by Tasha Black
He grinned and the pleased look tugged at her heart a little
“I will see you tomorrow, Honey,” he told her.
Then the screen door was closing and she was alone again.
She stood by the door for a long time. She could see the lake spread out at the bottom of the hill, until it reached the island at its center. The moon and stars reflected in the lake’s inky surface.
A million miles away, other suns burned and planets spun, and beings there might fret or work or celebrate.
Just a few feet away, the warm sleepy bodies of her roommates and the nighttime denizens of the woods filled the air with soft sounds.
She had a roof over her head and a job she loved. She had escaped her mother’s house and she was getting an education too. She had dreams and hopes and fears and there were things about her that Kitt could not even guess about - things he might never understand.
But about one thing, he was just right.
Honey McCarthy was secretly sad to be alone.
Chapter 13
Kitt adjusted his black tie in the break room mirror.
The hulking body to which he was tethered looked back at him, flanked by the forms of his brothers, Indiana and Remington.
Remington straightened his collar and checked his jaw for signs of shaving cream. Indiana shot him a wink, and Kitt grinned back.
“We look like Double-Oh Seven,” Remington noted approvingly.
They did look handsome in their suits. Kitt wondered vaguely why they were required to wear suits when their job was to serve people who wore informal garments. He had a vague sense that clothing should denote social status. But many things in this place were upside down.
“Wait until Honey sees you.” Indiana elbowed him and then headed out the door to the dining room.
Kitt felt himself standing up straighter at the thought. Honey would not be here, but surely he would see her during the day. He wondered vaguely if his appearance in a fine suit would sway her stance on mating.
“Don’t worry, brother,” Remington said mildly. “She’ll come around.”
“I wonder if she should,” Kitt said.
“I don’t understand,” Remington replied.
“Has it ever occurred to you that maybe we shouldn’t be here? I’ve studied these creatures. Their existence is delicate,” Kitt said.
“Yeah,” Remington said. “We’re going to change that.”
“Why?”
“What do you mean why?” Remington sounded shocked. “If we don’t they’ll burn themselves out in two rotations of Esmos.”
Kitt shrugged.
“Don’t you like them?” Remington asked.
“I love them,” Kitt said simply. “Everything about this place is magical.”
He didn’t have the words to express what he felt - that the tragic future of this blue-green planet was what made it special, what made each moment on it poignant.
Maybe it was wrong for Aerie to try and right the wrongs of such a flawed and lovely place.
“You’re just lonely, brother,” Remington said, wrapping an arm around Kitt’s shoulder. “She’ll come around. And when she does you’ll be glad to save her planet.”
Kitt and his brothers went to work. And within the first few minutes, he was too overwhelmed to worry about anything other than how to satiate the starving mass of customers. He was elated, sticky, terrified and sorely tempted to use his gift, but he wanted the experience to be as close to human as possible.
It all began with a single table.
“You’re up, Kitt,” Malik told him, giving him a hearty thump on the back. “Table 16, boy. A good place to start.”
Kitt had memorized all of the table numbers already, and he knew which ones he was responsible for. He headed over to the small round table by the window overlooking the golf course. A man sat with a newspaper open, while a woman and a young girl talked quietly.
“Welcome to Maxwell’s,” Kitt said, as he had been taught.
“We’ve been here five days already, but thanks,” the man said from behind his newspaper.
“You are most welcome,” Kitt replied. “What may I bring you to drink?”
They wanted coffee, tea and a mimosa.
He dashed off to obtain the needed beverages before he could forget which went to whom.
But on his way, Malik pointed him to another table.
A man and woman of advanced age were sitting nearby. On top of the tablecloth their wrinkled hands were intertwined. They both gazed fondly out the window.
Kitt grabbed drinks for the first table and brought them over, but had sadly forgotten which item belonged to whom.
Looking over the glasses he seemed to remember the husband wanting coffee.
So he gave the man the coffee, the woman the tea since it was similar to coffee, and set the glass of fruit juice in front of the little girl. He congratulated himself for his quick thinking.
“Yum,” the child said looking eagerly at the juice.
“Oh, my,” said her mother, quickly switching their cups.
“My apologies,” Kitt said gravely as he watched the mother put milk in the child’s tea.
“Ha,” the father chuckled, folding up his newspaper.
“We’re ready to order,” the mother said. “Josephine will have the steak and eggs, well-done.”
“I assure you that they will be done very well by the skilled cooks in our kitchen,” Kitt said immediately.
The woman gave him a strange look.
“I’ll have the same, but I want my steak rare,” the father declared.
Kitt tried desperately to remember if there were any rare meats offered in the kitchen.
“Do you mean ostrich?” He thought that might be on the menu, though it was a dinner item.
“What?” The father looked pretty annoyed. “Don’t try to up-sell me, boy. Rare New York strip.”
“Yes, sir,” Kitt replied.
“And I’d like the Greek omelet, please,” the mother said. “Hold the onions.”
