Topic: Conversations With ...

Caroline Granger

Date: 2010-11-18 15:08 EST
....My Cat

Another day, another dollar. Or so they said; it'd been a while since Caroline got paid cash in hand for anything. No, everything came into her bank account once a month, even the supposedly tax-free bonuses she earned for doing her grandfather various favours.

She drew up outside the gates of Maple Grove, Humphrey Granger's wallowing estate outside Rhy'Din city, leaning out through the window of her vintage Mini to announce herself. As the tinny voice of the elderly gatekeeper answered and she watched the gates slowly grind open, Caroline sighed to herself.

"You'd think that I'd be given a pass key by now," she muttered, rolling up her window and setting her foot on the gas to drive down the winding driveway that led through an artificial wilderness to the sprawling edifice of Maple Grove itself. "It's not like I've never not lived here."

She passed various members of staff - gardeners, cleaners, the serving staff - going about their business, never failing to greet each of them as she drew into the huge garage that lurked to one side of the house itself. They, in turn, greeted her just as pleasantly - she wasn't just a member of the family they worked for, she was one of them. It was a confusing state of affairs. In front of Humphrey Granger, she was Miss Caroline; anywhere else, she was just Caroline, or Caro, the part-time chauffeur for the big house.

Killing the engine, she clambered out, locking the door, and let her eyes scan over the garage floor. All the vehicles were here, and the mechanics had shut up shop for the day, so it seemed that Grandpa Granger wasn't intending on going anywhere this evening. She hoped.

As she turned to walk up the stairs that lay along one wall of the garage, she hit the keypad for the huge doors, listening to them squeak and clang into place as she jogged upward. The stairs opened onto a small terrace, bordered by the walls of the apartment that sat on top of it, and it was here that she finally started to relax. This, after all, was home.

Unlocking the door, she let herself in, and smiled as her cat, Zaphod, came padding up to her, rubbing his face over her knees.

"Hey, Zaph, missed me?" she asked the ginger fluffball, bending to lift him up into her arms as he purred his volcanic greeting to her. "I know, really long day, but I bet Blue came up and did your dinner, right?"

Yellow-brown eyes blinked at her, turning to look pointedly down at said half-finished dinner, sitting in bowls on the kitchen floor. Caroline laughed, putting her cat down beside the food, and stroked him as he made a show of eating what was left.

Moving to the refridgerator, she opened it, and grimaced at the sight of yet more leftovers from the big house. "Gods, don't they finish anything over there?" she asked no one in particular, chuckling when she got a plaintive 'meow' from near her feet. "Oh, no, fella, you're not getting this. You'll get fat and have a heart attack, and then who'd I have to talk to?"

A plastic dish of something that was probably beef strognanoff was pushed into the microwave, and she set to taking off her coat as it began to heat her meal, hanging it on a hook by the door. As usual, Zaphod followed her around as she then headed into her bedroom, removing her boots, and changing into her pajamas.

"So what did I do today, you ask me?" Caroline bent, scritching the ginger tom's head affectionately as he butted at her knee. "Well, I delivered wool and hemp to the spinning mills, thread to the weaving mills, and a new foreman to the farms. I know, thrilling stuff, huh?"

She laughed as the cat lost interest, padding back into the main room. Following, she gave him a gentle push with her bare foot to get him out of the way, and was back in the kitchen by the time the microwave dinged. Pulling the steaming dish out, she tipped the contents onto a plate, and dropped the plastic container into the sink to soak until she could be bothered to wash it. Plate in one hand and glass of water in the other, she returned to the living room and curled up on her couch, Zaphod tucking himself in beside her.

"I dropped in on Auntie Jay, too," she told him as she ate. "She's kinda gotten over that heart attack Correy gave her, but she says he's hanging out with some girl that she doesn't like the sound of." She chuckled to herself, one hand resting on the cat's back as he washed his paws. "She really needs to let up a little. I mean, I'm not his mom, but I'm doing all the parenting here. He hates me, too."

Sighing, she put her half-eaten meal aside, and gathered her cat into her arms, burying her face in his fur. "You don't hate me, though, do you? I feed you, and I let you sleep all over me, and you purr and let me hug you when I want. That's love, isn't it?"

There was nothing but a purr for an answer, and she smiled tiredly, hugging Zaphod tighter to her. Sometimes it seemed as though all she ever did was look after everyone else; it was times like those she was glad she had a cat to come home to. Yes, she might look after him, but he never made demands or shouted at her that she was ruining his life when she was trying to help him.

