90s draft 2

Audrey Two comes up hesitantly as I'm slicing cheese onto bread.

"Cam sounds...sweet," she says like a peace offering. It makes me snort.

"Cam is very sweet. He's also even more paranoid and pointy than Duke. Audrey told you what happened to me?"

The look of pale horror on her face answers that question.

"When she went there and met him-"

"She mentioned your name and he punched her." She sounds unsettled by that.

"If you meet him, remember that." I keep my eyes on what I'm doing with the knife. "You need to be very gentle with him because he's used to everyone being hostile, especially law enforcement. But once he feels safe with you, yes, he's sweet and loving. Just remember to treat him like a victim, not a suspect."

The fish is smelling done, so I put cheese on the last slice of bread and hand the entire tray to Audrey Two. A towel spread on the counter where the tray was, and I pull the pan out to check everything. Looks cooked. I take the tray back and slide it into the oven.

"Those are blue," she says, pointing at the potatoes.

"Yes, they are. I'm going to go wake up Duke."

"You know he's not napping," she says disapprovingly.

I shrug. "I'm bringing him back to consciousness. You don't have to approve, but you do need to keep it to yourself because it may not be the best coping mechanism in the world, but it's not your choice to make."

She looks affronted, but I don't care. Audrey's sort of zoned out on the couch. "Grub's up in five," I call to her, and then I pause at Duke's door and listen.

Nothing.

Gentle knock, shave-and-a-haircut.

Nothing.

Crack the door open and peek in. "Duke?"

He's definitely not awake, and just as definitely not dressed. There's a tank top, but that's entirely too much thigh for him to be wearing pants. I slip inside and close the door behind me, reminding myself firmly that I can not sex him awake, he hasn't given consent yet. Instead, I sit on the edge of his bed and call his name again. Still no response. Gently, I take one outflung hand.

The hand is ripped out of mine as Duke lunges into a sitting position, swinging at me. The blow never lands, of course, because I do know how to fight and blocking is instinctual.

"Julia?" he asks as his eyes open, but it sounds like he thinks he's woken up into another dream.

Gently, I say, "From the future, remember?"

He pulls his hand back to rub at his scalp, making me hot all over again. "Right," he says slowly. "With the cops and the...magic book."

Do not kiss the groggy gypsy. Do not. "I made food," I tell him instead. "You should probably eat some while it's still hot."

Like you. God, you're hot. I'm a shameless wench.

Duke sits up fully, preparing to stand, and I back out of the way of those long, long gypsy legs and stop it, wench. "Right," he says vaguely. "Um. Thanks." But his attention isn't on me, I know. "I'll be out in a minute."

Unless you zone out. "If you're not out in five," I warn, half-pointing sternly with my finger and then pulling it back, "I'm coming back." And I'll make sure you're dressed.

He gives me a loose salute. "Yes, ma'am."

He's not dressed. He's not dressed, and he'll hopefully remember to rectify that before coming out, but that might make him realize that he was mostly naked in front of me, and that could either lead to sex or just more unresolved sexual tension and I need to leave because I'm thinking way too much about Duke being naked and the toast might burn.

I do, however, make sure the door closes firmly behind me and dismiss thoughts about Duke's firm behind before glancing at the time and making a mental note to check on him in five minutes.

"Problem?" Audrey Two asks, peering at my expression.

"Nothing we want to know about," Audrey tells her. "Anything we should do before dinner?"

Pull yourself together, wench. "You," I say, pointing at her, "need to sit your ass at that table because I said so," I tell her in Mom's best voice, preempting whatever bullshit protest she was about to give me.

"Yes, mom," she mutters, but it's almost...grateful. I wonder what kind of maternal figures she's inherited memories from, or if her head is really that bad.

"You," I tell Audrey Two, "can help me get plates and things."

"Real plates?" she asks skeptically, but she follows me over.

"Kind of impractical to use paper on a boat." I point at the cabinet. "They should be in there."

