Family Tails

A Story of a Mixed Family in the Genetic Age

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Names of actual businesses, their products, etc, are the property of their respective owners.

Story and characters © 2013 Ronald J. Lebeck

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Chapter 10

The flight back to Alaska went smoothly, though they did have to skirt around a storm system over the Rockies. They landed at Sea-Tac airport to refuel the jet, and to take a bit of a break. The four of them rented a vehicle and drove on to Seattle, where they went up into the famous Space Needle and ate in the restaurant at the top. Both Lupina and Rosie enjoyed the view as the restaurant slowly rotated. They drove around the city enjoying the sights until they got the call from the airport to let them know that the minor maintenance checks and refueling were complete. After dropping the rental off, they returned to the plane, and this time Ron took the pilot's seat. As soon as the little jet reached cruising altitude, Rob slid the right-hand seat back so that he could get up out of it, and then he headed towards the back to get something to drink.

Lupina had decided to take a little nap, so she made herself as comfortable as possible. Rosie didn't feel like reading at the moment, so she looked out her window. Since she was sitting in the rearward facing front seat on the right side of the cabin, she watched the coastline recede into the distance as they headed out over the Pacific Ocean.

"Well, I guess that's one way of looking at it," she thought to herself, "seeing the shore slip past like that is like leaving my old life behind. I hope where I'm going now is going to be better than that skuzzy little place I was in. At least I'm with Lu, so maybe it won't be so bad."

When Rosie heard Rob get up to head back, she wondered if it would be okay for her to take a peek up front. She'd never seen anyone fly a plane before, so her curiosity was getting the better of her.

"Um, Rob...is it okay if I take a little look up front for a minute?" she asked.

"Sure, just don't go pushing any buttons, okay?" Rob said with a little smirk.

"Ooo, no way!" Rosie said emphatically, shaking her head. "I promise not to touch anything!"

Rob chuckled and said, "Okay, go ahead. I'm going to get something to drink, do you want anything while I'm back there?"

"Nah, I'm cool. Thanks, though," Rosie replied.

Rosie unbuckled her seatbelt, got out of her seat, and went up to the cockpit to take a look. Before she could say anything, and without even turning his head, Ron held up his right hand and waved with his fingers.

"Hi, Rosie," he said.

She froze in her tracks. "How did he know it was me?" Rosie thought to herself.

"Um, hi. You mind if I watch for a minute or two? I've never seen anybody fly a plane before," she asked.

Ron slid the right side of the headphone off his ear, and motioned for her to come closer.

"Geez! I've never seen so many buttons and stuff!" Rosie exclaimed as she looked at all of the controls. "That's way too complicated for me! How do you remember what all of these things do?" she asked.

"Oh, it takes a bit of training to get familiar with everything. It looks like there's more than there actually is, because there are two sets of everything," Ron said.

"Why two?" Rosie asked.

"It's so that the plane can basically be flown from either seat. It only takes one person to fly it, but if the pilot needs to get up for some reason, the person sitting in the right seat can take over," Ron explained.

"Oh. Um, don't you have to, you know, like hold onto the steering wheel or somethin'?" she asked when she saw that Ron didn't have his hands on the controls.

"In a plane, this is called the 'yoke', and it doesn't really turn the plane left or right, like the steering wheel in a car does. When you turn it to the left, the plane rolls to the left; when you turn it to the right, the plane rolls to the right. When you push in on the yoke, it makes the nose go down; when you pull it towards you, it makes the nose go up. When you want to turn left or right, you have to push these pedals on the floor--they control the rudder, which is what turns the plane. Now, you actually have to use the rudder pedals and turn the yoke at the same time to make the turn quicker. There's various ways you can turn, but the easiest is to turn the yoke in the direction you want to go, pull out on it a bit, and give it a little rudder," Ron explained.

"Wow that seems too complicated!" Rosie said, not really grasping how it all worked.

"Oh, it's pretty simple, actually, once you get the hang of it," Ron said with a grin.

"You say so, but still, don't you have to have your hands on the wheel...yoke, thing?" she asked.

"Heh, it's on autopilot now, so I can just sit and keep an eye on things, listen to other pilots and the air traffic controllers," he replied.

"Oh."

Even though she's the shortest of the four, there isn't a whole lot of room in the cockpit, so Rosie had to put her left arm around the back of Ron's seat and grip the sides for support as she bent down to talk. The little jet suddenly lurched a little to the left, forcing Rosie into the back of the pilot's seat and her face against Ron's.

