A Man on an Island Ch. 07

It wasn't noon yet when Cale's truck eased into a parking spot at the senior citizen's home, and the eldest Mac Domhnaill looked up from her magazine in the large community room where the huge television displayed the news at a ungodly volume level which she'd been doing her best to ignore as the door alarm screamed before it closed and many old eyes looked to the receptionist's window to see who's son or daughter had come to see one of the luckier ones among them.

The elderly woman who'd been sitting across from her looked over and began to wonder aloud whose relations these might be, coming for a visit and my God, didn't anyone know how to dress their children these days, why these young people looked more like a pair of street urchins than any respectable sort.

Sile looked over her shoulder and beamed before she turned back, "Oh pipe down, Hazel," she said, "The one on the right is my great-granddaughter, and I don't know the other one at all, but I'll bet I'll get more interesting thoughts out of her young head than anything that comes out of yours."

Old men stopped in their tracks and a platterful of geriatric medicinal doses fell to the floor and rolled in all directions as a pair of young women began to walk in the direction that they'd been pointed.

Sile smiled to see Siobhan in jeans and a bomber jacket walking next to a taller young woman in a black leather bike jacket and a hoodie. Siobhan reached out to hug her great-grandmother and she introduced Sam as Cale's daughter with a bit of pride. After that, Sam found herself in Sile's arms as well.

"Are you ready?" She asked and Sile nodded, picking up her coat to go. They got her into the front of Cale's truck and pulled away with Siobhan in the crew seat in back.

"I like this," the old woman smiled at Siobhan, "the way that you seemed to have grown some self-confidence in your travels. It becomes you as I always knew that it would."

"I grew a tiny bit of backbone over there," Siobhan shrugged, "because I had to rely on myself more, but I think it's also Sam. We seem to fit well as the friends we've become so fast that it's stupid. I seem to be able to get some of her confidence by wireless link somehow."

"That reminds me," Sile said, "I didn't know that Cale had a daughter, but I can see it in you now," Sile smiled, "How did this odd occurrence come to be?"

She listened as Sam drove and she looked from one to the other, obviously pleased.

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After arriving at the large farmhouse and having a little lunch, Sile listened as Sylvia outlined what she hoped might work for them all. Cale said nothing, since he knew about all of it already, but Sam and Siobhan had questions and points of view as well as suggestions.

A gradual plan emerged, based in large measure on Sylvia's outline with all of the suggestions taken into account, and then Sile asked for the younger partners to come with her as she stood up. As they left the room, Sylvia walked over to where Cale stood looking out of the window. She put her arm around his waist before she stretched up a bit to kiss him.

"So if the business loans are approved," Sile began, "the old place here will get a few alterations and the two of you can begin in a proper way. I hope it'll be busier than anything from dawn til dusk, between your mother's horse farm and riding school, your animal hospital and Sam's services. But now I'd like to give you my gift," she said as she stopped in front of a set of double doors to produce a key which she seemed to pluck right out of the air in front of them.

"This won't mean much of anything to you, Samantha," she smiled, "but this was my room. It started out as a second floor sun-room, but I took it over for my own uses long ago," she said as she unlocked the doors to open them wide.

They walked in and the two young women looked around in wonder. "I grew up in this house and I've only ever looked in here from the door," Siobhan said, almost in a whisper.

Sile nodded, "Sad but true. For a lot of your young life, Amy lay here ill before she died." Sile sighed then, "I still miss her.

This is the place from which I managed this farm for many years," she said, "when I wasn't with the others working at what needed doing. I worked here most of all, and I slept here, planned here, and made love here. Amy and I each had husbands and we loved them, though I'm all that's left of the four of us today. We slept with our men and we often came here to be alone, she and I.

Amy came here from Scotland as a young woman right about at the age where you both are at now. I was raised here and we just sort of fell for each other. That was over sixty years ago now. She came because her first husband had been killed just as the war was really getting underway. She was heartbroken and wanted to see no more of it, and knowing that she had a few distant relations here who would answer her letters," Sile said, indicating herself, "She came.

