'F' is for ... Fundamentals on the Fourth
Part 1
This is nice. Lying calmly, stretched out over a cozy blanket, atop the not-too-firm, yet not soggy, ground. He was surrounded by stretches of green grass all around, although much of it was covered over by blankets, towels, and lawn chairs. Not that Harm saw any of that at the moment. Right now, he was letting his eyes remain closed, allowing himself to enjoy the simple opportunity to relax in the sunbeams beating down on him.
He, the Roberts’ family, and Mac had gathered on a field of a Virginia suburb for the Fourth of July activities. They had considered going to the National Mall for the big DC display of fireworks, but after weighing the pros and cons, they decided against it. From years past, they knew the crowds in DC could be unbearable. And while everything downtown was super exciting on the holiday, it could also be overwhelming for little AJ and a bit too strenuous for Harriet in her very pregnant state.
Bud and Harriet had wanted little AJ to have the whole ‘picnic and fireworks’ experience though, so Mac had suggested that they all go to this local Virginia festival and fireworks display that she had seen advertised.
It seemed like an ideal solution. Not to mention that it had the benefits of nearby community restaurants and buildings that offered respites from the heat and provided indoor bathrooms, both of which Harriet, with a baby squeezing on her bladder and frequent periods of feeling overheated, had been rather insistent upon.
For Harm, it was the invitation extended to him via telephone by none other than the Admiral’s young namesake that brought him here this late afternoon to spend time with his friends and their family. … In a way, they were really all family; … he and Mac were AJ’s godparents after all. He sighed, half in contentment, half in yearning for more.
Not long ago, Harm would have never thought of a ‘family outing’ as his ideal way to spend the Fourth of July. But he was beginning to value family more and more these days. He kept imagining being with Mac, … playing house with her. No, not playing. He wanted the real thing.
* * * * * * * *
While Harm was imagining what life would be like if he were married, the object of his fantasies was looking at him from her spot next to him on the blanket. As she sat up and reached for her bottle of water, she couldn’t help the tug at the edges of her mouth, partly because Harm was a handsome sight – with his long body stretched out.
He had his hands behind his head, inadvertently showing off his well-toned arm muscles. His white t-shirt, with the stars and stripes of the American flag inside the word, ‘Navy,’ across his chest, clung to his slightly sweat-covered form. Indulging in her favorite eye-candy, … especially while he had his eyes closed so as not to notice, was definitely enough to make her smile.
But she was also amused by the expression on his face. She wondered what he was thinking about to cause him to grin in a way akin to the Cheshire Cat.
* * * * * * * *
Somewhere in the back of his mind, Harm registered the fact that he probably looked like an idiot, smiling to himself while he was supposed to be ‘resting.’ AJ had been given specific instructions to let his godfather relax in peace after their earlier session of horseplay and running around.
At first, Harm had just laid himself down and closed his eyes to merely ‘play along’ with Harriet’s orders. But once he settled, he found it rather comfortable, and he didn’t object to spending time with the pictures that his mind’s eye was conjuring up.
Besides, if his eyes were open, he knew where they’d be targeted. The same place his eyes had been wandering all afternoon -- to the woman next to him. Sarah MacKenzie. He figured this was a good opportunity to cut down the amount of time that day that he was actually staring at her. He didn’t want her to catch him doing that too much. But it was difficult, because she looked extra wonderful today and very relaxed in her casual apparel.
She had been wearing an eye-catching, red, button-down shirt over her jean shorts. But it was when she opted to take that over-shirt off, explaining that she wanted to ‘catch a little sun,’ that Harm really struggled to keep his eyes on anything other than her. Her smooth, tan skin looked so inviting, as it shone in contrast to the bright white, flag-adorned tank-top she wore. It fit her snuggly enough to let him appreciate the assets of her figure.
He had been struggling all day to pay attention to anything but her. … Harm couldn’t deny anymore, … at least to himself, how much he wanted her, … and not just physically. Somewhere along the line, he had fallen very deeply in love with her. He wanted to be with her and share everything a man and woman could share.
Would it ever happen? There was less than a year until their ‘baby deal’ now.
She had made fun of him earlier that year when he had nervously asked if she wanted to move up the timeline. He thought he had good reason to ask her, considering that she had mistakenly referred to AJ’s fifth birthday being this year, instead of his fourth birthday, which it actually was.
It was unlike her to mix up that kind of thing. But she had assured him that it was just a meaningless mistake on her part; it wasn’t a Freudian slip.
In truth, Harm had been disappointed that, back then, she hadnot wanted to up the timetable and join the pregnancy ‘club,’ as she had referred to it. He was beginning to think that sometimes he heard Mac’s biological clock ticking for her. Maybe that was because, in his mind, her clock was his clock too. He wanted them to have children together. She hadn’t told him to forget the deal, so he figured there was still hope to have a baby with her, … albeit, there were a lot of details to work out.
