The Desert, Arizona

As they got out of the car, watching Irene's last check of her face and clothes amused him in a small, thoroughly masculine way.  He thought men had probably been waiting on women in this fashion since the beginning of time.  He was certainly no stranger to it.  He smiled to himself as he watched Irene put on some lipgloss before she smoothed out her skirt and gave her fringe one last shake.  It suddenly occurred to him that his own appearance might leave something to be desired. 

He stretched his arms wide and gave a feminine twirl.  "Will I do, honey?"  His unease expressed itself in its usual absurdly flamboyant way.   

Irene looked him up and down.  Worn jeans and a flannel shirt over a t-shirt?  Was he kidding?  If it wasn't for his pale eyes, he probably wouldn't even garner a second glance.  Well, from the men, anyway.  Irene snorted in amusement.  "All but the watch."

He looked down at his watch with a grin.  He'd always loved expensive watches.  Flush from his last film, he'd splashed out all he'd had for it.  Nearly three grand.  Now it sort of served as a dual reminder both of his foolishness-- and of the fact that it was a mere shadow of the one he'd really wanted.  That one had cost well over twenty-five thousand.  It seemed outrageously extravagant next to the way Irene lived, and yet he felt no shame for it. 

What was wrong with wanting to own nice things?  He was young and hungry and had big dreams.  His castles were high in the air.  It was a part of why he'd come to America to begin with.  And a part of why he'd found himself drifting where women were concerned.  As they made their way through the sea of cars towards the throng of people, he wondered if he'd ever work out the reason he'd drifted here tonight. 

The vision that met his eyes was like something out of a dream.  The people.  The music.  The sights and scents and sounds..... He felt a sort of excitement taking it all in, almost a sensory overload as his eyes darted around from one unfamiliar sight to the next.  He couldn't even make any sense of it at first.  It was one big blur of buckskin and feathers and fringe and drums and laughing dark-eyed people.  The initial impression was so utterly foreign to his mind that it was several minutes before he'd even worked out the patterns of which sex wore what.  It was the first time in years he'd been so overwhelmed visually that noticing a person's sex seemed to fall somewhere behind noticing what they wore and what they were doing.

To be honest, part of it made him uncomfortable.  He had strong personal beliefs about harming wild animals; which admittedly was rather selective.  He liked a good steak and had a weakness for fine leather goods... but he wouldn't kill a snake if he happened across one in the bush.  He wasn't a hunter.  He didn't even squash spiders.  Seeing so many people wearing feathers and bones and leather and strips of fur was somewhat shocking to a man who had his own unusual brand of respecting all forms of life.  And yet, it was clear they respected it too.  Revered it, even. 

While his eyes drank it all in, Irene was speaking softly in his ear, telling him that he mustn't touch any part of a dancer's regalia unless he was invited to do so.  That what they weren't costumes.  They were sacred and in many cases extremely fragile, having been passed down for generations.  He put his hands in his pockets.  Irene laughed and thought of the way he'd stroked her shawl.  She thought of him stroking her skin, too.   

But before he could ask even a single one of the thousands of questions boiling in his brain, a heavily pregnant woman, who looked very much like an older version of Irene, appeared through the crowd and Irene screeched in joy and flung herself at her.  An insanely rapid conversation in strangely accented French followed, and between hugs and kisses, their two pairs of hands lovingly stroked her swollen belly.  He guessed she must be the sister Irene had driven so far to visit. 

It was a few minutes before she finally realized the tall white man with the pale eyes was with her sister.  Her eyebrows went up and she nudged Irene who blushed and giggled.  "So... who's your friend?" 

Irene introduced him and her face seemed to shine with a different light as she put an arm around her sister and squeezed affectionately.  "And this is Adele, my sister--"

"And passenger," Adel added, rubbing her belly tenderly.

He was enchanted.  He'd been clucky for years and he simply adored pregnant women.  He loved the way it softened them, made them almost luminous-- and he loved their shape, too.  It made something inside him glow warmly in a way that was somehow intimate without being sexual, and yet still a wholly masculine reaction to the ultimate expression of femininity.    

