Once the rowboat had been raised up to deck level, Sara declined any help with Cherise, as she had on stepping into the rowboat earlier, insisting on carrying Cherise herself. All the way to the sailboat Sara had sat with Cherise on her lap, bent over her, arms wrapped around her, holding her tight, both of them with tears flowing down their cheeks, Cherise asking again and again if this was really happening and Sara assuring her that she was pretty sure it was. Wendy and Karen, dressed in cloth shorts and t-shirts -- probably the first women ever to dress like that anywhere near the island -- were doing the rowing, both grinning at Sara and Cherise between strokes.

On the deck at last, Sara set Cherise down gently on her side, and said to two men she didn't recognize, "We need some bolt cutters. And clothes. And girlmeat, we could really use some girlmeat!" Then she'd turned and leapt at Bart, throwing her arms around him, saying breathlessly "Thank you thank you thank you I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry thank you thank you..." Bart only smiled and kept his arms around her until she let go, after which Sara threw herself at Steffi and repeated the process.

Sara, newly attired in standard island apparel, dressed the newly freed Cherise, who had tried it herself and then asked for help. Cherise flailed her arms uncertainly. "Sara, I feel strong enough, all those exercises really helped, but it's like I'm not sure how to get standing up. I've forgotten how! Am I going to remember how?" She was biting her lip, looking scared.

Sara kissed her. "I know you'll remember. It won't take very long." Without quite lifting her, she'd kept her hands on Cherise's waist to keep her moving the right direction, until Cherise was on her feet, grinning with accomplishment. Then, her arm around Cherise's waist, Sara had guided her as Cherise took clumsy steps towards the stairs the led down below.

At the top of the steps, Sara looked back towards the island, in time to see a swarm of men and several doggirls reach the sand. The men stopped abruptly, staring across the water at the boat.

They sat together on a bench pulled up to a table, Sara with her hip and shoulder rubbing against Cherise's, not wanting to be even an inch away from her. As Wendy brought out plates stacked with girlmeat sandwiches, and glasses of orange juice ("Anything but peach," Sara had told her and Karen), Sara grinned at Cherise. "See, I told you I'd find us some girlmeat!" Cherise laughed, and tentatively, still moving uncertainly, worked at picking her sandwich up. Sara started to reach for it, but Cherise shook her head quickly. "I need to do this. You've been doing everything for me, and I..." she looked at Sara with a gradually widening smile. "I want to feed you, because it's my turn!" She picked up her sandwich, fumbling just slightly, and held it up to Sara's mouth. Sara, laughing but with tears starting up again, leaned towards it and took a huge bite. Cherise continued holding the sandwich, alternately taking bites of her own and holding it up for Sara to do same, and shared the juice in the same way with Sara. The sandwich consumed, Cherise reached for another.

Steffi and Bart came in then. Sara looked wonderingly up at Steffi. "How..." she gestured around her, back towards the beach, "How did you know to come find us?"

Steffi laughed. "It wasn't that hard. You left a message. Obviously it must have been you, not Cherise. We'd assumed it was her."

"But that was only visible for like one day! And it was..." She stopped herself from saying "...months ago." She didn't want to sound as though she was complaining about the length of time the rescue had taken.

Steffi started to respond, and then her eyes suddenly narrowed, looking at Sara. Sara wasn't sure what she'd done, but understood when she noticed Bart looking at her in even greater puzzlement. Oh, I get it! she thought. Steffi's not used to me talking like this! And last time I saw Bart, I couldn't talk at all! It's finally sunk into them.

Steffi shook her head briefly and went on, "Well, we all owe a debt to the Onderman Corporation for that. It seems they'd assigned one of their staff sociologists -- they have a few, for giving advice on dealing with the native population -- to determine, by whatever means available, what the population of the west side of the island was, so they could decide whether it would be worth the expense to construct a trading port on the west side. This staff member, Mike Keller, decided that a satellite view of the island should be sufficient, so he'd recommended the company make arrangements with the government for high-resolution images of Purity Island from a low-orbit satellite to be taken on the next available clear-weather day. They finally had a day like that a couple of months ago, and got pictures from several orbital passes, before the clouds came back.

