Chapter 34

thirty-four

Lily

Every day is filled with stops for more art, beer, whiskey, and food to see how people tie the city into their individual location. Our afternoons are spent exploring and writing down ideas for The Featherweight. The public physical affection like hugs and hand holding continue, but I'm feeling cautious. My heart has a way of forgetting what it signed up for and daydreaming herself very far from reality. When we make our way back to my place, we still fool around regularly and fall asleep snuggled together. It feels so easy, I wish I could bottle it up and keep things here like this.

December 29th

This morning starts our final full-day together in this little bubble we created, and I plan to take full advantage of it. We are pressed together and kissing our way towards the shower after brushing our teeth, like every morning this week. Once in the warmth of the water, I take the soap and lather my hands to rub his shoulders and feel the swell of his muscles, the bumps and veins of his biceps, and the planes of his pecs. The soft tufts of dark brown chest hair clumping and swirling under my sudsy touch. I run my hands along his sides, his back, and down his bubble butt, giggling slightly.

On a soft kiss to my mouth, River asks, "What's so amusing?"

"The last book club pick was a sports romance, and I am starting to understand the obsession with hockey butts, that's all. Wait, do you still skate even? What do you do when you aren't at the bar? What do you want to have Vacation River keep doing at home?" I bite my lip and his thumb pulls it out from my teeth. I just know that most of the time when someone wants more, they find it after me, so I'm holding my breath because as much as I can't stand giving him up to another woman, he deserves the good luck. I feel his touch drift down towards my own behind and with a little squeeze he presses me closer.

"What do I want," he repeats back to me, pressing his hard length against my thigh with a little grin.

I gaze down at the impressive manhood, and then up at his face, "Well, yes. I know that part, you haven't exactly hid this desire. I meant more than that, but I guess we can talk about it another time."

We continue to wash each other's bodies, fingers lingering like they are trying to memorize this in the event there isn't time again before his flight tomorrow. Suddenly, I stop him. "Dude, no. You are basically promising to give me a UTI if you use soap as lube." He is clearly unaware, and raises his hands like he is surrendering to the police. I reach over him to remove the shower head, first spraying him down before myself. I linger a moment longer than needed over my pussy, humming appreciatively as I feel the pressure building against my clit.

Hands clear of soap, River proceeds to touch me until I'm panting and moaning in his arms. When my knees are too weak to continue standing, he presses his weight against me, the cold tiles reminding me of the morning before he arrived.

"You know, my toys were supposed to be put away. I was not sure you and I both were going to want this and I had tried to get it out of my system before. I just messed up cleaning up, as usual."

He throws his head back laughing. "I've never been so happy to hear that you forgot to put something away, now put those legs around me."

A bit nervous, I ask, "Won't we fall?"

He carries me over to the sink, before pushing himself in to the hilt. "No, darling, but we might fly," he says before he fucks me like he's also afraid he'll never be given the chance again.

After we clean up for the second time that morning he asks a vague, "You… did? Didn't?"

Gazing down at my bathmat, I repeat back his words from the start of the week, "Honesty over ego right?" I watch my toes brush the fibers back and forth refusing to meet his eyes.

"Yes, honesty. Always be honest with me." He tilts my chin so our eyes meet.

"Then honestly, I'm good and no, I didn't, but I'm good. And while you might want to redirect this back to the other room I've had a little surprise up my sleeve. I didn't want to jinx it, but we got really lucky. A resort client, the Hayden Group, was supposed to be here for the new year but there was a major snowstorm set to hit and disrupt their travel plans. Instead of canceling their tour of a local aero-garden and community farm project, we're going."

What I don't let him know is it is on the same property as a Michelin Star restaurant. I called and convinced the team to keep the reservation and reduce it to two, and since they had pre-paid for their tour and meals the place was happy to keep us as a small party. It is the most wonderful cap off to the week for River; dinner at the highly coveted Japanese restaurant that uses vegetables grown directly on-site in vertical hydroponic planters.

Arriving at the outdoor section, we see a slender man with a bushy mustache and day-old stubble approach in skinny jeans, boots, and wooly socks showing. His hat is pulled low towards his glasses, and his coat collar is up over his neck. Despite the usual warm daytime weather, there's been a cold front heading our way and today has been a big drop in temperature. He introduces himself as Silas, and begins to move us towards a small garden shed with heat lamps attached outside. There's an indoor portion above the restaurant that we'll head into shortly, and Silas is gunning for that it seems.

"Silas, I'm Lily. We've spoken a few times now. Thank you for keeping this on the books when the Haydens were no longer able to fly in from Chicago. I can tell you that we're happy to keep the outdoor portion quick." I register his relief.

Guiding us down the dirt path past the now-empty garden beds, Silas promises it was no trouble on his part, somewhat convincingly.

"As I mentioned on the final call, this here is River Hendrix, his family has owned and operated The Featherweight out in Peacock Springs, New Jersey since the end of the Civil War. He's the current proprietor and looking to see how others are expanding their operation to bring sustainability back east. There's nobody who does it like the folks out here, so we're extremely grateful for your time."

This flattery and move indoors was clearly the ticket and Silas begins to relax. The raised aero-beds are like nothing else, and could easily be brought back to New Jersey for replication.

More importantly, we take a lot of shit for being a joke of a state, but the Garden State nickname is because of the vast farmlands that stretch around home. His property could easily mirror the outdoor beds and move to an on-site farm-to-table style service.

Excitedly over dinner at the restaurant downstairs, we discuss everything with the eager enthusiasm of watching your team win the championships combined with kids at Disney on Christmas morning.

"This would allow for you to raise the prices on a number of items, you realize," I toss out there.

Smiling, River says, "My dad would be so proud of this profit-minded conversation between us. I'm surprised you aren't espousing the values of keeping things affordable for those who need it."

"That's the best part!" Shit, I am shouting but I can't contain myself, when I get excited about an idea I can go from zero to sixty faster than a Maserati.

"By having things be priced fairly, those who you add on to the staff to maintain the garden will be paid a fair and living wage, the overall staff meals can improve, and any produce which is just past the quality you'd use in food service but still edible can become part of an on-site community pantry. There's so many ways to turn The Featherweight into the sort of socially conscious place you want, without sacrificing the quality of the work. In fact, when we ignore the value of our own work we can end up losing out. There is a good reason for your food and your work to be priced fairly! It also means you aren't price gouging others. There's always a balance."

He is beaming at me, blinking back tears while simultaneously stifling a slight laugh. A flash of nerves hit me, and I question his look with a biting, "What?"

River puts his hand across the way and onto my cheek, looking at me he simply leans forward and nuzzles our noses together. "Passionate little adventurer you are. It just has always inspired and awed me. Is it so hard to believe that I'm not laughing at you but because you bring me so much happiness I can't contain it within myself?" He softly places a kiss on the tip of my nose before pulling back again.