Hartland

By: KSuzie

Chapter 15: Measured Moments

All things Power Rangers belong to Saban and everything else belongs to me.

Author's note: If you like my stories on Fanfiction, then check out my book, Sentinel Dawn: Journey Into Midnight

Available now for download on Kindle and available May 9, 2011 in print form at Amazon com or your local bookstore! ISBN-13: 978-1461028109

Kim smiled and waved as William trotted up to them, calling out a friendly greeting. "Are you here to drop Caroline off?" She asked cheerfully, still feeling smugly content from the morning's excursion with her husband.

"Yes mam." He replied easily enough, taking in their wet hair and clothes and wondering about them, but not daring to ask as he simply fidgeted with his hat in his hands; revealing how anxious he was.

"What is it?" She asked, eyes measuring the stress in his shoulders and the hesitation in his eyes. Something was definitely wrong, but she honestly wasn't sure if it was the new campaign or something else.

"May I speak with you a moment?" He asked apprehensively, eyes shifting to Tommy briefly to see if the other man might object. "Privately I mean."

"Of course." She responded, one hand automatically reaching out to his elbow in a reassuring gesture. Turning to her husband she added, "Tommy, would you mind taking the fish on in to Alicia? Tell her I promise I'll help clean them, I just need a moment."

Tommy regarded the youth with an unreadable look, but nodded his acquiescence. He'd honestly forgotten all about their conversation in the saloon where he'd promised to ask his wife to talk to the boy. Teenage tragedy was the bane of every generation, but when that teen was Ranger, the results could be catastrophic.

"No problem." He mumbled, glad the youth had followed up on his own and not really envying her the chore of helping the boy wrestle with his emotions. Personally, he was more than happy to retreat inside for a change of warm, dry clothes and cup of hot coffee.

"Come on." Kim coaxed in a soothing tone, slipping her hand through the crook of the boy's elbow and leading him in the direction of a large tree shading one side of the closest barn. "Tell me what's on your mind."

Abraham yanked on the horse's harness roughly for the third time, unnecessarily checking to make sure the animal was securely strapped to the small wagon, then nodded his head gruffly in satisfaction. The much anticipated telegram had come. The small convoy carrying his new wife would arrive at the Stone Canyon fort in two to three days.

It was a little early for their arrival, at least based on his initial telegram, which made him wonder if the original news of her arrival at Angel Island near San Francisco had been delayed in some way. It didn't matter. What troubled him more was her arrival just as things were starting up again.

This was his third tour as one of Zordon's Rangers. He'd served first as a young lad, barely grown and hardly anything his older self would have recommended for the job. His second tour had been under Ms. Kim and that, more than anything else had defined his tenure. He wasn't sure what this new campaign would bring. This time around he was, he admitted begrudgingly to himself, too old to be Rangering again. He was tired and a little slower than he should be, his joints protesting his exertions just a little too much, but like any Ranger, the simple thought of a new call to action stirred his blood and spurred him to action as enthusiastically as any youth.

This wasn't, he mused, the best time for a new wife to arrive, but was there ever a good time in a Ranger's life for personal matters? Zordon always seemed to have them busy with something; even when they technically weren't on duty. No, there was never a good time, he mused to himself as he pulled himself onto the board and clicked the reins. By leaving a day earlier than he needed to, he'd be able to drive his small cart to the Command Center and leave word where he was going. If he was needed, Alpha could simply latch on to his morpher's signal and transport him back.

His new wife, if she was the good Japanese wife his family assured him she was, would have to simply deal with a crash course in what being a Ranger's wife meant. After all, even when he wasn't technically on active duty, he was still working on assignments and projects. She would have to adapt and that was the end of it.

"It just happened, I swear." William wailed in a repentant and anxiety filled tone. "I promise you I didn't mean for it to happen Ms. Kimmee, you gotten believe that."

Kim closed her eyes slowly and breathed through a simultaneous urge to laugh and groan at the same time. She wasn't a bit surprised that teenage hormone driven lust had gotten the better of the two. William wasn't just a young man in his prime, he was a young Ranger in his prime; which compounded things exponentially. The two were already emotionally attached and lived in the same household with an oblivious chaperone; it was bound to happen sooner or later.

