Missing Choices

And that would be the very thing my focus was so intent on.

T'zuri was making her way down to the stream and I moved swiftly to slither back into the tall grass escaping her eye moments before she was upon me. Now you would think that a large man such as myself would have trouble moving silently .. but that is not the case. When I wish to I can move through the grass without giving myself away. Something I practice often and I am rather good at it.

So she stood there at the edge of the water and .. I knew she felt my eyes on her. I did not hide the predatory rush that washed out from me. I would swear she stomped her foot when she demanded to know if it was I out there in the grass ... I could taste the fear on her skin at the thought it might not be me ...but still confident in her belief that it had to be.

When the unanswered demand reached that pinnacle of fight or flight I tackled her from out of the grass flipping her over and pinning her wrists high over her head as I kneed her thighs apart. I think if she had not been wearing Fancy she would have peed all over me. Which of course would have only served to amuse me further.

I can not explain how beautiful she was. Her eyes so bright with excitement .. her skin flushed with fear and surprise ... color and scent heightened with the deep inhales she was taking trying to ease the crashing of her heart within her ribs. I wanted nothing more than to kiss her .. and I was going to until she asked me to. I am so not good at doing what I am supposed to ... so I told her to beg me for it. She said she did not know how and that I needed to teach her. I laughed and fell back into the grass and used my hands as a pillow while watching her. I told her I was the last person to teach anyone how to beg.

We spoke of the note she had left me with the beads and the flute .. while she told me of it I toyed with her. Not like a man should be while a woman speaks of her father. I did not get far of course .. she was wearing Fancy. But as I toyed with her belly .. that little pocket between her hips I wondered out loud without realizing I was doing it ... if they had not told her she was too small to have children. She wondered what the hell I was talking about .. who would tell her such a thing and then I had to go and explain my thought process which was a little disjointed. I told her .. you know .... a healer ... because she was so small. It was known to happen. She said her momma had no trouble with her. I replied I had not exactly examined her mother in such a fashion. To which she called me a scoundrel. And I took it one step further just to prove I could.

But the subject had brought up something I had wondered .. a question left unanswered when it came to her. Why had she given them up. If she could have them ... why had she been willing to let them go? She told me she did not think of it that way ... she did not think of what she had lost ... more on what she gained. But I could not understand how she could not have considered it at least? She asked me if I thought she was foolish and .. no that was not what I thought ... I simply wanted to understand this about her. Women were raised to bear a man's children .. as free women ... that was their destiny ... their future. Sometimes it is all a man ever gives a free woman. She told me her papa and momma never raised her to bear children .. like most parents did their girl child ... she was raised to love. That her papa never told her to find a man to give her children .. but to find a man to love.

huh

I told her that I wanted children .. sometimes more than anything ... even though it scared the fuck out of me as well. She said she had not known that about me .. but she thought that I would make a damn good father. That stroked my ego of course .. but I asked her then ... why she had taken her children away from me. I could tell that surprised her .. and she asked me if that was really how I felt? I told her that .. it was ... sometimes. I like choices. She said she never meant to do anything like that ... I asked her if it mattered .... my wants. She said yes ... so I said ... why then? She said .. we had discussed it ... went over it .. talked about the two sides of it that she wanted more than anything to be close to me ... really close to me with no walls.

That is when part of my brain started tuning her out.