Amorous Goods: Black Pearls

"And...?"

Yi took one of Kenny's muscular hands into both of hers. "I love you; I love you so much. It scares me sometimes. Do you understand that?"

"No, but I understand that it's something that you need to deal with on occasion," said Kenny.

"Sometimes you're ... you're too nice. Sometimes I'm so afraid you're going to propose to me..."

Kenny looked sad, "if the thought is that distasteful, I won't..."

"NO! That's not it, it's just... if you ask right now, I'll say yes and... and we will get married, but for me, it will be over. I LOVE working for Paul and Andi. I love living with the twins and little Danny. I love the beautiful bedroom they gave me. Wait till you see the bathtub! I love living there. But when we get married, I'm going to live with you in that big house with all those other people that I love, and I'll love that too... but this part of my life..."

"I understand," said Kenny as he brought out a small jewelry box and opened it. Inside was a delicate white gold woman's ring with a small black pearl. "This is a promise ring. I love you with all of my heart, and I promise I will 'till the day that I die, but I can't marry you right now."

"WHAT? WHY NOT?" Yi demanded. How dare he does not propose! Yi even shocked herself with her sudden change of direction.

"Because... the business. We can start growing now. If we were engaged, or even married, I wouldn't be able to give our business the time it needs and give you the time you deserve. I want to do it right, grow the business so I can afford a bathtub that will fit a VW like you have right now."

"Well, ok," she pouted. She loves her enormous bathtub. It would easily fit her, the twins, and Kenny. A man that will provide her with an "indoor swimming pool" that size is worth marrying.

"Let's do it like this," and he took her right hand and slid the ring on her right ring finger. "When you're ready, just let me know that you're ready for more rings and I'll know to present you with the engagement ring that we agree on." With that, he kissed her hand and sealed a promise that she was very comfortable with, then he handed her a small jewelry box that she opened and inside was a man's ring featuring a gemstone that resembled a flat black pearl.

"Is that a pearl?" she asked.

"Yeah, that's what they said when I got the set," Kenny said. The ring looked like a class ring or a sports championship ring but understated compared to those designs.

She took the ring out of the box and smiled. "Which finger?"

Kenny shrugged, "your choice, but it needs to be right hand."

"Here, here's my favorite finger," Yi said as she slid the ring up and down his middle finger while she licked his fingertip with the very tip of her dainty tongue. She paused and looked Kenny in the eye. "Does my engagement ring have to have a black pearl?"

"Are you saying we're getting married?"

"No," Yi lied, "but just in case, IF we get engaged, does my engagement ring have to have a black pearl?"

Yi slid his ring into place and suddenly Kenny felt a rush of something between his left and right arm. It coursed through his lungs, his heart, his mind. It felt like he was caught in a whirlwind of emotions and feelings until finally he returned to his body and gasped, "For continued blessings, Guoxin insists on it..."

"Who or what is Guoxin?"

Immediately, Ayato appeared at their table side. He had been as far away as he possibly could be, in a noisy bar with a wall of bottles and glasses and a wall of noise between them, but he heard every word they said. "Did you say Guoxin?"

Yi showed Ayato her ring and said, "He said that Guoxin gave that to him, and this," as she showed off her black pearl pendant and her earrings.

"Guoxin gave them to me," said Kenny. He didn't want to go in to detail about how he got them, not right now.

Ayato examined Yi's pendant necklace and said, "I don't want to play the race card, but you white boys don't get to see Guoxin, let alone..."

"I'm Asian," said Kenny softly. "At least part Asian. My great-grandmother was a Chinese war bride." Seeing the shocked look on Yi's face, he said, "Grandma Lacy just told me yesterday morning."

"I knew there was something about you that I liked," grinned Ayato.

"Let's eat up, soon as Lacy and Archie get here, we're going to have a ceremony."

Not long after that conversation, two women dressed in black robes entered the bar. One saw the costumes that the bar employees were wearing and pulled out a wide brimmed pointed hat from the folds of her gown. "Mom!" gasped the blond woman as she saw Maxine put the hat on her head. It was the very same hat that gave JK Rowling the idea for the sorting hat that she used in the first Harry Potter books.

"Oh, Lighten up, it's a party!" Maxine scolded Vikki. "It is a party, isn't it?"

Ayato appeared before them, made a few kung fu flavored gestures, struck a pose that he thought most resembled Bruce Lee, and said, "It's an open party for a local business. What'll you have ladies?"

