PADDY'S ON THE ROCKS  


Author: Limonize


E-mail: spiral@spinfinder.com
 
Rating: R
 
Summary: Nick finds a new hangout.

--+--

Paddy's on the Rocks– Part 1


The second time Nick had stopped in at the Incline after work since
Lulu had left he decided it was not the place for him anymore. He had
found himself subconsciously driven to lift his head from his notes
almost every ten minutes sitting in a booth at the Incline, hopelessly
anticipating that SHE might walk in, that SHE might broadly smile at
him and then invite herself to take a seat beside him. Each time he
had made the mistake, an aching, empty pang of loneliness in his belly
would return to punish him for his naiveté.

He knew she was never, EVER going to walk through the Incline door
again and he did not want to be reminded. It was easier to go elsewhere.

He started hanging out at Paddy's. It was a little more downscale
than the Incline, but it was a place he could lose himself in his
work. No one knew him, no one bothered him. Paddy's had a good range
of non-alcoholic beverages. Additionally, they had experienced waiters
who left regulars alone until summoned. All in all, he felt better
for having decided to drive the extra blocks to go there.

It was suppertime Thursday, and Nick had just finished a grueling
court case, involving abusive parents and their hapless tot. It had
turned Nick's stomach to have to listen once again in court to the
father's answers concerning the torture of his own small daughter in
the name of discipline, following Nick's questioning of the level of
care provided. It made him even sicker to have to listen, along with
the court, to the contents of the accidentally videotaped evidence
that a neighbor had reluctantly turned over to police – a determining
factor in whose care the child should be placed. There were days he
wondered how anyone at LSP could continue in their work year after
year, emotionally distancing themselves from the grotesque daily
realities of their young clients, but find enough caring left in
themselves to continue to fight for them. He knew he could never have
worked with the kids as closely for example, say, Laurie Solt, having
to try to work with dysfunctional families much more personally than
he. Dispensing legal advice at LSP and representing some of them, was
more than "front-line" enough for him.

He headed for Paddy's, parked, and walked straight to a well-lit
corner that he was getting into the habit of occupying. He soon had
his briefcase contents neatly spread across most of the table.
Although he shielded his eyes from the directness of the light as he
began reading, much of his face was still visible to a patron who had
a couple of times noticed the rather wounded-looking man in a dark
suit, hunched in the corner, poring over his papers.

Nick's "wounded" look often darkened his face, but it never really
seemed to discourage potential female admirers. In fact, although Nick
had not consciously analyzed the basis of his appeal with women – he
attributed his primary appeal to the fact that he did not tend to
behave as brutishly as many of his peers, but managed nonetheless to
be an effective man of action - like his father. He had not had
enough co-ed experiences in his younger school years to be able to
make a more sophisticated assessment of what drew women to him – or
repelled them. He knew nothing of the "sensitivity" he seemed to
emanate at certain times, did not appreciate the fluid appeal of his
movements or the fairness of his face. He assumed from the insults
received from his male peers, that he had a natural "sissy" look that
was not appealing to the fair sex. Nor did he appreciate how his
distancing of others, and general mistrust continued to drench the
fires of his most important relationships, leaving him alone,
bewildered, and sometimes very hurt. He would have never argued that
his darker moods did not appear to deter women's attentions – in fact,
he had noticed only too well that his happier moods seemed to make him
a less interesting person to women, although he could scarcely have
articulated this. Mentally, he wrote the anomaly off to "female
perversity".

Another patron of Paddy's walked in that evening. She noted Nick's
"wounded" look as well. But unlike the first patron who had tried to
size the measure of him in an in interested and open way, the second
one felt he deserved nothing better than hell.

"Wounded" was not even in the ball park.

"You @$^% son-uva-bitch!! Wasn't your stinking kid, was she??"
screamed the tall, dark and thick-haired woman.

Nick looked up from his notes reluctantly, assuming someone other than
himself was being addressed, not able to sustain his concentration
with such extreme agitation in close proximity. Through the venom
of her wrathful expression, Nick realized he was being stared down
by the mother of the child he had spoken out against in court, while
he had been trying to establish a case for the child to be with
another family member. It registered finally, that she was screaming
at him. Realizing this, he became very upset.

"You should NOT be here!" exclaimed Nick, adrenaline beginning to
surge. A mixture of anger, fear, hatred, and shock at having this
detestable mother so "in his face" welled up in him. He also felt
very betrayed. He had fought hard for the child to have an
opportunity at life away from violence, and the woman wanted to undo
it all by shifting blame, by asserting parental rights, by being
outraged instead of contrite, and now resurfacing like an ugly sea
monster, ready to re-destroy the innocence of the child he had tried
to protect!

Nick was in no mood to feel betrayed by ANYONE.

He lifted his finger accusingly, and curled it angrily back into a
knuckle. He wanted to at least intimidate her into silence, but
realized almost instantly, that sorely tempted as he was, he could not
threaten her with violence. And although he unclenched his hand and
hesitated, his adrenaline took over - he began to shake from the
intensity of his own rising rage. His therapist's words hung over him
like a sticky shadow: "Try telling people about some of your feelings…"

"Look, you unfeeling, uncaring, don't give a shit- about -anybody -but
-yourself WHORE!" he screamed. "Why don't you tell EVERYONE in this
bar just what the HELL you used to sit by and watch him do! Tell them
about how he used to pour acid down her throat, and stuff her mouth
with a rag because she cried too hard - while YOU watched it ALL!"
Nick began to choke.

"Tell – tell – " he began to stammer, and composed himself again:
"Tell everyone how you defended that lowlife in court! - trying to
tell everyone what a good father he was –" He sucked in his breath.
"You're worse than he could ever be! - you DEFENDED him! His voice
now became shrill. "You make me want to vomit!!" His anger not
wholly unleashed even with this invective, Nick spat on the floor in
front of her, before he finally retreated.

Everyone at Paddy's including the waiters were listening and watching,
their attention riveted at the exchange between them.

"Get the hell out of here!!!" bellowed Nick, turning briefly to face
her "Get out before I have you arrested!"

The woman was caught off guard by Nick's fury, and the way he had
somehow commandeered the hostile stares of everyone in the bar in her
direction.

"Yeah…well, what makes YOU so high and mighty?" she sneered, in the
manner of an animal who has flattened its ears and curled its tail
defensively under it.

Clancy, the stocky, wavy-haired bouncer had heard more than enough.
He did not normally intervene until an issue of personal safety had
evidenced itself with an actual physical assault. But he was
disgusted by what he had heard. Watching the woman become subdued by
Nick's words, he felt certain that Nick's accusations were absolutely
correct.

"You are to leave this establishment NOW," he ordered. "You don't come
back, you never walk through that door again–ever! Move it." He
advanced toward her, ready to throw her out bodily if she gave the
slightest resistance. He almost welcomed an excuse from her to do just
that.

Sensing this, she seemed to retreat in fear, not quickly, but she
moved steadily toward the door, and after swinging the door open, she
turned, ready to yell some form of retort back at Nick. On seeing her
about to do this, the bouncer shoved her in the back so hard, she
almost fell forward onto her face.

"I'll sue" she yelled at the bouncer. Everyone in Paddy's heard her
and everyone laughed at this.

"Break her bones, Clancy – we're not paying attention. Matter of
fact, we think we saw her try to jump ya…she started it…" several
patrons called out.

They continued to egg him on, but he did not consider such excess an
option. He would have called the police if anything had gotten
further out of hand.

"We didn't see it," one of the patrons was still yelling.


"May I join you?" asked a rather boxom, medium-length brunette who had
been watching Nick earlier, and jad continued to watch him through
the commotion.

"Er…I really should be going.." answered Nick, feeling self-conscious.
He could see people still watching him out of the corner of their
eyes. He tried gathering up his papers, although clearly too agitated
and distracted to do a good job of it. "Perhaps another time?…" he
offered politely.

"I'm here at least a couple of nights a week. Maybe we'll run into
each other again." she smiled encouragingly, flashing a shy smile
which revealed an even set of teeth.

He smiled weakly. "I come here pretty regularly now, too. Maybe we
will."

"Bye now. By the way, I thought that was very good, the way you stood
up to her!" She waved her fingers a little at him, as he fairly
stumbled away from his chair, making his way to door.

He went to open the car door with his electronic release, but there
was no familiar click. He opened his car door manually with the key,
and threw the briefcase across the seat. He then hopped in and went
to start the ignition. Nothing. Not even a clicking sound.

"Damn!"

He tried one more time. Nothing. Surely it could not be his starter.
He sat there. Finally, he pulled his cell phone from his pocket and
called AMMA for a tow truck.

"We're busy at the moment sir. Waiting time is an hour and ten
minutes approximately."

Nick felt deflated at this news. He wanted to go home and share what
had happened with his father. It was the first in a long time he felt
a strong need to confide in Burton.

Nick sat there. He did not want to go back into the bar. He might as
well wait it out in the car. Put on some music. No music? It was
then that Nick realized his problems were not mechanical. There was
no battery power. He noticed for the first time, he had forgotten
to switch his lights off. Just as the realization struck him, he
noticed the woman from the bar walk by his car. She did not see him.
He watched her as she walked over to a white Mercedes parked about
four cars over from his. As she went to open her car door,she glanced
around briefly – a survival habit – and spotted Nick sitting in his
BMW. He seemed quite unhappy. She smiled at him and waved, and
walked over.

"Something wrong?" she asked.

"Battery's dead." replied Nick.

"Oh. Well I have some cables…do you want a boost?"

"Would you? That would be great…"

A few minutes later after surprisingly little fumbling, Nick's car was
humming again.

"Give it some extra revs" she cautioned "Get the alternator working to
rebuild the charge!"

"You seem to know a lot about it. How much do I owe you?"

"Don't be silly!" she replied. "Oh well, let me see – maybe I
shouldn't be so hasty – maybe you can buy a girl a beer the next time
we meet?"

"Deal!" replied Nick with a smile, grateful to be mobile again so quickly.

He looks so passive and vulnerable, she mused. If I hadn't seen him
get so angry at that woman, I'd think he was a nerdy wuss. I've just
got to stop pigeonholing everyone I see.

_______________________________________________________________


"Nicholas?" asked Burton in surprise, when he picked up the phone. He
was expected one of the principals from Benton & Associates to be
phoning with some questions about the latest counter-proposal they'd
received.

"Hi, Dad. Are you busy?" Nick felt pleased that he had been home and
answered.

"No, not really. I'm just surprised it's you, because you don't
usually call at this time of the evening!"

"No, I guess not. Mind if I swing by for awhile?"

Burton chuckled. "Why, not at all - it'd be nice to see you for a
change, away from the office, and not passing by in a hall!"

"Be there in ten." replied Nick, in a hasty manner.

"Is anything wrong?" Burton thought to ask before Nick ended the call.

"No. Not really." Nick hung up. Had he intimated something was wrong?

Did "not really" mean not really these days? Burton wondered. He
could never keep up with Nick's coded messages. Never figure out what
was really going on, until way after the fact. He only knew that
Lulu's departure had left a huge hole in its wake, and that Nicholas
lately seemed driven to prove himself in every aspect of his work.


"So, Dad, what do you think of this Benton deal? Think we'll be doing
a lot more for them further down the road, or do you think their board
is too--"

"You know as much about it as I do. You've worked with them. What do
you think?"

"I think one of them has got his head on straight, but the other one –
Art – he seems like he's just along for the ride. I can't see him
getting too serious about anything."

"True. He's got a lot of experience to bring to the company, though,
so he may be the guy the other ones go to when they're dealing with
some of their international contacts."

"Hm-.. Tell me something, Dad – just to change the subject."

Here it comes, whatever it is, thought Burton. If I miss it, I'm back
to being dog dung again, for a couple of weeks at least. He waited
patiently for Nick to broach whatever it was that was bothering him.