She wasn't sure what it was about Rangers, if it was the battle experience, which definitely matured them beyond their years, the adrenaline rush they all felt at the slightest hint of a potential battle, the knowledge that they could, at any time, die and never see tomorrow, or something in the morphological energy itself, but every single Ranger she'd ever known usually ended up a lust driven basket case by the end of a campaign. Even Katherine Hillard, who was, even by Kim's admittedly biased and prejudiced views, the most ethical and moral, at least in regard to male/female interactions, of all the Earth Rangers, had given in to a little horse play by the end of her term.

The boys were the hardest hit. The ones like Tommy and Jason, who had become interested in the opposite sex at far too young an age anyway, were usually worst offenders. They became incredibly demanding in their pursuit of physical pastimes, often becoming the butt of lewd jokes and a good amount of eye rolling, but they weren't, by any means, the only ones. She'd seen it too many times to discount. If a male Ranger wasn't what society might call strapping or well-built before his tenure began, by the end of the campaign they were usually the polar opposite. Even Billy, who had been outright scrawny and timid, had matured and developed by the end of his term with the Mighty Morphin's into a physically broad shouldered and handsome young man who turned more than one female wasn't to say that the girl's behavior could be held faultless either. Whether it was the testosterone driven posturing constantly going on around them or simply their own reaction to Rangering, they indulged their carnal side just as much, if not as openly, as their counterparts.

No, she wasn't a bit surprised by the events between William and Allison the previous evening. The question was though, how to deal with it. In her own time, it wasn't as big a deal. She'd give a good amount of lecturing on birth control and protecting themselves against communicable diseases, as well as a good stern warning not to let it interfere with the boy's duty, but in the Victorian west, things were a little different. She already knew that William had grown up to marry Allison, knew that Allison was probably responsible for the infusion of high intelligence that had eventually spawned her teammate Billy, but she honestly wasn't sure how old the two had been. There was something about William's father being against it, unable to overcome the prejudice of Allison's poor Irish ancestry or her disability, but she was incredibly tired from her cross-dimensional trip and still half in the contented stupor of her own escapades the previous evening. She honestly couldn't remember exactly how the situation had resolved itself.

"I've got to marry her." William supplied anxiously. "There's nothing else except that. Allison's a good girl Ms. Kim, I swear it was all my fault, I just couldn't control myself, it was all on me, I made her do it."

"Are you telling me that you raped her against her will?" Kim asked skeptically, not believing it for a second. She'd seen the way the young deaf girl had looked at him; there was no way the matter was all one sided.

William paused and gave her a horrified look, unsure how to respond. Of course he'd never have done anything like that, he loved her, adored her, but there wasn't any way he'd ever disparage her by admitting she'd practically demanded it of him. Just the echo of the memory of the way she'd clung to him, the unexpected explosion of passion, crawled through his mind like sweet poison, causing his breathing to increase and his face to flush deeply all the way through his ears and then straight down his neck.

"Didn't think so." She drolled, giving him an amused, yet reprimanding look when his astonished eyes met her's.

"I love her Ms. Kimmee." He professed with all the earnest exuberance of a youth in love for the very first time. "I've got to do the right thing by this. I want to do the right thing by this."

"And what does she have to say on the matter?" Kim returned, wondering just what the problem might be. The nineteenth century wasn't the twenty-first. Teenage marriages were far more the norm. Waiting until you were in your late twenties or older was practically unheard of; unless you didn't have a choice.

"Oh she's willing." The boy assured with a lopsided grin and a pleased twinkle in his eyes.

"Then what do you need from me?" She asked patiently.

"It's my father." He revealed, the twinkle gone and the worried expression clouding his face again. "He's forbidden me to ever think of Allison that way. He wants me to think of her like a sister, but Ms. Kim I can't, I've never been able to. We've always been best friends. Always …well, you know."

"If it's always been like that, then why the rush now?" She returned, trying to get him to be practical or at least consider the idea. "Will, your father's ill, I know you know that. My best advice is to wait just a little longer. In a few years…"

"But what if I've gotten her pregnant?" The boy blurted out, the crux of his anxiety finally finding a voice.

