start up again with the molestation. She had no choice but to leave at fourteen years old.

She had to survive and ended up being taken in by a nice guy who housed some other kids. She very quickly learned how mean and brutal he really was. He beat her into submission and prostituted her out and he addicted her to heroin. At eighteen she finally got the courage to leave. She found refuge at a women’s shelter. They helped her get into a rehab program to at least give her a fighting chance to beat the addiction.

Some time later, she heard that her father had died. She went to see her mother who was living with the uncle that Julie had remained in touch with over the years. She could trust him and he was the only halfway decent person she knew. He lived on this very ranch.

To make a brief story even shorter, her uncle left everything to Julie. She forced her horrible-excuse-for-a-mother to move out. Yet, despite all that had happened to Julie, she was still a merciful soul and bought her mother a condo. “I haven’t seen my mom in seven years,” she said.

“Julie I admire you so much more now. I already feel proud to be at your side, but now even more so.” I embraced her and stroked her face for a little while and we both cried. Then Julie and I and Maggie and Little wart all crawled into the tent and went to sleep. Both Maggie and Little wart snored more than we did. But their snores sounded like people’s not animal’s. It was very annoying.

The next morning I awoke early and went for a walk. The dog and the pig followed along. I sat down for a bit with my legs hanging over the cliff we had passed on our way there. Little wart rooted around behind me in the debris and leaf mold. Maggie simply did what dogs do and sniffed everything around us.

I didn’t see what it was but something startled the pig and he came running towards us. He scurried too fast to get on my lap and consequently slipped right over the bluff. Luckily he landed only a few feet down on a little ledge. He squealed as I tried to reach him. He was too far down. I was frantic now. What bothered me the most was that I knew he was afraid and I couldn’t comfort him. Then I remembered that there should be some rope in my saddle bag. Maybe if I could hook it around him somehow, I could pull him up.

I ran down and told Julie. She had started a morning fire and sat sipping coffee. She had jumped up as soon as she saw me and yelled, “What? What?”

“I need to get some rope and rescue him, Julie. Oh my god,” I didn’t find any rope in my saddle bag. “Julie do you have any rope?”

“No, but take it easy, Gretchen. How far down is this ledge you say he is on?”

“Well, it doesn’t look far, but it is out of our reach.”

“Come on,” she said. “We’ll get him up somehow.”

Poor little guy was half squealing, half barking and we could hear him before we were mid-way up the hill. I was praying an eagle or a coyote wasn’t near by. When we reached the place, Julie looked over the ledge. “It’s okay, little guy, we’re here.” Then she looked at me, “Oh, I can get him” She grabbed a hold of some vine maple branches and started letting herself down slowly, trying to find footing. Within seconds she was far enough down to touch him with her foot. It looked a lot further now that she was almost to him.

“Julie be careful!” I said. I was so nervous. I am not terrified of heights, but I am not comfortable with them either.

“I’m fine. Are you ready to take him from me?”

I lay on the ground and hung my arms and head over the ledge. Julie had Little wart in her arm. Somehow she slung him up and I caught him -- barely -- by a leg. I took him up in my arms to calm him down when I heard Julie swear. “Shit!” then a pause. “Oh, fuck. No!” Just as I looked over she was hanging by one small branch There was no way she could pull herself up and the side of the cliff at that point was just smooth dirt and mud. Then it was over. Her hand slid down the branch and she let go.

I screamed, “Julie!” but there was nothing I could do as I saw her head hit a huge cedar branch below and heard the terrible thud as her limp body landed on the sharp boulders at the river’s edge. I watched her body for what seemed like forever and called her name. If only a finger or a foot would move, there might be hope. Nothing.

I ran down the trail toward the camp thinking I could somehow run down the beach and pick my way around the base of the cliff. No way. I could see there just wasn’t any way I could do that. So I jumped on the horse and galloped away . I knew the cell phone wouldn’t work down there, but I might be able to reach someone from the field.

Julie’s body was recovered later in the day. Through the stream of tears I could see that her head was bashed in and her neck was twisted at a horrible angle as they loaded her in an ambulance. An ambulance seemed wrong for a corpse. It made it seem as if there might be hope where there was none.

I wanted to die. I wanted to go back up to the cliff and throw myself over. How could I go on now that I’d lost the only person in the world that brought me happiness. The only person who made life a wonderful thing for me was gone. Simply gone. I would never see her again. I would never kiss her or smell her hair or embrace her. What was life to me without her?

But I did not kill myself. I was in a deep depression for months but I clung to life. I mindlessly cared for the animals and the ranch with the help of Sunil. Ina only stayed two weeks after and then left.

Julie left a will. I was so surprised that she did. I had not written one nor did it ever occur to me to do so. And the fact was I didn’t think to ask if she had one. She left everything to me. Nothing for her mother. I was shocked and of course I fell into a crying jag for a day. I asked Sunil to stay on. I would move into the upstairs rooms of the big house. I couldn’t stay in the older one that Julie and I had shared. To many memories around every corner and every shelf.

It has been five years and it is a hot day in august. The anniversary of Julie’s accident and death has come and gone and I have made it through. I didn’t fall apart this year, only felt a sadness that passed by the next day. There is not a day that I do not think of her however briefly. When we lose someone dear at first the pain is raw, pain that may diminish over time but our love for that someone never does. When she was alive I thought of her or saw her everyday. Why wouldn’t I think of her every day now, as I did then? After all that is what love does to us. I am simply a different person now. I understand that living is full of both joy and sorrow. Both. If you refuse to bow to the gods of tragedy, if you don’t give them due respect, you will have a difficult time seeing the God of beauty and love and goodness. Well, at least that is what I have found. Maybe it is different for everyone.

Time itself has been called the Great Sculptor. I think Love is too. Over time we become . . . what Love makes of us.

The End

POWERS UNEXPECTED

Power is a double edged sword. There was just one thing in my case that made a difference; I didn’t ask for it. I didn’t seek it out, pray for it or kick someone’s teeth in to get it. I was born with it. My power did not express itself until I reached a certain age, but it was always there crackling under the surface and it was, to me, as unappealing as acne or whiskers breaking through the skin.

My father had been a miracle working minister and a Klan member too. I am ashamed of it, but what can I do? How he reconciled these two things, I do not know. The point is he was an ecstatic. He had a volatile personality with boundless energy. Unfortunately he was also half-crazed. It all worked together to give him a certain charisma which could mesmerize a congregation.

My mother was the opposite of dad. She had the wonderful capacity to empathize and sympathize with others. She had been a pig farmer’s daughter and was abused by her father. When she got the courage to run away from home she found no way to provide for herself. She turned to prostitution in order to survive. My father paid for her services one night and afterward he offered her salvation. Three days later he baptized her. The strange clash of their characters ignited a consuming fire. It could have destroyed them both. Instead they inexplicably fueled each other. Through their bizarre alchemy I was born.

My ability to effect the emotional atmosphere around me -- comes in handy. Especially in tense situations or when someone is in the grip of depression or desperation or caught in a destructive loop of suicidal thought. The only requirement for my beneficial influence is that I am aware that the person is having problems.

There are other things I can do as well and often without realizing it until much later. If I am in the presence of the dull or the lazy, my company cuts through the bonds of lethargy and, suddenly, lard asses arise from their sofas and wallflowers bloom. The power that I bring to bear lasts only as long as I am a part of their lives, or at least in touch with them. Then I met Jett.

Jett was introduced to me at a friend’s party. When I arrived there were two women seated on one of the sofas. One was nervous and fidgity, like she had an internal itch she couldn’t scratch. Her friend was looking at her with concern was talking to her in a quiet pleading voice. It wasn’t helping. I sat next to the nervous one. I wondered if she was a junkie or just what. But, hey, I had to do what I do and try to help. Within two minutes of sitting next to her, we were talking and her nervousness was easing up.

Jett sat down on the other end of the sofa and watched, smiling, as I sat talking and joking with the girls. Then his smile disappeared and he just sat listening to us while staring out into the crowd of partiers. When the girls got up to go to the bathroom, I leaned over and spoke. “Not really into this, huh?”

“It’s okay. Got nothing much to do.” He had a strange accent -- southern maybe.

I stood up. “Hey you want a beer or something?”

“Naw. But thanks.”

He was immune to my attempts at manipulating his attitude. I was surprised to realize that I was unconsciously trying to steer his interest toward me. He was friendly enough, but not responding to my effort. Maybe I was attracted to him because of his cool autonomous air. I leaned toward him and held out my hand to shake. “The name is Josh,” I said.

He looked at my hand for a few seconds and I feared he would not take it. But he did. “Jett,” he said, and a smile spread over his face. “Jett Danforth.” But then he dropped his smile and looked across the room again. He didn’t appear to be looking at anything in particular, more like he was tired and just staring into space. It annoyed me so I tried again.

“Are you at school here, or . . .”

He looked back at me as if being pulled from something important. “What?” But his eyes latched on me with a strange intensity. Their color seemed to change. “Oh. No. I have a . . .”

The girls were back and sat down between us before he finished whatever he was about to tell me. RaeAnn and Jasmine were in much better spirits than when I’d joined them and influenced their moods. I’d done my job but I was disappointed by my lack of success with Jett Danforth and I decided to leave. I never cared for these parties anyway.

I walked leisurely to my car. Just as I got in and buckled up, someone rapped on the window. I was surprised to see Jett standing there. I rolled down the window.

“Got a light?” he asked.

‘I’ve got a flashlight in the trunk, I think”

He chuckled and held his hand out, balancing a cigarette between his fingers.

“Oh,” I said. “Sorry.” I did not know anyone who smoked anymore except my granddad. “You smoke?”

He raised his eyebrows and gave me a smirk. So I dug into my glove box and pulled out a book of matches. “Here,” I said handing them to him. Had he turned the tables on me? Had he followed me? Instead of being in charge of the situation as I usually was, I was tongue-tied and confused as to why he was beside my car. “No,” I thought to myself, “he is just leaving and needed a light -- that’s all.” I felt I should start the engine and back out of the drive, but I waited.

He exhaled a cloud of blue smoke then looked me in the eye. “Why are you leaving?”

“Why not?” I answered. “There’s nothing in there for me really. I only came because one of my buds asked me. I‘m ready to get out of here.”

“Could have fooled me.”

“What do you mean?” I said. We stared at each other in silence for moment. He looked at me in a way that men don‘t usually look at each other, but he certainly wasn‘t overtly gay. He blew out another hazy breath and winked at me. “Are you . . .” I hesitated, not sure how to respond. “Are you coming on to me?”

Jett chuckled again. “Look,” he said. “You’re different and I wonder if you know how different you are. I suspect you know a lot.” He waited for me to respond. I didn’t. “I’m sorry if I seemed to blow you off inside,” he continued, “but I’ve seen enough spooky shit to last a lifetime, and unless the prize is worth it, I steer clear of magic.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Sure you do,” he contradicted , “you got the gift, and I watched you use it to coral those two skittish fillies in there.”

