THE IMMORTAL, a Fantasy Romance by Linda Mooney - Chapter 6, The Lesson

THE IMMORTAL

Chapter 6 – The Lesson

             Jonah stepped into the kitchen to help himself to a glass of cold milk. Sweat poured from his face and dripped from his beard, and plastered his clothes to his skin. It was a muggy spring, which meant it would be a blazing summer.

He threw several handfuls of water onto his face and was drying off with a dishtowel when he heard voices coming from the rear of the house. Going over to where the kitchen opened up to the living room, he strained his ears to try and catch what was being said.

            “—very important that you not mention Mr. Cobb staying here with us. Do you understand, Joey?”

            “Not even to let Corey know he’s been helping us on the farm?” the boy asked.

            “Not even to let your best friend know,” Clea firmly responded.

            “Why? Is Mr. Cobb wanted by the cops or something?”

            If Jonah didn’t know any better, he’d swear the child was excited about the prospect.

            “No, Joey,” Clea softly replied. “He’s not wanted by the cops. Mr. Cobb is not in trouble with anyone.”

            “Then why can’t I—”

            “When you get older, you’ll understand. But if people get wind of the fact that I have a strange man living here and working for us—”

            “He lives in the barn, Mom,” the kid dryly reminded her.

            “I know that, but everyone else doesn’t.”

            “Then we’ll tell them!”

            “No. We. Won’t.” Her tone was harder. “Joey, people will think Mr. Cobb and I are romantically involved. They’ll think we’re living here in sin. They might ostracize us when they see us in town. The kids at school might even cut you out of playing sports with them.”

            “What does ‘ostracize’ mean?”

            “It means they’ll exclude you. Have nothing to do with you. Or with me. They might even try to prevent us from doing things we need to do.”

            “Then why is he here, Mom? If those people can do that to us, why do you let him stay here?”

            Jonah straightened, every nerve alert as he waited for her answer. What she said almost destroyed him.

            “Because he needs us…as much as we need him.”

            In the following silence, he heard some rustling coming from the boy’s bedroom. Not wanting them to know he’d overheard their conversation, Jonah went over to the back door, opened it, and slammed it closed with a loud bang. Striding up to the cabinet, he withdrew a glass and made sure to shut the cabinet door with an equally loud bang. He was pouring the milk when Clea entered the kitchen. Seeing what he was doing, she refrained from saying anything and went directly into the adjacent laundry room to place the clothes from the washer into the dryer. At the same time, Joey made himself comfortable on the sofa in the living room and turned on the TV to watch cartoons. Leaning back against the countertop, he sipped his milk as he waited for Clea to reenter.

            “I finished the repairs on the fence around your garden, madam. By the way, the bugs are beginning to infest the tomato plants.”

            She gave a weary sigh. “They always do.”

            “Do you have some baking soda?”

            She paused, momentarily distracted from whatever chore she’d been contemplating. “Yes. There’s a box in the pantry. Why?”

            Draining his glass, he set it in the sink and wiped the milk moustache from his own with the back of his sleeve. “I’ll dust the tomato plants with it. That will take care of that problem.”

            Her beautiful gray eyes widened. “It will?” The next instant, her shoulders sagged. “Of course, it will. You have the wisdom of decades to support you.”

            Sensing there was something seriously bothering her, he crossed his arms over his chest and kept his voice low. “Madam, whatever is troubling you, please let me be of assistance.”

            Clea shook her head. “I wish I could, but…” Stopping herself, she narrowed her eyes at him. “Do you know how to drive a car?”

            She had him there. “No, madam. I don’t,” he admitted.

            She waved a dismissive hand. “Never mind.”

            “But I’m willing to learn…if you’re willing to teach me.”

            He met her intense gaze with one of his own. He knew that sooner or later he’d have to become more acquainted with those motorized monstrosities. However, until now, he’d managed just fine by paying for any transportation he needed, or from using his own two feet.

            “I’m needing to run the fence line along the back pasture. Make sure there are no breaks or fallen posts where my cows could get out when I move them out there to graze. But I haven’t found the time to do it. Plus there’s getting to the feed store to get them another block of salt, not to mention—”

            “Clea,” he gently interrupted. “I told you. If there’s anything you need done, never hesitate to ask me.” He walked over to the back door. Opening it, he gestured for her to exit first. “Come.”

            “Now?”

            “I need to learn to drive. You need to check the fence. I do not know where this fence is you speak of. There is no time like the present for me to learn both and get that much out of the way.”

            Clea caved. “Okay. We’ll take the truck. Joey? Jonah and I are going to check out the back pasture. We’ll be back shortly.”

            “Okay, Mom,” her distracted son replied, letting her know he’d heard her.

            After first holding the passenger side door open to let her get into the cab, Jonah went to take his place behind the steering wheel. Right off the bat, the seat was too far forward to where he couldn’t get his long legs situated underneath the steering column.