"Life would be so much easier if all I had to worry about was you, Mister Zaphod."

Caroline Granger

Date: 2010-11-19 11:12 EST
....My Grandfather

The black Mercedes pulled away from the big house at Maple Grove and began the slow, pleasant drive down toward the gates. In the back seat, Humphrey Granger, the current president of the GrangerGuild Conglomerates, was busy re-knotting his tie after his daughter-in-law had insisted on doing it for him.

"So how is my Good Girl today?" he asked the driver, who tilted her head back to grin at him.

"Still hating that designation, Grandpa," Caroline chuckled. It was an old joke, and one that wasn't really funny any more, but he liked it and she played along for his sake. "You know nothing changes in my life. It's like watching paint dry."

"Ah, so you're still trying to pretend that a little over a year ago you weren't engaged, then," the old man in the back seat nodded to him, watching in the mirror as her expression shut down. "Caroline, Henry was a first class idiot, and you know it. Move on."

"I am moving on, Grandpa," came the slightly chilly response from the front as the car slipped out through the gates. "Where to this morning?"

"Oh, the offices in the city," Humphrey told her absently. "Bloody board meetings."

"Oh, hey," Caroline brightened as she remembered something. "We met a fella last night who runs day trips around the harbor on his sailing boat. Was that the sort of thing you wanted to make the directors do?"

Her grandfather chuckled. "Sometimes, Caroline, your mind is far more evil than you like to pretend," he laughed. "That's exactly the sort of thing. Go and investigate for me, would you? You know the size of the board and all the requirements for a long meeting, and you could do with getting out of your routine once in a while."

Caroline just about managed not to groan at that. "Yes, Grandpa."

"You said we. Who was we last night?"

Now that was a tough one to answer. She didn't know if he knew that Oliver was back in town, but she'd never been able to lie to Humphrey. She settled for a compromise.

"Lola and Gigi were out," she told him. glancing into the mirror to see his reaction. "I think Lola got the guy's card, actually."

Mission accomplished; he was distracted by the mention of Lola. "Did you remember to ask her about that cloth?" he asked.

"Yeah, I remembered," she chuckled back to him. "She says two weeks; her loom's at work at the moment."

"Oh, perfect," Humphrey nodded happily. "You'll be able to get those shirts run up for me in time for the Christmas party."

"Yes, Grandpa."

That was the way it always was, how Caroline ended up with relatively little time for herself in every day that passed. Someone asked her to do something - or in this case, assumed she would do it - and she never said no. In some ways, having family around all the time was not the boon some people thought it was.

Caroline Granger

Date: 2011-02-07 11:09 EST
....Myself

"It's been a month. Almost thirty days since it all ended. Why don't I feel better?"

No reply. Well, you couldn't expect one when you were curled up in bed with no one but a sleeping cat to hear you confess. She'd been allowed, finally, to move back into her familiar apartment over the garage, with regular, constant, incessant visits from the concerned relatives and friends who knew something was wrong. They knew, but they hadn't picked up any proof yet.

"He can't touch me anymore," she whispered to herself, staring blindly at the sunlight streaming in through the window. "Grandpa made sure he wouldn't do anything to any of us anymore. It doesn't help."

She'd been awake for what felt like hours, unable to sleep after being jolted awake by nightmares. But they were no longer just nightmares. They were memories. Memories of pain and humiliation, of hunger and fear, of gentle hands that burned and a smooth voice that mocked her even as the owner of that voice took every last shred of dignity and pride she had ever had.

"Should I tell them what he did" Would that make it easier to deal with' Gods, I can't do that. They wouldn't be able to cope with it; hell, I can't cope with it. Why else would I be talking to the walls?"

She sighed, rolling over onto her back to stare up at the ceiling for a change. At the end of the bed, the ginger ball of fluff that was her cat, Zaphod, stretched and turned around, falling almost immediately back to sleep. She watched him enviously for a moment before returning her dull gaze to the light above her.

"It's getting so hard. All everyone ever sees is Caroline, back to normal and twice as paranoid as before. That's all I want them to see. Grandpa suspects something, though. I wish I could hug him without flinching. Hug any of the guys without being pointlessly frightened. I don't have anymore excuses. I'm all healed up. I was fine before the nightmares started."