Now it was my turn to chuckle, but I laughed loudly instead. “I wasn’t aware we were at a rodeo.”

“Like hell,” he grinned.

Even though laughter was coming out easily, I didn’t feel comfortable with this conversation. My curiosity was aroused. Oddly and against my will my libido was too, I started the engine. “I gotta go, Jett. Nice to meet you.”

“Don’t get your dander up. We’ll talk again soon.”

“Yeah, sure. Right,” I said as I backed out of the space. I drove away slowly. I could see him in my rearview mirror getting smaller and smaller as I drove on.

**********************************************

Josh tossed and turned and flopped under his blanket. He kept thinking about Jett. How they met, Jett’s strange coolness, then his sudden interest, and the words they’d exchanged. Jett said they would talk again and Josh felt excited at the prospect. Very unexpected feelings. Josh finally swore and threw off his covers. He got up thinking that if he ate something or took a couple of plain white aspirin, he’d stop obsessing over this person. A person he didn’t even know. But the thing was, deep down, Josh was lonely. Of course he would never admit to it. In fact, he would never identify himself as lonely person.

Despite his power to manipulate the emotions of others, he had never really connected emotionally with anyone. Yes, of course he had flings. Mostly women, but occasionally a man. Still, he’d never known intimacy, never made a true connection. Now, out of nowhere, he felt it coming -- some sort of need, some kind of attachment was approaching from far away, but swiftly. He could almost hear the thunderous hoofs of horses or a far off locomotive moving swiftly toward him.

The trouble was that Josh did not like surprises and he had unconsciously been struggling against a need to make a true union with another human being. He had no name for his deep loneliness, no name for his buried soul. Josh ate a couple slices of cheese and swallowed two Tylenol PM and went back to bed. His unnamed anger, restlessness and anxiety soon dissipated under the spell of over-the-counter meds.

********************************************************

So I went about my regular work weeks and uneventful weekends without another thought of Jett. But after about a month had passed, Jett appeared. He stood outside my building as I walked home. I was so surprised and didn’t know quite how to react, so I went on autopilot. I held out my hand and said, “Hey Jett! Good to see you. What are you doing here.”

When he grasped my hand to shake, I was very aware of how large and warm his hand was -- and that he clutched mine with a bit too much pressure for a normal shake, and held it just a little longer than was customary. He smiled widely.

I was particularly aware of the beautiful lips above his rugged chin. I felt myself blush. I hated that. “I came to visit a friend,” he answered.

“Cool. I live in this building too.”

He nodded and looked down. “Mind if I ride up the elevator with you?”

“Not at all.” I was relieved and strangely disappointed that he was here to see a friend and hadn‘t come to talk with me.”

“Which floor are you on?”

“Sixth,” I said.

We got in the elevator and I pushed the sixth floor. He stood beside me not moving. “What floor does your friend live on?” I said, waiting to push the button.

“Number six,” he said, and winked at me.

I suddenly understood. I was the friend. I felt my face flush. I’m sure I was red as a beet . I sucked in a breath. “Oh.”

************************************************

“How did you find me?”

“Wasn’t hard. You gave me your name.” His wide smile hit me like sunlight. So beautiful I thought to myself, then furrowed my brow at my own thought. I had mixed feeling about a mere acquaintance showing up uninvited. It felt like an invasion of privacy and yet . . . I sounds strange, but I was annoyed with myself for being secretly pleased that he’d found me. It was a dubious honor, though, to be tracked by a stranger. If it turned out to be stalking, I would take care of that later, but I didn’t think it was that at all.

“Yes,” I said, “Yes, I did. I did give you my name. But why are you here?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Just had a hankering to see you, I guess.”

I shook my head as if confused. “I don’t understand.” He shrugged and smiled again but didn’t answer. It was important to me to figure out what was happening -- what kind of person this was and what his interest in me meant. “Look,” I continued. “At that party you showed no interest in talking. Then you followed me to my car for a light and said some strange things.”

“I needed a light,” he interrupted. You were leaving and I was too, so . . I thought I’d just chew the fat a minute.”

I looked into his eyes and tried to read him. Nothing. I decided to be blunt. “Well, if we’d had a conversation that would make sense, but we really didn’t. So, why?

He sighed as if resigned to giving away something he shouldn’t. “Because you’re different. I reckon we have something in common. You’ve been guarding secrets and you’re tired of it. I want to offer you my friendship.”

We stood in silence. He grinned. And I couldn’t help smiling in return although I was still far from satisfied. “Okay”, I said, “Sit down in the living room. You want something to drink?”

“Got any beer?” I didn’t drink beer, but I still had some left from when my friend, Lisa was here.

“Yeah, sure. I’ll get you one.” I grabbed one of Lisa’s beers from the back of the fridge, and joined him in the living room.

“So,” he said. “What do you know about your kin?”

“Not much.”

“I figured that might be the case.”

Strange question. “Do you know something about my kin?” I asked.

“Well now, I’ve been fixin’ to tell you but I wanted to hear from your own self what memories you might have had.” He looked at me and waited. He was very serious. Then he winked. “You’re a bastard, Josh.”

“Ya? Well, fuck you too.”

“Now don’t get your panties in a twist. What I’m saying is that the preacher that your momma was hitched to wasn’t your real daddy.”

I didn’t know how to respond because my mind went blank. It was such an unexpected thing for a stranger to say. Finally I answered, “How do you know that?”

“Don’t matter how. I know.”

His cowboy slang was bothering me. “where were you raised?”

“Arkansas.”

“Okay, who is my father?”

“Was. Who was your daddy? He was a vamp, kid. A blood sucker and your momma staked him, before she married the minister.” I guffawed, and looked at him in irritated disbelief. “I see you doubt it” he said.

“Uh, yeah. I doubt it. Are you crazy? There isn’t such a thing as a vampire.”

“Oh?” he said, raising his eyebrows. “How do you s’pose you got all your unnatural ways? See, your charms and spells come from your real Pop.”

“What charms and spells? All I can do that is “unnatural” is to sway people, calm them or help.”

“And I’m here to tell you that ain’t all you got. You just ain’t tapped into your birthright yet.”

“Give me a break. Are you going to tell me that I can bite people and live on their blood? I let out an exasperated sound. “Please.”

He had thrown his jacket on the sofa beside him when he first sat down. Now he reached for it and took something out of the inside pocket and handed it to me. It was a flask. “Here,” he said, “take a couple of swigs. Then he said, “No. You got no need for the red drink. You need something else.”

Against my better judgment, I took a long drink from the flask and coughed a little. Jett laughed. “That’ll help.”

I handed back the flask of whatever it was, but he didn’t take it. I felt like I was trapped in some kind of surreal western film. “I don’t drink that stuff.”

“Aw, c’mon, Josh. I know you want to know more. You down a shot and I’ll tell you everything you don’t know about yourself.” He stared me down. Finally I tipped back the flask again but held my breath after so I couldn’t smell it as much. It went down hot.

“There you go, Josh. That will help.” Then he muttered quietly, “I like to see those lips all wet.”

I felt an electric shock surge through me. Was he gay after all? “Hey, look, Jett, I’m not gay.”

“Hold your horses. I’m not accusing you of being queer. But you haven’t ever loved anybody. Not really. That’s why you don’t know yourself yet.” He smiled. “I’m bettin’ I’m the guy you need.”

“I don’t even know what to say to that. First off we aren’t friends enough to comment on each others lips or anything.”

“Alright, all right. I’ll try not to use that language if it’s distasteful to you.”

I got up and got a bottle of wine for myself. I didn’t like rot-gut he had. I didn’t like the way I felt about this whole thing, but I didn’t want Jett to leave either. Apparently I was at war with myself and taking the edge off with some good wine might help. To tell the truth I felt myself a little aroused. But, no, that had to be the alcohol. I never thought of a man quite like I did about this guy. Or maybe I had repressed it. I had sex with a couple of guys before, but I preferred women. I had plenty of girls, plenty of women available to me. But, Jett was right, I’d never been in love. “Anyhow, it’s a sin,” I murmured to myself.

Jett heard me. He threw his head back and laughed. “I’ll not answer to that,” he said “According to Leviticus I guess you should be hung, huh? They’re still doin’ that in Iran. I heard they’re still stringing ‘em up.”

For the next few minutes Jett went on about the Lord and the “good book” and questioned the interest God took in the sex life of people. I didn’t register all he said. I just sat there and wondered why he spoke the way he did. It sounded southern alright, but kind of old-fashioned too.

“So what do you say, Partner?”

“Say about what?” I must have lost track of what he was saying.

About sleepin’ under the same blanket maybe, and just see where it goes.”

“I told you. I’m not . .”

“Queer,” he interrupted. “Ya, I think I heard you. But; I ain’t got no place to stay and I can lead you into still waters that’ll bring out the power beneath the surface.”

I looked into his handsome face. He was trying to knock down my inhibitions. I was terrified by the growing desire to embrace him. He grinned at my hesitation. “C’mon brother, I’m offering you a gift. Take it, and the devil take the hindmost.”

“But first I want to ask you some questions. I noted that his visible hard-on begin to shrink some. He sighed in resignation. “Alright. Have at it.”

“Tell me about my father.”

“Born in 1808, Butler Country Kentucky.”

“What?”

“I told you. He was a vampire. He was bit when he was 27 years old in 1835.”

“That’s bizarre,” I said. But I was on the verge of believing. “How do you know this stuff?”

“Because,” he looked at me as if to ask if I was sure I wanted to hear. “He was my sire.”

I let out a laugh that sounded more like a bark. “So you’re my brother?”

“Naw,” he said. “He was my maker, not my real father.”

“Are you saying you are one of the undead?” I laughed.

“Yes’ sir I am one.”

“Prove it.” He smiled and showed his extraordinarily white teeth. And then, slowly, his two canines grew into inch long fangs. I stood up so quickly that I nearly knocked over the coffee table. I backed away from him. “Jesus!” I shouted. “What the fuck?”

His smile broadened at my reaction. “Careful now,” he said, “don’t take the Lord’s name in vain.” I stared, dumbfounded and scared. “Need more proof?” He reached out to me. “give me your hand.”

I didn’t move, so he snatched my hand. He took it in both of his. He was cold and it was uncomfortably cold. Not freezing, but not warm like a living thing. I instinctively yanked my hand back. “Holy shit!” I breathed. I can’t believe such things exist!”

“Well, now, that is just it see? We exist.” He drew out the word exist. “But since Eduardo, your pappy, impregnated your momma, we must have some sort of life percolatin under our reanimated skin. He paused. “I reckon if there are things like me existing in this world, there must be other sorts of creatures too.”

“If I’ve got some of my father’s gifts and he was your maker, we are brothers . . . in a way.”

