“Hamsters is nice.”
  ~ a drunk Kaylee from Joss Whedon’s Firefly

o….o

Chapter Four: Dresses & Men are Better When New
 

I needed coffee in a bad way. I felt like I died and my mouth had been filled with cotton and sown shut. Pairs of red lips danced before my eyes as I sat up in bed.

I was never drinking again.

I glanced at the bedside clock. Just after ten a.m. Hopefully the coffee and muffins were still in the motel lobby. Getting dressed, I crept quietly passed Richard’s door, thinking myself sly.

He was, of course, sitting in the chair by the CoffeeMate waiting for me.

“Good Morning,” I said. But he was quiet as I poured myself a cup. I hadn’t meant to drag him into the soap opera that was Ted and Donna’s life. Nor had I planned to get so defensive about it all. I had only thought of time alone with him away from St. Louis.

Now things were more complicated.

“I know what you’re thinking,” I said, shaking my head in sour humor. “You’re thinking how lucky you are that you never married me. You’re thinking that if I can come down here and celebrate Edward’s nuptials that I must have a really demented outlook on marriage and the whole fairytale. You’re thinking you got away clean.”

He’d been smirking humorlessly, but now stared me in the eye. “I never asked you for the fairytale. Do you think I’m that naïve?”

“No. But that’s not what Edward is asking for either.”

“Why are you defending him? He could get that woman and her kids killed.”

I sighed, thinking of Riker’s. “Donna knows the score better than you think she does. She was witness to some pretty horrible things some months back. I can’t begin to tell you.”

“Why don’t you try? That’s what I’m here for, right? To talk?”

“Yeah. About us.”

“Well, I’d like to hear about your life when you last disappeared from mine,” he said and I could hear a little bit of abandonment mixed in with the bitterness. “Why not start with him?”

“Him?”

“Edward. You’ve obviously gotten close.”

I laughed. Mostly to hide the truth. “Honestly, Richard.” I paced away from him, but he followed, towering over me.

I had no idea he could be this wolfy and possessive so early in the morning. Good thing we had the concession area to ourselves.

“Come on, Anita. Wasn’t it you who told me to be afraid of Edward, but never be jealous of him? Well, I think there’s good cause for jealousy here.”

I whirled on him, “Jealousy??”

He gave me one of those looks I hate that says that he’s about to get self-righteous. He stepped close and lowered his voice. “When you came back from the garage yesterday, I could smell the desire on you. It was faint, but it was there. And it wasn’t for me.”

There was something unreadable in his amber eyes. Not hurt exactly. Maybe we’d been apart too long to call it ‘hurt’.  Whatever it was, it stopped me from the denial that was on my lips.

He was so close to me now. Nearly had me up against the wall. I was so confused. Maybe he was doing it on purpose. Maybe he could smell the celibacy on me and decided that if I was going to play with him, he could play with me.

“God, Richard,” I whispered, as he took in a long deep breath of me. “It’s not that simple.”

“No,” he said in almost a growl. “It’s not. I can smell the indecision on you even now. You’re whole body quivers with it.”

This was true. I couldn’t move. He knew what buttons to push. If I hadn’t been so hung over and if he hadn’t been giving off that clean laundry and aftershave boyfriend-scent, I would’ve been able to think straight.

What was I supposed to be deciding about again?

Old thoughts of Richard were running rampant. Thoughts of him walking around my house barefoot or curled up with me in front of the TV set. My hormones were censoring all the complicated things about being with Richard. It was also telling me that I’d never be able to do those things with Edward.

I felt the shields that Marianne had helped me with for so long start to weaken.

Then he opened his mouth again. His lips were so close to my ear, distracting me, that it took a moment for my brain to register and react.

“You came back late last night. Were you with him? Letting him touch you? … Letting him fuck you?”

I shoved back from him hard. “You asshole.”

Oh, yeah. This is why I was indecisive.

He just looked at me smugly.

“What the hell has gotten into you?” I asked, incredulously.

“...You’re not going to even dignify my question with a ‘no’?”