"When you see a parent really mistreating a kid…" Nick began.

"But I don't really see much of that - fortunately…"

"But you must have seen something really bad at some time or another…"
Nick countered.

"Yeh. There was a worker at the mill. Everyone knew he used to use a
bullwhip on his kids…" Burton replied somberly.

"And no one did anything?"

"It was a little different in those days. Parents had more rights,
control, and more responsibility for their children. Things are more
state-controlled now. In our time, people minded their own business,
their own children" continued Burton stiffly. "If you were a kid and
you got in trouble at school or with neighbours, you'd get in trouble
twice – and you'd get it twice as hard at home!" His brow furrowed and
his gaze became fixed as he said this. It appeared to Nick that he
was recalling some unpleasant disciplining episodes in his own youth.

"So if you saw a kid being mistreated, you'd ignore it?" continued Nick.

"I didn't say that!" said Burton reproachfully.

"What would you do, then?" Nick persisted.

"Well, it depends. How old would the kid be around?"

"A tot."

"I see. Well, that's pretty difficult. Sometimes we'd contact the
priest and he would go and talk to the family…"

"And what if the abuse continued?"

"Call the police. Sometimes the police would have a talk…"

"What if they were neighbours?"

"You're asking me a lot of what-ifs, Nicholas. Did something happen?"

"I had this case in court this afternoon…" Nick went on to describe
the court proceedings.

"My God. What kind of a person does such a thing to a little child!"
asked Burton, genuinely shocked.

"What kind of wretch sits back, watches the whole thing and defends
the person that did it?" asks Nicholas.

"A battered woman. `Battered-woman syndrome'. Isn't that what they
call it?"


"But she could do SOMETHING…" protested Nick.

"But Nicholas, the thing is, they don't know they can. That's the
problem. They really don't know. Sure, they know they can pick up the
phone. But in their minds, it won't make a shred of difference, and
probably make things worse. And a lot of the time they're right."

Nicholas was surprised that his father seemed to have a deeper
understanding and acceptance of the woman's mindset - that he knew
intellectually existed - but found himself unable to accept on any
emotional level.

"This mother came to the bar tonight and started screaming at me,
about her kid." Nick revealed cautiously.

"What'd you do?" asked Burton nervously, concerned about Nick's
possible role. He knew him to have an uncommonly bad temper when
deeply provoked.

"I screamed back. Then the bouncer threw her out."

"Good thing you didn't hit her" commented Burton. "Then she would
make her fucked up world, your fucked up world!"

"Like Shannon did to you," said Nick a little disdainfully,
remembering how he had warned his father away from doing legal battle
with Shannon's father, and what Burton's response had been.

"Yeah!" Burton rubbed his chin, very displeased at the memory.

"I don't hit women, Dad" added Nick. "You know that."

"I know you don't, son. And you don't want to start for any reason.
It's a very bad thing." Burton affirmed, relieved that Nick had
inherited this important value of his.

"But if anyone qualified…" Nick reflected on how upset he had been
when the woman had tried to twist everything against Nick when he was
already very upset about the whole situation.

"Heard from Lulu?"

"We were having a good conversation, Dad." Nick's voice trailed off
to a whisper.

"Sorry, son…"


 
Paddy's on the Rocks – Part II


"Paddy's on the Rocks!" yelled the waiter to the aging bartender, who
was bent down and largely out of view behind the bar.

Nick looked up from his notes a few moments later, and was surprised
to see a waiter advancing toward his table with a drink containing a
swizzle stick, which judging by the pungency of its smell even at a
distance, clearly had contained a lot of alcohol.

"Ah…I didn't order this…" said Nick, feeling irritated at the
temptation of a stiff drink. He felt as if he could have used one
right then.

"That's right, lad. You've got an admirer over yonder…" answered the
waiter in a bit of a brogue, shifting the glass to an available
coaster and moving it away from where it was likely to perspire onto
Nick's notes.

A broad, sparkling white-toothed smile greeted Nick, as he looked
further across the room to learn the identity of his benefactor.

"I didn't think I was ever going to see that beer…" she said
playfully, with just a hint of somberness underlying the crease
lines around her almond-shaped, but penetrating amber eyes. It had
been about three weeks since he had seen her in the parking lot,
when she had saved him from a long wait. "Please – come over."
Nick replied penitently. "I'm sorry, but I can't be…I'm allergic to
alcohol" he lied.

"Allergic? Goodness – I'm so very sorry. It was presumptuous of me
not to ask you first if the drink was welcome," she said with genuine
concern. There was a bit of disappointment that she had hoped to
politely conceal, too.

"Please drink this for me," Nick encouraged her. " I'll order my usual
version of a `Shirley Temple'. What's in a `Paddy's-on-the-Rocks' by
the way?' Curiosity had got the better of him, as he started to pile
and shift his notes aside to make room for them at his table.

"Very little ice, and heavy on the other." she answered cryptically,
not wanting to reveal the secret immediately.

Nick smiled in spite of himself. "You come in here a lot?" He
noticed her hands for the first time. Even clasped, he noted a
slender grace to their shape that he found attractive.

"Not really – just when I have a bad workday." she said with a look of
barely masked chagrin.

"If I came in here every time I had a bad workday, I could set up
residency here." commented Nick in a subdued voice.

"It often looks like you have," she answered, in a natural,
uncensored way. There was some undefinable, sexy undercurrent to
her sultry, smooth voice that insinuated itself into Nick's psyche
and made him subconsciously coil and move forward.

"That sounded like a lot of self-pity, didn't it?" interjected Nick,
slightly furrowing his brows to communicate his contrition in as
close to an apology for his apparent boorishness as he was able to
muster. She definitely looked less buoyant than the first time he
had seen her. "You have a demanding employer?" he asked, unconsciously
trusting that she would open up to him first, allowing him to choose
his level of self-disclosure from a more secure vantage point.

"Underfunding can make a cruel `employer'," she stated flatly. "I'm a
locum social worker." His eyes widened and he blinked encouragingly
for her to continue. "The state has now decided full-time social
workers are too expensive, so they have a lot more scaled back to
part-time, and then they hire locums–floating social workers–to try
and pick up the pieces of devastation left in the wake of this new
policy." She rubbed her watch absently as if it chafed her, and stared
at him. He deduced that she was more troubled over what she had said
that her impassive expression face would indicate.

Nick nodded vigorously. Her bad days were something he could much
more easily identify with than two years ago, when he had scarcely
appreciated some of the hidden savagery that went on within the same
world he used to inhabit with blinders on – the one that included
physical and mental cruelty to a shocking number of society's more
defenseless members.

"You guys have a very tough, thankless job. I see the way some of the
families are when you guys try to become part of the solution."


"I appreciate where you're coming from, Nick – but unless I want to
accomplish the impossible, break the law and get fired, I have to
tell you –" she leaned forward conspiratorially, "my job is
disgustingly easy. Really! I push paper, do home interviews, and try
to keep the case files moving. I'm out of a job if I don't – I'm an
overpaid bureaucrat. It's not what I thought it would be, when I went
into this field. But plain and simply, I'm an overpaid paper pusher
who gets to leave her desk with its endless phone calls to de-listed
numbers once in awhile, to make house or agency visits – and maybe
taxi clients out of a situation." She barely paused for a breath,
and then looked at him almost challengingly: "How hard is that!?" Then
catching herself "– Listen to me," her mouth turned down, "Shop
talking already! I can be a real bore when I try hard. I'm sorry."
She looked at him, embarassed, wondering what he was thinking.

Instinctively, protectively, Nick moved his hand closer to hers. He
cautiously stopped short of actual contact, however. An
imperceptible wall of indifference went up suddenly, and he looked
away. She sensed the change in him.

"Are you going to tell me now what's in a `Paddy'?" He eventually
turned his head back to her, sounding a bit more playful now.

She laughed for the first time. It was a laugh of relief, since she
had found herself feeling stuck.

"They use a generous amount of whiskey, rum, and then…" The words
poured out of her like clean water out of a spring, it seemed to Nick.

"My name's Nick, by the way, Nick Fallin. You are…?"

"Keira. Keira Farrell" she replied, returning his handshake, noting
the dry warmth of his skin.

Her name sounds like water–just like her voice, Nick thought. The
conversation began to flow easily between them.

A half hour passed quickly as they chatted. Nick realized he had to
go. He had promised to taxi his father to a late meeting while
Burton's car was out for servicing. His father did not like to try
navigating Pittsburgh's busy streets with courtesy cars, particularly
in the dark.

"I…ah.."

Rising, he began to gather his papers and explain his departure to
her. She said to him warmly, "Well, Nick, I see you're on your way.
It was nice talking to you. Intelligent conversation is a rare
commodity in these parts."

"The feeling's mutual!" replied Nick. As he continued packing his
papers away into his briefcase, and was about to ask for her phone
number, he looked up and noticed that she had turned away already,
although she had not moved. Something else very obviously held her
attention and was not letting go. He followed her gaze to the doorway
and saw a tall, wiry man standing just inside it, staring at her.

"I've got to go! See you again!" She rushed away quickly, her coat
fluttering with the haste of her movements, and seemed to disappear
almost instantly into the inner recesses of the bar. It left Nick
feeling baffled and unsettled.

~ ~ ~

"The meeting was called off son. They just called to cancel. Sorry
you had to come down here for nothing." Burton looked
uncharacteristically anxious.

"Problems?" inquired Nick, responding to the look on his father's face
and the nuances in his voice, instead of the carefully chosen words.

"I saw the ophthalmic surgeon today. He says there's more vessel
bleeding in the back of my eyes–he wants to try a new thing."

"No more laser?" asked Nick apprehensively, wondering what the "new"
thing entailed.

"No. Actually, he wants to try some experimental drugs on me.
They're supposed to do a really good job, but –" Burton paused, his
worry lines seeming to have increased since he started talking.

"But what?" Burton was making Nick very nervous.

"There could be side effects – they haven't tested the drugs
thoroughly yet. Don't ask me, Nicholas. They don't know what side
effects – that's the whole problem. Could be anything."

"You're going to try it?" Nick would have been surprised if Burton
had refused to go along.

"Yeah, I think I am." Burton was a believer in modern technology and
medicine, more so than Nick. Nick knew what jerkoffs two of his
boarding school classmates who had gone on to med school, had been.
He would have been loath to allow them to experiment on him!

"Good luck!"

"Just be ready to play cabdriver a bit more for your old man, eh?"
Burton winked at him, trying to downplay the seriousness of the situation.

"Whenever, Dad." Nick answered, relieved that Burton seemed more
relaxed about the prospect than he had been earlier in their
conversation.

"Here's some gas money for..."

"It's okay, Dad. It's nothing. I came here from Paddy's."

"Paddy's? I thought you liked it at the Incline?" Burton was
surprised that Nick was not hanging out with his LSP gang. "I used to
hang out at Paddy's a few years back. They don't skim you on the
ounces like some of them–good business there, actually. Been there a
long time too. I used to be friends with the owner, whathisname?…er–"

"Washburn?"

"That's it – Patrick Washburn. Helluva scrapper when he got mad."

Nick was going to ask his father if he knew what a `Paddy's on the
Rocks' was so he could find out if the drink had been around since
Patrick's time, but he was suddenly feeling tired. "I better be
going," he announced.

"Thanks again, Nicholas – you drive carefully now. I'll need your eyes
for a few years yet!"

Nick smiled. A few years ago, he would have been offended. But it
was dawning on him that his time with his father was not infinite.
His father was not a young man. The words of a young LSP client–an
orphan–had gripped Nick the first time his young charge had uttered
them in Nick's LSP office, and at that moment they echoed in his
mind again:

"You only get one set of real parents. Mine got used up early. I
wish I could have at least one of them still…even just a little bit…it
would be more than enough for the times when it gets really bad!"

But it was typical of Nick that his face gave no clue to his inner
thoughts. All he said was, "Night, Dad."

