Sailing On


Sailing On About ten that night, the phone rang. Conrad lifted me over and hit the speaker.

Magic’s voice asked, “Conrad, do you know where Lisa lives?”

“I helped her move in,” he replied.

“Oh, good, because, see, that’s where we are.”

“Lisa owns a cat,” I said.

“Yeah, Lisa wanted to check on Spinner before she brought us home, so we stopped, and she sat down on the couch to cuddle Spinner, and apologize for leaving her, and she’s asleep.”

“You can’t wake her up?” Conrad asked.

“Did you not hear me say ‘cuddle’ and ‘cat’?” she yelled. “Not a good time to jostle her elbow!”

“Are you guys safe?” I asked while Conrad scrambled for car keys.

“Yeah, she put the carrier down near her purse, so we were able to run out and snag her phone and get it inside. Eventually. We, uh, we could use a bit of a rescue, though. Kitty’s REALLY interested in the funny mice in the big shiny cage.”

“We’re on the way!” I promised her. I held my arms up as Conrad reached down.

-----

Banging on the door woke Lisa, where high-pitched screaming hadn’t. As we heard her shuffling around, Conrad said, “Probably could have just phoned. She’d wake up for that.”

“We still had to drive over here,” I pointed out.

A disheveled and exhausted Lisa opened the door, apologizing a mile a minute. Conrad just accepted responsibility for the carrier, counted feet, divided by two, liked the result, and let her get back to sleep.

He didn’t start the car right away. Sitting at the curb, he eased each of his pets out to look them over under the dome light.

“We’re okay, Conrad,” Cher assured him.

“I know,” he said. “I just missed you guys.”

“Home, alone with Electra,” Delli quizzed, “and you missed US?”

“Of course,” he said. “I mean, I said things and my pronunciation was corrected, so that was normal.” He lifted me up and kissed me, putting me back on his forearm with the others.

“But I would come up with plans and schedules and no one pointed out things I’d forgotten.” He lifted Delli up to nuzzle her against a cheek.

“And no one ever pointed out that my teasing had gone too far, or that anyone ELSE had gone too far in teasing me.” He lifted up Cher and hugged him to his chest.

“And I went to the Pink Palace.” He reached for Magic.

“Why did you go to the Pink Palace?” Cher asked.

“That’s a Passion Cake lounge!” Delli shrieked. Magic lunged backwards, nearly falling off his elbow.

“I took two guests from the con,” he said. He lifted his hand rather than pressure Magic. “I had no sexual interest in anyone at the table. Just a nice visit, and a favor for Skippy.”

“Oh,” Delli said. “That horndog.”

“And this comes to mind…” Magic asked.

“Well, the drapes were netting,” he explained. “And I didn’t have to climb up on a chair to remove anyone from the top of the curtain beside our table.”

She smiled and stepped up, arms raised. He lifted her to hold her briefly to his throat. They both purred.

Then he asked for all the details of their trip. The brother or sisters not hugging me tightly described the drives, the wedding, the initial crisis…

-----

We didn’t tell them the amazing news about Denise. We saved that for her and Ray to tell.

We all met at their hotel before taking everyone to The Cattleman for lunch. I wanted to take a picture of their faces, in case I ever needed to define gobsmacked for an alien visitor. Magic wasn’t totally stunned, but then she’d never met Human Denise.

Ray offered to use their Ark carrier for the meal. We all explored it, tested it out, squealed in glee at the toilet.

Our carrier had a toilet, of course, but THIS one had a whole BATHROOM. A door that shut, not just a bucket in the corner! Denise, Annie, and Pet were living the life!

We got the same table as our first visit to the steakhouse, right by the fireplace. I mentioned my estimation that a sylph could climb those stones. Denise shuddered and looked away.

Magic agreed with me. She didn’t say so, she just shouted, “C’mon!” and jumped over the side of the table. Cher and I followed, jumping down to the chair, then over to the hearth.

Delli pointed out to Denise that the bread had just been delivered to the table, why didn’t they go see if they could beg some butter from that nice Mr. Conrad?

It was August, so there was no fire burning. The rocks were cool to the touch, and our hands weren’t slippery with sweat. We went up like tiny, giggly little monkeys.

