Heart Strings

I am yawning something terribly by the time we get to the car. Dad and Mom take the front seats and the cello takes up a large part of the back seat. I snuggled in next to it and after a second looking at the little that remained for her Katrina slides into my lap.

"Okay all in." she said as she closes the door behind her somehow. "No bumpy roads if you please."

"Seconded." I chime in as she squirms to get more comfortable. Finally I catch her hips and lift her up off my legs and settle her down almost cross ways in my lap.

"Yall okay back there?" asks mom looking back at us.

"Oh were good, just don't take the scenic rout his legs will go to sleep under me." says Katrina laughing.

"The way he's yawning all of him may." Says Dad with a chuckle as he gets the car started. It takes more than a few minutes to get us out the traffic snarl by the gate.

My hands have at some point in the shuffle come to rest just above my sister's knee. I see her looking down at my hand but when I go to move it she catches my hand and puts it back. Katrina snuggles down into my chest. I feel her breath by my neck.

"I'm sorry about what Mom said." I hear her whisper right by my ear.

I nod. The hot warmth of her body presses against me, with the sweet smell of her perfume filling my senses has gone a long way towards putting me to sleep.

I see her smile at me as my eyes flutter.

"Sleep big brother."

I feel her hand resting on my chest as I drift into slumber.

Given that I'm near six foot I know that no one carried me up to my old bedroom but I also have no memories of getting home or going to bed.

I wake to a near dose at three in the morning. My body set to a time zone far away. It takes little effort to convince it to go back to sleep.

I awake the second time more slowly. I can tell it's late in the morning by the light coming through the window blinds.

I'm awaken by the sound of a cello.

Not the soft soaring classical music of the night before. No this is more raw, harder.

Sliding out of the bed I grab up a tank top and walk out the room and down the hall.

As I step in front of my sister's room I awaken to full at the sight I behold.

Katrina sitting behind her cello, eyes closed lost in the powerfully dark music she is playing.

She is beautiful.

She is also naked!

I stand frozen, caught by the dream like sight of her and the hauntingly beautiful music she is playing.

I quickly forget who I'm watching, simple watching to enjoy what I see.

As her song ends she opens her eyes and sees me standing there. With a gasp she pulls the belly of her cello up close.

"David!"

Shaking my head I turn around.

"I'm sorry Katrina. I shouldn't have been starring. I got lost in your playing. I really didn't see anything; the cello covered you."

I start to walk away when she calls after me.

"David wait."

I stop and half glance over my shoulder then look away again.

"It's ok David. I forgot that you were here. This is my normal Saturday morning routine. Mom and Dad go play golf at the club. I play nude. It really is okay David you can turn around."

When I turn back she is still naked but the cello is blocking her body from my sight.

"I should go." I tell her softly.

"You don't have to. Even if the cello wasn't in the way all you would see is your fat sister." She quirks her mouth in a grimace.

"You are not fat!" I tell her with a bit of strength in my voice. My eyes go to her white thighs that hug around the sides of the rose colored wood.

She smiles then shakes her head.

"I am. If this cello wasn't here you would probably gag."

"Kat the only reason I would gag over what's behind that cello is if I got a hair caught in my throat." I say before I think.

I watch her eyes go wide then she blushes to her toes.

I take a second to think and regret what I have said,

"What were you playing?" I ask to cover our embarrassment.

She smiles.

"Its called Forbidden City by Tina Guo. She's kind of what made me pick the cello when I got Mr. Tims class."

"I remember my first day in his class. Tina Guo...don't think I've ever heard of her?"

Katrina starts to slowly play. Unlike the tearing song she was playing this one is softer, haunting, I can hear the mixture of classical and new.

"She plays an electric cello, in most of her videos. This is called 'I lost my love in the Winds'.' I watch as Katrina slowly sways with her bow. For half a second I see her dark nipple come clear on one side. It vanishes before I can lift my eyes away. I feel a stirring in my sweat pants that I tell to go away.

"It's beautiful."

Katrina opens her eyes and looks up at me. I see again those lovers' eyes focusing on my face. Then she blinks and smiles a sad smile,

"I wish I could play it as well as she can. I do my best but I don't have the years of experience she has." She gives a shrug and looks down at the dark wood.