"What was that?" she asked, getting a worried look on her face.

"Oh, nothing to worry about, it's just a little turbulence. Pretty minor, actually--you tend to feel it more in small planes like this," Ron explained.

"Oh."

Ron noticed that Rosie's face was still against his, and that her hands were on his shoulders. He reached up with his right hand and stroked the fur behind her right ear a few times.

"It's okay, Rosie, it's just like running over a little bump in the road with a car," Ron said reassuringly.

"Ron?" Rosie asked after a few moments.

"Yeah?"

"You...um...you're...mmm...a nice guy," she said, struggling not to say what she found herself suddenly thinking.

Ron had an idea of what Rosie might be thinking. He had to admit, though, that he did find her to be quite attractive.

On his way back to the cockpit with a couple of cups of coffee, Rob saw that Rosie was still apparently talking to Ron, though he thought she might be trying to get a little "face time" with him. Rob chuckled quietly to himself and shook his head. He stopped by the front passenger seat on the right side of the cabin for a moment to "admire the view".

"Mind if I squeeze past you, Rosie?" Rob asked when he returned to the cockpit with the coffee.

"Oh! Yeah, sure, let me get out of your way," she replied, a little startled.

Rosie stepped back and slightly behind the divider panel behind the pilot's seat so that Rob could hand Ron his cup of coffee and then get back into the right-hand seat.

"Must have hit a little bump back there," Rob said with a little smirk.

"Yeah, ZAN said that things might get a little rough as we approach Anchorage's air space. There's system building, though if it behaves itself, we might be able to go straight in to FAI, though we might have to contact Eielson if we have to route around to the east," Ron said.

"Yeah, no need to chance getting in front of an on coming C-130," Rob chuckled.

"Uh, what's a 'C-130'?" Rosie asked.

"Oh, it's a four-engine turbo-prop military cargo plane--they're just a little larger than we are," Ron smirked.

"How much is a little?" she asked again.

"Over fifteen meters larger," Ron said, "kind of like comparing a Volkswagen Rabbit to a Chevy Suburban, only we're the Volkswagen."

"Oh," Rosie said quietly.

"How long will it take for us to get to where we're going?" Rosie asked after a moment.

"A little over five and a half hours, give or take," Ron said, "and then we have about an hour's drive to get home."

"Yeah, it's going to be late by the time we get home," Rob said.

"And don't forget that we've already crossed two time zones so far today, and will be going into a third," Ron added.

"Oh," Rosie said.

She stood there for a little while just watching and looking out through the windshield, not seeing much of anything but kilometers of ocean and some far off clouds.

"Doesn't it get boring sometimes?" she asked after a while.

"Yeah, but that's why there's an autopilot, we can read or something while on a long trip like this. There's not going to be much to see until we get to the coast just east of Anchorage," Ron replied.

Rosie didn't say anything. She watched as Ron checked the instrumentation, punching up different information on the big color LCD screen just left of center in the instrument panel, eventually returning it to display the RADAR image. She noticed that Ron would occasionally tilt his head from one side to another, and one time she thought she heard a *crack* as he moved his head around. When he started rubbing the back of his neck, that's when she got into the space between the back of the pilot's seat and the divider between the cockpit and the cabin, and began massaging his neck and shoulders. He leaned forward a little so that she could have some room to move her hands. Reaching into a cubbyhole by his left leg, he pulled out a bottle of water and a pill bottle. He downed one of the pills with the water and put them back in the cubbyhole, and let Rosie continue.

"How's that?" she asked, looking around the back of the seat and smiling.

"Ooo...you've got strong hands there, Rosie," he answered.

"I'm not doing it too hard, am I?" she asked, suddenly concerned that she might.

Four-footed skunks have strong front paws to dig in the ground or to rip bark off old logs in search of food. The skunk G.E.L.F.s also have naturally strong hands. Thankfully, though, Rosie kept her claws short enough so that they didn't dig in and scratch.

"Nope, just right," Ron replied. "That feels...sooo good. Heh, ever thought of becoming a massage therapist, Rosie? You'd probably be good at it."

"Ya think?" Rosie asked.

"Yeah. MmmMMMmmm...," Ron moaned happily. One of the few simple pleasures in life, in his opinion--a good massage.