Audrey Two opens it and yes, they are. "Yeah, but..." She stares at the rack for a long moment while I check the toast. "I feel silly now, but I was expecting...I don't know, tin plates or plastic or something."

"We're on a boat," I tease, "we're not camping. The toilet flushes, and we have hot water."

"I know that, but..."

"She's never been on a boat," Audrey says from the table. "Not everyone spent their teenage years starring in the marine equivalent of This Old House."

And just like that I realize that she's staring at the plates because she's not sure how to get them out. "Oh, here - lift that." She does, and her expression clears a bit. "Can't just have them sitting on a shelf. Even if they cabinet stayed closed, rough seas could fling them around and then you'd go to get a plate and get a faceful of ceramic knives instead. It's the same reason the mugs are on hook clips and have padding and things."

“And the fridge and oven lock,” Duke says from behind me, “and all the counters have lips.”

“Ah, good. I don't have to follow through on my threat,” I say, trying not to turn into a girl. Both Audreys look piercingly at me. “Going back in for him."

“It's all good,” Duke says loftily. “There was mention of Julia-made food. Any home-made food is good, but Julia-made...” He kisses his fingers like an Authentic Italian in a pasta sauce commercial. I almost expect him to announce that it's Perfecto!

The toast is smelling done, though, so I roll my eyes and turn around, and then it's a good thing staring into a hot oven will hide my blush because I'm still sixteen as far as Duke knows, and I haven't even gotten that good at cooking yet. Oh god. Was he flirting with me? Did he do that back when I was a teenager and I missed it? Cheese is bubbly. Put another towel on the counter, set the tray on it and turn the oven off.

"Okay," I start, putting aside all thoughts of potentially-missed flirting. “We have roasted fish and vegetables with a simple beer sauce, and then toast with melted cheese. I'm not one-hundred-percent sure which fish this is..."

“Lake trout, from the looks of it.” Gypsy to the rescue. “The other's whitefish.”

“And the potatoes are okay being blue?” Audrey Two asks warily. “With the fridge having frozen some of the things I was..."

“That's a Newfoundland delicacy," I say dryly as Duke says, “That's a Newfoundland thing.” I take a plate from her and brandish a serving spoon. “Do you have any concerns about the carrots? Or the cheese?"

There are no objections, so I load the plate and pass it on. "Boss, can you get drinks for people?" I ask as Audrey Two hands me another plate.

With her ferrying food to the table and Duke juggling cups and silverware, it's not long before we're all sitting down ready to eat. Fish cooked in beer and blue potatoes are out of the ordinary enough that Audrey Two is wary about trying it. Audrey is a little more brave, but more because she trusts my skill than because she's not intimidated by the menu. Duke, of course, is high and not hungry, but he tries it all the same and everyone agrees that I have successfully improvised tasty food. Audrey makes a point of thanking him for having the ingredients and letting us use them, and Audrey Two follows suit awkwardly after what was probably a shin-kick under the table.

“I'm not going to bite,” he chides mildly, “but you're welcome.”

Audrey Two replies, “Well, earlier neither of us was at our best, so I wasn't sure.” It's almost an actual apology.

Duke spears a bit of fish and a bite of potato. “I only bite people when I've been given permission,” he says, and brings the food to his mouth almost as an object demonstration.

Audrey rolls her eyes and grins at me, silently inviting me to laugh at the joke, but I'm remembering gypsy teeth on various bits and she gives me a look of Really? I so did not need to know that. Naturally, that makes me blush and I look down at my plate, pressing my lips (and thighs) together while she coughs a subtle disavowal. 

"So..." Audrey says with a slight wince. “...that made me think: how are we going to sleep tonight? And well, however many nights it's going to take to get to Haven.”

I'm blushing harder. Audrey Two is looking like she's being given two choices, both of them bad.

