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Chapter 8 :

Acceptance

Megan stepped out of the guest home after getting ready for the morning shift, fiddling with her new flannel shirt to get it sitting right. Her first paycheck had gone toward buying time on some old debts, though most were far from paid yet. With the second one she had finally been able to get herself a few new items of work clothing. It felt significant to her somehow. Like a benchmark in her tenure at the job that she could finally dress like a farm girl again.

Cassidy was sitting on the steps staring out road as if she was waiting for something, taking a slow drag off her cigarette in the cool morning air.

"So you're not even trying to hide it from me now?" Megan asked with an exasperated sigh.

"You know, mom..." Cassidy said with a smirk, "It's really hard to rebel against you when you just let me get away with everything."

Megan moved over next to her to sit down on the porch, "Yeah, well... We've had enough on our plates. The last thing I wanted was for us to start fighting over trivial nonsense."

Cassidy nodded, flicking the cherry off the cig to save the rest for later. She was down to her last two, "Either way, don't worry about it. Once I run out I'm going to quit. I don't even like it any more."

"Good." Megan replied, the sound of a loud engine coming up the road as she continued, "Those things are no good for you, honey. I just..."

She trailed off. Megan had yet to see the military surplus truck that stopped by the farm twice a day. Almost on cue a whole stampede of little girls came running up the dirt road between the houses toward it, and soon after one very not little grown man.

"Mornin' Eli." Cassidy called, putting a little girly twang into it. Her accent was usually faint, but she was clearly using it for dramatic effect here.

He turned to walk backwards, giving her a shy smile, "Oh... Good morning Miss Cassidy. Miss Megan."

"I'll see you tonight for homework?" She asked

"Of course." Eli replied, "You ladies have a nice day."

Megan watched as the group all piled into the truck, staying silent until it had pulled away and out of view.

Finally she asked, "Should I be worried?"

Cassidy just smiled, "Definitely."

Megan thought about that. Her initial reaction was to put a stop to this, but it very quickly occurred to her that one of her primary jobs at the farm was to fist a giant to completion. She didn't really know Eli and that made her nervous, but she wondered how big of a hypocrite it would make her if she forbid her daughter from seeing him.

"Well, just be careful." She finally said, shaking her head.

"Come on mom, it's not like we're..." Cassidy had started to defend herself before the realization of what her mother said had sunk in, "Wait... You're okay with it?"

"Just promise me this..." Megan said, standing and moving down the steps, "Don't let anyone from outside the farm see you two together. That's the sort of situation that makes bad people do unkind things to good people."

Cassidy hadn't considered that, and she dropped her gaze, "Yeah, that's probably for the best, but... You're really good with this? Me and Eli?"

"What matters is that you like him, honey." Megan said walking away, "If he likes you too, then I'm not going to tell you no. Just... Be careful."

Cassidy couldn't help but smile. This place had changed her mother, and it seemed to be in a lot of positive ways, "I love you, mom."

Megan waved back over her shoulder, calling with a laugh, "Yeah, you'd better. Especially now."

Her daughter giggled, pulling her knees up to her chest and wrapping her arms around them. Cassidy and Eli, she thought... Eli and Cassidy.

She wanted that.

The conversation with her daughter had made her a little more late than normal, and Henry had already gotten started prepping things without her. She moved over to the sink, unbuttoning the flannel at the wrists and beginning to gingerly roll up the sleeves in measured and careful cuffs.

"Morning Henry." She called over to him, "Sorry I'm a little late. Cassidy and I got to talking, and time got away from me."

"Don't worry about it." He said, looking at her briefly with a polite smile, then went back to his task. At the end of every shift the glass cups the girls used were cleaned and stored in plastic bags to keep them sterile, and he was going around the center of the room reattaching them to the hoses now, "I'm not going to start nitpicking over a few minutes."

"Thank you. I appreciate that." She smiled, but she was just a little disappointed. It was a girly thing and not usually like her, but she kind of wanted him to notice her new shirt. She felt kind of silly about it really, being as proud as she was about such a simple thing.

Clairibelle was already present, and she caught the reaction. She was still fully clothed, having been just about to make her way in to disrobe at her locker in the shower room. She decided to make a detour instead, coming back to the sink near the entrance where Megan was washing up and leaning on the wall next to her. She reached one hand out to fiddle with Megan's collar.

"Is this new?" She asked, smiling, "I've never seen you wear this one before."

That was all it took to make Megan's day, and she smiled brightly, "Oh, yes... I mean, it's going to take Cassidy and me a while to get caught up, but we picked up a few things in town yesterday afternoon. Do you like it?"

"Anything would look good on a pretty little lady like you, honey." CB said, giving her a little shrug and a sly grin, "Hell, I bet I'd look great on you you."

Megan rolled her eyes, reaching for a towel. She was pretty well used to Clairibelle's antics by now, so she laughed the comment off, "Are you ever serious, CB?"