~.~

It was Saturday, and although Nick had planned to attend a baseball
game with Jesse, for whom he had been guardian ad litem and
remained occasional baseball buddy, it had been raining cats and
dogs all day. He called him to postpone.

"Aw geeze – I was hoping that darn rain would stop!"

"We'll figure something out for next Saturday, okay, Jess?"

"Ok, Nick. I know it's not your fault."

Nick hopped in his car and headed for Paddy's. He would rather
surround himself with a bit of noise, than…

"Face it, Fallin – you want to see if Keira will show up." he
interjected this admission onto his self-deceptive thinking processes.
He hammered the reality side of himself into his wishful-thinking
part, even further. "She has better things to do on her Saturday
night. She has a life, unlike you."

About twenty minutes after he buried himself in a law article that had
more entertainment than research value, he spied her walking in. She
wore a sepia raincoat and was soon busy folding up a rusty tartan
umbrella after she came through the door. Her dark hair was wet and
tangled, despite the fact she had brought her umbrella, so fierce
were the winds that day. She did not glance his way. He buried
himself in his journal, pretending not to notice her arrival.

"Oh hi, Nick! Fancy meeting you here on a night like this! I figured
you for painting the town with your corporate colleagues!" Keira said
with an easy smile.

"Seeking refuge after a cancelled baseball game!" replied Nick, glad
for the opportunity to present a planned evening gone awry to her,
rather than looking like he had nowhere to go.

"Watchya reading?" she asked interestedly.

"Just badly written legal gossip." replied Nick, closing his book,
pleased for the excuse to abandon it

"You ARE a bad case of not leaving work behind! This is no darn good!"

"It's not work, really." protested Nick.

"Oh, really?" she said mockingly, as if she thought she was having
someone pull the wool over her eyes. "So where's your `Shirley Temple'?"

Nick changed the subject.

"Do you live far from here, Keira?"

"Why do you ask?" She was wondering where Nick was coming from on this.

"It seems like you are here fairly regularly. Thought you might live
close by."

"And if I did or didn't, what difference does it make exactly?"

"Nothing really." Nick retreated from his line of inquiry. Clearly he
had stepped over some line.

"What about you?" Kiera asked, putting the question squarely back on
his side of the table.

"I'm about a ten-minute drive away. I usually come from work to here."

"But not tonight."

"Not tonight."

Somehow the conversation had gotten turned around from Nick's comfort
zone. He did not know what to say now, or if he should say anything.

"You look tense." commented Kiera.

"You could say that." Nick replied.

"Hope it's not because of me."

"I think it's a mix of things."

"I don't mean to pry. Just tell me about the part I contributed to!"

"You don't mince words, do you?" said Nick, slightly averting his eyes
from her gaze.

"Waste of time, Nick. I'm almost forty, and I'm figuring out that
beating around the bush can use up a lot of a person's time, you know?"

"Beating around the bush can also buy a person time."

"Never thought of it like that. I suppose you're right." There was
that sexy lilt to her voice again. He could not have described it
to anyone, but it was almost palpable. There was something so healthy
and wholesome about her. And something that made him uncommonly
nervous. And he could not describe that to anyone easily, either."

"Well, are you going to answer my question, or buy yourself some more
time?"

"Truthfully, I'm having a hard time putting things into words." He
felt self-conscious. "I'm not very verbal about certain kinds of
things – I'm more of – an analytical communicator I guess."

"I think you're beating around the bush, and doing a good job of
buying time."

"I think I was just trying to take a measure of you."

"Testing me?"

"Yes, I suppose – something like that."

"Testing me for what?"

"To see how available you would make yourself."

"And where did I fall on your chart of availability?"

"Not so available."

"As available as whom?"

"I'm not comparing to you anyone."

"C'mon Nick – surely you're capable of a bit more straightforwardness
than that!"

"I guess I'm not. I'm pretty closed up, so I'm told." He allowed her
to see a hint of an embarrassed smile. "I'm just the one to keep you
on the straight and narrow, then. I'm so closed up they call me the
`walking vault'," she announced.

"You're telling me you're the same?" Nick doubted she was like him.

"You better believe it," she said fervently.

"You seem open." Nick was skeptical.

"Maybe some counseling moves left over from grad school, but I don't
tell people diddleysquat. They could burn me at the stake for
witchery for all I care. Put me on the rack – mum's the word"

"You'd make a good spy, then."

"How do you know I'm not one?' she chuckled for the first time,
realising she had unbalanced him even more than he had done to her
initially.

"Good point. You know, I never got the chance to ask you last time
for your phone number. I wanted to call you up and see if…"

"And what would you be doing with my phone number?" she challenged
almost accusingly.

Nick did not expect this kind of a response.

"Nothing…I…"

She passed him a red match pack, which he opened. It had her name and
number handwritten on the inside. He noted as he closed it, that the
outside of the match pack had something written on it as well. He
squinted in the dim light to see it. It read: "For Nick."

He looked up, surprised to find her smiling warmly at him.

He could not suppress his delight at this, unselfconsciously returning
her smile with a broad one of his own. She got up then, pecked him on
the cheek quickly, and disappeared out of the door without so much as
a goodbye.
 
Paddy's on the Rocks – Part III


"The number you have dialed is no longer in service."

The monotone recording in Nick's ear, left him feeling puzzled.
After concluding that another Saturday of looking up case law was a
silly idea, he had worked up enough nerve to call Keira, only to
discover now that her line had been disconnected. About to shove his
cell back into his pocket, he stopped himself.

Maybe I misdialed? he conjectured. He re-punched the digits,
scrutinizing the match packet writing a little more closely – is that
seven, instead of a one, he wondered? He studied it carefully and
dialed the alternate number to his first call. After two rings, he
heard a "clear-as-rainwater"female voice greet his ears - very loudly.

"If you don't leave me the hell alone...!!"

"Keira?" Nick was more than surprised at the unexpected antagonism.
His voicing of her name was many notes higher, in placation, than he
normally spoke.

"Ah - hello?...who is this?" she answered, shocked to hear a voice
other than the expected one.

"It's Nick Fallin - have I called at a bad time?" aware of how silly
he had been to assume her yelling had anything remotely to do with
him.

"Nick Fallin? Oh." She was momentarily lost for words. "I'm very
sorry, Nick! I guess you can tell I was thinking it was someone
else?" Nick was pleased to hear her voice soften dramatically. "So
sorry!" she repeated. "No, it's fine - I'm glad to hear a voice I
want to hear. Do go ahead."

Nick's composure returned.

"I have a young charge who I have promised a dinner to, and I
wondered if you would be interested in joining us? And then after
dinner when I drop him off, we could maybe go to see one of the
Cinema in the Park movies together?"

"I think I would like to join you…yes. Have to tell you though, I
have some food allergies – nuts and peanut oil - things like that."
She paused for a moment and then continued, "- I like those Cinema
under the Stars things – nice night for it."

"I have to confess, I've never been to one. Pick you up at –? "

"Why don't I meet you at Paddy's? I'll wait outside."

"Er…okay," he replied a little off-balance. "Five-thirty sound okay?"

"Five-thirty's fine."

~ ~ ~

Nick and Jesse pulled up to the curb outside Paddy's a few minutes
early, and waited.

"What does she look like, Nick?" asked Jesse, excited that their
dinner was going to be a threesome.

"Well, she's…got dark, brown hair…maybe 5'4, 5'5"…maybe a pinkish
brown raincoat..." answered Nick thoughtfully. After some moments of
further reflection he added, "And strange-colored eyes."

"There's a woman coming down the road!" Jesse exclaimed. Even from
quite a distance, on spotting her medium-length, slightly wavy dark
hair, Nick was pretty certain it was Keira. She walked briskly, and
he noted she wore a nicely tailored, blue summer coat. An
indefinable sensual quality accompanied her movements, as she
walked. She looked up toward where they sat, and recognising the BMW
and realizing it was Nick, she waved and smiled at him. Nick briefly
wondered why she hadn't just driven her Mercedes there. But he was
slowly getting used to the fact that Keira was still a very unknown
quantity to him, even though he felt drawn to her. There was still
not the easy familiarity that had followed from working alongside
Lulu every day, knowing her habits, and the two of them knowing
people in common. He missed that. But he did his best to not let
his nostalgia or shyness best him, as he returned her smile. Jumping
out, he went to open the door for her. She eased herself into the
front seat gracefully and allowed Nick to close the door for her.

"Hello?" she said in a friendly manner, turning to Jesse sitting in
the back seat, waiting for someone to speak first.

"Hi! I'm Jesse, Nick was my guardian ad litem, which means –" he
spoke quickly and eagerly, as if wanting to recount his life story to
her in three sentences.

"Pleased to meet you Jesse! And I'm Keira." She reached over to
shake his hand. "I'm someone's guardian, too – not ad litem, but -"

"Wow! Really? How old is she? Or he?" Jesse added, just in case he
had miscalculated.

"She's fourteen and a half." answered Keira

"Cool! I'd like to meet her sometime." Jesse said, his enthusiasm
for their supper gathering even more intense than before. He pulled
himself forward eagerly by clutching the edge of her car seat..

Nick smiled as he put the car into gear.

"Ah, Jess? – you need to put your seatbelt back on now," cautioned
Nick.

Jessie buckled up obediently. He was too happy for words. He also
loved riding in Nick's car because Nick was willing to speed things
up for them on low-traffic roads.

"You're someone's guardian?" Nick asked Keira, curious about the
situation.

"Yes. It's a recent thing, really. I've only had her with me a few
months. It's a joint custody arrangement, where her father is in the
picture some of the time. I decided to take it on until she's ready
to be on her own -."

"Nick, you missed the turn!!" shouted Jesse.

Sure enough, Nick had bypassed the intersection turn which would have
taken them directly to their destination.

"Where are we going, by the way?" asked Keira, curious about where
they were headed for.

"He's taking us to one of those "fifties" places – you know – where
they have the big sodas and shakes?" Jesse interjected quickly,
answering for Nick.

"Is that okay, Keira – will it be a problem for your allergies?"
asked Nick.

"I'm sure it will be fine – most of those places don't use peanut
oil, I don't believe."

Nick realised then, that he hadn't thought it through very carefully –
even the possibility of allergic foods was not a good thing.

"Would you like to suggest a place?" asked Nick, wanting to be as
accommodating as possible.

"Oh, no!" replied Keira. "Most places have lots of things I can
eat. I just have to interrogate the waiters and cooks to be on the
safe side, is all. It can be a little uncomfortable for my fellow
diners, because I can't afford the luxury of accepting `I don't
know' as an answer from them."

"We're used to interrogating people around here, aren't we, Jesse?"
Nick said, grinning.

"Yup!" he nodded in agreement.

"Used to it?"

"Yeah! Nick - I'm going to tell her about the shooting, okay?"

Before Nick had an opportunity to open his mouth, Jesse had launched
into the story of that fateful day when a disgruntled father had
entered LSP wielding a gun, and how Jesse had been shot trying to
save everyone.

"And then I wound up in a coma...some people thought I was never
gonna be able to talk again..."

"Jesse saved some lives that day – very likely mine" commented Nick,
finally participating in the conversation, now that Jesse had left an
opening.

"Wow! What an unbelievable story, guys! If I hadn't seen that woman
accost you at the bar, I'd even wonder about the veracity of such a
thing...I don't know why I would, though..." Keira added
reflectively. "It's not like I haven't seen some bad things on my
own work travels…"

"What's "veracity" mean?" asked Jesse.

"Truthfulness." aswered Keira.

~ ~ ~

"Would any of you care for a drink? - We serve alcoholic beverages as
well." ther waiter asked them, when they had finished their burgers –
he had forgotten to ask them before their meal.

Nick waited for Keira to respond. She shook her head, to signal
refusal..

"Uh, no thanks, not for me" answered Nick.

