Attempting to force a light tone into his voice, Jamie added, "Maybe she'll be ready to talk without screaming when she gets back. Anyway, I intend to enjoy the weekend, and not think on it overmuch."

Jamie parked the car and they headed for the back door. The house was silent and dark but for a light off of the back porch and a soft glow from the kitchen. A mother's touch.

"It's a no win situation," Aaron mumbled, shoving his hands into his pockets. "But if she won't go back to rehab, I think she's about done for. She's gonna hit bottom. I guess have to realize that too. And I gotta stop thinking you're to blame."

"Thanks Aaron." Jamie gave his brother a sidelong glance. "I just wish that was entirely true." He closed the door to the night behind them.

Waiting for Eden ~*~*~*~*~*~.

Chapter 15.

Alex flicked off the radio with a smile on her face. It was going to be an ideal summer day. High of 83 degrees and plenty of sunshine. The humidity was still up above normal, bordering on the unpleasant, but the shade of the rustling trees that blanketed the mountain would surely give off their own brand of sweet relief.

She went back to packing her saddle bags. Sandwiches, chips, sodas, oranges... what else? She thought of bug spray and a first aid kit, but figured Jamie, certified forester that he was, would have those items on hand himself. Hefting the bags to her shoulder, she locked the front door and headed for the barn.

The interior was cool and quiet. She had let the others out in the pasture for the night, as relief from the heat and pesky biting insects. In fact, they hadn't even wanted to come in for breakfast this morning, so she had allowed them to stay out in the pasture for the night, happily munching the thick, tender grasses.

Bold Venture, being a stallion and thus an outcast from the others, had been sacrificed to remain inside. If turned out with the other geldings and mares, trouble was sure to ensue in the form of well-aimed kicks or bites, and the litany of squeals and neighs throughout the entire night.

He heard her footsteps and whinnied. "Coming, Big Man." Alex led him to the crossties and picked up a brush. She had made the time to give him a bath yesterday afternoon, and after whisking away the soft woodchips clinging to his skin, his coat gleamed an extraordinary burnished gold. Alex stepped back to admire him. The four white socks that graced his long legs and the slender blaze that ran down his face only accentuated the brilliant hue.

"You are some handsome hunk of male," she murmured appreciatively.

"Why, thank you kindly," a male voice drawled.

She whirled. "Jamie! I didn't hear you ride up."

He gestured over his shoulder. "Lilah's tied outside. I taught her to walk like an Indian."

"Yeah right." She laughed, and headed for the tack room. "Let me throw a saddle on Bold, and we can be on our way."

"No problem." Jamie walked over to the stallion and brushed his fingers down the muscled neck. "You are a looker though, fella. Would you like a try at my Lilah?" Alex reappeared and he flashed her a smile. "I think they'd make a good match."

His eyes were like the ocean today, turbulent yet ever so blue. "I think you're quite right about that, and you'd get an amazing foal off of her," she returned and focused her attention to the task at hand.

Jamie tickled the stallion's ears, and brushed the soft muzzle. Bold sighed contentedly. "Hey, he likes my touch." He grinned at Alex devilishly. "Usually, a soft caress only works with the ladies."

Alex swallowed a rising curse, realizing that her good humor was drowning in the familiar swamp of nervous anxiety that suddenly plagued her. Why did this keep happening to her?

Last night, they had parted as friends, chatting about their lives, the tense moments on the dance floor put behind them. But not forgotten, she realized, feeling the tension take its grip in the back of her neck, in the slight tremor of her fingers. She prayed that Jamie wouldn't notice, and that she could get through the day without making an ass out of herself, as she was so apt to do in his presence.

But apparently, Jamie had noticed. "That was a joke, Alex."

She didn't reply. When she finished readying the stallion, he gripped her forearm, forcing her to turn to him.

"What?" There was a snap to her voice that she regretted, as he recoiled slightly.

"I just thought I should make something clear before we left."

She bit her lip and worked to pry his fingers from her arm.

He dropped his hand and scowled. "Look, I'm sorry about last night, Alex. I just wanted you to know that it won't happen again. I didn't invite you along today to make a pass or anything. I just wanted some company and thought you might be interested. Okay?"

"Okay."

"Friends?"

He extended his hand and she took it gingerly. "Friends," she mumbled grudgingly, wondering why she felt a sliver of disappointment at the notion. Jamie left to get Lilah. She went over the saddle bags a final time, adjusting the strap a quarter of an inch, mainly to give herself a moment before she joined him.

"Conceit," she whispered, scolding herself. "You expected him to make a pass at you today. Wanted him to, in fact. You were just scared to face it." She was slightly humiliated to realize that it actually hurt knowing that he had no intention of doing so. Alex gritted her teeth and led the stallion from the barn.

