THE CAVERN OF DEEP HARMONY

PART TWENTY-ONE:

Martha peeked in the door to see if they wanted some fresh cookies, but when she saw them cuddled so close on the couch, merely smiled and went back to the kitchen.

"I think I've heard that last piece," Eden was saying, her temple resting against his, "but doesn't it usually have voices behind it?"

"You're right," he said, "almost always a choral backup, sometimes quite a large group of singers. This CD of mine just has the orchestral parts. Sometimes I like it that way. Leaves me freer somehow to go where I want with the music."

He leaned over and started 'Va Pensiero' from the beginning, this time with his head resting against hers, his hand quiet with hers in her lap, but sang the words just above a whisper in Italian, his lips not far from her ear.

She sat there wondering if anyone had ever actually just upped and died from sheer happiness. And it was there again, that almost desperate need to be closer than merely side by side. They said sometimes folks were blessed enough to find their other half and the image she'd always gotten of that was of two pieces, like maybe an apple cut in half or something, anyway, two pieces that matched closing together. But that wasn't what she was feeling. She didn't want

one smooth side of her pressed against one smooth side of him. That wasn't it at all. What she
yearned for was for all of her to be contained by all of him and all of him to be contained by

all of her. You couldn't really get a mental image of that, now could you?

His breath as he sang was on her hair and the sensation of it went down each individual strand to her scalp with a delightful tingle. He doesn't have to do more than this and he leaves me panting, she thought. What would it be like to...?  Something deep in her core trembled then went all soft and squishy. She didn't think she'd ever felt so completely female in her life.

The music was over, his lips were still against her hair, his hand in her lap. She lifted his hand

to her throat just above her collar bone and pressed it slightly, then let hers drop away. He kept his hand there, still, for a moment then his thumb pad began a soft stroking up her neck, moving on, back and forth along her jaw line.

There was something about the way she offered him her neck that moved him deeply.  Her neck was slender, delicate, and his hands were large. It was as though she were saying silently to him that she trusted him with the most vulnerable part of herself. He could feel her pulse beating rapidly under his fingers, the slight vibration in her flesh as he moved his hand. No one had ever offered themselves to him quite so completely and everything male in him responded to it. His thumb found her lower lip, explored across it, inside it, then in one smooth motion he locked his own mouth over it, nearly consumed with hunger for her.

He forgot himself, forgot his shoulder, and turned to take her in both arms, a wrenching movement that sent electric pain shooting across and through and around the upper left side

of his body. He gasped with the blinding suddenness of it, stiffening, which only made it intensify.

She realized instantly what he had done and her eyes flew open, finding him with jaw squared against the pain and a small trickle of blood seeping from where he'd bitten his lower lip. "Oh, Marshall!" she cried, stricken by the expression on his face. "I'm sorry...I'm so sorry."

He tipped his head down, blowing out short, quick breaths before he was able to speak. "No,"

he gasped. "No. Not your fault. I simply...forgot."  He raised his head, still panting, managing

a smile. "Just a second. I'll be ok."

There was a pitcher of water on a side table and she went hurriedly to it, dipping a handful of tissues she'd grabbed, then came back and dabbed at his lip. "This is why no bath, isn't it?" she asked, deciding she might as well speak her mind with him.

"No bath? Oh, you mean together?" He grinned just enough to make his lip bleed more. So, she'd thought about that, too, had she now?  "Yes," he chuckled ruefully, "I'm afraid it is."

"I just needed to be sure it wasn't because you didn't want to."

"Good Lord, darling, I want to so badly I can barely stand it." Another bolt of pain shot through his shoulder and he winced.

"I'm going to get you some aspirin," she announced. "Don't go away."

"I'll be here," he panted, his eyes squeezed tightly shut.

He sat quietly while she was gone, trying to relax his muscles as that seemed to help, and taking long, slow breaths.  He was concentrating so much on that, he didn't hear her return.  She'd started the CD again and 'Un Bel Di' filled the room. Dutifully, he swallowed the two extra-strength Bufferin she presented him with, then settled his right side against her as she sat

beside him again.  Still taking deliberate, long breaths, he felt himself  relaxing into her presence, into the music, and the pain began to drift slowly away on the tide of his rising peace.

Martha came in with a tray of cookies and hot tea. "Is he asleep?" she whispered.

"I don't know," Eden whispered back. "He's been quiet for a long while now."

"I'm awake," he said, not moving his head or opening his eyes. "Just comfortable, that's all."  Then his nose wiggled just a bit. "I smell MarthaCookies, I do believe."  He straightened then, running his right hand through his hair.

"Cookies 4 o'clock, teacup at 10," Martha laughed fondly, letting him know where his things were on the coffee table.

"Martha Malone, will you marry me?" he smiled.

"Already taken," she giggled.

"Drat!" he replied dramatically.  But both women saw his hand move, locate Eden's, and fold it into his. Martha looked at the two of them, a deep motherly tenderness shining in her eyes.

Marshall heard Martha's footsteps leaving the room. He sniffed the air again. "Ah, good... peanut butter."

"You like peanut butter cookies, do you?"

"We had this big production thing going with them when I was a kid," he explained. "Mom would make the dough and roll it into little balls. We all sat in a row at this big kitchen table, you see. I was in the middle and my job was to take a glass that had a damp cloth secured over its bottom with a rubber band. Each time a peanut butter ball would come in front of me, I'd take the glass and squish the ball sorta flat then move it on over to Jeff, who'd take a fork and press its tines across it in the traditional peanut butter cookie pattern. Rather like an assembly line of some sort."  He picked up one of the cookies, turning it over in his fingers, his thumb tracing over the impression made by Martha's fork. "Just like this," he said happily and popped it into his mouth.

"I don't think I've ever squished a peanut butter dough ball with a glass," Eden said softly.

He turned his face to her. "The kitchen table is still there."  He let his words, with all their implications, simply rest there, quietly solid.

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