“Not when you’re acting like a complete psychopath. I wouldn’t have been stuck going to that stupid club with those women to begin with if you hadn’t left me high and dry at Donna’s.”

A resigned look befell his whole body and he sat back down, not looking at me. It was a while before he said, “I thought you’d follow me back here, and we could talk.”

I sat across from him. I think he wanted an apology, but I didn’t have one forthcoming. All I could summon was, “Look, Richard. Maybe coming down here was a bad idea. I’ll admit that. Not because of Edward. But because I just wanted to get out of St. Louis.”

“And to get away from us.” By that I knew he meant him and Jean-Claude.

“No -” I began, but he rose and strode to the lobby doors, cutting me off.

“Maybe you should’ve stayed away. All this back and forth is killing me. You’re killing me, Anita.”

To that, I was speechless. He looked out into the bright daylight and slipped on a pair of sunglasses.

“I promised Donna I’d help with setting up. You know where I am if you need me,” he said, and then he was gone, leaving me alone.

It was ironic really. Although I couldn’t picture doing all the pretty things couples are suppose to do together with Edward, for the first time, I couldn’t really picture doing those thing with Richard either.

Maybe by bringing Richard here I was unconsciously trying to compare the two.

Serves me right for being nuts.
 

o….o
 

I couldn’t avoid Donna and her beloved Ted forever. But I didn’t feel like putting on my party frock either. There was always a chance I’d be coerced into manual labor. So I left on the jeans and threw my dress in my duffel and was off for Turtle Run Circle.

I’d get through this new-age couple shower thing if it killed me. Which it might.

Soon after arriving, I ran into Peter. It seemed like he’d grown about a foot since I last saw him, which boys tended to do around the age of fifteen. But it still caught me by surprise. Now he was taller than I was. That dark chestnut hair was growing wild too and curled around his tanned face in a stubborn way.

Like the way he was staring at me.

‘Hi, Peter.”

“Anita.”

“Your Mom working you too hard?” I teased. He was sweaty and dirty, and it looked like she’d put him to work.

“Yeah. She’s a back breaker.”

“I’m sure you’re having the time of your life.”

He rolled his eyes. I noticed they were tired around the edges and I knew that look. Stress. Too much stress for a kid his age. In fact he wore that wary expression that Edward sometimes had.

Like father like son. I had an epiphany right then that Edward would always be responsible for him whether he married Donna or not.

“How’s everything else?”

I regretted it as soon as the words left my mouth. Unlike Becca, Peter still - and probably always would - associate me with the night they were kidnapped.

Time had passed. But obviously not that much. He avoided my gaze and changed the subject, lifting a box and heading outside to the backyard. “I met your boyfriend,” he said.

“Oh, yeah?”

He turned to look at me over one shoulder as he opened the sliding glass door with his foot. “Yeah. I don’t like him.”

I watched him walk off and thought, get in line. Sheesh. What was with all the moody men around here? Was it just me?

Don’t answer that.

Moments later, Donna cornered me in the dining room.

“Anita,” she seemed surprised to see me. “You’re here early.”

“Well,” I relented, “I didn’t know if you needed help with anything.”

“Aren’t you a dear. And so is that Richard of yours. You’ll have to tell him so for me. What a big help. So much so that we’ve nearly finished setting up in the town square.”

“Ah. Well, it would probably be better coming from you. Don’t know how much he’s speaking to me right now.” I don’t know what possessed me to blurt that out to her, but there you go.

She, naturally, looked surprised. “Oh.” I could also see that I’d also made her uncomfortable. Interesting. “Well. Once the party starts I’m sure you two will be fine.”

She was nervous about something, but I didn’t know what.

“Yeah,” I replied absently. “Probably.”

“Well, let me show you where you can put your things to change into,” she said, eyeing my duffel.

“Alright.” I followed her down the shadowy hall lined with southwest prints, and she turned on me sheepishly.

“Actually, Anita. There is a favor you can do of me. You see, the Sandersons next door who usually sit Becca are out of town. Do you think you could keep an eye on her while I get myself ready?”