It was impossible to hold onto doubt and misgiving for long. The morning simply swept it away on crystalline wings, the sky above was liquid and flowing, crested by the occasional whispering cloud. As the air still lacked the heat of mid-day, the horses were justifiably frisky, transmitting exuberance physically into their riders. The pace was fast and furious initially, until all were breathless and sheened with sweat.

Jamie pulled Lilah up first. "Hey, we have to save some energy to get back down, you know."

Alex laughed. "Bold's energy is boundless."

"Well, we're almost at the site, anyway. It's over this next ridge-top." They ambled along at a walk, letting the horses catch their breath, and catching their own as well.

Alex began to absorb her surroundings, which, before, had sped by as a blur of green and brown. Ferns waved nodding heads everywhere, contrasting beds of emerald next to the quiet brown of heavy pine needles. Evergreens were slowly gaining dominance over the hardwoods, and the small foot trail they rode upon was blanketed with a soft film of dead needles. They moved silently now, with only the whisper of ferns against the horses' legs as the trail grew narrow.

"This path isn't used much, is it?" Alex inquired.

"No, not often. There's a faster way in using old logging roads. When I'm carrying equipment up, I use an ATV or a four wheel drive pickup. I seldom have the time to ride in."

They soon passed over the steep ridge, which Jamie informed her was Brodhead Mountain, leaving the horses laboring from the incline even at a walk. The apex was relatively narrow in width, and they soon crossed it and headed down the other side, of which, Alex noted thankfully, was not nearly as steep as the upslope.

All around were gnarled evergreens, packed tightly together in long, straight rows that led down the ridge. As they rode into their depths, the light grew dimmer.

"Were these planted here?"

"Yes, this is an Austrian pine plantation. This area was strip mined in the sixties, and these pines were the typical reclamation process in those days. I'm using this particular area as a control for the project."

The pines made it, and grew," Jamie continued, "but there is basically no plant diversity here at all, which makes for poor habitat for wildlife or other native species to populate the area. Even though there are trees here, it's actually a pretty barren landscape."

Jamie made a sudden sharp left, cutting across the neat rows of pines. Alex had to duck several times as scraggly branches made darting passes at her face. "Hey, I don't think this is a trail anymore!"

"We're almost there. Hold your horses," he laughed, "literally."

Alex chuckled, and then swiftly they were again in the light and open. A small headwater stream trickled its way down the mountain through a steep and stony channel.

Jamie motioned to the stream. "This is Bright Run. The spring that feeds it starts up on top of the ridge we just came over. It eventually joins a few other headwaters that empty into Kettle Creek."

"Kettle Creek." Alex rolled the name on her tongue. "That sounds familiar," she commented, struggling to pull the stiff remains of pine twigs from her hair.

"You must have crossed it near Ole Bull State Park on your hike. Kettle Creek has a lot of history, a lot of local lore, starting way back with the Native Americans who settled there. There's a book written on strange happenings in this whole general area in which we're riding. The original settlers called it the Black Forest."

"Ghost stories?"

"You bet. Remind me to tell you the story of the Twin Sisters when we it starts to get dark." He grinned and dismounted, leading Lilah to the stream to drink.

Alex followed his example, with Bold pulling at the reins in his eagerness. "Twin sisters?"

"Native American tales. This area is rich with that kind of history. Those Susquehannock sisters have an entire ridge named after them."

"Hey, why is the stream orange?" she questioned as Lilah thrust her nose in to pull long swallows from the water.

"Iron leachate. From earlier acid mine drainage."

Reflexively, Alex tugged Bold's head away from the water's edge. The animal pawed at the bank and pulled back defiantly.

"It's safe," Jamie grinned, "the pH is finally coming back toward normal and the stream is supporting invertebrate organisms again. I'm going to release some fish before long, see how they manage."

Alex noticed a flume-shaped, wooden structure farther down the stream. She pointed at it questioningly.

"That's for stream flow measurements. The main reason I needed to be up here today was to check the data. I've got a solid base flow hydrograph going, you know, a chart of stream flow levels over time. I'm anxious to get a good storm, and see how the stream responds."

"And this is all part of your plantation project?"

"The impact on the surrounding watershed is a big part of it. You see, the older style of strip mining was not... kind to the environment, you could say. The under layers of overburden, mine spoil, all that nasty stuff was mixed in with the topsoil. The soils ended up being totally degraded... with leaching of iron pyrites, leading to acidic soils, acidic waters. It's kind of like a snowball effect after that."

Jamie glanced at her quickly, obviously expecting to find boredom on her face, but she nodded for him to continue.

"My study focuses on reclamation: a traditional plantation of one species, like those Austrian pines we came through, versus integrated stands of various species, more like the natural surrounding forest community."

"Well that makes sense." She followed him down the stream toward the flume. There were different plantings all around, some small and scrubby, some hardwood saplings that she couldn't quite recognize. And there were some areas of bare, pebbly soil, stained orange and brown, where nothing grew at all.