While they were over the Gulf of Alaska, Ron and Rob heard a maritime distress call coming over one of the VHF radio frequencies they routinely monitored while over the ocean. A fishing vessel was apparently having an emergency, so Ron contacted the Air Route Traffic Control Center, ZAN, in Anchorage to alert them that they were going to descend and locate the vessel and alert the Coast Guard as to its location.

"Strap in ladies, we're going to try and assist a fishing boat that's having problems," Ron announced over the intercom.

He circled the little jet back around and started descending. Rob made some quick checks, and then pulled out a pair of binoculars to start searching for the boat. Lupina and Rosie hurriedly got their seatbelts on, not quite knowing what to expect.

"See anything yet?" Ron asked as he slowed their airspeed and made a gentle descent while taking a wide circle.

"Nope, still too high up," Rob said as he looked out his side window.

"Okay, hang on!" he said cheerfully, and then proceeded to descend rapidly.

"I...wish...you...wouldn't...DO...that!" Rob said through gritted teeth.

"GAAAAH!!!" Rosie cried out as the plane suddenly headed for the ocean. Lupina gripped the armrests of her seat, tightly shut her eyes, and wondered what had possessed her mate to do something so insane.

"I'm gonna whack him one if we survive this!" Lupina thought to herself.

It didn't take long to drop down to nine hundred meters from seven thousand six hundred twenty meters, after pulling that little maneuver. After leveling out and slowing down to more respectable low-altitude speed, Ron tried to raise the fishing boat on the radio.

[Ron] "Fishing vessel JOANNA RAE, this is NOVEMBER FIFE NINER SIERRA WHISKY ALPHA, do you copy? Over."

*Background hiss*

[Ron] "Repeat, fishing vessel JOANNA RAE, this is NOVEMBER FIFE NINER SIERRA WHISKY ALPHA, do you copy? Over."

*Crackle*

[Fishing boat] "...can you *crackle* engine out."

Ron repeated the call as he continued circling, attempting to get a clear signal from the boat.

"Hey, I think I saw them! Make your rudder thirty degrees starboard," Rob called out.

"Thirty degrees right rudder, aye," Ron said as he banked and turned to the right a bit more and straightened out.

He dropped down a bit more to seven hundred sixty-two meters AGL.

[Ron] Fishing vessel JOANNA RAE, this is NOVEMBER FIFE NINER SIERRA WHISKY ALPHA, say again. Over."

"Take us down to one hundred fifty-two," Rob instructed.

Ron eased the nose down until they were flying only one hundred fifty-two meters off the water.

"Okay, we're coming up on them," Rob called out.

"I've got them on RADAR. Get ready to mark their coordinates," Ron said as he rolled the jet to the right so that he could see them out the window.

"In five...four...three...two...one...mark!"

"Got the fix on their location," Rob said, pushing a button to hold the GPS coordinates so that he could write them down.

"Okay, I'm going to circle back around and do another fly-by to show them we've seen them, and then I'll climb up and give the Coasties a call," Ron said.

"Geez, Lu! We're awfully close to the water!" Rosie said as she looked out her window.

"I hope he doesn't do that again! I'm going to whip his tail if I have to change my underwear!" Lupina said with a slight snarl.

Just at that moment, the plane rolled to the right about forty-five degrees and held for a few seconds, long enough that they saw the fishing boat go by, before the plane righted again.

"There it is! I see it!" Lupina said excitedly.

Rosie saw it, too.

When he flew the jet by the second time, they could see people on the boat waving at them and pointing at the aft end of the boat, so he waggled the wings to let them know that they had been seen. Climbing back up to one thousand fifty-four meters, Ron radioed the Coast Guard, giving the name and GPS location of the fishing boat, as well as how many people they saw, and the apparent trouble. Ron also added that the radio signal of the boat was weakening and breaking up. When the Coast Guard called back to say that a unit had been dispatched, Ron took the little jet back down for a close fly-by. He called the fishing boat to try to tell the crew that help was on its way, repeating the message three times. As they approached the boat one more time, Ron flashed the landing lights in the Morse code signal "dah-dah-dah dah-dit-dah" for "OK". As they passed by, Ron executed a slow roll, and then climbed back up to their cruising altitude and resumed their course.

"R-R-R-O-O-O-N-N-N!!!" Lupina and Rosie cried out in unison as the plane rolled.