Adele smiled and without the least bit of hesitation grabbed up his hand and put it on her stomach where he felt a strong kick against his palm.  The soft bump against his hand made a wild splash of joy surge through him, washing away any awkwardness he might have felt at touching a stranger's belly. 

Adele lifted her chin to Irene.  "I've got a little grass dancer in there.  You just wait and see."

Irene was nodding and laughing.  "You are so huge!  What does Rob say?"  She turned aside and explained unnecessarily.  "My brother-in-law."  Like he couldn't have worked that one out for himself?

Adele huffed, waving her hands.  "He says no way.  That he comes from a long line of traditional dancers and that this one is going to be just like him."

Irene laughed.  "That's what he said about the last three-- and they were all girls!"

The women touched and exchanged a glance; their amusement at the male of the species.  

Adele put her hand on his arm.  "What do you think?  Girl or boy?"  Her eyes twinkled.  

He laughed.  "So, even though we're collectively hopeless, you still want to know what I think?"  His smile was wide and bright as he bent and put his ear to her belly.  "So, what's it to be then?"  He 'hmmed' and nodded.  "You sure?"  More nodding.  "You really sure?  Cos your mum is giving me that look, you know?"  One last nod and he straightened.  "Sorry, ladies, but I've been sworn to secrecy."

They giggled and booed and told him he was copping out-- but he held his ground, grinning.  "Oh, come on!"

He shook his head.  "You could do what my parents did."  

"And that was?"  He could tell by the looks on their faces that they expected him to say something about the marvels of modern white medicine.

"Ask the magic eightball."  He giggled; a sound that was at odds with his burly masculinity.  

His mother had used it with his brother too.  It was one of his favorite family stories actually.  The story goes that his dad had bought it for her when she fell pregnant with his older brother, but every time he asked it if she was having a boy, they got: 'Better Not Tell You Now' as an answer-- and when they pressed it, the thing grudgingly tossed back: 'As I See It, Yes.'  Of course, with him, when his dad asked if it was a boy, it answered straight back with: 'Yes, Definitely'.  Guess it never doubted his masculinity, now had it?  At family gatherings, when his mother wasn't looking, he still made a crude grab of his package and slapped his older brother on the back, tossing out, 'Guess it takes a ball to know a ball, mate'-- at which point they'd affectionately pound on each other until she made them settle down. 

He hadn't told anyone what it had said the last time he was home and had snuck away to ask it if he should go to America or not.  It was a silly thing to do, but he was one for flights of fancy.  Even if he'd already made up his mind before he'd asked.  He was also one for adding to the family lore.  Someday it would make an interesting story, especially considering the answer it had given. 

Lost in thought, he didn't see Adele nudge Irene and mouth, 'Where on earth did you find him?'  

Irene just shrugged and tugged him away, promising to come and sit and talk with everyone later.  

Adele just shook her head as she watched them go.  Kids!  Her look softened.  She knew what it was to be feeling the pull of the drum and the call of a man on a night the desert wind was blowing wild and hot.  She rubbed her swollen belly with a smile and went looking for her husband.

They walked.  They talked.  They made the rounds, looking at the wares the various vendors had for sale.  They wound back up at Irene's car.  He was a bit surprised.  Irene hadn't danced a step yet and he certainly wasn't ready to go.  He was even more intrigued when she popped the trunk and rummaged around, producing what looked like a bundle of dried herbs.  He wondered briefly if she was going to get high.  Not that it bothered him much.  He tended to stay away from the harder stuff, but he did smoke a bit of grass now and again.  It didn't make any sense, though.  She'd told him no drugs or alcohol of any kind was allowed here.  Hell, he wasn't even allowed to smoke.  His mouth watered.   

She picked up a small fan made of feathers along with the bundle of silvery green herbs and led him away from the cars, out to the relative privacy at the edge of the clearing. 

"What is that?" he asked.

"Sage," she said, using his lighter to ignite the end of the bundle.  Though she'd explained a lot to him while they were walking, this time she was silent as she encouraged the small orange glow with her fan until it was smoking.  The smoke was sharp-sweet and acrid, tickling the back of his throat as he stood and watched her gently wave the smoke over her heart before bringing it to her face and hair, her arms and body, even down her legs to her feet.  Her movements were unhurried, slow and graceful.  He watched raptly, trying not to cough at the strong unfamiliar scent, amazed how so little ceremony could presage something carried out with such reverence.

