Zoe, Wash, and memories

I taped River’s drawing to the wall, right by my bunk, just so’s I could look at it from time to time. I ain’t as fearsome-looking as some folks have said. Why, look at the twinkle in my eye and the big gray moustache. Hell, I look like someones kindly grandpap. I leaned back in my bunk with my hands behind my head and pondered a few things. Would more money matter to my retirement? Do I want to stay retired? Damn damn damn. All them questions and me without any easy answers. Well, ain’t that the way it always is. I scooted down a bit to ponder things some more and closed my eyes. Maybe the one true path will reveal itself, as Chiun would say now and then. Wise old coot, he was.

I meandered down to the mess for the evening meal. Zoe and the pilot was there, kinda jokin’ with each other. She saw me and gestured towards the red-headed guy and introduced him as Wash. She paused, then added “my husband”. I shook hands with him, said I was Lafe, and helped myself to some mystery food. On board a ship like this, man doesn’t ask too many questions about what he’s eating. Wash grinned over at me while Zoe was off looking for something in the galley cabinets and asked me if I ever made it with a warrior woman. I eyed him for a moment, quirked a smile, and reckoned that I hadn’t. He allowed as how there was nothing like it, then clammed up when Zoe came back. Interesting couple, I thought.

The rest of the meal I listened to the byplay between the two as I ate. Curious, I reckon. They had their personal lives and their professional lives. Kinda interesting how they work their different lives. Zoe is the hard-nosed exec, always ready to do battle for the captain, but at the same time she’s tied to her man. Wash flips back and forth between being a young guy playing around with an exotic woman and being a real professional pilot, able to make instant decisions. I’ve thought about getting’ a woman to settle down with, but seems to me it’d be unfair, me never knowing when I might be planted, the hunter becoming the prey. And her never knowing when I didn’t come home, if I’d breathed my last on some far-off planet or if I’d just tired of her and moved on.

I shook my thoughts out of my head. Starting to think like I’m old, just wondering about the way things might have been. Yeah, coulda, woulda, shoulda. I remember long ago, when me ma would sing something about yesterday being dead and gone, and tomorrow being out of sight. When I would hear that, I’d always know that it’d be about time for a new ‘uncle’ to show up for a month or two. Hell, maybe I ought to hunt up Book and confess all my sins. Take the rest of the voyage and then some, most likely. I got up, stuck my plate in the recycler, and headed back to my bunk. I think I need to be planet-side for an hour or two. Never did like being cooped up like this.

Tags: 'verse, bounty hunter, fanfiction, firefly, journal, Wash, zoe