“It'll really depend on the weather,” Duke says. “I couldn't take us to Newfoundland this afternoon because there's a storm closer to the coast and towing the Cape makes that even more dangerous for us than just going there in the Ursa. Provided that's cleared up we can go there tomorrow, and then on to Halifax depending how long it takes to get supplies, and then to Haven the next day.”

Audrey Two stifles any number of things before saying, “So, that's tonight here, tomorrow night in Halifax, and then to Haven.”

“Depending on the weather,” he repeats. “Winter is not always kind to the sea.”

Audrey and I both nod. “So, that's two nights,” I point out, “and the Ursa is...cozy.”

I'm pretty sure I'll be spending the night in his bed with him, and Audrey can sleep on the couch, but...

Duke tips his head slightly in my direction to acknowledge the point. “This is true, but it's not like I haven't...ferried people before. The couch is an option some people choose, alternately the cushions can be put on the floor. I have at least one air mattress, sleeping bags, blankets...”

Audrey Two looks relieved, and I don't blame her. Best to get this settled now, though. I put my fork down decisively. “Where do you want to sleep, Audrey?”

“What?” she asks, looking at me in bafflement. “Why come to me first?”

Yeah. We're doing this. “Because you're the one who has the headache they're trying to ignore, and probably has been since we got here.”

Audrey frowns, like she's going to try to deny it, then she sighs. “If it wasn't so cold outside I'd ask to sleep on the deck outside where it was cooler, but that's...asking for hypothermia.”

“Yes,” I tell her sternly, “it is.” And that's also worrying. I should check the not-a-book at some point to see if there's anything in there about whatever-she-is getting...sick, or being outside of Haven for longer than it takes her current identity to get there from wherever the Barn deposits her.

“Maybe the floor, then?” she says, like she's asking permission. “I can be near the door and get air if I need it.”

That's a better idea. I turn to Duke. “I know you don't keep regular painkillers, but do you have anything else that might help her rest?” The emphasis hopefully conveys that I know there's liable to be drugs, hopefully more than just the dope I know he's got, and I'm open to that possibility.

Audrey Two sighs. “I was just going to ask about Advil...if we'd stopped being stubborn.”

By we, does she mean Duke, or Audrey? She better mean Audrey. “We can always add extra to the-”

Duke interrupts with a raised hand, magnanimous captain of the ship. “You don't have to finish that, and I can probably come up with something, depending on Ms. Audrey's opinion.”

“Ms. Audrey's opinion on what?” she asks.

“You'll see when I dig it up,” he evades loftily.

Audrey looks curious despite herself. I'm pretty sure he means he has other drugs.

Audrey Two looks like she's checking both ways before crossing the street before saying, “So, there's the couch then?”

"Yes." Duke nods and stands up, gathering dishes and silverware and doing a quick clean-up. “I'll bring up the air mattress and pump when I go down to the hold. There are spare blankets and things inside the couch storage.”

As he goes down into the hold, I stand and turn to Audrey Two. "I'll take the dishes if you want to get out the blankets."

She looks uncomfortable, but Audrey says, "We'll get out the blankets," and that's that.

By the time the dishes are washed, dried, and put away, the air mattress has made an appearance and I locate the outlet so they can get it inflating. Then I turn my attention to the leftovers and make sure they're put properly in the section of the fridge that won't freeze them. I'm contemplating grabbing the sleeping bag, a blanket, and a pillow to move into Duke's room when he comes out with what's clearly a bong.

“What is that?” Audrey Two asks, but it's only technically a question.

“Pot,” Duke says, cheerfully unapologetic.  “It's good for what ails you.” There's a cough of mild disavowal. “Provided Audrey wants to have it, of course.”

Audrey looks like she's fighting the cop instinct before she says, “If it's going to make things feel better, I'll give it a try.”

“Are you-?” Audrey Two shops just short of demanding, Are you serious? 

“It's not as though it's a class A substance," Duke says in a reasonable tone, prepping the bong. "It's basically aspirin. And we're anchored in international waters. Cannabis is legal in many places. Consider us Holland right now.”

