Finn, you are never going to make any children if you don’t start paying attention to the signals of the women around you. I’m starting to think that even though this girl is not fertile, you should go ahead and fuck her just to get it out of your system—
Heat filled my body; it felt like even my toes were blushing.
Spring! Are you trying to give me a heart attack? Don’t use language like that. Especially about a girl I like.
I thought that the word “fuck” connoted sex for the purpose of pleasure and not for mating or bonding.
Well it’s not, and you know it! It’s crude and nasty, and I don’t like it.
Oh. How about instead of saying “fuck her,” I say “bang her”?
No!
Jump her bones?
Argh!
How about wild monkey sex?
Colette looked over at me with a small smile. “Finn, you are troubled? Is everything good?”
I squeaked out, “Uh, er, yeah, yeah, everything’s fine.”
You have a very unhealthy fear of sex, Finn.
I tried to ignore Spring’s mischievous giggle ringing through my brain and worked on getting Colette’s attention off of me lest she see my clothes smoking. “Uh, I was just thinking about how beautiful the lake is and... stuff.”
That was smooth.
Colette looked out over the calm darkening waters and the shadowed forest, which pushed down to the lake. “Oui, it ees quite romantic, no?”
Her sexy French accent pumped my already hyped libido. Over the summer, her accent had faded to almost nothing, but sometimes, like now, it came back with a vengeance.
“Uh, yeah.”
Go ahead Finn. Ask her if she wants to bump uglies with you!
Colette looked at me with her eyebrows raised in concern, and put her hand on my arm. “Are you well, Finn? You look upzet.”
The warmth of her soft hand on my arm occupied all my attention. “No, I uh...”
Go on
,
stud! She’s begging for a hot Finn-beef injection!
I rubbed my hand over my face to cover up the glow coming off of it. “I’ve got a headache coming on. I... I think I need some food and water.”
“But of course. Come, we will get you something to eat and to drink.” Colette stood up and offered me her hand. I took it and hopped up. She didn’t let go and I found myself standing face to face with her. Her brown eyes looked up into mine. She had the most amazing long eyelashes... I panicked, yanked back my hand, and headed back to the camp.
Spring laughed at me.
Dude! She wants you...
Shut up
,
Spring! One more word and I promise we’ll never go dancing again.
Spring finally shut up. That hit her where she lived. Ever since leaving her oak tree she had wanted to do nothing more than move and dance. After what had happened between Erik Parmely and me, I had been very motivated to move and get into shape as well, but I was happy with my Krav Maga practice and my strength and endurance training. That summer I had probably gotten more exercise than in my entire life to date. I didn’t need to add dancing to that list.
In addition, with Spring’s internal help, I had shed some of my “baby” fat and added on some good muscle preternaturally quickly. I think I was also growing taller, but Spring said it wasn’t her doing. I wasn’t complaining, but it made my mother worry.
By the time we made it back to camp, I had managed to slow my heart rate down to no more than 150 beats per minute, and my brain was starting to kick back in. To preserve what little dignity I had left, I made sure to drink a lot of water and munch on a power bar before I sat down at the small fire Jim had going. I was sure I had really messed things up with Colette, so I was elated when she sat down next to me. That only lasted a few seconds before Jim ordered us to go back out and collect the firewood we had forgotten. It wasn’t hard to find, so it didn’t take long.
I was getting used to seeing Colette hold her cross and pray before each meal, but, dinner that night consisted of salami, cheese, crushed Doritos, and fruit roll-ups. It felt a bit formal for our modest meal. That cold dinner was a far cry from the gourmet meals that we cooked on my excursions with my Dad and Uncle Mark, but it still hit the spot.
When it was time to head to bed, Dave couldn’t be coaxed from his tent and its protection from the mosquitoes, but Jim, Colette, and I chose to sleep out under the open sky. Jim fell asleep first. Colette and I lay on our backs, watched the stars, and talked into the wee hours. Though not a techie, she was as much a star buff as I was. Before Colette fell asleep, she scooted her bag next to mine.