“Round about way. We must be. I do know we’ve got a blood bond. Cause, see, I got some of his inside me when I died. It’s what resurrected me.”

I was frightened but still interested. “How did you come to know my father? I mean, why did he make you?

“He lived a few miles over. We was neighbors of a sort and friendly, but we weren’t pals. I think he might of done it out of anger more than hunger. See, I was sweet on one of his sisters. No one was good enough for her. After he killed me though, I believe he reconsidered. I don’t really know. And after it all happened, I lit out o’ there pretty fast.”

Jett took a swig of alcohol and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. I wondered how he could do that if he lived on blood. He said, “so that’s about the extent of it.”

“You said you were ‘sweet’ on one of his sisters. I thought you were . . . well, you know.”

He raised his eyebrows but said, “What? What did you think I was?”

“Well,” I said sheepishly. “I thought you liked men.”

He chortled. “It’s you I like, boy. Hell I never chased no cowboys around if that’s what your thinking.”

This all confused me. Was there something feminine or androgynous about me that attracted him? “So you are like me. Kind of on the border of bi-sexuality? But, I’m not very girly, am I?”

He laughed loudly. He hunkered close to me as if there were people around and he wanted to whisper a secret. “Truth is, any kind of sex excites a vamp. We’re not bisexual. We’re simply aroused by most things sexual. I reckon it’s because procreation and the flow of blood represents the life we don’t have. The true life that was taken from us. But I got more than that to give you.”

We sat in a moment or two of silence. I looked down as if studying my shoes and said nothing. “Well,” he said. “Is that all.”

“For now, I guess. My head is spinning.

“Let’s get your mind off it for now.” Suddenly he stood, grabbed my shoulders and pulled me to my feet. “Let’s do it.” And he gently but firmly pushed me along to the bedroom.

I sighed petulantly, “follow me then, you son-of-a-bitch.”

“Hey now, watch your language. My momma was a good woman.”

We did indeed sleep under the same blanket. Well, we didn’t sleep much. I tried to resist my uncertainty and calm my mind. I finally let go and went with it. It was more than a sexual encounter. I can’t explain, even now, how my body and mind reacted to him. Something about the fact that this very rough young man wanted to be my friend and mentor, how he had singled me out to be his bed mate. It caused me to practically shake with passion and lust. It was as if I couldn’t get close enough. I couldn’t kiss hard or long enough. I became crazed by him. Yet all we did was roll around with our bodies pressed tight against each other. As in Elton John’s song -- rolling like thunder under the covers.

I fell asleep eventually because when I awoke my legs and arms felt like Jell-O. My body had that good ache one feels after working out in the gym. At any rate the morning sun was straining to shine through the curtains and there was a note beside me. -- “Josh, I’ve gone to ground. I’ll be back when it is dark. Then we will talk some more.”

Talk? That was a laugh. I waited all day for dusk. We didn’t talk. We made love over an over and over again. We had rough sex, then tender hungry love making. If I had thought for a moment that I was rolling around with the undead, I would not have been able to do what we did. But he felt alive. Cool, not warm, but alive.

**************************************

As we lay there on my old brass bed, Jett turned his head toward me. “You know, Josh, the power inside you is strong. I can feel it...It echoes through my body and I can feel a life-force which I ain’t felt for some time.”

I was flattered or maybe proud and excited that I had something to offer -- though I had no idea what it might be. I smiled, “I just hope it doesn’t whet your appetite for my blood.”

“Naw. I only need that once or twice a month and when I do, I won’t be around here.”

I frowned. I really did not want to know about how he satisfied that need. “So what sort of energy or whatever, do I have?”

“You’ve been happy since we united, haven’t you?”

“To put it mildly, yes.”

“Well,” he continued, “have you noticed how sunny and warm the weather has been since then?” He paused and looked at me. “That’s you.”

I propped up on my elbow. “Oh, for heaven’s sake! That’s ridiculous. One person can’t influence the weather. That takes wind currents and air pressure and all kinds of things.”

He was sitting up in the bed now. He tilted his head to the side and raised his eyebrows. “Okay then. Whatever you say.”

The idea was so bizarre that I let it go in one ear and out the other. Whatever he might or might not know, the change in weather was a coincidence and nothing to do with my happiness.

“There’s more,” he said. “I only know a few things, but there’s liable to be a lot more just ready to pour out of you. You already know you got influence over folk’s moods. From what I know of your pappy I’m pretty sure it goes further than that. I’ve got an idea you can make demands, commands or suggestions to people which they won’t go against.”

“You mean they have to do what I say? Like hypnotism.”

“You might put ‘er that way.”

I thought a moment. That was something, at least, that I could test. But I doubted I’d have that sort of ability. “Alright, give me something more believable.”

“You bet. He grinned. Let’s try something. Something your real father could do. The thermostat is off in the house. I think you can generate warmth by just willing it.”

I rolled my eyes.

“Now just hold your horses. Close your eyes and imagine heat. I believe you can conjure it.”

I did what he asked. Nothing. Then I tried again and imagined the moist humid heat I’d felt in New Orleans once. I concentrated, keeping my eyes closed and imaging it. Within a few seconds the room began warm up until beads of sweat covered my forehead. I opened my eyes and was astonished to see the air was thick, damp and hot. Sweltering! “You feel that?” I practically shouted.

“No,” he said. “I am oblivious to temperature, but I can see the air is different.” He got up and looked at the thermometer on the thermostat. “The heat is off but the temp has gone up to ninety degrees.”

“How can this be?” I said with amazement?

Jett chuckled. “I’ll be damned if I know how it works. Some kind of unholy magic, I reckon.”

“I didn’t think you believed in holy and unholy. Anyway,” I changed the subject, “let’s go and test that other power you said I might have.”

“To close to sun-up Josh. I can’t go out. You’ll have to go yourself.” he leaned over and kissed me on the mouth. “I’ll be back this evening.”

I looked into his eyes. Suddenly I understood something. “You. You love me, don’t you?”

He seemed taken aback. “I dunno. I didn’t think my kind could love like living bodies do. I am awfully fond of you and I like to be with you and I can’t hardly wait to see you again.”

“Maybe it is just the physical,” I said.

“No, no, no. Hells bells, I could get that from any living person, man or woman.”

“Then what is about me?”

“Besides your thick hair, soft lips and that dimple in your chin, I like your calm attitude, your skepticism and, well . . . your mighty smart, too.”

*********************************************

I left the building and headed down the walk. The sky was unsure. The sun shone in places, but the few clouds there were sprinkling a light shower. Couldn’t make up its mind, I guess. But there was a rainbow in the distance. I wondered if it was my mix of hope and disbelief that transferred to the atmosphere. Silly, I thought, this isn’t going to work. But I had to try. So I walked down to the first place I saw that was open. McDonald’s.

I walked in and got in line to order an egg mcmuffin and orange juice. When I was next to order, I smiled at the counter girl and told her what I wanted. When she started to punch in the total, I interrupted her. “Wait,” I said. “This will be free today.”

She looked into my eyes to see if I was joking. Then she said, “Of course. Coming right up, Sir.” I sat down with my breakfast, ate and left, still hardly believing what I had just done. I decided to try it again, just to make sure it wasn’t a fluke. Fifteen minutes later I walked out of Jack’s hardware store with a new bike. The clerk, who was the owner of the store, insisted that I take it as payment due.. I told him that he’d known me for years and that last year he had borrowed eight-hundred dollars from me.

I left with a smile on my face and just a touch of guilt. It had stopped sprinkling. The few clouds had parted and into a mile wide circle around me -- the sky looked like the fringe of a medieval monk’s tonsured hair. I laughed and rode the bike home.

Jett arose at sunset and came down from the attic. I told him what had happened -- what I had done. He laughed, grabbed me, embraced me and swung me around like I weighed nothing. “I can’t do anything about the free breakfast,” I said, “but I will take the bike back tomorrow.”

“You’re just to good to be true. Too precious for your own britches,” he said. “I reckon I’m the luckiest vampire around to have found you.”

That sentence sounded so ridiculous that I burst out laughing. “Luckiest cowboy.” And, by the way, the saying is too big for your britches!”

“Well, why don’t you slip out of them britches and we’ll have us some fun.” Even though we’d already knew each other that way and it wouldn’t be new, I felt my face heat up and turn red.

***********************************

PART 2

Because our time together was dictated by the movement of the sun and moon, we did a lot of things together after sundown; went for drives, ate out, visited places like the Space needle and museums. Using our separate powers of manipulation of people and things -- like locked doors and alarm systems, we could go just about anywhere at any time. But keeping late hours took a toll on me so I persuaded my boss to allow me to set my own hours. I started my shift late and ended late.

On those nights when Jett was overcome by the hunger, I generally went to bed early and got up alone. Sometimes I looked into his new daytime slumbering place to see if he had come back. I hated seeing him asleep or dead, or whatever he was, but I was always glad he was somewhere in the house when I left for work. He told me that it was possible for him to stay up during the day as long as he stayed indoors, but that he would be very groggy, slow, and non communicative. I wasn’t interested in seeing him half dead and I told him so.

I asked him once if he was cruel to his victims or if he killed them. His answer was, “No, and if I had my druthers I’d just as soon not talk about it. So we didn’t.

One night I got home from work even later than usual. It was Friday night and I was in good spirits. But Jett wasn’t up when I got home. I checked his hiding place. He wasn’t there. I was disappointed but I knew he was out doing what he had to do. He usually left a note -- something funny to make me laugh. No note. I woke up before dawn but Jett wasn’t back. On Saturday night he still had not returned and I started to worry. After the second night I grew almost frantic. There was absolutely nothing I could do about my panic. I couldn’t report a missing person and I couldn’t go looking for him since I had no idea where he went on his feeding nights.

A month went by and I went into a deep depression. My anxiety and grief at losing the only person other than my mother whom I had loved, hurt inside. I was able to function, but just barely. How many times did I see someone walking along and thought it was him, heard a voice that was like his? Each time it was like a punch in the stomach. I missed him so much. I felt like a walking talking shell of sadness. I did go to the doctor and got on an antidepressant. It helped a little, not much.

One day the following year on a whim I decided to crawl into his hidden sleeping place. It was a stupid thing to do and I was pretty sure it would reopen the wounds that had begun to heal, but I did it anyway. On hands and knees I made my way across the wooden slats and boards he had put down and I rolled onto the small mattress. I was surprised that his scent still lingered. I made a choking sobbing sound and almost cried. Then I looked around and saw something. I sat up so quickly I almost hit my head on the low beams above me. It was a small wooden box about the size of a shoebox. It had to have been Jett’s. My heart began thumping in my chest as I grabbed the box and scooted back to the concealed door. Just to have something of his, no matter how small, was enough to make me almost happy.

