Annie IL: Undying

(Chronological index: New World Order #7)

Ray suggested driving to Florida. He thought it would be more comfortable for all concerned. More room for their stuff, clothing could be worn, actual food could be purchased and the bathrooms were sized for humans.

Annie responded with a heartfelt plea for speed. Time spent on the little hop from DC to Orlando was hardly worth getting upset about. They were used to the burdens of travel, and they could easily afford a rental car.

After she’d been speaking for about five minutes straight, she drifted to a stop. She stared up at her husband. Ray had a thoughtful look on his face.

Annie turned around to face her sister wives. “If, uh, that’s okay with you guys?”

“Ray?” Denise called. “If I could translate?” He nodded. “Annie says: Mia! Mia-Mia-Mia!”

“Oh, sure,” Ray said with a nod. His fingers wrapped around his first sylph and he lifted her to his cheek for a hug. “Why didn’t you say so?”

Denise and Pet ran to his other hand. He scooped them up and cradled all three wives to his chest for a hug. Annie was squeezed by three of her favorite people in the world. She started to cry.

“Aw,” Pet cooed. “We bwoke her.”

“Shut up,” Annie snarled. Or tried to, anyway.

“And we love you, too,” Denise replied. “Let’s go pack!”

------

Despite a history of poor navigational skills, Ray let Annie direct him through the streets of Tampa to Mia's house. She got more and more excited with each landmark that passed. She was practically hyperventilating when he finally parked in front of the place.

Ray held her against his heart for a minute before picking up the carrier and getting out of the car.

Mia's family remembered Annie well, and recognized Ray from the night they got Mia back. He was practically dragged across the threshold into a series of hugs and slaps on the back.

The sylphs rode it out in the carrier, peering through the ark's portholes for any sign of Annie's high school friend.

Annie sighted her friend leaning on a sofa leg just as Pet squealed. Ray spun at the sound. Decades of watching his step allowed him to spot the tiny figure almost instantly.

He lowered the carrier gently at the end of the sofa and tripped the latch on the loading ramp with a sweep of a finger.

"You know," he said. "I packed light clothes for the trip south to Florida. I forgot how cold the state could get this time of year. Could I trouble you for a cup of coffee?"

The giants all assured him it was no trouble and quickly marched him towards the kitchen. In seconds the sylphs were alone in the living room.

Mia waited patiently at the foot of the ramp. Annie slid down it to tackle her friend in a warm hug. Denise and Pet followed more sedately.

"I missed you!" they told each other for a while. Tears flowed freely and Pet wanted to console them both. Denise physically restrained her.

"Let them have their reunion," she said, hugging the youngest sylph.

"Okay," Pet said slowly. She could accept that not all hugs were team sports. Hypothetically. She just didn't understand it.

"So, so," Annie finally said, "tell me about your family. Are you picking up where you left off?"

"Oh, God, Annie," Mia said. "It's all so WRONG!" Different tears started to flow and she lay her head on Annie's shoulder and bawled. Annie's eyes went wide and she looked at Denise for help.

"Let's go inside," Denise replied, gesturing up the ramp. Mia nodded and let Annie ease her up and out of sight.

-------

Mia's father, Darryl, held his wife's hand as they talked to Ray. "We don't know what's wrong," he admitted.

"But we know something is, somehow," Cammy added. Mia's younger brother added a somber nod from the doorway.

Ray nodded. "Well, she's been… I mean, you've all been through a lot. It may take a while. And, well, you'll never go completely back to the way things were." He idly played with a plastic train engine that was on the table.

It was painted in primary colors and reminded him of a Happy Meal toy. He glanced around the room. "Is there a younger child in the house? Living here or visiting a lot?" If Mia spent time under the threat of being treated like a dolly…

"No, no," Darryl said. "That's Mia's."

"Really?" Ray asked after a moment of silence. He thought quickly. "Can I see…where Mia sleeps?"

He'd known there would be no cage. He'd suspected a dollhouse, maybe on a dresser in the master bedroom. But Mia had a bedroom all to herself. Ray stopped at the doorway and tried to take it all in.

There was a canopy bed, a single, designed for a girl that read and dreamed about princesses. In the center of it was a tiny, sylph-sized sleeping bag and pillow. And a full-sized teddy bear. All of it was so terribly, terribly pink.

Toys littered the floor: Matchbox cars and fast food prizes, My Little Ponies and Breyers stallions, a toy stable for the toy horses, and a Fisher Price barn for some other animals.

And three different dollhouses.

Ray dipped his head to see inside the nearest. It had working lights inside, but rope ladders hanging on the outside. The stairs ran between floors but where there should be holes to allow someone to climb to the next floor there were just stickers showing holes.

There was a Tinkertoy trapeze set up across a big fluffy pillow. A stack of teen magazines were piled beside a reading lamp that sat on the floor.

Posters for Twilight, the movies and the books, lined the walls. Most were a lot closer to the floor that a normal human girl would have had them, but they were still like movie theatre screens to a sylph. IMAX screens.

Ray took a deep breath and let it out gently. "Darryl? Cammy? Stephen? We need to talk."

He never quite promised them privacy. He just asked for a room far away from where the sylphs were and let them assume they wouldn't be overheard. They ended up in a guest bedroom at the back of the house.

"Have we…. Done something wrong?" Darryl asked.

Ray shook his head. "You're trying to adapt to your daughter's return after almost 30 years away. It's clear you're trying very hard. And it's always been clear how much you love Mia."

The couple sat on the guest bed and held their hands tightly. Stephen stood behind them, a hand on his mother's shoulder.

"I'm not going to say anything is wrong," Ray said. "But there are some things you should think about."

"Okay," they promised.

"Well, Mia got smaller, but not younger. She's in her forties, now, right? But you're treating her like a child."

"But we don't know what to DO!" Cammy wailed.

"She does play with the toys," Stephen offered.

"I think," Ray said slowly, "that she doesn't know what she wants, either."

Two closed doors away, Mia had her head on Annie's shoulder. The two sylphs held hands as they listened to the conversation.

"I don't know what I want," Mia said softly, agreeing with Ray.

"Well, we'll have to figure that out," Annie told her.

"Ray'll fix," Pet said, quietly but firmly.

"We'll all fix," Denise corrected. Annie smiled at both the other wives.

"We got her toys to see if they made her happy," Darryl said. "Do you think she plays with them to make US happy?"

"Could be," Ray said. "And maybe, to see if it is what she needs." He sat quietly for a moment, still playing with the toy train.

"Imagine that she hadn't sylphed, but that her plane had gone down in the Amazon jungle. And it took her thirty years to work her way back through various lost tribes and dinosaur mesas and wild animals to get back to civilization."

"She'd have been through things we couldn't imagine," Cammy said. "Good Lord, how could we ever understand that?"

"Probably can't," Ray said, but not unkindly. "But you can help her reconnect to living here, living now."

"How?" Stephen asked. Ray smiled.

"We have some errands to run in the central Florida. I was going to ask if Annie could stay here with her friend. But…"

"But what?" Darryl asked.

"Well. How's this? Mia comes and hangs out with my sylphs. I'll use Annie as a spy."

"A spy?"

"Well, I'll have her say that I'm letting her redecorate her cage. And she'll talk with Mia about ideas. And then she'll tell me what MIA thinks is a good idea for a sylph bedroom, and I'll pass that on to you."

"And we can make that happen," Cammy said happily.

"But what about…?" Stephen gestured towards Mia's bedroom.

"Well, look at that bedroom from a sylph's point of view," Ray said. "She has a private room, but she can't close the door by herself."

"Oh," Cammy said softly.

