where the ocean meets the land
"I've been close - there are little settlements dotted all along the coast, as far as the rail line goes." Wash leaned back in his pilot's seat and grinned at Zoe. "Shiny!"
She gifted him with the smile no one else got to see. "Shiny?" Zoe settled into his lap, waited for him to lean forward so she could wrap an arm around his neck, sent her hand nestling along his collarbone.
"Wife on the beach - hence the shiny." Wash kissed the smile, thoroughly, then took possession of the other hand, stroking each tapering finger in turn.
She listened to the humming that was never a bad sign. "You got plans, husband?"
He whispered the answer, a song against her neck. "Always."
Teasing him a little, Zoe arched an eyebrow and used her most innocent voice. "Apart from the clams?"
"Sexy, sexy, sexy plans." More humming. Zoe had heard that song before.
"Might not be warm enough to swim." She glanced at the weather report for Fenton 17, a tiny outpost far from the city of New Melbourne.
"I'll keep you warm." Both arms came around her.
Her hand rested over his heart. "Be a mite windy, too."
"Dare I hope for goosebumps? Because I like making them go away as much as I like, well, making them."
"Any chance of landing my boat? Because the good people of Fenton are waiting for their illegal lumber." Mal got progressively louder as he climbed the stairs into the bridge. "And I'd like to actually gain my ill-gotten gains. But if you two have more lovin-up to do, by all means - " he finished the sentence with an impressive scowl at Zoe. "I need you in the bay when we land." The scowl traveled to Wash. "Land."
Wash sighed and relinquished the first mate, letting his hand linger on her forearm until she stepped slowly away, following her Captain down the stairs.
They made their way quickly through the ship. "You anticipate any problems, sir?"
"We'll just need to help Bartlett get the shipment well-stowed before the train comes through, but he says it ain't due until tomorrow." They passed through the galley and Zoe saw Mal glance quickly around the room. No, she's not here, sir, was what she thought, but the first mate let the unasked question go unanswered. "Just a precaution, he doesn't want anyone takin' note of the lack of tariff stamps before he can get 'em all - stamped."
Zoe thought about this as they continued. "He's got his own stamp?"
"Not asking too many questions about how he accomplished that, but folks what need it get a better deal from him than from the goods that come by rail." Mal turned toward her at the top of the stairs to the cargo bay, but Zoe saw his eyes flicker past her for a scant moment. "Nothing grows tall enough out of the bog to make decent lumber, I reckon."
"It's a bog picnic, sir? And me without my bog gown."
Mal snorted at her. "The settlement's on the bog side of some kind of estuary - too busy carryin' on to look at the map? We land there, take the boat across, dig up our dinner on the ocean side. Part of the payment, Bartlett like to fell over himself with the helpful when I said our mechanic would take a look at his desalinizing system. It'll be...nice."
"You've done this clam-baking before?"
"No, but your husband has, how hard can it be?" Mal elected not to comment on the look Zoe gave him. "'Sides, Bartlett is loaning us all the gear, and I have a diagram." He waved a small datapad.
Wash's voice spoke out from the comm. "We'll have one more for dinner - Inara is en route from the city."
"Thought she was booked up through tomorrow." Mal's tone was even.
"Last job cancelled, apparently. She expects to be here within the hour."
Both men waited for Kaylee's excited comments to subside.
Mal spoke into the com again. "Jayne."
"Mal?"
"We're landing - got cargo to tote. Report to the bay."
"Yeah Mal."
-----------------
It didn't take long for Wash to land Serenity, or for Mal and Zoe to make contact with Bartlett. The man wasn't old but seemed permanently wrinkled, as though a lifetime of bog dwelling had left him irredeemably pruny. They stored the lumber in some falsely decrepit looking low-slung graying buildings that hugged the edge of the bog, then squelched through the mud to what Mal took to be the settlement's trading post. Bartlett had payment for them, and a substantial array of gear - pots, tarps, foil, some short flat knives, a few shovels, some odd-looking rakes, as well as a bag of brown-skinned potatoes and onions he'd retrieved from the cellar. He produced a brace of bottles - dark red, corked at the top and cloudy with promise - but forebore to part with them.
"Sure would like to meet with that mechanic."
Mal called Kaylee, indicated that Jayne should stay with her at the post, and he and Zoe loaded up with gear to make their way to the set of small row boats Bartlett had pointed out for their use. "Jayne," he cautioned under his breath, "don't stir nothing up. Don't forget the peat bricks. And I've counted them bottles."
Mal left the store with a nod to Bartlett, then called the ship again. "Wash, meet us at the boats. You're supervising this operation, I want you on site."
"Okey-dokey. What about Inara? She just landed but she wants a few minutes to change outfits."
Mal considered this for a moment. "Tell her to meet Kaylee and Jayne at the store. He can row them over." He hadn't planned on her being here. This was just supposed to be a pleasant afternoon for his hardworking crew, before he went back to being his usual hun dan self. Mal told himself he was not going to stand around, hat in hand like a schoolboy while Inara primped - and this would give her an opportunity to admire the manly perfection of Jayne flexing his way across the estuary.