Ah. Babysitting. My cup of tea. Not. But Becca was a sweet kid, and I had an itching feeling that I would probably be the kid’s constant companion through out the evening as well. Hell, she was a better date than I could come up with at the moment.

The room she directed me to looked like a spare, and as Donna explained, was stuffed full of wedding incidentals that wouldn’t come until play until the ceremony the next week. I set my duffel down by a pile of bags of wedding rice tied up with bows and glanced around, noting that Donna had barely hovered around the doorway before she disappeared to get ready.

Despite the boxes, the room was tidy. There was an old cot and a private bathroom on the other side of the room. Then I looked closer. A mahogany roll-top desk. Dusty pictures of mallards and fish. This was the late John Parnell’s den.

That Donna had kept all his things so out in the open, yet was antsy about even entering the room told me Edward was walking around on eggshells and didn’t know it. Or maybe it was more like landmines. Live ones.

My conversation with him last night was coming back in pieces. I wasn’t sorry for what I had said, but how I’d said it. I’d been so drunk. I glanced at my watch. It was after four. I should really go and hunt him down before I could no longer get him alone and maybe apologize.

I walked through the house, which had fallen eerily quiet – everyone must be outside or down the street at the Square. Either way, I felt slightly uncomfortable being there seemingly alone. There were family photos everywhere, staring at me as if to ask, “What are you doing here?”

Fuck, if I knew.

I passed by the large glass door that led into the backyard and stopped cold.

Richard and Donna were alone in the backyard talking. Donna seemed upset. Richard seemed to be comforting her. It seemed so suddenly private that I wondered if I should be watching this. I stood still in the late afternoon shadows of the living room wishing my vision were good enough to read lips.

Were those tears on her face? It was Donna after all, so it wouldn’t surprise me. Richard reached out to her then and set both large hands on her shoulders to still her, whispering something soothing to her.

What the hell?! Was she his pet-project all of the sudden?

I suddenly felt a hot pressure on my back and gave a startled yelp, spinning around. Becca had crept up behind me and grabbed the back of my shirt. She stood there in her cute little yellow dress looking solemn and holding her wide-eyed hamster.

“Becca. You scared me.”

“Where’s Ted?” she asked. Good question.

‘I don’t know, Honey. That’s a cute dress you have on. You excited about the party?”

She shrugged her shoulders. “Potato’s bored.”

“Ah.” He looked rather frantic to me.

“Aren’t you wearing a dress, Anita?” she asked, eyeing my drab jeans with disdain.

“Yeah. I’m gonna go change. Wanna  lay out my dress for me?” Suddenly I wanted to just get dressed and get the hell out of this house and into the open air.

She quickly brightened. Easily amused, she followed my into the spare room and she and Potato dove into my duffel on the cot like it was buried treasure.

In the meantime I washed my face in the little bathroom and tried to get a grip on myself.

I thought of Edward in a darkened bar watching me, unnoticed.

I thought of Richard and Donna and their private little chat.

I felt a little out of the loop. It was probably just nerves. Donna, I’m sure, had them too. No big deal. I would feel nervous too if I were marrying Edward. But if Donna had cold feet, I wondered if Richard was trying to talk her out of the wedding all together.

No. He wouldn’t do that. Would he?

Becca appeared in the bathroom doorway tossing about a couple of the little wedding rice bags like hackey sacks. “We get to throw these at people!” she exclaimed.

The idea of chucking things at Edward and Donna made me smile. A smiled that died before I had a chance to add lipstick to it.

A muffled screech came from the outer room along with a multitude of scratching noises.

“Becca,” I said suddenly. “Where’s your hamster?”

“Uh-oh!” She spun on her heels, her skirt flying and dashed to my duffel bag. “Potato!”

I watched in dismay as she tossed as side my clothes and rice bags in search of her obnoxious pet. Then I heard her exclaim, “Oh!” and my heart sank.

