Kerri awoke early in her father's bed. She opened one eye and peered at the ancient digital clock on the nightstand. 7:15. Her father slept next to her, turned on his side facing the wall, each deep breath punctuated with a short, rumbling snore.
She lay there for a while, remembering crawling into her parents' bed as a little girl, curling up with her father and feeling safe and warm, curling up next to him as he slept, usually before deciding to jump on his stomach and brutally awaken him with demands for breakfast. This was nothing like that, of course, but the feeling of safety and calm was still there, a distant echo of what felt like another lifetime.
Kerri considered waking him, perhaps with something pleasurable enough to make up for all those years of early childhood mornings, but decided against it at the last moment. She fetched her clothes, left the bedroom, and padded naked downstairs to the first floor bathroom, where she took a long shower and washed her hair. She donned a fresh long-sleeved purple sweater and some jeans -- the mornings were still quite chilly up here -- and made herself some tea.
The pale sun had just crested the mountains as she took her tea out to the porch and sat in the creaky old porch swing. She put her feet up on the railing and thought about the previous night.
Her father had taken her to bed after their conversation -- literally carried her up the stairs, her arms around his neck, his strong hands holding her close to him. He had removed her dress -- there wasn't much clothing for her to lose, of course, she'd thought ahead on that one -- and then let her undress him, which she was all too happy to do.
For the first time since her arrival, he'd treated her like a lover -- taking his time, exploring her body with his hands, kissing every bare inch of her body until she felt like she might go crazy with desire. Their encounter in the barn had been raw and rushed, almost desperate, as if she could feel her father fighting with his own lust and slowly losing. She'd felt none of that last night -- only mutual desire and an eagerness to please, for both of them. In short, it had been what she'd hoped for the first time around, when she'd daydreamed of this weekend in the darkness of her dorm room, silently confessing her thoughts to herself.
Her father had been sweet, and passionate, and most of all, hadn't treated her like she was still "his little girl," or some fragile doll that he would break if he treated her too roughly. He'd still been gentle, maybe even a little hesitant, but Kerri had begun to detect a hint of what he was capable of -- he'd tossed her around the bed a little at the end, not too rough, but just enough to make her curious and a little eager.
She had the bulk of the weekend left. The next step, she decided, was to see how far she could push him. She'd gotten him to admit that he wanted her -- that in itself was enormous, and the one wall she'd been afraid of hitting and shattering their relationship into bitter shards. But now that he had confessed his carnal feelings for her -- verbally and physically -- she felt she could afford to bring a little mischief into play.
Plans began to unravel in her mind, making her heart race a little, and she burned her tongue a little on the hot tea. A weekend like this may never come again -- she planned to wrestle every delicious moment from it that she could.
# # #
Kerri finished her tea and, on impulse, decided to make breakfast. She opened the fridge with some trepidation, wondering if her dad had reverted to a bachelor's diet in his solitude, but she found the fridge stocked with food -- probably in anticipation of her arrival. She put on some coffee, chopped up some ham and peppers, and started making omelets.
Dad wandered downstairs almost as soon as the smell of the freshly-ground coffee began wafting through the house. His hair was a little unkempt, and she was pleased to see he'd grown a little more stubble overnight, but he looked happy.
"Oh my god, you're cooking," he said. "Who are you, and what have you done with my daughter?"
"You caught me," she said, pouring him some juice. "Your daughter joined a convent a while back. I'm her filthy, degenerate doppelganger."
"Doppel-what now?"
"It's called a vocabulary, dad," she teased, throwing in a little of the sarcastic drawl she'd been so overly fond of as a teenager. "God."
"Well, excuse me, miss college," he said, pulled her into a rough hug from behind, and kissed her cheek. She grinned.
"Go sit down," she commanded. "You can manhandle me later."
"I plan to," he said, and went to sit down at the table. She plated the food for both of them and set them on the table.
"So what's the plan for today?" she asked as she sat opposite him.
"Much as I would love to just stay in all day," he said, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, "I need to run into town. My reciprocal saw died on me, I need to get a new one."
"Oh." Memories came to mind of tagging along with her father at the hardware store for what seemed like hours, bored out of her skull.
"I know how much you used to love the hardware store," he said.
"Uh-huh," she answered, and then glanced up at him. He was smiling at her. "Oh, I see, that's sarcasm."
"Yes, your favorite. So, you're welcome to come along if you want, or you can just hang around here until I get back."
"Did you get satellite TV yet?" she asked.
"No, Kerri," he said with the patience of a parent answering a question for the hundredth time.
