Blackfeather
36 Reconciliation
I’D HAD A SANDWICH, but mostly I was studying. I just liked to be out in the Student Union. When I sat in the food court it felt like I was more a part of college life. Even though we were living out at the ranch, we really tried to be more involved with campus activities this year. Most days, I went to watch Kyle at rodeo practice, but I was concerned about my ranch management class and needed to study today.
“May I join you?” a soft voice said. I looked up and my heart did a flip-flop. I know my mouth worked because I could feel it moving up and down. But no sound was coming out. “If it’s not okay, I understand,” Aubrey said. She started to back away.
“Aubrey! Please! Sit with me. Damn, it’s good to see you.”
“It’s good to see you, too. I’ve missed you, Ramie.”
“What have you been doing? I saw you once but you looked like you were… busy.” She looked puzzled. “With… um… Rick Miles.”
“Oh,” she sighed and looked relieved. “I couldn’t figure out who you could have seen me with. Rick’s been nice. We study together. When he’s not lecturing me.”
“What would he lecture you about?” I asked.
“How stupid I was to lose you and Kyle.” Aubrey had a tear threatening to leak from her eye. It didn’t quite break free. “So, are you seeing anyone?” she said brightly.
“Um… yeah, I sort of am. But…”
“I’m happy for you. I…” she broke off when she saw I wasn’t paying attention. I smiled as Kyle came across the cafeteria to our table. I’d let him go a little further Saturday night than I’d intended and I was still tingly from feeling his hand against my bare skin.
“Laramie,” he said as he bent to kiss me. I almost let him make a scene before I remembered Aubrey was there.
“Kyle,” I whispered. “Sit with Aubrey and me.”
“Aubrey?” He turned so fast toward her that he lost his balance and landed on the floor. At least that got us over the awkward part as we all started laughing and I helped him up off the floor.
“Wouldn’t you rather sit on a chair?” I asked.
“Yeah. Sure. Aubrey. How are you?” He was as thrown as I was and I could see in his eyes that he loved her as much as I did.
“You… uh… You are seeing each other now?” she squeaked. I suppose I had the stupidest grin on my face in the world when I nodded.
“We’re dating. He’s kind of hard to resist.”
“I always thought… I’m happy for you. I’ll see you.” She pushed her chair back and I looked at Kyle. He looked as panicked as I felt. We both reached out to catch her hands.
“Aubrey…”
“Would you like to go out with us this week?” Kyle finished.
“We could go to the Cowboy Bar and Grill Wednesday night. That’s when they allow underaged kids in until ten,” I added.
“We could pick you up early and go to dinner first.”
“Or we could go to the arcade if you’d prefer.”
“Or just go get coffee,” Kyle finished. We were both holding her hands and she squeezed them.
“You don’t think I’d just be a third wheel?” she asked.
“Nothing’s more stable than a tricycle,” Kyle answered. Aubrey nodded.
“We need to talk,” Kyle said as we walked into the apartment after dinner. I was pretty well caught up on my homework and I nodded.
“Let’s sit in the living room,” I suggested. It was already cold out and I was hoping we weren’t headed for another hard winter.
“I can tell you still love Aubrey,” he said. I nodded. “And so do I. But Laramie, I’m in love with you, too, and I won’t do anything to hurt what we have together.” Ever since he’d stopped ‘being my brother,’ he’d been using my full name instead of the family nickname. I liked it. It was special between us.
“Kyle, I won’t trade what we have for anything in the world. But I miss her and so do you.”
“Do you think she’d come back to us? The new us?” he asked.
“We can’t know until we ask her. She was never upset about us. It was all the other stuff. And that we deceived her. I won’t do that again,” I said.
“I agree. I won’t deceive her but I won’t let anything come between us, either,” Kyle said. He reached out and took my hand. I pulled him toward me.
“Do you have a lot of homework tonight?” I asked.
“I got most all the reading done while I was waiting at the arena,” he said, leaning toward me.
“Could we make out a while, then?”
I guess that kiss was a yes.
We ended up just going out for dinner Wednesday night. We had a lot to talk about and the other venues weren’t for talking.
“I love that you are together,” Aubrey said as she sat across from us. We’d had burgers and were drinking coffee. It was beginning to look like we’d be drinking a lot of coffee tonight. “You look so good together. Are you still… um… traveling?”