The slim wooden boats were loaded with gear by the time Wash arrived, wearing an impressively garish Hawaiian shirt and carrying a blanket and Kaylee's folding chair under one arm. Mal turned his back as he shoved off so as not to witness Wash's arranging of the folded blanket along the flat wooden seat he designated for Zoe, or his insistence on taking his wife by a well-kissed hand to help her into the rowboat.
It took only a few minutes to cross the estuary to the long, sandy peninsula, and Mal and Wash set about digging a pit while Zoe waded barefoot into the shallow surf a few meters to gather long strands of dark green seaweed into one of the biggest pots. The breeze came in from the ocean without much pause; but the sun was warm in a cloudless spring sky, and both men soon decided to store their shirts over the bow of one of the small boats.
A familiar shout brought all eyes up to the slim grey boat gliding quickly across the water. Both oars were stored in the boat, as Jayne, seeing Mal and Wash, had taken a moment's break to shed his shirt as well. Kaylee's rainbow umbrella shook with her glee, angled as it was slightly over the side of the boat. Inara - or, more correctly, Inara's extraordinarily voluminous woven blue sun hat - had edged Kaylee's umbrella nearly into sidecar position. As soon as Jayne was satisfied of the chance to earn his fair share of feminine admiration, he took up the oars and continued rowing, bringing the little boat rapidly to the sand.
Zoe approached the group from the water, hauling a bucket full of seaweed and salt water. Wash hastened over to trade a kiss for it, then took her hand as both approached the boat.
"Thanks - and I've actually piloted aircraft with a smaller wingspan than that hat. Most impressive." Wash cocked his head and wiggled the fingers of one hand at the marvelous hat. "Do you need a permit of any kind for that?" He and Inara exchanged smiles as she handed him a basket of supplies from the galley.
Inara smoothed the brim of her hat with gentle fingers. Her laquered nails, Mal saw, were some kind of shimmery and opalescent color, just the shade of a seashell's glowing inner curve. Perfect. Was that even necessary? he asked himself.
"It's actually quite comfortable for a day in the sun - and the weather couldn't be nicer, I'm glad I could join you." She brushed her hands lightly over the front of her dress, some filmy, flowing thing, all colors of blue melting together, tied at one shoulder and opening in folds around her knees when she walked. Mal noticed it was shorter and maybe looser than most of her frocks, and perfectly matched to her ribbony little flat shoes and the golden chain, winking with blue stones, around one graceful ankle. She couldn't have looked more out of place, Mal thought, with fairy wings resting on her back.
Jayne made his way to where Mal and Wash had been digging. "Get the peat bricks out the boat, Little Man, I'll dig."
Wash shrugged. "We're nearly done here, Jayne."
"Womenfolk can see me from across the way by the store." The big man's face was serious. "You got nothin' to gain from this, but I do." Jayne took the shovel Wash passed him and set to digging with relish, making sure to keep himself in magnificent profile for any admirers that might happen into town.
Kaylee ambled up from the boat carrying some kind of flat frame with plastic sheeting stretched over it. "It's a kite!" she explained in response to Mal's question. "That Bartlett fella had some odds and ends laying around he didn't mind parting with when I fiddled with the drainage pump in the cellar. Didn't take but a minute - and now we got a kite! And some other stuff," she added vaguely with a gesture across the water to where Serenity was parked. "He was real nice."
"Yet another helpless victim of Kaylee's charm." Wash returned from the boat carrying the peat bricks for the fire, as well as a hefty orange ceramic jug beaded with condensation. "What's this?"
"Juice from the bog berries - all those sweet-smelling flowery bushes get red berries on them come fall." Kaylee waved again across the estuary. "I got them bottles of the good stuff too, set 'em in the water 'longside the boats to keep cool 'til dinner." She fished a spool of twine out of the pocket of her lightweight pants. "Can I fly my kite, Cap'n?"
Mal couldn't keep the laughter from his eyes as he inspected Kaylee's kite. It was no more than a homely garbage bag stretched over some sticks, but he figured if his mechanic built it, the blasted thing would stay in the air just to please her. "Don't let it fall in the fire. And no one's swimmin' out to fetch it for you if that twine snaps and it dives in the ocean. Take it down there." He pointed at an empty stretch of beach to the south of them.
A quicksilver kiss, warmer than the sunshine against his cheek, and she was gone, pulling a laughing Inara with her. "Ya don't gotta run much, with this headwind. Just hold it up over your head and let go when I holler. Gonna fly real pretty."
Mal and Wash grabbed buckets and shouldered their clam rakes and walked north on the beach a short while, stopping at the place Bartlett had pointed out as being likely to yield a decent number of clams. Jayne continued to dig the fire pit, and Zoe set about gathering large rocks to heat in the fire. This job only took her a few minutes, since there were rocks on the beach that had obviously been used by earlier parties. She strolled up the beach, away from where Jayne was building the fire with the rocks and peat bricks, and settled herself in Kaylee's folding chair, the instructive datapad on her lap.
The two men rolled up the legs of their trousers and waded into the surf, using their rakes in an attempt to locate beds of razor clams. Mal was listening to the surf, and to Kaylee's voice in the distance, when Wash spoke.
"She likes you."
Mal looked up at this, but his pilot was still stirring at the sand with the rake. There was no doubt in his mind who Wash was referring to. For a moment, he let his eyes scan the ribbon of beach until he found the round blue hat, a safe distance away.