Inside the box were a couple of rings and some trinkets, a photo of me and a letter with my name on it. Before I opened the letter I turned the photo over and saw that he had written -- Josh, my true partner. The day my existence began again. Finally.

I unfolded the letter and read;

Josh --

If one day you find I am gone I guess you’ll figure that it wasn’t my intention. There is a heap of things that can happen to my kind. Things that either end us or break us so that we got to hide out ‘till we heal up. If it is the case that I got hurt or bushwhacked and ain’t dead -- I’ll be back when I can.

If a few years go by and you ain’t heard, I think it’d be wise to give it up. I love you, or loved you, like I never done nobody before. I don’t know why for sure, but maybe that power you got from your daddy, zapped me. Ha ha.

Yours till my final death, Jett

How can I describe what I felt as I wiped a tear with the back of my hand? Fear, sadness, hope, joy? It was a sweet agony at best. I did not want to resign myself to believing he was no longer in existence. How and why we came to cherish each other is unclear to me. The intimacy that we eventually shared spiritually, physically, emotionally was all encompassing though. And I wasn’t sorry. If there was an ounce of remorse in me it wasn’t because I had loved another person.

I lifted the box to my lips. I kissed it and then carried it to my room and set it on the nightstand. I was too emotional at that moment to do anything -- sleep, each, watch TV, nothing. So I put on my jacket and headed into the gray dismal day. As I walked I recalled things that Jett and I had shared. Things that were said, things we did, his laughter, his smell, his ridiculous cowboy accent. I was oblivious to everything around me. I moved along the sidewalks on automatic, not even feeling the rain. If he returns, I thought, I’ll value him even more.

Then, all at once, my mood changed. He wasn’t gone for good. I felt in my bones that he was somewhere and that I’d see him again. I’d come to trust the power and intuition I had. I stopped by a pond in the park near home and came out of my trance. There were mallard ducks swimming around close to shore -- watching me and hoping I had some bread to throw. I was amazed at how blue the water was. It should be gray, I thought.

Then I looked up and saw the sky. The clouds had parted and the sun blasted me with light. In the distance my rainbow hovered and such a wide smile spread across my face that my jaws ached. “Come back, Jett!” I said aloud. And with those words the mallards rose from the water and flew north. Perhaps they were on their way to tell Jett to hurry home.

THE END (for now)

THESE BOOTS

(Call me butch, but don’t call my shots)

“It’s too hot!” Without opening my eyes I heard Kaye get out of the lawn chair beside me. “I’ve got to get out of this heat and cool off.” A minute later, my eyes still closed, I heard her feet enter the lake -- a cool splashing sound and a small sigh of relief. There was no reason to look, I could see her in my mind’s eye. Tall, darkly sensual, almost masculine with her ever-present expression of authority. She was young, and possibly beautiful, but there was something in her face that carried a warning. I suppose initially that was what drew me to her. The thorns at the base of the rose were the dominant force in her personality. For me, those thorns held more intrigue than the color or scent of the flower.

Though we were close friends, I sometimes questioned our relationship. We were we friend only? Of course I knew the obvious answer, but I didn’t like it. More and more I felt pressed to confront the issue which kept us from being as intimate as we could be. She had all the qualities that attracted me in another woman, but we were both labeled “butch”, and in 1969 it was still a dangerous business being attracted to someone of the same role.

I heard Kaye climbing the ladder at the end of the dock, then the sound of her wet feet splashing against the planks as she approached. This time I shadowed my eyes with my hand and watched her. She was smiling as she sat down beside me.

“Ah, that felt good.”

I had the urge to reach over and touch her, yet I didn’t. “Why haven’t we slept together?”

She looked at me in silence for a minute. “I think you can answer that.” We had talked before about roles and relationships within the lesbian community. The subject never seemed to interest Kaye. But what I was about to do was different; I was ready to talk about us personally. Before I even had a change to get started, I could sense the danger. I could see sparks flying under the cool veneer of her face, and I almost backed down before I began.

“Okay, you’re right, that was a stupid question. I was just thinking how strange things seem sometimes.”

“Stop,” she said flatly. “There isn’t anything strange about it -- at least not in this case. We’re buddies. We understand each other. We can’t start playing roles now. I’m not ready to change my nature, and it would sure as hell be a waste to see you as a submissive little femme. Let’s just do us both a favor and drop the subject.”

Her way of avoiding obvious truths, especially if they did not fit in to her particular understanding of the world, always annoyed me. But her bluntness and unwillingness to talk about this irritated me more than usual, and it hurt too. I swallowed. “But Kaye, if we can’t talk about this, than it’s no favor to me. We have a great time, and I love the competitive relationship we’ve shared for so long. I love the aggressiveness of it, but the truth is; it turns me on. The last fluff I was with was real cute, but I kept thinking of you the whole time I was with her. All the time I was turning her on, I felt only disappointment. I feel short changed. I just want a little more of you. We don’t have to change. If you feel anything for me, then you can see this is the time to be honest.”

Kaye looked pissed, but there was a fearful sort of anxiety in her face as well. Something I hadn’t seen there before. She got up and started gathering her things. “Teri, you’re backing me to the wall, and I don’t like it!” She was yelling now. “This conversation is going nowhere! Whether I want something more from you or not, doesn’t mean a damn thing. I’ll see you when you come back to reality.”

I watched her walk away. I was afraid. Maybe I went too far, maybe being honest was bad. No, I didn’t believe that. If she believed there could be nothing more between us than friendship, then why did she react so violently? This conversation wasn’t finished. I was still scared, but an anxious excitement rose up in my gut. I was read to wait. Or, as they say, ready to be “busy being idle.” Only now, looking back, am I able to realize how unprepared for the outcome I really was.

I lay there the rest of the afternoon, determined not to let my torrid emotions surface to the point of being unmanageable. My week-ends were sacred to me . I worked hard during the week, on a thoroughbred stud ranch, harder than most men. I earned enough to pay my bills and survive, but little more. The only tangible saving I could lay claim to was my own time at the end of the week. I was vaguely aware of how easily I might come unglued by the constrained but charged feelings that Kaye and I had just hurled at each other. But I would not allow my weekend to be ruined. I would not loose control. In some way I derived a satisfaction from my own tenacity, my resolve. I was strong!

********************************

Two weeks later I heard her bike pull up my drive. I hadn’t talked to her since her blow up. My heart beat quick and irregular. I sat down at the kitchen table and grabbed a book. It was best to act uninterested, absorbed in something. That I had thought of her daily for the last two weeks, she would never know. I waited for her to enter the back door, as was her habit. When it became obvious that she was in no hurry, I silently moved to the window to sneak a look. I slowly moved up to the glass, trying not to be seen. My heart stopped. She was sitting on her bike looking directly at the window, as if expecting me to show my face. Our eyes met and she waved, expressionless. I jerked my head back. “Damn it!” I whispered. This is not at all the way I had it planned.

I walked outside. “Hi,” I said, unsmiling as I approached her.

“Howdy,” she answered. “I came to see if you’d come to your senses.”

Nothing she said could have irritated me more, but I was not going to give her the upper hand. “Why don’t you come back when you’ve got some strength in that backbone of yours?” I said stoically.

“Hey! Low blow,” she retorted. “I guess you’re not going to let up on me about this are you?” We just looked at each other. We were both edgy, nervous despite the seeming lack of emotion in our voices. It occurred to me at that moment that we looked like a couple of gun slingers, poised and ready, but afraid to draw. She shrugged. “I don’t like being pushed, and I don’t like where your head is at, but I’ll listen to you this once. I’ll listen if you agree to drop it after tonight. I’ll let you prance in your boots for a few hours, just hang ‘em up when the show is over.”

“Thanks, but no thanks,” I said. “I won’t agree to drop any thing. You know what your problem is? You’re so afraid of what you think I am going to say, that you can’t hear what I am saying! Look, Kaye, times are changing. There is a new attitude in this country. Somebody turned on the lights. People aren’t tied down to the old passive and aggressive gender roles. The idea of masculine, breadwinning protector is dying. We don’t have to take our cues from straight society anyway, regardless of whether they are right or wrong. You and I are equal. Nothing more or less. I know you’re scared shitless of what all our friends will say about us being more than just buddies, but if they are friends, they can take it. If we can take each other for everything we are and stop pussy-footing around our feelings, we’ll be miles ahead of all that bull.”

“Oh, ya,” she moaned. “I can just see us walking in the bar past Lucia ‘the Greek’ as a happy go lucky pair of butch lovers! Shit, Teri, you don’t know what we’d be in for! I’ve been around for awhile, I know. Besides that, touching you would be . . . I don’t know . . . wrong somehow.”

I knew what Kaye meant, but what Lucia and her pack of gargoyles thought was their problem. I’d be damned if I would bow to them. “Hey,” I said, “Lucia has been around for years, she took her cues back in the fifties. She lived the way she learned to live, which is fine for her, I guess. It’s 1969, for god sakes, we’ve got to make our own rules, get in touch with ourselves.” Suddenly I felt the wind force its way into my shirt. “It’s getting cold Kaye, why don’t you just go home and think about it. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Ya, I guess,” she said dully. She gave her big bike a kick-start and revved up the motor. “She you later,” she yelled as she pulled out of the driveway.

I stood there a few minutes looking after her. I saw a flash and heard the far off rumble of thunder. A few drops of rain pelted my naked arms. I shivered and went inside.

**************************************

It was around midnight when I heard the knock. I was working out, finishing my last set of push-ups, and my skin was glistening as I walked to the door. The chill I felt as I opened it, however, was not the wind against my wet body. There she was. She looked awful! Her left eye was almost swollen shut, and though she was drenched by the late summer rain, I could see she’d been crying. Her cheeks were stained with blood and tears.

“My gawd!” I said, “what happened?”

“Just keep you mouth shut for a minute!” she bellowed. “I just took a beating for us tonight, because I wanted to see if maybe you were right about what you said. I just started telling Sara A. how much I wanted to be with you. Sara was a little drunk I guess, and started laughing real loudly and yelling it all out across the bar. It was awful. And honest to god, Teri, I hardly said anything. She was making it sound so sick, so fucking queer! Everybody’s head was turned, listening to every word. I was so fucking humiliated! I got up and headed for the door. A couple of big dykes followed me out. I don’t even know who they were, but the rest is history.”

What she was telling me sunk into my skull like nails. While her admission to Sara stirred me deeply, I felt a rush of every conceivable emotion, including rage, fear, and disbelief. As I looked at her swelling, filthy, and red face, I wanted to run screaming into the night like a mad woman. How could our own kind turn on each other so viciously just as the police and so many angry men had done to us for generations? It was sick, and I felt overwhelmed by the ugliness of the reality. My throat was tight and my voice came out raspy and thick. “But why did you go alone? You went about this all wrong! I . . .” I almost choked on the words. “I’m sorry, Kaye, I . . .”

