Ch: 31 Feels Like Home

 

Before long, Gary and Shai began to wind down, becoming listless and sleepy. The others excused themselves, off to rest wherever they had found space in the cozy, crowded inn.

 

Drawing inspiration from Shai’s forest fantasy bedroom, Gary tried summoning a floating bed of moss. He was trying for a less submerged pool sleeping experience. 

 

Shai picked up his drift despite being mostly asleep. With a nod and a wink, a floating bower of vines and moss for two was drifting soggily about.

 

They climbed aboard and set sail for dreamland together, feeding each other a fresh wad of pollen, before kissing and passing out.

 

As usual Gary woke first, slipping from sleep to waking with a silent breath. He kissed Shai, still sleeping peacefully, Becky too, curled up with her sister on the mossy bed. He leaned over and kissed Esperanza good morning as she stirred, big brown eyes meeting his sleepily. 

 

The snug little raft became awkward as Gary took inventory of where his hands were. Left hand, on Esperanza’s bare hip, that was not ideal.  Right hand, holding a very nice and bouncy breast, NOT Shai’s, that was bad. 

 

When he started taking note of where her hands were, things got out of control quickly. One of her hands was firmly holding a smooth pale boob that Gary had been dreaming of longingly for several days, the other was on Shai’s favorite toy.

 

Carefully he began disengaging from the sexy trader. “Esperanza, that is a hard no… let me rephrase that, unhand Shai’s property before she murders us both.” He said as calmly and quietly as he could while being fondled by a beautiful woman. “My little sister is right there woman… so is my woman.”

 

“Too late boy, I be awake. Esperanza, I hae decided tae nae murder thee, but take yer hands off that ere me sister wakes.” Shai said calmly. 

 

“I’m sorry Shai, I woke up and she was…” She silenced him with a finger to his lips

 

“She does no harm.” Shai said. “Lie back down, tis the best night's sleep I’ve had since ye were hurt.” She said, curling up close and holding her favorite things protectively, while Esperanza snuggled in tight.

 

It really was the best sleep he had in forever. When he woke, Esperanza was curled up around Shai, while Becky was buried under a sopping wet Otho. 

 

Gary was half adrift, barely clinging to the edge of the raft with one butcheek and his legs, while Falco tried in vain to nudge him back aboard.

 

Gary surrendered to the inevitable and rolled off the raft, swimming for the edge and feeling good for the first time in a while. “Falco, it’s going to be a good day!” He whispered to his aquatic friend. 

 

He dressed himself, buckling on a leather kirtle to hold his giblets just a little. He had gotten a bit fancy with it, interlocking bronze bands made it as flexible as leather, while adding some extra protection. He left the rest of his new armor in his Pockets!, a man needed to keep a few surprises. 

 

He bustled about, starting breakfast and feeding Annie way too many carrots. Otho needed some attention too. 

 

“Ooo! Good boy! Otho bit that mean old mudbug real good yes!”

He burbled while rubbing the giant dog’s ears.

“Yes Annie, you would have kicked the carapace out of him I’m sure. Khan was just too slow.”

 He led the familiars out onto the beach by the dock to play with Falco in the early morning ‘surf’. The shallow sea was flat calm most days, low wavelets curling on the sand barely counted.

 

They invented a game together, where Gary would conjure a massive ball for them to push about, until it went ‘out of bounds’ and vanished at the edge of Gary’s sphere of influence. Creating another in neutral territory took only a moment.

 

While they played ‘ballsies’ Gary played ‘sneaky fisherman’, he used his recorder to lure a number of crabs and lobsters into his clutches. It was so cold the critters were moving slowly, that made for pinch free capture.

 

A summoned basket  trap rapidly filled with shrimp while he played. Aquatic life had taken a taste of him, it was time to repay the favor with interest. He took a perverse joy in the fate he had planned for these armored hooligans. Like the crayfish, these were extraordinarily large and populous. “You guys are gonna pay the price…” He whispered to his prey.