Kim couldn't help it, she reeled backward, closing her eyes and sucking in her breath, not so much by his words, but from the realization that she wasn't thinking in terms of her present time zone. There was no birth control in this era, well there was, but it was hard to come by and certainly not something a young man like William would have easy access to. The US had passed the Comstock Law in 1873, the fruition of the Victorian anti-obscenity movement in the United States, which had made all contraceptives illegal. There were a few things available that he might know of, like sausage casings made into skin condoms, but she doubted it. Doc would never have imparted that illegal wisdom and she doubted Curtis or Abraham would have thought to either; although she wouldn't put anything past Rocco.

No, the boy was right, but without her equipment, there was no way to look up the recorded facts and see for sure. Frantically, she tried to force her memory into remembering William's exact history, but all she could think of were basic happenings and not specific dates. It was extremely frustrating.

"I'm sorry, Ms. Kimmee, I don't ever want to offend you with such language, and spoken so blunt and all, but you gotta know what I'm facing. Allison's a good girl, I promise you she is, and she'll be a good wife, I know it, but I can't wait. People are gonna talk as it is, if she's in any kind of family way, there's more than one person gonna start counting backwards and trying to figure if we've done anything improper. You know who her parents were, how people gossiped and snickered behind their backs. No one has any proof that they were even man and wife, although Rocco swears they were as Catholic as he and Maria are so they had to be. You know they talk about Allison and wonder if she's going to grow up any different."

"I'm not offended William." She replied softly. "I'm just tired and not thinking straight. In my time…well, let's just say that extra marital relations between young people aren't really looked upon with any more acceptance, but we're better at knowing how to prevent certain outcomes. Although," She admitted with a sly and slightly conspiratorial look, "I'm the byproduct of a premarital, uhm….experiment." She added with a wicked grin. "So maybe we're not as good at it as we seem to think we are."

William blushed deeply in return and averted his eyes, chuckling a little as her meaning registered, but not really comfortable with the knowledge. Miss Kimmee was part mother figure, part teacher, and part hero to him; anything even remotely suggesting she was a real human being with real flaws made him feel a little odd and uncomfortable. "Did your parents get married?" He asked softly, still not looking at her. "Not that I have any right to ask or anything."

"Yes." She answered plainly, unphased by the topic. "They stayed married long enough to produce my brother, but my father wasn't exactly…" She paused, not really sure what to say. "Well, he was kind of like Caroline's husband." She admitted carefully, "He just wasn't ever able to handle being responsible."

"I'm responsible." He returned earnestly, turning his eyes to face her. "I'm ready for this Ms. Kim. I love Allison with all my heart. I don't care how hard I have to work, I'll provide a good home for her I swear."

"I know you will." Kim replied, patting his arm gently. She wasn't sure he had any concept of what he was getting into, but fortunately she had the foreknowledge to know that the two had stayed happily married for many decades.

"I need you to talk to my father." He said in a serious tone, eyes holding on to hers in an effort to convey the dire importance he placed on the matter. "He'll listen to you Ms. Kim. He respects you."

"William, I don't think…"

"Ms. Kim I'm desperate." He revealed, unwilling to listen to any advice except what he'd already decided upon. "I need your help. If my father finds out he'll pack her up and send her back east somewhere. You know he will. If could be months or years before I find her and then what? What if she has a baby and I'm not there? Who's gonna take care of them while I'm looking for them? What if he sends her someplace that shelters her and then takes the baby away? That's what happened to Melind…well, that's what I know he's helped parents do in the past." He amended uneasily, then paused and closed his eyes, exhaling his frustration, adding, "You and Curtis are the only ones I can think of that'll get him to even consider the idea of letting me marry her."

"Don't you think you need to be the one to…"

"I tried that." The boy spat back with unexpected venom, startling her. He jumped to his feet and paced back and forth, all the anxiety and worry in his chest making each booted step pound against the still muddy ground. "I've tried over and over. We yelled at each other until he told me he'd disown me. He won't hear of it. He sent me back east to my brother. Told me to find a girl from good society. I tried Ms. Kim, I honestly tried. I love my father, I understand what he expects from me, but I never found anyone I wanted except her. Then I came home and saw her again…I know this is right, I know she's the one I'm meant to spend my life with. She's not from a good family, I know she'll never be able to talk out loud, but she's not dumb. She's so much smarter than me, sometimes I think she's smarter than my father is."

"I don't doubt that for a second." Kim answered softly, causing him to spin around and face her to see if she was mocking him.