A quiet sob escaped her lips, quickly muffled by the curl of her palm over her mouth. She rolled to her side again, curling up tight beneath the covers as her face pressed into the pillow. All she wanted was for everything to be normal again. Not to be so frightened of every loud noise or, worse, the closeness of any male figure. She knew none of them would hurt her, and yet she hadn't been able to sit comfortably in the presence of any man she knew, family or not, for days now.

"I want my brother," she sobbed into the pillow, trying to hold back the tears and failing miserably. "Where is he?"

Caroline Granger

Date: 2011-02-24 10:49 EST
....My Cat (Part Two)

The Walk of Shame. Or in this case, the Drive of Shame. Except there wasn't much shame involved at all. Despite clearly wearing the clothing she had been in the day before, along with a grin that seemed to be on the verge of eating her nose, Caroline was utterly unbashed as she drove back into the Maple Grove compound that morning.

If she was extremely lucky, Humph would already be at work in his study and not staring out through the window to see her scurry from her car, up the stairs over the garage and into her little apartment. If she was extremely unlucky, he'd be over within minutes to find out where she'd been all day and night.

However, there was one person she could not avoid. Zaphod, her imperious ginger tomcat, was waiting for her by the door, a look of acute disapproval in his yellow eyes.

"Don't look at me like that," she admonished her cat, unlocking the door to let them both inside. "It's not like you've starved, Lucy always has something to keep you happy if I'm not about."

She bent to stroke him. He avoided her hand, apparently intent on punishing her for not having been at home to smother him in love the night before. Caroline laughed softly, letting the door bang shut behind her, and headed for her bedroom. She needed to shower and change before anyone came looking for her.

"Don't sulk, Zaph, it doesn't suit you," she informed her cat cheerfully, already stripping off her clothes and dropping them in the laundry bin as she passed through the bedroom to the bathroom attached. The tomcat immediately leapt into the bin on top of her clothing and began a minute inspection of said clothing, evidently memorising the new scent that clung to them. He offered up a curious meow as she turned the shower on.

Glancing back at the cat, Caroline's grin returned in full force. "His name is Richmond," she told her pet. "You'd like him, I'm sure. If you can convince yourself to let him get closer than a yard away while you're around. I can't believe I'm trying to convince my cat to accept the fact that I'm sleeping with someone."

This last was spoken to herself as she ducked under the flow of water, reliving certain salient points of her night away with pleasant nostalgia.

"At least I hope I'm sleeping with him now," she added thoughtfully. "What if it was just a one night stand" What if he thinks I'm some sex-mad freak who jumped him because he was the closest person to hand" Oh gods, that would be awful."

Horrified by this thought, she finished her shower quickly, wrapping herself in a robe before falling onto her bed. Now she was cleaned of the male scent that had ruffled his fur, Zaphod came over to her, rubbing his face possessively over her hands and jaw as he purred. She scratched his back fondly, letting the cat nuzzle away with a smile.

"I'm not a sex-mad freak," she said, uncertain if she was assuring herself or the cat, or just the world in general. "I mean, I shouldn't even really be thinking about anyone like that right now, should I" After everything ....no, I'm not gonna go there. It's done and finished, and I'm moving on. I've cried enough, haven't I?"

The feline curled up beside her, one paw laid in affectionate possession over her hand on the bed, and began to wash himself.

"It's not too soon, is it, Zaph' I haven't totally ruined everything" It felt right, it felt wonderful. He didn't care that I'm damaged, he just ....I think he really does like me. I mean, like me. He's nothing like Henry, either, so no worries on that score. But what if everything changes once he finds out about what Humph wants me to do?"

She looked down at the cat, who yawned hugely and closed his eyes, claws flexing lovingly against her knuckles.

"Alright, I get it," she laughed, lifting her hand to stroke the mottled fur. "Stop worrying and get dressed, point taken."

She rose from the bed, moving to grab fresh jeans and a shirt from her closet. So she'd taken a risk, and it hadn't hurt. Maybe the risk really had been worth taking. Maybe she'd be spending a lot more time with the sea, and the Whispering Wind, and a certain captain who didn't seem to care what she was or where she'd been. Maybe it was, indeed, worth the guilt and the flashes of fear.

Maybe soon she wouldn't wake up in cold sweat, terrified by her nightmares. If she wasn't reading too much into her exercise at the docks, there'd be company to hold her in the darkest hours of the night, and a calm, gentle voice to drown out the taunts of a memory that was best forgotten.