"The traditional plantations grow fast and are easy to harvest, if the soil's not too bad, that is. It's the quickest way to make money on degraded land. But I think the long term benefits of a more natural ecosystem will prove more profitable in the end. The trees will be of greater harvesting value, erosion will be reduced, there'll be less disease, an increase in infiltration to the groundwater supply, and high quality surface water will be provided to the drinking water reservoirs downstream."

"This stream leads into drinking water?" she asked dubiously, eyeing the orange-gold flow.

"Yep." He knelt to take a reading beside the flume.

"This will take quite a long time until you have results, don't you think?"

He sighed. "Yes and no. I'm seeing some results already, especially in the area of water quality, but the trees themselves will take a good amount of time to grow. I don't know how long the grant money will hold out."

Alex perched on a log, resting her legs. Birds seemed to be everywhere at once, dipping, soaring, chattering. "The birds seem to like it," she observed.

"Species diversity is a big part of the study too. Both plant and animal."

"Aah." She took a swig from her water jug. The open area seemed dry and hot, she could envision it being mined. "So how do they do this strip mining in the first place?"

Jamie was scribbling on a chart taken from a locked metal box beside the flume.

He glanced up, and squinted. "Well, to generalize it, traditional strip mining removed the topsoil and subsoil with large equipment, and then they blasted with dynamite until the underlying coal seam was exposed. The coal itself was removed with smaller equipment."

Alex looked around dubiously. "This area was once blasted wide open?"

Jamie nodded. "The coal had to be a shallow seam, probably only forty feet deep or so. Wouldn't have been profitable if it was buried deeper on these side slopes."

"Are these bare patches acidic?"

"You're asking a lot of questions today," he noted lightly.

At her hurt expression he added, "That's a good thing, I mean. You're really curious about all this? I was afraid this all would bore you."

She fixed him with a stony stare. "You mean because I'm a city person who thinks all food comes directly from grocery stores?"

He chuckled. "Is that what you think?"

She made an exasperated sound. "I am interested, Jamie. Very."

"Well then. Yes, these bare patches have a low pH... the soil has reached its critical point - that's where it can no longer heal itself naturally over time. The Austrian pines have a genetic ability to grow in these less than perfect conditions, provided that the acid content isn't too high, but for the species diversification that I'm interested in, I have to help these soils along. I began with applications of sludge and lime to increase their fertility.

The bare areas are highly susceptible to erosion, making it even worse for plant life, as well as dumping soil in the stream, creating dams and flooding downstream, or ending up in the drinking water reservoirs."

He sighed, dipping water from the stream into a little container and peering into it. "Suspended solids are low right now, but I'd really like a reading after a storm event. It's been so damned dry this summer."

Alex felt sweat beading up on her brow at the word dry. She picked at her shirt and waved the fabric around, hoping to cool herself with a little air flow. "Is this type of mining still done today?"

"Yes, in places, but today's miners are more conscientious. They restore the different layers of soil as they found them, replacing the original, uncontaminated topsoil in the end. And they attempt to re-create the original contours and hydrology of the area."

"Environmental awareness," she quipped.

"Well, they have to be aware, and prudent. Nowadays, mining companies have to post performance bonds, which the government can seize if they neglect to follow the rules and do considerable damage." He stood, and mopped sweat from his own brow. "I'm about finished. Like I said, I only had a few readings to take today."

"Good, it's really getting hot in the sun. Are you hungry?" Alex glanced at her watch. "It's about lunch time."

Jamie patted his stomach. "I'm getting there. But I have a better place in mind for picnicking." He grinned at her raised eyebrows. "Much cooler, and it's not far, I promise."

"All right then, lead onward." She turned to tighten her mount's girth before swinging into the saddle. The stallion stamped one hoof against the dirt and swished his long tail through the air at a buzzing fly. Alex heard a horde of fat insects whirring suddenly in the air around them, drawn by the scent of warm, sweaty animals. "As long as it's someplace shaded."

Jamie steered Lilah ahead of the stallion, who tossed his head once in mild affront at having to take the rear. He thought he heard Alex mumble "testosterone" before falling silent behind him. They were soon within the shelter of the trees, and a slight breeze lifted, touching against clammy skin and soothing it.

"So how's that Michael Dipton's horses turning out?" he questioned casually after a few quiet minutes along a narrow, winding trail.

"Dalton," she returned crossly. "It's Michael Dalton. And his horses are doing wonderfully for me. He won't have any complaints."

"I'm sure he won't," Jamie returned, and Alex gritted her teeth at the sarcasm she read in his voice. She knew suddenly that she didn't want Jamie to know about her date with Michael... or did she? It would only serve him right, she thought angrily.

"He asked me on a date," she blurted before she could chicken out.