She lifted her palm to my face. “Shut up,” she said. “Just shut up! You were wrong!” she was yelling, “do you know that? You were way off base, and you were wrong!” She looked down and began brushing at the caked-on mud and filth that covered her jeans. She did it delicately. She did it our of character. Her small deliberate movements seemed so slow and unreal. I was suddenly sure this was all a horrible dream. She looked up, her voice softened. “You were right about one thing though. I love you. I always have.”

Even in the state of shock and panic I was in, I heard her loud and clear. I understood how hard it was for her to admit what someone else might have said casually. She took something from her back pocket and dropped it at my feet. It was a pair of spurs, the silver studded pair that I had given her the Christmas before. My heart was racing as I looked from her to the spurs and back again. “What does this mean?”

“It means I won’t be needing them anymore.”

I picked them up slowly and understood. “No, Kaye, I don’t want them. You don’t have to change to love me. Not for those jerks, not for anyone. You keep them. Screw the rules! If those chicken-shits want to play games, let them. We can hold out as long as they can. Maybe it’ll be awhile, but things have to change eventually. I know damn well we are not the only ones tired of playing.” I held out my arms to her. “Come here,” I said.

******************************************

It all happened so long ago. In some ways it seems like yesterday, in other ways, like eons. All we could do back then was stay home. We didn’t enter the bars, and we lost a lot of old friends. It was our own personal fulfillment that kept us from toppling, balancing us against the pain and anger we felt at what seemed a narrow minded mentality. We stayed home for almost fifteen years, but we stayed together. The birth of a new acceptance within our community has all but disintegrated the bitterness. Some of the young people I’ve talked to have no perception of what we experienced. Sure, it is still not perfect out there, but then nothing ever is. Is it?

Kaye is in the other room as I write, listening to some “oldies, but goodies”. I can hear Nancy Sinatra singing, These Boots are Made for Walkin’. I never did like that one.

SOMETHING IN BETWEEN

The Johnston family was busier than usual, which is saying a lot. They were preparing for their annual holiday dinner party. Shari Johnston was the only one who was really rattled about preparations, but it was she who delegated tasks. Scott and Stacy, her teenage children from a previous marriage really helped ground Shari. Scott was the “go for” and Stacy planned most of the Christmas décor, helped her mom plan the meal and sent out invitations. Shari’s husband, Doctor Johnston, was always at work. His contribution hadn’t changed over the years -- providing the income and their massive house.

Stacy handed a list to Scott. He liked the chance to drive around town with the base in his truck pounding and vibrating the ground. He got a lot of attention from his peers but also a good amount of disgusted looks from older drivers. As Stacy filled out the invitations, she stopped when she got to a name she didn’t recognize. “Momma, who is Adrian Karlsson?”

“Oh, he’s staying with the Osters. He’s over from Sweden or Italy or somewhere.. They’re related to him somehow but I’ve never met him.”

Typical of her scatter brained mother not to get the details right. “How old is he?”

“I got the impression from Suzy that he’s fairly young, but I’m not really sure.”

“I hope he speaks English,” Stacy said.

“Most Swedes do,” Shari answered. “Suzy said he travels all over the world. I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t know several languages. Margo told me that he’s quite a rogue (whatever that means) and he’s very handsome. Apparently he stays up all night and sleeps all day!”

“He must be rich, then,” Stacy said, “because a person can’t keep those hours and have a job too. Not that I know anything about it,” she laughed.

When the night arrived, guests came through the wreathed front gate of black and gold. Then up to the porch decked with holly and Ivy. Another huge wreath hung on the door.

Some of the guests would probably stay the night. The Johnston’s lived pretty far out of town. The guests were always an odd mix; doctors, family and long time friends. Most didn’t really have much in common except their affiliation with the Johnstons. Brad and Anita Carter and their granddaughter, Cheyenne came. Mike and Martha Carrico, Doctor Teri Chambers, whose husband and recently passed away. Margo Wilhelm and her son, Freddie. Tom Jones and his partner Rocky B., the Osters, Doctor Rolando Curbello, Gosta and Eva Pearson, Rosie Glenn and Kayla Spencer. Their cousin Karleen Lindsey also came but only for the food. She always made sure to finish off any leftover salads and breads.

They came one after the other into the large lavishly decorated foyer. The grand staircase was flanked by two white and silver Christmas trees. White poinsettias were placed on the right and left of each step. The pillars were wrapped in silver and white garlands embellished with ribbons.

To the left was the great room which had its own fifteen foot tree. It was not the flocked colored tree that one might expect in such a grand interior. The tree was traditionally dressed. The mantle and hearth were festooned with cedar, fir and holly branches -- colored balls and festive candles. To the right of the foyer was the dining room. The long wide formal table was set with mauves and pale turquoise and a predominately white sparkly centerpiece, white balls and sprigs of baby breath.

About twenty minutes after the last guests had arrived there was a knock on the door. When Doctor Johnston opened it, there stood Suzy Oster and a very striking young man. Everyone stared and it felt as though the air had been sucked out of the room. The man looked to be in his late twenties. Black hair and eyes set against pale skin. Nothing like what you’d expect from Scandinavia.

Shari said, “Come in, come in!” finally breaking her momentary paralysis. “Hello Suzy. This must be Adrian! So glad you could come.” Shari turned toward the great room. “Everyone this is Adrian, Suzy’s cousin from Sweden. You can all introduce yourselves later.”

Adrian took in the room with his dark eyes and an amused smile. He laid an expensive looking camera on one of the small tables. “Thank you for inviting me, Mrs. Johnston,” he said as he took note of the decorations. “You have a beautiful home.”

God, he’s gorgeous -- Stacy thought to herself. She looked over at her brother and found he was also staring at the visitor. She elbowed him. “You don’t have to be so obvious,” she whispered.

She looked around the room and realized that though everyone went on visiting and pouring drinks, they all seemed edgy and uncomfortable. Martha Carrico was in the kitchen walking her baby, trying to soothe the little bundle and stop the incessant crying. Finally it stopped and she rejoined the group. Just as she sat down and relaxed, the baby started up again. Adrian walked over to Martha and introduced himself. “May I?” he said, holding out his hands for the baby.

“Oh, but she won’t stop crying,” Martha warned.

“Let me see,” he said as he took her from Martha. He looked down at the infant and smiled. The crying stopped immediately. He carried the baby around the house and it didn’t make a sound. People noticed. The original shock of Adrian’s beauty had diminished, but now he was esteemed a notch higher by his apparent affinity for babies.

Stacy stood on the opposite side of the room watching everyone while she sipped her Kailua. She kept her eye on Adrian. She tried to act poised, aloof, but she felt like a little girl with a crush. For a moment their eyes met and he smiled. She smiled back and blushed. He made her knees weak. He motioned her over and she obeyed. Her heart was thumping as she closed the distance. There was something strange about him. His skin so pale. His eyes were too intense. Danger? She avoided his eyes by looking at the baby and smiling sweetly.

“What a good girl she is, no?” he said. His smooth voice could make her swoon.

“According to recent gossip, she started being sweet when you picked her up,” Stacy answered.

He laughed. “Babies respond to the moods of those around them. I’m naturally low-key and she felt it.”

“You know a lot about babies?”

“I’m was once a father. I pay attention to things. Have you heard of Margaret Mead?”

Stacy thought a minute. “Um . . .wasn’t she an anthropologist?”

“Yes, a social anthropologist. At any rate, she supposedly said that insight can be gained by studying animals, studying infants, having a psychosis and getting over it, having a religious conversion and getting over it, and having a love affair with an old Russian. Or something to that effect.”

“An old Russian?” Stacy said, incredulously.

“In her day, an old Russian would have been a pre-Bolshevik,” he said thoughtfully.

“And I gather an old Russian would have a lot to teach.”

“You got it,” he smiled.

“So, not only do you study infants, you know a lot about old Russia.”

“You could say that,” then he rattled off something in the language. “but that is Old Russian, or more accurately, Old Church Slavonic.”

Stacy’s eyes grew wide. “Wow. She stared at him wondering what other languages and esoteric knowledge this man knew. “So,” she said, “What do you do for a living?”

He smiled at her again. His smile was mesmerizing. She didn’t think she’d ever seen such a beautiful creature. She felt as though she was sitting with a famous celebrity who, incredibly, wanted to talk to her alone. Thankfully the more they talked the more her butterflies settled and she began to feel as at ease as if she were talking to a family member.

“I teach physics at night, but that’s about it. I travel.

By now Scott had disappeared, probably to play video games, she thought. He got bored so easily. But she and Adrian continued talking. A few of the guests interrupted their conversation every once in awhile, but she felt compelled to stay where she was. As soon as someone said something and then walked away, Adrian would pick up the thread of their prior conversation as if they had never been interrupted. His eyes were intent upon her and his questions so intimate that she wondered if she was being groomed for . . . who-knew-what.

Finally, her mother asked her to re-stock the bar and help with the food. “People are going through the liquor like water!” Shari whispered to Adrian.

Stacy chuckled. “Well, that’s good, isn’t it Mom?”

* * * *

Scott had been sitting at the bar in the great room when Stacy had gone to talk to the Swede. Some Swede, he thought. His hair and eyes were black as a Spaniard’s -- seemed like the antithesis of a blond Scandinavian. But what did Scott know, really, of various Swedish characteristics?

He had looked over at Scott once, locked eyes, and winked at him. Scott smiled in reply but felt very embarrassed and uncomfortable. He left the room. Attention from a man like that made him feel inadequate and uneasy. He tried hard to sublimate his attraction to the guy. So he went to his bedroom and played a new game he’d bought recently. An hour later he was so engrossed in the game that at first he didn’t see Adrian standing at his door. When he did notice him he dropped the game and nearly cried out. The guy stood staring with those hypnotic eyes. After an unnerving moment, he finally spoke. “Your Mother told me to take the blue room, but I think I’m lost. Can’t seem to find it.”

Stop smiling at me so innocently, Scott thought. I don’t buy it. “Uh, that’s cause its on the third floor.” Scott jumped up. “I’ll show you.” He led Adrian up the staircase to the third floor and to the blue guest bedroom and started to turn away.

“What did you think of the Huskies’ win last weekend?”

“Um. Great,” Scott said, not knowing a thing about the game, let alone who won.

Adrian laughed. “Wait a second. Let me put my bag on the bed and I’ll walk back with you.” Scott stood at the door and watched Adrian put his overnight duffle bag on the bed. “Wow,” Adrian continued as he walked to the other side of the room. “I’ve got my own bathroom?” Then he came out and joined Scott in the hall. “Not really into sports, huh?”

“I didn’t say that,” Scott said defensively.

“That’s okay. Nothing to be ashamed of. Lots of people couldn’t care less about it.”