She was smiling as she finished and laugher sparkled in her eyes as they walked slowly back to her car.  The sound of the drum grew louder.  It was odd; he could almost feel his blood surging in time with it.  The songs themselves were strange to his ear.  They all sounded the same to him, something the musician in him was ashamed to admit, even though it was the truth.  There was something about the deep rhythmic percussion that pulled at him though.  He could almost feel it, like a tangible thing throbbing against his chest, even squelshing along in his blood.  Pound.  Pound.  Pound.   

Irene watched him cock his head and listen, lips pursed as he tried to work out just why he found it so compelling.  It wasn't the kind of music that got his feet tapping or his hips moving.  It was deeper than that.  More elemental somehow. 

"You feel it?" she asked quietly, watching his pale eyes sparkle as he nodded.  

"We say that it's the heartbeat.  If there is no heartbeat, there is no life.  We dance to live."

Something between them seemed to change just then.  They say you never know something as well as when you teach it to someone else.  Perhaps Irene needed that lesson just then in her crazy life.  How long had it been since she last danced?  Putting it into words for him seemed to crystallize something in her mind.     

He turned her simple words over and over in his mind as he watched her go.  She joined the other dancers, spinning and whirling so fast... it seemed her heels never once touched the ground.  He watched the other dancers; some were better than she was, faster with more intricate steps, but he thought she was the most compelling.  Not the most beautiful but the most passionate, perhaps.  When the song ended she stilled on the last beat-- and then laughed as she missed it and stumbled a step.  A different drum began another song and she danced again.  This time, she ended perfectly on the last note, breathing hard with her fringe flying around her. 

There was sweat on her face when she came back and she was panting.  "You going to wait till I pass out before you come running with that oxygen, or what?"  She giggled, her cheeks pink with exertion and bright with pleasure.  "I am so out of shape!"

He looked her up and down and shook his head.  Why did women always say that, especially the ones who were rail thin without an ounce of fat on their bodies?  He shrugged.  "I thought it was amazing."  Leaning in a bit closer he murmured softly into her ear.  She liked that he didn't whisper.  "And I think you're gorgeous."  It wasn't a come on.  It was the truth.  He hadn't said it to entice her or to hurry the night along so they could be alone somewhere.  He was enjoying himself right where he was.  The only thing that could have made the night better was a cigarette.  And possibly some food.  He was starving.       

She flushed at his compliment and then laughed when his stomach rumbled.  "Come on!  I'd kill for a Coke and it sounds like you could use some food.  You ever had an Indian taco?"

Irene gulped her Coke while she watched him take his first bite of hot frybread, all golden and crispy on the outside and soft and white on the inside.  He moaned and closed his eyes in pleasure.

"Good, huh?"

He took another massive bite in answer, making an obscene noise of pleasure as he chewed.  Irene wondered if he was as uninhibited about enjoying sex as he was at enjoying a good meal.  He thought it would have gone down better with a cold stubbie of VB, but for such simple fare, it was incredibly satisfying.  In fact, he got back in line and bought two more.  They sat on a blanket, flirting with their eyes as they shared the food-- and laughing as the smallest children, the 'tiny tots', were called out to dance.

They were Irene's favorite to watch.  Five and under-- what an age!  Several were hardly old enough to walk.  Some danced wildly, furiously thumping their little feet to the beat of the drum.  Others just stood and cried.  One little girl in a tattered red shawl was particularly adorable.  He nudged Irene.  "I hate to say it, love... but I think I've got a new girlfriend."  He nodded toward the little girl spinning away.  "She's stolen my heart." 

Irene nodded and smiled at his teasing but she had her own opinions about the state of his heart.  Somehow, she didn't think it was any more up for grabs at the moment than her own heart was.  It was a part of what made all of this so very.... messy.  He was handsome.  And witty.  Irreverent.  Prideful.  Surly.  Sexy.  He was so much more than she ever expected him to be.  He was a lot of things, Irene mused.  Just not free.  He was screaming his way down a one way track, fire burning, pistons churning.  It was the kind of ride you made with your heart in your mouth and your hair on fire.  But he was still on a track.  Irene's wild ride was far less predictable. 

