"Sure." Dar opened her mouth and poked her tongue out, looking inquiringly at the bowl.
Kerry placed another corn on her tongue and watched it disappear. "I was a lot more pissed off about all the bullshit talk at the office than you were."
"Was that a question?"
"Erm...no. I guess I was just..." Kerry paused. "I guess you're just used to it, huh?"
Dar's hold tightened. "No." She gazed reflectively past Kerry's shoulder. "I just knew none of it was true, so I didn't care."
Kerry's brow creased.
"The last time I heard stuff like that, it was," Dar clarified quietly, "And the time before that, and etc." Her shoulders moved in a faint shrug. "All I felt was just this sense of relief, honestly. As long as you know the truth, nothing else matters."
There were faint reflections in the depths of Dar's eyes. Kerry disregarded the movie and the popcorn, half turning to lay her hand gently on Dar's cheek. "Nothing else does matter," she said. "I never thought about that, you know? About how it was before for you."
"Mm." Dar blinked peacefully at her. "It sucked," she said, "especially the last time. Everyone took a..." She paused a second, "certain glee in our very, very public breakup."
Kerry rubbed the side of her thumb against Dar's skin. "Well, if I'd been there..."
"If you'd been there, it'd have been a moot point."
"Okay, well, if I'd been there and we hadn't been together..." Kerry restarted.
"You think that's really likely??"
Kerry shifted her hand to cover Dar's mouth. "Let me finish my over the top declaration, please," she scolded. "If I'd been there, and we hadn't been together, and we were just friends, I would have taken the biggest mallet I could find, and gone around whacking all those bastards on the head like moles." She removed her hand and leaned closer. "Do you believe that?"
"Oh yeah," Dar agreed instantly. "You have the staff scared spitless. They'd rather spill gossip to me than dare to tell you about it."
Kerry's eyebrow cocked. "Really?"
"Really." Dar kissed her. "So yes, Kerrison, I believe that with all my heart."
"Oo." Kerry nibbled a piece of corn. "I feel like such a mercenary." She let her head rest against her partner's. "Grr. You bring out the beast in me."
Dar eyed her, a grin surfacing immediately. "I'd buy that a lot faster if you didn't have that cute smile, Ker."
Kerry solemnly stuck her tongue out, then licked Dar's nose with it.
Dar reveled in their closeness, feeling a simple happiness not only in having Kerry in her arms, but in being here in this place that was so much a part of both of them. The troubles at work niggled at the very periphery of her conscience, but she ignored that, leaving the potential issues for the daylight.
Tonight didn't belong to work, it belonged to them. Dar poked her tongue out for more popcorn, and they then settled in to watch the mayhem.
AS IT HAPPENED, it did rain the next day. Kerry was in her glory, lounging in her pajamas on the couch watching luridly violent, yet curiously satisfying, cartoons. Dar was stretched out facing her, the length of the furniture explicitly planned so they both could relax on it at the same time.
"Mm." Kerry wiggled her toes against Dar's, grinning as she responded. While purchasing leather furniture didn't usually involve measuring for footsies, in their case they'd decided to make everything in the cabin fit them--even the chairs on the porch. Hers was a little smaller with a shorter seat, and Dar's was long enough to fit her legs perfectly. A bit pretentious, perhaps, but as Dar had said at the time, they could afford it and it lasted longer than an ice cream cone so why not?
At least they hadn't had the towels embroidered with Hers and Hers. "Find anything yet?" Kerry asked.
"Nope." Dar had her laptop balanced on her thighs. "So far, nada. That MCI router exists, but they swear nothing in it has got our IP."
"Uh huh." Kerry put her head down on the plush leather couch arm. "You think they're covering up, or just clueless?"
"Eh. Let me threaten more people. I'll let you know."
Sounded like a fine idea to Kerry. She stifled a yawn as she watched the animated characters thrash and dance their way across the screen, reminded suddenly of her little friend Gopher Dar. "Are you messing with that program a lot more?"
Dar's fingers stopped moving, and she peered at Kerry over the top of her laptop screen. "That program." She repeated. "You mean..." She made a face, and chattered.
"Yeah."
Dar continued typing for a bit in silence, thinking about the question.
"I thought maybe you were getting a little bored," Kerry suggested. "So you were using that to keep yourself interested."
"No." Dar shook her head. "Actually, I think I've just been lonely."
Kerry rolled over and looked at her in surprise.
"That's my way of hanging out with you when we're both busy." Dar had most of her concentration focused on her screen, and was unaware of Kerry's rapt attention. "I'd be sitting in my office-- c'mon, you bastard--and I'd be on this stupid, pointless conference call wishing I was out on the boat with you instead, and all of a sudden some new idea for the damn thing would occur to me. New t-shirt, new dance...I finally got the vocal program working the other day."
"I noticed," Kerry replied quietly, now understanding the message it had conveyed.
"Anyway, it's more interesting than listening to people bicker about their budgets."
Kerry studied Dar's angular face, watching the pale eyes flick over the screen with restless energy. "Dar?"
"Hmm?" Dar looked up.
"Do you...not like what you're doing now?"
Dar's brow creased. She thought for a moment, and then cleared her throat a little. "I don't know, really. It's not so bad most of the time."
Kerry got to her knees and scrambled forward, sprawling over Dar's legs to get closer to her. "You liked what you were doing before though, right?"
Dar shrugged. "Yeah, I guess."
"I took your job."
Dar chuckled easily. "No you didn't. I horse-wrangled you into the position over your protest, if I recall correctly." She set the laptop aside. "Besides, you do it better than I did."
Kerry crawled up further. "That's not the point, Dar." She objected. "Not if you're not happy because of it."
"Happy?" Dar took hold of her and pulled her up further until Kerry was half lying on top of her, their limbs tangled in a warm mess. "I have never in my life been happier."
Kerry rested her chin on Dar's shoulder. "That's not what I..."
"I know. But it's the truth." Dar nuzzled her hair.
Perplexed, Kerry fell silent, not really sure what to say next. Maybe, as Dar had hinted, it was time for her to change and move on to do something else. The thought made her anxious, though, and she had to admit, if only privately, that the last thing she wanted from a professional standpoint was Dar leaving the company.
Maybe they should both leave. Kerry liked that idea better. They'd talked around the idea of forming their own business for the longest time. Maybe it was really time to get off their butts and do something about it.
She put her arm over Dar's stomach and squiggled down between her and the couch, liking the view from this end better anyway. She thought for a bit about her own job, and whether or not she liked it as much as she had when she'd started.
It was okay, she finally decided. The one big problem with it was that it never really allowed a sense of completion of anything. It was always one situation after another, after another, after another. There was never really any time when she could sit back and feel satisfied with where she, and by extension the company, was.
Would that ever change? Kerry doubted it. She was about to mention her revelation to Dar, when her cell phone rang, as though punctuating her thoughts with eerie precision. With a sigh, she took the phone from Dar, and opened it. "Hello?"