Rob looked over at him and smirked, "I think you might end up on the couch tonight, buddy."

"Ya think the natives are restless back there?" Ron asked chuckling.

"I can hear the drums now," Rob quipped.

Ron stuck his tongue out with a mischievous grin.

After turning the autopilot back on and placing a call to ZAN to inform that they had secured from their part in a search and rescue op, Ron had to get up for a bit.

"Hey Rob, you wanna take over for a bit, I gotta make a head call," Ron asked.

"Okay, I got it," Rob replied.

"We still have those sandwiches in the fridge, don't we?" Ron asked.

"Should. Bring me up one, too, if you can make it back there in one piece," Rob chuckled.

"Let's see...a wolf on one side, and a skunk on the other...what are my chances?" Ron asked.

"You're doomed," Rob smirked.

"No doubt," Ron agreed.

"Is it safe to come back there?" Ron called out as he left the cockpit, with Rob chuckling behind him.

"What is WRONG with you???" Lupina shouted, throwing a wadded up paper towel at him.

Ron noticed that the ears on both ladies were pinned back. Rosie looked scared, and Lupina was fuming.

"I take it that you didn't much care for the quick descent...or the barrel roll," Ron said sheepishly.

"What was all that you said about never doing anything to hurt me?" she asked giving a hard look.

"I did tell you to strap in, didn't I? And I did tell you to hang on, didn't I?" he asked in return.

"Yeah, but...," Lupina started to say before Ron interjected.

"I gave fair warning to be ready for something, and I didn't do anything to hurt anyone. There was a fishing boat down there giving out a distress call, and we were obligated to check it out. We had no idea what might have been going on down there, so we had to find them quickly to assess the situation and then radio for help. The radio signal from the boat was getting weaker and breaking up, so it wouldn't have been much longer before they would have no other way to get help. There's a storm system approaching, and it wouldn't take much for the sea to capsize the boat since they are without power. We saw six people on the boat, and given the cold temperature of the water, they would have succumbed to hyperthermia quickly and drown, if sharks didn't get them first, and then that would be it for six people--their families wouldn't likely have a body to bury. Without us getting a fix on their position, the Coast Guard would have to search a huge area once it was discovered that they were overdue, and that would be very time consuming. The survival rate for humans in cold water can be as low as only a matter of minutes without proper protection. This way, they know exactly where they are...well, at least at the time we radioed, but they can account for drift due to current and wind, and they can get to them much quicker. A search and rescue helo is already on its way to them using the coordinates that we sent, and they'll probably send another vessel out to tow the boat back to shore," Ron explained.

Lupina's ears dropped after hearing Ron's explanation. He came over and held his arms out, so Lupina unbuckled her seatbelt and got up. She let him put his arms around her and he held her for a little while.

"I'm sorry, baby; I didn't mean to scare you. I just wanted to get down low quickly so that we could find them easier. It's kind of hard to see a little fishing boat from seven thousand six hundred twenty meters," Ron said quietly in her ear.

"I thought I was going to have to change my underwear!" Lupina said.

"Yeah, me, too!" Rosie chimed in.

Ron held his hand out to Rosie; she got out of her seat, and hugged him, too.

"Um, if you two don't mind...I need to make a head call," Ron said after a few moments.

"A what?" Lupina asked quizzically.

"Restroom...gotta recycle some used coffee," he said with a grin.

"We ought to make you wait, after putting us through that!" Lupina said, jabbing her finger in his chest. "Go ahead, though...but make it snappy!"

"I'll hurry," he said, still grinning.

As Lupina started to remove her arms from around him, Ron felt another hand run down his back...and give a little squeeze on his backside. He didn't give any indication that he noticed, but he most certainly did notice. When he was about to step into the plane's restroom, he looked back and met Rosie's eyes. She had been watching him make his way to the back of the cabin, though when he stopped to look, she saw him raise an eyebrow a little before he ducked into the little restroom.

As they approached the south coast of Alaska, they could see the storm system approaching ahead of the front. There was some turbulence at their altitude, but not as much as it could be. They didn't have any trouble making it to Fairbanks, and after landing, Ron drove the plane up to the hanger. Rob got out of the plane and got the huge door opened, and Ron parked the little jet inside. As soon as Ron got the engines shut down, Rob closed the hanger door. Once they got all of their things out of the plane, Ron shut off the lights and closed it up. Ron and Rob did the usual things they had to do after parking the jet, such as chocking the wheels, connecting external power, plugging the end of the pitot tube, and putting the covers on the intakes of the engines.

