Line I

Laura’s heels clicked loudly in the corridor as she made her way to her office. It was early evening. She was supposed to have left hours ago, but Richard had summoned her to go over some details in the latest teacher’s contract.

To put a fine point on it, he wasn’t happy with some of the concessions that the schools had made. She wasn’t either, but it had been the best compromise they could work out to prevent a general strike before the spring semester began. It was vital students’ educations not be interrupted mid-year when a stop-gap agreement could buy them until the summer months to renew talks with the union and districts.

Entering her office, Laura found her secretary still at work, transcribing the notes to an earlier meeting. “I thought you’d left hours ago, Kate,” she said on the way back to her inner office.

“I thought I’d finish this up in case you need it in the morning,” came the young woman’s voice.

“Melanie and the others leave?” Laura asked as she gathered her purse from the bottom drawer of her desk.

“Yeah, they were all going out somewhere, I think. That new place down on Minister that everyone’s been so excited about.”

“Ah, yes, I believe she mentioned that,” Laura commented, remembering she’d heard her aides talking about the new restaurant downtown that featured several live music performances a night by some well-known bands. Apparently it was some sort of coup to get such popular acts to play at a restaurant. Laura imagined so. Even in her day, big-name bands did not play in those kinds of venues. “You going to join them?” Laura asked as she straightened her desk for the morning.

“I think I’ll skip it.”

Laura looked up to see Kate entering with a folder and the just-typed report.

“I’m in the mood for a quiet evening at home,” the young woman said.

“You and me both,” Laura smiled, taking the folder and setting it with the others on her desk. She would take care of them in the morning.

“Oh,” Kate said and Laura looked up to see the young woman had returned, bearing a small box. “A package came while you were in with the president.” Kate smiled brightly when she added, “It was delivered by military courier.”

Laura took the box, unable to corral her own smile. She checked the label and confirmed the sender even though it was highly unlikely it was from anyone else. Bill.

“Thank you, Kate,” Laura said politely as she tucked the box under one arm and picked up her purse. She looked at the young woman then. “What do you say we call it an evening?”

“Sounds good to me,” Kate replied and Laura followed her out of her office.

Laura waited until Kate grabbed her own bag then walked out with the young woman, locking the office behind them. They parted ways in the garage and Laura slipped into her sedan, placing her purse and the package in the passenger seat.

As she put on her seatbelt, she eyed the box, considering whether or not to open it now or wait ’til she was home, settling on the latter as she started the car. Whatever was in the box, she would be able to enjoy it best once she was relaxed and free of distractions. That had certainly been true of the previous package, the first one he’d sent.

That one had contained a book, one she’d never read but had always wanted to, and the timing had been impeccable since she’d just finished the one she’d been reading. She’d curled up in bed with it that night, and the three subsequent, and read until she’d fallen asleep.

Pulling out of the parking garage with a wave to the security chief, Laura eased into traffic. Since she was leaving later than normal, traffic had calmed from rush hour, still busy but not bumper-to-bumper. It naturally made the journey home quicker. She listened to music along the way, tuning the radio to a contemporary orchestral station, enjoying several string quartet pieces and a pair of solo piano performances, before she eventually turned into her driveway and parked the car in the garage.

Her neighbor, who was sitting out on his porch, waved to her as she carried her purse and package into the house. She smiled and returned the gesture before slipping her keys in the lock then entering her home.

While waiting for a plate of leftover chicken and rice to reheat in the oven, Laura brought the package over to the bar and opened it, smiling as she removed the outer brown paper wrapping to reveal a plain, brown box. As she retrieved a pair of scissors from a nearby drawer, she found herself thinking on the giver of whatever was in the box.

He had been gone nearly two months, but those last moments with him had remained vivid in her mind. How he’d kissed her and smiled at her as he knelt by her bed, how his form had loomed in the shadows of the hall, his bag slug over his shoulder as he told her how he felt.

Laura had not expected that. She’d had an idea of his feelings, better than an idea, actually. The way he’d made love to her that last time had been different, and it hadn’t just been him and his feelings driving that difference. She’d been an equal participant, responding innately to him, with him, just as she had from the start.

Even still, she hadn’t expected him to say anything, to actually voice what they’d been so carefully dancing around, what had refused to wait even with the grief of his son weighing on him. And she hadn’t expected to make her own confession, but his honesty had compelled her own, and she’d put herself out on the same limb with him.

As with everything where Bill was concerned, it had been an instinctual reaction, and she had no regrets even if she was a little frightened by how powerful that instinct was and how little control she apparently had over it. She took comfort in the fact that he seemed to be just as powerless where she was concerned.

What amazed her most, though, was how easily she had accepted, well, accepting it all, with little to no questions. Not Bill, but how things seemed to just happen between them, how she just did things where he was concerned without thinking about it beforehand. She wasn’t like that normally. She liked having control of her life, who was in it, what access they had to her, how things progressed.


Her affair with Richard had been that way, but she didn’t seem to have any of those things with Bill, and yet, when she thought about it, she did.

Laura suspected that if she told him she’d had a great time but that she never wanted to see him again, that he would probably just go. There wouldn’t be any histrionics. He would just kiss her on the cheek or temple and wish her well even if it ripped his guts out. It was how she’d seen him deal with his other son, with his ex-wife. Whatever they dished out, whether he deserved it or not — and she didn’t think he did, especially the vehemence — he just took it, hid it away somewhere, and offered no protest or, in the case of his son, he reached out with love.