"So this Keller gets the pictures and starts examining them, counting all of the farms and measuring their size -- he figured that any farm's population could be estimated based on its size and... well, while doing that, he sees this mysterious message on the beach up at the north end. He studied it kind of idly, asked his colleagues if they knew what a "cherise" was, and when none of them did he looked it up in the relevant books from the company library -- if he'd done an online search on the word "cherise" this might have all gone faster, but the corporation has a lot of proprietary information on the island that isn't available online, so he thought the books would be a better bet. He assumed it was some sort of Purity slang term. Couldn't find it, of course. And whatever it meant, he couldn't come up with a theory on why they would have written it in huge letters on the beach. Facing the sea.

"So Keller gives up and pushes it to the back of his mind. And a couple of months later, he's attending a sociology conference, and gets in a conversation with a group of other attendees, a couple of whom were from the university. And just as a curiosity to toss out there, when it came back to mind while he was discussing his research, he mentions this message, "cherise here" on the sand, and starts to ask if they have any idea...

"And of course, the guys from the Sociology department at the university knew exactly what a "cherise" was. Word got back to the Foundation in the time it took one of them to get his cell phone out of his pocket.

"And then we spent a solid week, myself and the advisory board, going around and around about whether to try a rescue. About two-thirds of them were against it, on the grounds... well, you probably know why they'd say that. And I understood them, really I did. But I thought of what Amy would want. The whole Foundation was her idea, and I knew she wouldn't want it endangered, but I also was sure she would never have wanted any of our girls to be abandoned on the island, because she herself was once." She obviously caught Sara's surprised look. "It's a long story. I'll tell you sometime. The fact that we could see Cherise was still free to leave messages, or at least had been two months ago, and that the message told us exactly where she was, was enough to make it worth a try. I decided to bring my own boat out here and just wait, off the beach, to see what happened. We weren't going to put a search party ashore. We got there towards nightfall last night, and I figured we'd wait offshore all through the next day -- today -- to see if you responded."

Sara's jaw dropped as she considered how unlikely it had been that today, the one day Steffi was going to spend out on the bay looking for them, would be the one single day in the last two months Sara had looked out on the bay, after having sworn to herself she wouldn't look again.

Sara's eyes caught Bart's, and her greatest worry returned to mind. "Is the restaurant okay? Did I..." She swallowed convulsively. "Did I screw everything up?" She gave him a look that pleaded for reassurance.

She was intensely relieved when Bart smiled at her. "What, your little experiment with grand theft?" Sara blinked in astonishment, and heard Cherise gasp. Bart went on, "We know about that, yeah. A couple of days before the big party, I got a summons to the mayor's office. There was a delegation there from the west side, mad enough to fry eggs on their foreheads, swearing some girl from the restaurant had been on a crime spree, wearing an island outfit, stealing farm products and at least one slavegirl. One of them described the culprit, and I knew it was you, Sara. When I probed a little to see exactly what they knew, it turned out only one of them had ever eaten at the restaurant, and he said it was the girl who'd cleaned tables there who'd done all this, but it turned out he'd never actually got a look at her when his slave disappeared -- he never hinted his missing slave was also from the restaurant, because that would have required some uncomfortable admissions on his part as to how he'd come into possession of her, but we figured it had to be you, Cherise, because we couldn't imagine a reason for Sara taking anyone else. He said he'd only concluded it was the "cleaning girl" at the restaurant after he heard the other guy describe the thief, and said he wasn't surprised because, I quote, 'You people don't keep your slaves under control.' Of course, I suspected right off he was the one who'd taken Cherise, so he was more disposed to think in terms of the restaurant than he wanted to admit. I told him we didn't have any missing girls. This guy tried to get the mayor to order me to show him all our girls to prove that the clean-up girl was missing, but one of the rules we established to begin with is that nobody's allowed in our building without our permission, not even the mayor himself."