The drive home from the airport was relatively quiet since it had been a long day. Ron dropped Rob off at his place, which was only a five to ten minute walk from his own house, and when they arrived home, he parked his SUV in the garage.

"Well, gang, we're home," Ron said letting out a sigh before they got out of the vehicle.

"What's for supper tonight?" Lupina asked.

"Oh, I don't know...I'll see what's in the fridge and come up with something," Ron replied with a grin.

He and Lupina held hands for a moment, and then the three of them got out. After getting their things out of the back of the SUV, they entered the house through the door in the garage. Inside the door was two sets of stairs--one going down to the basement, and the other up to the main floor. They put Rosie in the first bedroom on the right, the same one that Lupina had stayed in her first night.

Lupina took Rosie around to show her the house while Ron headed off to the kitchen to see what he could make for supper.

"Wow, Lu, this place is nice!" Rosie said, looking in wide-eyed wonder. "It's a lot better than that old dump I was in!"

"Ha, at least you had running water and electricity!" Lupina said, referring to the little cabin she first stayed in.

"Yeah, well, I guess you got me there," Rosie said, sticking her tongue out.

Ron took the ash pan out of the wood stove, carried it over to the big fireplace, and dumped it carefully in there. The back of the fireplace has a thick metal door that opens up to a chute going down into the basement. It empties into a steel collection drum so that the ashes can be used later for soap making. Ron opened the door and scooped all of the ashes down it, closed it, and then got started building a fire in the fireplace. After cleaning up from getting the fire going, Ron set about fixing supper.

Rob came over to have dinner with them, though while Ron got things going, Rob went down into the basement to check over the latest batch of mead they had been making.

"Anything I can help you with, dear?" Lupina asked as she leaned against his side.

Ron put his arm around her and smiled, and then they kissed each other.

"Well, let's see...you mind measuring out two cups of rice for me?" Ron asked.

"I think I can handle that," Lupina replied. "Um, where do you keep it?" she asked, not knowing where it is.

"Oh, it's in the pantry, in a big glass container. There's a scoop in it, and the measuring cups are in that cabinet over there," Ron said as he pointed to the one he meant.

"Okay," she said.

Rosie sat at the kitchen table and quietly watched as Lupina helped Ron fix their supper. He was making his own version of sweet and sour chicken with jasmine flavored rice with freshly grated ginger root. After cutting up the boneless, skinless chicken breasts into chunks, he cooked them in a big pan with a mixture of extra virgin light olive oil and sesame seed oil, and seasoned with a touch of white pepper and sautéed garlic. When the chicken was starting to brown, he added chicken broth, sweet white wine, honey, chunks of fresh pineapple with juice, and Asian vegetables. He put the lid on the pan and let it simmer for a while, and then got the rice going. When the rice was about half way done, he took the lid off the chicken and veggies, stoked the fire up a little, and let the liquid cook down until it thickened. Lupina was trying not to drool while she sat at the table with Rosie and Rob. When it was all ready, Ron put the food on the table and served both water and Formosa Oolong tea--one of his favorites.

"Ooo, this smells delish!" Rosie exclaimed as the food was passed around the table.

"I told you he's a good cook," Lupina said with a knowing grin.

"Yeah, well, Rob doesn't do too bad, either," Ron said, pointing his fork towards his friend.

"We used to take turns cooking when Ron first moved up here," Rob said.

"Did you two live together or something?" Rosie asked.

"Yeah, we shared a place until we were able to get our own places built here, and before it starts getting too cold out, we usually cook outside on the charcoal grill every so often, or else will have something in the smoker," Ron explained.

"Smoker? What's that?" Rosie asked.

"It's something that you slowly cook food in, mainly meat, and it uses the heat from a charcoal fire with damp wood chips tossed in, a pan of water to catch the juices from the meat and also provide steam to keep the meat from drying out. The smoke from the wood stays in and it flavors the meat. You can get different flavors depending on what type of wood you use, like hickory, oak, or mesquite. It's really good, and comes out tender," Ron said.

"Maybe next weekend we can do big roast or something," Rob suggested.

"Yeah, that might be good," Ron agreed.