"Your playing is top notch. I can tell...I have a good ear for it. Mr. Tims said I would make a good conductor if I wanted to take the time." I grin at the slow smile that creeps back into her features. She starts to softly play again.

"Can you still play?" she asks me as she drifts a bit with the sounds she pulling out of her mind.

I nod.

"Would you get your flute and play with me?" she asks softly.

"If you like. I'm not as good as you are by a fair measure, you've put more passion into it than I ever did." I walk back to my old bedroom. In the closet is the silvery flute I haven't touched in six years, but that's not what I'm after. Going to my bag I pull out the flute I carry with me. The engraved bamboo, still after all my years of handling it, shows signs of its muddy rebirth.

When I return to Katrina's room I am somewhat shocked to see she is still in the nude. She looks up at me and smiles seeing my reaction.

I pull her chair from under her desk and sit down. A couple of breaths and I start to play the tune I was first taught.

"Oh my god David that's beautiful." I hear her whisper. "What kind of flute is that.

I stop playing and wet my lips.

"A Suling, it's a bamboo Suling. I found it in the mud in Indonesia." I run a hand over the smooth wood. A lot of memories come back in that simple gesture.

"Indonesia?" she asks softly, I look up to see her leaning her chin on the side of her bridge. "My god the places you've seen."

I shrug.

"Indonesia wasn't pretty. I got there six months after the tsunami. The place still looked like a sea of mud and trash. We worked for seven months and I barely felt like we made a dent." I run my fingers over the holes in my flute. "I was digging with this local man, we were trying to uncover part of his mom's house. I felt something poke me in the leg. I thought it was as stick at first. Then I saw the engraving. I cleaned it up as best I could that night. I tried to play it the way Mr. Tims had taught me." I lift it to my mouth and blow out a few notes. I see her eyes contract. I nod agreeing it sounds wrong. "A local that was sitting near by came over and showed me how to play it."

I go back to the tune I was playing. I watch her listen to the song for a second then slowly the cello begins to join in. I watch her eyes close and I see then the true mastery that she has attained. Her 'ear' is far beyond mine. Listening to just a few notes she picks it up and then takes it to places I could never reach.

Her eyes open and lock on mine. I see her mouth open and the pink tip of her tongue come out and lick her lips. I watch her breathing quicken.

The minutes pass as I play, watching her, watching me. I see the occasional flash of darker skin from the side of her cello as she moves with the bow.

Slowly the song fades.

"David that was beautiful." She says in a whisper. I look at her breathing slowly in and out, almost like a runner catching their breath after a jog.

"Your playing was beautiful." I shrug. "I've been mostly playing at night for the amusement of children in the villages were helping. It made Tina smile to see them laughing and happy." I swallow past the lump in my throat.

"Mom told me." She says quietly "I am so sorry to hear that happen David. Mom and Dad may not have approved of her, but I thought she was the best thing to ever happen to you. I saw the change when you two met. It was like seeing you come alive."

I lower my eyes to the flute resting in my lap. Memories flood back to nearly over whelm me again.

"Where is she buried?" Katrina asks after a moment. I look up to see her eyes full of concern. "I might like to go put flowers on her grave."

I give a humorless chuckle.

"It's a long plane ride. She wanted to be buried wherever she died. She told me that years ago. She didn't have any family but me. She didn't want to be hauled around the world to be buried in a graveyard next to people who never really understood her anyway." I smile at the memory of her saying that. My eyes look across endless amounts of seawater to a far distant land. I see again her large cairn of stone. "The local people and the other volunteers helped me dig the grave. Every one brought stones and flowers. The local women took her body and cleaned her up. They wrapped her in white linen, local spices and flowers."

I look up to see Katrina silently crying.

"A little boy she had been teaching english too placed a huge bouquet of yellow flowers on her cairn. I hadn't seen them before so I asked my interpreter about them. He told me they don't grow locally. That boy had walked twenty miles up into the mountains to pick them... cause she told him her favorite color was yellow."

I hear movement but don't look up till I see her bare feet in front of me. My eyes go up her till they meet her eyes. I take in without seeing the beautiful curves of her naked body. She takes my hand and pulls me to my feet.

