The day after our gumbo and bluegrass blowout, we woke up to another one of those nasty winter days, an occluded front keeping the skies leaden and dripping. I didn't feel like cooking breakfast and cold cereal just wouldn't do on a day like this. I kissed the nose that was peeking out just above the blankets.

"I'm going back to bed, wife. Call me when you have breakfast ready."

The blanket came down far enough for her to stick her tongue out. "Pancakes and hot coffee sounds awfully good, husband. And you wouldn't have to worry about wakin' up tomorrow morning with an icepick in your earhole."

With the appearance of her red lips, I kissed her through her giggles. "That's another thing to love about you. You know how to compromise!" We got dressed as the thermostat forced the heat from the fifty-five degree "I love to snuggle with you" to the sixty-five degree comfort zone.

It was hovering around forty, the wind raw and damp and gusty as we hustled into the pickup and headed off to breakfast. By this time, not only did the restaurant staff know us, but we were starting to be familiar with some of the Sunday morning crowd. I wrote that up to the striking little redhead I was with.

There were many narratives floating around about Cindy: Mizz Helen's foster daughter. Married at fourteen. The high school thing. Little Miss Cindy and her shotgun. But the Sunday morning crowd was mainly a church crowd, so those who took time to say something, well, they said something nice. I did notice, as did Cindy, that there were a few people who seemed to look askance at our situation.

One of those WASN'T the older guy in a neatly pressed deputy sheriff uniform who was there with his wife. They stopped by to say 'hi'. "You're the little girl that Deputy Stevens told us about, ain't you?" he asked.

"Yessir," Cindy said.

"Me an' Myra just wanted to say 'hi' to you, young lady. Didn't mean to interrupt your breakfast."

"Oh, that's okay," I said as Cindy smiled. "Thank you for taking care of us. Deputy Stevens seems like a good guy."

"Oh, he is," the old guy said. "But he still talks about Miss Cindy here. You're her husband?"

"Yessir. Long story."

"We've heard bits and pieces. He smiled. "Stranger things have happened. Myra was fifteen when she trapped me."

Myra punched her husband playfully. "And he was eighteen. And goin' in the army. And forty years later ... Old goat!"

"Ya'll got time, sit down and drink coffee with us," Cindy said.

"Oh, no, dear," Myra said. "We have to get to church, but maybe some other time, okay?"

"We'd love that. We're here a lot of Sunday mornings," I added. I stood and shook their hands as they left.

I took a sip of coffee, smiling at Cindy. "I'm married to a famous woman."

"It was nice of them to stop by," she said. "But you're what makes me famous. If it weren't for YOU, I'd be just another screwed-up schoolgirl." She paused. "Well, Mizz Helen might've rescued me, but NOT nearly like you did. An' you KNOW I love Mizz Helen. But I seriously doubt that Mizz Helen would be teaching me to fly."

"Maybe not, cutie," I said, "but you might've found an equally interesting path with her. Of course," I mused, "My life would be much poorer."

"Mine, too, Dan." She tossed her head. I don't know if she did that because she was conscious of how I adored her face, framed by that aged copper hair, but every time it did, a part of me melted. "Finish your coffee so we can go home." And a smile that had just a hint of sexuality.

I drained the mug and we stood, paid the ticket, and we were out the door into the nasty drizzle.

"We got beans, baby," she said. "It's a 'soup' kind of day."

"Yeah," I said. "Too nasty to go out and exercise."

Giggle. "I know some pretty good indoor exercises..."

I glanced away from the road to see the delight in those green eyes. "You make a rainy day perfect, little angel," I said. "Perfect for makin' soup and makin' love..."

What a way to spend a nasty Sunday: make happy, giggling love, watch an old movie, stir the soup, eat, take a nap to the occasional sounds of wind-driven rain striking the walls and windows. Make love again. Go find another movie. Reheat the soup for dinner. Play cards with the TV on in the background, shower, go to sleep with the most perfect partner imaginable.