"And she sleeps a football field inside the room."

"Ah," Stephen said with a shake of his head.

"Okay, so box all that stuff up and be ready to talk to Mia about what she really wants."

"Of course," Darryl said.

"If nothing else, maybe making the room a blank slate'll help her express what she wants."

"A gym?" Stephen asked. Everyone looked at him. "Well, if she's been living actively for so long, maybe an obstacle course or something to burn off energy?"

"It's a thought," Ray said.

"A good one?" Annie asked her friend.

"Yeah," Mia said slowly. "I think so."

"And that's one!" Pet said happily, making a checkmark in the air.

"How many to make it right?" Mia asked.

"You tell us," Denise said simply. Mia nodded, a thoughtful expression on her face.

"But what will you do?" Darryl was asking. Ray mentioned a few theme parks in the area that specialized in sylph friendly amusements.

He promised a never-ending whirl of activity to bypass any suspicions Mia might form.

The GPS coordinates and the approaching date just never came up in conversation.

----

They went through the motions of asking if Mia wanted to spend time with Annie, and pretending to be pleasantly surprised by the question. Both sides were sure they were getting one over on the other, which made for a rather happy shared meal.

The Fosters raved about Cammy's cooking while they were impressed with the guest sylphs' appetites.

Then there was some brief packing, lots of hugs, and Mia was spirited away to a nearby hotel.

Where they vegged.

Rather than overstimulating the girls, Ray left them to quiet, to privacy, and to several internet links to sylph products.

"We certainly CAN go to Sylphanna or Tiny Town," he started to say.

"Oh, PLEASE," Mia moaned. "If my folks aren't taking me through the Toys R Us aisle, and buying anything my eyes light on, they're taking pictures of me on the big slide or the long train, or the undertunnel... I have actually considered asking Santa for a Nap in my stocking."

"I thought that might be the case," he said. Mia stood and walked towards him. Knowing that she was still a little gun-shy around giants, he sat perfectly still as she approached.

She pat his wrist and smiled up at him. "Thanks for being understanding," she said.

"Annie has me trained to whip and voice commands," he replied. Mia laughed. It was the first real laugh Annie'd heard from her friend since... Maybe since high school. She ran up to hug the other sylph, smiling wide.

The giggles spread through the room. All four Fosters ended up laughing with Mia, mostly in joy at her joy. Annie spun around and leapt from the table to grab at her husband's shirt.

He collected her into a hug, smiling back at her smiling face.

"You're a good master," she said. "And a better husband."

"I try," he said.

"Husba-what?" Mia asked. The room was suddenly silent.

Ray leaned back from the table they were standing on. Pet walked over to put a hand on Annie's shoulder.

"Annie? You didn't tell her?"

"Um, no."

"Tell me what?" Mia asked. "Besides, you know, everything."

"It's not just my secret to tell, though," Annie protested. She grabbed Pet's hand and looked at Denise. Denise shrugged and looked up at their husband. All the sylph's gazes tracked with hers. Ray blinked.

Then he smiled and reached for Annie. "Annie, for over twenty years, you've been the one I turned to with such questions. Should I date her, can I try that, which version should I buy? If you trust Mia, tell Mia."

He lifted her to his lips and kissed her head. "If that's an agreeable policy with you guys?" he asked the other wives. They nodded vigorously. Annie turned from them to kiss one of Ray's lips.

Then she jumped down to the desk and hugged the other two. Finally she walked over to take both of Mia's hands in her own. "Okay. Um. Okay. Where to start?"

"I'd say," Pet said, "with an apology for keeping her in the dark."

"Accepted and forgiven," Mia said instantly. "Now spill it, sister."

"Okay. Well, first off, this isn't Buttercup. This is Denise."

"Named after Ray's wife?"

"Nooooo," Annie replied. She paused, seeing Ray slide a cushion from the carrier in behind Mia's legs. A bump at her calves told her she got one, too. "Yeah, let's sit. This'll take a bit."

"Shall we...?" Pet asked, gesturing towards the balcony.

"No, you'll need to point out the things I miss," Annie told her. Pet smiled and ran over to stand beside the two friends. Ray slid two more cushions into place, then lay his chin on his crossed arms.

Mia looked over Annie's shoulder at the giant and grinned. "He looks ready for a bedtime story."

"Yep," Annie said. "Okay, once upon a time in Regency Mall..."

-----

"Wow," Mia said. She was standing on the list of map coordinates and time stamps. Pet had just finished telling about her and Amelia's dreams and the conversation drifted to a stop.

Mia tapped the Day Time Group of the top entry. "That's in six days, right?"

"Yep," Annie repeated. She glanced at her family as she stepped close and put an arm around Mia's waist. "You wanna come with us?"

"Yep," Mia said quietly.

"YAY!" Pet shouted, clapping her hands. Everyone stared at her. "Well, four sylphs means two to a pocket. No overcrowding and no one has to ride alone."

"Dibs on the pocket with Mia!" Annie said quickly.

"Aw!" Pet pouted.

"You don't want to ride with me?" Denise teased.

"Oh, well, yeah, but I wanted to visit Annie's friend."

"There will be plenty of time, Pet," Ray said, "to ask Mia for stories of Annie in high school." He stood and walked towards the wet bar. Pet slapped her hands over her mouth as if she'd just revealed a secret.

"I'd never betray Annie," Mia told Pet.

"What? Who are you?" Annie asked. "And what have you done with my partner in crime?" She turned to Pet. "She's the one that told my parents about my speeding ticket."

"Be glad I didn't tell them about-" Mia started to say with a wicked smile.

"Shutup! Shutup!" Annie protested, but with a wide smile.

"Spill it!" Denise shouted.

"Spillspillspill!" Pet added.

"Well, this one time," Mia said, fending Annie off with both hands. "We went to the museum for a field-"

"NOT THAT ONE!" Annie screeched, tackling Mia and throwing her down on the cushion.

"NO CENSORSHIP!" Pet shouted, diving into the fray.

By the time Ray came back with a bottle of water, there was a four-way pile of tickling, giggling sylphs wrestling on the table.

He poured a little bit in the sylph-sized pitcher on the edge of the table, then sipped and watched.

After a few moments, they showed no signs of stopping. He smiled and leaned over the melee. Annie felt firm fingers pinch her hips and lift her out of the tangle.

Ray stroked and petted her, then stuffed her into his pocket and closed the top. "You were saying, Mia?"

-------

"I am going to kill you," Annie muttered much later. Ray nodded and pinned her to the pillow with two fingers on her elbows. She kicked a bit, but his tongue easily slid between her legs and pushed them outside of his cheeks.

"Seriously!" she insisted. "Treating me like an unruly pet! In front of my best and oldest friend! That was humiliating!"

"Mm-hmmm," he agreed. With his tongue as wide as it would get, he licked her. The hot, slippery surface rubbed her from thigh to thigh, working under her to the small of her back. Then he stroked it over her until her belly button was slick with his saliva. Then repeated.

"Don't think I didn't notice that the three of you were ganging- Ah! Ah! Ahhhhhhhh!"

"Mm-hmmmm," he hummed again. He wrapped his lips over his teeth and gently nibbled at her. Her head rocked back and forth on the pillow.

Her back arched, her legs simultaneously trying to close together through his cheeks and to spread out over his tongue. She bit her own lip and moaned.

"Mmmm?" he asked.

"Please," she whimpered. He held her in place and rolled onto his back. She grabbed his nose and ground herself against his pursed lips.

He sucked and she felt it from knee to knee. When she came, she reared back and screamed in pleasure. She felt him smile in satisfaction. She slapped his nose. "Don't think that I've forgiven you!"