Rosie greatly enjoyed the chicken with all of the veggies. Ron had made plenty for the four of them.

"This is sooo good!" Rosie exclaimed. "Where did you learn how to cook like this?"

"Well, my mom got me started helping in the kitchen when I was old enough to stir a pot. A lot of it I learned on my own by watching others, reading cookbooks, cooking shows on TV, working in restaurants, and lots of experimentation," Ron explained.

"Wow, Lu, if you guys eat like this all the time, we're gonna have to get a treadmill or something," Rosie said.

"He's got one, down in the basement," Lupina said with a smirk, "in fact, he's got a regular exercise room down there."

"I can imagine what kind of 'exercising' you probably do," Rosie teased.

"Rosie!" Lupina said with a bit of embarrassed exasperation.

Rosie stuck her tongue out at Lu and giggled.

After supper was over Ron opened one of the bottles of mead they had made and poured some for everyone, and they sat in the great room near the fireplace and chitchatted for a while. By the time Rob finished his second glass, he decided it was time to head home, so he said his good nights and went off to get some sleep. One glass was all that Lupina and Rosie could handle.

"I think I'm gonna sleep good tonight," Rosie said after yawning.

"Yeah, me, too. Are you going to come to bed soon, dear?" Lupina asked.

"Yep. I'm going to check my messages first, but I'll be in shortly, luv," he replied.

"Okay, don't take too long. Come on, Rosie," Lupina said to her friend.

Rosie was feeling a little fuzzy and had to have a bit of help getting up.

After they went off to the bedrooms to get ready for bed, Ron took the glasses into the kitchen and turned off most of the lights. He went up to his desk in the loft and logged into his e-mail. Sifting through the various messages, he came to one in particular that he was hoping to see. The message was short, with only two strings of numbers, each string beginning with three upper case letters--"LAT" and "LON". He opened up another program, entered the numbers, and watched as the image on the screen zoomed in from a display of the entire globe, down to a rather precise location...that just happened to be located within the state of Texas.

"Gotcha," Ron said quietly to himself.

Before he headed down to his bedroom, Ron picked up a small box that had a little bow stuck to the top. Smiling, he shut off the lights by his desk, walked down the stairs to and went into the kitchen to get some water to take back to the bedroom. He turned the lights off except for a few little L.E.D. lights that gently illuminated the kitchen as a night light. Before he left the kitchen, his senses told him that someone else was approaching. He quickly determined that it was Rosie by the way she walked.

Just as she rounded the corner, Ron said, "Hi, Rosie."

"Oh!" she said, startled to see him in the room. "Hi. Um, I was just going to get a drink of water before going to bed."

Even though the light was dim, he could see her well enough. Rosie had changed into a gray t-shirt that was probably a size Large...for a human male.

"I'll get you a bottle that you can take back with you," Ron offered.

"Okay, that'd be great," she said.

Ron got one of the glass sport-type water bottles out of a cabinet and filled it up for her. He showed her how the mouthpiece worked. As Rosie was giving it a try, she looked up innocently, though she knew full well that she didn't have much on underneath the t-shirt.

"Oh, I got something for you," Ron said quietly.

He held up his hand, which was holding a box with a little bow on top.

"For me?" Rosie asked sweetly, and a little surprised.

"Yeah, just for you. Remember what I said about having a big box of the best raisins that I could get waiting here for you?" he asked.

"Um...yeah, I remember," she replied.

"Well, here it is. I was going to bring it by and see if you were still up or not," Ron said.

"Geez...I...um...that's...awfully nice of ya. I-I wasn't really...expecting...," she said.

"Yeah, well, I keep my promises, Rosie," he said with a grin.

"I...guess so. Um, Ron?" Rosie asked quietly.

"Yeah?"

"Um...thanks...for bringing me here," she said with a little waiver in her voice.

He gently hugged Rosie and said quietly, "You're welcome." After holding her a little longer, he added with a few light pats on her back, "It's going to be okay, you're safe here, and you can stay as long as you like."

Rosie pulled her head back and looked up at Ron and asked, "You mean that?"

"Absolutely," he replied.

Ron cupped Rosie's chin in his hand and held it up as he leaned in.

"Rosie...," he nearly whispered.

"Yeah?" she asked just as quietly, closing her eyes and parting her lips a bit in anticipation.

He kissed her on the cheek and said, "Good night."