Monday morning's weather wasn't any more pleasant than Sunday's. If anything, it was worse, although the front was slowly pushing through, promising cold and clear in the near future. We did breakfast at the restaurant, I dropped Cindy back at the trailer to wait for the school bus and I went to work.

The project was past the '90% of the work takes 10% of the time' stage and I was tied up in taking all the big pieces and little pieces and correcting the "I didn't know THAT would happen" issues. It was old stories with me, for the most part, communication and control issues, changing modes from those used to facilitate the initial application of high voltage power to those that would carry and control loads when the facility came on line for real.

I'd just had ANOTHER revelatory discussion with the "systems integrator" about how his plans for tying the power system communications needed to, 'you know, actually consider that my communications protocols were ONLY compatible with the rest of the system if we put a little magic box between the two systems, and that MY equipment specifications showed that the magic box and the programming thereof was on HIS scope of work'.

"There it is, right there! In black and white."

"Okay! You got me. Now what?" He said, disgusted.

"We get the interface, connect it up and program it. Piece of cake. My system's got holes in it waiting for us to plug into. I'll help you through this." I was only cheating a little bit. The problem was one I'd faced before, and I had some files that would get up and talking, then it was a matter of him deciding what data he needed. "Order the box," I said.

That's why some days I felt tired when I got home. Actually, I stopped by the park office to find Cindy perched on a chair, laptop out, tapping away, stopping to chat with Helen and Charlie, then back on the keyboard.

"Wow!" I commented. "She's busy! Homework?"

"Kinda-sorta," she said, smiling. "Doin' a little project for my English teacher. A short story."

"Oh," I said. "Is this one going to show up at another college English department?"

Charlie chuckled. "She told us about that. I find it amusing."

"Amusing is a good word," I laughed. "Astounding works, too."

Cindy looked up, grinning. "Ya'll are talking about me like I'm not here."

"Oh, we know you're here, sweetie," Helen said. "We're just talkin' about some of the happy things about you."

"I know," Cindy answered. "This is fun stuff. I get to make things up."

"DO I get to read it before you turn it in?" I asked.

"I hope you do," she said. "You're a better spell-checker than Microsoft." Giggle.

Charlie said, "Yes, son, when I was a young lawyer, the very best you could hope for was a secretary that could take your henscratch and make you sound intelligent."

"Those are getting hard to find these days," I said.

Another giggle from the little redhead. "Ummmmm! I'm gonna tell Mizz Sara you said that..."

General laughter.

"Yeah, there ARE exceptions. But Sara seldom does correspondence for anybody, what with email and word processors, and you'd be scared to read the writings of some of my co-workers, knowing that people who can't spell or write any better than that are building industrial facilities." I laughed.

Cindy was shutting down her laptop. "Salads for dinner?"

"Sounds good to me." I looked at Helen and Charlie. "You want to join us?"

"Thanks for asking, Dan," Helen said, "But we'll have dinner ready when we get home." Judge Charlie's housekeeper took care of her eighty-odd year old employer and his sixty year old wife. "We'll have to plan something, though."

"Yessir," Charlie said. "We'll do that."

Cindy and I went to our trailer. She dropped her backpack and we rested for a while sitting on the sofa with me listening to her school happenings and then telling her my hurdles. Dinner almost went away when she swiveled from beside me to be seated on my lap with her arms around my neck and her lips fastened to mine.

"Don't get ideas now, boy," she giggled. "I have my heart set on something stuffed in a big Portobello mushroom."

"That makes me soooo sad, little redheaded girl, that I come in second to a mushroom..."

"And the Sommers sisters..." she tittered. The Sommers sisters, the owners and operators of our 'salad place', were kind and friendly to us, the strange pair that came in so often.

"Okay, cutie. I'll take the back seat to the Sommers sisters." It was five o'clock. When we walked out to the truck, the wind was brisk, biting, but there were streaks of orange tingeing the western sky as the clouds broke up.

Despite the truck's heater rapidly taking the chill out of the cab, Cindy was belted right up against me. As soon as I got the truck into 'forward', I took that arm and draped it around her, gaining me a purr from my little kitten. She reached forward, punched up some music, then took that hand to pull my arm tightly around her.