 

Despite a good start, Gary was running out of gas fast. He headed inside and pushed his conjured baskets of jumping and pinching seafood into the freezer. That was how mom always did it, ‘A family tradition of bug murder!’ He thought wistfully. 

She would have loved his girls, Shai and Becky both. Their cioppino took him on a voyage home, and he needed to go there again. Those pinchy monsters were his ticket. With a little help from his friends. 

 

He left the familiars to their game with a few balls in reserve. Coffee was ready and the girls were just stirring, it was time to face the day. Those cold predawn moments, before the sky’s colors came out, were magical and misty by the shore.

 

By the time the rest were moving, he had a good start on a mountain of pancakes. When his knees got shaky he abandoned his spatula and bowl of batter. He sagged into a chair with his third cup of coffee and watched the proceedings with interest.

 

A full house, packed with friends. He relished the energy of his huge unruly family, bouncing off his walls with rowdy energy even while sleeping. 

The three sailing men were quiet and stolid for the most part. Yuzef’s guitar skills were excellent and he had a natural sense of timing and improvisation, the other two Gary had not really made a connection with.

 

The three young boatmen proved early risers and able in the kitchen as well. They took over for Gary and displayed far more aptitude. Sausages and groundworm hash started sizzling and the morning was officially on.

 

Becky flopped down on the couch beside him and stole some blankets for herself. “Is Esperanza gonna survive? They’ve been floating in there alone for a while…”

 

“Ooh, they need to talk some things out, boundaries and stuff. How long were you awake?” He asked, not really wanting the answer.

 

“When Shai let her aboard and then when you started moving. She got handsy after she fell asleep. It was weird, like she couldn't get close enough to you two.” Becky skootched in closer. “I get it, but her vibe is way too… intense.” She settled in and rested her head on his shoulder. “That woman has real personal space issues.”

 

“About that Becks…” Gary began. 

 

“Yeah, you guys are gonna need some alone time… I get it, I just always slept in the youngling’s barracks. It’s so quiet all alone.” 

 

“I don’t want it to get weird like last night, love. Esperanza was crossing boundaries and you don’t need that on top of your own stuff.” Gary said lamely.

 

“Your stuff is my stuff Gary, cause I had Shai first.” She smirked and wiggled closer.

 

“Brat.” Gary said, as he rested his head against hers. She smelled like home.

 

As the rest of the group straggled out, Shai and Esperanza remained closeted in the floating bower until food started hiting the tables. They emerged looking flustered and ate side by side in silence.

 

After breakfast, as they were preparing to take to the road and waves, respectively, the pair cornered Gary. 

 

“This one would have the pair of you join us on Esperanza today, we will follow the shore and remain with the group. We have much to discuss.” She said, with a shaky smile and a sweeping bow.

 

“Aye, much tae discuss.” Shai said, in a tone that was hard to pin down.

“Shai, this morning…” He began.

“On. The. Boat. Gary.” She bit off the words as though it cost her coin to say each one.

 

They followed the swaying trader in silence, down the dock and through the hatchway to her quarters.

 

#

 

“Gary and Shai will be sailing with Esperanza today, we will meet them when we camp tonight.” Liam announced to the Bathers. “They have some things to discuss after last night.”

 

“Things are weird there guys, don't bust on them about it ok?” Becky added in. “Let’s be adults about this.”

 

“We are absolutely not going to be adults about this Becky.” Ivy called back.

 

#

 

“The boys will not disturb us, we are alone.” Esperanza said, with the air of a woman going to her own execution.

 

Gary and Shai sat on her bed, while she knelt on a pillow on the deck. She bowed low and spoke softly. “This one has no excuse. She saw the three of you…” Soft sobs shook her as she sat, head low.

 

“Falco said this one should not, that with patience we might win you over.” She tried to squirm lower to the deck, but her anatomy was not compatible with anything flat. “This lowly one gave in to desire and must beg forgiveness again and again.”

 

Shai sat there, more still than Gary had ever felt her, wound up so tight anything could happen. 