"Aw – c'mon Nick – I wanted to try some!" Jesse urged him.

"You're not old enough to drink, Jesse!" answered Nick, starting to
panic a little. He had let Jesse conspiratorially have a sip of a
beer that Nick had drunk one evening, on a night when Lulu's loss
weighed heavily on him. He sorely hoped that Jesse was not going to
mention it now.

"You let me have a sip of yours last time, Nick!" pouted Jesse,
dashing Nick's hopes at being spared exposure.

"I thought you were allergic!" Keira spun around and glared at Nick,
picking up on the conflicting information instantly. She felt stupid
at having been conned, and resented it at the same time.

But she didn't feel as stupid as Nick.

"I…" sputtered Nick as his eyes narrowed guiltily.

"You lied." said Keira. "And you know, Nick, I just don't have time
for stupidity. It was nice meeting you, but I really should be
moving on now." With that, she got instantly got up, eased out of
the booth, and headed quickly for the door.

"Wait!" cried Nick, running for the door after her. `Let me explain!"
Nick panted, almost out of breath from his hard bolt to catch up with
her.

"What's to explain? – obviously you drink, and obviously you lied to
hide that fact." she retorted.

"I'm really sorry – I just wanted to avoid a complicated answer – and
a big admission to have to make to a stranger!"

"I'm listening." Keira expected a poor answer – she had heard
every "fall-off-the-wagon" excuse in the book.

Nick hesitated.

"You see? You don't even want to be up front even now!" she fumed.

"I'm a probationer - I'm not supposed to having alcohol until my
probation is through."

"You're a drunk that's sneaking drinks then!" disappointed and
annoyed that Nick was obviously a regressing alcoholic – most likely
charged with drunk and disorderly, as this was a common probationary
charge.

"No. I'm a "cokehead" who sneaks the occasional drink." The
information was somewhat mollifying.

"Do you sneak the occasional snort too?"

"No." he answered, suddenly feeling sick.

"What's the matter?" asked Keira. She could see a ghastly pallor
overtake him.

"I don't know." Nick replied. He turned and bolted for the washroom,
but did not make it. His vomit spewed out of him like a projectile,
and landing on the floor in front of the washroom door.

"Nick!" Jesse ran over to him. "Nick, I feel sick too," Jesse
whined. Keira noticed Jesse was also perspiring, looking as pale as
Nick.

"Keira, can you drive?" asked Jesse, suddenly taking charge of the
situation while Nick continued to sway unsteadily, even while
crouched and doubled-over. "I think it was those burgers…"

~ ~ ~

"Cheese" said the emergency physician. We've had five cases of
people eating bad cheese this evening. "Drink plenty of fluids and
wait it out."

Keira had eaten her burger without cheese.

Nick felt another wave of nausea hit him.

"Are you okay to walk to the car, Nick?" asked Keira sympathetically.

"Uh.." was all he managed, when he began to heave again. "In a few
minutes, maybe…" he eked out the words weakly.

"Would you like me to drive Jesse home, and come back and get you
after?" Keira asked him?

Still grimacing.Nick managed to rifle through his pocket, and
immediately handed her the keys,

"You just take it easy, Nick! I'll be back in an hour." She
escorted Jesse out of the Emergency area and back to the parking lot.


~ ~ ~

Three quarters of an hour later, Keira returned to the Emergency
unit. She discovered Nick sitting upright, in the admissions
waiting room, reading a business magazine. He looked pale, but more
collected than when she'd left him.

"Feeling better?" asked Keira with a tone of concern.

"How's Jesse?" asked Nick uneasily.

"He's feeling a little woozy, still. But not like you. You obviously
had the worst piece of cheese!" commented Keira.

"Don't know if I'll be able to look another cheeseburger in the bun
again!" quipped Nick ruefully. "Thanks for taking him back for me."

"Are you going to sue them?" asked Keira with interest.

"Hadn't thought about it." answered Nick thoughtfully "But now that
you mention it, I should probably call the Health Department -"

"The doctor will have alerted the Department of Health." Keira
said. "Do you need a wheelchair, or some help to get to your feet?"

"No, I'm okay now. I think I'll last till I get home - I got a bag
from the nurse, in case I don't."

Keira drove him home, neither of them speaking about anything other
than traffic directions.

"I want to thank you for your help, Keira," Nick said when she had
turned the corner onto his street. "And I'm sorry."

"Nothing to be sorry, for." she said guardedly. "But if you want to
get to know me better, Nick, no more lies." Her no-nonsense tone was
not unexpected.

"No more lies," he echoed, again feeling like a fool, but relieved
that things were not over between them. "And thanks again for
driving us home."

"Consider it nothing." She gave him a small smile.

Nick pulled out his cell phone to call a cab for Keira to take her
home - wherever that was.

"Thanks, Nick." She opened the passenger door for him and when he
emerged, she unexpectedly pecked him on the cheek, as she had done on
a previous evening.

"I'll wait on the curb. You go on in!" she patted him on the
arm. "'G'night now!"

Feeling far less than wonderful, Nick did not argue.
 
 
Paddy's on the Rocks – Part IV

"Look Connolly, for the last time, I told you to stop calling. We've
got nothing to talk about! You and I are not a "we". We haven't
been a "we" for a very long time. You know this and aren't accepting
it. You've got to give up this obsession. It's about not getting
what you think you can't have, and not about what you really want –
the only damn reason you're really calling!" With that, Keira slammed
the phone down. Again.

Justin Connolly had been pestering her sporadically for two years
whenever he got drunk – usually on holiday weekends and Christmases,
whenever his work did not keep him busy enough to stay out of
trouble. He would call her and start whining, and garnering no
sympathy from her, he would then become belligerent. He felt she
owed him something.

She had had her number changed twice, but some member of her family
would take pity on him, and capitulate to his pleas. She no longer
even gave them her number, so anxious was she to be rid of him.

A registered, practicing psychologist until some of his patients had
filed formal complaints about his arriving inebriated at his sessions
with them, Justin Connolly had eventually had his license suspended.
With a serious decline in income following this catastrophic event,
he no longer enjoyed the prestigious power of his practice from which
to impress and pursue members of the opposite sex. He was in better
times a charming man, but with little self control. That fact should
have been obvious to Keira from the start, because Keira had started
out as his client. She had been going through "burnout" - the
occupational hazard of self-protective indifference that she and many
of her peers working in the helping professions were subject to when
they had worked with hundreds of clients over a long period of time.
She had gone then to Justin, to receive counseling for this – to get
help with remaining sensitized to her clients.

Justin Connolly had been a good listener. Keira's guard had been
down when he had orchestrated their appointments over the occasional
lunch to accommodate her hectic schedule – for which he then cleverly
shifted them over time, to the occasional dinner and eventually into
a local bar not far from Paddy's. It was always over drinks, and
always at his suggestion. The move into her arms, her bed, and
finally her apartment, was typically Connolly. It had his "After all,
I'm doing her a favor!" rationalized attitude stamped all over it .
Never mind that Keira had been dating someone else at the time.

His serpentine progression into her life had occurred over a period
of months and a good many "one for the road"s, at a time when Keira
had been very lonely after the death of her husband and not without
her vulnerabilities. Being privy to her secret emotional world,
Justin had known exactly how to exploit them.

The phone rang a third time that morning. She ignored it. It was
the safest way she knew, to salvage what good mood was left of the
morning. She let the answering machine pick up the call.

"Hello, Keira. It's Nick. Hadn't seen you for awhile. Wondered if
you still wanted to try "Cinema in the –"

Keira snatched up the phone.

"Nick!?"

"Oh – you're there.."

"Hi Nick! How's it going?" Keira did her best to sound casual,
seriously doubting that she had managed that.

Nick wondered why it had taken so long to answer, and why she sounded
strange. But not enough to stall him from securing a Friday evening
with her. This was all to the good, as he was not looking forward to
another evening at Paddy's, or hamburger joints, any time soon.

~ ~ ~

They sat in his car, discussing the possibilities:

"They seem to have a few locations, and a few shows. What type of
show do you generally like?"

"Dramas. Intelligent plots. – you?" Keira replied unhesitatingly.

Nick felt relieved on hearing this. He was not into comedies, or
anything he tended to regard as silly. Most public entertainments as
far as Nick was concerned, bordered on silly.

"The same - here's the lineup." He drew closer to her and offered
her the list he had downloaded from his home laptop.

"Have you seen "John Q"?" she asked, after mentally writing off the
James' Bond flick.

"No." He looked at her, asking "Good?"

"Haven't seen it, but I hear it's good." said Keira, studying him
closely for how interested he seemed, but found herself unable to
gauge him. " Denzel Washington's in it, and most people think he's
pretty good, too." she added for good measure.

"'John Q', it is then." Nick was glad he knew nothing about it. He
generally avoided movies or live plays because of their sheer
predictability. He pulled away from the curb and they headed out to
Arsenal Park, saying little enroute. Nick enjoyed the quiet company
as he drove – and he liked to drive. Keira enjoyed the adventure of
being with an obviously intelligent, well-bred mystery man - of not
knowing what the evening might bring. And of experiencing something
beyond Connolly's small, suffocating world for a change. Keira had
noticed the difference immediately being around Nick – an entirely
different man. She did not experience any of those feelings of
suffocation she had felt very early on with Connolly. Because
Connolly had called the day before, forcing his brand of energy onto
her psyche, she felt almost compelled mentally to make such a
comparison.

"Makes you want you to get lawless, eh?" commented Keira, when the
hero of the film, John, took control of some doctors at gunpoint, in
an attempt to save his child.

"Yeah" replied Nick, very engrossed with what would happen next.
Both were finding the movie cathartic. "But I think they would have
gassed him out by now, in real life" speculated Nick. "Someone
would have."

Keira noticed him now leaned forward in his seat, his muscles lean
and tense as he watched. Like a jaguar, Keira thought. "Assuming a
quick response." she replied. Based on bitter experience, she had no
faith in EMS or swat team response times. And she doubted they
would have subjected John Q's prisoners to this either.

Nick said nothing, wondering if Keira was right. Surely someone
would have rousted John Q?!

Like all absorbing movies, it seemed to end quickly. The air had
cooled. Keira began to shiver. It would have been the right moment
for Nick to offer his coat, or to put his arm around Lulu at this
point. But she was not Lulu.

"That first night that I saw you at Paddy's…" Nick asked.

Keira looked at him in surprise. "You mean the night you were busy
being allergic to alcohol?" she teased a little.

"Yeah, that night." Nick was so focused on the question he was about
to ask, he did not even bristle at the reminder.

"Yes?"

"I saw this guy looking at you. Is he a friend?" Nick assumed he
wasn't but was trying to approach his curiosity about the man with
some delicacy.

"No." Keira tried to gather herself to explain without going into
any real detail. "He's a man from my past, who sometimes doesn't
like to stay there."

"Near past?" Nick asked this in a more lawyerly tone, which put
Keira on edge a little.

"No, Nick." She did not elaborate further. "What about you? Going
with anyone else right now?"

Nick gulped. She had done it again. Turned things around on him.

"N-no."

"You don't sound sure."

He measured his words. "There was somebody. But it's been months."

"You still hoping?"

"Make a deal with you…" grinned Nick sheepishly. "Let's talk about
John Q…"

"What kind of a deal?"

He suddenly leaned forward to kiss her, but she instantly drew away.
He re-opened his half-closed eyes and looked at her in surprise, his
pupils shrinking in fear.

"What kind of a deal?" she repeated.

"What's past is past." he replied, shivering, while he waited for her
response.

"I'll do my best." she answered softly. She seemed to invite him to
try again.

"Me too." he answered. He leaned forward again, more slowly this
time. But as she felt his warmth descend toward her, she panicked
and drew away from him. She did not feel ready, in spite of even
having hoped things would come to this. The subject of Connolly had
overshadowed her earlier mood and managed to douse the small flames
that had been burning in her earlier during the movie. She was not
ready.