She looked up at him from under her lashes and wondered what he was going to take away from this night.  They had made a connection.  Bridged two very different worlds.  What did you call something that was more than sex but less than love?

A lesson?  

It seemed Trickster had started to whisper something in her ear besides: messy... messy... messy.

She looked into his eyes.  

He looked back.

Adele hid a smile and scolded her youngest daughter for paying too much attention to the couple making eyes at each other on the blanket. 

The MC broke in over the loudspeaker with a few announcements.  A lost child was waiting for someone to claim her at the MC's stand.  Someone had left their lights on in the parking lot. 

The man with the pale green eyes barely heard any of it.  He heard his blood pound.  He heard a woman's call.  He heard the desert wind blow.  When Irene jumped up at the start of the next song, he was a little startled.  She grinned and laughed as he cocked his head, listening to the beat.  It was different this time, even to his foreign ear.  Almost like the drummers were accentuating every other beat.

"Oh!  My favorite!"  Irene was already pulling away.  

"What is?" 

Her eyes sparkled.  "Listen."  She was bouncing lightly on her toes.  "It's a Crow Hop."  His eyebrow went up.  A small half smile formed on his lips.  A what?  But before he could ask, she'd slipped away from him to join the dancers revolving slowly around the circle.  The dance was somehow both jerky and graceful.  He watched her arms, first the left one up and right one down-- then she'd switch.  Right up one and left one down as she sort of skipped along.

He got it.  Crow hop.  

Irene was smiling when she got back, flushed and smiling at him with a hint of amusement in her eyes.  The MC's voice came over the loudspeaker and announced an Owl dance.  It was one of the few socially acceptable ways for boys and girls to meet and dance together.  Indians had their own curious morality too.  It just wasn't polite to sleep with a girl before she asked you to dance.       

Adele nudged his shoulder.  "This one is ladies' choice."  It was only fair to warn him, after all.  She'd seen several young women eyeing him tonight.  "If you refuse someone, you're expected to offer compensation to the young lady for the insult of refusing to dance with her."

A curious custom.  He liked it.  But he didn't feel any apprehension.  He knew with a certainty he couldn't explain that Irene was going to ask him to dance.  The energy seemed to surge around him, leaping through the people gathered there under the stars.  Several of the younger men swaggered and postured, hoping the girls they'd been eyeing all night would ask them to dance.  The women nudged each other and smiled.  People began pairing off.  There was lots of laughter.

Irene's eyes were downcast.  A courtesy.  It was rude to stare at people.  She sidled closer to him.  "You wanna dance?"  The invitation was soft.  "Or are you going to wait for your little girlfriend to ask?"

His lips twitched.  "I think I saw her sleeping on a blanket."

"Is that a yes?"

He put his hand in hers.  The beat was easy.  They made their turns around the circle.  He felt a little self-conscious at first, but there were lots of people in plain clothes dancing, and the triple beat wasn't hard to pick up.  Her body was lithe and supple.  Holding her felt good, exciting.  The dance wasn't sexual or lurid but it sensitized him to her femininity all the same.  It ended too fast.  A few minutes ago he'd been apprehensive, but once he'd gotten started he wasn't ready for it to end.  He wanted to dance more.  He wanted to hold her more too.

The evening wore on.  They talked more... and danced more too.  He sat with Adele's family on a blanket and just drank in the night.  Her daughter fell asleep in his lap, wrapped up in his warm flannel while he shivered in the wind.  He got to know her cousins and uncles.  For a man who hadn't wanted to get caught up in the strings of meeting a woman's family, it was surprisingly relaxing.  They were easy to talk to.  Some time later he realized it was because they asked very few pointed questions.  More often it was sideways expressions of interest left open so he could fill in as much or as little as he wanted. 

Nobody recognized him.  Or maybe if they did, it just wasn't a big enough deal for them to mention it.  Usually when people found out what he did for a living, a barrage of questions followed.  What's it like?  Do you know XXX? (Fill in their favorite star's name here)  Does it get you lots of girls?  Do you make a lot of money? 