Their eyes met and Adrian winked at him again. Scott turned and started walking back the way they’d come. As they went down the stairs to the second floor, Adrian briefly put his hand on Scott’s shoulder. “What a huge old house you’ve got. It must be interesting to live here.” The hand had felt cold through Scott’s shirt. It was about time for dinner so they continued down to the first floor together where most of the guests were mingling. Scott’s shoulder, where Adrian had touched him felt all tingly and warm now. He felt inexplicitly happy and excited, like a puppy following the first person to pet it.

“Everyone find your place cards and sit down,” Shari said loudly. They all sat and Doctor Johnston made a toast to good friends and good food. Stacy was confused. She and Scott were on each side of Adrian. She had placed the cards on the table herself, and her own should have been on the other side. Had someone moved it? At any rate, confused or not, she couldn’t be happier to sit beside her new friend. The light conversation around the table continued; Oh these table settings are gorgeous! The food smells so good, I just love these parties, I’m so unworthy! Laughter and on and on.

As everyone dished up, Stacy felt Adrian’s leg brush against her shin. Then he actually put his foot on hers for a moment. He turned his head toward her and said, “sorry Stacy.” He laughed as if were perfectly normal to play footsies under the table. She hardly knew how to react.

At the same time, Scott felt Adrian’s knee against his. Scott’s reaction, though, was not the same as his sisters. He felt embarrassment rather than titillation. He had no problem with people his own age, but he didn’t know how to react to the attentions of an older guy and one whose good looks were so extreme. He felt himself turn red and then when Adrian tried to lock legs with him as if they were playing a game, Scott was beside himself.

Shari broke off her conversation with Martha and looked at Scott with concern. “Are you all right, Scotty? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

The talking stopped and everyone turned to look at Scott. “I’m fine,” he says. “Well, actually I feel kind of queasy. I think I’ll go to my room for a little while.”

“Good idea, Son,” his Father chimes in. The utensils began clinking again and conversation continued.

As he scoot his chair out from the table he addressed Adrian in a whisper. “Sorry, man, but you’re making me feel weird.”

“We’ll talk later then,” Adrian answers, as Scott stands up to leave.

The rest of the dinner was uneventful but Adrian continued to seduce Stacy -- and truth be known, she was enjoying it though she kept her legs and feet away from him.

* * * *

That night Stacy and Scott had the same dream. They were standing in a field in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by acres of flat land. The weather was overcast and dismal. Everything was silent and everything was still as if the world had been deserted. Then Adrian appeared in the distance and he motioned with his arm to come and join him. He stood and waited as they approached. His dark hair and eyes made his white skin almost glow.

He gave them an enigmatic smile. He took them each by the hand and all three began to run together -- laughing and feeling nothing but abandonment and joy. They continued to run. Scott and Stacy suddenly noticed the warm smile changed into a hideous, rapacious grin. A dark house appeared to them as they ran. Adrian’s whole aspect took on a monstrous predatory hunger.

During the entire dream Stacy could hear nothing except the sound of their legs brushing across the gold and bronze grass. The place was devoid of wind or breeze. When they finally reached the house there was a plaque that read “La morte mi troverà vivo.” The door automatically opened and Adrian flung them inside. Then it crashed behind them and they were in complete and utter darkness. The two clung to each other. When he awoke Scott jumped out of bed and went to Stacy’s room. He burst in to assure himself she was there. Having just opened her eyes from the same dream, Stacy screamed. “Sorry,” Scott said, “it’s just that I had a terrible nightmare.”

“Me too!” she said. She told him her dream. Scott sat at the end of her bed amazed. He was seriously frightened and told her that she had described his nightmare to a T. “That’s so bizarre,” she said. “He’s such a nice guy. If you hadn’t had the same dream, I would have forgotten it. But that is just too weird.

Scott was calming down now.

“Yeah,” he said, “it is. But, on the other hand, you and I have always been in tune with each other that way.”

“It probably has less to do with Adrian than it has to do with us.”

“Probably,” Scott answered. “Does he give you the creeps sometimes? I mean, he’s sort of scary. I always feel like he’s coming on to me. The guy is hot, but he must be about thirty and I’m only seventeen. What’s his deal?”

“Funny you should say that, because I’ve felt it too. I’ve felt like he’s trying to gain my trust -- like he’s trying to seduce me.”

“I’m not sure it is about sex, but it seems like it.”

Stacy stared at her hands. Even though her brother was gay, he had loads of self confidence -- but she doubted he had any more real experience than she did with boys. And there was nothing feminine about him, nothing overt that would lead one to believe he was homosexual. She thought about Andy, her friend at school, and how his voice and gestures and reactions to things advertised his sexuality. It was too bad, because people are so much more than that aspect of their make up. She felt bad for him, too, because even though the younger generation was not as concerned with such things as the older generation, it was still hard to gain people’s respect when you don’t look or act like everyone else.

“Right,” Scott said. “Why don’t we drive into Redding today and just hang out. Shop, eat, whatever. We just won’t have to deal with Adrian.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

“Let’s go after breakfast.”

* * * *

PART II

Adrian didn’t show up for breakfast and when they returned from their outing about four-thirty, Shari said he hadn’t shown himself all day. At six o’clock, as the sun weakened, darkness spread its velvet fingers across the earth. Adrian finally descended the stairs like a dark prince.

“My goodness,” Shari said, “you slept all day?”

“I’m a night owl,” he answered. “I rarely see the sun.”

“Suzy called this afternoon. She has to drive up to Washington. She wondered if you wanted to make the drive with her. I told her it was no problem at all if you wanted to stay here another day.”

Adrian walked toward the large picture window and stared out into the growing darkness. Then he turned. “Mrs. Johnston, if you’re sure it wouldn’t be an inconvenience, I believe I’d rather stay here.”

He wanted the twins. He needed a companion. Two would be better than one. Since he lost Sara, his partner, to some hunters in England, he’d kept his eyes open for company. Stacy had been easy to draw in. He would only need a little more time. The boy was proving more difficult to seduce. Yes, in Scott’s case he had his work cut out for him.

He was confused about Scott. At first he was sure he could lure him in. He had been as enthralled as anyone when Adrian entered the house -- which was to be expected -- but the boy’s subsequent reaction to him had been far from predictable. He would have to step up his seduction. He might even have to resort to mesmerizing him -- a gift all vampires had but one which Adrian preferred not to use. He enjoyed using his talents to do it the hard way. He wanted to get them to Sweden where he would indoctrinate them in the existence of the undead. He’d have to work fast.

* * * *

In the middle of the night Stacy was awakened. She opened her eyes and looked around the dim bedroom. She heard small furtive noises, hushed movement, but could see nothing. She laid her head down and closed her eyes. A few minutes later a soft knock on the door. She instinctively knew it was not Scott. It would be Adrian asking to enter. Against her best judgment she went to the door. It was him, but she was surprised to see tears on his face. As if his good looks weren’t arresting enough, “What’s wrong Adrian?”

“Oh, Stacy. I just got some very bad news. I need to talk to someone.” he said.

“What happened, Adrian? Come in.”

He was wearing silk pajamas which were unbuttoned, exposing his perfect flesh. He touched her cheek and lightly brushed her skin. He closed the door. An hour later Stacy awoke. She felt deliciously spent and fulfilled. She stretched her arms across the bed like a cat stretches when it wakes from a nap. She felt a breeze caress her skin and realized she was completely naked. She jumped up and gasped when she saw the sheet she’d been lying on.

Not long after this, Scott was also awakened by a light knock. He threw back his comforter and walked to the door. He opened it. “Hey,” Adrian whispered. “Sorry I woke you but I’ve got a problem in my room and I could really use a hand.” Scott was immediately suspicious but he followed Adrian to the blue guest room. Once Scott was inside, Adrian put his cold hand on Scott’s shoulder.

* * * *

Neither Stacy nor Scott really remembered anything, but both knew that Adrian had taken them by surprise. Strangely Stacy had calmed down and really didn’t care. In fact her emotions seemed flattened in general. All she knew was that she felt good physically and very calm.

Scott’s attitude was much the same. When he looked in the bathroom mirror that morning and saw a small wound on his neck, he just smiled. When they saw Adrian that evening nothing passed between any of them other than a “good evening” from Adrian and a wicked smile. Later he sat with them in the great room and asked them, if they were free, to come and visit him in Stockholm in a few weeks. Both of them thought that would be fine and without much enthusiasm, both agreed to come.

Two weeks later the siblings were on an airplane headed for Europe. Adrian had left shortly after his stay at their house and would be waiting for them when they arrived. During this time, their usual personalities had gradually returned.

Stacy was sitting in the window seat gazing at the high clouds. “Why are we doing this?” she asked.

“Doing what?”

“Flying to Scandinavia to see Adrian.”

Scott studied his hands. “I’m not sure. I think he needs us.”

“Yes, I suppose he does,” she answered. “We aren’t what he is, you know.”

“No, we’re something in between.”

“Do you think he’ll make us the same as he?” she asked.

“I don’t believe he will. I think we’ll be looking after things for him during the day when he slumbers.”

She opened a magazine tucked into the back of the seat in front of her and sighed contentedly. “That will be nice.”

THE E ND

(for now)

AGATHOS DAIMON

(good spirit)

He was, in a word, everything I had ever wanted. But nothing is exactly what it seems on first appearance -- at least, nothing human. He hade been the subject of my dreams long before I met him. I mean, literally, I believed him to be the incarnation of a character in a re-occurring dream from my childhood. This dream, which was nothing more than the emotional union with the “perfect friend,” necessarily ceased before adolescence commenced. Why “necessarily”? Because the very essence of my desire was emotional and spiritual, not corporeal. It was the imagination and ideal of reciprocal tenderness and caring -- pure love, unencumbered by sexual considerations. Nevertheless, the completely unexpected nature of our reunion was the sweetest surprise I could have experienced -- nearly an epiphany, certainly sublime -- never mind the dark overtones which I chose to ignore.

So, you see, meeting this person in the flesh was something of a regression as well as a prophecy fulfilled. My child-like joy and excitement was mitigated only slightly by a more experienced and less enthusiastic adult mind. When I met K.Y., he shook something deep within my memory which, in turn, opened a floodgate of conflicting sentiment. Given his handsome face and form, it seemed only natural to want communion with him in every possible way. But not, well . . . while some believe sexual union to be the greatest manifestation of the more cerebral intimacies, it cannot be denied that sexual desire is capricious, complicated and, very often, animalistic. Should I jump this angel of my childhood, force myself on him as a demon lover? I had a sense that my angel had metamorphosed as much as I over the years. I would be hard pressed, at this late date, to debauch innocence.