She sighed. "Isn't it like an hour into town?"
"An hour twenty. But I need to do it today. They're closed Sunday and Monday's a holiday." He picked at the omelet with his fork. "What are these green things?"
"Peppers, dad."
"So, you're looking out for my health now?"
"Someone's got to. Anyway, you bought them."
"Yeah, I bought them for my hippie vegetarian daughter."
"Oh my god," she said. "That was one year when I was like thirteen. You're never going to get over that."
"'Meat is murder, dad,'" he said in an angry, squeaking falsetto, and she threw half a cut strawberry at him.
"I think I've proven I'm a meat-eater," she said, and then snapped her mouth shut. He gave her a knowing look.
"Go ahead," she said. "Get it out of your system."
"I didn't say anything," he said, his face a careful blank.
"That was unintentional."
"What was? I heard you. You love the meat."
She rolled her eyes at him. "You are so lame."
"That's the daughter I know and love," he said, and drank his juice. "So do you want to come to town with me or not?"
She shrugged. "Sure. Just let me change."
"Huh?" he said around a mouthful of egg. "You just got dressed an hour ago. Why do you need to change?"
"There's the father I know and love," she said in a singsong as she got up and moved toward her bedroom. He took a swat at her ass as she went by, and she yelped.
# # #
Kerri knew the weather this time of year all too well -- it was cool now, but the heat was already rising and it would be nice and hot by midday. That in mind, she changed into a low-cut tank top and a belted skirt that ended well enough at the knee -- long enough to not be scandalous, but short enough to draw some attention. She briefly entertained the notion of leaving behind her underwear, but decided not to push her luck that far just yet.
He was already waiting in the battered old red truck when she emerged from the house. The interior smelled like old cigarettes and engine oil -- oddly familiar and comforting smells. As she hopped up beside him and belted herself in, he looked her up and down.
"You didn't finish dressing," he said.
She grinned. "Shut up, dad."
He nodded his head at her shoes. "Are you going to be able to walk in those?"
"What, you don't like my heels?" She braced her foot against the dash, letting her skirt ride up to show off her leg. "They're awesome."
He took her ankle and pushed her foot back down brusquely. "Kerri, you need to be on your good behavior while we're in town. I know people here, okay? I don't need any tongues wagging."
"I don't know what you're talking about," she said, widening her eyes and giving him a guileless look. She shrugged her shoulders, deliberately coaxing one of the straps of her top down over her arm.
He gave her a stern look. "I mean it," he said. "Good behavior."
"Well, what if this is my good behavior?" she asked.
"Kerri..." she heard the note of exasperation in his voice and found it made her more amused than contrite.
"Yes, daddy," she said, her voice teasing. "I promise I'll be good."
He shook his head, clearly not convinced, and she burst into giggles as he started the truck.
# # #
The ride into town was every bit as boring as she'd remembered it being. The local radio station, it seemed, still only played country music from somewhere in the Triassic period, and once they reached the base of the mountain road, there was little to look at but endless fields and the occasional cow. Kerri soon found herself counting telephone poles.
Forty minutes in, she idly wondered how her father would react if she unbuckled her seat belt and tried to blow him while he was driving. She had no real intention of trying it -- newly acknowledged carnal lust or not, she knew from experience his feelings on auto safety were not to be meddled with -- but the thought of it kept her amused the rest of the way to town.
The town itself was also much as she had remembered it -- mostly one long, dreary main street, lined with broken-down strip malls and local shops with signs fully thirty years old. She was shocked at the number of places from her childhood that were still open.
The hardware store was the same, too; a grim-looking brick facade with a massive metal sign that read HENRY'S in rust-pitted letters six feet high. But across the street stood a massive box store with a parking lot almost an entire block wide. As they pulled in, Kerri counted perhaps half a dozen cars in the Henry's lot.
"When did they build that thing?" she asked, pointing across the street.
"About a year ago," he said. "A lot of locals are pissed about that. Especially Henry. It's pretty sucked up all the local customers."
"I can imagine."
The inside of Henry's was cavernous and cold. Some of the aisles sprawled wide enough to drive a car through, others so narrow that two people could barely stand abreast of one another. Her father grabbed a cart and gave it to her to push. Within minutes, she'd begun to regret her skimpy outfit a little -- the air conditioning pumped out cold air full-blast, and she had goosebumps running up both arms. Her dad, having apparently changed very little over the years, took a meandering route through the store, browsing through the shelves, examining tools and pieces of equipment she knew he neither needed nor wanted. When it came to hardware, her father shopped like a girl.