He let his mind come back to the present. By allowing his heavy lids to stay shut though, his eyes remained useless. So he let his other senses work in their own fashion, functioning at a noticeably higher level without the distractions of the overabundant sights that normally dominated his brain.
With his senses focused, he acknowledged the light breeze which would occasionally brush lightly over his skin like a lover’s tender caress. He, of course, secretly wished that Mac would one day touch him like that. Although, he imagined that her touch would have the opposite effect than that of the cooling wind. Her fingers were bound to send sparks of heat through his body. He smiled again at that thought.
All he could hear at the moment were a few birds calling to each other and the indistinct murmuring of the crowd of people gathered on the field. But even those sounds, as background noise, seemed to lull him further into a state of restfulness.
Occasionally, he caught a whiff of a hot dog or pizza that someone had bought, or even a hint of tuna fish from someone’s homemade picnic. But mostly, it was Mac’s light perfume that delighted his olfactory sense. It was good to have her near. Her mere presence was comforting to him.
With the warm sun beating down, baking the restless energy right out of him, it was with pleasant thoughts and feelings that Harm was slipping off into a nice, semi-conscious state of relaxation. Sleep was beginning to gently overtake him as he was lulled by all these peaceful …
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BANG!!!! POP!!!! SQUEAL!!! BANG!!!! BANG!!!
Harm startled, sitting up quickly, before he realized the source of the sound.
“Son of a bittttt-ter woman!” he corrected his exclamation, remembering the presence of his godson.
After a brief moment, Harm apologized to Bud, who currently had AJ on his lap in a lawn chair. “Sorry. It’s just … Jeez. Scared the living daylights out of me. … Have you ever had your heart stop?” Harm dramatically put his hand over his chest for effect.
Surprising Harm, who was simply expressing his shock and not looking for an answer, Bud replied, “Yes, sir.”
“… Well, … then … you know how it feels,” Harm awkwardly fumbled, trying to make his point.
“Actually, since I was unconscious at the time, I really don’t,” answered Bud with all seriousness.
Oh … Bud’s accident. Landmine. Lost leg. Flat-lining. Harm felt like a heel.
“I’m sorry, Bud …”
Bud subconsciously squeezed his son a little tighter in a hug. He didn’t remember that it was his connection to little AJ that helped re-start his heart, – but his heart itself knew.
“It’s okay, sir; I know what you meant.” Bud offered a small smile. “I think the fireworks startled us all.”
“‘Fireworks’ starts with ‘F,’” announced little AJ proudly.
“That’s right,” Bud reinforced.
“Good job,” Mac added.
It was a game that AJ liked to play; he loved it when someone said a word and he could identify what letter it began with. Sometimes, he would focus on a certain letter of the alphabet for a few hours at a time and name all kinds of things that began with that letter.
“You know what else starts with ‘F’?” Harm began. “‘Forbidden.’ … As in setting off fireworks like those kids did just now is forbidden because it’s unsafe, inconsiderate, and illegal.”
Mac laughed at Harm’s reaction. Not because he was wrong, but because of how his attitude made him sound like a grumpy old man. She sensed that he was really just embarrassed at his own reaction and taking it out on the group of boys who were probably not doing anything worse than Harm himself did at that age.
“What?” Harm objected to her amusement and elaborated on his point, “… Scaring everyone like that, and who knows who could have been hurt. … Or here’s another ‘F’ – for the ‘fire’ that they could have started.”
“How about ‘F’ for the ‘foul’ mood that someone is in?” Mac teased Harm about his sudden bout of complaining.
“I’m not in a foul mood.”
“Oh, you’re always this ‘fractious’ when someone wakes you up?” Mac teased.
Quickly readjusting his attitude, Harm gave her a small smile. But he still lightly grumbled, “Just wondering where the ‘fuzz’ is when you need them.”
“Why do you need fuzz?” asked AJ. Fuzz was that stuff on the outside of peaches. Or it was the little pieces of lint from blankets that sometimes got in his mouth and made him want to spit. He had no idea why someone would want it.
Harm momentarily froze, not knowing how to answer. ‘Fuzz’ wasn’t exactly a term that he wanted AJ using to refer to the police, as he, himself, had just done.
“Uh, … those warm, fuzzy feelings I was having before the loud noise startled me. I need them back so I can continue to enjoy my day here with you.” Harm affectionately tugged on AJ’s right foot, which was dangling from Bud’s lap.
Harm’s answer satisfied AJ, and the action spurred the boy to declare, “That’s my foot, Uncle Harm. … ‘Foot’ begins with ‘F’ too!”