An eye opened from the folds of the hat and studied Ayato, another eye opened, then a mouth opened and finally said, "The ladies are with me, and they'll both have a Schönauer Apfel Schnapps and a Strongbow chaser."

"Mother please," whined Vikki.

"Make the blond's schnapps a double, she just had an audit," said the hat, then the face disappeared into the hat's wrinkles.

"That hat is so cool!" said Ayato as he poured the drinks. "How much do you want for it?"

"It's not for sale. Besides, all it does is order drinks," said Maxine as she sipped her schnapps. "It will order for you until you're in a coma or bankruptcy, whichever occurs first."

The face on the hat appeared and said, "My date will have another schnapps, and so will her... ahem sister," then the face disappeared once more. Maxine nodded and tapped the rim of her glass, and Ayato poured her and Vikki another drink.

"How do you make it work?" asked Ayato

"It's now how to make it work," said Vikki as she sipped her Strongbow hard apple cider. "The trick is to make it STOP working."

Maxine nodded in agreement. "Once it orders a drink, you just have to drink it. That's how things are done!"

"That is so cool!" laughed Ayato, who still thought it was a trick. "Where did you get it?"

"A little town near London named Chipping Sodbury, in South Gloucestershire," said Vikki. Her words were already beginning to slur. "Got it at an estate sale."

"No kidding?" asked Ayato.

"If we hadn't gotten it first, JK Rowling would have snagged it and drank herself senseless. Harry Potter never would have existed if it weren't for us," said Maxine.

As Maxine was talking, Julissa came up behind them and hugged Vikki. "Hey, you bum, what cha doing here in the real world?"

"I'm looking for..." she looked at a scrap of paper blearily, she moved it nearer and farther from her eyes until the words swam into focus. "Kensington Parker Johnson. Who in the hell would give a kid three last names?"

"Don't ask. That's their family tradition. We just call him Kenny. They're in the back. Come on." As Vikki and Maxine snagged up their drinks, one in each hand, Julissa led Vikki and Maxine into the back room, where a crowd had gathered around a table. Dave and Angi Johnson stood in front of an old metal trash can. Dave held a piece of paper that he claimed was the mortgage for the building their business was in. (It was actually a copy)

"Paid up! Lock, stock, and barrel!" called Dave, and he tore the paper into a few large pieces and held it over the metal trash can. Angi then lit the paper on fire with a lighter and Dave (Davis Jackson Johnson) held it while it burned, and their friends cheered. Eventually he dropped the burning remains into the can before his fingers burned and turned to hug his wife Angi, his dad Archie (Anderson Abbott Johnson), then he turned and hugged his son Kenny (Kensington Parker Johnson).

"That doesn't make any sense," said Vikki as she studied the contract that Kenny signed. "Kensington Parker Johnson sent all his bad luck to his father and they're having a party, hugging, and having a great time." She was having trouble focusing, but she was sure something was wrong. Did they sell him the wrong pearls?

"He was pretty firm about it," said Maxine. "I was there when he signed the papers. I asked which relative you want to screw over, and he said, 'My father' loud and clear!" she emphasized the expression loud and clear with an apple scented belch.

"Oh," said Julissa, "That guy over there is Dave. He's not Kenny's biological father, he's the man who raised him, he's Kenny's dad. Years ago, Dave Johnson's secretary came to him in tears, she was attacked a few months prior, and she found out she was pregnant, so Dave took care of her, fell in love with her, and eventually married her and took the boy on as his own and followed it up with two girls. Only recently did Angi admit to Kenny who his biological father really is. He's a genuine piece of shit, Wehrle H. Holloway. Imagine finding out that your father was your dad's old business partner who is trying to take over the business!"

"What happened?" asked Maxine.

"Kenny somehow got the courage a few days ago to go over the business books, and he figured out how Holloway was screwing over his dad. He took what he found to a lawyer who took it to the district attorney."

"So, Kenny is an accountant?" asked Vikki. 'The Books' are the worst part of running a business.

Julissa whispered, "Not at all. He told me some Chinese guy named Guoxin told him where to look."

For the first time in days, Vikki felt relaxed. Justice had been served with a little help from Amorous Goods. "I think our work here is done," said Vikki.

"There she is!" cried Kenny, and he led a smiling Yi to Maxine and Vikki. "Ma'am, this is my best girl, Yi-jin Carlson, Yi, this is the lady that sold me the pearls."