“How long do you want me to hold them for?” Kitt was completely bewildered. It was against policy for him to touch the food, he was sure of it. But Malik had said they were to give the guests whatever they wanted. It was a pretty problem.
“Ha,” the father barked out again. “I like your sense of humor, kid. But don’t quit your day job.”
Kitt was confused but he understood the second part of what the man had said.
“I shall not quit, sir,” he declared. “I will serve your family faithfully.”
He dashed off to tell the cook their strange order before the man could reply.
On his way past the other table, he noticed the older couple look up at him expectantly.
“I will return,” he called to them.
Malik pointed out a third table on his way back to take the couple’s drink order.
It went on like that endlessly.
Once in a while Kitt would bump into Remington or Indiana. He could tell by their expressions that they were as overwhelmed as he was.
At last, when the sun was high in the sky, the number of guests diminished.
“Last table, boy,” Malik whispered to Kitt, pointing to a table overlooking the golf course where a young woman with fluffy yellow hair sat alone, studying a packet of papers. “Then you’re getting a half hour break before the lunch crowd starts.”
Kitt approached her immediately.
“Welcome to Maxwell’s,” he said. “What may I bring you to drink?”
“Oh, hey,” she said, looking up. “Um, can I have some orange juice?”
“Of course,” Kitt said. “I will bring it right away.”
She smiled and he noticed that her lips were very red, and the outlines of her eyes were very dark.
She looked back down at her papers and Kitt looked too. The lines of words were striped with neon yellow.
He headed to the kitchen to get her beverage.
When he retur
ned with the glass, her eyes were closed and her red lips were moving, but no sound came out.
He froze, wondering what was happening. He certainly had not experienced this in any of his other tables.
Was she praying? He knew some humans thanked their creator for their meal, but her meal had not yet been requested and it certainly wasn’t here.
She looked up. “Oh,” she said, “sorry.”
“I regret that I have interrupted your prayers,” he ventured.
“My what?” She looked terribly confused. Then she looked down at the papers in front of her. “Oh,” she said, “no, I wasn’t praying. I was memorizing lines. I’m auditioning.”
“Oh,” Kitt said, trying desperately to put together what all those words meant.
“I want to be in the play at the end of the session,” the woman confided. “But I’m having a hard time with the lines.”
Suddenly it clicked. Kitt had read a little Shakespeare in his studies with Dr. Bhimani. He had not learned much about love as she hoped he would do, but he liked the idea of performing.
“I probably just need someone to help me with the lines,” she said with a little laugh.
“I will help you,” he told her solemnly.
“You will?” She smiled brightly. She almost reminded him of Honey for a moment, except that her smile wasn’t as warm.
“Of course,” Kitt replied. Malik had said he was to help every guest, no matter their request.
“What time are you finished here?” She looked up at him, her cheeks pinker than before.
“I have a break after your meal is complete,” he said.
“Oh, great,” she said. “Then I’ll just have a muffin to go.”
He ran off to obtain the item she wanted and returned with a small white paper bag.
“Great,” she said. “I’ll meet you in the pavilion.”
She got up and he watched her exit the dining hall.
When he moved to gather her dishes he noticed that she had absentmindedly left money behind, just like all the other diners.
He carefully folded it and placed it in his pocket. On his way out he would turn it all in to Malik so that it could be returned to its proper owners. It had been so busy there hadn’t been time to address the matter. He hoped it was not his fault that the customers had been so careless with their belongings.
In any case, Malik would surely help him make it right. He was a fine employer.
Chapter 14
Wade jogged up the steps to the dance studio. He was eager to see Honey today.
He’d done a lot of thinking last night after leaving her cabin.
“Hey, Wade,” a female voice called to him from out on the lawn.
He turned, shading his eyes with his hand.
“Hi, Lynn,” he called back to the little brunette lifeguard.
She winked and kept walking toward the pool.
Lynn was hot, a lot of the staff were. So if his experiment today didn’t go as planned, he was in no danger of a dry spell. On the contrary, the ladies’ junior staff cabin would be abuzz in excitement tonight if Wade decided to drop his interest in Honey McCarthy.
He had himself good and convinced when he stepped into the studio.
But he had forgotten, as usual, the power the trashy little blonde had over him when she danced.
Honey was in the center of the pine floor wearing a simple leotard. No music was playing. But she was spinning and kicking and flinging herself around like a pair of jeans in a washing machine.
Wade licked the sweat off his upper lip as he watched her breasts heaving, her ass quivering. Jesus.
She must have caught sight of him in the mirror because suddenly she made a little sound of surprise and stopped moving.
“Wade,” she gasped, catching her breath. “You startled me.”
He shrugged. It wasn’t his problem if she was startled.
“Look, we need to talk,” he said.
She grabbed a towel and flung it around her neck, then crossed over to him. “What’s wrong?”
So she was worried. Good, she should be worried.