 

“Shai, our friend is asking for our forgiveness.” He said gently, putting an arm around the smith’s waist.

 

“Aye,” She whispered hoarsely. “I will forgive, but I will nae share thee boy. Ye be mine.”

 

“And you’re mine love, but I think we’re both also hers, just like we’re Becky’s. I think she’s like me, that makes us family.” He said softly, almost a whisper.

 

“Where are you from Esperanza? Where were you born?” He asked.

 

“No one knows, this one was found adrift, a babe afloat on the shallow sea. Only Falco was there, a baby as this one was.” She lifted her head slowly. “My family took this unworthy in, kept my secret that this one might not go to War. Now you know. This one too is an orphan by law.” 

 

“So how do you have this whole sexual energy Contra…” He stopped halfway through. “You really are like me, Falco is like my house, all energy and over the top. You’ve been doing this alone, all this time never knowing...” 

 

Gary sank to the floor with her, and held her as she wept, sobbing along in time. Shai joined the sobbing sniffling mess on the floor; that pillow was done for. 

 

The weeping trio somehow wound up on the bed, still sobbing and tangled together, ruining additional bedding.

 

Soon the girls were kissing, sweetly, chastely at first. Then Esperanza and Shai began caressing and undressing anyone they could get their hands on.

 

Esperanza and Shai kissed passionately, their tongues dancing over lips and between each other ravenously. 

Each beautiful woman had an arm behind him, propping him up into the delightful melee, while their free hands roamed. 

 

Gently caressing and stroking where they pleased and pleasing where they wandered, the two women were all over each other and him. 

 

Gary’s hands did their fair share of roaming, as much as he could without pulling anything sensitive in the mess he had going on downstairs. 

 

He stroked breasts, both new and familiar, teasing and fondling in tactile delight. He kissed and nibbled at anything that came within range. The girls seemed to be making a game of baiting each other into his zone.

 

Tentative fingers drifted to little Gary, joined shortly by a familiar hand. Two beautiful women, each exciting, vibrant and delightful in her own way were fondling him with eager enjoyment… Hazy waves of desire and passion engulfed the small room, leaving doubt, reason and rationality to fend for themselves.  

 

Lost in unfamiliar desires and carried off on the lips of two beautiful, desirable women. He was adrift in a dream of surreal pleasures and intoxicating emotions. 

 

He figured out what was happening real quick when someone unbuckled his kirtle. 

 

Things below the ribcage got unstable fast, bringing Gary to a gasping, shuddering spasm of the not fun and almost debilitating kind. 

 

Four gentle hands eased him down onto the bed, probing tenderly to make certain he had not come unstitched. When their hands found no leaking or ruptures in his crazy quilt abdomen, the two women eased off.

 

His expression should have been comical, a mixture of hopes dashed, fantasies shattered, dreams become nightmares and crippling self doubt. 

 

His face broke Shai’s heart as his fragile confidence crumbled into a wretched mask of despair. Little Gary never even twitched. 

 

“Oh my love,” Shai whispered. “tis nae important, ye are on the mend, tis madness tae even attempt tae try.” Shai thumped him gently on the chest and scolded softly. “Settle, we rest, there is naught more tae be said.”

 

Esperanza curled in, resting her head on his shoulder, while holding hands with Shai across him. “You were clear when we docked. A broken toy indeed, but soon mended and ready to play again.” 

 

Two beautiful, extraordinary women fell asleep, draped across him, glowing in the dim light from the curtains in naked splendor. Pure terror haunted and hounded him to exhaustion, while little Gary slumbered on.

Hours later, a soft knock at the door roused them. “We are near Tingly village, we shall tie up nearby.” Dante’s voice called through the thin door.

 

With an audible crackle, three faces peeled off of a comforter that had seen better days. They took turns washing the snot and tears from their faces in the small basin by the door. 

 

“Come sister, we have a home tae conjure.” 

Three rumpled and disheveled young people came out on deck blinking in the watery sunshine of an early evening.  

