AREA 47

SECTION 89:

COURTNEY, Chapter 2

No . . . first it was the little girl . . . who was running around the bend and up toward where Courtney was sitting.  The little kid was laughing joyfully, charging up the hill like an energetic elf.  She was a young girl, holding a camera in her hand.  The strap dangled in the dust as she ran.  Ten years old?  Tiny, short blonde, with a boy’s haircut, wearing new climbing boots and a big army canteen on her belt over her dusty jeans.

The girl ran almost up to Courtney, barely glancing at her.  But the little girl was looking back down the path, ready with the camera to take a picture.

“Kid knows the secret of happiness,” Courtney said.  “Total disregard for other people.”

The kid spun around, backed up a little, then raised the camera to her face.

Snap.  Snap, snap.  Courtney on film.

It was not a kid’s camera.  It was an expensive 35mm model with an attachment under it that electrically advanced the film after each shot.

“Hello,” Courtney said.

The kid was cute.  “Hi.”  The camera aimed back down the path.  “C’mon, c’mon!”

The guy who walked around the corner and toward the two of them wasn’t really all that handsome.  He wasn’t super tall or exceedingly muscular.  He needed a haircut; three years ago.  Maybe thirty, thirty-five years old.  He was dressed for climbing hills.  He wasn’t in perfect condition, he was breathing hard; and she squinted and noticed a streak of sweat drip off the side of his face.  He had a fond smile on his face for the little girl before he really noticed Courtney.

Snap.  Snap.

Courtney found herself staring at him with interest.  Possibly it was the fact that he was staring at her with interest.  She decided that she liked his long tousled hair; almost as long as her own, and nearly the same straight deep dark brown.

“Let’s rest here before going on,” the man said.

“Dad!” the girl protested.

“Five minutes,” he said, while looking at Courtney.

“Three minutes,” the little girl bargained.

“Three minutes,” he agreed.  Still his eyes were on Courtney.

She pushed her glasses back up on her nose, and returned his challenging look.  Vavoom!  Her heart was hopping.

The little girl took one more picture of Courtney.  Then, she handed the camera to him and he put it around his neck.

The little girl started to fiddle with her watch.  She was wearing one of the big boy’s watches.

“Jesus Christ, you’re pretty,” the guy said.  “What are you doing up here all alone?”

Courtney wasn’t slumping dejectedly anymore.  Her back was straight as a post.  “Oh, Drat.  Another one who can only count up to sex.”  She tried to show disappointment on her face, but she doubted that she expressed it.  Her internal Geiger counter was clicking like crazy!

The guy sat down on the rock next to her, smiling confidently.  “Actually, I was thinking of something else.  I’m Reed.  She’s Blue.  Hi.  We’ll leave, if you want us to.  We don’t have to rest here.  You call it.”

There was strong, undeniable chemistry between the two of them.  It was confusing for Courtney.

This is medieval, Courtney thought.  He’s married.  Married, with a kid, and I’m attracted.  I’m here with Vlad!

“Courtney,” Courtney said.

“Hey, if you’re gonna talk to her,” the little girl said, “gimme a perplexer to solve.”

“All right,” Reed said.  “Which is worth more?  A one gallon jug that’s full of $10 dollar gold pieces?  Or a one gallon jug only half full of $20 dollar gold pieces?”

The little girl started to think like mad.  Courtney could imagine the gears of the girl’s mind turning as her face contorted with mental effort; and that amused her.  The solution was obvious.  Although, on second thought . . .

Two teen-age girl climbers passed them on the trail; everyone said passing friendly hellos, except Blue, who was lost in thought.

“What’s short for Courtney?” Reed asked.

“Two minutes, thirty seconds,” Courtney said, and turned her head away to look down into the valley.  Her body was burning.

“The one full of gold!” the little girl shrieked.

“Right,” Reed said.  “Forget the stamp on the coin, one of the jugs is full of gold, the other is only half full.”

“Another one, another one,” little girl Blue said.

“You’re over-simplifying,” Courtney interrupted, feeling her pulse race even more, but jumping in anyway.  “The value of numismatics is not directly proportional to volume or weight of the coins.”

That brought a startled look from Reed.  Courtney quickly tried to explain, using an unintentionally precise, dry lecturing tone.

“When you stipulated ten and twenty dollar gold pieces, you brought the problem into the realm of rare coins.  They’re no longer minted or circulated.  The value of a rare coin is dependent on many factors . . . such as . . . face quality . . . wear, year . . . and so forth.  The actual amount of gold in a rare gold coin is not necessarily significant.  The value of one coin to the next can vary greatly.  And I’m sure it’s quite possible to put together a collection of $20 dollar gold pieces——half a jug full——that is far more valuable than a full jug of another collection of $10 dollar gold pieces.”  As she spoke, she exposed her teeth, long and white, but slightly crooked.  But because her face was so pure and free of blemish, her gently uneven teeth were an eccentricity, that actually made her sexier.

Reed looked at Courtney with fresh respect.  “Well, you’re perfectly right.  But listen, the whole point is to say it in a way that she can deal with it.  I mean, ten and twenty dollar gold pieces . . . they’re just ways you talk about it.”