The circumstance of our meeting was not peculiar, though the force of recognition, that surge of electricity, was. We met in a bar! Our instantaneous rapport was (and I must say it) overlapped by an incredible, mutual urge toward raw sex. Perhaps this was only one of those strange moments of desperation when a merger of body seems the only response possible to sate the spiritual and intellectual thirst we humans are so prone to. But because we refrained, the magic, the magic was strong. It was as if we were emanating a scintillating aura which glowed and encircled us, enclosing and separating us from everything else. The air virtually snapped with the charge. That K.Y. was not exactly human, I did not know, and of my own potential for preternatural power, I was blissfully unaware. That we both had connections to a vast, unearthly Diaspora of immortal spirit-things, would have caused me to throw back my head with a loud guffaw. My ignorance was complete and absolute. Still, looking back, I believe we both had heard the voice of desolation echoing within us prior to our meeting. Our inarticulate and almost instant recognition of each other seemed to stifle, at least temporarily, that Tartarean groan, and inform the incipient relationship.

But to escape vagueness and give a more distinct picture of this over-reaching affair, let us plunge directly into actual fact. Perhaps I can relate how it all began:

On the night in question (to borrow a legal phrase)

I was sitting at the bar of my usual week-end haunt The place had a horrible name -- The Squealing Pig -- but served excellent mixed drinks and attracted a fairly upscale gay crowd who were, for the most part, well behaved and sporting the new ante plague morality. I had been there about an hour and a half. I was not inebriated, but was well on my way and feeling rather frisky. I had spent several minutes talking to a rather dull young man who, nevertheless, laughed easily and had a pleasant social disposition. He was, of course, made the more interesting as my sobriety decreased. While it is true that there is no finer place for the intellectual and the artist than a bar, tavern or pub, I had long ago ceased expecting to meet anyone who might share similar interests with me. I concentrated instead on a more superficial goal -- finding beauty and form rather than intellectual substance. Anyway, contrary to popular opinion, I think it is questionable whether the desire for intelligence in others is any less superficial than the desire for beauty. Both qualities, after all, are in essence a mere matter of luck -- helped along toward perfection by rigorous efforts at enhancing natural gifts. Tell the tragically stupid person that you care nothing about his feelings, or the horribly disfigured that you can not look at her long enough to have a meaningful conversation. Isn’t it all the same? On the other hand, none of us appreciate seeing the holes in our own disproportionately elevated morals.

When I turned from the man I had been conversing with, to hail the bartender for another drink, there stood K.Y., ordering a beer in all his invisible splendor! Well, invisible to all but me anyway. (Sometimes only the mind which is drunk to the point of torpor can see divinity!) Apparently his gaze was upon me even before I was aware of his presence, because, when my eyes met his, he was smiling with a sort of amused anticipation. This intense, open-faced interest completely lacked any hint of embarrassment. I rewarded him with an equally broad smile and a bit of idiocy; “Wow, you’ve got a great nose! Where did you get it? I mean . . . what’s your heritage -- Italian, Greek, or . . . ?”

He chuckled. “Not a drop of classical blood, if that’s what you’re driving at. I’m German, among other things.”

The guy with whom I had been conversing tapped me on the shoulder. Turning back to him, I saw a suppressed disappointment written on his face. I was about to make some sort of apologetic offering, but before I had a chance, he spoke. “I’ve got to go now, John, but it was nice talking to you,” Then, shooting a piercing glance at K.Y., he added, “. . . while it lasted.” I ignored the sarcastic inflection, said goodbye, and offered my hand as respectfully as I could -- which all martyrs of his caliber deserve. He had every right to take offense at my sudden focus on K.Y. How could I begrudge him his moment of contempt?

Before I returned to the object of my impulsive infatuation, he came around and claimed the now empty barstool. Without hesitation, or the usual preliminary niceties, we entered into a spontaneous, mutually revealing, and unforgivably literate conversation. We talked of poetry and poets, antiquities, modern controversial authors, cultural anthropology and religious rites. Everything I was interested in, he seemed to either know something about or to be as interested in as I. It was as if we were a perfectly matched pair --mirror images. Source and reflection were indistinguishable, all labels were annulled. It seemed, in that moment, we precisely exemplified the mythological motif of twinship. Our desire, I felt, was as precisely matched as our individual strength of character. Of course we were not the same person but, as would so often happen between us in future, we obliterated all differences. Minor distinction that is swallowed up by the cosmic force of oneness. The unity which is peculiar to nature was pinpointed on us with all the devastating power of the sun’s rays through a magnifying glass! For me, the quest for the absolute, as we continued drinking and talking, I expected to realize through Dionysian enthousiasmos, which blasted apart all separation and pierced darkness.

As we communed there, our awareness of that segment of humanity seething around us was reduced to a meaningless hum. The place was a hive of drones. Conceptions like Time and Place were stolen, gone, non-existent, and at the risk of sacrilege, I will say that our communion was a manifestation of something eternal. As offensive as this reality is to those who are excluded from the process, the transfiguration of the mind to the celestial spheres, is a normal state of affairs -- a re-occurring phenomenon which comes quietly, sometimes completely unnoticed, and often misunderstood by its patrons. But, realizing the godhead while still in mortal form is not the strangest human experience, as I was soon to find out.

I didn’t consider myself superstitious, but things between us were too right to have happened as coincidence. That he had the look and manner of half forgotten dreams challenge my rationality only slightly. (Laugh if you like!) When we parted that night, I started to suspect . . . no, to believe, that he was sent to me from origins other than flesh and blood. He was either a sort of seraphic being or one of the gods incarnate!

PART II

“That is why the Masters of the World, initiates, do not indulge in mysticism. For them, a mystic is a slave, a site of the manifestation of the numinous, through which site the signs of a secret can be observed. The initiate encourages the mystic and uses him as you might use a telephone, to establish long distance contact, or as a chemist might use litmus paper, to detect the action of a particular substance. The mystic is useful because he is conspicuous. He broadcasts himself. Initiates, on the contrary, are recognizable only to one another. It is they who control the forces that mystics undergo. In this sense there is no difference between the possession experienced by the cavalos and the ecstasies of Saint Theresa of Avila or Saint John of the Cross. Mysticism is a degenerate form of contact with the divine, whereas initiation is the fruit of long askesis of mind and heart. Mysticism is a democratic, if not demagogic phenomenon; initiation is aristocratic.”

Over the next few weeks we spent as much time together as we could, but it was never enough. Our appetite for each other’s company grew to enormous proportions and threatened to burst under the pressure of self restraint. We corresponded by mail, exchanged literature, and esoteric lover letters. Finally we gave up on abstinence. I will leave off descriptions of our “sacred rites,” but suffice it to say that what ever happened between us was intense and harmonious as any twinship. It wasn’t long after this that strange occurrences begged my attention. What seemed to be insignificant, unrelated events -- which by themselves would mean nothing -- accumulated to a degree impossible to ignore.

I lived nearly forty miles from Seattle in a small town, and because of my job and other commitments, I was unable to see K.Y. every day -- though phone conversations kept us in communication. One good example of the bizarre happenings which began to assert themselves came on a Saturday morning when I was grocery shopping. A group of people were standing outside the store before I went in. I might have paid no heed had it not been for their unusual appearance. They had a unique ethnic look, though I could not guess from what country they might have been. It was not so much their skin or hair, or any other physical attribute, which defined them as foreign, they looked like any number of northern European natives, but their manner and facial expression were singularly non-American -- something inexplicable. But what disturbed me about the little huddle standing there was that they seemed to be watching me! As I walked toward them and into the store, they made furtive gestures which I found annoying and rude. No big deal, right? But inside, as I pushed my cart down the aisles, I met some of them individually, and each time I passed one, they smiled or nodded or both. One woman whispered as she went by, “congratulations.”

“What?” I said, startled. But she only smiled and walked on. I shook my head and continued. When I reached the check out lane, the man and woman in front of me were obviously from the same group. There was nothing unusual about their selection of foods, but I scrutinized them nevertheless. Just as they paid and were about to step away, the woman whispered in the man’s ear. He nodded to her, then as she walked out with the cart, he turned to me and, smiling, said -- “They’ve been looking for you for a long time, you know. Longer than even they knows.”

“Who?” I asked, irritably. “What are you talking about? Who are you?”

The man held up his had to me as if to say calm down. “Don’t be afraid,” he answered. I meant to question him and started to speak, but he cut me off, saying, “Look, John, don’t worry. We will be in touch with both of you soon.” He walked away without meeting my eyes again.

“In touch with both of you soon!” I thought. What was that supposed to mean? Both of us. . . Kamil and I? It wasn’t as if we were applying for a job!

My response was fear. He said don’t be afraid, but I was. Thoughts shot through my brain in rapid fire as I tried to make sense of the nonsensical. Were these weird relatives of K.Y., or . . .? Paranormal, mystical interpretation did not occur to me until later. I was afraid to run out after the two that had addressed me, but when I finally left the store, there was no sign of them; not a trace of the strange fold who had made for such an extraordinary shopping experience.

It’s difficult to describe my thoughts about Kamil after experiencing something like this. The whole episode had to be connected with him. I had certainly never attracted such attention from strangers before! Suspicion seems the most appropriate word to describe my state of mind. If there was magic about, it was antique magic, and his. His interest in past culture, especially the archaic Greek, was too seductive to me to be coincidental; but my fear stemmed from an uncertainty regarding the nature and origin of his connection to me. My normal skepticism, under the reality of this strangeness, could not sustain the weight of an inbred superstition -- (superstition, our real original sin hides crouching in us all) -- so my rationality collapsed. It caved in upon itself. Was this magic good or evil? I did not believe in evil, I had disavowed the concept years ago, but, what if I was wrong? But no, if there was anything about him which was not as it appeared, it must be good.

When I told Kamil about this incident, his reaction was not what I expected. After describing my day-time, and very public, haunting, he was silent for several queasy whirling moments. He had a similar experience that same morning he said, although his visitor was a single soul. He had been looking for some particular book, and a lexicon of Homeric Greek. An old woman asked if she could help him in find anything and, assuming she was employed there, he told her what he was looking for and she said she would direct him toward his desires. She led him to a narrow aisle in the store and pulled out three books from the shelves. Handing them to him, she said, “you’ll need these, I think.” Kamil politely told her that the books looked very interesting, but that he was looking for something quite different. She shook her head, clutched his upper arms, looked directly into his eyes, and insisted, “You need these! You both need them!.” She took the list he was holding and said petulantly, “not these!” Then smiling, like a calm after the storm, she shuffled out of existence.

I looked at Kamil incredulously as he related this to me. He continued, “It really spooked me, John, but I bought the damn books. When I mentioned the ‘pushy old lady’ to the sales clerk, he said he was the only person working that day and, as far as he knew, there were no old women employed at that bookstore.”

After K.Y. had finished, he looked at unflinchingly and, with frightening sincerity, asked, “John, are you a witch, or . . . into something . . . like, really heavy?” Then, reassuringly, he added, “I mean, whatever it is, I’m sure I can handle it if you just tell me the truth.”

