Chapter 11

Their visitors left as the sun was setting. There was a just a faint glimmer in the sky when Eddie and Sarah finally were alone for the first time. Eddie was sitting on a log next to the barbeque, and Sarah came over and sat on his lap. Sarah leaned against him and sighed with pleasure. After a minute or two of comfortable silence, Eddie nudged her head up, and for the first time in her life, Sarah kissed a man.

They were interrupted by a cough behind them. Eddie looked up to see his parents standing there. His dad spoke first. "Eddie, I need to check on the animals. How about you come walk with me."

Eddie sighed. "Okay." Like he had any choice. He gave Sarah another quick kiss and stood up, letting her down gently.

For a while, Eddie walked with his dad in silence. He had to work hard to resist feeling petulant. Clearly his dad had a problem with what he had just been doing with Sarah, but why?

Finally, his dad broke the silence. "Eddie, when we took Sarah in, we accepted a great deal of responsibility for her. You accepted the most of all."

Eddie sighed as he walked. So it was her age that was the problem. "Yes," he said guardedly.

"So tonight you are planning to sleep with her."

"Is it that obvious?"

"Yes Eddie, it is; like a lighthouse beacon, it's written all over both of you."

"And you don't think I should; you're going to try and stop us?" Eddie's petulance slipped out. He grimaced, knowing he needed to be more grown up about this.

"Eddie, I'm not going to try and stop you, you're an adult now. But you're right, your Mum and I think it's a bad idea. We're going to speak to both of you, to tell you what we think. If you both still want to do it after that, then you go ahead and do it, and it will be okay with us."

"So, why do you think it's a bad idea?"

"Eddie, Sarah doesn't come from our time. In her time, women were good girls, and married as virgins, or they weren't good girls, and so then they were stuck being whores for the rest of their lives. Her mum was a whore. If Sarah sleeps with you tonight, what does that mean she thinks of herself?"

Eddie stopped, struck dumb by that thought. He looked at his dad with horror in his eyes. "Oh no! She ... no, I can't let that happen."

"I'm glad Eddie. You keep making us proud, you know."

"But, why? If that's what it means, why is she doing it?"

"Sarah's life has been turned completely upside down. Her mother was murdered, beaten to death in front of her, and then she died in Sarah's arms. The murderer tried to rape her, so she ran away from everything, everyone she knew. Then, suddenly, she finds herself here, where she knows nothing, nothing at all, and it's dangerous. She depends on us for everything, and she knows it, and she can't go back. And most of all, she depends on you, completely. She's terrified that you'll throw her out. If that's not enough, you're the very first eligible male she's ever met, you've been really good to her, showed her real love, and so now she's got a huge crush on you. There's no way she could hold herself back. She wants you, but even more than that, she needs you.

But even then, I don't think that she actually wants to take you to bed yet. Jill chose the outfit, and Jill wanted it to happen, but all Sarah said was that she wanted you to notice her, because she thought you weren't."

"I'd noticed her all right."

"We knew that, but Sarah didn't, not with everything else going on."

Eddie thought about it. "So, what now? What do I do now?"

"Eddie, Sarah's mum lived with men, had their children, worked on a farm, did the housework, and her own daughter knew she was a whore. Your mum lives with me, has my children, works on the farm, and does the housework. But you don't think she's a whore. What's the difference?"

"Well, you love her."

"Yes, that's part of it, but it's more than that."

Eddie looked at his dad blankly. What else?

"The relationship between your mum and I is based on love, but it's built in the context of respect and stability. That's what Sarah needs. Right now, she's trying to trade respect for security, because that's all she can do. But you can give her all three. Right now, you hold her whole life in your hands. You've taken in strays before, but none of them changed your life. Sarah will."

Eddie was silent again, thinking about what his dad had said.

"Eddie, there's something else for you to think about. I'm looking at Sarah and thinking that here's a hot babe who'll be happy to live on our farm with the limited economic resources that means. Like we've talked about before, that's getting rare. In fact, in all my life, up until this week, I've only ever met one woman that I'd even think about being married to, and it's your mum. But Sarah, woooh, I'd marry her today if I was your age. That's one helluva girl you've found yourself there."

Eddie looked at his dad in shock again. "Dad! I'm not thinking of getting married anytime soon."

"I know. But you know what? Sarah is. Right now, she's at the age in her life where she expects to find a man, settle down and have children. And I bet she doesn't even know that there's such a thing as contraception."

Eddie shuddered. But everything his dad was saying rang true.

"So, build your relationship with Sarah with this in mind, you need to give her stability and respect, and you both need to align your expectations with each other. We all need to do this, but you most of all. If you do things this way, everything else will just sort itself out."

They walked for a while as Eddie pondered all that his dad had said. Finally, he felt that he had it straight in his head. "Thanks Dad. Now tell me, how did you manage this with Mum?" They walked on, as his dad tried to figure out exactly what he could say to his son on this important but sensitive issue.

"Sarah, why don't you come with me?"

Sarah followed Danni dejectedly. There could only be one reason why Eddie's mum and dad had interrupted. Danni led her over to a seat and sat on it. Sarah sat down next to her.

"I spoke to Jill. She told me that you wanted Eddie to notice you."

"Yes, that's what I said."

"Sarah, Jill is still a virgin. Oh, you look surprised. I know, she's so sexy and sassy, but really that's a shield for the wall she's built around herself. But it means that she didn't understand the implications of what she's done tonight. Did you want to get Eddie into bed tonight?"

"No, I just wanted him to notice me."

"Oh, he'd already noticed you all right; he's noticed you real good. But what you're wearing tonight screams out that you want him to take you to bed. In fact, tonight, you are hot, beautiful and ultimately sexy. I've got to say, I've never seen anything like it."

"Oh." Sarah's heart fell. "I didn't know. That's not what I meant."

"But you'd do it if Eddie wanted, right?"

Sarah looked at Danni, with her mouth open. She hadn't really thought about it as much as she should have. Yes, she did want Eddie, though she'd rather be married to him. But if Eddie wanted it without that, well, of course she'd have to do it. What choice did she have? But what could she say to his mother that wouldn't get her thrown out? Her mouth opened and shut a few time as she tried to figure out what to say.

Danni could see Sarah's distress. "I think you're worried that you depend on us, and we mightn't want you to stay, and so you need to be with Eddie so that you can stay." She could see from the look on Sarah's face that she had hit the nail on the head. "Okay, I want to make this very clear for you. You do not have to sleep with Eddie so that you can stay here. Whatever happens between you and Eddie, we - that's Wal and I - we promise that we will support you for at least a year, until you finish a year of school."

Sarah looked at Danni in astonishment.

"In fact, if Eddie came to us and said that either you or he had to leave, he'd be the one packing, because we'd think that he needed to learn something about honouring his responsibilities."