Katrina's arms go around me in a fierce hug. There is an almost desperate power to her embrace. I settle my hands onto the warm smooth skin of her bare back and just hold her as she cries. I feel the need to do the same but there aren't any tears left in me.

After several minutes she stops crying and looks up at me. I see the tracks of tears down her face. I bring around a hand and brush them away. I can't pull my eyes away from the dark depths of her eyes.

"Would you play some more for me?" I ask looking into those eyes.

She gives a sniffle and a smile.

"If you would play with me." She says teasingly.

I grin.

"I never could turn down a naked woman offering to let me play with her." Grinning I see her eyes turn downward.

"Even a fat one?" she asks sadly.

I catch her chin with one finger and make her lookup.

"You are not fat."

"Yes I am. Even my own brother won't take a look at me. Your eyes haven't left my face the whole time."

I open my arms and take a half step back. My eyes slowly lower down across her face, down her throat.

Her breasts are large but not out of portion to her. The nipples a dark rose color, they stand out a little more than my wife's had. My eyes slide past them and down the white skin to the dark tuft of hair. She has herself shaven so that a bathing suit would be modest yet there is still a thick covering. I drop my eyes even lower to those smooth thighs I have been watching from around the cello. Finally I look at her dainty feet and ankles then just as slowly I bring my eyes back up.

I see the red of a blush when I reach her breast. When my eyes met hers I smile.

"You are absolutely beautiful. You are full figured, you don't have a body like a model, but that in no way makes you fat. You are perfect in every way that I can see." I smile when I see the emotions cross her face.

"Your not just saying that?" she asks after a second.

"Look down."

When she does she can see the tenting in my sweat pants. She gives a giggle.

"Wow. I did that? Okay maybe I don't look that bad." She smiles at me then gets a mischievously devilish look. "Try to keep up."

I watch with a grin the curve of her ass as she moves back to her cello.

She picks up her bow and I lift my flute.

Within four seconds I'm lost.

"I can't play 'Flight of the bumblebee' on a flute!" I protest as she plays at a ferocious rate. She grins at me.

"It called 'Queen Bee" it's the heavy metal version." She saws like mad.

I just sit back and watch. She makes no effort to stay hidden now she is simply playing.

After a few minuets she switches pace to a slow classical number that I know and I join back in.

We must have played like that for the better part of an hour, me constantly aware I'm playing with my naked sister.

Then I hear the moan.

It's low and if it hadn't come at a pause in the music I wouldn't have heard it. I bring my eyes up and see her panting. Her eyes are shut and she is moving with the music. Swaying against her cello as she plays.

The next moan is a little louder.

I notice then how deep between her leg the body of her cello is.

"You naughty minx!" I tell her with a grin. I chuckle when her eyes pop open. "Now I know why you play in the nude."

She blushes a little and gives a shrug.

"It really does help me to practice. I can rally feel the music all the way through me."

I laugh.

"Helps you relax and...really get into it." I tell her with a lot of sarcasm.

She blushes and nods.

I sit back and start to play softly. I bring up the sound in a slow building way watching her play along.

I see her eyes close and her mouth open slightly I watch her breath become a soft pant.

With eyes half closed I play a soft counter to her, listening to the growing sounds of a young woman in passion.

As the song rises to crescendo I see her moving against the back of the dark wood, grinding herself against the vibrating cello. And then just as it peeks I hear a gasp from her, her bow drops away from the strings. I watch her grasp the cello to her clutching at the neck and stilling the strings. I watch her breath slow from a pant to a heavy gasp for air then to a slow even in and out. Her eyes flutter open.

She looks at me with her lover's eyes.

"That was the most beautiful thing I have ever seen... and heard." I place my flute on the desk beside me. "I have only one thing t say though."

She slowly quirks an eyebrow.

"I've never been envious of a cello before."

She breaks into laughter.

The sound is interrupted by the noise of a car door closing. I see her eyes go to the clock by her bed.

"Oh my god it's Mom and Dad." A second car door shuts.

Getting up I quickly go to the door and turn towards my room.

"David." I hear softly behind me the sound of her footsteps.

