“Emmie, what are you doing here in this cold! Get in here right now and warm up!” Florence said from her doorway.

“Danny’s been avoiding me all morning, I don’t know what’s going on but I had to get out. He says he’s just feeling tired but… I hope you don’t mind. Is Mary here also?”

“Of course she is. Now come in before this snow starts!”

Emmie slowly made her way up the steps and sat by the fire and took her winter boots off… “My feet are so swollen…”

“Well, you’re also very pregnant!”

“Yes Danny says any day now and it feels like it. He wanted to take me to my parents in Boston and be near hospitals and such but this storm is probably going to block us up for a week.”

Mary walked into Florence’s parlor and greeted Emmie with a hug. “Yes you’re ready to pop the buns out of the oven as my mom used to say. Let’s get you some tea.”

“Thank you…” Emmie said, sitting back deeply in her chair when she noticed a sketch book on the end table and began looking through it.

“Florence, did you draw these?”

“What? Oh no, I left that out! I…I…” she said rushing in from the kitchen.

“No, No! They are really good! Like really good… all of Mary?”

“Yes… She’s been my muse to start drawing again.”

“And I take my clothes off for her.” Mary joked from the kitchen.

“Yes.. I see that…but… they are really good.”

“Well doesn’t Mary have a real innocence to her? Like a forest fairy, or water nymph? That’s why I like to draw her down by the pond, or in the forest.”

“Why yes… Very artistic.” she said slowly looking through the book, examining the details on each sketch until flipping one page over. “Oh My! Well now…”

"Oh... Ummm..." Florence said, a bit shocked, forgetting about that one sketch being in the book.

"Isn't that your church dress Mary? Hiked up, about your waist, like that?"

“Well it was Sunday.” Mary said unapologetically.

“So not always innocent?” Emmie replied both shocked and amused.

"Well I think I look innocent there... Just... Umm... well satisfied... and... ummm... sleepy?"

Florence smiled coyly at the memory then quickly took the sketch book away as Mary brought them some tea.

After some polite conversation Emmie piped up again. “Florence, can you draw me? As a gift for Danny? Maybe not looking nine months pregnant… something tasteful like you usually draw Mary?”

“I suppose so. I mean I can try…”

“We could right now. Emmie can pose on the couch.” Mary said, sounding a bit eager.

Mary helped her undress and pose on the couch while Florence sat across and began her sketching.

“Emmie if you don’t mind me asking, what was the moment you fell in love with Danny… I don’t mean just attraction, I mean when did you KNOW you’d marry him?” Florence asked.

Emmie took a deep breath. “We’d only been officially dating for a few weeks… Though Auntie made sure he had been at every Sunday dinner since we first met…We just were not official… I really wanted to be sure I was staying and I think Danny had to sort out some things in his own heart. Now I wanted to cook him the best meal he ever had for his Birthday. My aunt and uncle agreed to go for the day so I could cook a roast dinner for Danny by myself.

He was playing records on the phonograph, we were chatting, I was cooking like a madwoman. I needed this to be perfect! I just put everything in the oven, had a proper fire going, when Mr Holt showed up and asked Danny to go see his daughter who’d been sick all day with a cough and fever. I was feeling sorely disappointed that he was about to leave, but then he asked me to come along…”

“Clara Holt?” Mary asked attently.

“Yes Clara, boy did she look pale and sick when we got there. Coughing, weezing, pale, but alert and annoyed her dad called the doctor because her mom was out of town visiting her sister..”

“So you got to watch?”

“Mary! And yes I did… He was very professional and I helped her get her nightgown off… and he listened to her heart, lungs, took her temperature, you know where.”

“She’s got a cute bottom…”

“Really Mary?” Florence said, a bit annoyed.

“Sorry but it’s the first girl’s butt I ever saw when she taught me how to swim as a kid. Anyways she had the hots for Danny for a while, but he wasn’t interested in anyone until he met Emmie.”

“Well even I need to agree about her bottom, and oh yeah she was trying to flirt with him and he was totally not into it… I am glad she got married herself though. Heck she already has two children!”... But when we were leaving she sneezed on me! Completely by accident but I thought for sure I’d get sick… And well I was looking forward to that house call.. I was so fascinated by what happened… and just aroused seeing him work… I had him pull over and we kissed in his car for a while…” she said looking over and seeing Mary hold back a chuckle. “Just kissed, we didn’t get handsy…”

“Well what happened next?”

“We got back home and the roast wasn’t just burned…. Smoke was coming out the windows! I set the it on fire! Mashed potatoes boiled over. NOTHING was edible… and I just started balling… Danny though…He started cleaning up the mess without me asking… and he thought it was funny!”