"She really doesn't," he replied. He remembered her face when she said it: He thinks I'm despicable trash and he's not shy about saying so. He hates me. Mal didn't consider letting Wash know the details of last week's conversation - he hadn't told anyone. He didn't want her fretting over what his crew thought about what she'd said.
"She watches you. When you're doing that thing you do, that thing where you don't look at her, or that other thing where against all probability and reason you pretend you don't know she's in the room? She watches you." Wash had stopped raking now and stepped out of the surf to drag one of the buckets to the water's edge. He filled it with water and pitched in a few bumpy-shelled clams.
"Well, when you're walking through a barnyard you watch out for horseshit. Doesn't mean you want it in the parlor." Mal leaned down and filled his hands with clams. He crossed the few steps to the bucket and added them to the growing supply. "How many of these we need?"
"Several dozen - we'll get that easy. They must be truly sick of clams in town." Wash pulled the second bucket alongside the first, and waggled his fingers at Zoe, who was still sitting nearby. "How about we send her a note: 'Do you like Mal? Check yes or no.' You can fold it up in a triangle like a football and -"
"How about you bi zui? She's a tenant. And a Companion." Mal raked at the sand. "I'm the fella with a ship full of contraband - and that's only on the good days - duckin' the law on every planet that'll deign to let us land."
"Her friend retired." Wash uncovered another set of clamshells.
Mal raked harder. "Her friend found herself a man that can buy her diamonds the size of chicken eggs. Me, it's a shiny day when I can afford eggs."
"Has it escaped your captainly notice that you've already got two brilliant, gorgeous women that are so loyal to you they'd follow you anywhere? Sir?" Wash heaved some clams at the bucket, overshot his target, and bent to retrieve the clams where they rocked in the shallow surf.
That particular form of address was so unexpected from Wash that Mal stopped laying waste to the sand and squinted at his pilot. "What's this about?"
"Nothing." Wash frowned as he leaned on his rake. "It's not that they've got no other options, Mal, either one of them. But they're with you. Ever ask yourself why?" He stared intently at the sand as he slid the rake across it. "I do."
Mal was quiet for a moment, then shrugged. "I reckon it's 'cause they -"
"I'll tell you what it's not. It's not your personality." Wash shook his head at Mal. "You're an enigma - a fractious enigma. Fractious, wrapped in morose, wrapped in intolerant, wrapped in mad."
"How's about violent?" Mal waved the business end of the rake at his pilot.
"You've already got two - all I'm saying is maybe third time's a charm."
-------------------
"He likes you."
There was no doubt in Inara's mind who Kaylee meant by he. She glanced quickly north along the beach, let her gaze touch him, shirtless and browning and beautiful, with those inexplicable suspenders hanging from the buttons on his trousers.
Inara returned her gaze to Kaylee. "I really don't think so." She looked at the roll of twine in her hands. "Last week, when I was away at the wedding? He called on the Cortex, only because I had asked him to, and I said some terribly insulting things to him."
Kaylee considered this for a moment. "Worse than whore?" she asked gently, her eyes on her friend's face.
"I was angry for that, I suppose. But I tried to embarrass him." She handed the twine to Kaylee. "It was just wretched."
Kaylee passed Inara the kite. "What'd he do?"
Inara shrugged. "Laughed at me." She remembered the way his voice had sounded. I'll just carry on being stupid, desperate, and mean. "I was behaving like a bratty teenager. I apologized," she finished lamely.
"Prolly knew he had it coming." Kaylee nodded stoutly. "Good for you to show him not to cross you."
"Oh, he's terrified of me." Inara rolled her eyes.
"He watches you."
"Well, that's...he's a...I would think it's because..." At Kaylee's nod, Inara raised the kite over her head. She watched her friend unroll the twine as she backed away. Another nod, a gentle pull, and Kaylee had the kite in the air. She was beaming as she made her way back to Inara, letting out twine and watching her kite dance over the waves.
"When you're not looking, when you're turned away getting something in the galley; when we're all talking and you're looking at me - he watches you."
Inara sighed. "Mei mei, there's nothing about me that he approves of. Nothing. Besides, he's renting me a shuttle. I know he's very dear to you, but he and I have a business arrangement."
"That's how it started with your friend, right? Business, with her and that nice Radamus fella? Now look at 'em."
"Radamus respected Chrysa's work, her standing as a Companion. From the first, he was proud of her." Inara let the rest of her thought go unvoiced.
Kaylee shrugged. "Wouldn't hurt to be a little friendly and see what happens."
------------------------------
They made their way back at Jayne's call - the peat had burned nearly to ash, and the rocks were glowing hot. Wash took the lead at layering the damp seaweed, the clams, and the vegetables into the pit. Once it was blanketed with the wet tarp and well-covered with sand, the crew passed the time taking turns with Kaylee's kite and finding seashells in the surf.
Dinner was more of a chance to relax than they had taken in a long time. Zoe and Wash spread out on the blanket he'd brought, passing each other food, whispering, and leaning into each other. Kaylee reclined contentedly in her folding chair, her plate balanced on her lap.
"Real nice picnic you got for us, Cap'n." She smiled, waited for him to return a smile of his own.
"Remember that next time you're of a mind to call me a kuh-ooh duh lao bao jurn."
Jayne ate standing up. "Can't see any prospects sitting down," he explained with a nod toward the outpost.
