Dammit! He was fantasizing about a woman barely mature enough to be deemed such. He liked woman, but he liked them naked, silent and in bed. He never thought of them as people with careers. Never did he seek one out for the sake of an enlightening conversation. Yet today he had shared with Kathleen thoughts that he hadn’t even catalogued in his own mind. It was her rapt, intense listening that had opened up his own brain, making him see things clearly that had been nebulous before.
The kiss last night hadn’t been spontaneous. He had planned it right down to the last detail. He had wanted to match his mouth to hers. But rather than satisfying him, he now craved more than one kiss. He had to see if she tasted as good as that one brief appetizer had indicated she did.
The tape running through the machine clicked off, and Erik was thrust out of his pleasant surmises by the enthusiastic applause of the children.
“Again, again,” they chanted.
Erik laughed. “I don’t think so.”
“Children,” B. J. called over the roar, and clapped his hands. “Children, the night bell is about to ring, so let’s all start toward our cabins, please. Counselors, round up your groups. We’ve had a real treat tonight. Let’s all give Mr. Gudjonsen a big thank you.”
The words were screamed at him, the campers taking full advantage of being as loud as they wanted to be.
Kathleen had reentered the room when all the commotion started. Erik managed to wade through the throng toward her. “I’d like to show you the tapes I shot today. They’re not edited, but I thought you might like to see what I’ve got so far.”
“Well, I…” She hesitated. She didn’t know whether she wanted to be alone with him or not.
“Come on,” he urged. “Look at it as a free movie.” He cuffed her on the shoulder with a gentle fist.
She laughed. “All right.”
They said their goodnights to the other counselors and to the Harrisons, who hurried out of the building, declining Erik’s offer for them to stay, so B. J. could get back to their cabin before the ten o’clock news came on. The ladies who managed the kitchen had been cleaning up the dinner dishes while the tape was playing, so the building was now deserted.
“Let me load this first tape,” Erik said. “Why don’t you catch the lights? We can see it better.”
Kathleen moved to the large panel and flipped off the switches. Only the diffuse light from one small bulb in the kitchen illumined the room as she made her way back to the benches.
“Ready?” Erik asked over his shoulder, and smiled.
“Ready.”
He started the tape and Kathleen took a seat at one of the long dining tables. Erik sat down beside her, propping his elbows on the table behind him and stretching his long legs out in front of him. Kathleen looked down at her own bare leg, a scarce few inches from his thigh. She didn’t move farther away.
They watched the raw footage that he had shot and were soon chatting amiably about the moods he had captured. Kathleen couldn’t help but laugh when the camera rolled in on Gracie’s splotched, tear-streaked face. She had fallen down and scraped her knee on the morning hike, and had wailed disproportionately to the injury.
“Oh, Erik, how cruel,” Kathleen admonished, even though she was laughing.
He chuckled. “Maybe so. But I couldn’t resist. You know, one day, when she’s older, the braces come off and she can wear contact lenses, I’ll bet Gracie will put the rest of them in the shade.” His hand found its way to Kathleen’s shoulder.
“I hope so. She deserves some happiness. Her parents and little brother died in a car crash. She was hospitalized for months with injuries. She was eight at the time, and as sad as it is, that’s often considered too old for adoption. She’ll probably live at an orphanage until she’s eighteen when, hopefully, she can go to college.”
“God, what a bummer.”
Kathleen sighed. “Yes. Most of the children here were orphaned under similar circumstances. Some of them have one parent, usually a father who isn’t able to keep them with
him. Very few were born in a home for unwed mothers or lost their parents in infancy. Most infants are easily adopted.” Just then, a close-up of Jaimie filled the small screen.
“Jaimie is the exception to that rule. His father never married his mother. She gave him up for adoption at birth. He was never placed because he’s biracial.”
Erik’s hand moved from her shoulder to her neck in a comforting gesture that changed into a caress. “He’s rather special to you, isn’t he?”
“Yes. I try not to let it show, but he is.” She was glad Erik had to take his hand away when he got up to change tapes. She was finding it hard not to lean against him.
He had shot four twenty-minute tapes, and each time he got up to rewind the one just played and exchange it with another, he returned to his seat and replaced his hand on her neck or back or shoulder. In some way, at all times, he was touching her.
Kathleen buried her face in her hands when her videotape of the spider came up. They laughed over the erratic movements of the camera, which made the spider look as if he were dancing on his web.
“I’m glad I didn’t aspire to be a videographer!” she exclaimed.