Claribelle leaned off the wall. giving Megan a little backhanded pat on the bottom as she walked away, "I'm always serious."

Several of the other girls were exiting the locker room now, and one in particular wanted to get her attention.

"Hello, Megan." Daisy said, moving over to face her.

"Good morning, Daisy." She replied, "Something I can do for you?"

"I was... Well." She said, rubbing the back of her neck nervously, "I heard from Eli's school. They wanted me to know that his grades have improved."

Megan tilted her head to regard her curiously, "That's a good thing, right?"

"Well, yes..." Daisy said with a sigh, "They said it's like he cares about learning again, and I think we both know who we have to thank for that. I was... I was wrong about Cassidy. I'm sorry."

"That means a lot to me, Daisy. Thank you." Megan smiled, reaching up to put a hand on the other woman's arm.

"You're welcome." She replied with a smile, "I was just worried they were getting involved in something... Romantic. I don't want to see anyone get hurt by something that can't be."

"Well I don't think you were completely wrong about that." Megan said, moving around her to get started on her job, "She is kind of sweet on him."

Daisy lowered her eyes, a bit of sadness in her voice now, "Oh, the poor dear. Any idea how we should go about letting her down easy?"

"That's the thing." Megan replied, "I... Think I'm okay with it. He's a nice boy, and..."

"What?" Daisy said, cutting her off, "No, we have to put a stop to this. Why would you allow it to continue?"

"I was late today because she and I were talking about him and, well..." Megan said, ignoring the tone of Daisy's outburst as she went about setting up the cleaning supplies they would need later, "The way she smiled, Daisy. It's a smile that's been long gone from her life. I don't have the heart to take it away from her again."

Daisy was raising her voice now, on the verge of yelling, "I get that, but there is no future in it. We either hurt them a little now or it's going to hurt an awful lot later. They can't be together!"

"Why not?" Megan said, no longer able to contain her annoyance, "Cassidy is a good girl, and you just said yourself she's been good for him. What is your problem with her?"

"She's human!" Daisy screamed in frustration.

Everything went silent. The pair stared at each other in shock, almost as if a threshold had been crossed that they could never come back from. Daisy had her hand over her mouth now, aware of what she had just said and full of regret.

"Enough."

Henry never yelled at the girls, and he wasn't doing so now. He had a way of putting bass in his voice when he needed to be heard that felt like a lead weight had fallen onto the room. He was standing there with his arms folded over his chest, looking more like an stern father than Megan had ever seen him.

He waited for them all to turn their attention to him, then added in a much calmer tone, "We do not fight in the barn."

Daisy had withdrawn in on herself, "I didn't... I didn't mean it like that. I'm sorry..."

"We need Eli. It isn't fair to him, but we need him." Henry said, looking away sadly, "That doesn't mean he doesn't get to make any of his own choices in this life about how he goes about it."

Daisy had slowly moved around to her station now, tears forming in her eyes. As she did so. Penelope placed an arm around her in a loose hug to try and comfort her friend.

Henry continued, "Most of you girls haven't had a chance to know what love feels like and that's an unfortunate thing. Being born into a species that doesn't have enough men is a pretty unkind lot to draw."

There was a long silence that no one wanted to break. Henry debated whether or not he wanted to continue. What he wanted to say was on a topic only one person in the room knew about. Something he'd only told Elsie.

"My wife's name was Catherine." He said wistfully, arms still folded and looking at the ground, "She was kind, she was beautiful and she loved you all in a way that to this day makes me remember what it is about this farm that means so much to me."

Everyone was just staring at him now, but he was hardly paying attention to anything more than the tale he was telling, "We found out she had cancer three years before she passed. They thought she had it beat for a while, but it came out of remission and took her from me just before the change hit you girls."

"It won't ever stop hurting, but it's worth it. Every minute of it." He said, turning away to get back to his tasks, "I'd ask you to consider that."

Elsie was in her corner, watching the same as everyone else. They were all sure he was still talking to Daisy, but he caught her eye when he said it. Elsie knew he was talking to her. He still hadn't given up hope.

It was an awkward morning shift, but everyone went back to work. Needless to say, nobody was really in the mood for any kind of milking aides now. Even Clairibelle didn't feel right about getting herself off after all that. The room stayed quiet for most of the shift. The only break in the silence from Daisy, about fifteen minutes in.

"This isn't what I wanted for him..." She said, almost too quietly for them to hear, "We don't have a choice... My son... He has to..."

She was crying now. Megan didn't really understand, but she wasn't angry anymore. She couldn't imagine what it was that was troubling the other woman so much, but now wasn't the time to ask.

Daisy just said it again, almost a whisper now...

"He has to..."