This left Mal and Inara. He watched her start to fold her legs under her on the sand. "Hold up." He passed her his plate and strode away to the boat. Inara watched him come back, stretching his arms into his shirt and carrying something folded under his arm.
"Allow me." With a wry smile, he shook out his coat, let it rest on the sand, and gestured for Inara to sit. Blinking a little, she did. Mal fastened a few buttons, then settled in next to her and reclaimed his dinner.
------------------------
"We're going in the boat now - down there." Wash indicated the southern end of the estuary, where the land jutted out and tall shrubs obscured the view. "I will be rowing in a manly fashion, and my wife will be sighing over the...manliness of me. We don't want company." He and Zoe gathered up their blanket and were soon skimming away over the darkening water, heads bent intently to each other.
"They'll be sexin." Jayne chuckled.
Mal was watching Inara trace absently in the sand with one contented finger. Characters. The first one, Serenity. The second one he did not see - she saw him reading her words and brushed them away, looking almost bashful.
Kaylee's voice opened the silence. "Hey, my shoes! 'Nara, we left our shoes on the beach!"
Inara chuckled softly, looking at her own bare feet. "So we did. Shall we walk?" She crossed to Kaylee and extended a hand. They headed down the beach, arms around each other's waists, both shaded from the late day sun by the hat Inara still wore.
"What'd ya think of dinner?" Kaylee gave her friend a squeeze.
Inara smiled. "It was nice. The dinner."
"And friendly." Another squeeze.
"Kaylee, we were only -" It puzzled her, how oddly nervous and shy she had felt sitting next to Mal on the beach at dinner. It's not like we've never sat next to each other before, she chided herself. And laying out his coat for her - them, Inara revised - to sit on? Any other Companion would have expected no less as her due, but from this man...
"I hope we get to come back." Kaylee broke away to turn a lithe and graceful cartwheel in the sand. She landed with a flourish, and Inara applauded.
"I hope so, too." Inara reflected on her work in New Melbourne. She'd engaged with two clients, neither one of whom she'd consent to see again. A detached part of her mind wondered why she was so quick to find fault with new clients these days. But there were other prospects she could explore on future trips.
Kaylee turned another cartwheel. "We got some cider, too, for after dinner."
"We'll be here until after dark?"
"Why not? Gonna be pretty as Christmas when the stars come out - romantic, too." Kaylee grinned at her friend and skipped ahead quickly, away from Inara's protests and into another cartwheel. But when she landed -
"Aaaargh!" Kaylee sank to an awkward sitting position in the glinting sand, holding her left foot.
Inara rushed over, bent down. "What is it?"
Kaylee pulled her hand back; both hand and the foot it covered were red with blood. Inara looked more closely - there was an ugly, jagged gash along the pale arch of her friend's foot. She heard Kaylee gasp at the sight.
"It's okay, mei mei. Don't look at it." Dropping her hat in the sand, Inara pulled free the silk scarf that had held back her hair. She brushed away what sand she could, then quickly wound the scarf around Kaylee's foot several times, tying the ends at the top of Kaylee's instep.
"Your scarf's gonna be ruined!" Kaylee tried to shake her foot, then hissed at the pain.
"Don't worry about that."
"Gotta get that cut cleaned out." Kaylee's face was much paler than it had been a moment ago.
Inara crouched next to Kaylee's side. "Let me pull you up. Stand on your other foot - see, there's the shell you landed on. Does it hurt badly?" She put an arm around Kaylee's waist. "It's okay. Wrap your arm around my shoulders; give me your hand. We'll just go slowly, it's not far."
-------------------
They were coming back arm in arm, just as they'd gone, but Inara's hat was missing. Her hair was blowing around in the wind, and for a moment Mal found himself able to do nothing more than watch her. It was the first time, he realized, that she didn't look like picture book perfection, and he could not look away. Mussed. Maybe like it looks spread out on those pillows of hers in the morning. Then he thought to wonder what happened to the hat - not lost, surely, something of that size? - when he looked again and realized Kaylee was limping, badly, her lips pressed together. He started off toward them.
Jayne, still shirtless, sprinted bulkily by him to where the women approached. "What'd you do?"
"Cut my foot up nasty." Kaylee was balancing on one foot. Mal saw that the other was wrapped tightly in a festive-looking scarf, stained with some red at the edges.
"All that flipping about - " Mal growled, striding up behind the merc.
"Don't worry." Jayne lifted Kaylee in his arms, and she beamed up at him, suddenly much more cheerful, and snuggled against his broad chest. All ten of her toes wiggled. "Let's go back to the ship and get that little bitty foot cleaned up, girly." The merc flexed his arms around her and smiled suggestively. "You ticklish?"
She slid an arm around Jayne's shoulder, cuddled closer against his neck. Kaylee threw an excited smile at Inara, then wrinkled her nose at Jayne. "Mmm, you're so...warm." She patted a saucy hand on his chest. "That depends on who's doing the - hey, who cuts your hair?" She was examining a spot behind Jayne's ear, and her smile was gone. "Cause they don't know what they're doing. You gotta let me fix that." She called back over Jayne's shoulder as he turned away from the sea. "We'll be right back for the cider. I'm not missing that cider." She continued to explain about the haircut, but her words were lost on the breeze as a deflated Jayne marched away toward the small boats.