            “There’s a lever on the left side of the seat,” she instructed. “Lift it to make the seat scoot back.”

            He fumbled for said lever, unsure if it would be in the front, in the middle, or at the rear, when she leaned over his lap and tried to reach it herself. Suddenly he found it and pulled, and the seat jerked backwards. Caught off-balance, Clea landed halfway across his lap.

            For several long seconds, they stared at each other, noses mere inches apart. He had always been entranced by the cloudy, slate gray color of her eyes, but he’d never been close enough to her until now to realize there was the tiniest green ring surrounding her pupils. Like hidden emeralds were still embedded within their rocky tombs.

            Before he was aware of it, his gaze dropped to her mouth. At the same time, she licked her lips. The temptation to kiss them was…

            Groaning softly, Jonah sat up and stretched his legs out, now that he had enough room. Clea resumed her seat—the moment broken, the chance missed, and more importantly, a possible calamity averted. Still, he silently cursed himself.

            Jonah, old man, you’ve known for a while now, almost from the first instance after you awoke in her son’s bed, that you were going to fall in love with her. Admit it. You’ve put up a hell of a fight, even though you know it’s a losing battle.

            “Jonah?”

            Hearing his name, he broke out of his temporary trance to find himself staring at the steering wheel patiently waiting for his guidance. He tried to cover his lapse by examining it.

            “If I recall, it requires a key that goes…”

            “Here.” Again, she leaned over the center console, key in hand, and slipped it into the slot on the column. “It’s an old truck, not one of those newer models.”

            “Madam, I wouldn’t know an old truck from a model T. Frankly, I never paid attention to them except to ask if they were willing to take on a passenger. Just show me how this one works.”

            She snorted softly at his remark. He caught the faint whiff of coffee on her breath. As much as he enjoyed the smell of fresh-perked coffee, the scent of it coming from her was even more intoxicating.

            “Now, turn the key clockwise, away from you.”

            He did so, and the engine spluttered to life.

            “Thank goodness this is an automatic,” Clea remarked. “Now, take this lever behind the wheel. It’s called the gear shift. See these letters on top of the column? Move the lever until it’s over the D. That stands for ‘drive’.”

            Jonah moved the gear shift. The truck suddenly began lurching forward.

            “Hit the brake! Hit the brake!”

            “What is a brake?” he yelled back.

            “On the floor! In the middle!”

            Slamming a boot on the middle pedal by his feet, the vehicle stopped. Clea began laughing hysterically as Jonah tried to catch his breath.

            “What did I do wrong, madam?”

            “You did nothing wrong. I failed to tell you to keep your foot on the brake until you’re ready to press the accelerator,” she apologized.

            “Press the what?”

            Collecting herself, Clea cleared her throat and took several quick breaths to calm herself. “Okay. Let’s start over. I seemed to have skipped over a few important steps.”

            Jonah winced. “Do tell.”

            She pointed to the floorboard. “The middle pedal is the brake. The one to the right of it is the accelerator. Got that so far?”

            He studied the two objects. “The horizontal pad is to stop, and the vertical pad makes it go. Got it. Now what?”

            “Now you put your foot on the gas pedal. Excuse me, the accelerator. Slowly press down on it to make the truck move forward.”

            “And if I wish to move this mechanical marvel backwards?”

            “That’s what the R in the window is for. It stands for ‘reverse’.”

            “What are all these other letters for? And what do all these dials mean? What do they represent?” he questioned, indicating what he saw on the dashboard.

            “We’ll cover those later,” Clea promised. “For the moment, let’s concentrate on going forward. Now, slowly press the gas pedal. Keep your eyes on the road and turn the steering wheel in the direction you want to go. Preferably on the road,” she added with an amused grin.

            In all his long years, Jonah had never considered himself to be the romantic type, nor the impulsive type. But for some reason he couldn’t explain, much less restrain, seeing that smile on her face was like seeing a beacon of hope.

            No. Not a beacon. A promise. Almost like a wish needing to be fulfilled. Only it wasn’t as much her wish as it was his.

            Reaching out to her, he gently took her by the chin and leaned across the seat. She didn’t pull away. Neither did she remain steadfast. To his shock, she also tilted forward, nearly meeting him halfway.

            Their lips touched. Tentatively. Too briefly.

            As awareness cleared away the momentary fog that had enveloped his senses, Jonah withdrew, dropping his hand from her face. He gripped the wheel, focusing his eyes on the short gravel path in front of the truck, and tried to come up with an appropriate apology.

            He’d gone too far, and he feared what her next step would be. Would she demand he leave this place and her property immediately? Or would she give him the chance—

            “If we’re going to check out that fence line, we’d better get going,” she remarked in an odd tone of voice.

            His mind was still in a muddle. Not trusting what he might say in return, he simply nodded and gradually pressed the vertical pedal until the truck moved away from the house.

 

TO BE CONTINUED

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