"You gotta make him see the sense of it." William implored. "You gotta help me Ms. Kim, you're the only one who can. Please come back with me, talk to him."

Kim regarded the boy carefully, something in his tone or stance niggling at the back of her mind. There was something more in play here, but she wasn't sure what. He seemed honest enough in his petition, but there was more to his request than simply trying to convince Doc Cranston to consider Allison as a match for his youngest son.

"Alright." She answered, watching curiously as his shoulders dropped in relief. "Curtis and I can ride into town after breakfast."

Tommy stopped short as he entered the large kitchen area with the fish baskets still in hand, surprised to see Caroline tying the strings to her apron. He had assumed Kim's ancestor would still be in town recovering, although he wasn't sure why. She seemed just as surprised to see him and the two stared at each other for several seconds before she offered him a flustered greeting and he mumbled and equally uncomfortable reply.

"Alicia took Kelly Ann to the hen house." Caroline offered lamely and Tommy nodded quietly that he understood. "Can I get you some coffee?" She offered, the nervousness in her voice very apparent, and again he nodded, but this time he also continued his progress into the room and hoisted the two heavy fish baskets up on to a side work table.

"I want to thank you for your generosity." She continued, and Tommy whirled around in surprise, his eyebrows raised far above the rim of his western style hat. "Formally, I mean." She continued, her back to him as she carefully took down a mug from the cupboard and moved to the stove."

"I…uhm…" He began, but she cut him off.

"Traveling such a long way back to Chicago at this time of year would be difficult on a young child. She's all I have now and I just wanted you to know that I appreciate your kindness in sheltering us until the spring."

"I think…" He stammered, but again she cut him off.

"I want to assure you that neither of us will be burdens. I intend to work for our keep and I promise you I'll keep Kelly Ann out of the way." She continued.

Tommy wasn't entirely sure what to do and the feeling made him extremely uncomfortable. He'd only seen Kim's ancestor from a distance at the funeral of her little son and felt incredibly nervous about being alone with her now. This wasn't a fellow Ranger, someone who could forgive him a slip in period etiquette, but someone who knew nothing about who he was and expected him to speak and behave like a man of this time zone. He had no other Rangers near him to gloss over any mistakes or Kim to warn him about accidentally changing the timelines. The woman before him was a local civilian from a time outside his own and the pressure to behave and act correctly pressed against his chest like a led weight.

"I'm not Curtis." He said in a tumble, adding an almost forgotten and awkward, "Mam." A few seconds later than he really should have.

As she whirled to face him in shocked surprise, he belatedly remembered to remove his hat and hold it politely against his chest as he'd seen the other men do. "I'm Tommy." He corrected, smiling nervously at her as she simply stared at him. "I'm…uhm… I'm Kim's husband." He clarified gawkily, swallowing hard and mentally chastising himself over the clumsiness of his words and ordering himself back under control.

Caroline blanched visibly and teetered a little, her hands letting go of the mug with an audible thud and stabilizing herself on the long table even as Tommy moved forward to catch her in case she feinted. She stared wide eyed at the wet, short cropped hair that curled in an unruly manner around his head and the eyes which were just barely a shade off from the man she'd thought he was. She was, perhaps, the only person in the county that hadn't heard Curtis had a brother or that Calamity Kim had a husband. She'd been grieving her son and respectfully left alone as the news buzzed around her faster than any internet service a century later and neither Curtis nor Alicia had thought to fill her in.

"I beg your pardon." She managed breathlessly, her discomfort as obvious as the attempt she was making to hide it. "Why you're the very image. I was aware Mr. Hart had family, but I fear they're too seldom mentioned in my presence for me to have made the connection immediately."

Tommy grinned a little at the tiny woman in front of him, then squashed the reaction and tried to make his face neutral in case he offended her. She couldn't have been more than four and a half feet high and didn't look the least bit like his wife, but the set of her chin and the way her body forcefully moved itself back under control was too exactly like her descendant to miss.

"I'm told I look a great deal like my brother." He offered a bit more easily, although his hands still clenched his hat uncomfortably. Kim had said to keep to as much of the truth as possible and let people draw their own conclusions. It was a true statement, people were always telling him he looked like his brother David, although he couldn't really see how they thought so.