I knew the subject would come up again. There was no way we could get back together without talking about it. And it sure looked like Aubrey was interested in getting back together. But it hurt so damned much to talk about. I could feel my face squinch up and tears in my eyes. Poor Miranda. Poor Jason. Poor Katie. I loved them all so much. Aubrey reached out and took our hands and brought them together so she was holding Kyle and me between her hands.
“I promise I won’t freak out. I’m so sorry that I ran away from you before. I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not that, honey,” I said. “They’re dead.” I saw her try to comprehend what I was saying as she creased her eyebrows together.
“You mean like they lived a couple centuries ago, right? But you still go back?” she asked. I shook my head.
“We were there, Aubrey. I know it’s hard for you to believe,” Kyle said. “It’s why we never told you or anyone. We thought it was just a dream for a while. When I killed all those helpless women and children and old men, I prayed that it was a dream and I’d wake up from it. But we were there when they died, Aubrey. We can’t change it. We can’t go back and make them alive. No matter how much we want to.”
I just knew this was going to end up in a river of tears.
“And that’s the end?”
“So far as we know,” I said. “Pa says he traveled a few times after his host died but it was because he was anchored to his wife. When she died, he stopped traveling. Our hosts—who were married to each other—both died. I so want to go back and see my baby. And my Katie.”
We just held hands. Aubrey had a lot to take in.
“See? We’re still crazy,” Kyle said. He tried to laugh it off like Pa did when we told him we thought he was crazy.
“No. I don’t believe that,” Aubrey said.
“What changed for you, honey?” I asked.
“Rick. I’ve been hanging around campus ever since football practice started the first of August. He was nice to me and I thought we were dating but we weren’t. He was just being a friend. Whenever we got together all I did was talk about the two of you. I… I sort of told him… everything. Please don’t be mad at me for that. I had to. One day he took me by the hand and we walked out to Green Hill Cemetery. It’s really big. There’s a whole section where they just buried babies. He walked me up and down every avenue in the cemetery pointing out different stones and how long the people lived. He’s a history major and he kept telling me what was happening in Laramie or in the U.S. or in the world when that person lived. Then he’d say things like, ‘You think that person ever imagined there’d be airplanes?’ Finally, he looked at me and said, ‘You can’t imagine what the future will bring. But you can’t imagine the lives these people lived, either. Who is to say that no one ever bridged the gap?’ And that’s when I… It was like I heard a voice from somewhere out in that cemetery telling me I could be the bridge. I had to come and find you.”
“But time travel wasn’t really the issue,” I said. “We deceived you. I’m so sorry, Aubrey. There is nothing I can do to make up for that. I can only promise I’ll never lie to you again… no matter how unbelievable the truth is.” Kyle nodded his head.
“Can we go on another date and… um… do something fun?”
We were all taking it slow. Well, sort of. I was having more and more trouble keeping my panties on. One night we were parked and Kyle and Aubrey both got their hands down there and I screamed into Kyle’s mouth as I came. Then I just kept kissing him until Aubrey pushed his face away and claimed my mouth for her own. We hadn’t gone all the way yet, but my boyfriend and my girlfriend were ready. When I stopped to think about it, so was I.
It was my twentieth birthday and I was nervous. There were no classes because the next day was Thanksgiving. Aubrey came home with us Tuesday night and very circumspectly spent the night on the sofa. Before we went to bed, the three of us had a hot make-out session on that couch that included Aubrey and me stroking Kyle to a huge come. Wow! Just wow! No one was going all the way this time, though, until we all did it together.
Today—tonight—sometime—I was going to lose my virginity. Again.
That thought gave me pause. I was going to be the first girl in history to lose her virginity twice. I’d already lost it once riding inside Miranda’s head the first time Jason pierced her maidenhead. Of course, my maidenhead was long gone—probably before I had my first period. I guess I understood Miranda’s objection to riding astride a horse. I don’t think any of the girls who rode on a regular basis kept that tiny little membrane intact for long. But to Miranda it had been important.
Dear, sweet Miranda. How I wish you here with me now.
The three of us walked up to the house for my birthday breakfast and all of a sudden Raven was sitting on my shoulder. He gave Aubrey quite a start and she squealed. He looked at her. I held my breath.