Mal looked at Inara. "I'd better make sure Jayne don't get a competent haircut."
Her smile was fond. "Kaylee's a sensible girl."
"There such a creature?" Inara only shook her head, still smiling a little.
Mal exhaled, found himself needing to say something. "Sure is emptying out here."
Inara's eyes traced the ribbon of beach. "Completely." She was quiet for a few moments. "I thought I'd go retrieve our shoes." She turned to retrace her steps.
Mal fell in step beside her. "What about the astonishing hat?"
"I must have thrown it when Kaylee got hurt - probably blown into the water by now."
"Terrible shame - must be all the fashion on Sihnon."
"Last season, yes. Now it's solar veils." Inara waved a hand in a circle around her face. "But I love that hat." She raised her eyes to the waving line of surf as they walked. "On Sihnon this would be lined with pleasure boats, hotels, galleries, every luxury one can imagine."
Mal frowned. "Such a pity how we don't measure up to your - "
Inara spoke as though she had not heard his defensive bluster. "It's perfect." Her eyes were wide and soft as she took in the long and empty stretch of wind-rippled sand.
"Come again?"
"I've never had a beach all to myself before. It's like we're the only two - it's perfect." Inara picked up the shoes and gazed out at the pounding waves. The wind snuggled her dress against her curves and blew her hair around her face in gentle waves. Her soft-looking little toes curled into the warm sand beneath her.
"There's your hat. I can just - " Mal hurried away.
In a moment, he had returned with the hat and passed it to Inara as she murmured her thanks. She was still watching the surf. "It never stops," she said, in almost a whisper. She brushed a few pale grains of dry sand from the hat's brim.
"Couldn't if it tried." The sun was setting behind them. Mal glanced up at the moon, enormous in the darkening sky. "I want to get the rest of the gear in the boat before Kaylee gets back demanding that cider."
Inara nodded. "I can help you."
They walked back to the fire pit in silence.
-----------------------
"I'm gonna stay out here all night - watch the stars come, watch the moon, see the waves..." Kaylee dropped an empty bottle onto the sand next to her chair, gestured vaguely at the sea. Jayne had rowed her back to the beach, then quickly set out to meet a woman he'd spied going into the trading post.
"Be washed out to sea by morning, Little Kaylee." Mal uncorked a bottle and drank deep. "Besides, it's cloudin' up - might rain."
"The merfolk..." Kaylee giggled. "Meet a nice merboy..." Her eyes were drifting closed.
Inara moved to kneel in front of Kaylee, looked at her closely. "Honey? Did Jayne give you anything in the infirmary?"
"Nooooooo." Another giggle. "But I sure thought about it." Her voice danced into its upper register. "Thought about it all the while he was takin' care of me."
Inara squeezed her friend's hand. "Kaylee - "
"You're so pretty." Kaylee squeezed back, smiled dreamily. "He likes you."
"Did Jayne - " she tried again, a little louder.
Softer now. "Boys without shirts. So swai. Did ya see him, 'Nara?"
Inara's voice was a bit more emphatic now. "Mei mei. I mean anything for the pain. Medicine?"
"Jus' a little smoother. Jayne's nice...bandaged me right up...so big all over...just got to get that haircut fixed..." Kaylee frowned sleepily for a moment, then relaxed into her chair and said no more.
"And she chased the smoother with this finely fermented berry cider. How many bottles?"
Inara looked at her own bottle, then eyed the sand next to Kaylee's chair. "A few. Will she be okay?"
Mal considered the unconscious girl. "Won't feel too shiny come morning, but she'll live. Reckon I got some conversatin'' to do with Jayne. Little thing like Kaylee, can't dope her up like he does himself."
Inara saw Mal take a few empty bottles to the shore. He bent to rinse them before setting them down carefully in the sand. She gathered Kaylee's bottles and joined him.
Mal nodded at the set of bottles. "We'll leave those on the trading post steps for Bartlett. Shop's closed by now."
She rinsed the bottles and set them behind her, then stood watching the waves pass through stripes of moonlight. "Ever wonder what's out there? Down deep? Beyond what people can see?" Inara took a few steps forward into the waves. Mal watched the cool water, foam-tipped, glide over her toes. It was almost unbearable to look at her. The universe must hate him.
He turned away and shrugged. "Whatever the terraforming crew dropped in there - list on some datapad, I figure."
Inara's voice was wry. "Is there no romance in your imagination?" In a new voice, she continued. "I read about the whales that may live in the deep on some worlds. They...sing."
"Singing whales." Mal flexed an eyebrow. "Opera?"
"Their songs could echo through thousands of miles of water, almost across the entire planet. Swimming alone in the dark water, it was how they found each other."
Mal thought for a moment, picked up a small gray shell and watched it rest in his hand. "Ancient sailors, on Earth-that-Was? On their maps of the sea, uncharted waters, they'd write 'Here Be Dragons.' " He flung the shell into the dark waves.
"Here Be Dragons," she repeated, her eyes on where his shell had fallen. "They knew it was dangerous." Her voice sounded different to him, and he wondered if the cider was stronger than what she was accustomed to drinking.
Surely it was the sea that was mesmerizing him. Or the cider was too strong for him as well. "But they couldn't stay where it was safe. They wanted to know more than what they could see."