She snuggled up to me, put her head on my shoulder with a sigh and said, “
Bon soir
, Finn.”
Startled, then elated, I hesitated and then wrapped my arm around her. “Good night, Colette.”
Wonder and warmth filled me. The only girl (not my mother) I’d ever been close to up to that point was Spring, and my relations with her (when she had a body) had been purely carnal, overwhelming, and required no help from me. On top of that, Spring wasn’t really a girl, she was a dryad. Colette was a living, vital woman who wanted to be close to me. It tied my insides up in a knot, but in a good way.
Colette quickly fell asleep and the soft sound of her breath caressed my ears as it grew deeper and more regular.
The sublimely perfect moment lasted for about ten seconds. That’s when the mosquito buzzed my ear, no doubt attracted by the DEET I’d slathered myself with. In a reflexive panic, I slapped my hand to my ear and nearly popped my eardrum.
I bit back a curse and froze. Colette stirred and mumbled, but thankfully didn’t wake up. I had no idea how people could fall asleep that quickly.
I rubbed my sore ear for a bit and then put my arm back down. Unable to find a comfortable position, I settled with putting it carefully behind my head. That freed my attention to better feel the root sticking into my other shoulder. It had previously gone unnoticed, but now it began to hurt as I relaxed and the weight of Colette’s head pressed my arm down. I tried to subtly reposition my shoulder but failed to relieve the pain. In fact, it just got worse.
When a cat falls asleep on my lap, I find myself paranoid about waking it up. I feel like it’s a violation of a sacred trust or something. Needless to say, I would rather have chewed my arm off than pull it back and wake up Colette, so I just gritted my teeth and tried to go to sleep.
Of course, at that point, my left arm, now behind my head, started to go numb. When I slowly and carefully moved it down to my side again, I found it left my neck uncomfortably stretched onto my small pillow. As a bonus, it pressed the root deeper into my shoulder.
I lay there cursing silently while looking at the silvery stars twinkling against the velvet black sky above me. As I did so, the pain continued to worsen in my arm, and my neck started to protest its awkward angle. Eventually I’d have to move, but I resolved that I would wait till Colette was deeper asleep, so I could move without waking her.
Spring was mystified.
Just move your arm
,
you goofball. So what if she wakes
up? It’s not like she’s any great catch.
Internally, I gritted my teeth.
Spring, please shut up! We’ve been through this. Go to sleep!
She huffed at me and then pulled away. It was a good trick for someone who was living in my brain. I still hadn’t come up with a reasonable physical explanation for the relationship Spring and I shared. How one brain could host two consciousnesses was just one of the inexplicable, but undeniable mind scramblers that had been making an omelet of my conceptions of reality.
I held out through an eternity of growing agony. After about thirty seconds, I decided that I couldn’t take it any longer. Carefully, I rolled onto my side and held my breath while I nudged Colette’s head back along my arm and scooted my shoulders into a more comfortable position. I managed to move my shoulder off whatever had been poking it, but then realized that I’d pushed my pillow out of place so I had nowhere to rest my head. After another eternity of slow motion, and breath holding, I retrieved the pillow and got it into a semi-comfortable position.
Finally pain-free, I sighed and relaxed. My face was just inches from Colette’s and the strange but heady mix of salami, toothpaste, wood smoke and woman filled my head. I took a deep breath, let it out through my pursed lips, closed my eyes, and let myself go.
That’s when Colette let loose with an ear-numbing snore. I could scarcely believe such a huge snarling sound could come out of such a petite woman.
Fortunately, all was not lost. I had a secret weapon.
Spring? Hey Spring? Can you help me go to sleep here?
Snoring sounds started echoing through my brain as Spring showed her annoyance with me.
Come on
,
Spring, I’m sorry!
The internal snores continued, playing counterpoint to the ones reaching my ears the normal way.
Oh god. I was doomed.
The next morning, after a long, noisy, uncomfortable night, a stab of pain in my head poked right through my comfortable woolly blanket of sleep.