"I'm sorry. . ." he said. "Maybe I'm rushing things." He was in
fact, a little relieved. He did not want to move too quickly, and
habit would have led him to do just that this evening. In fact, he
was more than a little relieved.

"Don't be. I appreciate the compliment." she said pleasantly. "Shall
we go for a coffee or a nightcap?"

"Coffee. Yeah. Some hot coffee." Nick put the beamer into gear and
did a smooth U-turn out of the parking lot. After a few moments, he
turned to look at Keira's profile. She seemed to know how to handle
people. How to handle him. He wondered how many men she had had in
her life. Then he wondered how he would feel about any of the
possible answers. He realized no answer would have satisfied him.
He had not quite yet come to the realization of how much he was
beginning to want her approval. Or whether she was good for him or
not. His head hurt trying to think about it. It was easier for him
to think of where the best coffee shop was on the way home. It was
something he knew how to deal with, with some certainty.

"Americano" coming up!


~ ~ ~
Paddy's on the Rocks – Part V

The morning sun shone through her kitchen window. Keira was thinking
about Nick as she cleared the table, cleaning the scraps off the
breakfast dishes. Her foster daughter tended to pick at her food a
lot, always eating less than what she was served, and leaving much of
it untouched. It had been about five days since Nick and she had
been on their movie date. She had not heard from him. She wondered
if perhaps she should call him. After careful consideration, she was
reluctant to do this. He was probably very embroiled in his work,
and she would only be interrupting. Or perhaps he had expected more
than a coffee to end off a second date, after the way she had
initiated things between them initially. She missed his maleness,
and his genteel manner already - maybe she was just too shy to handle
any possible rejection - would he consider an evening of videos
dull? No doubt. Scratch that idea.

Looking up at the clock, she saw it was already after eight and felt
a bit of shock. Her thoughts about Nick had slowed her pace
considerably, as there yet a lot to do, before leaving for work. To
begin with, she had not even scouted her closet for an appropriate
outfit to wear to work. Second-guessing Nick's silence had been a
time-costly activity.

"I'm going with my friends after school to watch the boys play
hockey, and then I'll be home around five, okay?!" It was the voice
of her foster daughter as she blurted this out and ran out of the
door so quickly that Keira could not even acknowledge her itinerary,
let alone review it with her. She saw only streaks of long blond
hair flit quickly past the window.

Taking on a teenager meant, among other things Keira was learning,
keeping one's wits about oneself. The "honeymoon" phase – the term
some social workers used to describe the first 21 days between new
foster child and new foster parent together - was apparently
now "very over". But Keira was not sorry for her decision to take
her young charge in. Foster-parenting to this point, had been a
rewarding experience which she would have recommended wholeheartedly
to anyone who would have asked her. She wondered how she would feel
a year down the line – she already found the idea of their eventual
separation an alien thought.

~ ~ ~

When Keira arrived at work, she found among her stack of telephone
messages, a note to "Call Jesse!". She struggled mentally to place
the name but found herself unable to. It sounded very familiar,
however.



"Hello? Keira Farrell returning your call. Am I speaking with
Jesse?"

"One moment, Ms. Farrell." There was a muffling of the receiver and
a muffled shout of "Jesse! Telephone!". A few moments passed.

"Hello? Jesse speaking!" announced a loud, youthful voice.

"E...Jesse – Jesse who I ate hamburgers with?" Keira was momentarily
taken aback, recognising the voice more than the name.

"Yeah! It was a cheeseburger – I had a cheeseburger – but close
enough - it's me."

"How are you? What can I do for you, Jesse? - How did you know my
number, by the way?"

"Well, I called Nick and he was on his way into court and he was
really busy, so he told me to try and get ahold of you about my idea
for all of us – if that's okay?! And you gave me your number the
night I felt like puking, remember?"

"Oh. Yes, I do remember." It would have something she would have done
for a sick boy, although she did not recollect this exactly. "Well,
Nick's really a busy man, isn't he?" she commented a little
facetiously, but not enough for Jesse to pick up on her tone.

"He's always busy! He's got a lot of kids he has to help out on
account of his probation. And then he does a lot of stuff for his
dad – I used to work there, you know – and he does these big
business deals - you know, I'm going to be a lawyer too, after I get
back to college? Well, anyway, there's this computer camp..."

Jesse still hadn't paused for a real breath, and Keira had to listen
closely to stay tuned into his thought processes. In a way however,
listening to Jesse was more than worth ten minutes of her time even
though he threatened to intrude into her heavily scheduled morning.

"- and so like I was saying, there's this computer camp where kids
can go for a day and learn how to do Internet research for school and
personal growth, and look for good colleges, and use dictionaries and
encyclopaedias online and –"

Keira interrupted. "When is it, Jesse, and how much does it cost?"

"It's FREE!" he fairly yelled into the phone, "and your foster
daughter can come! And Nick is gonna come, and you should come too
because they're going to give out free educational software and…and –
and that software so kids can't go on porn sites - of course, Nick
won't care about that but, but, I think it would be good for the four
of us and - and it's the Saturday after this one, ah, and it's, it's -
at the Carnegie - Carnegie College computer lab - but there's only
room for 75 kids and 20 adults so we need to get registered fast and –
"

Keira felt she had to interrupt him a second time. "It sounds great,
Jesse! But I'll need the registration phone number and if you talk
to Nick first, tell him to call so we can coordinate this all, okay?"

"That's means we're going, right? Oh, great! I can't wait! I..."

"Yes, Jesse, we probably are. But I need to hear from Nick, okay?"

"I'll tell him to call you - tell your foster daughter! Tell her
it's cool! She'll like it, she can look up clothes and makeup…"

"I will, Jesse. I'll tell her."

It was already 9:17, when Keira began to appreciate that she had not
even wrapped up her first phonecall!

"Thanks for calling, Jesse - bye now!" She hung up swiftly, before
he could utter another word. Did she overwhelm her foster daughter
this way? She could not remember a time when she had so strongly
felt the need to hang up a phone on someone, just to give her time to
assimilate!

~ ~ ~

Keira started to laugh. "Gosh, Nick - I barely know the difference
between a spreadsheet and a database – am I going to look really dumb
here?" Nick had just finished asking her if she wouldn't mind
supervising the kids for the first couple of hours of the computer
camp workshop, while he attended a mandatory morning law clinic which
was part of his ongoing obligation as a lawyer, to remain up-to-date
with new legislation.

"Do you have an Internet hookup and have you used e-mail before?"
asked Nick.

"Sure, but…"

"I'll e-mail you the info, and what they're covering." Nick replied
unwaveringly. Aside from wordprocessing, Nick's familiarity with
computers was largely conceptual. He relied on others to push the
thousands of extra buttons it took to keep good case law, meetings
and formal client correspondence flowing in and out of his e-mail
box. Technical contractors upgraded his hardware. His conceptual
grasp of hardware, software and research strategies were nonetheless
unsurpassed in corporate legal circles. He would vet all incoming
software and pursue information on emerging computer technologies.
Occasionally he investigated potential clients of the firm online.
Not infrequently, he would review the websites of existing Fallin &
Fallin clients. It seemed prudent to be able to promote Fallin &
Fallin's image as a .dotcom-savvy legal firm who understood the big
picture among the intellectual property issues which could confront a
growing firm.

Nick felt it did no good to be perceived as less than technologically
progressive in the field of corporate law, while Burton had reserved
his opinion sounds more like you're saying "Burton had reservations
about on the matter. Burton had always had mixed feelings about
spending too much time with computers and telecommunications
gadgets – they seemed to absorb a lot of valuable time when they
malfunctioned which, he noted, they often did. He remembered all too
well when an undetected corrupt file which would not print out for a
key meeting had once wound up costing them a major client.

But Nick had in fact been trying to recruit someone who had a strong
background in intellectual property to come on board at Fallin &
Fallin to widen their area of corporate expertise in the area of
intellectual property contracts. He would have also endorsed
bringing in a lawyer who had database programming skills to enhance
the integration of a lot of their data. He felt no hesitation in
this, nor in increasing the role of computers in the daily
operations of the Fallin & Fallin offices.

"Oh! I guess you want my e-mail address then. Just hold on here…"

"That would help." answered Nick patiently.

Keira read out her work e-mail address to him. "I better give you my
private one, too," she added, reading it out to him, a letter at a
time.

"Good. Okay, to recap: You will register the kids online, pick up
Jesse in your car and I'll be joining you all around eleven thirty.
After the camp, we'll head out to Ben & Jerry's for ice creams.
Then I'll come back to your place to help you install a firewall
router on your system, and then we'll have dinner at your place."

"Right. What kind of food do you prefer?"

"BLT okay?"

"A favorite around here – but will that be enough for you?"

"More than enough, thanks." he said with a huskiness in his voice
that seemed to Keira to contain a sexual edge to it.

"That's it then. See you then."

~ ~ ~

A whole day of kids at a computer camp! Keira reflected. I better
learn my gigabytes from my megaherzes. Or is megabytes and
gigaherzes? No, I think it is now all giga something-or-other,
isn't it? - at least I still know the difference between a radiator
cap and a distributor cap - maybe I should get my foster daughter,
Shannon, to try and explain some of it to me. I'm sure they've
already learned some of that stuff in school.


~ ~ ~


Paddy's on the Rocks – Part VI


"I don't want to go to any crappy computer camp! - Tina and me are
going to the mall to see this band playing there, Saturday morning.
They're way cooler than some dumb computer -" Shannon whined.

"A band right in the middle of the mall?" interjected Keira. "Sounds
loud to me!"

"Sounds great!" contradicted Shannon rigorously.

"When you come to the computer camp, you'll have a chance to meet a
nice, young man named Jesse, who's looking forward to meeting you."

"I don't like the name `Jesse'. It sounds wimpy. He sounds like a
computer geek!"

"Shannon, I'm willing to make some compromise here, but you're going
to have to make one too. Deal?"

"What com-pruh-MIZE??" Shannon stuttered the word cautiously, to
ensure that she had said it correctly, at the same time continuing to
communicate her peevishness over the idea.

"I'm willing to let you go to the mall for a couple of hours,
provided you make it over to the computer lab by eleven-thirty. I
think taking advantage of learning some extra computer skills is too
important an opportunity to be messed with entirely" Keira was
learning that a bit of give and take with teens gave her a bit of
leverage sometimes.

"Oh - kay." answered Shannon in defeat, determined to let Keira know
what a great sacrifice she was making. But don't expect me to suck
up to that Jesse guy, because I won't!" she added petulantly.

"You're free to choose your own friends" Keira assured her, "provided
they don't have any really bad habits and get into serious trouble."


~ ~ ~


Nick fairly flew up the steps of the Carnegie College entrance with
briefcase in tow. It was almost twelve, since the law clinic had not
wrapped up until late. He wore his dark wool pants, but he had left
his suit jacket in the car for what was turning out to be quite a
warm morning. As he entered the lobby area and looked around for
directive arrows and for classrom numbers, he espied a young teenager
who although she was significantly taller, looked a good deal like
Shannon, Burton's temporary foster daughter and technically,
briefly, his "sister". The girl turned and glanced in his
direction. Nick froze.

Although he looked like a deer caught in someone's headlight's,
Shannon was also shocked to find herself staring at Nick. She had
never seen him without a suit jacket. He somehow looked less
disdainful and imposing than she had remembered him. She tried her
best to hide her surprise.

"What are YOU doing here?!?" exclaimed Shannon, as if addressing a
trespasser on the school property.

"I'm going to a computer lab." he explained tersely, his stomach
tightening into a knot. He would have rather had a snarling dog
confront him than have this girl – who it turned out, was indeed
Shannon, but who had simply grown another unbelievable two or three
inches - speak to him. He hated to even feel as if he had to talk to
her, but he reminded himself that although she was a source of
extreme discomfort to him, she was also in fact still a child. He
berated himself for feeling too angry and intimidated by a girl to
even want to speak to her, because it was surrendering too much of
his personal power to anyone. "to meet some people."

