St. Clair Ch. 01: Soldier Girl

The next morning TJ woke up clinging to Tammi like a drowning woman to a life raft. When she looked up Tammi was watching her with those crystal ocean eyes.

She didn't say anything or ask anything. After breakfast, TJ sat on the old creaking porch swing, while Tammi across from her on an old plastic chair.

She didn't push. She didn't say anything at all.

TJ suddenly found herself talking. One long string of explanation.

"Six months ago, I lost my squad. The whole goddamned squad. Twelve men and women. We'd lived together, ate, slept, argued like kids, played stupid jokes on each other. We were there for each other. Hell when Deaner's dog died we had a memorial service. We lived in hell together. And we loved each other. Six months ago, a soldier opened the wrong door – it was booby-trapped. With 40 tons of explosive. Destroyed three goddamned city blocks. "

She sucked in a little breath.

"I can't talk to people, I sleep like shit. I dream of that explosion almost every night unless I'm completely exhausted. I don't know why I'm alive."

TJ went on, about her pain, she talked about her soldiers, and how everything felt broken and wrong.

Wrong to be maimed, wrong to be alone and wrong to still be alive when her friends were all dead.

Tammi listened intently. She just moved over to TJ's porch swing and sat with her, not pushing, but just letting TJ talk.

After TJ wound down, Tammi asked little things, quiet things, things about her lost soldiers, about little memories that made TJ laugh and cry.

The rest of the day was quiet, TJ feeling that she'd just heaped her problems on Tammi who damn sure had enough of her own.

That night after TJ climbed into bed, Tammi walked into the room wearing a pink terry robe and sat next to her pensively.

"Can we talk for a minute."

"Sure"

"You have these dreams every night?"

""Yes"

"Unless you are totally exhausted."

"Well, at least I don't remember having them then."

\

"Okay, well that's simple then. You just have to be exhausted."

Tammi stood up and slid her robe off in the soft light of the table lamp.

Even with all the glimpses, Tammi was more stunning than she'd imagined – or even imagined was possible.

TJ suddenly felt like a hideous, scarred, troll. "Tammi, you don't have to..."

"I've spent the last two months parading around here half-dressed. It's pretty obvious you like me "that way", but you're afraid to say anything because you think I'll feel pressured by the fact that you saved my sorry butt from Andy. Since you're being so honorable, if I was to wait on you, I'd be waiting forever."

"TJ, I've wanted to do this since you walked into the diner." Tammi grabbed the waistband of TJ's shorts and snatched them down with one easy motion.

In a teasing voice "Oooh, My Soldier sleeps commando."

"Tammi..."

But Tammi had already straddled her leg and was pulling her tank top off. TJ weakly tried to cover her badly scarred left breast, but Tammi just smiled and pulled her hand away.

"No hiding. Those scars are part of you. I want all of you."

She gave TJ a kiss that seemed to last forever. Then she pulled back and looked TJ directly in the eye.

"Better hang on Soldier Girl, this ain't my first Rodeo."

Tammi proved to be almost a force of nature; "hang on" was all TJ could seem to do at first. It felt like this was what Tammi was born to do; she had no inhibitions. Still, when Tammi relaxed a bit, TJ retaliated with every bit of pent up sexual frustration she'd stored away the last several months. They were caught in an overwhelming need that seemed to wash over them back and forth in waves.

The next morning, TJ woke up to find herself face to face with a smiling Tammi.

"How did you sleep?"

TJ blinked her eyes a couple times to clear the cobwebs. "I don't remember any dreams at all."

Tammi's smile broadened and she seemed to relax a little. "I was hoping that'd work. Guess we'll just have to do that a lot. It's for your own good really."

TJ laughed out loud.

Over breakfast TJ asked, "So I gather that wasn't your first time with another woman?"

Tammi's eyes sparkled wickedly "Nope. Had a real close girlfriend in High School, then for my first two years of college I had a very friendly roommate. Been a couple years though. I hope I wasn't too out of practice."

Tammi tried to look doubtful, but broke down in giggles immediately.

"Uh, no. You were amazing."

Tammi grinned "You gave as good as you got Soldier Girl. That was the first time I've ever had that happen. And I know I'm good at it."

The playfulness would have probably ended up with them back in bed if they didn't have to get to work.

Tammi pulled on her diner uniform, while TJ donned her uniform for her first day at work. The whole "dispatcher" role seemed to have disappeared – Shannon needed a deputy. Swede had dropped off her uniforms a few days before. They didn't have any standard "Browns" in her size so she ended up with jet black "Tacticals."

Tammi offered to drop her off, since she would be issued a car that she would keep at the house when she was off duty so she could be called in rapidly. TJ expected Tammi to discretely drop her off to avoid talk. Instead, she pulled straight into the Yard of the station, where four deputies were doing "walk-arounds" checking cruisers and other gear before setting off, under the direction of Swede. TJ had met most of them when she'd been sworn in. When TJ got out, Tammi did the same and walked around the car to her, slipping an arm around her waist.

Then she yelled across the Yard.

"Hey Swede!"

The huge deputy turned toward them.

"I'm dropping off your new deputy, but you better return her in good shape – I got me a bad case of DonWanna!"

She pulled TJ around and kissed her intensely for a long moment, sliding her hands to TJ's butt and squeezing before walking back to the car with an exaggerated sashay.

As TJ turn back to the yard, stunned by Tammi's behavior.

All hell broke loose.

Catcalls, whistles and shouts of "Amen".

Ray, one of the older deputies asked if anyone had a defibrillator handy, while one of the younger deputies insisted he'd won the pool over how long it would take Tammi to get into TJ's pants. Hell, it sounded just like TJ's old squad.

Swede grinned as she walked up.

"Please tell me she's as hot undressed as she is in that damn pink skirt."

TJ shook her head. "Freak. She's your cousin. About 10 times hotter though."

The good natured ribbing lasted for a while – not only did there seem to be no resentment, TJ overheard a couple whispers that carried a clear sense of relief that Tammi was with someone "worth a shit."

Swede led TJ to a large black crew cab F250, handing her the keys.

"There it is, your new vehicle."

TJ eyed it, suspicious of "nug" or "new guy" jokes.

"So what's wrong with it?"

Swede grinned, "Nothing is wrong with the truck, but whoever gets it has to do 'Jenny calls'."

TJ shifted her gaze to him.

"No, nothing weird. You just have to pick up Jenny Leffler when she breaks up with her boyfriend and gets a skinful. And she'll sure as hell puke all over the back seat. Back seat is all vinyl covered so you can just hose it out. Takes a while for the smell of rum and vomit to air out though."

"Why doesn't she find a better boyfriend?"

"Different guy every time. Takes about six months and we're getting close. So 'tag' you're it. It's sort of a shit detail, but all of us have done it."

Sheriff Shannon, behind her, chimed in. "That girl is a walking Miranda Lambert song. Falls in love, has her heart broken, ends up busting up the guys car and throwing rum bottles through his windows. Been seeing Tony Simmons for a while, saw them all over each other, hot and heavy down at Bert's a week ago."

TJ shrugged. "So do I get all the drunk calls?"

Shannon shook his head. "Nope, other than Jenny, everybody gets what they get."

He paused.

"And sometimes what we get is 'Lucky'. You take damn good car of Tammi. She'll take damn good care of you."

Post Production Notes: More to Follow on TJ and Tammi. They still have a lot of issues to deal with, but at least they have each other.