Ray suddenly rolled his tongue and probed at her crotch. The semicircle cradled her pussy without actually touching it, lifting her on a hot soft pillow. Then he blew softly.

The air evaporated the fluids at her center, dropping the temperature and dragging every last bit of her attention to a small area of her body.

She screamed again, then collapsed across his face in exhaustion. He smiled once more, gently kissing at her.

Ray lowered Annie to the pillow and cradled one hand over her. She curled up in a fetal position, riding the edge between the cool pillow and the warmth radiating from his hand.

"Oh, GOD, Ray," she whispered. "Treat me like that, me love you long time."

"I love you, too, Annie," he said as softly as he could. He felt her body tense for a second as he spoke. He suspected he knew why. He let her lay in the warmth, in their cuddle, though, rather than break the moment.

Later, as he washed her off in the sink, he brought it up. "Did you really think I was going to call you by the wrong name?" he asked.

Annie shrugged. "I thought it might be in character for you to tease me." She lay back and let her hair dangle over the edge of his hand. He carefully moved her to the stream under the faucet to rinse out the shampoo.

"In character to call you 'Pet' or 'Denise?'" he asked.

"Actually, Ray, I thought you were going to call me 'Mia' right there."

He considered that, idly running a finger over her lathered belly. "Yeah, that would have been a powerful shock. I can see the humor in it." Then he shook his head. "I tease, but I like to think I know where the unforgivable boundaries are."

"I suppose," she said softly.

"I mean, come on," he protested. "How long have you known me, Deliah?" She laughed and threw a handful of soap suds at his eye.

-------

Mia lay in the sleeping bag next to the others. She rose up on her elbows as Ray came into the room and deposited Annie on her bag.

The others blew kisses at him as he made sure they didn't need anything else for the night. Then he was gone and they were alone.

"You all better?" Pet asked. Annie nodded sleepily.

"That's a hell of a way to work off your anger," Mia said.

"You're welcome to try it," Annie replied.

"The hell she is!" Denise said.

"Oh. Yeah, right, sorry," Annie said. Her voice was much clearer as she rose up to look at Mia. "I didn't mean, you know, with Ray. But if you can find, well, someone... That you want... To, uh..."

"It's fine," Mia said. "I appreciate the sentiment. But I don't know any male sylphs. And my time with my old Master? Kinda soured me on sylph/human relationships. At least naked and breathing funny relationships."

Annie reached out a hand to take and squeeze Mia's.

"What did he do?" Pet asked softly.

"Let's just say, he didn't take, 'no, no, for the love of GOD, please, no,' for an answer."

"Oh," Pet replied. "Ray's not like that," she promised Mia.

"So I heard," Mia said. Annie's hand flinched in hers. "Annie? Are you blushing over there?"

"No," the other sylph lied.

-------

Denise took personal charge of the shopping for Mia's new digs. She insisted that she was the only one there who'd actually done shopping for sylphs, so she could make sure Mia's parents would be able to find what Mia picked.

Pet helped operate the mouse and the other two sat close together on the bench in front of Ray's keyboard. For his part, the man prophesized much giggling and took a paperback outside.

Annie and Pet discussed the advantages of a cozy cage or carrier, rather than trying to sleep with a roof 80 or 90 feet over head. Mia nodded. "But my folks would never put me in a bird cage."

"No, no. But if there was a permanent spot for your carrier," Annie suggested. "That can work sometimes."

During a break from surfing for furniture, Annie went through Mia's wardrobe and declared herself physically ill. "DOLL clothes!" she snarled. "Have these people NEVER noticed how thick the seams are?"

"I, uh, never noticed," Mia said. She was hesitant before Annie's outrage until she saw the smile on Pet's face. "Is this a common issue?"

"More of a running gag," Denise said. "But didn't you get something of hers at the Trace house, the night we brought you back?"

"Yeah. And that was comfortable." Her head dipped down towards the floor. "I just thought...Annie had worn it smooth. Or something. We... The folks and I, we didn't know any better."

"Well, you do now," Annie said cheerfully. "Pet! Summon the pack mule! We must take this girl shopping!"

"Pack mule?" Mia asked. "Another running gag?"

"More of a term of endearment," Annie assured her while Pet waved the semaphore flags.

"What's up?" Ray asked as he approached the table.

"Clothes!" Annie commanded in a regal tone. "We need to clothe this one properly."

"Yes, of course. And you need a pack mule." He swung the carrier up to the table and lowered the ramp.

-------

Pet giggled suddenly as Ray entered the elevator. "What?" Annie asked.

"Did you really kiss a mannequin in the museum?"

"What did the evil twin of my high school friend tell you while Master was gentling me?" Annie asked back. She fought a smile until she saw Mia grinning at her.

"That you climbed into a diorama and kissed a mannequin on a bet," Denise said.

"Not quite," Annie corrected. "_I_ climbed into a closed-off diorama with my boyfriend for some quick kissing because the tour was boring."

"Malcolm Westman," Mia said with a sigh. "He certainly was not boring."

"You had a boyfriend before Ray?" Pet asked, shocked.

"Pet, I had a whole life before Ray."

"Oh. Yeah, I guess."

"So whose idea was it to sneak off and cuddle?" Denise asked.

There was a distant bell tone, then Ray walked across the hotel lobby towards the parked car.

"Mine," Annie admitted. "But it didn't take much effort. They were going on and on about the tediozoic era or the repetaceous period. And Malcolm never had that much of an attention span.

"Well, there's this exhibit that's closed off, so we sneak in there and start kissing.

"The caveman?" Pet asked. Annie turned to glare at Mia. That sylph shrugged where she sat against the woven wall.

"I may have mentioned something," she admitted. "But really," she drawled, "Malcolm, Neanderthal? Not much of a difference."

"I WAS kissing Malcolm. Then the lights flickered. We thought they'd pulled away the curtain so we ducked down behind this rock wall."

Ray settled the carrier on the floor of the passenger seat, out of direct sunlight, then walked around to his seat.

"Then the lights went out," Annie continued. "I thought it was safe in the darkness so I stood, found Malcolm's scruffy beard and kissed it."

"And when the lights came back on," Mia said, "The whole class saw Malcolm with his hand down a cavewoman's fur blouse, and Annie tonguing the man who discovered fire."

Annie watched Pet roll on the deck in laughter. She had a wry smile of her own. She looked up to face Denise. "Of course, Mia never tells the part of the story where she's the one that asked the curator, what's behind that curtain?"

-----

Ray was adamant that they'd only buy a couple of pieces for Mia. "The whole point of her stay with us is so HER family can find out what she really wants and start providing it."

Mia shrugged, Pet nodded, Denise kept her eye on Annie, who stomped her foot. "Two suits are NOT enough!"

"Annie, it's okay..." Mia said. Over her friend's shoulder, she saw Pet waving her off.

Annie shrugged Mia's hand off and climbed up to the passenger seat to explain the importance of choice and style to the brain dead, fashion challenged driver.

"I didn't mean for..." Mia protested.

"Not your fault," Denise assured her with a tug on her shoulder. Mia let herself be guided to a seat on the carrier roof. They sat and watched the fight rage back and forth.

Annie wanted to indulge her friend, Ray didn't want to offend the people who had trusted him.

"What if..." Pet asked after a while. Ray and Annie both stopped in mid-sentence and waited patiently for her to form her thoughts.

"What if we buy her a bunch of clothes...?" The blonde sylph started to pace the carrier's weatherdeck. "But only send her home with a couple of dresses? We can always mail the rest to her in a week or so?"