Caroline Granger

Date: 2011-02-25 09:49 EST
....My Cousin

It had been a good day, Caroline decided. First being able to see Lola's debut with her L/O collection in Millie & Mallie's show for Fashion Week; then an interesting evening spent at the Inn with Cally, and to her surprise, Richmond, too. She'd never thought he would actually take her teasing little phone call as an invitation to head ashore. And in pajamas, no less! But the night was wearing on, and she'd had enough of pretending comfort in a crowd. Not that she had much choice as to when she could leave - Ollie had caught her by the door, offering company while she 'got some air'.

Caroline smiled more fondly, feeling a little guilty for making him feel unwanted. "Sure, why not?" Looping her arm through his, she tugged Ollie out onto the porch, pausing to shrug into her coat before hugging Richmond's forgotten red flannel shirt to her chest. "Still finding it hard to do more than say hello and goodbye with Cally, huh?"

Ollie sighed, scrubbed a hand down his face. "Every time I try to say something more to her, she makes it painfully obvious that she doesn't want me around. She's always sending me off to talk to you or to Lola or to Jon." He sat down hard on a bench. "I don't understand it at all, Caroline. Everyone keeps telling me to chat her up. Hell, Lola's absolutely convinced that I'll suddenly be happy if I date her, but....She doesn't want that at all. She doesn't want anything to do with me."

She smiled gently, nudging her arm against his. "Ever think that maybe she's just as shy of you as you are of her?" she suggested softly, moving to sit down on the swing beside him. "Maybe you're just thinking about it too much. Stop trying to chat her up, and just chat, maybe?"

He gave her a mildly disgusted look, as if it were possible for anyone to be as shy as he was around women who were not related to him. He bumped her gently with his shoulder. "I have no idea how to do that, you know. I don't do small talk. I haven't the skill for it."

She snorted with laughter. "Yeah, well, neither do I, and I managed to ..." She stopped herself just in time, eyes widening as she realised what she'd been about to tell him. "Okay, yeah, not going into that right now." Laughing, Caroline shook her head. "Well, you don't have to do small talk. You know the things she enjoys and the things she finds interesting - learn a little about them, develop an opinion, and talk about those."

"I don't actually know any of those things. The only thing I know about her is that she's Lola's best friend and she's..." Ollie sighed, realising that he was about to sound like a lovestruck teen-ager.

"Alright." Thinking for a moment, Caroline leaned back, still hugging the shirt wrapped around her arms. "So find out what she likes from Lola. It's not like people don't do that all the time anyway."

"I think....I think I'm giving it up as a bad job." He shrugged and plunged his hands into the pockets of his coat again, looking out into the street in front of the Inn. "It seems rather pointless and self-defeating to keep throwing myself at a girl who hasn't shown the littlest amount of interest in me, beyond being her best mate's brother." He glanced over at her with a tiny teasing smirk. "There's gotta be someone out there who has need of a painter with minimal social skills, right?"

"Nope. But I'm willing to bet there are plenty of people out there who need and want the handsome, intelligent, deeply devoted, and incredibly talented artist sitting right next to me at this minute." Caroline loosed an arm from the shirt wrapped about it to hug Ollie fondly. "Stop looking, and it'll just drop into your lap without you realising."

He smiled at her praise and pressed a kiss into her temple. "You and the rest of the family don't count." He glanced out into the street again, watching a trio of extremely drunken dwarves amble by, singing about gold...or maybe glod. Then he said, "I haven't been looking since Lily left, and that was...six, seven years ago' Maybe I should start actively looking now" Maybe my luck will change?"

She shrugged lightly. "Looking never hurt anyone. Just ....stay away from redheads for a while, huh?" Her smile was gentle, but definitely teasing. "We wouldn't want you sabotaging yourself with unfair comparisons, now, would we?"

He laughed, a quiet sad, sound, completely without humour. "I think..."

Their talk was momentarily interrrupted by the subject of their discussion letting herself out of the Inn on her own way home. "Hey, ya two," Calypso called. "I'm headin' out."

Caroline's head lifted, a wide smile touching her lips for Cally. "You're going home like that?" she asked, nodding to the PJs Cally still wore. "Don't you want a ride, at least?"

Whatever Ollie had been about to say, it trailed off as Cally appeared in the doorway. "Goodnight, Cally," he said softly.

The redhead offered them both a smile, nodding to Caroline with a faintly apologetic look on her face. "Sure am. Lo don't live far. Good night, ya two." And with that she was off, still officially dolled up for Risa's Pajama Party night.

"Take care, Cally!" Caroline might have insisted, but she knew Cally could look after herself; Ollie seemed more in need of company right now. She squeezed his arm gently. "You think?" she asked, gently encouraging him to finish the thought he had begun.