Cher mostly hauled himself up by brute force, keeping pace with me. I would scoot sideways along a stone until there was more of a path in the space between stones.

Magic, I think, looked for harder angles to climb. Or maybe she just calculated that going across the ‘cliff’ face diagonally made the climb longer, greater distance covered.

I don’t know, I only glimpsed her now and then as she passed above me.

I was up, I don’t know, maybe four feet from the hearth, six from the floor? Frankly I was starting to get tired of gripping rough rock.

My thesis had been proven, and if this was a requirement, say climbing out of a well, I knew I could do it.

But how to quit? I mean, it was my idea in the first place.

That’s when Conrad placed a few tiny bites of his steak on a bread plate. An extra. The table had been set for four when we arrived. The men kept the bread plates as they tried to clear the extra settings.

Anyway, loving master’s order was a strip steak coated with bleu cheese and garlic. Three bites of that were in the center of the plate that he lifted up.

He wordlessly tapped it against the rocks beneath me. Then he held it steady as I stepped off the rock and onto the plate.

We picked up Cher and Magic the same way. For an idiot, he has his uses.

Denise and Delli were already almost through with their servings when we were set down.

“Now that’s a business idea,” Magic said. “Gourmet food delivered to the mountain where you’re climbing!” She bit into her sliver.

“Actually, Magic,” Denise observed. “Weren’t YOU delivered to the steak?”

“If there’s one thing I’ve learned in this household,” Magic replied, “reality is frangible.”

“I don’t know if I’d go that far,” Conrad said.

Delli looked up at him. “Do you know what she just said?”

“Nope,” he shrugged. “But that’s WHY I wouldn’t go that far. I don’t know how far that is.” He put down his fork and reached for Delli. Taking her up in a finger-hug, he whispered, “And that’s exactly what I missed, shorty.”

“Awwww,” she sighed. “Any one of us knew you don’t know the word.” He agreed and hugged everyone.

Back at the hotel, Ray expressed total satisfaction with the remote encouragement program.

“We haven’t broadcast anything!” Conrad protested.

“We’re already getting orders,” Ray said. “First Coast is happy, the Anthonys are ecstatic, and the Sylph Center is just thrilled.”

“So,” Ray went on, “we’re in your debt! And as long as you don’t hire a rabid Bigfoot to edit the episodes, we’ll be even deeper in your debt!”

“Not a concern,” I assured him. Them. I hugged Denise, giving her a kiss on the cheek to share with Pet and Annie.

“And on that note,” Denise said, “we had a wonderful time. We being me, Pet, Annie and Whatshisname over there.”

“Very fun,” Ray agreed.

“Well,” Conrad started to say. Delli shushed him, sensing something on the wind. Denise pulled out a folded sheet of paper. It was a card. All three Foster sylphs had signed it. It said simply ‘Thanks. And you’re welcome.’

“Welcome for what?” Magic asked.

“We wanted you guys to have the Ark carrier,” Denise said.

“TOILET!” Cher squealed. He did. No matter what he tells you, he did. “Dibs the stern room!”

“Which one’s the stern?” Delli asked.

“It’s under the poop deck,” Cher said.

“Aye, Matey,” Delli told him. “And arr and all that nautical bullshit.” She turned around. “Which one’s the stern?”

“Thank you,” I said to Denise. Then we all kept repeating thanks, to her and her… Her owner-husband?

Then Ray started making noises about ‘an early flight.’ Which was silly, as they were still on Florida time. Six in the morning would feel like eight.

But they wanted to be shut of us, and we wanted to start decorating our rooms, so we said our goodbyes.

“Yeah,” Conrad said, “I gotta figure out a way to distribute the rooms fairly.”

“What you could do-“ Ray started to suggest.

“NO ENGINEERING!” Denise shouted. I thought it was a wonderful imitation of Annie and said so. Denise blushed, Ray shut up.

And off we went.

In the car, we stood on the observation deck of the sylph mount, staring at the carrier down on the passenger seat.