"Hi, I'm Maxine, and this is my daughter, Vikki. It's really her shop. She inherited it from her dad's brother." They shook hands around, then Maxine said, "I see the earrings, pendant, anklet, wristband, and rings. There's a few of the interesting pieces missing."

"I'm slow-rolling them out," grinned Kenny.

"There's more?" Yi quietly asked in Kenny's ear.

"There's a few that... ummm... are best worn in private," he whispered back. As Yi tried to hide a grin, Kenny turned to Vikki and said, "I think this covers my debt to you," and he handed Vikki a cloth bag with two dozen perfectly matched black pearls.

"But... we really need that help in the warehouse..." said Maxine, hoping that he would write them some software.

Kenny thought about it, then finally said, "If you have a dress like the one you wore the other night in Yi's size..."

-=●=-=●=-=●=-=●=-=●=-

Kenny and Yi spent a day exploring their island, discovering secret groves of fruit trees as brightly colored songbirds serenaded them. In the interior of the island not far from a waterfall into a clear shimmering pool, a flame flickered and danced. It was seated in the middle of a small pile of rocks and occasionally a secondary flame would puff up near it. "This must be natural gas leaking to the surface," said Kenny. "A friend showed me one like this on Connisarauley Creek."

The water from the waterfall was sweet, and the flame showed no indication that it would go out, and next to the flame was an open area of soft, dry sand. "This looks like a perfect campsite," said Yi firmly, hands on shapely hips. "No cabin needed."

"Wherever we are, we can always find each other here," said Kenny as he held her hand and their black pearl rings touched. The pearls were joining them together. Kenny couldn't figure out how, but he stopped asking how and started enjoying the closeness he was feeling with Yi, both awake and asleep.

Yi sighed in relief, the Jarecki's love to travel and since they hired Yi, traveling with the children is much easier, they bring Yi along to help with the two children, soon to be three. There is more travel in the future for Yi and this island will make the future days and weeks of separation from Kenny much easier. As they melted into each other's arms to seal the idea with a kiss, Guoxin's voice boomed at them from above, somewhere in the palm trees swaying overhead.

"STAY OFF THE BEACH UNTIL THE DANGER IS PAST!"

The voice of the dragon was impossible for them to ignore. It rang in their heads as it was accompanied by the sound of small arms gunfire offshore. His US Army training kicked in and Kenny crept toward the sound of battle followed by a terrified Yi and soon they were at the edge of the forest watching a large boat filled with modern day pirates shooting in all directions as dragons of different colors swooped and dove at them, primarily a black dragon. The black dragon took glee in causing terror among the pirates, then with a bellow from the black dragon, the other dragons scattered away from the pirates. A huge dark cloud had grown over the ship during the attack and now, with a roar from Guoxin, a storm erupted. Lightning and hail poured down from the massive cloud, driving the pirates away.

Guoxin turned to inform Kenny and Yi that they were safe now, but he saw they were entwined on the sand, and he chose not to disturb the lovers. The huge yellow dragon slipped below the waves to his home in the sea.

Kenny was suckling and squeezing Yi's breasts, her bikini was tossed to the side along with his shorts, his fingernails gently scraping up and down her sensitive inner thighs, his kisses moving down lower, lower... Yi gasped and writhed, it's been so long since he's kissed her there, her fingers tangled in his hair and....

PUMPKIN DAY!!!

Pumpkin day? What the fuck? Kenny sat up in bed and checked his alarm clock and found that it was still four AM. The cry of Pumpkin Day interrupted a beautiful dream. His erection still throbbed, the scent of Yi still filled his nostrils. He could almost taste her. He ran through his mental calendar and yes, it's pumpkin day. Today was the day that The Boys and their families gather together to carve pumpkins so they would be ready for the Halloween carnival next week. Kenny wasn't part of the carving party; in fact, he had work to do at the feed mill. He pulled the blanket up over his head and tried to go back to sleep.

"PUMPKIN DAY!" shrieked the twins as they bounded onto Yi's bed in Paul's cabin. Yi groaned; her wonderful dream was just starting to get good! She was on the island with Kenny, they were safe from marauders and Kenny was kissing his way down her ribcage, getting closer and closer... "Yay," groaned Yi, "Pumpkin Day." She moaned sadly and looked at her watch... "You little turdburglars! It's four AM!" she whispered to the tiny five-year-old twins.