Ray nodded. Annie jumped back down to the carrier to hug Pet. "Good idea, Pet," she said.

Denise leaned over to stage whisper to Mia, "That's MY sister wife who came up with that idea."

"It's a good idea," Mia agreed. Pet's smile stretched wide.

-------

Back at the hotel, Ray put the girls down on the table with their purchases, then went down to the lobby for some soda from the gift shop. Pet seemed disappointed that he didn't stay to watch her model the clothes he had just helped them buy. Mia was relieved.

"Nothing against your husband," she explained, "but I'm not ready to bare myself in front of him."

"Just as well," Annie said. "First time I took Pet shopping, the bastard shot me with a foam dart while we were-" She stopped talking and looked around the room suspiciously.

"Oh, YEAH!" Pet said. "You got jammed into the cushions!" She looked around the room for a second, then ran across the table.

She jumped easily to the loveseat by the window and bounced to the center. "She was stuck like this!"

Denise and Mia laughed as Pet reproduced Annie's distressing moment, complete with half-removed shorts, kicking legs and muffled euphemisms of Annie's preferred profanity.

Annie glared, but the expression didn't reach her eyes. Denise stepped close enough to put an arm around the other sylph's shoulders.

"This is how you kept Pet from worrying about me?" she asked softly.

"I'd like to say that was our intent," Annie said. "But this was just Ray being a fuckwit."

"And you married him?" Mia asked. Pet was quieting down.

"Well, yeah. About, what, ten years later?"

"You forgave him?"

Denise and Annie both shook their heads. "She got even," Denise said.

"Guys?" Pet called. She was laying very still in the cushions.

"You're not stuck, are you?" Annie called back.

"Um...."

"Come on," Denise said, running to help. The other two followed a second later.

------

That night was Pet's turn for husband attention before the slumber party. She wasn't angry as Annie had been and wanted to take it slow, savoring the attention.

Ray lay her across the bed sheet and loomed overhead, slowly outlining her body.

The constant breeze from the air conditioner fought the heat of his regular breaths, making the young sylph very aware of every square millimeter of her skin.

Her mind followed his rough fingertip, softly running down her sides, up her legs and along her arms. After several laps, he added another finger from that hand. Then, when she was ready to shout, he added two fingers from his other hand.

Slowly and smoothly, the petting and stroking became a massage. She melted into the sheets. He lowered a shoulder to block the AC. His breathing slowed and the heat of it lingered.

He swept her outstretched arms to her sides and rolled her over. She sighed as his tongue sketched an outline of her skeleton. Ray started at the shoulders and worked his way down her spine to her ass cheeks.

She wasn't really sure if she spread her legs or he did, but it didn’t matter. He went where she wanted. He found her pussy and gently licked. "Good boy," she said.

Lips pinched at her ass while fingers supported her shoulders. He lifted her into the air. Fingertips found and teased her nipples, her hips, her calves.

Her husband knew her pleasure points and played her like a harmonica. Except he was sucking, not blowing. The image made her giggle. And giggling made her ticklish. So the touches went from sensuous to tickling. She started to laugh.

Then she felt sad that she'd ruined the moment. Ray didn't break away from her, though. He just stopped moving his fingers or tongue. The breaths from his nose cascaded over her back and shoulders, keeping her warm.

She snuggled in his grip, appreciating his delicate consideration. Which made her aware of how much she loved him. Which made her horny again.

Pet wriggled her ass against his lips. He took that as a command and started rubbing her again. The tongue gently spread her lips and the mouth sucked hard as if he wanted to turn her inside out.

She kicked and flailed, resting her face against one firm fingertip, nibbling gently.

She bit her lips and groaned, legs scissoring against his cheeks. He eased the pressure then lowered her to the pillow. Pet gasped and smiled up at him.

"Don't call me Deliah," she whispered.

"Wouldn't think of it, Carla," he said.

-------

Annie folded the edge of the sleeping bag down as Ray opened the bedroom door. He slid the exhausted sylph into place and tucked her in.

Kisses were blown all around and he was gone. Annie made sure the zipper was all the way up, then pat Pet's hair. Mia was staring when she looked up.

"You guys... Can you even GET jealous?" she asked.

"Not of Pet," Annie said. She stroked the blonde once more. Mia looked back and forth. Denise smiled at the two sylphs across from her. It was a bit more wistful, but still a smile.

"My parents," she started to say. She stopped for a moment, then rubbed her face. "They teased each other all the time. If Dad was going out of town, Mom wrote a menu for things that Lars the Pool Boy preferred."

"We didn't have a pool," Pet said quietly.

"We know," Annie said with a smile. "Hush."

"And Dad always came home, telling us about the great restaurant that he ate at. With the prostitute he hired that night. With presents for us that she helped him pick out."

"Must have driven you nuts," Mia said.

Denise smiled. "Oh, no. We always knew they were devoted to each other. Absolutely." She laughed lightly. "Pet and I asked him, once, what he'd do if he came home and found Mom in bed with another man."

Her voice dropped lower as she imitated a gruff male. "'Well, Courtney,' he said, 'I've been watching sitcoms all my life. An hour or a half hour of trouble, all because people misread or misunderstood a situation. A little time spent listening would have made it all good.

"'So, I'd go back out to the living room and wait for them to sort themselves out and give me the whole story.'"

"Sounds like Chuck," Annie said with a nod. Mia shook her head, partly in wonder.

"'But,'" Denise continued, dropping her gruff tone even deeper. "'It had better be a daaaaaaaaamn good story.'"

Pet burst into giggles. "THAT sounds like Chuck."

Denise sighed. "I noted their devotion. But I never quite understood it. Until I met Ray." Annie and Pet nodded.

"He says I'm the other half of his soul. The whole time I've known him..." Her voice trailed off.

"What?" Mia asked. "What?"

"Well. I know, to the center of my being, that he's never had sex without my permission," Denise finally said.

"Um..." Annie started to protest.

"Okay, not for each individual liaison," Denise corrected. "He doesn't raise his hand and ask if he can touch no-no place number three. BUT, he's never had a partner I didn't know of and approve."

"Okay," Annie accepted.

"And that's not just because he's almost never alone long enough to get away with it."

"You're assuming I'd have squealed? On my Master?" Annie asked.

"You're loyal, but not blindly loyal," Pet said. Annie's head whipped around. "If Ray was a bastard, you'd have made sure his bastardty caught up with him."

"Okay, yeah," Annie allowed. "Even if it got me punished."

"Because you're a good person, Annie," Denise said. She reached out her hand. Annie took it and they squeezed.

"Annie? You think Annie's a good person?" Mia asked.

"What? You disagree?" Annie asked her friend.

"No," Mia croaked. She had to swallow a few times to talk again. "I'm just... Glad that you ended up here. With people that see you. The real you. Behind all the... The..."

"Bluster?" Denise suggested.

"Anger?" Pet offered. Mia pointed at both women and nodded. Annie let a small sob and crawled over to hug her friend.

"God," Pet protested. "She is SO emotional." Denise raised her own arms in invitation. Pet wiped the tears from her eyes and plunged into the hug.

------------

The next day started on the phone. Ray called with his 'scouting report.' Mia's family thanked him profusely and promised to go out and buy it all by the end of the day.

Ray made them promise not to. "One or two pieces, sure, to show willing. But you're going to want to SIT DOWN with her and TALK. Let HER tell you what to get next. Okay?"

Annie and Mia pumped fists in the air as they listened. "It's like I'm becoming a real girl," Mia said.

After that was done, Ray boxed everyone up and took them to the car. The GPS site was about halfway across the state towards Cocoa Beach.