The Bathers were all waiting, huddled against the cold. Their cloaks were thrown about each other, forming a silly, constantly shifting tent.  

 

“Ohh! Cold out today!” Gary gasped, drawing sharp looks from beneath the hoods of the shambling cloak monster.

 

“Get to playing boy! Before me arse freezes!” Shai barked.  “We shall perish while ye prattle on!” She and Esperanza disappeared into the cloaks along with the boat crew, leaving him alone. 

 

“Awww.” He complained at his anonymous friends. “Ok I know you’re in there Luna, this one is just for you!” 

Gary’s weird guitar shattered the still with ethereal wailing, mournful and plaintive. He fiddled with the knobs, making the wail seem to echo on forever, while he hammered the bass strings with his thumb.

 

There is a house in New Orleans,

They call the Rising Sun…

 

When the ‘House of the Rising Sun’ wound down, his friends nearly trampled him heading for the door. 

 

On her way past, Luna swept him up and dragged the boy along. “I’m sure that was all deep and meaningful, fraught with subtext… it’s freezing arse cold out boy.”

 

Inside things had changed drastically. The common room remained, as did the open kitchen and the door to the workshop. The rest was a hallway leading to a number of comfortable rooms.

 

A misty and mossy grotto beside the pool was the oddest choice. It seemed a fairytale caricature of a bedroom. The light came from glowing shelf fungus. Bathers peered in at a fluffy moss bed, ringed with river stones and topped by puffball mushroom pillows and a moss coverlet. Flowering vines and shrubs curtained it off from the rest of the bath.

 

It would be nice, save for the hot water and steam showering constantly from the waterfall that filled the bathing pool. 

 

“Aye, til ye can sleep like civilized folks boy.” Shai whispered. “I kinna sleep in yer bath and ye kinnae sleep in bed. This will do.” She looked furtively around. “Now we need only be left alone fer a few…”

 

“Gary, the freezer is filled with baskets of dead bugs!”

“Shai! The horses are in the pool!”

“Esperanza’s dolphin stole my boot!”

“Otho says his bed isn't facing north by northwest, he can’t sleep under these conditions!”

 

“Cram it you goons, we just got in!” Gary shouted at the inn. “Ahh,” He whispered in her ear. “Feels like home.”

Summoning the house nearly wiped him out, so Gary retreated to a chair by the fire while his family bustled about. Otho settled in with a quiet “Oof” of doggie pleasure and accepted ear rubs from his boy.

 

“That’s really weird Gary, the ear thing needs to stop.” Ivy said from the common room. 

She and Tallum were going over a list of goods to be bought or traded in the village tomorrow. 

 

She was rubbing her ear and looking distracted. “I was wondering what that was. I thought I was going crazy. Turns out it was you being weird again.”

 

“Try your ring, ‘Ol’e Big Bro Gary’ has it all figured out.” He chattered, manic and strange as ever.

“Weirdo.” She looked puzzled for a moment. “The ring works great!” Somehow the whole room began to feel slightly smug.

 

Shai and Becky were in the kitchen, swaying together in a way that felt so familiar. They were cooking together, singing softly. He couldn’t make out the words, but salt-pork, onions, garlic and chilis hit hot iron and started playing along.

 

“That’s my mom’s cioppino song... she sang the recipes when she…” Gary struggled to his feet and lurched to the new grotto, his shoulders trembling with emotion. 

 

He shed his clothes as he went dropping them carelessly, only to have them vanish at the tips of his fingers. A rough wooden door appeared and closed off the small chamber after he went in.

 

He lay back on the tightly woven mat of watercress, lily pads and rushes, they let him submerge just enough to keep things soaking, without feeling adrift and helpless. The moss coverlet, fireflies and mushrooms were just for Shai.

 

Gary sank into his own mind, replaying the day slowly, step by step. He did not have to look far, waking up with that woman in his bed was becoming a real issue. 

 

That was when things came unspooled, with Esperanza and her grabby hands. Shai’s reaction was even stranger, especially with Becky asleep on the raft with them. 