"Right," she says in the way that means No way in hell. She stands and starts gathering blankets and a book. “Well...I'm just going to...” It's pretty clear what she's going to do, seeing as she's bundling up now, and as she opens the door she says, “...call me in when the air's clear.”

Wait...if Duke's delivering... “Using this is going to be okay?” I don't want to be the cause of the drug people beating him again.

“I can pick something up when we're in Newfoundland to make up the missing. It'll be fine,” He waves a hand in my direction. “I've done it before.”

He's done it before. We're in the past. He's going to be fine, it's not like he's never smoked pot before.

Fuck, he's going to be smoking pot.

“You know what," I say in a universal making-polite-excuses tone, "I'll go outside too. I have some energy I need to work out." Not sure jumping imaginary or improvised rope is exactly going to help negate sexual frustration, but it will at least keep me occupied. "A contact high's not going to help with that. I'll check on you guys in a half hour or so if we haven't heard anything. I hope it helps,” I tell Audrey as I pass her.

“Me too,” she says, and the door closes behind me.

It's chilly, but I won't be cold for long. As I'm emptying my pockets into my purse, though, I discover a coil of rope that's been in there for I don't even know how long. Perfect.

Audrey Two gives me a raking sort of look. "I somehow doubt you have a moral issue with marijuana," she says as I shake out the rope, "considering you don't have a problem with the heroin. So why are you not in there with them?"

"Adverse physical reaction," I answer shortly.

She sits up in alarm, ready to go on the warpath as soon as she gets the go-ahead. "You're allergic?"

"No," I tell her, trying to throttle back my withering look but not quite managing. I was trying to be polite about this, but... "Let's just say that it loosens my inhibitions in a way that would be rude at best to you and Audrey."

Silence for a long moment.

"I appreciate your restraint," she says finally. "Thank you."

After a minute or two of jumping, she looks up from the book to ask, "And you're not worried about them...doing anything in there without you?"

"They won't," I reply, not slowing my jump pace. "I know what it looks like when Duke's angling for sex, and he's not. She's a cop. Even if she weren't, she's not interested in him as an adult and she's probably weirded out by him as a teenager. Plus not wanting to mess up future things. And it's not like it would mean anything if they did," I add with a verbal shrug. "It's just sex. He'd probably slept with a hundred different girls in Haven alone, by this age."

She stares at me, mouth open. "You're joking."

"Nope. Duke sleeps with a lot of girls. He's a horny gypsy."

"And that doesn't bother you."

I grin at her skeptical tone. "Which is better - coming in first place competing against three or five others, or coming in first place competing against hundreds of others?"

The look on her face is priceless.

"We had that talk pretty early on in our relationship," I say smugly before she can think of something to say. Remembering that conversation makes me feel like a girl, all warm and squishy like a chocolate bar left out in the sun. How much would my teenage self have freaked out if she'd been told, like I was, that Duke Crocker doesn't want anyone else, he wants me. My gaze settles in the middle distance while I remember that I'd thought I was dreaming because...

Because Duke said...

"Mother-FUCKER."

"Something wrong?" Audrey Two asks warily.

"I just realized that...okay, Duke is bad with expressing feelings because he grew up in an unhealthy environment and was weirded out by the idea of people being nice without wanting anything from him. That plus him thinking that I couldn't possibly want to be with him for the rest of my life because he doesn't think he'd good enough to deserve that plus me thinking he couldn't possibly want to be with me for the rest of his life because he has lots of casual sex but few repeats and he doesn't know how to express things..." I jump in silence for a minute to let her work her way through that and fume at the cosmos for the months we both spent in uncertainty. But it all worked out, I remind myself. "Anyway, we both spent several months thinking the other just wanted to be Friends With Very Generous Benefits when really, we've both wanted to be Mr. and Mrs. Pirate since...about now, actually."