They all speculated on what they'd find. Pet suggested the Fountain of Youth.

"Off the Beachline Expressway?" Annie asked. "And no one's found it all this time?"

"Well, no," Pet protested. "Ponce de Leon didn't have GPS coordinates."

"She's got you there," Mia said.

Denise was expecting a UFO Landing Site.

Annie insisted it would turn out to be a expatriate Leprechaun colony. "And we'll all get ravished by the tiny men."

"What?" Ray asked. "Why?"

"Well, have you ever see any Leprechaun women?" Pet raised her hand. "Outside of a beer commercial?"

"Oh," Pet replied. "Then, no."

Mia refused to speculate. Annie stared at her. Pet looked between the two, then crossed her arms and adopted Annie's stance. They glared until Mia could stand no more.

"Fine, fine," Mia said. "I think..." Her eyes lost focus. Her voice deepened and slowed. Annie took a step closer to her, hand out to grab her by the arm. "Life," she said. "Undying, the spirit of Life. The Water of Life. It circles forever, carrying our sins. And our salvation." She swayed then. Annie caught her and lowered her to the car seat.

Ray pulled over to the side of the expressway. "Need any help?"

Mia shook her head. Three worried heads loomed over her and the sky looked worried, too.

"Guys? What's going on?" she asked.

"I don't think we're getting green beer," Annie replied.

--------

They all stood on the dashboard as Ray tried to follow his Mapquest printout. The dirt road wound through the deep brush.

"We're in the boonies," Annie said.

"We passed the boonies," Mia said. "This is west Bumfuck. Keep an eye out for camels."

"Really?" Pet asked cheerfully. "Won't the alligators have eat... Wait. Are you teasing?"

"Joking," Mia said. "There's a difference."

"We're here," Ray announced. He stopped the car. They all looked at the face of the GPS unit, then stared out at the brush.

Ray finally shrugged. "All a-pocket that's going ashore."

Denise and Pet stood close and he moved them to his left shirt pocket. Annie took Mia's hand and waited patiently. Ray paused. Mia swallowed.

"I've never, actually, picked you up, have I, Mia?"

"No, I don't think so."

"It's okay," Annie said. "He's been practicing for this for thirty years."

"But I'm a strange male human," Ray said, eyes on Mia's.

"Not...strange," Mia said. She nodded. "It's okay, Ray. I trust you."

He moved them to his pocket, tucked a handkerchief in with each pair for warmth, then stepped out into the December cold.

They shivered as he stood at the side of the road. Some of that was due to the cold. It may have only been cold by Florida standards, but all five people were Floridians.

Still, it wasn't JUST the chill affecting them. Ray squared his shoulders and stepped off the asphalt.

The sylphs gazed around at the thick growth of greenery. Ray alternated between watching his step and keeping branches from snapping against his chest and passengers.

"This place is special," Denise said. "I can just feel it."

"Yeah," Annie agreed.

"I don't know what's going to happen here on Tuesday," Pet added, "but it'll sure be-"

DWONK! Ray rocked to a stop. Everyone looked down to see what his foot had brushed against.

It was half of a washing machine's tub. A power cord lay draped across some grasses to the side. Ahead and to one side was a car tire.

"It's polluted!" Pet cried.

"That doesn't...feel right," Mia said. Everyone paused. "What?"

"Just waiting for the trance state," Annie said with a small laugh. Mia laughed with her, then it choked off. Her eyes rolled up and she started to shake. "Ray!" Annie shouted.

She pushed her friend into the edge of the pocket, one hand poised to sweep her mouth in case she started to choke on her own tongue.

Ray leaned back and raised his hand to support the pocket and steady the two sylphs. Denise and Pet tried to see what was going on around Annie's hair.

"You will..." Mia intoned, "take us... all of us..." She started to flinch, disjointed and violent.

"Yes?" Annie prompted. "Mia? Take us where? Sylphs us or all of us, us?" She glanced up at Ray, her face full of fear.

"For fondue... tonight." Mia finished.

Annie stared for a second, mouth agape. "BITCH!" she finally shouted. But despite the name calling, she wrapped her arms around her laughing friend.

Relieved laughter sounded in the other pocket. Ray managed to stay silent, though she didn't look to see if he kept a straight face.

"Gotcha," Mia whispered. She squeezed Annie back as hard.

"I'm gonna laugh so hard when the goblin king comes to take you away," Annie promised.

"Mmmmm. Bowie," Mia replied.

"And on that note," Ray finally said, "how would you guys like to go back to the heater?"

-----

"So what are we going to do?" Annie asked as she paced the dashboard. Ray was searching for something on his phone. The rest waited around the defrost outputs and defrosted.

"Maybe whatever it is doesn't care about pollution?" Pet offered.

"Maybe the pollution is why we were brought here," Denise countered.

Ray suddenly smiled and started dialing. The sylphs watched as he contacted the nearest Boy Scout Council.

He figured they'd have the best idea of where one could find trash haulers and clean up crews if you needed work done on short notice. And you could honestly use the phrase, "Money is not object."

They gave him some phone numbers which he put to immediate use in contracting some trucks, a back-hoe and workers.

When asked why he was in such a hurry, he said he'd caught some sylphs at that spot and wanted to 'give something back.'

Annie sulked on the drive back to Tampa. "You know, they only agreed to swarm out there because they're thinking they'll catch some sylphs."

"And any sylph that can't hear a back hoe coming," he countered, "deserves to get collected."

She continued to glare. Pet joined her in a show of solidarity. Denise and Mia lined up a moment later.

He managed to ignore them for a few miles, but finally reached for the phone once more. He offered the contractor a large finder's fee for any sylphs they collected during the clean-up.

"We can foster them with Kelly's group," he suggested after hanging up. "Unless they want to go to the Sylph Center. Happy?"

"Mollified," Annie allowed. She raised and eyebrow at the other sylphs. "Any opposed?"

-------

"Though it was in jest," Ray said as he stopped the car, "I was able to fulfill the prophecy." He lifted the carrier up to the windshield. The sylphs saw the sign for the fondue restaurant and squealed happily.

"So let it be written," Annie intoned.

"So shall it be done!" Mia finished. They clapped hands together and giggled. The others laughed, though Denise noticed that Pet's laugh seemed forced.

The table had two bowl shapes set into the middle. The sylphs walked around the table, admiring the décor. "Nice place," Denise said.

The whole thing shook as Ray slid into place. He grabbed a knee and winced.

"Sorry," the hostess said. "I did warn you about the gas fittings under the-"

"He wasn't listening," Annie said. "We can't take him anywhere."

The hostess nodded as if unsure whether she or Ray was being teased. Then she tossed down the menu and made her escape.

Ray made short shift of the choices. "No need to look at the broths," he said as he flipped the page.

"Why not?" Mia asked.

"Takes too long for the food to cook," he said. "Sylphs are notorious for pulling the food out before it's done, just because the smell's driving them mad with hunger."

"Notorious?" Denise asked.

"He remembered!" Pet said happily.

"Similar problem with the oil," he said as he flipped more pages. "Plus it's more of a spatter hazard."

"You set ONE placemat on fire," Annie muttered, "and you're doomed for life."

"Let's see what's next," Ray said. Pet ran to read the menu heading.

"Cheese! I like cheese! What kind of cheese? Can we get the cheese? Would they put it in both bowls?"

"Well, the food in that course is already cooked, so it's no health hazard. But cheese is too thick," Ray told her. "The food isn't dipped, it's dragged through."

"Yes," Annie whispered.

Ray was still trying to convince Pet that they didn't want cheese. "Annie tried it," he said. "It's like moving an oar through cement, hoping that the fish doesn't fall off."