Courtney noticed that as he spoke, he gestured with his hands in a way she found disturbingly hypnotic.

“While you two are arguing seman’ics,” Blue said, “gimme another one.”

It was such an odd thing for a tiny little girl to say, that Courtney found herself looking at the little girl in amazement.  The child was even right: they were arguing over semantics.  Though she hadn’t quite pronounced the word right.

Courtney’s look of amazement tugged a chuckle out of Reed.  “We’ll have to give her a rough one to shut her up.  OK, there’s these two books that tell a single story.  The two books are Volume I, and Volume II.  And they’re standing on a bookshelf the way books that go together would normally be arranged.  You know, with their bindings facing out, so you can see which one is which.  But there’s this bookworm, and she comes along and starts eating the books.  Now, she eats from page 1 of Volume I, to the last page of Volume II.  Got it so far?”

“Yeah,” Blue said.

Reed continued, “The pages of Volume I are two and a half inches thick, and the pages of Volume II are three and a half inches thick.  The covers are an eighth of an inch thick.  Question: how many inches did our little female bookworm eat?”  Reed said the question line while looking at Courtney, a tremendous twinkle in his eyes, and a roguish smile on his face.

Yes, another one who can only count up to sex.  It’s just pheromones, Courtney told herself.

“Six and a quarter,” Blue said, in a bored tone of voice.

“Wrong,” Reed said.

“What!?”

“Now, we can talk,” Reed said brightly, turning back to Courtney, inching closer to her, there on the shared rock.

“What?” Blue repeated.  “What?”

“Now,” Reed told Courtney, “about gold——”

“You should have used Krugerrands,” Courtney said.

Reed threw up his hands.  “What do little girls know about Krugerrands!” he exploded.  “You have to bring the problem down to their level.  Dollars!  What are you?  A scientist-type?”  His hand gestures slashed through the air aggressively, and the quickness of his temper surprised her.

She matched his mood with a sting of quiet bitterness.  “So you condescend to your own child?  You over-simplify the world for her?  You give her false analogies to understand complex life?”  Her thermostat was about to pop, but she was really enjoying this.  It actually had a head on its shoulders.  And a thigh that kept gently touching her thigh.

Reed was absolutely silenced by her retort.  His hands moved, trying to think of something to say.  Then he changed his tactics.  He let his fingers do the walking, down his thigh, and then his fingers ‘stepped’ over onto her thigh, and started walking up her thigh!

Courtney’s mouth hung open in charmed astonishment.

“I’d love to go for a walk in the rain,” he said, his fingers continuing to slowly ‘walk’ upward . . .

Her fingers were suddenly tangled in his fingers, trying to stop him.  The way he had just insinuated his hand over onto her thigh, good grief.  And that come-on!  Gawwwd.

The little girl groaned.  “Ohhhhh.  A quarter inch.  You’re right, Dad.”

“Hey,” Courtney managed to say.  She pushed, as if to make his hand go away.  But her fingers had a finger-lock on his fingers, as their hands bumped against the camera hanging down by the strap.

The alarm on Blue’s watch went off.  “Let’s bail!”

But Reed was still finger-wrestling with Courtney.  “Listen,” he said, his warm brown eyes targeting her sky-blue eyes.  “I’m just trying to teach her to think.  And keep her in the habit.  You raised a good point, and I’ll have to think about it.  But right now, I think the problem is valid as stated.  It’s understood the particular rarity of an individual coin is not at issue, because of the way I stated the problem.  There, you like that tech-talk?”  He untangled their fingers and stood up.  He turned around with his back to the little girl.  He bent down a little and held his arms back and to the sides.  The camera dangled from his neck.  Blue leaped up onto his back, and he held her legs piggyback.

Courtney could not figure out her feelings at all.  She had just stalled.  She couldn’t even make words come out of her mouth.  She could feel her heart racing.  Reed was impossible, but she didn’t want him to leave yet.

“Why don’t you climb with us?” Reed asked.

“Oh, no you don’t!” Blue said.  “You’re mine until midnight Sunday.  You’re mine!”

The look that Blue gave Courtney was almost fierce.  She held her father jealously, possessively, and obviously wasn’t about to share any of him with someone else.

“Sorry,” Reed said.  “I only get her for the weekend.  Divorce and all that bullshit.  Offer retracted.”

“Giddyup!” Blue said, and kicked her legs into his as if she had spurs.

“I still say you’re fucking beautiful,” Reed said.  The strong language surprised Courtney somewhat.  

“Give it up!” the little girl said, growling and acting like she was choking his neck with her hands.  “You’ve already got one!”

Reed put a humorous but nasty expression on his face as if he wished the little creep would drop dead.  Courtney was charmed by the pair.  If she understood correctly, the girl was reminding her father that he already had a girlfriend.

“So,” Reed said, delaying their departure another moment.  “Here’s a perplexer for you, Courtney.  You want to climb with us . . . but how the hell are you going to convince Blue, here, to invite you along?  You can only climb with us if she invites you.  So what do you do?”   

 COURTNEY, Chapter 3

Copyright 2005 Area 47