Krista woke me, screaming from a bad dream. Startled, I first held her tightly to keep her from hurting herself (and me!), but then I just laid next to her waiting for her to calm. Her body bolted upright, looking around and orienting herself. She laid down again, rolled towards me, and looked up into my eyes. "Hey", she said in a voice straight out of a Vegas call-girl's playbook.

I looked down at her, and helped her wiggle out of her clothes. We made love quietly, conscious of strangers in the next room, giggling like high schoolers. This one didn't last long, we were both too tired; we fell asleep in each others' arms.

The next sign of life from either of us was after the sun was up and shining in, as we squirmed into our underwear so we could dash to the bathroom. Once we were dressed, Marta and Chester came out; obviously they had been up a while but were being courteous. We tossed together a pancake and real North Country Maple syrup breakfast, with genuine America's Dairyland butter. About thirty cakes later, I sat down from cooking and told Krista that the dishes were her job, since I cooked. She shrugged and looked cornered a minute, then saw my smile and understood, I think.

While we gathered up the plates, I told Krista, "I have to ride with Chester into town for some supplies and such... should not take over three hours. Just take it easy, maybe get to know Marta a bit more." I kissed her on the lips, hard, then bit her neck. "Back by noon at the latest."

Chester tossed me my jean jacket and we got aboard his Hog, spraying a few stones as we headed towards the main road. An hour later, a used car dealer was grinning about the schmuck he had just fleeced, and I had a two-year-old Explorer with all the toys and four-wheel drive. Now if it rained we wound not be stranded at the cabin or limited to pushing the bikes to the road. Twenty minutes in a hardware store, half an hour at Wal-Mart, and a visit to Piggly-Wiggly and we were set for days. Lots of camping supplies, food, cooking utensils, and miscellaneous bumf and we were back on the way to the cabin. The car needed tires, so I stopped at a Firestone store on the edge of town and reshod the beast.

We beat our noon promise by about 20 minutes, and walked into the cabin with arms laden with packages. I was more than pleasantly surprised by the sight which greeted me.