Inara folded her arms across herself, rubbed with her hands against a sudden shiver. "They risked everything."
"Some of them died for the wanting of it." He knew just exactly how they felt.
"Lost at sea, far from home." There was a sorrow in her voice.
"Shipwrecked, left with nothing." A ship, a life, smashed to ugly kindling on the indifferent rocks. No matter what Wash thought he saw and knew. Parts and pieces, that's what he'd be, parts and pieces floating and clashing without purpose or design. Used up and useless. Or whole, but empty-handed and alone, no way off a hostile shore, no help ever appearing on the horizon, no way back to a life of his choosing.
From behind them, Kaylee coughed in her sleep. Inara blinked as if waking, then turned to find her friend's sleeping face. She was watching Kaylee, but Mal was still watching the surf, and her, so he saw what she didn't. A rogue wave, foolishly yearning more than any of its brethren for the pulling moon above, rushed foamy and almost silent onto the sand. Just a few feet farther, no danger, but she'd be half-soaked and shivering in her pretty dress.
"'Nara - " He reached, caught her by a wrist, and stepped back.
Then not only was he falling, he'd yanked her comprehensively off-balance as well, no saving either of them. He heard himself yelling, heard the clanking glassy bottles, heard her gasping indrawn breath, reached out with his other hand and prayed not to land on top of her.
Mal hit the sand with a thunk, mercifully avoiding both the lady and the breakable bottles. He had curled in, instinctively, on his way down, so the hand on her wrist and the one that had a purchase on her waist followed along and pulled her right down on top of him. Which is how he came to be sprawled, barely upright enough to be sitting, on the sand, on an empty beach, with Inara jostled breathless on his lap, her body pressed against the length of his chest. Her free arm had circled tightly around his neck during the fall - the other rested between them where he was still holding it. Mal could feel her breath on his cheek, could see the moonlit shadows her eyelashes cast on her face. She could have felt his breath too, he realized, if he hadn't been holding it. Mal exhaled, dared to breathe again. He could smell the sunshine that had been pleased to warm her skin all day.
Don't move your fingers, don't move that hand soldier, don't look at her mouth, her eyes, her hair, her shoulders, Oh sweet Mother of God, the curve above her knees, where in holy hell did the rest of her dress get to?
Inara wasn't closing her eyes, was watching him closely, first his eyes and then his mouth. Looking for all the world like a woman who wanted kissing, which meant that the cider definitely had hallucinogenic properties, because in no way could that be the case. She'd made it very clear just a few days ago, how she thought of him.
Don't think about everything you've been dreaming about for weeks, this is a mistake of truly colossal proportions.
There was no power in him to lift her away and out of his arms. He might be dying.
"Mal?" In a whisper.
Not dying. This onslaught, feeling her everywhere, he was overwhelmed, the enchantment of her voice, her hand now resting so lightly on his shoulder, and the continuing press of her legs across his lap, it would take just a moment to put both hands around her waist, pull her closer, bring her knees to either side...
"Bwaaaaah!" And Inara was not quite flying through the air. Mal told himself he hadn't really thrown her, he'd just - ah, ta ma de, he'd thrown her. He counted himself lucky she was uncanny graceful, and landed on her feet. Mal scrambled to a standing position, strangely out of breath, and pulled his jacket tight. She must know the state of him - how could she not? He had a heart to slow, a body and an imagination to rein in toward something approaching calm.
Mal figured he'd better explain. "There was a wave." Neither of them moved.
"Oh." Inara's voice was fragile, little more than an exhalation. There was enough moon to see that she was flushed pink on her cheeks, and trembling. Mal wondered why she had any business shivering - the heat of her against him still scalded him everywhere they had touched. But he didn't want to let her freeze on top of everything else he'd done - he shrugged out of his coat, crossed the space between them and laid it over her shoulders. Inara met his eyes, then looked quickly down at the brown leather wrapping itself around her. She ran a hand slowly down the length of the coat and looked back at Mal, a question in her eyes.
"I had a plan."
So the plan was, he'd pull her safe as he stepped back neatly onto dry sand. Easy peasy, he had congratulated himself. Good plan, outstanding plan.
Inara nodded her approval of the plan.
"And then the bottles." It might have been his own throat strangling him.
A tiny laugh. "I forgot about them too."
"I didn't think you'd want to get all wet." The filmy dress, soaked through and clinging to the bare, wet skin underneath - yet another thing to add to the list of things not to think about.
"You surprise me so." Her voice was gentle, and the fingers of one hand trailed inquiringly down the length of his coat again. "I'd have bet you'd think that was good for a laugh."
The words were out before he had time to think about them. "Reckon I'm not in a laughing mood."
A pause. Her voice was careful. "You're not?"
Mal headed off the follow-up question he could not answer. "Are you alright? You didn't get hurt when I -"
"Threw me?" There was laughter in her voice, but something else, too - did she sound a little sad?
"No!" Mal protested, moving closer to her. "Well, yeah, but - it's just that the way you were, on my - and the way I had you, with my - " This was not getting easier. " I didn't want you to think I was trying anything - unseemly."
"I didn't think that." Inara's voice was so soft over the waves. "I knew you would never...thank you."