"Life is good, Dan," she said.

"Indeed it is, princess," I said.

The next day Cindy came home with an application to take the ACT in February. That was easy enough, except for the part where we decide which colleges to send official copies to. I flipped the phone open.

"Hi, Dan," Jim answered. "I expected you to call."

"Then you know what I'm going to ask."

"Why don't you two come over for dinner tomorrow. I think Ann's doin' Purina Baptist Chow."

"Huh?" I blurted.

"Casserole, man! Casserole!"

"Yeah, okay! Sorry! I'm punchy from the project today."

He laughed. "So you're tellin' me that a trailer full of engineers is worse than five hundred and sixty-three middle schoolers."

"Your middle schoolers don't yet have the opportunity to screw up a two hundred and fifty million dollar construction project," I said.

"Yeah, but they would if they had a chance."

Cindy said, "Hi, Mister Jim. We'll be there!" loud enough that Jim heard it.

Jim laughed. "It's fortunate that we marry women who have better sense than we do, ain't it?"

"Yeah. And tell Ann that it won't match hers, but I'll bring a pie for dessert."

"Dan an' Cindy're bringing pie," Jim said to Ann.

"That's good," Ann said. "Just make sure he brings Cindy!"

Jim said, "You heard all that?"

"Yeah," I said. "I'm now defined by the personality of my wife."

Jim laughed. "As are we all, Dan. We married above our station, Dan."

"Yeah. We got lucky, didn't we? Okay, We'll see you tomorrow."

"Tell Cindy that I'm gonna want to talk to her tomorrow in school."

Cindy's ear was pressed against mine. "'Kay, Mister Jim," she chirped.

We hung up. She wrapped her arms around me and whispered, "So what were you tellin' me about simple foods? A pot of rice, some vegetables? Indian?"

"I think we can fake some of that. I worked with a couple of Indian engineers on the last project. We talked."

"I can see that happening, love," she said. "That's something I learned about you that I find very attractive."

"What?" I asked.

"Well, I can't remember you not talking to somebody. When we go out, you find friends easily. And you know, look at all the stuff we've shared. You love to do things. And you love letting ME do things. You want me to be ME!"

"And at the end of every day, I want you to think that 'me' is a part of 'us'."

Her face was inches from mine, her green eyes connected to my blue. "Dan," she said earnestly, "I stopped being 'me' and became part of 'us' when you admitted you loved me."

Some basmati rice, a little bit of exotically spiced chicken and a handful of vegetables made dinner for us. She hovered as close to me as she could in the tiny kitchenette. I talked about the ideas that my old buddies Sanji and Asif had shared in our conversations about mommas and grandmothers cooking for families and I added little pinches of spices to try and replicate the tastes of an Indian restaurant that they swore was almost home cooking for them.

When the meal was over, I looked at her. "Well?" I asked.

"Interesting," she answered.

"Worth further research?"

"Yep! Maybe they have one of those restaurants in Mobile, for the weekend..." she smiled. I remembered that only a few months back she'd had her first try at Chinese food.

"So you're looking for an adventure this weekend?" I looked at her across the little table.

"Maybe a little one. But what I REALLY want..."

"What do you REALLY want, kitten?" I smiled.

"What I REALLY and is for us to find another of those fantastic evenings with an orchestra and something REALLY special. Haydn. Bach. You know ... Make a big weekend of it."

"I think that would be perfect, little one. We need to do a search. Anything within six or eight hundred miles. We can fly that far with no problems."

" ... can fly that far. And if we have to do instruments, YOU can do it." She sounded confident.

"Yeah, just remember, sweetie, that ol' plane isn't a REAL instrument platform. No punching fronts and getting crazy. No ice."

She leaned over the table, her chin propped in one hand. Her eyebrows raised above those green eyes and there was a twinkle. "So we need a good day to leave, and if we get stranded a day because of weather..."

I chuckled. "So you're, like, planning for our plans to crash..."

"Nah..." she smiled. "I'm just sayin' that if they were to come apart, it wouldn't be soooo bad..."