We had quite a life here running this place with my parents and all of the hired workers. The place hummed like a top most of the time but Sundays. It's no big thing today, but the way that Amy and I were wasn't the sort of thing the one could exactly be let known.

It'll be different for you."

Siobhan and Sam stared at the old woman and then looked at each other. "Come here, children," she smiled as she walked to a large carpet laid out in the middle of the floor. As soon as Siobhan stepped on it, her eyes registered surprise and Sile grinned.

"You know what lies under your feet and this rug. I was just as you are, but Amy had it stronger than me. Our circle lies here. Now you both might just get yourselves men and live the way that my daughter and granddaughter live their lives, but then you might also be like we were.

In any case, this room and all that's in it is my gift to a pair of young women who want to make their mark in the world. For as long as I've got, I'll live in another room here when I'm not at the home so that you can ask me anything that you think I might be able to help with. So, as friends and business partners along with your mother and father, as women who will take a man one day, or not -- this is yours now.

There's too many stairs up to get here for me anymore anyway," she smiled as she walked out.

Sam looked at Siobhan and opened her mouth to speak, but Siobhan chuckled and shook her head, "I dunno, Sam, but we're friends now and I mean to keep that if I can. I can't see any of what she says, but I'm old enough to know that when she says something to me, well I'm all ears because she's right more often than she's wrong. There's a room with a bed off this one and another on the other side. We can use this as a quiet place to work when the day's over. Mom and Cale are gonna live at his place, "she said. "What do you think?"

Sam looked around, "I like to work," she said walking over to the large windows to look out at the countryside. "I like to work out and train and once in a while, I like to fight. I like to ride horses, and play video games when I have time.

I like to surf the web and once in a blue moon, I like to get laid -- by a man.

She looked over as Siobhan came to stand beside her. They watched through the window as Cale and Sylvia walked Sile out to his truck to take her to the old homestead where she'd been born, the last Mac Domhnaill to have been born there. "You should get all of the knowledge that you can from her while you have time left," Sam said quietly, "I don't know about what she said, though."

Siobhan shrugged, "There's nobody more direct with her words that my great-grandmother. We live our lives to an older way -- or maybe to the way that things are now, but we never forget. All of the women in my family think to when people didn't have such a tight hold on the world and it was more the other way around.

People liked to live in groups -- families and clans. That life was hard for everybody and harder for the men. Lots of times, some men wouldn't come back from a battle with another clan. I think things like that are the reason that women bond with other women more easily than men bond with men. It gave them all a better shot at survival."

They saw the truck head down the long drive and Siobhan smiled, "So I'm beginning to think that you have a father to get to know, and I've got a better one too, who is obviously interested in me and what I'm doing, just as he is in you. You get a new mom and a whole family to stand in the middle of."

She looked around, "I feel like I'm being turned loose in a wonderland. I could spend a year reading all of the old texts in here."

"What are they?" Sam asked and the other girl shrugged, "I don't even know how to begin to tell you what I am, but I promise that I will make a try at it soon. I have to tell you some things anyway -- like what's under that rug."

"All right then," Sam smiled, "Start by telling me just what's under that rug."

Siobhan shrugged, "A circle, carved or more likely burned into the wood of the flooring, the way that my mother's ring is burned into the floor in the old house. It's a ring to cast in and a ring to scry in -- and make love in if you have somebody close enough to your heart to want to do that with there in a magical sort of way."

"Magical?" Sam asked without a hint of scorn or skepticism, "This relates to the things that you uh, might have done as we were driving here, and the way that you get this look in your eye that kind of knocks the wind out of me to look at?"

Siobhan was thrilled to hear those words spoken that way, "I like the same things that you said, except for the fighting and the video games, though I'd probably like to watch a little as you play. I used to like getting laid, but I never got more than used afterward so I just keep to myself more. It hurts less that way."

"You shouldn't look at it like that, Siobhan," Sam said, "You're not going to have much to enjoy that way. I never had a great time in a romance with any of the guys that I've known and that's probably as much my fault as it was theirs, but I'd rather try than be alone. Neither of us is alone now. I think that's what she meant.

What about if you had a big sister who could look out for you?" Sam smiled, "You let me tell you if I think you're gonna make a mistake and you do that for me. What about then? Think that would prevent any heartaches?"