She turned and held up my one and only dress. It looked like Swiss cheese. With powder all over it. I glanced unwillingly down into my bag. Staring back at me were a pair of wild beady eyes set in an erratic poof of hair, a piece of cloth sticking out from it’s mouth. Cute. Now I had nothing to wear.

“What’s all this ashy stuff,” I asked, holding up my destroyed garment.

“Rice leaked,” Becca replied.

“That’s not rice.” I looked down at the tattered mesh rice bags amidst the mess. Except it wasn’t rice bags. It was something identical; Asuka’s gift of Bloodstone to Donna.

The aphrodisiac. It must’ve gotten mixed up with the wedding stuff!

I reluctantly stole another glance at Potato, who was calm for once. In fact, he looked a little high.

Hang in there, Spud, I thought. Ride it out.

All this evening needed was a dead furry pet and a crying child. What next?
 

o.…o
 

Once the hamster and child had been vacated from the premises, they were replaced by Donna. Other than be overly apologetic, she was composed and well dressed and not a worry line on her face. What the hell had Richard said to her?

She was also in a hurry to get out of the den and down to the Square where the Jack and Jill was about to start. In fact, through the open window, I could hear the faint sound of music as it drifted down the street.

“Here’s a few of my dresses to try on, Anita. I’d help you go through them, but apparently the guests are already arriving, and I’m hostess after all…”

“Go on, Donna. Find Ted. And get going. I’ll be along.”

She seemed relieved at my dismissal, as was I.

I had no idea if any of these would fit. She was taller and had less curves than I did.

Maybe all this was some strange omen that I shouldn’t go to the party.

And miss seeing Edward at a couple’s shower?

I smiled unevenly at myself in the full-length mirror. Not on your life.
 

o….o
 

I was self-conscious as hell.

As it happened, there weren’t too many dresses of Donna’s that I could choose from that fit right. The final choice in question was a midnight blue shift made out of that thin imported rayon-crepe stuff you find in all those new-age hippie shops. It had racer spaghetti straps and was nearly backless.

So much for hiding my scars.

But pretty much all of what Donna had me choose from were thin strappy things. I was miffed that I hadn’t pegged her for the type to show skin, dammit.

As for the party, I was fashionably late. The park’s small town square wasn’t all that small and a large teal and violet pavilion tent was set up over a makeshift dance floor. Outside of that, there were tables of food and refreshments and presents everywhere, set up buffet style. The summer night was warm and the grass gave off a strong sweet smell.

And Donna had more friends than I had imagined. Hopefully it would be easy to blend in.

I turned and glanced behind me before I entered the open tent. The lights of the party blurred the darkening surroundings and I could barely make out the horizon of mountains in the distance.

I hadn’t carried a firearm this entire trip, but suddenly I felt naked without one.

When I stepped in and immediately locked eyes with Edward, the naked feeling intensified.

He was leaning nonchalantly over by the bar in the far corner, Ted-style. He was wearing a soft taupe suit with a white silk shirt and casual dark mauve tie. His frame went rigid when he saw me, like a leopard in tall grass. The samba beat in the air was Brazilian and in tune with the Rio de Janeiro honeymoon theme of the evening. But it wasn’t in tune with us.

I saw him glance around before moving towards me – looking for Donna? – and words from the night before came rushing back at me.

Had I actually told him that he would die alone and unloved? What a cold bitch I was.

His gaze, as he drew closer, was anything but cold, and it scared and confused me. But he wasn’t staring at me. He was staring at the dress. And my scars.

Both should be familiar to him. I struggled to understand what the big deal was.

Finally, I said, “It’s Donna’s.”

He met my eyes slowly. “I know.” His voice was low and rough. “It’s just that…”

I cocked my head at him as he trailed off. Edward speechless? I saw him mentally shake himself and smile at me thinly. “It’s just that it looks different on you.”

“No, shit.” I smiled and absently covered my burn scar on my arm with a stray hand. He caught the motion and his brows drew together.

“The Executioner shy over her war wounds? Since when?”

“Since now, dammit.”