"Stranded on a desert island with you for the rest of my life wouldn't be soooo bad..." I laughed.

"What?!?! No gumbo? No whatever that Indian thing we just had? Nope. Desert islands are a definite no. but Memphis or Nashville or Atlanta or Houston..." her smile melted me faster today than it did the first day I laughed with her at the pool at the end of last summer.

The north wind gave the trailer a little shudder. Little Miss Always Thinking said, "IF we crack a couple of windows for a minute, we can cross-ventilate and clear the air out of here."

"Good idea," I said. She opened a window on the south side and I opened one at the opposite end of the north side, and the wind almost whistled through the little trailer. The temperature dropped like a rock. We gave it five minutes then closed the windows. The heating system kicked into high to get us back up to sixty-eight. We cleaned up after dinner, I played on my computer while she worked on her story, then we showered and went to bed.

I hit the shower after her. She finished drying her hair, and as I came out I saw her flipping her nightshirt onto the little bedside table. "Just bring your clothes, guy. You won't need 'em for a little while." And a smile.

Why should I resist? She expected me and I relished her. And we loved each other. Softly at first, then she started getting insistent and I reacted and somebody had to sleep in the wet spot because when we stopped, there was only a small gap between the little death of orgasm and the sweet oblivion of satiated sleep.

The alarm brought us back to the everyday universe: Breakfast, school, work.

My buddy's magic box came in, courtesy of a phone call to another project that had one on the shelf. We plugged in a couple of pairs of fiber optic cables, I plugged in my laptop, did a few programming things, and then the configuration file slid right in. That hurdle was in our dust. The next one involved some calls to our engineering firm and a few comments verged on strident as I pointed out a couple of mistakes that could have been critical. They promised corrected files in two days.

I went home. My cellphone rang a few minutes after four. Cindy.

"Hi, cutie," I said.

"Hey, my guy," she chirped. "Just wanted to make sure you were on the way home. We have dinner at the Hardesty's."

"I remember, baby," I said. "What did Jim want to talk with you about at school?"

"College choices," she said. "We'll talk about it tonight when we get there. I'm trying to reach a decision. I need you to help. And Mister Jim and MIzz Ann."

"Okay, baby. I'll be there in a few minutes."

"I'll meet you at the trailer, love," she said.

I hung up, reflecting on the absurdity of a fourteen year old having to "reach a decision" about college. I never had to reach a decision. I graduated high school in the middle of the thundering herd, grade-wise, stood out ONLY because I had ACT and SAT scores that reflected my abilities rather better than my actual grades did. And there was a university in town that I could get into with the savings Mom and Dad had for my college, plus a part-time job, to pay my way. And then ROTC helped.

And Cindy was fourteen and if I was a candle in the dark, she was a bonfire, and two universities had room for her under 'gifted' programs already, and for all I knew, there were others. My dilemma was how to support her, to hold the ladder as she stepped to the stars.

I was happy as an engineer, really. I'd considered myself a success, especially in the last few years, but I wondered. Cindy said she wanted to be like me. And I wondered if she was setting her sights too low.

I waved at Helen as I passed the office, heading to the trailer. Cindy heard my foot hit the step, because when I opened the door and stepped in out of the brisk air, it was right into her arms. I worked a hand free to close the door behind us and kissed her back.

"You've been thinking, haven't you," she said. "Hard stuff."

I nodded. "About us?"

"Yes, Cindy love. About what happens when you graduate."

"We have an adventure, baby. You get to be the husband of a college student. I get to go to college. And become an engineer. Like you." She kissed me. "So stop worrying. Okay? You and me. Forever."

"I worry. I married a rockstar. I don't want to limit..."

"Shush, hon!" she said, touching a fingertip to my lips. "Since we met, there's not a day that I haven't seen you, and we're married."

I nodded. "But..."

"But nothin'" and there was that 'I know what I'm saying' wrinkle above her nose. "I know you get wrapped up in all these things, like I'm just fourteen, and all that, but baby, YOU of all people should know ME and you should KNOW that fourteen doesn't mean a thing when it comes to us."

