But as it involved making love to Innocence, who was quite clearly rather enjoying it, the whole affair was not of overwhelming appeal to her. It also...came as no surprise to her, that as the days passed, Innocence left Alice’s bed, and she and Mouse began sleeping together on the bed-settee in the living room. To a certain extent, Alice rather welcomed being able to sleep alone again. On the other hand, despite the fact that she and Innocence would still occasionally make love, it still. "Louis," she said softly, but looking at me this time around with an unconvincing expression of hurt and outrage. "How could you?"Since I knew what was coming next, I simply turned to Mr. Shark Teeth and awaited his next pronouncement."Mr. Chandler," Thompson's lawyer declared right on cue, "I am in possession of a deposition by one Joan Hartmann--who was an employee within a department over which you have hiring and firing and promotion influence--claiming that you coerced her into having sex. So in places it looks like there are grammatical errors but to my ear (fading fast though it is) it represents a lot of what I hear in an extended multicultural family. Mea culpa, please don’t shoot me! Maybe some day I’ll be brave enough to try a story in Spanish. Thanks as always to Techsan for his great editing talents and LadyCibelle for her ongoing support. Enjoy! CASTLE ROCK, COLORADO The sticky note was on the outside of one of those disposable file folders you can get for practically. Mark and I had been friends since 2nd grade when he moved here from Hawaii. His mother was from Oklahoma and his father was pure Hawaiian. He was a military man stationed in Afghanistan, a Sgt. Jeremy Baroda. He died in October 2004. His marine unit was ambushed by a group of insurgents. He was buried with full honors and a silver star. Mark does his father proud, he is 6 ft. 200 pounds, jet black hair, and tattoos everywhere. He visits his people on a regular basis so Mark still kept his tan.