"Well, okay," she replied. "But you're going to go all the way through the menu without finding anything to eat! And I'm hungry, Ray! Aren't we, guys?"

"Starving," Denise nodded.

"I could eat," Mia allowed. Annie just started rocking back and forth on her feet.

"Hmm. We have made it to the back of the menu," Ray admitted. "Nothing left but....." Mia and Pet's heads spun as Annie started to hyperventilate. "...Chocolate."

"We came here just for desert?" Pet asked.

"Yes, Pet," Mia said. "We came here just for desert."

"There's no JUST about it!" Annie protested. "We came here FOR desert!"

"Ahhhhh," Pet finally said. Everyone picked two items for the communal platter. Then they dipped their food in teams of two for each fork.

Pet watched Annie and Mia giggle as they worked a skewered marshmallow over the lip of the bowl.

Denise and Ray watched her watching, then their eyes met. He speared a cherry and handed the fork to Denise. "Pet?" she called. "A hand?"

-------

They returned Mia that evening. As soon as Ray knocked on the door he was rushed to Mia's new room. He put down the carrier and the sylphs slowly debarked.

The toys were gone. The posters were rolled up and put away. Boxes filled the room's closet. Annie only glimpsed those as Stephen shut the door.

A high-end sylph house was in one corner. Like a dollhouse but with a wall that the occupant could close.

It was open to reveal a cozy apartment including a functional kitchen and a TV showing CNN.

Two sets of clothes hung in the closet, both suspiciously similar to what Annie had been wearing the two times the family had met her.

A sylph-controlled electric cart was charging nearby.

The little yellow 'welcome back' banner was a nice touch, Annie thought.

There was a moment of pregnant silence, then Mia burst into tears. Her family soon followed. Everyone tried to promise to talk, to listen, to make the connection both sides were desperate for.

Ray suggested that maybe the Fosters should leave them to that and reached for his wives. Mia got a death grip on Annie's shoulders and cried.

"Maybe one Foster, Ray?" Annie asked. "To give a girl some emotional support?" Mia nodded wordlessly.

"Well, you're all welcome to stay," Darryl started to offer.

"Eh," Ray said. "Annie's enough support for the 101st Airborne. You guys talk, you two have a sleep over, we'll be back in two days to pick Annie up."

"Ray?" Mia asked.

"Oh, right. We wanted to take Mia to-"

"All of them," Mia said. "Can we all go?"

"Go where?" Cammy asked.

"I'll explain," Mia promised. "After we...talk."

"Uh, yeah, sure, if they want," Ray said, looking down at the faces of his wives. They shrugged and nodded. "Okay, then. It's about two hours to get to the site, and the time... Well, we'll be here in plenty of time."

"You guys talk," Annie was saying as he walked out. "I'll be here if you need me. Is that fridge stocked?"

------

"Long day," Ray said as he put the carrier down on the table. Pet stepped out and stopped at the circle of sleeping bags. Denise came up behind her slowly.

"Ready for bed?" she asked.

"Mmm," Pet said with a shrug.

"Do you want to put our bags side by side?" Denise suggested.

"What?" Pet spun around. "No, no. This is your night. Your turn with Ray. I'll be fine. I'll...read something."

The table tilted slightly as Ray sat down and leaned on it. The two sylphs turned and looked up at his face.

"Pet? You're not...worried about anything, are you?"

"No," she said.

"Well," he said, reaching down to stroke her face. "You seem bothered about how close she is with Mia."

Pet shrugged, rubbing her face on his fingertip. "They're friends. They've been friends since before I was alive. I'm...not jealous."

She sighed. "I mean, I grew up with my mom. She grew up alone. She's found her sister, and we're still friends. She's found her partner in crime, her original partner in crime, and I know we'll still be friends."

Her foot twisted a bit as she stared down at the bags. "I'm not jealous." She looked up and pushed Denise gently towards Ray's hand. "You go, be intimate with adult relations." A forced smile stretched across her features. "I'll be fine. Really. Take your time."

Denise offered her arms and Pet took a slow hug from her. Then the redheaded sylph looked up at her husband. He noticed that her expression was different, but couldn't quite tell what she was thinking.

Then his wife took the other wife's chin in her hand and kissed her. Full on the lips. Ray thought there might even have been tongue. "Do you want to join us, Pet?"

Pet stared. Ray stared. Denise shrugged. "I think it's time."

"No, you don't," Pet said. "You think I'm feeling sorry for myself and alone because Annie's rekindled a high school best friends foreverness and now you're going to let me and Ray have sex in front of you to make me feel like I'm loved and wanted and adored."

"And do you have a problem with that?" Denise asked.

"No," Pet said with a giggle.

Ray stared. "Come on, lover," Denise said. She slapped his hand where it lay. "Palms up for your wives."

"You're sure you want this?" he said without moving.

"I think so," she admitted. "I know I can't possibly have fun in there if Pet's out here alone, listening."

Pet gasped. There had been an unwritten rule about their sex lives since the first shower they all took together. Though the sylphs heard everything that happened, they never commented on things that happened when they weren't participants.

They pretended not to know intimate details, or what Ray did with one or the other. No 'do what you did to her with the feather' or 'please don't hold me down like you do her.'

It kept Ray from feeling like he was subject to performance evaluations or direct comparisons.

Now she was touching on a taboo subject. Of course, Pet thought, touching her tongue to her lips, it wasn't the only taboo she was breaking tonight.

"Okay," Ray said after a moment. "Okay. How about... We get naked, we lay together, and we just see how it goes? No expectations?"

Pet and Denise glanced in the direction of his lap. They couldn’t see it but they suspected... "Hey!" he protested. "That's a hope! Not a demand. I'll still take no for an answer."

"Of course you will, Ray," Denise said. "That's at least one thing I depend on from you." She raised her arms over her head. "Help me with my....everything?"

He swallowed hard and reached out. Pet stepped up. "Can I?"

"You want to undress me?" Denise asked. Pet shook her head.

"Not really. But. I do want my husband to see me undress you."

"OOooh," Denise purred. She turned to face Pet, and to offer her profile to Ray. He leaned close, breath crossing the two in hot waves.

"Stop panting, Ray," Pet ordered, "or back away." He covered his mouth and nose with his hand and stayed where he was. "Good boy," she said.

Denise balked when Pet had her down to her panties. As the girl reached for the waistline, she turned just the littlest bit, and Pet smoothly turned the move into a shoulder-level hug.

Then she walked around Denise, turning the other woman to give Ray a view of her bare back and apricot-colored panties.

Then she stepped back and raised her own arms. Denise swallowed and reached out.

-------

"How do we undress him, though?" Pet asked when she was naked.

"Oh, that's easy," Denise assured her. "Lover? You're allowed to be naked."

"THANKS!" he called, swifty stripping off his shirt. Pants followed. He stood before them....expectant.

"And now I feel overdressed," Denise said. She hooked thumbs into her panties.

"Can I help?" Ray asked.

"Can we?" Pet corrected.

Denise nodded. She had to close her eyes but she stood still as a small hand and giant fingers peeled her panties down from either side.

"Ooookay," she breathed. "Now, let's go lay down."

"Uh huh," Pet said. "He's not going down for a while."

Ray carried the two in different hands and kept them apart as he lay on the bed. He had an idea that he could keep the two from looking at each other, maybe Denise could pretend she was alone with him.

Denise, who was trying to keep Pet from feeling isolated, kept looking around to keep track of her sister wife. As Ray settled her on his sternum she was almost ready to shout out Pet's name.