She gave me a push backward onto the sofa and straddled me, her forehead touching mine. "Just remember, Dan. We stood together in front of our friends and promised. Forever."

"Okay, punkin," I said. "You win. Me."

Giggle. While she was straddling me, she wiggled, knowing full well what her wiggle did. I, well part of me, responded in the most intense manner and she planted her lips on mine, her tongue emphasizing our connection and she ground her crotch against the hardness in my pants.

"I adore you, Cindy," I said.

"Then you need to understand that I adore you just as much. You rescued me..."

I sighed. "And you rescued me..."

She said, "You didn't need rescuin', Dan."

"Oh, but I did, little one. I had no idea how dead I was until I met you."

"Good!" she said. One more grind, to which I moaned. "We'll go have dinner and talk with our friends, and then we'll come home and see if we can make each other pass out." Her face lost the serious look. It was all 'happy young girl', and I wondered what I'd ever done to deserve her. I got one more kiss before she climbed off my lap and donned her jacket.

Her hi-tech florescent colors were a stark contrast to my own jacket, a nut brown canvas thing common on jobsites, and when she pulled a knit wool cap down to the tops of her ears, forcing that red hair to flare at her jawline, my heart stopped. She saw me stare, and that meant that she struck a little pose, one knee bent, smiling, the absurdly rare Alabama ski bunny. "Let's go, guy!" she said. And we were off.

Twenty minutes later, we were knocking on the door at the Hardesty house. Teresa answered the door. Jim was rounding the corner, laughing. "Careful, sweetie," he said to Teresa. "You never know WHO you're gonna let in."

"Daaa-adddd," she groaned.

Ann's blonde head peered around the corner. "We'll eat in ten minutes. Make yourselves at home, 'kay?"

"Hi, Ann," I said.

"Hi, Mizz Ann," Cindy said. "Can I help?" Cindy was carrying the pie we'd picked up on the way over. Apple.

Ann headed back into the kitchen. "You and Teresa can set the table. Billy! Glasses with ice, son!"

"Yes, ma'am!" Billy answered.

"Come sit," Jim said. "I had a talk with Cindy today, but I'd rather discuss it with both of you. You've got a single-minded young lady there, Dan."

"She's something," I said. "You know, I've hung around women who weren't that 'together' that were twice her age."

Jim looked at me. "Sorta what I keep coming up with. You know, until this year, she was just in the background, loping along, hidden in the herd."

"She said she did C's without having to try, just wanted to keep her mom off her case."

"Yeah," Jim said. "I get that. But I'd have never sat her down and talked, you know, REALLY talked with her. We talked for about an hour today, Dan. You know, every case I put in front of her, she went through this 'what if' analysis, and a lot of it was how it would affect HER, but she always worked in how it would affect both of you. It was like watching a good chess player thinking so many moves ahead."

I smiled. Just a little.

"We sort of talked like, you know, friends, because we ARE friends, our two families. And she said she stood by her original plan. Wants to be an engineer. Because her best friend in the whole world, her life mate, is an engineer." Jim smiled smugly.

"Yeah, you smile. But how do you live up to that?" I said.

"I know. Ann pulled that same stunt on me. She could've done well as a professional violinist, but she said she fell in love with this goofy-assed Marine." He sat back. "So every day I thank God that I have her and she has me and that's the way it's supposed to be. I mean, she could be playing in a symphony somewhere, and I could be wrapping up a career in the Marines, but you know, it might sound sappy, but we were made for THIS. So when Cindy says ... fourteen going on forty, that she belongs with Dan, then I guess I'm inclined to believe her."

Ann's head popped around the corner. "If ya'll are finished draggin' your knuckles in the dirt, dinner's ready."

Jim snorted. "See! Pure love and respect!"

We sat together at the table, bowed our heads, and yes, I felt blessed.

Ann said, "This is my award-winning casserole. Got a ribbon last year at the church for best main dish in an oblong pyrex container." She did that twinkly eye thing pretty well, too, along with a smirk that broadened into a grin.