I began to laugh. If this was a ruse, he was good! He perfectly verbalized my own thoughts and suspicions about him! Could this be subterfuge designed to cinch me to him even tighter? I finally answered after regaining control over myself and the irony of his words. “No! Of course not! I’m nothing” He just looked at me. “Nothing!” I repeated. He looked at the floor, shaking his head dubiously, as if silently going over the facts again. His obvious ambivalence matched my own. We dropped the subject, however, and did not pick it up again for a long, long time. But equally bizarre events continued to accumulate.

Ultimately, our mutual confusion only intensified my desire to be near him. I envisioned us as two innocents sucked into an awful Charybdis, dragged under and toward infinite void of a blood-black sea. I think he felt it too. He nearly crushed me in his embraces as we fell together. Of course I was no gentler.

PART III

“God hissed and there was light.” “. . . but the lights of Serirot must be gathered in vessels that can contain their splendor without shattering.”

Eco’s Foucault’s Pendulum

“If all else perished, and he [Heathcliff] remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the universe would turn [into] a mighty stranger: I should not seem a part of it. My love for Linton, however, is like the foliage in the woods; time will change it, I’m aware, as winter changes the trees. My love for Heathcliff resembles the eternal rocks beneath: a source of little visible delight, but necessary. Nelly, I am Heathcliff! He’s always in my mind: not as a pleasure, any more than I am always a pleasure to myself, but as my own being. So don’t talk of our separation again: it is impracticable; and . . .”

Cathy, from Bronte’s Wuthering Heights.

Weeks later found us preparing for a week-end hike in the mountains near mount Pilchuck. Why did we not live together? you might ask. That is a question which did not come up, though I can not say why. And though I now know more about the mute and forceful, guiding voices, I can only surmise that we needed our own personal precincts; his urban, and mine rural. His congregation of mortals were, for the most part, within the city limits, mine scattered over the countryside. He flew on two wheels like a personal god of the “‘hood” and the back streets of the “Swish Alps”, while I screamed over large stretches behind four wheels like a crop-duster, acting as mere functionary; a demiurge, eniautos daimon, chthonic and led entirely by earth-bound society. If I was of the earth, he was a blazing ball of fire, and a scourge of the heavens. But we loved each other and, as it turns out, had good reason; ancient ones. But I digress -- and besides that, I was a little off the mark about most of this stuff.

We decided to actually climb to the peak of Pilchuck itself. We had started before dawn from Kamil’s place in Seattle and drove to the starting off place, half way up the relatively low mountain, which was a now abandoned ski lodge. We reached it at eight o’clock am, put on our minimal gear, locked up the car and began what would be our longest and most profound journey together.

Though we were in the last stages of an Indian summer, at the higher altitude the morning was cold, and the air carried the undeniable scent of Fall’s approach. The bottom of the trail was wide and still. Walking from the earth and gravel area where the car was parked, through the tall pines and mountain shrubbery, gave the impression of passing through a mystic gate -- towards a pristine loneliness and sublime desolation. The Romantic in me (inspired by the profound silence and the presence of my daimon lover) gave a nod to the Roman god, Janus Clusivius, of opening gates and doors. Here we were, two strong young men (like countless young heroes before us on the sacred foothills of the mountains of ancient Greece), beginning an ascent towards a wider view of Gaia, where the latent power of nature might open to us in all its dual potentiality, its terrible lover’s embrace, its pure sacredness and heartless beauty. My mind was invigorated by the scene, my body by the renovating air, and my thoughts were clamoring and lucid. Kamil, too, was near a manic possession; but, yielding to the dictates of our surroundings, we walked in silence. The only sound we heard was the far off rushing of water and the trickling of tiny streams -- and our own breathing.

The growth was thick for most of our morning -- there were places where the pine trunks were bare a good third of their length, the tops forming a sort of alpine canopy -- and we stopped several times in wonder of the vast carpets of moss and ferns, dappled by the sunlight which streamed in fantastic, otherworldly shafts, through the tree tops. Our steps were muffled by the bed of needles and mosses along the trail, and except for the occasional splashings through thin rivulets of ice water, our presence was not detectable to whatever silent beings might exist there.

Once, as we walked along in file, Kamil stopped in front of me and, without turning, thrust his hand back, signaling for me to stop and be quiet -- though I was not talking or making noise. Just ahead of us, a light-footed doe was making her way toward us at a fairly rapid pace. Her delicate trot was accentuated by lithe hops and boundings. Not far behind her were twin fawns. When she was within a few feet of us, rather than turning aside and veering, she actually slowed down and surveyed us with alert interest. We remained still and, as she passed, she nudged Kamil’s pack, raised her head and sniffed his neck and ear! It was very strange and decidedly unnatural. Then she moved on, her offspring in hot pursuit. “Jeez,” I whispered, “I can’t believe that!”

A delighted smile spread over Kamil’s face. “I can,” he said.

“But, it seems pretty high up the mountain to run into deer,” I answered. Then, returning his smile, I said, “maybe she was the sacred doe of Artemis.”

Kamil took my face in his hands and kissed me affectionately. We walked on, and my heart beat faster as I savored the pleasure of his touch. My face flushed a bit, too, imagining that the Nymphs or Muses watched me in jealously from behind the forest growth.

We sat and ate lunch in an open area, which overlooked a small waterfall. Strange grey jays appeared from nowhere to join us. We actually heard them a way off in the tree tops approaching, but their descent on us was reminiscent of the flying monkeys in the Wizard of Oz.

Finally we were almost above the tree line, and the silence was deafening. There was no sound, not even of water . . . nothing. It had been a long time since I had experienced anything quite so pure as that complete absence of sound. As we came out of the trees, we could see the very peak with the little look-out shack made by a group of government sponsored bad boys, years ago. The materials had been flown in by helicopter, I think. Making our way through the last sparse growth, we began the actual rock climbing. It was rather dangerous, but nothing that a million other summer hikers had not done before us; still, we proceeded with care. The boulders were large and lichen-covered, but they were dry and easy to grip. On the summit we sat on a large ledge and over looked the valleys below, we were even able to make out some peaks in Canada, to the north. He kissed me again, and we entered the shack to see what we could see. Inside was a notebook with signatures, dates and graffiti written by previous visitors. We added ours and began our descent to find less precarious shelter for the night.

PART IV

“Omne ignotum pro magnifico est.”

(Or, What men know nothing about, they see as wonderful.) Calgacus

“I have tried to learn a great deal since we were in Rome . . . I can read Latin a little, and I am beginning to understand just a little Greek. I can help Mr. Casabon better now. I can find out references for him and save his eyes in many ways. But it is very difficult to be learned; it seems as if people were worn out on the way to great thoughts and can never enjoy them because they are too tired.” Dorothea, from Eliot’s Middlemarch

“Silent, alone, no one escorting us, we made our way --one before, one after --” Dante

“Sshhh . . . Silentium post clamores!”

They appeared, as we made our ascent, in the clearing where we had earlier shared our lunch with the jays. All of those “people” whom I had seen a few weeks before outside the grocery store (although their aspect had changed somewhat) and more, stood around the clearing, staring at us. They wore peculiar tunics, chitons, not of white, but greens and greys and browns. My skin crawled at the sight of their strange eyes set in pale faces. I heard trickling at my feet and saw that, unbelievably, Kamil was pissing himself, which only added to my horror. Before I could turn to retreat, they encircled us. I took Kamil’s hand and stepped forward to confront them. “What do you want?” I said, with a great show of false courage.

“Do not be afraid,” said one of the women, stepping forward. She looked at Kamil, “Did you read the books, Son?” Will did not respond.

“Who are you?” I asked, impatiently.

“Family!” bellowed a voice from the distant trees. “We are the Agathoi Daimones, and you have clearly forgotten who you are!”

I looked at Kamil. His eyes remained ahead and did not meet mine, but in a hoarse, scratchy voice he whispered; “good spirits.”

Thinking he had temporarily lost his marbles, I ignored him and directed myself to the group. “I’m John, and this is Kamil,” I said. “We know who we are and what we are.”

“Oh?” said the woman who had addressed Kamil personally, “and what are you?”

“Uh . . . we’re, uh, dilettantes!” I have no idea why I said that, but the immediate reaction was a group fit of laughter. “Well we’re a couple of American boys, okay?”

“No!” Came the bellowing, male voice again. “You are the twins, the Dioscuri, the Anakes, the great double Epiphany!”

“Just let us pass,” I said. “We are nothing of the kind! You’ve made a terrible mistake,” and, as if in a dream, I said, “besides, you Greeks have no business on this continent!”

“Silence! How do you think you found each other, you fool? And, for that matter, why? An accident? Hardly! Do you forget so easily? Stop thinking, and become!”

At that moment, clouds gathered and rose above us like a black colossus, Zeus’ thunder cracked and rolled, and the trees seemed to whirl about us in a blur of greens. We fell to the ground like rag dolls, and when I looked at Kamil, he was but a coiled serpent. I tried to reach out to him, but had no arms with which to do so. We entwined and spiraled to an upright position and, with a shock and a snap, we were standing as before. Everything had stopped spinning, the sky was clear again, and we were stark naked. So mutatis mutandis, we dropped our fear along with our thoughts, listened and learned our greater, ancient function without repulse.

A boy to our right came with an amphora of wine and offered us to drink. A boy to our left, brought a basket of ritual shape, with cakes and fruit, and a pig for sacrifice. “You are Daimones,” said the unseen voice.

“We are Daimones,” we repeated, mindlessly.

“You are gods of fertility, of all increase, full of instruction, but only entwined. You will make rain, cause the dew to fall, you will eat of the pomegranate, bursting with seeds. Now returned, you are agathos, good, goodness, abundance, something very much -- muchness.”

K.Y. and I drank and ate and fell asleep, spent, understanding without thought, without intellection. Next morning the sun awoke us, naked and entangled and heavy-limbed. We smiled at one another. “I love you,” I said.

“I am you,” he answered.

“Do you know what we are supposed to do?” I asked.

“Only that we do it together, otherwise there is no power in it.”

“Anyway,” I said, “whatever we do, it is meant to be periodic. Are we not the eternally incumbent?” We both laughed loudly.

We arose, left our clothes and ran, naked, down the trail, chasing each other and laughing down the mountainside. When we came around one bend in the trail, two or three hikers were on their way up. On seeing us streak by them, laughing, they screamed and ran in all directions!

When we reached the water of one of the larger streams, we jumped in and ran splashing down its course until we found a relatively calm, deep pool where we swam together until we regained a certain serenity. We eventually crawled out into a secluded, sunny knoll and did what we did best. We were in love, we made love, we could never again be parted; we were one, and we had work to do without really trying. Work to do down amongst the cities and towns below. But it could wait . . . For the moment anyway, two good spirits (Agathoi Daimones) two saviors of lucky mortals below, were a few thousand feet above sea level claiming their pagan godhead.

-- the end --

The authors