"No," Siobhan said, "But I think it would make it easier to get over the guy."

"And a lot more laughs afterward," Sam said looking at the pickup truck leaving, "Look at them. I can't imagine that not working, can you?"

"No," Siobhan said with a smile, "I woke up just before dawn, when you rolled off me. So I took the opportunity to go pee and as I was coming back to bed, I looked down the stairs and they were still making out."

Sam laughed, "Really?"

Siobhan nodded, "It was sort of nice to see, not that it wasn't weird - sort of like watching your mother in a slo-mo porno. Rufus was still here and he got up and stood next to me, and it felt as though he was leaning against me a little as I pet him for a second. Then he walked down the stairs.

So I came back to bed and got in so that I didn't wake you up and I couldn't help myself for the way that you looked. I wanted to hug you, but I settled for just kissing your cheek once and then rolling over the way that I was when we got into bed."

She shrugged, "Everything just felt so good to me. I was just thinking of using my hand a little, since I was lying on it a little when you rolled onto me again with a flop and began to snore softly into my ear. I couldn't do anything but use my hand a little, since I was trapped like that. I didn't mind the way that you trapped me, but you're heavy when you're asleep."

"Shit," Sam muttered, "I'm sorry if I wrecked your moment or anything."

"You didn't wreck it," the dark-haired one grinned, "It felt great to have your arm and leg over me. I came in like seconds, but you missed it when I told you that I love it when you talk dirty."

Sam's eyes looked as though they'd leave her head, "I missed that? And I was talking dirty in my sleep?"

Siobhan shrugged again in kind of an offhand way, "Yeah, something like the way that I imagine a bear would say it - growl, growl, grunt, snort, growl.

I'm telling you," she grinned, "seconds and I was there. I think I might have made a noise, but I'm not sure. I came though, and it was nice, even if you were asleep."

She pointed at the departing truck, now little more than a speck to them out on the road, "See that? So there HAVE to be at least a few good men out there." She put her arm around Sam's waist, "and if we can work together the way that we can bullshit each other, the world is our oyster."

"Yeah," Sam sighed, putting her arm around Siobhan's shoulders, "and you're welcome."

"Huh?" Siobhan looked over.

Sam smiled a little awkwardly for a second and then gave up and chuckled, "I really rolled over to try to kiss you just once, since I felt like it.

Then I noticed that you were moving, so I held still and pretended to be asleep." She grinned, "I was awake the whole time."

Sam watched as Siobhan's face began to turn scarlet and she shook her head, "Too late for that," she chuckled, "We're their daughters and we're gonna be business partners. It can't hurt all that much if we like each other some."

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"I'd say that you've raised a fine daughter, Cale," the old woman said with a smile as they drove.

"I didn't have very much to do with her upbringing," Cale said with a bit of regret, "The more that I learn, the more I find out that she pretty much raised herself. But I am pleased at the woman that she's become and I am proud of her - and for her, too. We've got a lot of catching up to do.

I also want to learn what I can of Siobhan. I just don't know where to begin - not that she needs me any more than Sam does, I suppose."

"Oh, I think that they don't need you as a child might," Sile said, "but it's plain to me that they both want you in their lives. This is a strange and wonderful time for them, meeting each other the way that they have and finding a friend in the course of a day and a family that is changing for them under their feet at the same time.

If I were you," she said, "I think that I'd try to be prepared for anything, because if nothing else, I can see that that pair will become very close. Most of all, I can see that they need each other more than they know yet.

With the changes that are to come, they'll need support and strength as will my granddaughter here. That's what you're for in all of this, and if it's up to me, then I bless this as I did the day that you both met each other long ago.

I know you, Cale Taylor," the old woman smiled, "I know that you've lived feeling cut off from the world that you walk through. The one who loves you now has built the first bridge, and if I know her at all - and I do - then she will turn that into a causeway, and more than just one."

Cale smiled as he looked into the mirror to see Sylvia smiling softly back at him with a gentle nod.

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***Besides the characters who will appear in the sister tale, I'm considering doing something with the two girls in their own story, I haven't decided yet.