Sometimes he liked the attention.  Sometimes he felt like telling those sorts of people off.  Occasionally he felt like telling them the truth.  He was flat broke, lived in a trailer or crashed on his parents' couch when he was between apartments.  But he had big dreams.  He wanted to buy some land in the bush.  Build a house there.  An empire.  Maybe see if he couldn't get his parents to come and stay.  It was all part of his methodical plan to build a strong foundation for the future.  Someday he would raise his children there.  And God willing, if his career stayed on track, it would be the anchor that kept him from drifting.   

Irene's family took a different tack entirely when they found out what he did for a living.

"A storyteller," her brother-in-law had said with a slow respectful nod.  "That's a good job."

They were impressed, not with his fame but more taken with the idea that he was passionate about telling stories.  He'd never really thought about it like that.  He believed it was a privilege to be able to tell stories in that fashion, but to hear someone speak with reverence about the art of telling stories was a real gift.  But then, they came from a People with a long tradition of passing history orally.

He found himself talking more than he ever imagined.  Sharing things that moved him.  His family.  The bush.  His passion for music.  There were nods from time to time.  Her family liked his sincerity.  He clearly respected and admired their attachment to their culture, but his own was just as important to him.  He was a man proud of where he came from and he didn't let them treat him like some cultural pygmy.  He had good things to share about his life too.  He was always learning and had little respect for those who were not prepared to do the same.  He was respectful and irreverent and funny.  And his obvious love of babies and his innate gentleness with the heavily pregnant Adele only raised their opinion of him.  But for all of that, not a single one of them was unaware of the smoldering looks Irene had traded with her pale-eyed man.    

The moon came out and the night wound down.  Irene had slipped away and for as much as he was enjoying the easy camaraderie with her cousins, his legs were stiff and he was dying for a smoke.  He almost didn't recognize her when she came back dressed in jeans and a soft denim shirt with the sleeves rolled up.  Her hair was down, kinky where it had been bound tightly in long braids. 

So there it was.  He'd seen behind the curtain-- and danced with the Wizard herself.  For some, the magic might have worn off.  For him, it was intensified now that he'd gotten a glimpse at the spirit of the woman under that silly Snoopy t-shirt.  He'd been attracted to her from the moment he'd seen her on that weathered old porch.  She was in his blood now, throbbing like the drum.  He wanted her.  The only thing that gave him pause was what her family might think.  He liked them.  He liked her.  He wanted them to like him.  He also wanted to feel her naked body moving under his.  What he didn't want was for that to be obvious to any of them.

He might as well have wished for the moon.  He was not a child.  He hadn't advertised his interest, but he hadn't hidden it either.  It was just the idea of her family knowing what might happen between them that made him uneasy. 

A sudden unpleasant thought occurred to him.  What if she intended to go straight back with her family?  Was this a one way ticket?  How was he to get back?  He didn't have the money to pay for a cab to come and get him all the way out here.  Or a cell phone with a signal.  There probably wasn't a tower for miles.  Even if he could find a phone, the thought of having to call one of the production's gophers or assistants to come get him did little to ease his mind.  Jesus, he could be so stupid.  But it wouldn't be the first time a long walk home had come at the end of a night like this.  Most likely it wouldn't be the last either.  That was the downside of getting life all over you.  Sometimes it sure could be messy. 

Fuck.  He always thought better with a cigarette in his mouth.  He sure was feeling the want of one now.  There was nothing to do but wait and see how it turned out, he thought as he carried Adele's sleeping daughter to their car.  Adele was scolding her husband for forgetting the kids' coats and rummaging through the back looking for a blanket.  He tucked the warm body of the sleepy little girl into the back of the car still wrapped in his old flannel, shrugging off their attempts to return it.  Something in feeling the limp weight of that little girl in his arms had triggered a memory of his own childhood; of being tucked away warm and cozy in the back of his mum's old clunker, wrapped up with his brother in some relative's scratchy old coat that smelled of cigars and the spray of the sea.

He could hear Irene speaking softly to her sister.

"Hey, 'Del.... I'll be by tomorrow... late.... ask Auntie to make my favorite chili, eh?"