"My apologies Mr. Hart." She replied more formally than she needed to. "You must think me terribly rude and forward."

"No, not at all." He returned, adding in the once again forgotten "Mam." A few seconds later than he really should have.

Fortunately, he was saved from further awkwardness by Alicia's timely arrival back into her domain. She took three purposeful strides into the room before stopping to regard the two people staring at her uncomfortable. "I see you've met Miss Kimmee's husband." She announced in her matter of fact way to Caroline, then turned in a flash of yellow toward Tommy, "But would you please explain to me why you've got two filthy fish baskets on my baking table?"

"Kim went fishing." He replied awkwardly, pointing lamely to the baskets; although he supposed it was fairly obvious. "She told me to bring them in while she talked to William and she'd be back in a few minutes to help you clean them."

"Up." She ordered plainly, calloused palms lifting upward in a gesture reminiscent of lifting something.

"Up?" He asked blankly, still slightly disconcerted by his encounter with Kimberly's ancestor. When she simply glared at him expectantly, his brow creased, mouth pouting slightly in confusion, but he didn't move.

"Lift the baskets up off my baking table." She clarified as if he were no bigger than Caroline's daughter. "Unless you want your biscuits tasting like pond mud and smelling like dead fish."

"Oh…" He replied gawkily, quickly lifting the heavy wet baskets from her countertop. "I…uhm…sorry."

"Now take them outside and ask someone to point you over to Maria's cabin." Alicia elaborated, shooing him out of her kitchen like a wayward chicken. "I don't have any time to be gutting and scaling fish this morning. You tell Maria to have the girls set to work on prepping them for the lunchtime meal and she can take whatever she needs for their efforts. Fishing." She snorted as if that was the silliest thing she'd ever heard of. "Next time you tell that wife of yours to ask me before she gets an idea into her head to change my menu for the day."

Caroline watched without a word as Alicia shooed the tall man out the door, grateful for his departure in light of the embarrassing way they'd been introduced. She was mortified to have made such a clumsy mistake and positive the man would think her terribly forward, if not completely brazen in the way she'd informally spoken to him. She didn't know how she'd be able to face him again, let alone his brother.

"Fishing indeed." Alicia sniffed as she returned back from the door, grabbing a wet rag and a bottle of ammonia from the shelf. You see that wet head and drenched clothes of his? I guarantee you she's as soaked to the skin as he is. Skinny dipping is what those two have been up to, mark my word on that one, if not other things." She added with a knowing look. Her tone, although blustery, seemed more amused than angry though, causing Caroline to pause and her eyes to lift cautiously to the now empty doorway as the other woman scrubbed her wooden pastry counter free of dirt and mud.

"Has Calamity Kim been married long?" She asked guardedly in a soft voice, lifting the spilt mug delicately and righting it back on the countertop.

Alicia paused slightly, not sure how to answer and silently berating herself for digging herself a hole. She'd meant to distract the other woman, get her mind off of why there was a man in her kitchen who looked more like Curtis than any being had a right to. Turning, she added as honestly as she could, "I'm told they've been together since they were kids, but that's Ms. Kim's story to tell and not mine."

"I'm sure she tells it well." Caroline responded, just a hint of bitter resentment tingeing her words.

She didn't like Kimberly and the other woman knew it, but if she was honest with herself, it was more because of her close relationship to Curtis and the quietly whispered rumors that they were not brother and sister at all, but lovers. More than one person had sworn that they'd seen Curtis kiss her, and not in a very sisterly way, but if Curtis had a brother in town who looked just like him, perhaps it was the brother that had been seen kissing her and not him. Curtis was, admittedly, a very mysterious man. If any other resident of Angel Grove suddenly produced a twin out of nowhere, no one would believe it, but with Curtis Hart, it was entirely plausible.

"She loves him." Alicia responded simply, turning and replacing the bottle of ammonia on the shelf with the other cleansers. "And he her. Never seen two people as old as they are behave like that around each other." Turning, she met the other woman's eyes evenly, wondering what she would make of the pair. "You'll see, one minute they're barking at each other like any old married couple and the next they're giggling like idiots all in love for the very first time."

Caroline didn't answer, simply lowered her eyes, then picked up the mug and replaced it in the cupboard where she'd found it. Her own marriage hadn't been a happy one, but she knew of many cases where couples stayed happy with one another their whole lives. She was envious.