“I know you wanted me to dance with you for the demonstration,” he said. “But we’re not together anymore and I’m really not into it. You understand, of course.”
He paused and watched her harder than he’d watched the overtime of last night’s game.
Only one thing was important to Honey.
And it wasn’t Wade Travers.
This was Wade’s diabolical plan to correct that.
She would beg him to dance with her. She would agree to be his girlfriend.
“What do you mean?” She looked horrified.
“I mean that if you really don’t want to date me, I get it,” he went on. “But you can understand how other girls I date might not like for me to spend so much time dancing with you.”
“Are you dating other girls?”
Oh-ho, now she was paying attention.
It took all he had not to grin like a fool, but he knew he had to play it cool for this to work.
“Honey,” he said, trying to sound sympathetic and mature, like Mr. Rogers, “I don’t think it’s appropriate for us to discuss that anymore. As you know, I have feelings for you. But since you don’t return them, I have to move on.”
She was silent.
“Unless I’m wrong about that?” He held his breath.
Now was his moment. He’d turned the tables on her. He’d made her jealous, taken away her little prize.
Now she would crawl.
Wade had identified four different positions to fuck her in, right in front of the mirrors, before she replied.
“Wade,” she said sadly, “you’re right. I’m sorry it’s been hard for you to spend time with me when I don’t share your feelings. I’ll find another partner.”
“Wh-what?” he heard himself stammer.
“You’re right,” she said. “I should have thought of it sooner so I could find someone else to dance with me. I know I might lose my job if I can’t pull this off, but I don’t blame you, you were honest with me. Thank you for coming to tell me.”
He was so thunderstruck that he didn’t even notice that she was walking him to the door, sending him back out into the blinding sunshine.
The door closed quietly behind him by the time the truth hit home.
He had bet wrong on Honey.
And now he had lost the last of his tenuous hold on her.
Spread out on the lawn below him, the guests and staff of Maxwell’s laughed and played as usual, unaware of the awful thing that had just happened to their crown prince.
Wade ran a hand through his golden hair and began to think up a Plan B - damage control.
He slipped his cell phone out of his pocket and shot off a text to the male senior staff:
Wade Travers to GROUP:
No one is to partner Honey McCarthy for the session demonstration.
There.
If he couldn’t have her, no one would.
She could come crawling back, or she could get fired.
Either way, Wade Travers won - he always did.
Chapter 15
Honey stood frozen in the studio for a long time after Wade left. Then she began to pace.
“Honey,” she muttered to herself,” this is not the end of the world. You’ve gotten yourself out of worse.”
But this one hurt. It really did.
She’d never had a summer job she loved like this one. And to have gotten to this pinnacle - senior dance instructor - only to have it taken away in the first session was awful. She had high hopes of using it as a stepping stone to a full-time position once school was over. But now it was slipping away.
“I’m not going to let that happen,” she whispered to herself as she spun on her heel and paced the other way. “I’ll find another partner.”
Wade was a horrible partner anyway. Even if the other person only had a day to learn the routine it couldn’t wind up that much w
orse than dancing with Wade. There were plenty of athletic guys here. She only needed one who was willing to spot her a day’s help. Maybe one of the swim coaches, they were all pretty built…
She slipped her phone out of her pocket and began to text:
Honey:
Hey Addy I need help stat. Wade won’t do the demo. I need a guy to dance with.
Addy:
Holy crap, that sucks. Coming to take you to lunch.
Honey wanted to argue, but she was hungry. And if she was hungry, Addy was ravenous. The cold water seemed to drain her friend of energy so rapidly there was hardly enough food in the dining hall to satisfy her.
She dressed quickly.
A few minutes later there was a bang on the door and Addy came in, with Nikki in tow.
“Look who I found, hanging around the tennis courts,” Addy said, indicating Nikki.
“Hey, Honey,” Nikki said with a smile. “I heard about Wade, I’m so sorry.”
Honey shrugged, suddenly feeling a lump in her throat. What was it about friends and sympathy that let the bottled up hurt come out?
“Come on,” Addy said, “let’s get food. Food makes everything better.”
They headed out into the sunshine.
Somehow, seeing the guests and staff out running around on the lawn lifted Honey’s spirits. Everyone had their own private troubles, but if all those people were happy, she could look at the bright side too.
She was just beginning to feel like herself when they passed the pavilion. The domed roof and built-in benches reminded Honey of something that would have been found in Victorian England. But it was large, and set up high enough to be more like a stage.
She did a double-take when she spotted Kitt up there. Though it was what all the waiters wore, Kitt looked especially handsome in his suit.
She almost called out to him.
Then she noticed who he was with.
A dainty looking blonde sat on the bench. Kitt was leaning on the column over her, talking with her softly.
Ironically, the woman looked kind of how Honey might have if she had been born into the worry-free lap of luxury: blonde hair in perfect beauty shop waves, gorgeous make-up in spite of the heat, a lovely white dress that showed off her pretty figure.