There was a beat of silence.  And then another.

"Tomorrow, huh."  It wasn't a question.  He heard the sound of soft laughter and saw them embrace.  "Be good.  Be safe!"

"Always."  The conversation lapsed again into their strangely accented French.  

He heard Rob's voice call out to him, "See you again sometime, man."  He sounded like he was smiling.

A few moments later they were waving goodbye to the sleepy faces pressed against the back window as the car sped away into the night.  An odd quiet seemed to settle around them.  He liked it.  They were still surrounded by people but the lack of her family made it suddenly feel as if they were alone.  A wild desert wind blew as they slowly walked back to Irene's car.  He noticed they weren't the only couple strolling off together into the dark.  At the side of the car they stopped and blinked as a pair of headlights swept over them before the darkness swallowed them again. 

He felt the soft press of her body and her warm breath on his cheek.  "You wanna go somewhere?"

His answer was quiet and revealed none of the wild excitement that had just flared to life in his chest.  "Sure."  He kissed her there, pressing her up against the side of the car.  Her lips were soft and tasted of frybread and honey.  She sighed against his mouth as he drew away and for a moment he wished that she was small enough to tuck under his chin.  He settled for pulling her close and wrapping his arms around her instead.

She pressed the keys into his hand.  "You drive.... I'm tired!"  Too much dancing.  Her spirit was invigorated; it was just her feet that ached.

Eyes twinkling, he pulled away.  "Wow.  Trusted to drive this fine little beauty?"  His eyebrows waggled as he patted a particularly rusty spot.  "Guess I made a good impression, then?"  He held the door for her and then ran around and jumped in, crossing his finger over his heart and kissing the keys.  "I'll try not to scratch it.... but only if you give me back my lighter... I could kill for a fag!"  The engine roared to life.

Actually, it had been hours since he'd last smoked.  He was a little jittery.  Bloody bad habit-- but it was his.  And he liked it.  He drove.  Irene put her feet up on the cracked, peeling dash and leaned over, resting her head on his shoulder.  He put his arm around her and they shared most of the rest of his pack between them as the miles rolled on. 

"Hey, pull off here."

"Here?"  It looked pretty dodgy-- but she was the boss.  For now.    

She nodded and he pulled into the dusty gravel lot of a little rundown roadside motel with four cabin style bungalows that looked like they had once been cotton candy pink.  He winced. 

He paid for the room.  She'd paid for the frybread and Cokes, after all.  It was shabby and outdated but at least it smelled clean.  A threadbare quilt was on the bed.  It didn't have a TV, just an empty stand where it looked like one had once been bolted.  It made Motel 6 look chic.  He felt right at home.  It was actually nicer than his last apartment had been.  Certainly neater. 

Irene didn't bring anything in.  He didn't have anything to bring in.  They didn't linger at the car.  The temperature had dropped and sitting for hours in just a shirt without his flannel over it had chilled him through.  He wanted nothing more than to be inside, under the covers-- pressed up against her.  Naked skin to naked skin. 

He could hear coyote pups howling.  He felt like throwing his head back and joining them.  

He caught her hand.  She smiled.  He did too.

"You sure?"

She gave him another of the off kilter looks that had been throwing him all night.  "Are you?"

Irene wasn't foolish.  A man like him would have someone back home.  That he hadn't mentioned anyone, even casually, told her a lot. 

"More sure than I've been of anything in a long time," he said quietly.  But then he cocked his head and grinned.  "And I didn't even have to ask the magic eightball."

She laughed, feeling dizzy as he swayed toward her.  "Crazy..." she said with affection, slipping off her shoes.

He just shrugged and whispered against her lips, "Go with it.  S'good for clarity...."

Irene thought he was too.

Their clothes came off.  He told her she had gorgeous breasts.  But not with words, although he still used his mouth to get the message across.  Still cold and sluggish, he lost his balance pulling off his pants and skipped along on one leg before crashing into the bed with an impressively inventive curse.

One of them giggled and the words 'Crow hop...'  could be heard-- but the amusement was short lived as he pulled her down with him, kicking away the old quilt so his body could lay with hers under it.  Brown legs tangled with white.  He liked the way it looked.  So different from the picture in his head... and yet still so very good. 