Mal wasn't quite sure what he was being thanked for - following the impulse to pull her out of the wave, or ignoring every other impulse he'd had since then.
"I figure I'll get these bottles in the boat." Mal clustered the narrow tops between the splayed fingers of each hand and crossed the luminous stretch of beach to the edge of the estuary. As he was stacking them carefully behind the seats, he heard Inara approaching, heard the soft clink of the bottles she carried.
"This is the last of them." She passed the few bottles, still crusted with sand, across the boat to Mal.
"No, here are the last." Mal held two dripping bottles out of the water next to the boat. "Shall we sit? Watch the surf?" Inara raised her eyebrows at this, so Mal added, "From a safe distance, of course. Reckon we'll be in the black a long spell after this, better get our fill of earthly delights."
"I think everyone had a lovely day."
"Folks appreciate getting to relax now and then." They stopped just before the tawny smooth sand that indicated high tide. Mal saw Inara begin to ease her arms out of his coat, and stopped her. "You wear that, you were shivering cold just now."
"I wasn't -" Inara was quiet for a few moments. "But you'll have nothing to sit on."
A wry smile. "These trousers are well-acquainted with the sand, you'll have reason to know. Besides," he added, "you look almost as pretty in that coat as I do." Mal took a seat on the sand.
Inara laughed, beaming a moon-bright smile at him. "You are insufferable," but her voice was warm. She settled in next to him, wrapping her arms around her knees, and accepted the bottle he passed to her.
They sat quietly for a while, not near enough to touch, watching the waves below and the clouds above.
Mal stirred a little. "So...clams."
"The clams were good." Inara looked at the man next to her. "Have you ever done this before?"
"Sat on a beach? My first time, think I'm doing well, though."
Mock exasperation. "Have you ever baked clams, is what I was referring to. Digging them up and cooking them like you did. Although the sitting? I'm impressed, you seem to have a natural aptitude."
"No, this is the first time. I had a diagram, though. Devout believer in the power of a good diagram." Mal nodded, as if conceding something to himself. "And Wash knew what to do."
"The two of you looked quite industrious in the surf."
"Oh, so you were watching me?"
"Hardly. I was busy flying a kite."
"Yes, gliding about holding string. Quite an impressive repetoire you have."
Inara arched one perfect eyebrow slyly. "Oh, so you were watching me?"
No more than I can help. Mal waved the accusation away with one hand. "I heard reports."
"I'm sure your crew appreciates what you did for them - the day was very pleasant."
"We can fry up the leftover baked potatoes and onions for breakfast. Some of that juice left, too."
"That'll be...good."
"Little Kaylee might not think so." Mal considered his mechanic, still sleeping in her folding chair. "You about finished? We should get her back on the boat."
Inara nodded. "I'll carry her chair if you want to lift her out -" the glass clanked softly as she accepted the bottle Mal passed her.
"Heyyyyyy!" Kaylee's inconvincingly threatening voice rose from behind them. "I hear you over there. No messing with our gear. Cap'n's gonna...fix your wagon when he - " the rest of the words were slurred.
"Now she raises the alarm?" Mal was affectionately incredulous.
"We'd better see to her."
-----------------
Inara settled onto one of the boat's wooden seats, scooted to the side, and held her arms out to guide Kaylee down beside her as Mal eased her in. Their mechanic's eyes barely opened, and no sooner had Mal taken up the oars than she slumped over entirely, resting her sleepy head on Inara's lap.
Inara gave Mal a smile over that, and smoothed Kaylee's hair back where it lay across her face and neck. Kaylee stirred a little and muttered what might have been a question.
"Shhh, mei mei, we're on our way home." Inara's hair swayed as she bent over her friend.
"I love you, 'Nara."
A low, musical whisper. "I love you too, Kaylee." Inara looked up and saw Mal watching her, and as she turned away, her face seemed a little shy. She trailed a few long fingers in the starry water.
Mal found himself rowing slowly, listening to the nighttime songs of unseen things and watching the ripples his oars made in the water. There were more clouds now, and as they amassed in front of the moon the night was growing darker and darker. But the estuary was narrow, and they were almost to the bog side when he saw Inara look at him, then wonderingly over his shoulders to the left and the right.
"Mal, Mal, oh - look!" Inara closed a hand over the one of his she could reach, gave it a little shaking tug. Her eyes were fixed on the space behind him. The clouds had obscured the moon now, the night was truly dark, and so she could see what she had not seen before.
He let the boat drift into a turn so they both faced the shore, and he saw it too. Fireflies. The whole landscape illuminated with them, countless thousands of them, blinking and shining as they drifted golden in and out of the berry bushes. The fragrance of the pale sweet flowers floated out to them.
"I've never seen anything so magical." Inara's hand, the one that had touched him, rested lightly over her heart. She looked at Mal, then back at the landscape again.
The tightness in Mal's chest was getting painful. "Maybe your friend's new hubby can make one for you." There were people in her world, he had seen, who could command such resources.
"No one could ever touch it - " and he heard her reverence for the wild beauty all around them.
She surprised him. Delicate woman, accustomed to luxury and privilege, and this had brought her near to tears. He remembered what a stranger had told him, days before, about her heart, and thought he might have a glimmer of understanding. And he was proud, in a way he did not want to have to defend, that she was here because of him. That it was he that had brought her here to see what moved her so that her eyes were brimming at the perfection of it.