 

Things in Esperanza’s quarters were beyond complicated. He felt embarrassed, to be so easily befuddled into that position. Humiliated by his own failures, crushed by worry and self doubt, Gary wandered in the realms of ‘I’m not good enough’ until he found a nice spot with a view of self loathing and self doubt...

 

The girls, his girls, singing his mother’s silly recipe songs in the kitchen, that was just too much for one day. He slipped away, chomping down a wad of pollen for uninterrupted sleep.

“Shai says you gotta eat if you wanna get better Gary, everybody else is done. Get moving.” Becky was just outside, trying to keep dry, with clouds of steam and spray tumbling through the door.

 

He threw on a robe and shambed out, plopping down in front of a good sized bowl of seafood stew. Crabs, shrimp and the local spiny lobsters balanced out bacon, groundworm and giant crayfish perfectly. The toast was loaded with garlic and soaked into the stew like a fond embrace.

 

That just made everything worse. Memories washed him away into a fog of confused and angry grief. Gary couldn’t really remember returning to the grotto and closing the door, but it happened somehow.

 

Shai and Becky tried the door, murmuring soft greetings and calls through the loose boards. No reply came from the dark cavern. 

 

#

 

Tawny, Liam and Shai sat plotting in the far corner of the common room. 

“You fools, if his abdomen ruptures, there won’t be enough left to stitch back together! He’s a man and can’t help himself, you should know better.” Tawny complained, shooting dark looks at Esperanza, who just happened to be lurking by the grotto door.

 

“Frankly, I’m surprised you let that woman anywhere near him, she’s all hands and hips.” Liam said, receiving a sharp look from Tawny that left him confused and mildly hurt.

 

“Tis needful, she be like Gary, damaged and lost.” Shai said soberly. “I will nae tell her secrets, yet she does   belong wi this family, wherever she wanders. I nae kin contest that.”

 

“Be that as it may.” Tawny said. “You tried too soon and failed, Gary is no child, he will get over his silliness soon enough.”

 

“It be more than that.” She whispered softly. “I were his first, his only. He were nae hardly kissed ere now. An he be damaged almost beyond salvaging in his soul. Tis nae meet he should be alone.” She whispered low and urgent, pulling her confidants closer. 

 

“He’s not alone, Shai, we are all inside him in a way. That sounded really creepy, sorry.” Tawny blushed golden in embarrassment.

 

“I did jest in a tender moment that he be me apprentice in the art o love. Suren I japed of making him an apron of gray for his pajamas… But tis true, he be a newborn babe in such matters, fumbling and lost.” Silent tears welled in her eyes as she went on. 

 

“Ye hae not seen much and he dinnae speak on his old life, even tae me an Becky, though he be marked deeply by these things. He did even promise tae murder the god Knowlege for good and all, an he be caught digging in me boy’s memories. There be much work tae do ere he be free of those old chains and shackles.”

 

“When it’s time he will come out. Leave him alone for a while.” Liam said firmly. 

 

Over by the Pianoforte, Dannyl, Ivy, Tallum and Becky were having their own strategy session. 

 

Yuzef, Marc and Dante had somehow been dragooned into snapping their fingers along in a simple beat.

Tallum came in with a complex bassline, bringing urgency and moving the music forward. Dannyl’s guitar rang out in a steady rhythm, strumming hard to drive the beat. 

 

Ivy’s kickdrum locked the beat down while her snares and hi-hats shimmered around the sonic edges. Becky took the lead with her harp, strumming an upbeat melody as she threw her head back and sang out in her clear, ringing soprano.

 

Oh, oh, oh,

For the longest time, 

 

Oh, oh, oh,

For the longest time,

 

Becky threw herself into the song with vigor, even when she fumbled the words and got verses out of order. 

 

Gary’s flute came piping along and nestled in right behind Becky's harp for the last few bars. 

When they  started in on Johnny B. Goode he was out and grinning like his old self. Mostly.