I yelped and struggled to sit up in my sleeping bag. A huge insect buzzed around my head, sparkling in the morning sunlight. From the sting it had given me, I assumed it was a wasp. I waved my arms around frantically trying to slap the thing away before it stung me again.
Colette sat a short way away from me on her sleeping bag. “Finn!”
The bug, or whatever it was, buzzed my ear. I tried to smack it. “Graahhh!”
I scrambled out of my sleeping bag to get away from my little tormentor.
Behind me Colette cried out, “Finn,
c’est une fée
!”
I stared at Colette and eloquently stated my confusion. “A fee? Huh?”
She pointed her finger at something beside my head. “
Regardez-le
... I mean, look!”
I followed the direction of her finger and saw a startlingly large dragonfly whose wings flashed with a rainbow of color as it hovered a few feet away from my head.
Spring relieved me of my misapprehension quickly.
It’s not a dragonfly, Finn. Look at it.
I scowled at the bug that certainly zipped around like a dragonfly, but in one of its stationary moments, I saw that it really wasn’t a dragonfly. A tiny, naked, human girl with bright yellow hair and black eyes returned my regard. She was held aloft by tiny shimmering wings.
Spring sent me an image of the little creature landing in my mouth just before I snapped it shut.
Close your mouth Finn. I doubt it will fall for that old ruse
,
anyway.
I shut my mouth, but it dropped open again as my brain tried to digest the fact that a quite fetching micro-girl, check that, micro-woman buzzed around my head. She zoomed right at my face.
I ducked and put my hands up to ward it away, but instead of hitting my face, it went over my hands and stung me on my head again.
“Ow! You little shit!”
Turn around
,
Finn. It’s behind us.
I whirled around to confront my tormentor again. She buzzed in place about three feet away. In her tiny little hands, she held a tiny little handful of hair.
“Hey, that’s my hair!” I tried to swat the little blighter out of the sky. It was about as effective as if she were an agitated housefly. She zipped, zoomed, zigged, and zagged around my head faster than I could follow and then came in for another run. I frantically flapped both hands around my head again, hopping to keep her off this time, but it was to no avail. Another sharp pain heralded the loss of more of my hair. She buzzed away with her booty.
She’s gone.
I spun to look at Colette. Her eyes were wide as she stared at me. She half spoke, half-whispered, “C’est une fée!”
“What?”
She shook her shock away, and wonder cracked her face into a huge smile. “That was a..., it was a..., did you see that Finn?”
“Yes, I felt it, too. The little asshole pulled out my hair!”
“How do you call it in English?”
“Uh, I don’t know. A sprite or a pixie, maybe?”
Colette’s smile turned into a laugh of delight. She clapped her hands together with a look of joy on her face. I’d never actually seen anyone older than a baby clap with delight like that, but on her it looked completely right. She said, “I have heard of zees pixies, but I have never seen one before.”
“Yeah, well, that’s because they’re imaginary.”
I do not think this word means what you think it means,
quipped Spring.
Hush.
Colette pointed to the ground a little way from us. “It flew over to ze flowers. Let’s go see.”
She pointed at a small patch of Black-eyed Susans a short distance away. Their yellow petals and black centers were beautiful in the sunlight filtering through the green shade of the trees. Colette carefully approached the patch of flowers, while I hung back about ten feet. I liked my hair just where it was, thank-you-very-much.
Colette knelt down in front of the nodding flowers and started a singsong crooning. Her back blocked my view, so I sidled around to see what she was doing. As I moved back into their line of sight, the dozen or so flower heads all turned to face me.
I stopped cold. I didn’t like this at all. I moved sideways a bit more just to see what would happen. They kept following me like I was the sun.
See, I told you that you were my sun!
Colette noticed that I seemed to be the object of the flower’s attention as well. She gave me a calculating look and chewed on part of her lower lip. “The flowers, they like you, Finn.”
“Great.”
She studied the flowers more closely. “Oh,
vous êtes adorables
!” She lowered a finger into the flower patch and the little pixie popped up out of the flowers and landed on it. Colette kept up a murmuring stream of little sounds, cooing as if the pixie were a baby.