And he watched, and listened, to her and Mooncrow. Maybe he was seeing things more clearly now, but-
-but under all the teasing, the things that seemed like sniping, there was a very deep and abiding love between Jennie and Mooncrow. It kind of surprised him, in a way; he hadn't known they could have a teacher/student relationship and still have that kind of emotional bond.
He noticed something else, as well. Mooncrow was worried about something-about Jennie-but was keeping very quiet about it. Was it because he respected Jennie's ability to take care of herself? Or was it simply to keep from appearing to be an interfering old man?
If it had been anyone else, David would have said it was the latter. But not with these two.
And Jennie was beating herself over the head about something, something that had nothing to do with any of her current investigations. What it was, he had no idea, but as he watched her all through that day and the next, there was at least one thing she was doing that he figured he might be able to cure.
It was a trap he'd fallen into himself often enough to be able to see the same fault in her.
She was being way too serious, all the time; it was one thing to make sure the work got done, but it was another to let the work take over your life. She probably hadn't taken any time out just to have fun in years! There was a little tension-crease between her eyebrows that he wanted badly to smooth away, and he wanted to do it because he was her friend, and not for any other reason.
Well, mostly not, anyway.
Finally, he just couldn't take it any more. He had to try something. Otherwise he could see her turning herself into a knot in no time flat.
It was about nine; she typed a few things into her computer with the decisive clicks he'd come to associate with her finishing for the night.
"There," she said, shoving the keyboard drawer back under the desktop. "That's as far as I'm going to get with this Calligan thing tonight-"
"Then let's go," he said, quickly, before she could say anything about a sauna, or early bed, or catching the news.
She blinked at him, as if she had forgotten completely that he was there. "Go?" she said, puzzled. "Go where? Why? What's open at this time of night?"
He grinned. "You like techno," he stated. He knew he was right; he'd seen the CDs on her shelf, and he'd heard her listening to the techno-industrial alternative-rock radio program from Rogers College-or at least she had, before the college administration in their infinite wisdom shut it down.
"So?" One eyebrow lifted.
"So trust me." Before she could object, he came around to the side of her desk and held out his hand. She took it, dubiously. He pulled her to her feet, and led her out the door. She got into the passenger's side of his car with an expression of puzzled patience. It changed to an expression of disbelief when he headed downtown, since most of the downtown area locked up by 5:30 at night.
Most of it.
He took her to a rave, at a "club" that hadn't been there a month ago, and might not be next month, in a building that had been everything from a factory to an art gallery.
They were probably the oldest people there; it was hard to tell. The lighting was not particularly conducive to taking a good look at peoples' faces. Interesting thing about techno; the heavy beat was not all that dissimilar to drum-song. He hadn't done any fancy-dancing in a long time, but when the beat caught him up and he found himself gyrating as if he were wearing his old costume, he simply let his body do what it wanted to. Jennie clapped her hands and grinned like a maniac; she recognized the moves, even if the kids there didn't. He wasn't dancing for them, anyway; he was dancing for her, parading like the buck deer before the doe, and they both knew it, and both were delighted by the sheer silliness of it.
He drew a crowd anyway, a little circle of admirers, and when that piece ended and another began, Jennie got into the act, leaping into the circle and matching him beat for beat. He'd forgotten she used to compete in the shawl-dancing; maybe she had forgotten too, until that moment. Now it was a kind of competition between the two of them, but a competition of display, where it didn't matter who won, or even if there was a winner at all.
The band gave up before they did. But the moment the music ended, they tossed sweat-soaked hair out of their eyes, and traded a look of agreement.
This was enough for one night.
It took a little time to work through the crowd to get to the door and the parking lot. David was a little surprised when he stopped under a lot-light and looked at his watch to see that it was already midnight.
Beside him, Jennie paused to glance at her own watch. "Wow!" she said in a tone of awe. "I have more stamina than I thought!"
"Same here," he confessed, laughing. "Think we showed those cubs a thing or two?"
"Well, either they decided that we were too crazy to mess with, or we'll have started a new dance craze by morning," she replied. She stood under the light long enough to pull her hair back and braid it. That little frownline was gone, at least for the moment, and he felt a definite glow of satisfaction at how relaxed and happy she looked.
"Can I show you a good time, or what?" he asked, smugly.
"A lot better than what you used to think was a good time," she retorted. "A mug of beer, a loaf of rhetoric, and thou-"
He started to get angry, and stopped himself just in time. Things were going well. He wouldn't gain a thing by starting an argument. Besides, she had a point.
"I guess I've loosened up some, since then," he said mildly, and grinned when he saw the blank look on her face, the surprise that he hadn't plowed right into a fight. "You could stand to loosen up some, yourself, Jen."
She flushed, but he realized how she could take that last comment, and went on.
"What I mean is, you don't have fun enough. Take some time out, for godsake. See a movie! What was the last movie you saw?" He knew he had her then, when she had to think about it.
"Uh. Beauty and the Beast?" she said. I "See what I mean!" he responded triumphantly. "You haven't even gone out for a walk, or rented a horse, or anything unless it had something to do with your work! Right?"
She shuffled her feet a little in the gravel of the parking lot. "I guess so. . . ."
"You need more fun in your life," he said, decisively. "If you get bleeding ulcers and wind up in the hospital, who's gonna put Calligan away? Who's gonna make sure he doesn't sell our people up the river? Who's gonna keep Mooncrow from living on pizza and ice cream?"
"All right, all right!" she conceded, throwing up her hands. "I surrender! If you want to be the designated maker-of-fun, go right ahead! Just remember, the work has to be done first, before we have fun."
He executed a fancy-dance step, right there in the lot, and amazingly, didn't fall on his face or turn an ankle in all that gravel. She chuckled.
He took that as a good omen.
Toni Calligan put her forehead down on the kitchen table, and fought tears. She was beginning to think she ought to pack the kids up for the summer and take them someplace safe.
Like maybe a maximum-security prison! There certainly didn't seem to be any safety around here!
No one, not any of the repairmen she'd called, had been able to figure just what had gone wrong with the dryer. One of them had even accused her of sabotaging it herself! He'd said it looked as if someone had just gotten in there and cut the insulation off of everything in sight. . . .
She succeeded in persuading Rod to buy a new dryer-after making certain he didn't hear that particular story. But that had only been the start of her problems.