“Well knowing you, it probably was…”

“He could tell how upset I was though…He grabbed me, so gently but firmly… Kissed me and said ‘Emmie, if you want to be married to a country doctor someday, this will probably happen again… and again… how about cooking next weekend? And why don’t I take you to town for dinner and then a movie?”

“What movie did you see?”

Emmie laughing “We never made it to the movies… We had dinner, then we parked in his car for a while…And got a little handsy… and before you say anything we kept our clothes on! BUT I was really disappointed when I didn’t get what Clara had…Like I said I was looking forward to that house call.”

“Yeah and when you did get that house call you didn’t know what to do!” Mary said with a chuckle.

“What happened?” Florence said curiously.

“He felt up Emmie’s boobies.” Mary again said, laughing a bit.

“Well.. not like that… Remember when I was hobbling around for a week after I was kicked by that cow?”

“Oh you were in rough shape… All the ladies thought you’d go back to the city after that… You got a lot of points with us when you stayed.” Florence said.

“I really don’t remember much between being kicked and waking up and seeing Danny rushing into my room. Uncle Paul said after I was kicked he saw me stumbling out of the barn and passing out. He carried me in and they called Danny… Auntie was pulling my clothes off when he arrived… I screamed out “I’m Naked!” but she whispered in my ear that he’d probably need to examine me… and that she didn’t want to embarrass me because I wet myself…

So she’s throwing a blanket over me and I am just in so much pain. I am seeing blurry, my whole body hurts and I threw up on my aunt. Danny turned white as a ghost when he saw me… He screamed out ‘Emmie! Oh my God!” and rushed over. They said I was just coming through and it was a pretty hard hit… He took a deep breath, so loudly I could hear it over the ringing in my ears, and then he calmed down. He started off checking my head with me sitting up … Said I didn’t fracture my skull and my vision was coming back by then. When he lowered the blanket his face went white again… Yelled to my uncle to get an ice pack.. I had a bruise shaped like a hoof on my breast… He had me so carefully lay back and started feeling around it. I screamed in pain when he touched it. All he said was ‘I’m so sorry Emmie… I need to be sure you didn’t break a rib.

By then my uncle passed an ice pack to my aunt who passed it to Danny… He was so calm but I could tell inside he was in a panic.. He put it on my breast and well you know what happens when they get cold…”

“Your headlights turned on?” Mary said inquisitively, not really knowing how to describe what was happening.

“Yes Mary,” Emmie said with a chuckle. “He felt my other breast a bit and pressed all along my ribs… Then pulled the blanket down more.. All the way to my thighs and felt my belly and pelvis really well… That’s when it hit me that he was seeing me naked like that… I mean he sort of did before… But this was different… I mean I kind of wanted him to see me naked at that point… Just not like that… The man I love is seeing me naked and in the most unerotic way possible… If I wasn’t in so much pain I’d have run away from embarrassment right there. Then I said “Danny Dear… My ankle hurts so much.’

Well he covered me back up. Then rolled the blanket back past my knees… I still had my stockings on. He could see what ankle was swollen and asked for another ice pack. Luckily it was just a sprain… though he cut off my last pair of silk stockings! I won’t forgive that.” she said with a smile. “But… He said I didn’t break a rib… or didn’t think anything internal was damaged… He was really worried about my concussion though. He spent the night sitting on the chair next to my bed.

Now the next morning, it really sunk in what happened… He was sitting there, half asleep but looking at me… I was still in too much pain to really move. I joked that it’s not the way I wanted him to touch my breasts for the first time… he just smiled and said “Oh Doctor Richardson touched them for necessary medical reasons… But Danny stayed by your side all night” and then he kissed me on the forehead…

Now I will admit I started fantasizing about it later…”

“Oooh how so?” Asked Mary as Florence was sketching away.

“Well either not in pain and having an exam like that… or well watching him examine someone else while I watched… In full doctor mode…”

“Oh? any ladies in particular?” Florence said not taking her eyes off the sketch.

“Oh that’s a secret now…”

“I bet it was me!” Mary said, laughing a bit.

“Mary! And… maybe a few times… and well most of the young ladies church group.”

“You’re as naughty as Mary.” Florence quipped.

“Yeah, but Emmie likes man parts way more than we do.”

“Oh… well…ummm… yes but… OK I’ll admit I find women attractive but men have the equipment to make me… you know… and ummm less girl drama…no offense I love you like a sister Mary, and I love you too Florence but drama!”

All three of them laughed as Florence gave the sketch to Emmie.

She got dressed and stayed for lunch as the snow started to fall heavily.

“Mary, Florence.. Oh my… Something is… It might be time…I think my water just broke… Can you get me home!”