It was quiet. The day had gone by without another mention of the disagreement in the barn earlier, and now it was late. A warm quiet night with a gentle breeze that fluttered the curtains in Henry's bedroom as he lay staring at the ceiling. He couldn't sleep. There was too much on his mind tonight.

He was worried that the argument Megan had been a part of was going to become a real problem. He didn't want to consider the possibility that hiring her had been a mistake. He had come to rely on her help far too much for that. She and her daughter had become agents of change at the farm though, and he couldn't be sure how much of it would be good.

He was worried about Eli. He'd always tried to be like a father to the boy when he needed one, but as time had gone on they had drifted apart. They were both fighting their own demons, and Henry wondered if maybe he wasn't partly to blame for not helping him fight them. He protected Eli as best he could by setting in stone the rule that he had to finish school before any thoughts of his 'destiny' were entertained. Mostly because it was what he deserved, and partly out of fear...

The world didn't need another Duke.

He was so lost in thought that it took him several minutes to realize he wasn't alone. He lifted his head off the pillow, slightly startled to find Elsie there. She was lit by the full moon through the window, her white dress fluttering in the wind as she watched him.

She was beautiful.

"Elsie?" He said, sitting up to look at her, "Is everything alright?"

She watched him for a bit longer, her expression difficult to read as she considered her choices. It took everything she had not to talk herself out of coming here, and now all she could think to ask was one thing, "Why me, Henry?"

He took a moment to chew on the question in his mind. He knew what she meant, but how could he even begin to explain.

"You were first..." He said, looking away sadly.

She sighed and closed her eyes, "I've always feared that was the reason. That you love me purely by chance. By accident."

"You don't understand, Elsie. The night I first heard you crying in pain... The night you started to change..." He was motionless, as if afraid to look at her now. "I was right here, sitting on this bed with a bottle of bourbon and a shotgun."

"Henry!" She said in a startled voice, "You wouldn't have..."

"I would have. I'd lost everything worth living for." He said, letting his voice drop low, "But then I heard you. You don't remember, I know, but you came to the fence by the house. I looked out the window, and there you were looking back at me. You were calling out for Catherine. Not just for help, not just for anyone... But for her."

She took a couple of slow steps forward as he continued.

"You didn't know she was gone. You were in pain and you wanted the woman who cared about you to come and make it better." He said, shaking his head, "Just the same as me."

She was standing next to him now at the edge of the bed. In her mind there was a flash of something she'd forgotten. A memory from a mind that had changed too much to know it well. She remembered dragging herself across the pasture, unable to stand. She remembered the house, seeming like it was attached sideways to a world she couldn't stop from falling over. She remembered the red haired woman that always adored her, and wanting her to come help.

And she remembered Henry. She remembered him as he hopped the fence, taking her head in his arms and whispering words she didn't understand. Words that didn't make the hurting stop, but made it bearable. Words that made it less lonely.

"You call it an accident, but it wasn't any such thing." He was looking back at her now, "It was a blessing, Elsie. You were a blessing."

She stood there silently for a long while, hands at her sides as she stared at him. She finally felt like she understood something that had never made sense before. She didn't understand how a god fearing man could love a changed creature like herself, but now she could see it clearly. The way he looked at her wasn't the way a man looked at a woman. It was the way a mortal looked upon the angel sent to save him.

He loved her. He loved her even in the face of all her denials, and she loved him in spite of them. She was ready now. Ready to do what she came here to do.

Her dress fell to the floor around her with little more than a single button and a shrug of her shoulders. Henry's breath nearly caught itself at the sight. He knew her body well, but it had been months since she had started hiding herself from him in the barn. In the dim light of the moon through the window it almost felt like seeing her again for the first time. She leaned forward, lifting one leg to crawl into the bed with him, and he caught a glint of moisture forming on the tuft of hair between her thighs.

She rolled herself into the bed next to him, settling in comfortably on her back in a way that made her breasts part off to the sides, before catching them with her arms to press them back together again in a little self hug.

"Make love to me, Henry."

He didn't hesitate. He moved over the top of her, leaning in to kiss at the side of her mouth. He had no intention of trying to figure out how to make out like a teenager, so he just moved along her face with gentle kisses that ended at her neck. She clearly liked it, and tucked against him with a sigh.

She wrapped her arms around his back to pull him down against her fully, feeling the boxers he always slept in and the stiffness contained within as it pressed against her sex. She found that barrier between them unacceptable, letting her hands slide down to start pushing them off as far as she could before bringing up her leg to hook them with a toe and drag them down completely.

She felt his member pop out and press against her belly. Henry was on the modest side of eight inches, and not especially thick or thin. It was a respectable amount of manhood that wasn't trying to be anything other than what it was, just like the man who wielded it.