Small talk covered the meal. Teresa sat next to Cindy on the side opposite me and they were talking about teachers and classes for a bit until Cindy's ears perked up at the mention of a concert schedule.

"Mobile?" Cindy said. "we ought to go to that one together..."

Teresa said, "Mom?!?! Bach? Beethoven? Not my thing..." I saw Billy nodding agreement.

Jim said, "Well you two could stand spending the weekend with your cousins, huh?"

"Oh, yeah," Billy said. "He's got X-box, too!" It was Teresa's turn to agree.

Ann said, "That's weekend after this one. We could drive up on Saturday."

"Yesss!" Cindy said. "We do that! And have a nice dinner, then a concert, then late night snack." She smiled. I know why she smiled. "And then we get up and have breakfast and drive home."

"Or we could leave EARLY Saturday and do the mall!" Ann said.

"That makes it an expensive weekend," Jim snickered.

"I need a few things, Jim," she smiled sweetly.

"And I can..." Cindy started.

"Help," I finished.

Teresa's face was showing mixed feelings now. "Mooo-ooommm! The mall?"

"Okay," I said, reaching for a compromise. "How about you ladies, Ann, Cindy, Teresa, go to the mall this weekend and do a round trip, and next weekend, we'll just do the concert."

Cindy turned to Ann. That meant Ann had a thirteen year old AND a fourteen year old looking at her. "And you guys can have a testosterone day. Go slay a beast or something."

I looked at Dan. "Rifle range? Billy?" Billy's grin told me we had him sold.

"Pie, anybody?" Ann asked. We had pie, and then we jumped into clearing the dining room table. Five minutes after the meal was over, Cindy and I were side by side on the love seat in the Hardesty living room.

Ann started off on the main subject. "Cindy, Jim says ya'll talked about colleges today..."

Cindy smiled. "Yes, ma'am. We did. I need to make some decisions, but I wanted to talk with you an' Mister Jim and Dan all together."

Jim said, "We talked about her going to one of the high-powered big name universities like MIT or Stanford."

"We did, baby," she said. "You know, the idea about those big names is exciting an' all, but you know what I talked about with you from the beginning..."

I did indeed know. But it was in the beginning when I knew her to be just bright and precocious. In the months we'd been together, I learned that she was more than just bright. While back then I was flattered that she wanted to attempt the climb to 'be like me', now I saw her as leaping over me to heights I could not imagine.

"Dan, Mister Jim and I talked. I want to be an engineer. That's what I want right now. When he talks about it, maybe that will be step one, but that's going to be MY step."

I looked at those green eyes. She read my expression because that little 'I know what I'm saying' wrinkle showed up above her nose again. I could read her face, too, you know.

"I fell in love with you. I want to be LIKE you. Engineer. Now we have to see if it's University of Alabama or Auburn."

"That's what I got out of her today, Dan," Jim said.

Ann wrapped her fingers in his. "Sounds like she's chosen a path, Dan."

"Yes, ma'am, Mizz Ann," Cindy said. Her hand held mine. "Y'know, before Dan came into my life, I didn't have much at all to look forward to. Now ... I can't imagine all the possibilities like Mister Jim talked with me about today. But I know that my future wouldn't be as good without..." she kissed me lightly on the cheek, "this guy. Not even a choice, really."

I patted her hand. "Are you sure, sweetie?"

"What'd I say? We got MARRIED. We'll have THIS adventure, then we'll see about the next one. We got each other. And we've got the BEST friends! We'll do fine!"

Ann interjected, "We're just trying to give you all the options Cindy. The final decision is between you and Dan."

"I know," Cindy answered. "I appreciate that. And that's what we're doing. And ya'll are helping." She turned to me. "Mister Jim's setting us up a visit to the people at Auburn and University of Alabama soon. I hope you can get loose for them."

"I'll try," I said. "Work's, well, it gets crazy when we start things up. But I'll try. Jim, I trust your judgment on these things."

"You shouldn't, Dan. You're the engineer here. And Cindy's the proto-engineer. What's that they call her out there?"

"The Engineer's Apprentice..." and a satisfied smile from the cute little redhead.