Cherise interrupted with a puzzled frown. "But if it's your word against an islander, how is the mayor going to side with you? Everything they told us about the island says that would never happen. None of them trust any outsider. He could have just ordered you to bring all the girls out."

Bart laughed. "Well, part of the initial planning of the project covered eventualities of that type. Did you ever wonder what we do with all the trade goods we get in return for restaurant meals?"

"Ummm... I assumed you sell them on the mainland to help cover expenses."

He shook his head, grinning. "Well, partly. When we get the fertility herbs, we can't legally sell those, so we turn them over to the Onderman Corporation -- that was a big factor in our getting permission to operate to begin with. Of the rest, we sell about half, and turn half over to the mayor's office."

Sara and Cherise both stared at him for a moment, and then Cherise slowly said, "Ohhhhhhh."

Bart laughed. "So you get it, right? I knew we'd be okay as soon as the mayor saw that nobody who'd seen the thief on the west side had ever actually personally seen Sara at the restaurant. I didn't even have to point that out to the mayor. He jumped on it himself, and told them they had a pretty flimsy case, and they ought to keep better track of their own slaves, because it must have been one of them. But anyway, yeah, the mayor's personally invested in making sure the restaurant stays in operation. It's a source of income for him beyond anything he's ever had before. He ended up tossing them out of his office. And then apologized to me for the trouble."

Sara said, "All those guys were from the west side? You didn't get any other.... ahhh, complaints?"

"Why, what else did you do?"

Sara told him about Hairy and Hairy Junior. Bart laughed and shook his head. "The kind of shape it sounds like you left them in, I don't think they'd want to admit to anyone that a woman did it. Just like the westsiders won't come back and say they saw you carried off on a boat. In their case, they know their credibility is already shot anyway."

Sara laughed. "Well, so what about the party? Did Jill end up doing it?"

Bart nodded. "Yes, and it was a smash. She wanted to do a speech beforehand and tell them how honored she was to have them all eat her, but we weren't completely sure how that would play. But anyway, she was so wiggly when she got her neck on the guillotine that I think she had an orgasm just as the blade was coming down."

Sara and Cherise both laughed, and Sara said, "Yeah, that does sound like her."

Steffi, smiling, broke in, "So Sara, do you think you'd want to be the party girl next year? We haven't had a volunteer yet. Though I admit we haven't started looking for one yet. I was just thinking we should give you the first shot at it."

Sara blinked in surprise, and was about to thank Steffi for the offer but wanted to think it over, but before she could open her mouth, Cherise gasped and said, her words coming out so quickly they ran together, "Sara before you say anything..." She stopped, and Sara saw she was out of breath for some reason.

Sara looked at Cherise in surprise, her arm automatically going around Cherise's waist. As Sara looked at her expectantly, Cherise went on, "I was thinking... I mean hoping... well, wanting..."

Sara had to kiss her just to calm her down. "I'm listening. Just breathe a minute."

Cherise sat with her hand over her heart. Sara could hear it pounding from where she sat. Cherise finally said, her voice shaking, "Could we... I mean... What would you think about getting married?"

Sara stared at her for just a second. But it was a very long second. As it passed, every minute, every hour, every day of all of the years since she'd met Cherise, all of her fantasies, all of her dreams, everything she'd ever wished for and despaired of ever having with the only woman she would ever love, went through her mind in an orderly progression, ending with now, this moment of present time, in which she understood why Cherise had spoken so quickly: If Sara had said yes to Steffi's offer, then Cherise could never have been so rude as to try to change the mind of a woman who had decided when, where, and how she wanted to be eaten -- certainly not a woman she loved. So she'd had to stop Sara before she said anything.

The second ended, and Sara threw her arms around Cherise and squeezed her as tight as she could, the side of her head rubbing against Cherise's, the tears flowing once more, her lips moving for several seconds before she remembered to make sound come out of them. "Yes! Yes! Yes!"

Out of the corner of her eye, Sara saw Steffi nudge Bart with her elbow, heard her say, "I think we need to go help out with something topside. The sails, that must be it."