"Me too." replied Shannon dumbfounded, sounding much more vulnerable
than he had seen her before.

"Room 222…?" asked Nick, feeling deeply conflicted and almost
laughing at the absurdity of the situation – he already sensed what
her answer was going to be – clearly the fates were having fun with
him.

"Yeah, 222!" she replied, even more dumbfounded. "I'm supposed to
meet my foster-mother there." Shannon was glad for the safety she
felt, knowing that Keira would be waiting there to protect her from
the awkwardness of being anywhere near Nick, even though she was
secretly glad to see him. It had been awhile since she had rejected
his overture of trying to buy her forgiveness "with a dumb gift",
and she barely remembered it. But she knew herself to be a little
bit of prima donna at times. She sensed she had probably given him
more than one reason to be irritated with her in the past.

"Would her name be "Keira", by any chance?" Nick was slowly applying
logic to a certain possibility..."

"How do you know HER??!" Shannon now felt devastated, wanting to run
out of the building, anyplace, so long as she could feel more in
control of her world.

"Um. I met her a few weeks ago." Nick felt like running out of the
building himself, pretending he had car troubles. But he couldn't
leave Jesse like that. And Keira – well, if anyone was going to
cotton on to a lame excuse, it would be Keira – he could count on the
fact that Shannon would tell her they had met

His fantasy of flight evaporated. He was stuck with the situation.
So was Shannon.

"I am here to meet you and she, with a boy named Jesse." Nick
elaborated.

Shannon felt like crying. Her temples began to tighten. She lowered
her gaze and bit her lip.

Nick saw her anguish and tried to placate her, but wound up trying to
placate himself more.

"He's nice, Shannon - give him a chance," Nick said with a measured
amount of sympathy.

"You never gave ME a chance." she answered, wearing a miserable
expression, but he noted her tone was devoid of its usual judgment.
He appreciated for the first time that he really had hurt her
feelings, with his initial rejection of her. But he couldn't stay a
lingering doubt that she might be simply playacting to manipulate
him, so deep was his mistrust of her.

"I'm sorry. It was like I told you then – I was going through
something pretty – look, why don't you tell me what I can do so that
you like me more? And I'll try, okay?" Nick finally asked her, very
guardedly.

"It's okay...just – " She felt at a loss for words. "Just act
like...like I MATTER, okay?" She spoke this so softly, he could
barely hear her choke out the words. A tear formed in the corner of
her mouth, but she did not give in to her urge to cry in front of
him. To him, she looked extremely forlorn, and it caught him in his
throat. He had not expected this. The problem with Shannon had been
that she had mattered too much - too much to Burton, and too much to
his world, when he stood to face probation revocation and jail time,
and too much in terms of him wanting a good relationship with a "baby
sister". It was finally obvious to him now however, that Shannon was
scarcely aware of how much she had mattered in the scheme of things.
He surmised that the loss of her father, mother, grandmother and now
Burton, had taken a deep toll on her.

"Okay." responded Nick finally "- and will you stop acting like I'm
dogshit?" When she looked up at him with surprise registering in her
eyes, he smiled a little at her.

She could never remember Nick smiling at her before.

"Yeah. Okay." She smiled back at him warmly, with a look of sweet
vulnerability and genuineness that Nick had not seen in her before.
He was finally seeing a glimmer of what Burton had seen in her. For
all her height, her glares, scowling and petulance, the realization
struck Nick deeply, of just how much she was still a vulnerable
little girl in a tall body, under her tough veneer of street smarts.

~ ~ ~

"You mean you –? Shannon? – omigod!. It was Keira's turn to be
dumbfounded. How could she not have realized? "Fallin" was not that
common a name to begin with -"

"Didn't you realize he was Burton's son?!" Shannon demanded of Keira
incredulously, having now learned that Nick had been Keira's "movie
date" the week before . Shannon was feeding off the fact that she was
not the only one feeling off-balanced that morning.

"I…well…there could many Fallins, couldn't there Nick?" She looked
to him for a bit of a bailout.

But Nick was heartily enjoying seeing Keira squirm.

"There might still be one or two of us left in Pennsylvania." he
smirked.

"You're adults!" declared Shannon. "You're supposed to be smarter
than this!" Feeling a bit more superior and in control for having
said this, she looked at Jesse conspiratorially, lowering her voice.

"You think they know how to order ice cream?" she quipped
sarcastically.

The sarcasm was lost on Jesse who replied "Oh, I'm sure Nick will do
okay. He did okay with our burgers."

"That's not what I meant." said Shannon, annoyed that her innuendo
had sailed right past him.

After some reflection Jesse caught her drift.

"You mean are they smart?"he laughed. Lowering his voice also,
enough that Nick would be unlikely to hear, he answered. "Adults can
be dumb asses sometimes! – for sure!" Shannon smiled at him for the
first time, and led him over to some computers in the next row, away
from Nick and Keira's possible prying ears and eyes.

~ ~ ~

"Okay, guys. Ready for some Ben & Jerry's?"

"Yeah!" Jesse was starved. Shannon turned to Jesse to ask him what
flavours he liked, and as a debate over the merits of various
flavours ensued, Nick and Keira began to bundle their gear and head
out. Nick asked Jesse "Do you want to go with Keira and Shannon.
I'll meet you there?"

"Definitely!" Jesse began to run away from Nick toward the car..

"Slow down, Jesse!" Jesse turned on his heels and returned to Nick.

"How come?"

"Never run after females. Just walk." Jesse looked at him a little
puzzled. "You mean, keep `em waiting?"

"Yes. And don't tell Keira I said that, either." Nick winked at him
conspiratorially.

"We men gotta stick together!" said Jesse, very pleased that Nick was
sharing a secret with him, "man-to-man". He strolled over to Keira's
car at an exaggeratedly leisurely pace, while Nick watched in
amusement, reflecting to himself "Wish somebody had warned me, when I
was his age!"

~ ~ ~

"We're not gonna stick around and watch you guys play around the
computer – we're going out to the park." announced Shannon, once
everyone had finished their BLTs and salad and cleared their plates
from the table. For the first time in a long time, Shannon had
wolfed down her meal.

"Be back at eight-thirty sharp – no excuses!" Keira said, searching
them both for visual acknowledgement.

"We will, Mrs. Farrell." Jesse assured her.

The door slammed, and they were gone.

Keira looked up at Nick, just before she was about to settle into her
dish washing routine. "Have you installed routers before?" she asked.

"No, but I'm told they're no big deal. Just follow the direction on
the box and make sure you've got some coaxial cable - which we have -
" he answered her, clearly expecting no obstacles. "I figure at the
most, twenty minutes." he ventured.

"Another coffee?" offered Keira, pointing a carafe in the direction
of his cup.

"Sure. Thanks." He reached his cup over toward her to make the reach
shorter. He then buried himself in reading the directions. The
router had been manufactured in People's Republic of China. As a
result the text was minimal, lacked cohesion, and he found the print
markings of ports were also badly disintegrated. Nick squinted, as
he tried to reference the instructions to the diagram.

"These directions look like an afterthought" he commented.

He moved his freshly poured cup aside, stood up, and leaned forward
contorting himself to reach down behind her computer tower case,
groping for the first port to insert the wire end into, but which he
was to learn, was just out of his grasp. She watched him from behind
in his bent over position, struggling. She became especially focussed
on his white shirt which was slowly emerging from his pants with each
thrust. She fairly gaped at his reddening face, which became redder
with each new attempt to gain access to a bottommost slot opening
which he could not quite reach. A wave of hot arousal fleetingly
overtook her, leaving her momentarily breathless. She forced herself
to breathe deeply and refocus, then asked him:

"Is there anything I can do – move something out of your way?"

"Er..well, I think…if you have a flashlight…" he writhed some more,
but the computer table height was simply too high. He uprighted
himself, tired of trying to accomplish the impossible, feeling and
looking very disheveled. He paused to catch his breath.

"I'm going to have to go at it from the front.." he explained.

"I'll go get you a flashlight!" She disappeared from the room,
wondering if he had noticed the flush in her face. She went to the
bathroom briefly to splash cold water on her face before returning
with a flashlight.

"Hopefully the batteries hold out!" she smiled somewhat embarrasedly,
as she handed it to him.

Nick lowered himself onto all fours, and wriggled himself under the
computer table, holding the flashlight.

"Could you pass me the cable?" he asked breathlessly, as he squirmed
on his stomach, like a fish trying to move upstream. He reached
around the back of the case, wrapping the cable across his wrist,
this time, much more easily locating and the elusive slot.

"Got it!" he announced victoriously. He set the flashlight down by
his hip, and as he began to wriggle himself backwards and out from
under, he suddenly felt a warm hand wrap itself around his lower
back, and a very warm body pressed in on him, on his left side.

"Uh.." he croaked in surprise. Her hand slipped itself down below
the edge of his cotton boxers, which were failing to protect him from
an unexpected intrusion like this. He felt fingertips graze lightly
along his sensitive lower back and upper buttocks, in a languid
motions, soon followed by the feel of Keira's fingernails pressing
stiffly, but lightly, into his gluteal muscle.

A hot mouth and tongue announced itself on the other side of his
midriff and added to a growing sea of pleasant, erotic sensations
that he found himself enjoying. He let his muscles relax, allowing
himself to sag into the carpet for a few minutes, unresistingly.

Until he felt her hand snake around to his lower belly.

"Uh..are..you sure?" he whispered,, feeling somewhat helpless and
confused, trying to collect himself by propping up himself up on one
elbow. She responded by simply continuing her exploration of his
skin, plunging her hand in between his legs and raked her fingernails
gently along his inner thigh, slowly upward toward his pain-pleasure
centers.

"Guess that's…yes" he mumbled incoherently through a receding tide of
numbness. He lay back down as her hypnotic, erotic touching began to
resurrect him from him his entombed condition. Her arm encircled his
waist more firmly. She slid her hand softly around, and inserted it
under his hipbone, protecting it from the roughness of the carpet.
He closed his eyes, and surrendered his claim to rational thought as
her hand probed deeply between his legs. She stroked his cheek and
nuzzled it, beginning to make love to him with her lips and fingers
in all the places that counted with him at that moment. His
breathing quickened in anticipation. Her experienced, explorative
mouth and fingers teased him into a panting need he hadn't believed
possible on such short notice. Spikes of desire shot up his spine.

Never opening his eyes for fear the spell would be broken, he twisted
onto his side and groped to bring her head into alignment with his
crotch. When he had done this, he waited patiently to see if she
would refuse him. She brought her mouth up to his zippered area.
She then breathed hotly through the wool in his pants, answering his
plea. She next gently rolled him onto his back. Reaching down, he
fumbled to unzip himself, but her hand found his first. Intercepting
it, it wrapped itself around his fingers. He felt himself being
released by her other hand. He bound his thumb tightly around hers,
pressing and squeezing it with urgency. Her response was to nuzzle
and suckle him, until he gave himself more completely to her. His
grip on her tightened with an intensity that bespoke his need for
release which had been denied for too long.

His subsequent outcries told her that his need was growing dire.

"K-a-ah..uh.." he gasped sharply after some moments. "Ka-oh-
oiieeeeee", crying out again. He quieted momentarily and seemed to
unexpectedly go limp after that.

Then suddenly, he shrieked so loudly that, the sound of it echoed
wildly throughout the house, shocking both of them at the same time.
Time stood still for unmeasured seconds. He groaned a gutteral groan
of a wounded animal. He grabbed and held Keira's arms and hand in a
vise-like grip. His insides began to eject themselves finally outward
in machine-gun-like explosions in slow motion.

Keira could only listen and watch in amazement, as his body spent
itself in a series of dramatic contortions she imagined she might
never see again if she lived to be a hundred.

