<em>~ Nicci feeling a little adrift ~</em><br/><br/><br/>Mila spoke so easily of her art, and Nicci was pleased she had said nothing, to be honest it was something very few people nowadays knew about anyway, and most of them were people she had grown up with.  She wasn't a real artist anyway, not like Mila. Nicci drew because it freed her, just like her writing, her sketchbook diary the release that helped her make sense of things and more importantly let them go.  No it was better it stayed that way. Although when Bo said he loved art too she felt sad, and when he stopped gently caressing her shoulders she shifted a little, feeling unsettled.  In this dress she couldn't do what she would normally do, and she had to draw on her abilities to sit still and ignore the need to move that she so often had to draw on.  That was something she could do well at least, she thought, sit still for Mila to draw her, and she looked forward to talking to her about her experiences as an artist's model, and some of the artists she had  worked for.  She was sure Mila would enjoy that with her, she wasn't one of those nose in the air kind of artists who thought only they created 'True art' thank God.<br/><br/>Nicci wished again she was closer to the two girls, the rapport they were building was so pronounced. She looked at the fire, feeling that to share her love of yoga and Tai Chi would be trying to steal Mila's thunder, and but inbetween the two of them, and she didn't want to do that at all.  She moved to put a couple of bits of wood on the fire, kneeling in front of it poking it first with the fire-iron hanging beside her.  She listened to Marcus talking about tattoos and sighed gently, she had always wanted a tattoo, she loved them and had often even drawn designs she would like.  But she couldn't have one in her job, and as she needed to earn her living it wouldn't be until she retired that could get one.  Smiling, she imagined her older self walking into a tattoo parlour and the looks she would get, and wondered if she would still feel she wanted one then.<br/><br/>She turned and sat facing the girls, her weight on one arm her legs tucked in to one side, the heat of the fire on her back, and looked up at Marcus as he admitted he was quite a high powered businessman from the sound of it and that didn't surprise her.  In fact it was what she had been guessing in way so it was nice she was on the right track. She loved it that for a moment he connected with her, it made her feel he might be drawn to her a little more in time. She, herself, was astonished at how much she cared what the three men thought about her and felt about her.  She was drawn to all three of them, and whether it was because she had come with an open heart she wasn't sure, or that her longing for a polyfamily was driving her, but it was more than just a physical attraction.  In some ways she was scared of giving in to that, it would be so easy to do so, with any of them, but she want so much for this to be so much more...........