And so we wave goodbye to Frankie and Mathew. Their story together comes to an end. Remember until I post again, that there are stories galore on Amazon that I've written that you can browse.

NINE

Four weeks later, Mathew and Frankie had each tried to settle into their old routine. Mathew was back to running their company, and Frankie was back to playing golf and tennis. She spent a lot of time in the gym. They’d been going to their doctors together, so there were no secrets.

The two sat together on the couch facing Ruth Savage, their psychiatrist.

Janegirl Camp
Chapter 6
Copyright 2022 by Heather Rose Brown

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For the next couple weeks, Lanie and Rachel continued to go to the board game club and hang out with Conner, Justin, and the other guys there. Outside of the club, Lanie practiced playing checkers at the orphanage with Rachel, Aaron, Trevor, and some of the other kids at the orphanage. It took some time, but she was able to improve. And it got to a point where one day, in the game club, Lanie actually beat Conner in a game of checkers. She felt proud of her victory-but she didn't let it cloud her feelings for Conner.

"Women!" he exclaimed. "You can't keep a secret! None of you!"

"Well, to be fair," I interjected, "I wasn't a woman at the time."

He gaped at me, incredulous. "Seriously? Seriously now? That's your excuse?
That's supposed to somehow make it better?"
 

2 Years Ago

I could see the Stormveil from my vantage point, safe behind the steel-glass port of my father’s airship. To see it for the first time was beyond breathtaking; a perpetual storm four hundred and fifty meters high, running the length of the continent, stretched out along the horizon. A rush of wind enraptured millions of specks of dirt, debris, and even rock, swirling and blowing, tearing through the sky to create an immense wall of pitch blackness, broken only by the period lightning flash from beyond the event horizon.

Gering, Nebraska
June 13th, 2007
Late Evening

EIGHT

An hour later, Mathew lay on the bed next to Frankie. “Well, that didn’t work out as planned, did it?”

Frankie couldn’t help but laugh. “Seriously, I’m not the one with the growing problem. One piece of clothing and boom, it’s got to br break time! And I’m getting sore. You’re wearing me out and exhausting me at the same time! It’s not fair.”

Mathew sat up. He was naked. “I think I need to put on a tee shirt and a pair of boxers. I think it’s all about top much tactile stimulation.”

“Is that your final answer?”

“Jen!” My voice echoed breathlessly down the hall as I watched her petite form bob further and further away from me. She half turned and watched me as I collapsed to the floor; the balls of my feet ached and throbbed in tandem, but were then overtaken by an almost soothing pain as the pressure was alleviated from them. I gasped and wheezed, my back to the wall just in front of a series of blue-tinted windows that bathed cool light over my crumpled form.

Chapter 11

When we had finished the meal, Suzette and I packed the dishes in the washer while my mother chatted with our guests. May was regaling her about some of the odd ladies she had made dresses for and when she mentioned that a few had been men my mother said “Wouldn’t that be difficult?”

I said “Mother dear, have you looked at the photos in the window of the shop?”

She nodded so I carried on. “One is of a lot of local ladies at a celebrity wedding and the other is a group at a party.”

When Lanie saw Mr. Ryan's orphanage, she knew things were about to get a whole lot better.

It was three stories high, and it was in much better shape than the homeless shelter. The walls were painted bright orange, the windows were nice and shiny, and it was all very neat and well-kept. It was just like the Pretty And Pink foster home, except without a heart of darkness under the surface (probably).