~ ~ ~

A little unsteady on his feet, Nick was just finishing washing
himself in Keira's bathroom when he heard Shannon and Jesse returning
through the door, unexpectedly early.

"Ugh! What's that gross smell in here?" inquired Shannon as she
entered the living room, looking around with a puzzled expression,
settling her attention finally in the direction of the computer.

"Router grease!" replied Keira, in a piercingly loud voice. She
wholeheartedly hoped that Nick had picked up on her fabricated cue
from the other room, before he emerged, and would give her no grief

~ ~ ~ .


PADDY'S on the ROCKS - Part 7


(Keira's basement rec room couch)


"Tell me what you like..." Nick whispers huskily, nuzzling Keira's
neck.

"Imagination." Keira twists herself until she faces him and bites
him lightly on his chin, licking its underside, then tilts her head
and continues to nibble forward, into the inner recesses of the front
of his neck.

"You're not making this easy..." purrs Nick.

"But you are!..." she answers, smiling "- and I love it..." She plays
and trails her fingernails lightly along his knees while burying her
face in his neck, continuing to nip it gently. His cheeks, and the
part of his chest visible through the top of his shirt now sustain a
constant pink blush.

He goes to wrap his arm around her head to draw her closer to kiss
her, but his breathing is already beginning to accelerate - so much
so, that as she moves her hand inward from his knee, he sits
motionless instead, passively savoring every sensation her movements
rouse in him.

"Tell me..." he tries again.

"You know..." she replies somewhat breathlessly, drinking in his
aftershave smell and body heat. "I know you KNOW what women like..."
Glancing upward, her eyes lock onto his smouldering green gaze. He
feels himself falling into the amber currents in her eyes.

He gathers her hair behind her and plants his lips gently under her
ear, where he embraces her skin gently with his lips. Lapping with
his tongue tip, he begins to suck her exquisitely, expanding his wet
claim across her skin pores, saturating her libidinous thirst like
rainwater on a desert landscape. He inhales her light body musk and
his heart beats more rapidly.

His humid, moist motions make her feel heady and weak with desire for
him, from her throat through to her chest, to her stomach and
profoundly into her inner sanctum.

He lifts his head a little higher, and begins to sip her earlobe
langorously, pressing his thumbs into the side of her neck as he
does. She entwines herself more fully into his warm embrace, loving
the feel of his warmth.

"You're too shy to tell me.." Nick states quietly, as he continues to
move his lips across her skin.

`I...like what you're doing..." she confesses, trembling as he
brushes his hands along her upper and then lower belly.

"Yeah?" he asks coyly, placing his hand lightly between her thighs,
and dragging his fingers gently over them, eventually sliding
between. He feels the warm pulse of her leg vein where his hand
alights along with the growing rigidness of her leg muscles.

"Yes!" she whispers tensely, close to the point where speech fails
her. Flashes of white heat course through her upper legs to the back
of her cervix and deeper in waves of vague, anguished longing,
leaving her sex regions aching for his touch and entry.

"This?" He begins to tug gently at the top edge of her panties. She
bites and sucks his shoulder, rocking her head slowly from side to
side.

His fingers continue to probe very tentatively, inside the body-
warmed cloth. He can feel her body shiver with his every flutter of
movement, and smiles inwardly. Surprised at how hot her skin feels
to him, he dances his hands lightly over her, skimming his fingertips
along her leg.

She moans deeply, reflexively shivering harder, and bites him again.
Her bite travels through his body in the form of a delicious shudder
which causes his shoulders to twitch. He begins to unbutton her
blouse skillfully and after three buttons, moves his cheek downward
to her cleavage, in the process grazing her skin with his ear and
hair. His ear feels hot and seems to burn into her tissue.

She feels the heat of his mouth close onto her flesh just above the
rim of her bra and gasps. He retracts the obstructive cloth a little
to expose more skin, and slides his tongue down further. She
stiffens, finding it difficult to breathe. He begins to circle it in
small, descending plunges, in the direction of her nipple. Her
fingernails dig into the flesh of his upper back, affirming to Nick
that he holds her rapt attention.

He lifts his head and speaks to her mockingly, in a low voice.

"This?" .

She releases a shrill cry of hunger, throwing her head back wantonly
in a sharp arc. He marvels at how extremely bowed her neck had
become much like a ballet dancer's. Outstretched, with only his
arm to support her back, she looks beautiful to him.

He descends once more, lightly nuzzling her cleavage torturously with
his lips. Unable to endure more waiting, she cries out in pain:

"Suck me! - Oh, please suck me!!" she pleads.

He spreads his tongue broadly across her breast, lifting it gently up
to him, bringing it into his mouth like a special dessert. He sips
and suckles it lightly instead. Then he begin devouring it with his
lips and cheeks: lashing, nuzzling and sucking it with the abandon of
a wolf cub. After many minutes, he opens his eyes. He sees her skin
ravaged with goosebumps. Her nipples have become like swollen cherry
buds, still burning for the wetness of his tongue. Her face reveals a
trance-like state. Her eyes glow at him like amber coals. Her need
for him is exposed in a futile tugging of her hand at his pant
waist. He begins to emerge from his own sexual trance, as her
panting breaths recede. He notices them for the first time. The
sound of the soft panting causes rumours of desire to ricochet
through his scrotum, arousing him more. He metamorphoses: he turns
into a lean, hungry wolf, wanting to hear more.

He slides his face down between her legs, beginning to prowl.
Another gasp. Good. He opens his jaws and looks at her
threateningly. She sees him looking at her and stares at him wide-
eyed, becoming fearful and excited at the same time. Good. He begins
to close his jaws slowly, and maneuvres the material of her panties
aside. Another gasp. Good. He thrusts his outstretched tongue
beneath her pant material and discovers her milky oils. Good. He
dips his fingertip and wetting it, traces unhurriedly around the
edges of her labia. Her breathing turns hoarse. Her thighs tighten
and she raises her pelvis to meet him. Good. He moves two of his
clustered fingers painstakingly inward like a small javelin,
swivelling them extremely slowly. She entreats him by urgently
squeezing her vaginal muscles on them, gingerly clawing at his
unyielding upper arms. Good. He patters her clit bud gently with his
tongue, making her cry out the evidence of his teasing torment of
her, imploringly. Good - her sexual suffering is a good, pleasing
thing to him.

To Keira, it is as if she has been placed under a fairy-tale spell.
She feels like a little "Red Riding Hood." who for some reason cannot
outrun the big, bad wolf, finding herself caught in a sweet captivity
of her own needs, almost begging to be eaten by him.

"NICK FALLIN!!"

Hearing his name uttered so loudly, he tilts his head upward
questioningly.

"It's what I want!...it's what I like....Take me." she says
prayerfully.

He uses her to his own designs with his devious tongue, provacative
lips and sensuous mouth, driving her into irrationality for untold
minutes, and suddenly pulls away.

He slips his pants decisively off, without taking time to unbuckle or
unclasp. He mounts her slowly, feeling the material of her underwear
under him.

He begins to rock himself on top of her, measuredly.

"You'd tease me until I died, wouldn't you?' she whispers woodenly,
panting more deeply at each stroke. Her eyes water very moistly,
betraying her acute lust for him.

"I try to please" he says almost flippantly, his clipped voice
betraying his need. The contoured pliancy of her love saddle is now
more seductive than he can bear. He no longer resists his
overwhelming compulsion to thrust hard atop of her pubic bone. But
he does not enter her.

Her insides cry for his fullness. She whimpers to him. But he does
not signal for her to part for him.

He squeezes her shoulders hard, and lunges, landing on her stomach.

Her erogenous zones scream in riotous disbelief and protest. He lifts
again and charges straight at her womanhood, but slams and grinds his
flesh against her pubis intead. She bites her fisted hand, screaming
his name.

He roars.

- even then not diving into her epicenter.

Suddenly it is over.

His grand slam has discharged orgasmic release in both of them on
contact. She surrenders to sobbing tears of relief. He collapses to
the side of her, burying his face in the nest of her upper arm and
breast, breathing hotly and hard until a long sigh of contentment
emerges from deep within his chest.

~ ~ ~

"Coffee?"

"Uh, yeah."

She fills and hands him a cup, and then fills her own.

"Sugar?"

"Uh, no."

"Milk?

"Uh, yeah...a little."

"Forgot to bring a condom, huh?'

"Uh, yeah."


 
Paddy's on the Rocks – Part 8

"We need to talk.." she heard Nick say coolly over the receiver, with
an edginess that Keira had not heard before.

"E…sure. You want to come over? Shannon's not expected for another
hour and a quarter."

"Be there in fifteen." The phone went dead.

~ ~ ~

"You're looking very fine and well-dressed today, Mr. Fallin! Please
do come in!" Keira spoke to him in a mock formality that seemed to
work for both of them, opening the door widely for him. He was as
usual, spectacularly dressed, this time in a black business suit with
a narrow, brooding, black-purple tie. He seemed to be in a serious
mood. But then, he usually was.

"Get you something?" she offered, as she made her way to the kitchen
area.

"No." He seated himself in her kitchen chair and looked up at her.
"Thanks."

"You look like you've got something weighing pretty heavy on you, Nick."

"Show that much?" Nick asked, barely able to muster a smile, his
tension easing only slightly. Keira glided up quietly behind him and
placed her hands lightly on his jacketed shoulders. He inhaled
deeply, on feeling her touch.

"Right there…" she said, pressing down a bit. "If your cock were as
hard as your shoulders, we'd be having this conversation in a
different room…" She began patting the top of his shoulders
soothingly and progressed to compressing his muscles gently.

Nick found himself a bit shocked and amused - also stimulated and
bothered by her unexpected remark - all at the same time. Her calming
rubbing was luring him into silence about what he had come to tell
her. Silence was easier. His shoulders dropped, and his unusually
pale face relaxed and turned expressionless.

After some moments, Keira noticed his worry lines begin to re-emerge
across his forehead.

"I don't own you, Nick." she said kindly. "I know that."

Nick gulped. How had she known? How could she POSSIBLY have known??
If he had wanted to chicken out now, she had spared him the gross
discomfort having to explain himself to her. He knew she deserved
more than silence. He struggled with his conscience - or was it his
fear of closing another door in the face of uncertainty?

"My...this woman I was involved with...." he started. He did not want
to finish. These were the messy things of life he spent many hours of
poring through contract clauses to avoid. He could normally lay out
emotional ground rules for the women he dated, and walk away with
little remorse if the other person had not received the message from
the get-go. But somehow Keira had slipped under the wire, making it a
lot less easy for him. He found himself in the type of awkwardness he
explicitly went to great lengths to avoid.

She slid her hands along his sinewy, sensuous arms, gently kneading
his soreness away, raising his desire for her continued touching.

"You're making this hard, Keira." he said in a lowered voice. She
noted some anxiety had crept into it.

She removed her hands, went and sat down, and locked her hands around
her crossed knee. His muscles remonstrated against her abandonment of
them by stiffening again, aching for her warm touch. She looked
squarely at him.

"She called me, and said she thought we had got our communication
wires crossed. And wants to try again." he continued reluctantly.

"M-m…" was all Keira said.

"I'm going to try and work it out with her." he said decisively

"You want to marry her?"

"I…I think I do, yes - I'm sorry, Keira."

"Don't be." she answered patiently, smoothing her suede skirt a little
and pulling it forward. "I'm not sorry for what we've shared! - Too
bad you're so split." .

She sounded genuinely sympathetic, and genuinely sad. He searched her
face closely. "Split?"

"I think…maybe you're in a little deeper than you think. . ."

He did not know what to say. This exchange was difficult in a way he
had not imagined. He had expected anger, tears, deep hurt, a
rebellious act of indifference - anything but what he found. It was
true, he could hear some sadness in her voice, but not the angst he
had expected. This left him in uncharted territory and made him
nervous. He wanted to reach out to her to – to what?