The book gets closed, a blanket-wrapped finger used as a bookmark. "So you're saying that that Duke, in there, secretly wants to marry your...how old are you now?"

"Sixteen."

"And your sixteen-year-old self wants to marry the - how old is he?"

"Three years older. I didn't learn his birthday until last year."

"So sixteen and nineteen and you've both decided the other is the one and then fifteen years in the future you finally get together and you're still determined the other is the one."

"That does about sum it up."

Audrey Two stares at me in partial disgust. "I'm not sure if I disapprove on the basis of making potentially poor lifelong decisions that young, or envious that it actually worked out."

"Or if you're unsatisfied because the traditional romantic fantasy actually came true, but the handsome prince is a gypsy pirate with a rapsheet, a history of occasional drug use, and a list of sexual conquests that would put an entire whorehouse to shame?"

She wrinkles her nose. "Yes, that."

"Well, the princess is a cowgirl assassin kitchen wench with a body count, so we're not exactly fairy-tale material, either of us." I consider that for a moment, the sound of the rope against the deck and my feet landing rhythmically the backdrop to contemplation. "Well, if you go back to the old, old stories, maybe some of the Arabian Nights..."

Audrey Two laughs. There's silence for a few minutes while she pretends to read the book, then she looks up again. "You're so calm about all of this," she says in something just short of a whine. "Not just this, but all the Trouble...weirdness."

"I did grow up in Haven," I point out dryly. "And my mother was a paramedic who became the M.E., so I heard a lot of stories with medical details. Does wonders for accepting the strange and scientifically impossible."

"You were more calm than me, Audrey, and Duke combined," she points out just as dryly.

"I was trained for this," I protest. "Maybe not specifically for being chucked back in time, but I was given military training and then followed that up with more than a decade of active service going to places with dangerous Troubles, finding the Troubled person, and evaluating the situation. More often than not, they could be taught to control it and were horrified at what they were doing. Sometimes they were doing it deliberately, out of spite or anger or hatred or lust for power, and when that was the case, they got neutralized. Keeping my head in a dangerous situation where literally anything can happen is what I did for a living from the age of twenty-one until I was called back home last year."

More silence for a minute.

"You really are the local expert, then," she says in a sort of chastised voice. "Audrey and I went to Quantico, or at least I did, but you..."

"I knew I'd be spending the rest of my life in Haven as soon as...I was needed," I finish lamely, biting back the venomous phrase, the father I never met died. "So I took advantage of not being there because I knew I was on borrowed time. I was never one for doing things by half-measures."

"That explains why you're still jumping rope and not a panting mess on the deck." Audrey Two smiles. "I know I can't jump rope for as long as you're doing, and you look like you can keep going forever."

"Practice," I say lightly. "It's hard work, working on a boat, and I was not the most robust child." My eyes focus back on the horizon while I remember things I'm not saying: sneaking out of the house at dawn to jump rope in the side yard, being able to walk all the way to school without stopping to catch my breath, the constant disgruntled look on my mother's face when the yearly winter flu didn't have me flat on my back for three full weeks. Amazing what some stamina and a diet that includes all four food groups will do for a body's ability to recover in a reasonable period of time. Of course, then anytime I tried to tell her I was sick, she was doubly convinced I was faking it...

"It wasn't my fault!" Audrey Two protests, breaking me out of my thoughts.

Guess I was glaring.

"Sorry. Let's just say that a life of fucking off to who-knows-where and being your own boss was very enticing to me as a teenager."

"I can relate to lousy parental figures," she says. "But you already know the story about the Mickey Mouse scissors, don't you?" It's not a question, and she glances at the closed book. Then, in a meek voice, she asks, "Can you really get us back to the future with a magic book?"

The effort of not laughing makes me trip on the rope and stumble to a stop. "That was a simplistic explanation," I say, coiling the rope back up, "but yes. As long as I can get to the lighthouse in Haven, I can get us back to the future. And I do really have a magic book, but I'm the only one who can see that it's magic."