“What do you want, Blackfeather?” I asked. “There isn’t any place for you to take me anymore. They’re dead. Why’d you have to let them die?” I broke down. I hadn’t seen the old bird since Kyle and I got back in July. I thought he was done with us. Seeing him again just opened all the wounds as if they were fresh. But he didn’t caw. He just looked me in my teary eye. “Kyle?” I whispered. “Go get a piece of bacon, would you? Raw.” Kyle left and was back in a minute with a two-inch chunk of bacon. I took it in my fingers and held it up. The whole time, the bird never stopped staring at me. He bobbed his head a couple times and plucked the bacon out of my fingers. Then he hopped off to the porch railing and started pecking at his prize. We went on in to breakfast.
Of course, Mom Mar saw Kyle take bacon and saw the tears in my eyes when I walked in to sit down. Kyle and Aubrey sat on either side of me and hugged me. Ma set plates of food in front of us. Phile and Caitlin were already out riding bareback on Bells and Bows. The pregnant mares didn’t seem to mind.
“That’s really the bird?” Aubrey finally whispered. “He’s so… awesome. Is he taking you back again, Ramie? Kyle? Can you take me with you? Will you still be here? With me?”
“Sweetheart, there’s nothing for him to take us back to,” Kyle said. He ran a finger along her cheek and lifted her chin. I was between the two of them, so I kissed her.
“It was like he was searching my soul for something,” I said. “I knew he wanted some meat and that’s why I sent Kyle for bacon. But he wanted something more. I’ve ridden in that bird’s head. Even then, I couldn’t understand what he was thinking.”
Mom Mar set two cups of coffee in front of me.
“Take them with you and go visit Pa in his office,” Mom Mar said. “You come with me, Aubrey. Ashley will be along for you in a minute, Kyle.” Aubrey and I got up to do as we were told. Ashley passed me coming out of Pa’s office. I handed Pa a cup of coffee and he patted the footstool in front of his chair for me to sit on.
“Happy birthday, baby girl,” Pa said. He didn’t usually call me ‘baby girl’ these days. That was sort of reserved for Caitlin.
“Thanks, Pa.” Maybe he was going to give me my birthday present privately. I wondered what he got me.
“Laramie, have you thought through what you are doing? Your moms and I try not to interfere. You’re an adult. But you are walking on dangerous ground,” he said. There was only one thing he could be referring to. It had been pretty obvious all fall that Kyle and I were doing more than carpooling to classes. Especially once Aubrey joined us again.
“I only know my heart, Pa.”
“You’ve loved your brother for years, but I… Well, I’m worried about both of you. This isn’t a trifling thing.”
“Pa, Phile is my brother. I know you have another son, but I only have one brother. Kyle is my boyfriend. He’s been courting me and I love him. We’ve been courting Aubrey and she’s in love with us both. We aren’t sneaking around, Pa. We learned our lessons. But we’ve got to follow our hearts.” I was amazed at how calm and sure of myself I felt. I was in love with Kyle. I truly didn’t think about him as a brother any longer. He was my mate.
Pa was staring into his coffee cup and tears were running down his cheeks. I put a hand on his and he set the cup aside, opening his arms to me. I jumped into his lap as quickly as I could. He hugged me. It was only the second time I’d ever seen my father so overwhelmed with emotion.
“I’ve only ever wanted what was best for my children,” he whispered. “You know Caitlin and Phile are nowhere near as clever as they think they are. I don’t think Phile’s slept in his own bed since they moved out to the efficiencies. Maybe not since they were eleven or twelve years old. But they are special. I don’t think they see a distinction like you do. I don’t think in all their lives that they’ve ever considered any possibility other than being together. And I doubt they will have much to do with the outside world—as long as you and Kyle protect them. I hope to get them through high school, but even that is touch and go.” Pa sighed. I suspected all along that Caitlin and Phile were ‘special.’
“We’ll protect them, Pa,” I said. “We knew they were going to depend on us when they first asked to be our hired hands. Maybe when they first laid eyes on those rescues. Something changed.”
“It did. But that is different from you and Kyle. You know you won’t be able to bear him a child. A child would be… admissible evidence. You can’t marry him. No matter how you’ve managed to separate your lives, the State is the law,” Pa said. “Are you okay with that?”
“I guess if it ever comes down to wanting a child—and based on my experience in the 1800s, I’m not sure I ever want to go through that again—I’ll find a sperm donor. We’re going to marry Aubrey if she’ll have us. I know only Kyle and Aubrey can legally marry, but only you and Ashley could legally marry, too. If we decide to have children, Aubrey will bear them,” I said.
“When the wedding day comes, I’ll write the three of your names on the eighth page of the Bible.”
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