She watched his acute discomfort. She had known how strong the
possibility that this time would come, had been, from the moment Nick
had sidestepped admitting to her whether or not he still hoped his
former relationship worked out. She had worked out her own rules for
herself privately at the coffee shop after their movie date, when she
noticed how instinctively he veered away from all conversational
topics that involved a discussion of personal feelings.

"You're still welcome to visit, if you want." Keira replied. "I know
Shannon would be happy to see you, even though she likes to play games
about it. If you don't, I'll understand." Keira paused. Sounding a
little tired as she continued speaking, she nonetheless went on,
putting him on notice: "But just so we're clear here, Nick: we can be
friends now, but not lovers. Not now."

An unhappy silence followed as he let the finality of their ended
relationship sink in more deeply. He had always believed that
everything he ever wanted was in Lulu's caring, her quick mind, her
adoring arms and her sweet, small body. He stood up to leave. But on
seeing Keira's sad expression - in spite of her uplifted chin - and
noting her steady gaze, in spite of himself, he decided to walk over
toward her. He leaned forward, intending to give her a goodbye kiss
on the cheek. Self-protectively, she drew away and looked downwards
at the floor. Realising how rejecting she was being of him, she
whispered "sorry!" and through her dark, alluring lashes, looked up
again. He watched her amber eyes and pretty lips soften. There was
something sensuous and radiant about her skin, and the movements in
her arms, in spite of her disappointed voice and look. He drew her
fascinatingly full, but graceful, dancer-like body toward him, to give
her a farewell embrace. But again as if in rejection of him, her arms
seemed to go limp as he did. He released her respectfully.

"I'll go now." he said quietly.

She walked closely behind him to the door. As he reached for the
handle to go to open it, he turned to face her. Her brown hair seemed
to shimmer in the sunlight as it passed through the living room
window. A wave of sadness moved through him.

"Keira – "

But he was stopped in midsentence by the unexpected sensation of a
hand - her hand - caressing his testicles and drawing them up slowly,
as she advanced more closely to him. When he searched her face
questioningly, she blinked demurely at him. She seemed him to be
wearing her "would you like a cup of coffee?" expression, as if she
did not know what she was really doing. He stared at her
open-mouthed, as she continued to gently knead his private parts,
still seemingly unaware.

"A-a-h!" was the only sound that continued from his throat. Like a
rabbit, who in turning at the wrong moment had fallen into a caged
trap, he found himself unable to move or walk back out. As he
continued to stare, he felt her arm slip behind and shape itself
around his waist and pull him toward her so that his waking bulge
bumped against her leg invitingly. He closed his eyes and released a
low groan through his still unclosed mouth. Re-opening them, he
involuntarily shifted his focus lower to her chest. He became quickly
mesmerized by the suggestive sight of her two orbs he espied through
her semi-sheer, harvest gold-coloured blouse that she wore. It was as
clear as crystal that she was not wearing any bra underneath it. Her
soft-edge nipples seemed to be trying to poke through the thin cloth,
as if reaching out to him. How had he missed this earlier?

Gently breaking his trance, she chirped in a sweetly, innocent voice.
"Forget your rubber again?'

At her casual mention of contraception, the most intense brushfire of
his existence swept through him, aborting all utterance. He
immediately drove his leg in between hers, and spun her around
violently. She felt herself being pushed into the door, which then
slammed shut in one motion. The crashing sound of the knocked-over
umbrella stand startled her briefly. Oblivious to the accident
however, Nick's steely eyes continued to rove on her until grabbing
her face wildly with his hand, he suddenly crushed his lips onto hers
with brute force, ramming his tongue into her mouth aggressively and
pumping furiously. Too surprised at first to even react to his
fevered response, she felt herself pulled into a vortex of her own
heat, and excitedly began yanking his jacket from him. As it fell to
the floor, she made a passionate exploration of his shoulders and the
back of his neck, eventually sinking her fingernails proddingly into
his flesh. He lowered himself and ground his hip into her thigh. He
was quickly rewarded by the sound of a baleful whimper. The room began
to recede for Keira, as his body shape and movements began to
hypnotise her. Wriggling a little until she had positioned herself
more comfortably, she began in feral acquiescence, to rub her hips
gently on his ramming leg. He broke away for quick seconds, panting
hotly. She drank in the sight of his swollen lips and cherry red
cheeks. A small moan escaped from her throat.

"Take that blouse off!" he growled, glaring at her. As she began to
obey, lifting her hands toward her blouse, his crushing mouth
replanted itself on hers aggressively. When she had undone it
halfway, she switched to trying to unclasp his perfectly-creased black
pants. He saw her hand slip lower and felt a tugging at his zip. He
pushed himself away from her yet again, more slowly this time, easing
himself smoothly onto his haunches until his face was level with her
stomach, then nimbly worked the bottom of her blouse from her skirt.
With her inviting, rounded stomach protruding into private view, he
began to randomly suck incitingly, in a pattern of slow descent,
savoring the texture of her edible-looking flesh. As her fawn-coloured
skirt became a hindrance to his activities, he unbuttoned and pulled
at the suede skirt until it released and fell down at her ankles. He
slipped his hand to the back of her ankle, and in one descending
movement, removed her shoe. Then the other.

She felt very dizzied by this: by his fourth or fifth suck, she had
become so lightheaded, she thought she would pass out. The speed and
intensity of his broad-lipped sucking was electrifying, waking deep
hunger in her. But she did not. She somehow managed to remain on her
feet as he continued to embrace her hips loosely with his arms. She
clutched his hot temples and his sensuous hair stiffly for balance.
His mouth persisted with its seductive magic, plunging ever lower.
When he abruptly uprighted himself, she released his disarrayed locks
of hair and fought to help him remove his shirt. He felt grateful to
be freed of its long-sleeved confines. Grateful all the more so, when
in greeting his semi-nudity, Keira had tweaked the tips of his
pectorals gently between her fingertips, causing him even greater
stiffening.

Once stripped of his shirt, he reached into his pocket for his
circular shield. She watched his green-eyed, smouldery fixed stare
intently, as he extracted and then unfurled it. She glanced away past
him, to a familiar room which seemed not to really exist. There was
only him, their breathing, what he felt like on her, and what he would
feel like in her. He made her feel so alive.

She eventually glanced downward, and seeing the sexy breathing
movements of his lower belly along with his covered erect flesh, she
shuddered in anticipation. "You look so delicious!" she said.

His mouth moved straight to her ear, where she heard him whisper
huskily "Don't put the coffee on yet!" He moved his flushed face down
to her exposed left breast and began sucking it firmly. Her heart
began to pound loudly. Watching his wide shoulders and muscular chest
rise again and press in against her, forcing his weight onto her, she
began to pant heavily. She then felt him insert himself into her
lower hunger. She stood there helplessly, completely pinned by his
hard, adonis-like body, while he penetrated her with persecuting slowness.

Her moistness on entry felt exquisite to Nick - even through his
rubber "desensitizer". Now having impaled her on him, he joyously
lifted her breast to his mouth and began to suckle and tease without
mercy, enjoying her reflexive squirming and attempts to manipulate his
head to come closer and urge him to take more of her. But so
powerfully locked against her was he, that she could not budge any
single part of him. She could not remember feeling so helpless – and
so deeply satisfied at the same time. He plunged himself more deeply
into her and began his rhythmic thrusting. They moaned in unison.
The smell of her musky sex gradually made its way up into Nick's
sinuses. Reflexivley, Nick began to hammer himself into her more
urgently than ever. His ability at motion seemed endless. Perspiring
profusely, he gripped her shoulders and buried his face into her neck.
Images of burying himself in a tomb of erotic sensation created by
her, flickered through his mind.

Keira found she could not get enough of him. No matter how much of
herself she surrendered to him, no matter much he pleasured her, her
hunger for him just seemed to grow with every twitch, every caress,
every thrust

"You're so FUCKING sexy!" she croaked in his ear, her heart pounding
like a primal drum. Images of surrendering to an unending, increasing
erotic intrusion from him, passed through her mind.

He began to adopt a staccato dance inside her, playing his rhythms
against her like a conductor of pleasure. She noticed him watching
her through half-lidded eyes, and felt another deep wave of yearning
for him. Her muscles tightened on him. Almost imperceptibly at
first, she felt herself breathing start to synchronize with the speed
his heavy, lust-filled breaths. She marvelled at how completely
transformed his whole body had become – an instrument of sweet
torments and satisfactions – a powerful pistoning machine that could
not be stopped.until he willed it so. He did not will it so. For
that, she was very, very grateful.

A clock ticked quietly in the background - the only reminder of an
existence outside her intense state of aliveness.

With some difficulty, he separated himself from her magnetic warmth,
and paused to look at her a minute as he caught his breath. She began
to ooze down a little lower to meet him, tilting her head wantonly.
Fleetingly, he reflected on how the sight of her now inflamed him so
much that he had come to feel that his captive libido had sent him
onto a road of immense freedom. He felt so utterly liberated pursuing
physical union with her, he wondered if it was possible to make any
sense of his feelings. Was there anything rational to explain it? If
her were honest with himself, he still did not know her very well.
His only real connection with her was in what they were doing. And
Shannon. Keira had said she thought he was in a little deeper than he
realized. Was he?

Right now, it felt so freeing to be doing what he was doing

~ ~ ~

"What time's Shannon getting back?" he asked.

"Fifteen." Keira mumbled.

He thrust his pelvis forward, hard, to hear her gasp again.

"Oh God, Nick!" Her voice had risen an octave from "Fifteen".

"God won't help you now!" he quipped tauntingly as he leaned forward
and grabbed her by her buttocks, splaying her and driving her more
fully onto him. He enjoyed the saucy feel of her back curvature as he
ran his fingers over her sweet ass. Pummelling her gently for a
minute, he then pulled out, and sank onto his haunches for the second
time. He went to kiss her sex, which she reflexively pulled back
from, so excited was she for his continued attention in her most
sensitive regions. She was simply not calm enough to hold still.

"No?" he asked in her in surprise.

"Yes! Yes! Yes!" she replied emphatically.

He wrapped his arms around her legs and tried again, this time
slithering his tongue past her labia, and pursing his lips lingeringly
over them. She shuddered repeatedly with every movement. He flicked
once or twice more, and re-erected himself. He entered her again and
began his final thrusting with her. Synchronicity of breathing
resumed, making Keira feel as if she were in heaven.

A quiet "N-n" escaped from Nick's throat. As quiet as it was, the
sound of it tripped a switch in Keira, sending her into a climaxing
chaos where she squealed such an unnaturally high, sound, she was not
even sure that it had come from her. Nick felt her love grip
squeezing him, and his balls tightened in readiness for a what would
be a hard, feverish expulsion. But Keira reached down and drew them
away from his penis teasingly, to delay the inevitable.

"Aoh!!" uttered Nick, in frustrated disbelief, never expecting this
denial of his pleasure. As her squeezing continued, his testicles
began to curl up again in angry determination. He pumped quickly,
ready to rebel if she interfered and - BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!!! Angry, hot
jets of semen began to spurt out of him violently, draining him by
delicious, quaking degrees. He began to laugh a shaky, quaking laugh.
He felt as if his own collapse was imminent. She joined in his laughter.

Then through the sound of their peals, a movement in the doorlock was
detected and felt at Keira's back.

"How fast can you say, `Shannon, want to go to Ben & Jerry's but
you'll need to go the back door'?" whispered Keira.

"Shannon!" yelled Nick through the door. "Want to go to Ben & Jerry's?

"Yeah…" came the answer. "What's the matter with the door?"

"You'll have to go to the back door!" answered Nick.

"Weird!" remarked Shannon, as she walked back down the steps again.

"I trust you know how to talk your way out of this one?" Nick
beseeched Keira. "I doubt "router grease" is going to cut it this time."

~ end of Part 8 ~