“It sure does, buddy,” Harm agreed.
“Daddy has a fake foot,” the toddler informed Harm.
The Commander looked up at Bud to help gauge how to react to AJ’s declaration. He didn’t want to make Bud feel uncomfortable.
But Bud smiled and eagerly added, “‘Fake foot.’ … That’s two ‘F’s!”
In sing-song fashion, AJ echoed his father. “Fake foot. … Fake foot.” He giggled at the sound.
“Hey, you know what, AJ?” Mac asked. “There are a lot of things about the Fourth of July that begin with the letter F.”
“Fourth!” said AJ.
“Very good,” Mac told him. “And how about ‘freedom?’ That’s what we are celebrating today.”
“Uh-huh,” the boy agreed.
Harriet got involved from where she was seated in a chair next to Bud’s.
“How about what the little girl over there is holding?” she asked her son, pointing to a cute toddler who was wearing a red and white dress and waiving the patriotic freebie that someone had given her.
“That’s a flag!”
“Right! Very good!” his mom praised him.
Harm pointed up to another flag that was raised up high on a pole. “How about that flag up there? What’s it doing?”
AJ squished his face up, not sure what the appropriate answer was. The flag was just there; it wasn’t doing anything.
“Come on,” Harm encouraged him. “The wind is catching it, and it’s …” he waited for AJ to finish.
“Blowing!” AJ finally stated, excited that he understood Harm’s clue about the wind.
Harm frowned. “It is blowing, but that doesn’t start with ‘F.’ Come on, there’s another word.”
AJ fidgeted and looked up to his mom for help. But it was Mac who offered the next clue.
“Something that rhymes with ‘mapping,’” she suggested.
The boy furrowed his eyebrows. ‘Fapping,’ didn’t sound right.
Ignoring Harm’s displeased glare at her, Mac added, “When something goes back and forth and makes a … whishing sound it’s … fllll …”
“Flapping!” AJ figured out.
“Yea!” Mac clapped.
“That’s not the word I was going for,” Harm criticized Mac for hijacking his clue.
“But it was correct,” she argued. “What word were you thinking of?”
Harm looked away from her and up at his godson. “What does Uncle Harm do in a plane?”
“Flies!”
“That’s right. And just like I fly in a plane, that flag is up there flying in the wind.”
“Figures you’d come up with that word,” Mac said, rolling her eyes at Harm.
“‘Figures’ begins with ‘F,’” said AJ, even though he didn’t understand its meaning exactly.
“Yes it does, AJ,” his father told him. “But since we were talking about words that have to do with today, I thought of someone’s name. He’s a man we mentioned the other day when we were talking about going on a trip to Philadelphia someday after the baby gets bigger.”
AJ was listening carefully for clues about words with the letter F, so he right away mentioned, “Fildelfia!! That begins with ‘F’!”
The other grownups giggled, but Bud was flustered about how to explain that the same sound could be made with a combination of letters instead of ‘F.’
Harriet jumped in, “You’re right, AJ, that Philadelphia begins with the ‘F’ sound. But it’s a special word. Remember how we talked about ‘S’-‘H’ together making a ‘shh’ sound?”
AJ nodded.
“Well, when ‘P’-‘H’ are together, they make a sound like an ‘F’,” she explained.
Her son tilted his head. “Why not just use ‘F?’”
Harm laughed. “That’s a very good question, AJ. And scholars might have opted to replace the ‘P’‘H’ with ‘F’ years ago, … except that most of them feel that the added initial in their degree makes them extra special.”
The comment was, of course, not for his godson to understand, but the adults chuckled at Harm’s ‘PhD’ joke.
Mac wanted to give Bud the opportunity to get back to the name that he had been thinking of. “Bud, you were mentioning someone whose name begins with ‘F’?”
“Uh, yeah. His picture is on money, and he was very influential in the Revolution and the creation of the Declaration of Independence.”
Harm noticed from the corner of his eyes that Mac’s face had twitched ever so slightly at the mention of the historic document. Well, not everyone had an uncle who had stolen the thing.
But Harm was kind of glad that her Uncle Matt had taken such a … well-intentioned, but misguided step. Not that he wanted the man to be in Leavenworth , … but investigating that case had brought Mac to first work with Harm at JAG Headquarters.
Harm smiled as he remembered back then. Mac had tried so very hard to keep up her tough exterior back when they first met. She wouldn’t let him get away with anything. Not that she let Harm get away with very much now, … but over the years their sparring had become more teasing, more like … foreplay.
Whoa. Foreplay? Had he really just thought that? Okay, that was one word beginning with ‘F’ that he was going to keep to himself.
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TBC ...