SIXTEEN MONTHS LATER

Sara shifted the grocery bags into her left arm and maneuvered from her pocket the key to the apartment she shared with her wife, Cherise. Today was Sara's turn to pick up groceries on the way home, while Cherise had stayed on a little longer at the gym.

She just had time to unlock the door and push it open with her foot before having to secure the teetering bags with her right arm to stop them from spilling all over the floor. Breathing a little easier with that disaster averted, Sara set the bags on the kitchen counter.

She smiled, as she always did, at the sight of the wedding photograph in its frame on the wall -- Sara and Cherise in matching off-the-shoulder dresses in complementary colors, yellow for Cherise, violet for Sara, sharing a bouquet in both colors, their heads tipped together, both beaming at the camera. Steffi and her husband Preston had been so nice to hold the marriage party in their own spacious back yard.

Sara felt almost overwhelmed by the things Steffi had done for both of them: paying for the four weeks of physical therapy for Cherise, with Sara allowed to assist the professional therapist; the Foundation scholarship for Sara, while Cherise continued on her earlier scholarship; finding the perfect off-campus apartment for them and paying the rent on it. According to Steffi, it was all a "consulting fee," in return for the two weeks of debriefing by the Foundation's advisory committee, during which Sara and Cherise had described, it seemed, almost every minute of their stay on Purity Island, especially all interactions with and observations of islanders, and answered endless questions from committee members. The committee, Steffi had told them, had found their input "invaluable," including as it did any number of things no mainlander had known before about the island, especially the west side.

The Sociology Department at the university had been equally generous, awarding both Sara and Cherise fifteen credit hours of sociology elective credit for their experiences, and allowing Sara to take the final exams she had skipped at the end of Spring Semester -- she passed all but the statistics, which she then retook as an overload when she and Cherise returned to classes for the next Spring Semester. With the fifteen hours compensating for their missed Fall Semester, they ended up caught up on credit hours for starting their senior year the following fall. They'd taken all their classes together (except statistics, which Cherise had already passed) since returning, but sat on opposite sides of the classroom in each one. Sara found she could concentrate in class as she never had before -- she never got lost in fantasizing sexual encounters with Cherise, able to put such things out of her mind until she and Cherise got home. At home, she and Cherise spent marathon sessions studying together, which had helped both of them manage straight A's since returning. Even at home, Sara was able to push her sexual desires aside while studying with Cherise, because she knew there would be plenty of time for lovemaking after.

And in bed, somehow Sara found that her heart still pounded, her body trembled with excitement, whenever she sensed that Cherise wanted to play. When they did sleep, it was with their arms locked tightly around each other, their legs in a complex conjoined tangle, and lips pressed together on their shared pillow.

Entering the bedroom after putting the groceries away, Sara quickly took off her clothes, putting them back in the closet or the laundry hamper as appropriate. She and Cherise never wore clothes at home unless guests were present, and sometimes not even then, depending on the guest. It was one of the ways they used for reminding themselves of the first time they had made love. They had maintained the brush-cut hairstyles they'd acquired on the island -- the other interns had let theirs grow out immediately on returning, but Sara and Cherise both loved keeping theirs that way, feeling that it connected them to those intense months of loving in the cave on the island. Neither trimmed her pubic hair either, each of them giggling over how much they loved feeling the prickling against their chins when they sixty-nined.

Naked and comfortable now, Sara went back to the living room to retrieve the mail, in its tray below the slot in the front door. Among the usual pile of advertising circulars, she found that there were two identically thick envelopes, each obviously containing multiple pages, with the return address of the Department of Sociology, one addressed to Sara Lynn Marteau-Bollinger, the other to Cherise Marteau-Bollinger. Barely able to breath for the sudden pounding of her heart, Sara ripped open the envelope addressed to her with shaking fingers, unfolded the contents and read the first paragraph of the top sheet:

"The Department of Sociology is pleased to welcome you to the doctoral program in..."

Behind that were a copy of the program requirements, a list of department faculty, and a brochure with information about graduate student housing.