He moved over her and she pushed the hair from his eyes.  He had good hair for a white man, thick and soft.  It smelled good too, like smoke and sage and man.  She licked his smooth pale skin.  He let her and murmured his pleasure against her flesh.  Her skin was salty.  It pulled at some primal place inside of him, woken by the earthy flavor and by the throbbing of the drums they'd danced to tonight.  She smelled like a woman, musky and warm. 

The desire to burrow into her warm honeyed welcome made the blood pound in his ears.  He gave into the urge, first with his fingers and then with his tongue and finally with his cock.  His body was heavy and hairy and the sensual rasp of his stubble under her tender lips and searching tongue was every bit as good as she'd imagined.

Irene was sweaty again.  This time, he was too.  He covered her with his body and she sank deep into the soft flimsy mattress, legs spread wide around his hips as he sheathed himself for both their protection and then pushed in deep.  Clinging to him, she whispered for him to wait.  He was big and had filled her to overflowing.  He wished he could do the same thing with his come.  He wanted to feel her wet with it, see it drip from her, feel the ooze as he held her close afterwards.

A fleeting thought of the sure bet he'd left behind at the bar flashed through his brain.  He wouldn't have looked at her face.  He wouldn't have wanted that much intimacy.  He'd have kept chin buried in her neck instead.  This moment was so very different.  He didn't just look into Irene's face... he looked into her eyes as he moved over her, muscles straining, pelvis hunching as he worked himself in deeper still. 

They rose higher and higher, out of that cheap old room and over the desert, until they were lost somewhere walking among the stars.  Her long lean dancer's legs squeezed his hips hard and her back arched, head tossing as she came.  She'd called out, words he didn't remember, and he gave her back whispers he couldn't recall as his body convulsed in powerful surges.  Thunder rang in his head and behind his eyes lightning flashed as the throbbing streams of pearly ejaculate slowed to a shuddering trickle and finally to dry waves of pleasure.

His soft cock lay nestled against her thigh.  The discarded condom lay on the floor.  They slept.

The moon rose higher, spilling though a gap in the cheap curtains that were too small to span the full length of the window.  He woke and smiled.  He hadn't spent the night in a woman's bed - sleeping - since he'd left home, and he wondered how long it would be before it happened again.  Something told him a long time. 

"You know, you do dance good," Irene whispered into the silence.  And then he felt her smile against his shoulder.  "But you fuck better."

He chuckled, not at all put off by her candid comment.  "For a 'wasichu'?" he teased.

She snuffled quietly in amusement.  "For anyone," she answered back for the second time.  He was a good lover.  Passionate.  Earthy.  Big.  Tender too.  She liked that about him.

He liked that she hadn't dressed it up with pretty words.  They hadn't made love.  You have to be in love to make love.  They were just two lonely souls on walkabout, sharing a bit of each other's path where it meandered through the same stretch of stars.   

They walked among the stars again, shattering in the desert sky.  His penis was sore.  Her throat was raw from crying his name.  Their bodies ached.  A second condom lay discarded on the floor.  It was later joined by a third. 

Afterwards, he scooted down and put his head on her breast, licking lazily at her nipple now and again but content just to rest there.  Her heart beat strong and steady.  Like a drum, he thought with a touch of wry amusement.  His hand traced up and down her smooth flat belly.  Irene knew the instant he realized--

His hand paused and then he deliberately followed the fine tracing of silvery white lines, old stretch marks, long faded.  He'd been with enough women who had children to know the signs.

"You have kids."  There was just the slightest touch of incredulity in his voice.

Irene nodded.  "A daughter."  There was more silence while he shifted over and rolled up on his elbow to look at her breasts, tracing the same faint lines he saw there and thumbing her thick brown nipple.  "She's nine."

A thousand things he had no words for boiled up through him.  It made him feel.... frustrated.  He thought he'd worked her out.  Now it felt like he was starting over.  "Christ... you can't be- what?  Twenty-six?  Twenty-seven?"

"Twenty-five."  The silence stretched out.  "She lives with my mom."

"And that's OK with you?"  It angered him for some reason he wouldn't quite work out.  

