by Tiffiny
"You're going fishing?" The words were accompanied by a raised brow - the only evidence of surprise the gunslinger allowed to show."Yup." Vin Tanner finished saddling his horse before looking up to meet the gunslinger's cool gaze.
"You know it's been pretty dry this year. Fishing hole's mighty low." Chris observed, leaning casually against the wall of the livery.
"Don't matter."
"It does if you was planning on catching your supper."
Vin held up a small basket in reply. The gunslinger recognized it as the kind you could buy at the hotel. They had sandwiches and pie and he didn't know what else in them.
"You got enough for two in there?"
Vin smiled slowly. "I reckon."
"Then let's go." Chris began moving over to saddle his own horse. He made a quick job of it, anxious to get out of town before the walls started closing in. He knew Vin was probably feeling it even worse than him. He didn't think Vin had stayed in any one place for more than a few months at a time since he was a kid.
Chris had a tendency to get itchy feet himself at times. Especially now with the town starting to become so civilized and all. They were even having a dance tomorrow night. To celebrate Valentine's Day - a damn fool notion if you asked him. Although the other men seemed to be looking forward to it some. But then they had reason to, he supposed. JD was taking Casey and Buck had pestered Inez into agreeing to go. Nathan was bringing Rain and Josiah had offered to escort a friend of Mary's. Chris had toyed with the idea of asking Mary Travis to go - he had a feeling that most of the town had expected him to - but he just didn't feel comfortable with it. So she was going with the judge. That left just Vin and Ezra unaccounted for.
Chris led his horse out of the livery and swung up into the saddle, giving Vin a sideways glance. What was the tracker doing tomorrow? Well, if Vin wanted him to know, he reckoned Vin would have told him.
"Let's ride." Chris dismissed his wayward thoughts and gathering up the reins, he nudged his horse into a walk with the tracker following close behind.
+ + + + + ++
"You know we ain't caught a damn thing all day?" Chris said lazily a few hours later, leaning back against the bank with the pole clasped loosely in his hands. The water level in the pond was low and he could see the remains of a tree that had been submerged in the water and was now sticking partway out in the middle.
"I reckon we probably won't either. Good thing I brought along that basket." Vin patted his stomach in satisfaction. He was stretched out beside Chris, no longer even making the pretense of trying to fish.
"Good thing you did." Chris agreed, lazily casting his line a bit further out.
"If you're set on catching yourself something, I know a better way." Vin propped himself up on one elbow, smiling mischievously.
"What's that?" Chris eyed the tracker skeptically.
"Watch." Sitting up, Vin pulled off his boots and socks, got to his feet and began wading out into the water. He stopped in about the middle, near the partially submerged tree and bent down. Chris could see him reach his hands into the water and feel around a bit. Then with a cry of triumph, he straightened up, holding something in his hands. It was a fish.
"I'll be damned." Chris grinned and watched as Vin tossed the fish onto the bank and reached down to scoop up another one. As he dug around in the water, his body turned so that he was facing the thickest part of the tree that had a large opening right about eye level with the tracker when he was crouched down in the water.
Seconds later, Vin let out a startled yelp that had Chris on his feet and wading out into the water before he knew it.
The tracker scrambled back away from the tree, slipping and sliding on the muddy bottom and swearing a blue streak. Chris stood there, knee deep in the water, gun half drawn, wondering what the hell was going on.
"Vin?" he asked, wading out a bit further and grasping the muddy, disheveled tracker by the shoulder.
"Jesus, Chris! Biggest damn snake I ever seen in my life." Still swearing, Vin pushed a piece of wet hair out of his face and glared in the direction of the fallen tree.
Chris squinted his eyes, looking in that direction as well. Sure enough, there it was. Biggest cottonmouth Chris had ever seen. Laying right in the opening of the tree so that he must have been face to face with the tracker. Although this fact seemed to bother Vin a whole lot more than it did the snake - who was till laying there, supremely indifferent to the two men who stood a few feet away staring at him.
"Yeah. It's a big snake alright. But I don't think you have to worry none, Vin. I think he already ate." All the fish in the pond, by the looks of him, Chris thought, his lips twitching.