Someone was talking.
"I said, can ya eat 'em?" Jayne. Standing near the landed boats. Apparently hungry. Mal heard Inara's soft laugh over his own exasperated sigh.
---------------------
Mal convinced Jayne not to eat the fireflies while both men unloaded the gear and bottles from the boat. Inara waited, Kaylee still resting across her lap, for Mal to finish his terse and muttered appraisal of the merc's pharmaceutical skills.
"Aw hell, Mal, you didn't see it. Lotta sand and greeny beach stuff in that cut." The merc glowered down at the crate he was carrying. "She was cryin', Mal."
Mal glowered, but nodded his understanding, and Jayne trundled away toward the outpost.
"Ready?" Mal moved next to Kaylee's side of the boat.
Inara nodded. "I didn't want to chance dropping her on the sand, poor thing." She eased her friend to a sitting position and leaned her into Mal's arms. Inara watched him lift Kaylee against his chest, a fond smile on his face. She stepped from the boat and walked by his side through the dark to Serenity.
"Are Zoe and Wash back yet?"
Mal shook his head. "Don't expect them 'til morning."
He paused in the cargo bay, considering his mechanic. "No way she can navigate that ladder to her bunk. She's got a hammock in the engine room." Mal frowned. "I'll just - "
"Come to my shuttle." Oh, how that must have sounded! At his carefully blank look, she explained. "With Kaylee. She should stay with me, I'll make sure she's alright."
"You don't need to do that."
"You don't need to sit up against a bulkhead in the engine room all night, making sure she doesn't get sick. My bed's big enough for the two of us." She felt a blush sting its way across her face. "For Kaylee and me, I meant." She hastened her steps toward her shuttle, making space between them just in case her brain was formulating even more appalling things for her to say.
As she climbed the stairs to her shuttle, Inara reflected that she both wanted and did not want time alone to think about everything that had happened today. The ungodly sexiness of him, shirtless and moving with working grace through the surf; the curious words between them at the water's edge; and most of all, the troublingly addictive pleasure of having him pressed against her for that moment on the sand.
She was the perfect guardian for Kaylee tonight - despite a long day in the sun, despite the cider still warming her behind her eyes, she was unlikely to be sleeping any time soon. This completely unfamiliar frustration was shaking her, badly - in a calmer mood she would have found her predicament laughable. She'd made a career of fulfillment and pleasure. She'd bedded, as a matter of course, any man for whom she'd ever felt the slightest desire. But this man...Inara realized she had too many thoughts about him that ended but this man, too many questions that defied elucidation.
Beyond this, beyond the wanting that pulled her as tight as the string on a bow, she found herself with foolishly protective impulses toward him. That is, when she didn't want to smack him silly. His voice in the dark on the beach, something about it had reminded her that his home world was lost and gone. That there was no patch of ground, on any of the worlds left turning, that he could claim. It made her wish for the power to gentle away the sorrow in him. Ridiculous, the impulse to protect a man who came to breakfast wearing a gun more often than not. She knew he would not thank her for her concern.
"It's a kindness, you taking care of Kaylee tonight. You're a good friend to her." Mal entered the shuttle behind her, still holding Kaylee, and crossed to the narrow red couch. He sank down, resting his mechanic against his chest.
"She's very dear." Inara wet a small towel slightly and crossed to her friend, kneeling to wipe Kaylee's face and hands with gentle strokes. Kaylee sighed contentedly and murmured something neither of them caught.
Mal watched her. "You've done this before."
A nod as she rose. "We were responsible for helping with the younger girls in the Training House."
"Training House awash with little drunk girls?" He wasn't even trying not to smile.
Inara couldn't help laughing. "Only on special occasions." She laughed again, but felt compelled to clarify. "Little girls get sick sometimes, or just - homesick." She brushed a lock of Kaylee's hair out of her eyes. "It feels good to be a comfort." Artless words that touched the heart of what Inara loved about being a Companion. And she would not deceive herself - there had been a fragile offer in those words, for one who cared to hear it. It was all her pride would allow.
"Bed's ready?" His voice was soft, but all business. Better this way, Inara thought.
"I've turned down the right side so she can - yes."
Mal rose and followed her, Kaylee still tucked against him, until they reached the bed. He lay her on her side while Inara set a glass of cool water on the nightstand and arranged the bedclothes carefully around the injured foot.
"They grow up so fast." Mal smiled to himself and squeezed Kaylee's hand. He said it as a joke, Inara knew, but she found herself touched by Mal's unalloyed affection for his mechanic.
He turned to go - Inara followed him without really knowing why. Hoping for a kiss? was the sardonic question she would ask herself, much later.
"Oh, your coat!" Inara retrieved it from where she had laid it neatly on the couch. "Thank you."
Mal folded the coat over his arm. "Don't mention it."
"She'll need a crutch for a few days." Inara glanced over her shoulder at Kaylee.
Mal considered this. "Might could have something at the outpost."
"I suppose we'll see in the morning."
He turned to face her, and the look in his eyes was speculative. "Guess we will at that." With a nod, he was gone.
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bi zui - shut up
kuh-ooh duh lao bao jurn - horrible old tyrant
mei mei - little sister
swai - handsome
ta ma de - f**k