"I'll probably be raising her children in a few more years," she said by way of answer.  It was hard to explain to an outsider, even one as empathic as he was.  All children were welcomed.  Sometimes they wished the new arrival had come into the family under different circumstances, but there was always a mother or an auntie or a grandmother willing to step in; many of whom felt that hundreds of years of systematic genocide was birth control enough. 

He recognized that same sort of sideways response in her answer that he'd noticed her cousins and uncles using with him earlier.  He tried it on.  "Don't you miss her?"

Irene nodded.  

So much for that.  He shrugged and asked the question he really wanted to know the answer to, even if it was about as far away from sideways as a person could get.  "Was it her you were running from?"

She turned over, smoothing the frown from his brow.  "I don't think so."  A soft sigh made her chest rise and she held it before letting it out softly.  "I think I was running away for a long time.  I think I'm just now finding my way back."

"Dancing helps you do that?"  He played with a strand of her hair where it was tickling his skin.

"Dancing does.  My sister does.  Her kids do."  She smiled up into his face.  "You do."  They kissed softly.  "Good for clarity, you know?"

Irene felt like maybe Trickster might be satisfied now.  It had been messy.  But worthwhile.  She would have been floored to know that in their brief time together, from the seeds she'd planted inside of him would grow lessons as powerful and moving as the ones she'd taken from him. 

Nestling down next to him, she whispered something into his ear.  A foreign melodic jumble of syllables that sounded like splashing water.  He repeated it, looking at her with a question in his eyes. 

"My name," she murmured.  His hand found hers and he squeezed but he didn't smile.  He remembered what she'd said.  Names had power.  He didn't think she'd done it to even anything.  Now they were each responsible for a piece of each other no matter how long the journey was.  He blew out softly.  Strings.  Somehow, this one didn't seem so bad.

He was alone when he woke.  Irene was gone.  The sun was up but not yet high overhead.  He looked around.  She'd smoothed the sheets over him before she'd gone and his clothes were neatly folded on the empty TV stand.  He rolled to a sit with a groan, his back hurt from the soft squishy bed, and he stretched and scratched.  A wince followed.  His penis still hurt.  But in a good way. 

Grabbing one of his remaining three cigarettes, he stuck one in his mouth, lit it, and staggered to the bathroom.  He wasn't sure what he felt when he stumbled back in and sat down heavily on the bed.  Rolling his thick wrist, he looked at his watch.  Nearly nine.  Wrapping the sheet around his waist, he stuck his head out the door.  Irene's car was gone.  There was only one car out there in the empty lot-- and then he realised he recognised the beat up minivan parked in the shade of a craggy outcropping of rock.  He'd tucked a sleeping child away in the back just last night.  He recognized the man sleeping behind the wheel, too.  He was wearing a very familiar flannel.  It looked like he'd be getting that ride back into town after all.  A smile touched his face despite the strange jumble of emotions swirling inside of him.

Pulling his head back in, he dropped the sheet and sat back down on the bed, still not quite sure how he'd wound up here even though he remembered every moment of the ride.  Funny how life works out that way sometimes. 

A quick hot shower restored him.  His stomach rumbled.  He thought of frybread and wished for a hot cup of his mum's tea, dressing quickly before the warmth of the shower could wear off.  Push.  Tuck.  Button.  Zip.... what the......?  He pulled his phone out of his pocket.  What do you know?  A signal!  Finally.  But if his phone was in his hand and his lighter was beside the bed, what the hell was the lump in his other pocket?

He shoved a hand in deep and found that Irene had tucked her beaded bracelet inside before she left.  His hurried flight slowed as the sight of it started working on those little seeds she'd left behind in his chest.  Something profound was beginning to shift inside of him.  All it needed was time.  A thousand possibilities flittered through his mind, but there was only one he kept coming back to.  Sitting down on the bed, he snapped open his phone and looked at the display-- no new calls.

Well, the power to change that was in his hands.  Flicking through the names in the display, he selected the one that made his heart jump no matter how many times he saw it.  He'd figure out how to pay for the international call later.  Right now, he just needed to hear her voice.  And for her to hear his.

It rang.

She answered.

He smiled, took a deep breath and started talking.