He watched Cally walk away and shook his head sadly. "Oh, I'm plague-ridden for certain. Maybe I should become a hermit." He glanced back at Caroline. "I think that most women will pale in comparison, regardless of hair colour."

Her brow rose. "Keep thinking like that, and you are going to be doomed forever," she assured him. "Ollie, you got over Lily. I got over Henry. Moping over someone, no matter how extraordinary, does more harm than good, and I know you know that. I don't want to watch you waste away on a dream."

"Bah," he said decisively. "I'm far too practical for that. I just....I just want people to understand that my happiness is not dependent upon another person. I'm perfectly happy as it is now. In fact, this whole business has made me less happy. Maybe if I just stopped trying so damned hard, I could go back to how I felt before she came back into my life."

Caroline Granger

Date: 2011-02-25 09:50 EST
....cont.

"That's a good idea," Caroline smiled, tipping a gentle kiss to Ollie's temple. "I want to commission you, by the way. Let me know when you have the time, and I'll smuggle you down to the docks to see what I want you to paint."

"The docks. Hmmm. If you have a bunch of half-naked sailors in mind, you can count me out."

She laughed again, shaking her head. "No! I know you can do seascapes, I was just wondering if you'd do a seascape with a particular ship in the foreground." A tell-tale flush crossed her cheeks for a moment before she clamped down on the feeling. "It's a sailing yacht, a double-masted cutter. You don't have to agree just because we're related."

Ollie leaned back a bit, looking her over with extreme scrutiny. One corner of his normally severe mouth curled up in a knowing smirk. "Why, Caroline Granger! If I didn't know better, I'd say you were sweet on someone!" he proclaimed in his best (read: awful to hear) Southern United States Gentleman accent.

The blush returned, her lips curving in an amused smile. "And what if I am?" she asked a little defensively. "It's not a crime to find a fella intriguing, is it?" She stuck her tongue out at him.

He shook his head, a full-blown smile settling in. "No. Not a crime. Who is he?"

"Uh ..." Slightly lost for words for a moment, Caroline laughed to herself, shaking her head once again. She hadn't expected this level of interest; protective belligerence was more what the Granger men tended to lean toward when a new beau came on the scene. "Uh, his name is Richmond, and he owns his own ship. And that's all Humph knows for now, so no sharing anything else if he asks." Her finger waggled under Ollie's nose as she laughed softly.

He snorted. "Yeah, like I talk to the Old Man on a frequent enough basis. How is he, by the way' And ....Junior?"

Calming, she sighed softly, her smile fading. "He's okay, I think. Pretending not to be in as much pain as he is. And Junior" Well, he's a pain in the ass, as usual." Caroline growled the reference to Ollie's father; she'd had a problem with him since his treatment of his own son had so dramatically deteriorated over the summer. "Building his own little faction because obviously he's going to take over when Humph retires."

"He's not, right?" This was a worry that Ollie faced on a daily basis. If the Guild fell into Junior's hands, it would likely go under. "Humphrey's not naming him as successor?"

Caroline let out a soft bark of laughter, covering her mouth. "No, no, no ....Junior's got a snowball's chance in hell of getting control of the Guild," she assured Ollie. There was a pause, during which she swallowed and cleared her throat. "Uh, actually ....Humph asked if he could name me his successor." She watched Ollie worried, uncertain of the reaction; after all, she knew how he felt about the business side of the Granger family.

"You"!" He barked out the word, surprised and shocked. Then his face split in a huge grin and he hugged her tightly. "That brilliant, devious, underhanded genius!"

"What?" Startled, it took a moment for Caroline to hug back as she was shaken out of her concerned watchfulness. "You're not angry' I thought you'd go ballistic for sure!"

He let her go and held her out at arm's length, confusion somewhat dulling his grin. "What' Why would you think that?"

"You hate the business," she burst out, confused enough herself. "It's the reason things went so bad for everyone; it's why Junior talks out of his own backside! I didn't think you'd want anyone you liked involved with it, let alone ....Can you even imagine me in charge?"

"I don't hate the business, Caro. I....I hate that it consumes people the way that it does. I hate that it makes people stupid and greedy and selfish." Then he let go of her and gave her a lopsided little smile. "Yes. I can see you in charge. I think you'll be brilliant."

"So ....you think I should say yes?" Her brows rose as she asked that question, the expression on her face suggesting that his answer would directly influence whether she agreed to be Humphrey's heir or not.