"But there's so many pumpkins!" gasped Sandy, her hands held palm upwards. She's the most active of the two and the instigator of most of the trouble.

"Shhhh! Baby!" Yi warned. By this time next month, the girls will have a baby brother and they were practicing how to behave around a baby. You can tell the twins to keep quiet until you're blue it the face with no appreciable drop in volume from the twins, but saying "Shhhh! Baby!" they understand and quiet down.

"But there's so many Pumpkins!" gasped Sandy quietly, her hands held out, palms upward.

"That's right, but they're safe in a cabin behind Mister Josh's Pond and we can't get to them until Miss Veronica unlocks the cabin later. You guys just snuggle with me until then." The twins crawled under the blanket with Yi, and after a few giggles, were fast asleep.

At about six AM, Yi's watch alarm went off, and she worked her way free of the sleeping twins and pulled on her sweats. As she dressed, Paul's chocolate lab, Wonka, slipped into her bed between the twins, silently called "dibs" on the warm spot and went to sleep as Yi crept down the creaky wooden steps. Yi doesn't have to come to the cabin with her employers on the weekend, but she enjoys the country life, it's the complete opposite of the ultra-modern life she lived in Florida. So, when Kenny has to work, she'll be fifteen miles away in a cabin, eagerly waiting to be reunited with him in their dreams.

Yi crouched in front of the wood-burning stove, the source of heat for the cabin, and fed a few logs into the dying fire without disturbing Paul and Andi, who slept on the unfolded couch. Poor Andi! Her stomach is so huge! And she has another month before the baby arrives! How can she find comfort on a futon?

Andi and her sister-in-law Macy both claim to have been impregnated on Valentine's day, Macy here in this cabin and Andi in a Canadian hotel overlooking the falls. Both couples refused to have the doctors tell them what their babies will be (other than healthy) but Mama Giardini, an old family friend of Paul and John, insist that Andi is carrying a boy as brave and smart as his dad, and Macy is carrying a girl that will be far more beautiful than her former fashion model mother.

Yi grabbed her basket and a flashlight and stepped out of the cabin and walked over to the barn to see if the girls had left her any eggs. The girls were, of course, Paul and Andi's chickens. The chickens lived in a huge 150-year-old barn; the main beams were held together with wooden pegs. The cabins were three small barns in a row, the two outer barns where the living quarters and the central barn contained the common kitchen, bathroom, and showers.

As Yi scooped up the last egg, her phone chirped and she saw it was a text message from Kenny-"I miss you, <3" She chuckled at his old school keyboard emoji and headed back to the cabin to start breakfast. Maybe a nice breakfast casserole... No! She's got a stale loaf of homemade French bread. "I'll go over to Hirsh's farm and get some fresh whole milk and make some French toast," she thought to herself. She pulled on a jacket, then stepped outside and fired up the ATV.

-=●=-=●=-=●=-=●=-=●=-

It had been a busy day; they spent the day carving pumpkins and taking plastic pails of the bits and pieces cut from the pumpkins and Josh took those pieces and scattered them in a grove of Larch trees, those oddball pine trees that drop their needles in the fall. Of course, the twins had to help Josh, which insured a wagon ride back to the large cabin where the pumpkins were being carved. The deer will feast well on those chunks of pumpkins and hopefully hang around until deer season, hoping for more. There were some wild turkeys strutting about the woods. Wise in the way of people, the turkeys apparently knew it wasn't turkey season and allowed the pint-sized visitors to marvel in awe at their size and grace. The twins were fascinated and watched the large birds for a long time.

Later, after a dinner of their dad's beef stew that simmered in the iron pot on the wood stove all day long, the twins were at the table in the cabin doing their homework, Andi was proctoring their reading test when Madeline started whining that she wanted her upside-down pumpkin. They spent the day in one of Josh's cabins with "the gang" carving pumpkins and hauling pumpkin chunks out into the woods and were getting very tired. Mom and dad are tired too and Yi is doing what she can to help. Sandy had a pumpkin with a surprised look on it that her daddy Paul carved for her, it was sitting on the picnic table outside their window, but Madeline insisted on a happy pumpkin that was upside-down, so Paul carved her one like that too. It's a cute upside-down smiling face that Madeline just loves (probably because daddy made it for her). However, the upside-down pumpkin that used to be just outside on their picnic table is missing.