When I turn I see her in all her naked glory just a foot away. Her hand snakes up behind me and catches my hair.

My sister's lips are soft and warm against me. So is her body as it's pressed into my chest. I feel her breast push against the thin material of my shirt as my hands come to rest on the soft curves of her hips.

Hearing the front door open and their voices our lips part. I slowly step back from the woman I've just kissed. That she's my kid sister hits me then in an odd way. A mixture of maybe confusion and a little guilt.

Guilt that I've only been a widower for a few months and already I'm looking for comfort in a woman's arms. I watch the door slowly close as I turn and walk back towards my room.

The memory of Tina pushing me into the arms of a village woman, after a day of her flirting with the both of us, comes to mind. I smile thinking back to that night. I feel the guilt drop away as, in my mind, I hear Tina laughing that I ever felt it.

The meal is probably the largest I've had in a long time. Mostly I eat and go back to work. Or eat and go take a nap.

Sitting across the table from Katrina I listen to dad chatter on about the latest football scandal.

Mom hasn't said much. I can see the wheels turning behind her eyes.

As we sit sipping coffee after I hear her plans come spilling out.

"I called my brother Daniel. He said he could get you on with his firm. It will be a low-level position of course; you don't have the right kind of experiences for anything else yet. Give it a year of so and he can give you a leg up." She lay is out to me like she already has the glass men etching my name in the frosted door at the firm.

I sigh.

"Well tell Uncle Daniel I said thank you for the offer but I'm not really interested." I take a long sip at my coffee.

"David." My name comes out of her like a drill sergeant on parade ground. "You need that job!"

I look up when I hear her cup hit the table

"Actually Mom I don't" I tell her siting my empty cup down beside hers. Gently.

"Oh really? You're nearly thirty! You have no Real job experience. You have waisted the business degree we sent you to collage for. You've spent five years of your life gallivanting around the world when you should have been working your way up the corporate ladder. You could be nearly ready for upper management by now!" she looks over to my Dad. "Don't just sit there help me talk some since into him!"

I turn and look to my Dad. He's sitting looking down into his coffee cup. I wonder if he wants more or wishes it large enough to drown himself in. Always the one told to make me see reason I generally get the idea he's sometimes on my side.

"What are your plan's David?" he asks me finally looking up from the cup. I hear Mom huff in frustration.

Sitting back I rub my chin feeling the beginnings of stubble.

"Well I'm going to find me a small place in town to start. I don't really have a need for a lot of material things in my life a small place will suit me fine." I hear Mom's exasperation. I know she's shaking her head without even looking. "After that I want to get in touch with a couple of the local charities, places like Habitat for Humanity, Toys for Tots. Maybe the local homeless shelters as well. Do some volunteer work there. Retraining people, to do new jobs. I've picked up a lot of odd skills in the last five years. I've already offered to do some speaking at the locals schools, talking about the Peace Corp. Do some recruiting work for them maybe." I give a shrug. "After all that I'll see how it goes. One day at a time basically."

"Homeless shelters! Well you better get in real good with them cause your ... PLANS will have you living in one before long!" Mom gets up and storms out the room carrying the tray of cup. I hear them slammed to the counter in the kitchen.

I watch Dad cringe at the sound. He slowly turns to look at me. I see him sigh.

"David...Son, I want you to know that the fact you want to do those kind of things makes me very proud of you. Most people go through this life just living for themselves and their families. You have gone out of your way for the last five years to help as many people as you can. I'm proud of you for that." He looks up at me and our eyes meet. "Nothing you have just said though is a way of making a living. There all good things...things you could do on the side. You need to be getting started with your financial life. Your going to turn around twice and be old and wondering what happen to all those years when you should have been putting away. What if you meet someone, remarry? What if you have kids? Wouldn't you want them to go to the finest schools? To have the chance at the best education?"

I look up from the table at Katrina sitting across from me. Her eyes show a concern for me that tears at my heart. I can tell she wants me to do what I want, but at the same time is as worried about me in her own way as Mom and Dad.

"Have I ever told you how I met Tina?" I ask her. That Dad is there is almost irrelevant to me just then. "It was when I was at collage."

I watch Katrina slowly shake her head.