"If you think you'll be a good fit, Caroline, say yes. But you know you're going to have a battle on your hands, right' A serious battle."

She nodded slowly. "I know. And I know I'll have to be ruthless. But I ....I can't say no, Ollie. Humph's so ill, no matter what he pretends, and all the worrying about what?ll happen when he retires is making him worse. If he thinks I can do it, then ....I suppose I can. But I'm gonna need help, and I'm gonna need it from everyone our age. I don't really trust the other generations that much."

He nodded slowly, weighing his next words very carefully. He'd escaped, after all. Did he really want to get sucked back in" "If you..." He cleared his throat and shifted a bit in his seat. "If you think you'll have need of my knowledge, it's there for you. All you need to do is ask."

She shook her head quickly, her expression stricken with guilt. "Oh, no, I wouldn't pull you back, I wouldn't even think about it," she assured him quickly. "I just ....I think I'm gonna need your advice a lot more, and ....well, if people could just generally let it be known that most of the family is right behind me, that'd make things a lot easier."

He smiled, relief flooding him. "Like I said, whatever you need. You only have to ask. Have you told anyone else yet?"

"No. I wanted to run it by you before I said yes or no, and I owe it to Humph to let him know before I tell anyone else. He doesn't want it to be known." She snorted faintly. "I think he wants to see the reactions first hand when it's announced in a few months."

Caroline Granger

Date: 2011-02-25 09:51 EST
...cont.

His smile turned wicked. "Oh, I would love to be there to see the expressions on the faces of the Board members."

"I'll make sure I get the surveillance tapes," Caroline promised, smirking.

"Thank you. I think the first thing you should do is fire Junior. That'll send a message and shut up your biggest detractors in one fell swoop."

"Actually, I was thinking of firing him, taking away his control of his own allowance and handing it to you and Lola," she mused thoughtfully. "Or would that be just too evil of me?"

He blinked, his mouth falling open a little in shock. "You're not serious."

She held his gaze solemnly. "I kinda think I am."

"Well. Um....Wow." He was stunned into silence.

She smiled faintly. "I might not, of course. It depends how much he pisses me off."

He chuckled softly. "Well, whatever you decide, just make sure to fire him or perhaps railroad him into quitting. You know his dirty little secret, after all."

"Oh, he's not staying any longer than I can get away with it," she assured him with a firm nod. "If I get proof of his little secret, he'll be out faster than even he can name his current floozy."

Ollie chuckled. "The proof's in his personal accounts. At Alder House. On his desk. Unless he wised up and started hiding those books away."

"Hmm." She looked thoughtful for a moment. "Then I think maybe one of us should start talking to Brynne, don't you?"

"Oh, yes. She would be a wonderful person to have in on things. The dirt she'd be able to uncover!" He actually clapped his hands in glee.

Caroline laughed at Ollie's reaction to that thought. "She won't trust us to begin with, though," she mused. "She barely speaks to anyone since she came back. Just works and stays home with her little girl. Makes me wonder what he's done."

"Probably scared the living crap out of her. Threatened her or something like that. Poor girl."

Her expression darkened. "If he has, I'll rip his throat out and dissect him on the board table," she threatened quietly.

"It's par for the course, Caroline." He glanced out at the street, trying to assess the time. "It's late. Kay might burst something if I don't come home soon. Did you drive tonight?"

"Yeah, the Mini's down there," she nodded, rising to her feet. "Want a lift?"

"Sure." He stood and reached down to help her to her feet. "I'm still surprised at how well I fit in that thing. Shocking, really."

"This is Rhy'Din, Oliver," Caroline teased as she rose, grinning cheekily. "Anything is possible." Chuckling, she turned to step down off the porch, heading toward the shadow of her little car. "C'mon, let's get you home before Kaylee decides to come looking."

"She'd shout at me," he said in the tone of a petulant child and followed her to her car.

"Somehow I can't imagine Kaylee shouting and actually meaning it," she chuckled, unlocking the Mini and pulling her door open. "It'd be like being attacked with a wet hanky."

He snorted and folded himself inside. "You know, I believe she is capable of that. She did drip all over my couch." He pulled the door shut and held on for dear life.

Laughing at the way everyone seemed to be utterly terrified of imminent death whenever the Mini was the vehicle of choice, Caroline climbed in and started the engine. It was always good to get a chance to talk to Ollie - he never let her go without a smile.

((With grateful thanks to OH Granger for this scene.))