"You know that sounds like bullshit," she points out. It's a calm statement, neither a question nor an accusation.

"Oh, I'm well aware," I retort. "There's a reason I haven't shown it to anyone. But I've used it a couple of times before, both to go into the past and to return to the future. For me, it's as simple as calling an elevator."

Audrey Two grins. "Nicely done, avoiding a Back to the Future reference." The smile fades. "Can I ask a question?"

You just did. That's what I want to say, but no, I'll be good. "Go ahead," I say instead.

"If you never knew your birth parents, who provided the fifty-thousand-dollar college fund?"

Fuck.

"I never knew my birth parents," I say, slow and even with my eyes closed and my fists clenched. "That doesn't mean either of them couldn't know me. I used to get presents from 'Father Christmas'. And I believed it for years, because they were always the things I really wanted that my adoptive mother thought were silly and wouldn't buy. Found out later they were really from my father. That he couldn't raise me himself, so he watched over me through other people and made sure that when I graduated, I'd be able to do whatever I wanted." Until he died and I was tied to Haven for the rest of my life, anyway.

"Wait...he sent you Christmas presents but he didn't talk to you face to face?"  I can hear the outraged frown in her voice. "Why not?"

"I don't know," I snap, eyes open and glaring, fingernails digging into my palms. "He's dead."

It's like I've just kicked a puppy. Or maybe that I'm the puppy that got kicked, because she's hugging me and repeating that she's so sorry and I'm crying because now I'm remembering my father smiling at me through clouded eyes and telling me how proud he is of how I turned out, years stolen from both of us. But then years of being expected to suck it up by Eleanor re-assert themselves. One brief hug, some terse words of comfort, the appearance of motherly concern and then the expectation that I would return to being a quiet, obedient child and discard whatever emotional turmoil I was feeling.

I should take a week and go to the Pearson timeline, just have everything out with her and get some closure before the Troubles end.

Audrey Two releases me when I make a motion to free myself, and I wipe my face before the wind makes things painful. Good timing, because the door opens. She pulls her blankets back around herself as we both turn to see Duke waving vaguely, like he's trying to shoo the smoke out but he's not nearly sober enough and oh my god, I want to cuddle him.

Well done, wench. Calm down from crying over your dad by getting worked back up over your gypsy.

"Everything good?" I ask, sidling closer and ducking my head to grab my purse so he doesn't see anything I may have missed.

“She says the headache's eased,” he says, leaning against the door frame. “But may want to let the place air out a little bit before being in there.”

I'd love to, Boss, but I kind of need to get myself back together and the bathroom should be pretty safe, right? At the very least, I can get the sweat off myself before I stink completely.  “Well, I need to shower. Can I...?"

"Sure," he says easily, pointing. "You know where it is.”

As I slide past him and go into the cabin, the smell of pot hits me and I hold my breath. I still need to set up my own bed. Grab the sleeping bag, a blanket, a pillow, nod to Audrey but she's at the sink. Quick, into the bedroom. Close the door. Drop everything. Into the bathroom. Close the door. Start the water, strip, breathe. I can still smell pot. Okay, change of plans. Turn the water colder, get in. That'll help short-term, but chances are still better than even that I'll be horny as a celibate gypsy within the next few minutes. Scrap the idea of sleeping on the bag with the blanket; I need to keep myself as bundled as possible so the idea of freeing myself and crawling into Duke's bed seems like more effort than staying where I am and handling things myself.

Quickly now, wench. Scrub all the sweat off. Duke's liable to come back in any second and you need to be in position because things are going to get real awkward if he walks in on a naked wench.

I'll steal a shirt to sleep in, I decide as I shut the water off and squeeze my hair out. No underwear. Leave my dirty clothes in the corner overnight. Towel off quick, steal a shirt and shake out the sleeping bag. Wrap myself in the blanket and I've got myself halfway into the bag when the door opens.

Showtime.