"Where's William?" Doc asked as Allison served him his breakfast at the long table.

She responded silently that he'd taken Caroline and her daughter out to Curtis earlier that morning, but when he simply frowned and seemed to not understand the signs she was using, she slowed down and carefully spelled out Caroline's name with her fingers, then pointed out the window.

"He took Mrs. Carson to Curtis?" Doc asked, making an educated guess. She nodded that he was correct and he nodded back, then turned without another word to his breakfast.

Relieved he didn't want to try and speak further, she quickly turned and headed back into the kitchen in case he asked her to sit with him until he was finished. She was incredibly nervous. Part of her was terrified that Doc, a medical doctor, would be able to discern simply by looking at her what had happened between her and his son the previous evening. William had confessed his fears that Doc might send her away if he knew and that if he somehow found out and tried to pack her up before he returned, she should run to Earnest's and wait for him there. Under no circumstances was she to board the stage or let anyone take her out of town.

Her heart pounded in her chest as she returned to the kitchen, nervously cleaning up the last of the dishes and making sure she was leaving everything in order. She doubted she'd ever be allowed to return to the only home she'd ever known, and that saddened her. She truly loved Doc Cranston and she was incredibly sorry for the angst, anxiety, and disappointment she knew she was about to cause him, but she loved William, always had and always would, and William loved her. The previous night had proved to her, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that they had been born to love each other. She understood Doc was fond of her, maybe, in his own way, he might even love her a little, but she knew he didn't want her as a daughter in law.

Allison understood her place in society. She knew, even if William didn't, that by getting married to each other, she wasn't elevating her status, she was bringing his down. There was a place for people like her, born dirt poor and unable to hear or speak, and it wasn't married to the town doctor's son. Doc had been incredibly generous to her by sheltering her, educating her, giving her a decent place in his home as a housekeeper; she was making an incredibly ungrateful and vile gesture by sleeping with and then marrying his son.

Part of her felt incredibly guilty and, for a moment, she considered simply walking out the door and sparing the family all of the slander and gossip and humiliation that was to come, but she couldn't do it. William knew his father would cut him off, knew his sisters and half the townsfolk would never speak to him again, he knew his brothers would also turn their backs on him, he knew…and yet he still wanted her. No one had ever loved her the way he had, was willing to give up everything just to be with her, and she would never betray that love. She had idolized him since the day she'd been dropped on Doc's doorstep and would worship him her entire life.

Taking a deep breath to calm her shaking hands, she carefully checked the set of saddle bags William had told her to have ready. She didn't have many possessions, so she focused instead on the practical things they would need. She supposed it might be considered stealing, but she doubted Doc would miss two sets of knives, forks, and mugs or the two small plates she'd carefully wrapped in a small cotton table cloth. She'd packed several needles and some thread, as well as her knitting and crochet needles, but decided there was no room for the two small towels or her extra kitchen apron. She packed a small picture frame of Doc and his family because she knew William would miss them, but of most importance was the small sack of money she'd saved. Combined with William's stash, it would see them through the next few weeks until he could find work, but it wasn't nearly enough and they'd have to be very careful with it.

Deciding she had everything she could think of for now, she set to work making sandwiches, carefully wrapping and tucking away a few extra pieces of bread, fruit, and cheese for a small dinner later on. Once everything was packed and the buckles on the saddle bags tightly secured, she made Doc a lunch plate, then covered it with a small towel and wiped the kitchen down for the last time.

The stranger caused more than one eye to turn cautiously towards him as he walked casually up the wooden sidewalk through the heart of town. It wasn't the way he was dressed that made people catch their breath and move out of his way until he'd passed, there was really nothing out of place on him, it was simply the way he moved. It was slow and deliberate, as if he knew exactly where he was going and who he was going to find. There was an aura of power that surrounded him, so strong that people could feel it from several feet away. This was not someone you challenged, this was someone you left alone. No one could see a gun belt on him, but no one doubted for a second that he was armed and mostly likely deadly.

He paused briefly at the swinging doors to Earnest's Saloon, regarding the sign with serious, calculating blue eyes, then grinned as if finding something sardonically amusing. Slowly removing his hat, revealing short cropped, dark brown hair, he turned and entered the saloon.