Praeludium -- wherein we meet our heroine and a friend

"Kev, you're nuts. No!!"

"C'mon Mar, you gotta help me out on this one."

"But I don't HAVE another opening at the Prairiedog. It just ain't happening!"

"What if I paid his wages -- we can make a... a sort of active leave of absence sort of thing."

"Kev, now that's starting to sound illegal."

"If you don't tell, I won't tell."

"..."

"What was that Mara? I'm afraid I didn't catch that. Rotten telephone lines sound like we're calling the moon half the time anymore... Mara? You still there?"

"Yeeeessss."

"Well?"

A long sigh. "Okay. Tell me again why you want to babysit one of your best journalists and make him write color pieces for the Prairiedog. God, Kev, you're insane even to think about it. Yeah, he won't be stressed out here in Pittsville, he'll be laughing his guts out. He'll be in the local surgery having his ribs taped from the strain of laughing so much. Shit."

"Mara. You know what it means when you start swearing at me."

"What!"

"It means you're about to cave and help me out here."

"Keeeevin!"

"Okay, you wanted me to tell you why I'm asking this favor."

"That would be helpful, even though I'm still probably going to say No."

"Hmmm. Probably? That's better than the No I got after the first run-through of Rafe's story."

"Dammit."

"Another swear word, m'dear."

"So let me get this straight. On of your first stringers is burned out and needs a little R and R. So Kevin Kuntzler, mad as a hatter, is going to send him from Chicago to lil' ol' Pittsville, South Dakota. The man needs to rest his nerves, not be on the edge of them."

"Nothing that a few peaceful nights on the prairie can't take of."

"What? Rest his nerves or get on his last one?"

"Mara, love, when I came out to vacation in your lovely PEACEFUL burg two years ago, I learned to appreciate the silence. At the risk of sounding like a cliché, the silence was golden. The rustle of the grasses, the crickets, it was a complete paradigm shift of sound that only took me a couple of nights to get used to."

"So what makes you think Mr. 'HotShot High Strung A Few Cards Short Of A Full Deck' will learn the joys of crickets and grasses after learning to sleep to the sound of sirens and gunfire? He's probably got PTSD on top of everything else. He needs to spend a few quiet hours on a shrink's couch, not a couple months amongst the bugs and the ditch weed. Sometime the sounds of silence are LOUD when you've emotional turmoil to work through."

"Mara, honey, you know that. When your father passed so suddenly and you found yourself at a year short of a Master's Degree in Journalism from Medill running the Prairiedog... Hmmm, Mar, I hate to say this, but...

"Spit it out Kev."

"...well, let's just put it this way, I think you're the best person I know to guide Rafe through those loud silences."

"..."

"Now, dear, that was a pretty loud silence right there. I thought I heard a "yes" in there?"

"Keeev..."

"I meant what I said. Okay, okay, I'll figure out a legal way to pay Rafe while he works at your paper. Maybe he could write some color pieces for ME about La Belle Prairie and its locust."

"Okay."

"What?"

"Okay. Send him out here. But make sure he knows I'm in charge of the paper here. I don't want the big city boy taking over, trying to show up us rubes here. I'm all for the master class in the finer arts of writing high-key reporting journalism, but the Prairiedog is MY paper."

"Mara, I swear on the wires that carry my news out to the world, he'll know who's in charge."

"..."

"What was that?"

"Kev, why am I such a pushover where you're concerned."

"Darling, it's meant to be..." a lingering flirtatious hopeful note.

"Kev, you flirt, what we had while we were at school is long gone and I'm sure your wife wouldn't appreciate you wooing strange editors of small newspapers in Podunk. Send your man out here. Tell him to bring plenty of self-entertainment in books or movies or whatever, or he'll have to special order it here. Wamblee's Drug doesn't carry a huge selection of either of those."

"He's a big boy, he'll bring his own computer. So it's a deal."

Exasperatedly, "Yes, Kevin, it's deal."

"Love you, Mara. I'll fax the details out to you tomorrow."

"Love you, Kev, you rotter!"

"Ciao"

"G'nite"