Vin transferred his glare to Chris and then turned around and began sloshing his way back to the bank.
Chris gave one last look back at the snake. It was wearing an expression of smug triumph. Then he looked at Vin who was wearing an expression of offended dignity and he felt a chuckle escape him. The chuckle had turned into full fledged laughter by the time he joined Vin on the bank.
"I think I'll stick with the old fashioned way of catching fish, if it's all the same to you, Vin." Chris grinned as he grabbed a blanket from his saddle roll and tossed it to his muddy, still dripping wet companion.
"Me too, cowboy." Vin grinned sheepishly as he caught the blanket and began wiping at his face and hair.
We can build us a fire and dry you off some." The gunslinger began gathering some wood as he spoke. The earlier warm temperature had given way to early evening chill. But Chris wasn't quite ready to go back to town yet, so he grasped at the excuse.
"Sounds good right about now. For not havin' much water in it, that little old pond managed to get me plenty wet." Vin grimaced suddenly, stifling a grunt of pain.
"You hurt?" Chris looked up from the small blaze he was tending with a frown.
"Just a cut or something on my back. From trying to climb out of the water in such an all fired hurry, I reckon." Vin's wry tone reassured Chris.
"Why don't you take your shirt off and let me take a look at it?" Chris ran a hand through his hair and waited for Vin to finish drying off as best he could.
Vin finished removing all his clothes except his pants and then spread the blanket he'd used to dry himself with out in front of the small fire and knelt down with his back to Chris.
The gunslinger knelt behind Vin. "Where does it hurt?"
"Right there." The tracker indicated a spot near his shoulder blade. Chris frowned as he peered at the smooth skin in front of him. It was getting too dark to see real well, so Chris brushed the wet strands of Vin's hair out of his way and ran his fingertips gently over the area in question. "There?"
"Yeah." Vin sounded strange, like he had something in his throat.
"Hurt bad? It feels like just a scratch, but it could be bruised too," Chris said, continuing to run his fingers gently across the tracker's shoulder blade and the surrounding area.
"No. It's just a scratch." Vin shivered when Chris's fingers brushed the back of his neck, arching back a little before suddenly flinching away.
Seeing his companion flinch like that caused the gunslinger to hastily pull his hand away and sit back. What the hell had he been doing? What the hell had Vin thought he was doing? It had just felt good to touch someone like that. He'd used to run his fingers over Sarah's back that same way. She'd always reminded him of a cat, arching her back and purring in response. It had been one of his favorite things to do. Hers, too. But Vin wasn't Sarah and he didn't have no call to be doing things like that to him. Did he? No, he didn't. He didn't even know why he'd asked such a stupid question.
"Yeah. Just a scratch. You can have Nathan look at it when we get back to town." Chris got hastily to his feet and moved over to the other side of the fire.
Vin grabbed his damp shirt and began slowly buttoning it, before answering.
"Nathan is at the village bringing Rain back for the dance tomorrow night." Vin gazed steadily at Chris as he spoke, his expression impossible to read in the flickering firelight.
"I forgot. The dance." Chris met his friend's eyes with some difficulty, still trying to sort out exactly what had happened and why it disturbed him so badly.
"You going?" Vin dropped his eyes as he waited for Chris's answer. His fingers fumbled over the last button and he cursed under his breath as he struggled awkwardly with it.
Chris resisted the impulse to help. Vin was old enough to button his own damn shirts.
"Only if the judge thinks he needs some help keeping the peace. But Josiah and Buck and the rest of you will be there." Chris shrugged his shoulders, not looking at Vin.
"I reckon." Vin finished buttoning his shirt and pulled on his socks and boots - the only things that had stayed dry.
Vin was going to the dance? With who? Chris felt a surge of something dangerously close to jealousy.
"We should head back." Chris was suddenly almost unbearably anxious to leave this place.
Vin began silently packing up their belongings and they headed back towards town. But the laughter and happiness of earlier seemed very far away to both men as they rode.
THE END
Continues in Going Fishing