But that might spoil the mood. Not hers, but someone's.

"I could go down," Ray said. "If you'd like?" He pursed his lips and extended the tiniest tip of his tongue.

"Huh?" she asked. "Oh! Go down on me, sure." She meant only to acknowledge his comment, he took it as permission. Fingers pinched her hips and lifted her up.

She dangled over his mouth, staring down at his face. He pushed his little finger between her thighs.

"Oh! Of course." She spread her legs and he lowered her down. Warm, moist lips cushioned her intimately. She made a conscious effort to relax. Hands on his nose to steady her, she pushed her thighs together to lift her pussy up a bit.

His lips worked to stroke her thighs and ass, his tongue gently spread across her pussy. He worked it back and forth across her.

"Oh, that's nice," he moaned.

"What is?" Denise, who wasn't doing anything back to him, had to ask.

"This is!" Pet shouted. Denise turned around to see her partner. Pet was just visible peering around Ray's cock.

Her hand was doing something at the edge of the purple helmet... Denise twisted further to see, slid off Ray's face and ended up stabbing him in the ear with her heel.

He groped around to find her, she ducked his spread fingers and tapped his wrist. "Just hold still," she said. He obeyed and she climbed up to his shoulder.

Pet helped her up the last couple of steps. They stood facing each other. Pet's face was shiny with precome. Denise's cheek glinted from a tear.

"It's okay," Pet said. "We can quit if you want. We said we'd stop if we had to."

"Really? You don't mind?"

"Well, the lummox might," Pet said with a shake of her head. "But he's at the bottom of the totem pole so it doesn't matter."

Ray laughed and lifted them. A slow, lingering washup was enjoyed by all, then a careful drying. Finally, Ray lay on his side and his wives curled up against his bare chest.

"You really don't mind?" Denise asked once more. Pet groaned and snuggled deeper into his skin.

"I'm disappointed," Ray told her. "I'm a little frustrated. But I'm not angry. I don't measure my marriages by the frequency of or population density of sex.

"I am glad you can tell me when you're uncomfortable, that you can be honest, even if it might upset me." He lifted her to his lips and kissed her face. "I'd rather you said stop than faked 'whip it out.' Please believe me."

"I do," she said after a moment. "I do believe you. I appreciate that. More than you may know." She spread her arms and tried to hug his cheek. "I love you so much. I want this to work, but..."

"Hush, hush, hush," he said. "It'll come. Or it won't. Don't rush it on my account. Okay?"

"Okay," she agreed. "No pressure, huh?"

"None," he promised. They regarded each other in the feeble light of the alarm clock. She took a deep, cleansing breath.

"Jump me," she said.

"No," he laughed, lowering her to the mattress.

"No, no, seriously, you finally got through to me!"

"Good night, Denise," he said.

"Please? I don't feel pressure, anymore. I'm through my hang-ups!"

He fluffed up his pillow carefully, without disturbing the snoring sylph by his ribs. "G'night, dear."

She jumped up to slap his chin. "Come on, come on! Whip it out!"

He snugged his head into the pillow so she couldn't reach it. She stopped, hands on her hips. "Ray?" She jumped when something touched her shoulder.

Pet stood behind her, tossing her head to the foot of the bed. "Let's go grope him," she whispered.

Denise giggled and snuck off.

She and Pet played with Ray, rather than trying to make love. It was sexual, but it wasn't sex. Denise later thought that made all the difference.

At the time, though, they just giggled and groped.

They felt their way down this belly to find his hard-on. "I don't think the snoring is sincere," she whispered to Pet.

"Great," Pet replied. "That means he can't let himself wake up." She felt along the length of Ray. "Did we ever measure him?"

Denise licked her lips. "Not formally."

"Mmm." Pet reached down into the hairs at the base, then measured him hand over hand.

Ray twisted a bit under her touch as she rounded the shoulder. She giggled. "How many was that?"

"Weren't you counting?"

"No, 'fraid not."

"Then you'll have to start over again."

They giggled and measured length, width and girth; laughed and checked their results, double checked their math and marked spots by licking.

He twisted and flinched, but made a heroic effort to keep his breathing deep and slow. He twisted enough to prop up the blanket, letting a little light in.

Pet's smile shined oddly in the greenish light from the clock face. Still, Denise found it beautiful. She took the other sylph's shoulder and brought her close for another kiss.

"Ah, Denny," Pet whispered, cupping her cheek with a hand. Then they turned back to their husband. Pet used a fingernail to trace every bump and crease on the top of the glans. Denise walked around to rub the underside with her fingertips.

"Hrrghrrk!" Ray said through clenched teeth. They smiled and sped up their fingers. They had to step back a bit as his back started to arch.

Denise glanced down at his sac. "I think he's about to-"

There was a groan and a splort. She looked up to see Pet wiping her face to clear an airway. "Yep. Just about," the blonde coughed.

-------

"A weesome!" Annie cried. "And I missed it?" She leaned back against the wall of the carrier, staring at the smiling fools across from her. They nodded happily.

"Huh," she murmured. "Well, I'd better be in the next one."

Denise and Pet looked at each other, then back to Annie. "Eh," they said together.

"Jackwads," Annie said, but with a smile.

"Coming up," Ray said. With a last shake of her head, Annie led the other two out onto the top of the carrier. They grabbed the winter coats waiting there and waited for Ray.

Darryl parked behind Ray's car and picked up his daughter. Stephen helped Cammy out on the passenger side.

Ray glanced at his watch and nodded his head into the brush. Tree branches were broken in a line headed through the foliage. Large holes marked the former locations of appliances, tires and lockers.

"I thought about getting a landscaper out here," Ray said. "But getting the trash out in a hurry seemed more important."

"Yeah," Stephen said. "Respect for the place, whatever it is, seems right."

"There," Mia said. Everyone turned to see her. She poked up out of Darryl's coat pocket and pointed. Her eyes glowed bright yellow.

"Ooooh, creepy," Annie said. All turned to face where the sylph was pointing.

A column of white light stood in a small clearing. Ray looked around but couldn't tell if it was shining up from or down onto the ground. He stepped forward to see if he could make a shadow.

"Ahem?" Annie called.

"I was just going to-"

"Stick your hand in a mysterious light?" she asked. "While your favorite three women in the whole world are in your pocket?"

"Uh..." He stepped back.

"Damned straight," Annie muttered.

The group circled the light. "Where's it coming from?" Stephen asked.

"I wanted to find out," Ray said. "But my conscience was too smart for me."

"Hey, look!" Cammy said, pointing at the base of the light. Water bubbled out of the mud. Light sparkled and flashed off the drops of spray. Little rainbows arced here and there, none more than a foot off the ground.

"Oooh!" Pet cheered. "Sylph rainbows. Put me down there!"

"No can do," Ray said. "Annie pointed out-"

"Oh, let her down, Ray," Annie said. "If this is a universe where Pet can't play with Rainbows, there's no God."

Ray skipped reminding Annie that she was an atheist and lowered Pet to the ground. She stood there on the mud and goggled at the colors.

"Pet?" She turned to see who was calling her. Her father waved her over, pointing to a spot in the ground. She smiled and ran to him.

"Ray, over here." He turned to see his grandfather Walt tapping his foot on the ground. It seemed perfectly natural for him to turn his back on Pet and walk over.

There was a design on the ground, sketched in light. A diamond overlapping a square. Walt was pointing to one corner of the diamond. Ray stood there.

Annie gasped in his pocket and pointed. There was no one there, but she was pointing at a corner of the square.

Chuck beckoned to Denise as Ray lowered both sylphs to the ground. Mia's family walked as if in a daze, taking stations around the light column.

