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It's Dolly's Birthday
Chapter 20.
OK, so THIS is the happy reunion...
Dolly managed to keep her gait steady for perhaps a half-dozen steps, until Drummond began to run up the slightly-raked floor of the sanctuary toward her. Then she broke into a run herself.
They collided in the middle of the big room in what had at one time been an aisle. She dropped her capture rifles and leapt into his arms; he gathered her in and lifted her off her feet, spinning around and laughing with hysterical relief. Their lips met in frenzied greeting for a moment, but it was too hard to maintain contact, so violently were their bodies shaking from the excitement.
Drummond sank to his knees, cradling her in his arms. "Oh, Dolly! Dolly, Dolly, Dolly, Dolly," he babbled.
"Hey, lover," she replied, her blues singer's voice pitched halfway between a purr and a growl. "Lemme tell you, that was one fucking scary birthday surprise." She hooked an arm around the back of his neck and pulled him down until their lips met.
After a brief moment of moaning and heavy breathing, he leaned back and looked her in the eye. "You listen to me Gabrielle Dolly. Don't. You. Ever. Do. That. Again! I almost died from worrying about you!"
"Oh, Baby! I really tried not to do it this time. I just seem to be a magnet for trouble."
They both grinned.
"Yeah," he said softly, the affection coating his voice, "You are that, aren't you?"
Then she smacked him on the shoulder with her open palm. "Next time," she said, "Take the fucking shot!"
"Be careful what you ask for, Gabrielle," spoken in an arch feminine voice. "You might get it."
Dolly looked up into the warm brown eyes of her younger sister dolly, Callisto, who was standing a few feet away. Xe Doll stood behind her, her hands on Cally's shoulders. Cally held Gabrielle's green satin CFXS baseball cap in her hands and was twisting it around nervously.
"That's exactly why I'm asking," Dolly said, scrambling to her feet and helping Drummond up. "I figure that some day, my chances will be better than even that I'd be better off wounded or dead than captured by the Meqs. Speaking of which," she peered around Drummond looking for Pete. "Pete, one of those guys back there might still be alive. He was the one in charge and might be able to tell us something if we can interrogate him."
"I'm already on it. And, hey! Good work, Baby Troll!"
Dolly just grinned at that. She was so very proud of the affectionate nickname the Trolls had given her, inspired by the Charlie Hustle attitude she'd exhibited during her training with them. And praise from Pete was a gift indeed.
"Listen," Callisto began, obviously uncomfortable. Xe's hands on her shoulders squeezed. Once. "Mitch..." she stopped again.
"Cally..." he interrupted.
"No." She ducked her head and swallowed. "Let me finish. I'm sorry I gave you shit. You were right not to take the shot if you weren't confident in yourself. We've all..." her gesture included Gabrielle, Xe, and the Trolls, "We've all been taught that from the git-go."
"No, you're wrong, Cally. I let my fear overcome me. I lost confidence because I was afraid to see Gabrielle hurt. As we all know from personal experience, fortune favors the bold, and... dilly-dallying around usually gets people hurt. I should have known better." He turned to Dolly and took her in his arms, pressing her against his chest and burying his face in her hair.
"I'm sorry, Baby," he murmured. "I won't say it'll never happen again, 'cause I'm only human and I know better than to promise what I can't... I know better than to make a promise I can't keep. But I..."
She felt him shaking and anyway she knew what he was trying to say, so she leaned back and pressed her fingertips against his lips like she did. "It's OK. I understand."
Callisto cleared her throat and shuffled her booted feet on the bare wood of the sanctuary floor. "Listen, Gabrielle. I... I found your hat and I..."
Dolly gently freed herself from Drummond's arms and moved to face her sister. Callisto held up the cap and settled it over Dolly's red-gold mane. Dolly reached up in the back and undid the plastic snaps on the adjustment strap, flipping the end under her ponytail and refastening it.
"Thanks, Cally," she said, putting her hands over Xe's on the blonde's shoulders and leaning in to kiss the other on the cheek. "You're a good sister."
Then she looked up into Xe's ice blue eyes and almost cried out at the masked pain she saw there. Everything that had occurred between her and the raven-haired, taciturn doll in the last year ran through her mind like a nightmare scene in a Fellini movie.
The wild life the two of them had led, even before Genesis, when they were still plastic dollies. The internecine violence of their brief love affair and their private death marches into the world of booze and drugs. And their long hard roads back; hers with Drummond and the TAT, Xe's with Trish and Terry's bodyguard detail.
Then, when she was in the hospital, they'd made that blunder. Thinking they were being pushed together, they did what they thought they should. Or could. Instead, they'd hurt people they loved and didn't really do themselves any good, either. Since then, they hadn't talked much. Just business and music. It hurt them both too much. If they'd been anybody else, they would have gone apart from each other, but they couldn't. Maybe it was time.
"You, too, Xe," she said quietly.
Callisto's eyes widened and she leaned back and to the side trying to catch a glimpse of Xe's face. There was almost nothing to see. A slight twitch at the corner of the mouth that might have been a smile. A quick double-blink of the eyes. A brief nod. And that was it. Xe's reaction to Gabrielle's offer of peace. Some kind of closure between them.
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