They stayed like this for a short minute, slowly grinding against each other while he continued to pepper her neck with little kisses. It wasn't long before he finally drew back to let the tip of his crown press against her opening. He pushed back against it, too high to achieve penetration but letting it part her hood and rub along her swollen clit just a bit before popping back out onto her abdomen. She gasped at the sensations it caused to tingle through her body, letting her hands linger on his backside. He drew his hips back again, this time letting the tip drop lower, slowly pushing forward and finding no resistance. Just warmth, and moisture, and a welcoming velvety quiver from the woman now impaled on the shaft that she had so longed to feel inside her.

Neither of them spoke as he started to pump his hips, his member now drenched in the arousal of the woman he loved as it slid in and out of her body. She was panting against his neck already, and he could tell she was nearly there. There was no need to start off too slowly, only the need to give her what she needed. He picked up the pace, listening to her breath come faster and faster with each few thrusts.

Henry lifted his head, nuzzling against her ear and said with a whisper, "I love you, Elsie."

"Henry..." She gasped. It was all it took to throw her over the brink. Her back arched, pressing those magnificent breasts up against him even tighter. She didn't tense up completely though, not willing to fight back as she let the orgasm have its way with her.

He pushed himself all the way inside of her and held it there. He held her tightly against him, feeling the rise and fall of her chest as she took deep and heavy breaths and the rapid squeezing of his manhood as her pleasure caused her body to pulse with contractions around it.

She slowly came back down again, still panting as he rose up on his arms to look her in the eyes. She'd never seen him like this. There was a look on his face that was almost alien to her. A sense of satisfaction that he hadn't felt in what seemed like an eternity. She looked back at him, running her fingers along his cheek with a meek and satisfied little smile that he found adorable.

They kissed then. For the first time, they truly kissed. Lips pressed together, eyes closed and still locked together in the most intimate of congress. They loved each other, and right now there was no more hiding from it. Right now it just was.

She pulled back after a few minutes, meeting his gaze and said the words again, "Make love to me, Henry."

He started to move his hips once more, slowly at first this time but picking up speed once he was sure she wasn't still too sensitive. He wanted this bad. He desperately needed to feel the same release she'd just felt. His only worry was that he wasn't going to be able to bring her to those heights a second time.

"It's been so long, Elsie..." He said, letting his head drop to place his cheek against hers, "I don't think I can hold out..."

"Then don't." She said, reaching up to stroke his hair now, "It's alright. Just let it happen."

That was all the encouragement he needed. He started pounding himself into her, letting his physical desire overtake the emotional one. Her orgasm had produced even more of the excessive lubrication that her kind was known for, and now they were making a sloppy wet slapping sound each time he drove it home. It didn't take long to get him right to the edge and soon enough he could barely pump his hips at all as he lost control of them, finally just pushing all the way in and letting go.

His load started to fill her with thick blasts of his seed, forcing itself up into her as if to try and claim the parts of her body that the rest of him couldn't reach. She held him tightly, welcoming it. She wanted it inside of her. For a brief moment, she even wished...

If only it were possible.

He rode out his orgasm inside of her, unaware of the sadness that had just overcome her until it was over and he collapsed. It was then that he could feel it. It was then that he could hear her softly crying as she cradled him.

"Elsie?" He said, raising up to look at her with concern, "What's wrong?"

"No, it's not... I just..." She shook her head, smiling through the tears as she struggled for the words. Eventually she kissed him once on the lips, pulling him down against her once again, "I would have been honored carry your child, Henry."

He wrapped his arms around her tightly. She hadn't told him she loved him in the entire time they'd been together tonight. It was something he had been aware of since the beginning, but this... This was more than those three little words ever could have meant. It was everything. Love, family, a sense of being together in all things.

It was something she couldn't give him.

Humans and the changed couldn't conceive children together. For everything that made them the same, they were still too different. It was something she desperately wanted, but which still terrified her. She had declined to be inseminated with the others when they reopened the farm, and she hadn't needed it since she was already producing for her son. The same son who was now buried out in the graveyard at the back of the property.

"Elsie, I..." He started to say, but he could feel her starting to move out from under him and he rolled away to let her.

"Don't say anything." She said, rising from the bed. She picked up her dress and started to slip it back on, "It's all just a dream, Henry. A wonderful dream."

He rose up out of bed after her, moving to her side to put a hand on her arm, "Please don't leave. We can be together, Elsie... It doesn't have to be so difficult."

"You never give up on me." She put her hand over his, and leaned in to kiss him once more before pulling away with a smile, "But this was difficult. It was a hard step down a long road, and I need time to learn how to walk it."

After a moment, he nodded slowly and let his hand drop as if to set her free. It's not what he wanted, but it was what she needed.

"Go to sleep, Henry." She said, turning slowly to leave, the wind offering up a gust to catch her hair, and to him it almost seemed as if she faded into mist as she slipped out of the room into the darkness. He heard her voice, calling back to him and becoming distant as if she was falling away...

"Dream of me."