In the end, humans stood at each diamond angle, sylphs at each corner of the square. They faced the light and waited.

There was...a face, maybe. No one quite remembered if it was human, or mostly human or humanoid or what.

They all agreed it was happy, though. A feeling of satisfaction and well-being swelled up in every heart.

Then the column of light changed to a tower of water. It fell to the ground, splashing everyone standing around it. Mist filled the air instantly, shrouding the clearing in fog.

Ray broke out of his fugue state, terrified that the water would freeze his wives. He dropped to the ground and crawled towards Denise and Annie.

The winter breeze started to nip around his exposed, wet skin. He swept up the two closest sylphs and turned to where Pet stood.

Cammy was between him and his third wife. And Cammy looked good. So good, he stopped dead.

The woman he'd met was in her later sixties, he thought. The woman wearing Cammy's coat was in her twenties. She stared at her hands in shock. Darryl was to Ray's right. He also had shed years.

"Wow," Ray muttered.

"Yeah," Annie said. He looked down. His eyes bugged.

"Annie...you look just like you did when I was in high school! Cut your hair, you could be Norallus the Strangely Compelling again!"

"Really?" she asked. She covered her eyes and squinted. "You...look like you did when you were in college."

Denise looked from sylph to human. They looked at her. "Denise!" Annie exclaimed. "You look GREAT!"

"Uh huh," Ray grunted. Denise smiled. "So, we found the fountain of youth? Everyone lost twenty years of- PET!"

They all three cast their eyes towards the other sylph, fearing that she'd be a toddler, or younger.

She hardly looked different at all as she skipped over.

Behind her, Cammy and Darryl had walked to within arms' reach of each other. They stared, hesitant smiles growing on shocked faces.

"We should get them a room," Annie said. "Oh, I can't wait to see Mia! UP, mule, over to the-"

Stephen stepped out of the fog. He looked a little younger, but much more shocked.

And in his hands was...

"Oh, my GOD!" Denise exclaimed.

"Mia?" Annie asked. "Is that...you?"

-------

"I think they're about to call our flight," Ray said. He lifted the soundproofed carrier in one hand, the other reached for Pet on the lounge table.

"Stifle it," she said, eyes on the television. The CNN host was finishing her review of Mia's life up to that last Christmas season.

A picture of the family on the sofa was on the screen, fragile smiles aimed at the camera. A closeup of Mia's scarred face and milky eye was in a corner.

"...but some scars take longer to heal over," Tiffany Winters said. The closeup slid away to reveal Winters' face.

"Now, we have Mia and her parents in the studio." The screen split to show the old photo and the live image of the family on a sofa. They had been posed to resemble the photograph.

The features of the newly-young couple were recognizable. Mia's scar was the same jagged shape, though her eye was restored. And she stood between her parents' legs. A full foot tall.

"Mia, can you tell us what happened to you?"

"I found my place in the world, Tiffany. I'm here to heal."

"Heal people?" Winters asked. She touched her own cheek with a finger. "Your scar didn't quite..."

"Oh, that was a choice I made," Mia said.

"Boy," Ray observed, "she sounds a lot more confident."

"Shut UP," Pet ordered.

"Yeah!" someone at the next table added. Pet flashed him a smile and looked back to the TV.

"...a part of my life," Mia was saying. "But I'm really out to heal the Earth. Friends of mine went and cleaned up a spot. I...felt the Earth reaching out to me, through that."

"The Earth contacted you?"

"All of us. It's...hurting, Tiffany. And it's offering a deal. If we clean up the pollution as best we can, Earth is offering some magic back to us."

"That's how you and your parents got young, again?"

"That's right," Mia said. "It's part of the magic. The Earth doesn't really think like we do, can't quite understand us. But it has grasped enough. It'll offer it's magic to make us young, if we want it, after we help clean it up."

"You said part of the magic?" Winters pressed. "Magic is real?"

"Well, everyone pretty much accepts 'magic' as the only explanation for sylphs. Sylphs were made by magic and there are more than a few cases where it appears that sylphs ARE magic."

"Yep," Pet said proudly.

"Shut UP!" Ray hissed. Pet looked scandalized for a second, then smiled.

"Now," Mia went on, "Earth can use some of that magic, as a conduit. After the cleanup, Earth sends the magic through sylphs, as a reward."

"Interesting," Winters murmured. "Now, we also have Samantha and Amelia Anthony in the studio. Hello, girls and welcome back to the show."

"Hi, Tiffany!"

"So, you two are aware of Mia's... discovery?"

"Oh, yes," Amelia answered. Sam nodded.

"Okay, this sounds like something you'd be up in arms about. Exploitation of the sylph population?"

"No, no, not at all," Samantha replied. "There's a lot more to this than just using sylphs in a Fountain of Youth ceremony."

"We're preparing a full presentation," Amelia added.

"ANNIE is preparing the presentation," Pet muttered. Ray stroked her back gently and she stopped grimacing.

"...but the most important part seems to be that it won't work with coerced sylphs."

-------

"Really?" Winters asked as if she hadn't been briefed specifically on the story before it broke. "How do you know that?"

"Well, that's part of the presentation," Sam said. "It's... Not complicated, but there's a lot of ground work that led to the conclusions we draw."

"Part of it's the impressions of the participants," Amelia said. Ray remembered the morning after the Fountain. There were hazy memories that seemed just out of reach.

And when he tried to express them, someone else in the room remembered part of it, which sparked a memory in someone else.

Fragments flew around the room and the general 'contract' Earth was offering came clear. Along with Mia's place in the plan.

"So," Winters was asking, "anyone that wants this sort of makeover, needs to be a friendly terms with a sylph?"

"No," Mia said. "Tiffany, they need to be with a sylph who feels loved."

Pet turned fully around and smiled up at Ray. He lifted her up for a long, slow, intimate kiss.

Behind her, Mia was describing her plans to use the Sylph Center to organize cleanups and Fountain Ceremonies, matching happy sylphs to Earth's needs.

No one brought up any future overhauls of the Sylph Act, although the writing was on the wall for the current policy. It would be hard for caged property to feel loved.

And if bigotry, paranoia and fear were powerful motivators for the original legislation, the desire for health, happiness and extended youth would prove far more lasting.

Probably. Ray knew that everyone in the Foster household had their fingers crossed, but no one was holding their breath.

"One last thing, Mia," Winters was closing with. "You're more than twice as tall as any sylph on record. Do you consider yourself a sylph anymore?"

Ray and Pet both chuckled. Annie had predicted that question almost at the start, even before Mia's torn clothing had been replaced with something from the Barbie aisle.

"Tiffany," Mia said with a shake of her head. "I consider myself a person. I always have. And I'm surrounded by people that feel the same way." She held out her hands and her parents squeezed them gently.

"But, I realize that there is some use to having a standard term for people of standard sizes. And as the Fountain Ceremonies spread, there will be more like me.

"Well, sylph was a term for elementals of the air. My work, now, is largely with water, so I'd suggest referring to double-tall sylphs as undines."

"A form of water elemental," Winters nodded.

Now they really were calling to load the flight to Dublin. Ray eased Pet into the carrier and headed for the gate.

"Ray?" Pet called. He held the carrier up to his shoulder.

"Do you think....other things changed with the fountain?"

"Like what?" he asked. He opened the lid to show her to the airline employee while another took his boarding pass. Then he went down the jetway, lifting her back to his ear.

"Ray? Do you think Annie and Denise can have kids, now? Ray? Ray, you have to walk, Ray. Down the hall, Ray. Move your foot. Okay, now move another one...."



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