“Available wealth and income?” Isaak asked from where he sat on the other side of Alfonso. Dree watched him talk. “What would you have Nepal do? Melt down all the idols in the Hindu temples for their gold and sell it to help the poor for one season? And then, there would be less tourism forever because there are no golden idols to look at, and the poor would be worse off next year.”
Dree looked between the guys over the campfire. This was an intense discussion, but not a fight.
Maxence said. “A society can be judged by the way it treats its poorest citizens.”
Across the fire, Father Booker cleared his throat and went back to eating his supper.
Max used a piece of bread to sop up some of the lentil stew on his plate and ate it, chewing as he stared at the plate and not looking up again.
Dree was ready to sink into the ground. She hadn’t wanted to start an argument, but she didn’t know what else to do for the kids who were on the verge of starving to death.
She managed to change the topic to a meteor streaking across the sky, leaving a trail of fire in the star-strewn heavens for a brief moment before it burned out.
Isaak had also seen the meteor streak overhead. “It’s probably one of the Ursids. The peak of the Ursid meteor shower started on December nineteenth. Since the nineteenth was a few days ago, we should be at the peak for another day or two.”
Dree had lost track of time other than the daily schedule of deciding which particular sites would not be ideal for a NICU micro-clinic, riding her motorcycle to the next village, and then trying to help the endless,endlesspatients. On a few days, Father Booker had celebrated a Mass, but she hadn’t asked whether it was yet another Sunday or a different day that they should do Mass. “What day is it?”
“December twenty-second,” Maxence said. He looked up at Dree, and her expression must’ve been puzzled because he added, “Father Booker and I have daily prayers that we are obliged to say, the Divine Office. Every day, there are different prayers that have to be said. I keep track of the date with a downloaded file on my phone.”
Dree managed to stay awake only about another fifteen minutes before she crawled into her tent for another quick sponge bath with a pan of warm water and wiggled into her sleeping bag, where her anger at the plight of her patients warred with her exhaustion.
Maxence crawled into the tent just a few minutes after she turned her flashlight off.
As always, he undressed as silently as humanly possible, and Dree resolutely stared at the fabric wall of the tent as he peeled the black leather off his body until he was nearly naked.
As the motorcycle leathers left Maxence’s body, the subtle scent of his cologne, which was cinnamon, vanilla, and the secrets that happened in an orange grove at night where no one could see, filled the tent. She had no idea how he managed to smell so good when they were riding the motorcycles for days between the few overnight stops at inns where they could shower, but he did.
She clutched the fabric of her sleeping bag in her fists. If anything could distract her from the simultaneous rage and exhaustion that ran through her mind, it was the thought of Maxence sitting right behind her, his broad, strong shoulders and muscular biceps and triceps of his arms bared to the chilly night. His tight white undershirt would cling to his narrow waist, the lumps of his abdominal six-pack, and the strong sinews around his waist that pointed to the sexy line of coarse masculine hair that led from his navel, downward. Only a few weeks ago, she had run her tongue down his happy trail, and his sharp intake of breath had contracted his abs into a stack of bricks under his skin.
If she didn’t hang onto that side of her sleeping bag for all she was worth, Dree might accidentally turn around and pounce on that ripped hunk who was just inches away from her, getting naked.
Or, nearly naked. In the morning sunlight, she’d seen the white rim of a tee-shirt collar above his sleeping bag.
But hey, a girl could dream.
Indeed, her dreams were turning increasingly erotic as their time in Paris receded into their history.
His flashlight clicked off, and absolute darkness smothered her sight.
In the dark, she could barely hear his faint whisper. “You awake?”
“Yeah. I might’ve dropped a bomb into the campfire tonight,” she said.
“It’s fine. No one was offended. The folly of these NICU micro-clinics is an important point that we’re going to need to discuss sooner or later. Father Booker and Batsa have both made comments about the unsuitability of high-tech clinics for villages that have barely changed since the medieval era.”
“So, what’s going on between you and Father Booker? Out there at the campfire, the two of you were giving each other the hairy eyeball.”
Silence blended with the darkness in the tent until Maxence said slowly, “No, he’s not my type.”
“No, silly. The hairy eyeball means that you two were shooting daggers at each other with your eyes.”
“I haven’t heard that expression, either, but I think I can guess what that one means. Father Booker and I are not adversaries. I am quite sure that he and I both believe something we can never admit, even to each other.”
“About God?”
“About the Church, but it’s an obscure theology that is probably only of interest to Jesuits studying the difference between orthodoxy and orthopraxis.”
“Maybe you should tell me that. Sounds like it would put me straight to sleep.”