His smile softened and it melted my resolve to apologize.

“I’m sorry about the stupid shit I said last night. I was drunk. I didn’t mean any of it.”

A ghost passed through those cool baby blue of his. “Yes, you did,” he answered gently, his eyes suddenly wandering again toward the crowd on the dance floor and out into the open summer air at my back.

Jeez, he was being shifty.

Without warning, he grabbed my hand and led me toward the crowd. “Come on, Executioner. Let’s dance.”

All at once, we were lost amongst people I didn’t know. I felt Edwards’s warm, rough hand trailing up my bare back, drawing me to him. He waited patiently for me to slip my left hand into his before we began to rock back and forth to the gentle percussion of “Quiet Night, Quiet Stars”.

It took a little more courage to actually look him in the eyes. There was something there hiding behind the indifference. I searched and searched to find it, and I saw that I was making him uncomfortable.

“ Edward,” I barely whispered. I just couldn’t call him ‘Ted’ in a moment like this.

“Anita.”

I wanted to ask him again why he was following me last night. But a different realization came to surface. “You didn’t want me here in the first place, did you?”

He didn’t answer and continued looking over my shoulder intently.

I shook my head softly and resigned myself to staring at the heart of his tie. “I thought everything was okay between us…”

We were close enough that I felt the reverb from his chest when he finally answered. “No. I didn’t want you here.”

I looked up at him incredulously. “Then why didn’t you just say as much?”

There was a long pregnant pause during which he glanced down at me briefly. “…I don’t know,” he admitted.

I stared hard at the line of his jaw and thought back to something Richard had asked of me. “I think you do. Is this some kind of new game you’re playing? Or are you just bored?”

His attention came back to me fully. Whether he was reacting to the heat and anger in my voice, I didn’t know. But his left hand became more insistent upon my back, caressing the scars there in such a way that was meant to startle me. It was working.

“I just thought that…if you came down here and everything was still the same between us as it always has been…then I would know for sure.”

He was being cryptic. But the way he was touching me I think I could follow it. Because I’d come here with the same agenda in mind. “You were testing yourself,” I mumbled, not sure if I were answering him or myself.

“Yeah.” He pulled me closer, and the anger in his voice didn’t match the intimate touch of his fingers stroking my skin. The anger was directed at himself.

I knew we shouldn’t be doing this here were Parnell eyes could see. I didn’t know if this conversation was actually going to effect anything in the ‘real world’. From what his body language was telling me, it would change absolutely nothing.

Peter had Becca dancing on his toes some distance away and I felt Edward’s protective watch over them even now. Any feelings we were admitting to wouldn’t matter in the end. He would probably still marry into this family next week. And that made me slightly sad. And maybe even a little relieved.

“ But it’s not the same,” I whispered matter-of-factly. “It’s different between us.”

Although I could see that he agreed, he was genuinely at a loss. “But why? How?” He stared hard at me. “When??”

He didn’t like not knowing the answers. It made me smile inwardly. I gazed back at him and shook my head. We’d have to be completely clueless in this together.

If I had to guess, these intangible feelings began somewhere between Santa Fe and Santa Fe.
 

o….o
 

Donna stepped into the pavilion and surveyed her friends and family with a smile. Everything was going smoothly and it seemed that her guests were enjoying themselves.

She’d done the dutiful hostess rounds, and now it was time to find her man.

Her smiled faltered at the corners when she finally spotted him on the dance floor.

With her.

Part of her wanted to turn a blind eye and be oblivious.

But the way in which Ted’s hands were on Anita made her chest hurt. But that wasn’t all. It was the way he was looking at her:

Strange. Foreign. Unrecognizable.

She wasn’t stupid, she thought as the ache inside her grew. She would not create a scene. Especially in front of the children.

She turned swiftly on her heel and headed out of the tent, her vision so blurred by unshed jealousy that she could barely see straight. So much so that she ran right into a large warm body. Her tears fell in relief when she saw that it was exactly whom she was looking for.

Richard.

o….o
 

~~~~