Bill hadn’t tried to control her or the situation either.

She’s the one who hauled him into that bedroom in the governor’s mansion. She’s the one who asked him to frak her senseless without even exchanging names. She was the one who invited him into her home and into her bed, not once but twice. And she was the one who sought him out after a year of no contact, needing to know he was okay after the death of his son.

In every one of those instances, and so many others, he’d surrendered control to her, or they’d surrendered it to whatever it was that seemed to draw them together.

He asked. He always asked, or he accepted. He didn’t just take from her or demand things she couldn’t give.

Laura wasn’t naive enough to believe that he, or she, was perfect in that regard, or that there wouldn’t come a time when he would expect or demand something she wasn’t able or prepared to give or do or whatever. He was human, just as she was. Things like that just happened regardless of best intentions, but she didn’t believe that was his baseline. And she didn’t think it was hers, either.

She did concede, though, that she liked to keep things neat in her life, particularly emotionally, and she didn’t like being vulnerable, which made her easy acceptance of Bill in her life, her openness with him something tantamount to a miracle. The lack of expectations on both their parts admittedly played a part in that.

There were, of course, expectations now, of contact if nothing else. So far, she’d sent him a few letters and he had replied, and now this second package. The letters had focused on their daily lives, reports of general health and well-being, but had, to date, avoided discussions of feelings.

That could wait for now. They knew how they felt about each other, even if they couldn’t name why or where it was going, and that was enough as they got to know one another in other ways, those that were equally relevant to determining what future they might have and if they even wanted it.

There was a part of Laura that was amazed she was even considering it but she liked Bill, liked being with him and being there for him, and she liked how she felt when she was with him. She hadn’t felt so safe or comfortable with anyone in a very, very long time, and found herself understandably reluctant to return to the emptiness that his arrival in her life had revealed.

In the last couple months, Laura had thought about that a lot, among dozens of other things, and she was sure she would continue to do so. For the moment, though, she wanted to find out what was in the box.

Slicing through the tape and lifting the flaps, Laura pulled out the packing material to reveal the contents. She smiled at seeing a note atop several smaller boxes. She picked it up and read:

We were near Tauron and I couldn’t resist. Enjoy. Bill.

Laura pulled out the boxes, opened each to reveal several jars of various Tauron-grown spices and, at the bottom of the box, a cookbook of traditional Tauron dishes. Several pages, she noted were marked, including one showing the Tauron pot roast recipe he’d shared with her during his first stay in her home.

There was more, too. A letter at the very bottom of the box. Laura picked up the envelope, which bore her name in Bill’s increasingly familiar script. She was eager to read what he wrote, but decided to save it until she was settled in for the night, so she set it aside while she ate supper then cleaned the dishes, and took care of various other tasks around the house.

When she headed to her bedroom, she took the letter with her and laid it on her nightstand. Then, after showering and putting on her nightgown, she slid beneath the covers, propped against the headboard, put on her glasses, pulled the letter from the envelope, and read.

Laura,

I hope this package and letter find you safe and well. Things are about as good as they can be here. I am sorry I cannot tell you more, but I know you understand why I cannot. Our jobs, though not all that similar, are likely not all that dissimilar either in some regards.

To your question of when I may be in the area again, I do not know, but I will let you know what I can, when I can.

Until then, I hope you enjoy the spices and the cookbook. It is a copy of the one my grandmother kept in our kitchen when I was a boy, though, I honestly can’t say that I remember her actually looking up many of the recipes. I believe she kept them all in memory, but the recipe for the pot roast I recognized and thought you might like to see if there was anything else you’d like to try your hand at.

Saul asked that I pass along his best wishes, and I send you my own as well.

…

I miss the shore, Laura.

Bill

At the last line, Laura ached. Even though she hadn’t hear him say it, she heard the melancholy in it. She could understand. The shore had been a magical place outside of reality in many ways. It had provided him, and them, a haven those few days.

He’d been largely at peace there, his grief with him but somehow soothed by the sound of the sea and constant breeze. Now, out there in the vastness of space, locked within metal walls, he was alone with it, probably unable to indulge in even a bender with his friend.

Too many responsibilities, too many eyes on him. She knew how those things felt, and yet, she felt her responsibilities were radically different than his own.

Laura wholeheartedly believed that a child’s education was important, that it was vital to their futures and she championed that every day. But Bill, he was charged with keeping “the children” in his care alive, to protect, guide, and lead them into situations that, wartime or peace, could take their lives. The potential for detention and failing grades just didn’t compare, no matter how passionate she was about it.

It was a fact that kids in her realm weren’t likely to be sent knowingly into harm’s way, and yet Bill potentially might have to order them into it, daily. On top of that, as a father, he knew what he was possibly doing to the parents of those children when he did so. With what she knew of Bill, Laura imagined that knowing that reality weighed heavier on him now that it ever had before.

With a sigh, Laura folded up the letter and replaced it in the envelope. She slipped out of bed then and went in search of a pen and paper, thinking maybe she could write something that might ease him, or at least let him know she’d heard him and would listen if he wanted to talk about how things were going in dealing with Zak’s death. He might need the outlet and she needed to know he was all right.

Line II >

< Recognition (the previous series – you’ll want to read it if you haven’t already)