Sara threw her arms in the air with a loud whoop, and drew her cell phone out of her pocket to call Cherise. Obviously Cherise had been accepted as well -- a rejection letter would consist of a single thin sheet. She brought up Cherise's number on the phone's contact list, and stopped herself just before punching Call. Her smile widened. Got a better idea, she told herself.

She dropped Cherise's letter on the kitchen counter, by itself, then sent a text to Ashley. She then sent a text to Cherise: "Box. Pizza. Check kitch counter first."

Cherise would probably figure it out before she got home, Sara knew. Pizza was their celebration food, and Cherise would likely realize that there would be a letter waiting for her on the counter. That was okay. She and Cherise always found it hard to surprise each other anyway.

Retreating to the bedroom, Sara finally took the shower she'd intended to have as soon as she got home, with the scented soap they both liked. Then she opened the toy drawer and pulled out the padded cuffs -- two for wrists and two for ankles, all joined together by a few links of chain. Dropping the key into the cup on the dresser they used for exactly that purpose, she climbed into the pillow box.

The pillow box was exactly that -- a large, almost bed-sized box filled with soft pillows. They often used it instead of their regular bed. It gave the sensation of floating on air when they made love in it.

The cuffs were self-locking. Smiling and already wet between her legs -- Sara knew how much more wet she would be soon -- she clicked the larger cuffs closed on her ankles, with the wrist cuffs hanging down just below them. Bending sharply at the waist, she slipped her hands into the wristcuffs and clicked them closed as well.

She nearly had her first orgasm right then, but held it off, relaxing and blanking her mind. She didn't want to use up any significant sexual energy before Cherise even got home.

She had rendered herself completely helpless, but the text message she had sent to Ashley would see to her safety: "8 p.m. Sara." Ashley would be expecting a text from Cherise before 8:00 to let her know everything was okay and that she was home with Sara. Sara expected Cherise home well before then, but knew that life has no guarantees. If for any reason Cherise didn't message Ashley by 8, Ashley would come to the apartment, let herself in with her own key, release Sara from her restraints and together they would try to figure out what was wrong with Cherise. But assuming all went well, the first word "Box" in Sara's text to Cherise told Cherise that she would be waiting at home in the pillow box, and that Cherise should come home alone. And it hinted at many other things that didn't need to be explained.

As it was Friday, Sara looked forward to spending the entire weekend being cared for by Cherise.

Sara knew that Cherise understood fully, now, why Sara had never tired of taking care of all of her needs while they were on the island. Love never got tired.

Sara wriggled deeper into the pillows and relaxed, letting the time pass in anticipation of the beginning of a lovely weekend. She smiled at the sight of the wreath on the bedroom wall -- the one she had made on the island, that she had run back to retrieve as the rowboat neared the shore, the symbol of sharing a home with Cherise. They took turns putting fresh flowers in it.

Sara was half-dozing, but came instantly alert at the sound of the key in the front door. She heard the door open, and Cherise's musical greeting "It's meee!"

Sounds of backpack set down, zipper going down, soft plops of clothes being discarded. Cherise always dropped her clothes as soon as she came in. Sound of footsteps toward kitchen. The smell of hot pizza. The sound of a ripping envelope, a loud squeal of joy.

Cherise appeared in the bedroom door, carrying a large pizza box, with a huge smile. She enjoyed so much being able to feed the helpless Sara. "I texted Ashley."

Sara, as always, momentarily lost her ability to breathe at the first sight of naked Cherise, because her body was, literally, breathtaking. "You worked on your abs after I left. I can tell."

Cherise's smile turned almost shy. "They're still not like yours."

"They're getting there."

"Eat now, or later?"

Sara grinned. "It'll warm up in the microwave. I want to do something else first."

Cherise tried and failed to look innocently mystified. The smile broke out again, wider. "What would that be?"

"Guess."

Cherise put down the pizza box, climbed into the pillow box, and wormed her way into the circles of Sara's legs and arms. Putting her arms around Sara, she kissed her.

Sara, as always, thought in amazement, I'm kissing Cherise I'm kissing Cherise I'm kissing Cherise!

It never got old.