Iolaus
hadn't seen the heroes sudden departure, he was busy looking
for something to eat. He went to the kitchen and smiled at what he
saw. "So I guess it's just us,"he said toGabrielle.
She was cooking something that smelled delicious. She turned
around, somewhat startled.

"Oh, did
Hercules leave?"

"Yep. Said
he didn't need me on this one, so I'm kind of on vacation.
What about you?"

“Yeah,
Xena left too."

"She do
that often?"Iolaus asked as he came into the room.

“storytext”>"What?" the bard asked, honestly
puzzled.

"Leave you
behind?" Iolaus was truly surprised at her calm manner. He
really didn't like being left out of anything, but Gabrielle
seemed totally at peace with it.

"Oh.
Sometimes," she shrugged and turned back to the food she was
preparing. "I've learned not to ask too many questions.
She always comes back." She smiled and motioned for Iolaus to
sit. "You want lunch?"

"Are you
kidding?" he laughed and sat down.

“storytext”> 

Later that
afternoon Iolaus went outside to find Gabrielle.She was in the
garden, humming to herself as she picked some flowers.

Oh sweet
mother of Zeus, he thought. Does she have to look
that amazing? It was getting very late in the
day and the sunset was catching the red in her hair, making her
glow in the early evening light. The errand he'd meant to run
was completely forgotten now, he could just stand there and watch
her forever.

But moments
like this have to end sometime. Abird made a loud noise overhead
and she looked up to see it. She stood up when she noticed Iolaus.
"Hey!" she grinned, shielding her eyes from the sun.
"What's going on?"

"Huh? Oh,
nothing," he stammered, hoping she wouldn't notice
he'd been staring at her. "It's just, really beautiful
out here, isn't it?" Gods, that's so
corny!

“storytext”>"Yeah," she smiled and looked back over the
yard. "It really is. Hercules is very lucky." She turned
towards Iolaus and her smile fell a little. "Are you going
somewhere?” She noticed his bag strung over one arm and
didn’t like the idea of staying by herself at someone
else's house, even if it was Hercules's.

“storytext”>“Huh?" the question caught him off guard. It
took him a good minute to remember what he came outside for.
"Oh, yeah. I was thinking of going over to my old farm –
it’s just over the hills there – gonna go see if the house is
still standing.”

“I
didn’t know you have a farm,” she said, suddenly
interested. She put down her flowers and came over to where he was
standing.

“Well, I
did, once upon a time. But it’s been so long since I’ve
been back there, I don’t know what kind of shape it’s
in. Uh… Would you care to see it?”

“storytext”>“I’d love to,” she answered honestly.
She ran into the house and grabbed her things. Iolaus stood by the
gate and waited. What had he just gotten himself into, he wondered.
Well, I couldn’t very well just leave her here by
herself. Herc and Xena shouldn’t have just gone off and
left her here. He was fine, he knew the area – he used to live
here, just over the ridge from Hercules and Deianeira. But
Gabrielle – they should have been more considerate about
that.

“All
set,” she said, returning with her staff and a small bag. He
grinned and they headed off.

Iolaus was glad
of Gabrielle’s company, he had to admit. They never seemed to
have enough time together as either Xena or Hercules was always
pulling one of them away. And on top of it, she looked so dang
beautiful. He'd been around long enough to know that spending
some one-on-one time with a gorgeous girl was not always a good
idea. Iolaus, don't fall in love again, he told
himself.It's exhausting! Everytime he falls for a
pretty girl something always goes wrong, and normally Hercules had
to bail him out of it. It never works, don't even go
there.

For her part,
Gabrielle was very happy with the prospect of spending some time
alone with Iolaus. She was cheerfully making conversation as they
started down the road. Although the sun was starting to set, they
knew they could make it ptretty far before nightfall. "So why
did you leave the farm?" she asked.

"Well you
know, once Hercules started traveling again I sold off the
livestock and boarded up the house. I keep meaning to go back
there… Just figured now's as good a time as
any."

"But you
didn't sell it or anything? You just left it unattended?"
Gabrielle was genuinely surprised. It seemed like such a careless
thing to do, especially for someone as contientious as
Iolaus.

"I
couldn't sell it. I have too many memories there. And it's
kind of my retirement plan, you know?" he grinned. "So
I'll have somewhere to go when Herc stops roaming the
country."

"If that
ever happens," Gabrielle smiled. Iolaus laughed. She
understands perfectly.