“So, glorious master,” I said. “What’s a fair way to figure this out?” “What? I was joking. I’m dumber than a bag of hammers. You guys can figure it out.” He shrugged. “It’s not like I’ll wake up the wrong person knocking on the wrong door…”

“Do you people not understand the word ‘Dibs’?” Cher asked.

-----

Conrad mounted the Ark in the bow of the rowboat. It was woven, not waterproof, so he had stuffed an empty water bottle in the bilge. It wouldn’t sink, worst case.

Every sylph stood on the bridge, each in our own bulking floatation gear. Lanyards held us each to the next person, so none of us would be lost.

Conrad had his life vest on as he carefully pushed off of the dock and out into the reservoir.

If you stood in the bridge and looked forward, all you saw was the water, stretching around us for about a million miles.

“I want to go stand in the bow!” Magic said.

“We ARE in the bow!” Delli said. “Conrad mounted this thing in the bow! He just said so!”

“I mean the ARK’S bow,” Magic explained. She couldn’t go alone, the lanyards wouldn’t reach. “Please….?”

“We DID do fondue on your night,” Cher told Delli.

“Fine,” Delli snapped. We allowed Magic to lead us out onto the weatherdeck. The breeze was stiff but comfortable. The sun shone and the water splashed.

Oars shoved us forward with relatively smooth motion.

We all looked for the raft we were headed for. Delli pointed. “Is that it?”

“Turn to starboard!” Magic shouted.

Conrad stopped rowing. He didn’t turn to face us, just lifted the oars and let the boat drift. “Um, sorry,” Magic apologized. “The raft is a little to the right, which is to your left as you sit.”

Now he turned, glanced in the direction she’d indicated, then turned back to row some more.

Magic guided him after that, taking us to the raft with no more confusion.

“You’re drifting to YOUR LEFT, bring it back to YOUR RIGHT!”

Finally we were beside it. He tied the boat to a cleat and carefully moved us, the Ark, and the picnic to the raft. An umbrella mounted in a cup holder on the cooler provided shade and we lazed about for a while.

Then he opened the tubs of potato salad, chicken wings and rolls. We sat on the roof of the Ark’s bridge and ate. Conrad sat with an elbow on the cooler, watching sailboats and cabin cruisers in the distance.

“Next time we bring fishing gear!” Magic announced.

“MAYBE for catch and release,” Conrad said. “But that hardly seems sporting.”

“You eat trout!” Cher said.

“I’m not against eating other living things,” Conrad said. “Just cleaning them. My stomach is not a woodsman’s stomach.”

“A man should know his limitations!” Delli shouted supportively.

“It’s not a limitation,” I said. “Give me ten minutes and I’ll figure out a reason that it’s not a limitation.”

“That’s fine,” Magic said. “I shouldn’t be greedy. This is ALREADY a much better trip than I ever thought I’d have, not when Marcus…”

She went quiet. Everyone else went on with our meal, letting her have her moment. Conrad dipped more Coke for us all, then casually placed a hand around Magic.

She sobbed and fell on his thumb. I undid her lanyard at a gesture from loving master and he lifted her up to his throat.

After she stopped crying, he kept her cupped in one hand and lowered that to rest beside the Ark.

We all knelt by his thumb and grabbed her by shoulder and arm and hand.

When Magic decided the moment was over, she sat up, thanking everyone. She cleared her throat.

“Now, tell me someone packed dessert!”

“Ice cream!” Conrad said proudly.

“Ice cream?” I asked. “In the cooler? Oh, Conrad!”

“I put lots of ice in there!” he said defensively.

“But it’s a cooler! That means COLD!” Cher explained. “It’s not a FREEZER!”

“Oh.” He looked crestfallen.

“He’s faking,” Delli whispered, hardly moving her lips. Conrad could not have heard her.

He put us down and opened the cooler.

Reaching into the ice water, he pulled out a tub of Ben and Jerry’s in a Ziploc bag. That was opened and he looked inside.

“I dunno,” he said. “What do you guys think?” He tipped the tub over.

Inside there was no ice cream. A printout showed the fastest route from the boat rental parking lot to an ice cream parlor in Mountain Home.

Along with the parlor’s business hours…

“We can just make it!” I said.





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Index

154. Insignia On

22. Doting On