OCTOBER 30, 1861

With arms folded behind his head, Joshua Smith alias Hannibal Heyes laid on the bed thinking about Jess. Thaddeus Jones alias Jedidiah Curry was over at the washbasin shaving. It had been a long time since he had shaved because being held prisoner at the silver mines, the guards were not kind enough to give him a razor.

"Heyes, what you thinking about?"

"About Jess,"

Thaddeus stopped shaving and turned around to look at his partner, "Heyes, I don't know how you do it?"

"Do what, Kid?"

"Keep believing we're going to find her that's what. I also can't believe that you're holding on to your childhood love like you are. Oh, don't get me wrong. I think it's good of you to still be in love with my sister, but what if you find her, and she's not in love with you any more?"

Heyes frowned. "I know she still loves me Kid. I can feel it, and she's just waiting for us to find her." He went back to thinking about his first love.

"I know it's hard to get over one's first love, Heyes, but still-" he let the sentence hang, and his partner didn't respond, so Thaddeus went back to shaving.

Heyes wondered if his sidekick could be right. What if she had fallen in love with someone else? No, he wouldn't think like that. He remembered the first time he had kissed her.

*****

School had just let out and the kids were heading home.

"Jessica is acting like she's queen of the world today. Just because it's her birthday." The fourteen-year-old Jeannie exclaimed.

"Well, I guess she has the right to. It being her birthday." Jedidiah always took Jessie's side.

"Tonight is the first summer dance of the year." Jake stated and then proudly declared, "I have a date." Jake was seventeen, and because of his practical joking and the first to always jump into a fight swinging his fists, he seldom had any luck with the girls.

"You have a date?" Johnny, eighteen, the eldest of the group, couldn't believe his ears. "Who in their right mind would want to go with you?"

"Well, Bessie has accepted my invitation." Jake grinned at his older brother.

Jeannie and Jessie giggled because they knew that they were the ones who had convinced Bessie to go to the dance with their brother.

"What's up with you two?" Jake inquired.

Both girls replied in unison, "Nothin'," and continued on their merry way home.

"Ma is going to have my dress done tonight, and she said that I could go to the dance as long as Jed looks out for me, which he said he would, right Jed."

"Right Jess," the sixteen-year-old brother replied.

“I wish I could go, too.” Julianne stated. She was the youngest of the bunch, only 11 years old.

Johnny patted his youngest sibling on the head. “In two more years when you’re thirteen you can go to a dance.”

“Aw shucks,” the young girl said, but she knew arguing wouldn’t help because she had already tried that last night with their ma.

"But what fun will it be, Jess, you don't have a fella to dance with." Jake loved teasing his sisters.

"Jed will dance with me. Won't you Jed?"

"Aw Jess, you know I don't like dancin' much," but as he saw a frown cross her cute little face, he continued, "but for you I will."

"Thanks brother." Jess veered off their normal path to cut through the woods.

"Jess where you going?" Johnny asked as he stopped, and all his other brothers and sisters and Joshua stopped, too.

"I'm going this way home."

"Why? It takes longer to get home that way." Johnny was perturbed that his little sister wanted to take the long way home today. He wanted to get home, do his chores and get ready for the dance because he also had a date for the evening.

"I just want to be alone for a few minutes on my birthday." She said as she hurried on down the trail. She didn't want any of them to follow her.

The others stayed on the normal path and kept on their journey home, all except for Hannibal Joshua Heyes. The sixteen-year-old light brown haired lad lagged behind and then went back to the path that Jess had taken. He followed her through the woods to the creek, and he watched her stand in front of a little pool of water separated from the main creek. He snuck up behind her and saw her hand go out over the water and drop something into the little pond.

***************

Nevada Territory

Ponderosa Ranch

****************

Jess was describing her family to Little Joe, and he finally butted in and asked, "How do you know this Joshua fella will still be in love with you. It's been a couple of years now. He might have found someone else."

"No, he wouldn't. We're soul mates. He's looking for me. I know it. He will find me, and we'll be together once again."

"I hope you're right kiddo. I hope you're right. You sure have your heart set on this fella. I can't wait to meet him." Little Joe didn't like to see Jess in a sad mood, so he didn't say anything more about Joshua not being in love with her.

As Ben came inside, Little Joe stood up and said, "Jess we’ll have to talk some more later. Right now I have some chores to do." He rubbed Jess on the head as he passed her going around the sofa. "Hi pa."

"Joseph," Ben smiled at his youngest son as he passed him.

After Little Joe was gone, Jess excused herself and went up to her room. She settled down on her bed and began to think about Joshua.

His name was Hannibal Joshua Heyes, but ever since Jess had known him she had called him Joshua instead of Hannibal because she liked names that started with a ‘J’, and Hannibal hadn't minded. And since she called him Joshua, all her brothers and sisters called him that as well, except Jedidiah who called him Heyes, just to be different from the others and because Jess didn't like him calling Joshua, Hannibal.

It was the day before her birthday, and Jess was feeling wonderful. Her mom was making her a new pretty dress to wear to the dance. The first summer dance was tomorrow night. Jed had volunteered to take her, so that also meant that Joshua would be going. She hoped with all her heart that he would ask her to dance. She knew there were lots of pretty girls around and that he might like one of them. One of them that were older than her because she would be only turning thirteen tomorrow and Joshua was three years older than her. For the last couple of months, she had started liking Joshua more and more. She had told her ma about her feelings, and her ma had told her that it was probably just puppy love, and not to be too upset with Joshua if he didn't share the same feelings for her.

She tried to think of other things, but of course her mind would always wander back to Joshua. She liked his cute smile, his charming personality and the way that he treated her. When she was younger, he used to tease her as though she was his little sister, but lately he hadn't been teasing her much. And she noticed while sitting across the room from him in school that when she looked at him that she would catch him looking at her with a big smile on his face. She was beginning to think that he had more feelings towards her other than sisterly, and she liked that. She had more feelings for him other than brotherly. It was amazing how one's feelings for another could change so easily and quickly. She had begun thinking about him as more than just a friend.

That evening her pa and her went into town, and he had gave her ten cents to buy some candy. She used it all but one penny. She was saving that one-penny for something special to do with tomorrow on her way home from school. When she got home she gave all her brothers and sisters some candy, and she gave Joshua two licorice sticks. Her brothers and sisters had wondered why he was so special and had got two, whereas they had only received one. She told them because he had helped her do her chores earlier today. It was a good reason even though it wasn't exactly the truth, but she couldn't tell them because she liked him in that certain kind of way because she didn't want Joshua to know in case he didn't feel the same way, and also because if they knew then her siblings would tease her.

That night she put the penny under her pillow for safekeeping. She didn't want to loose it. The next morning she almost forgot to take the penny with her to school, so a quarter of the way to school, she had to turn around and run back home and get it. She never did tell her brothers and sisters what she had forgot. Although she could see that Joshua was curious and dying to know what she had left at home that she had to go all the way back for, but he didn't pester her about it.

On their way home, she left the normal path to travel through the woods and stop at the little pond. The little wishing pond is what her pa had called it. She had only made one wish in it before, and it had come true. She had wished that her pa would find work and then the very next day, he had left home to take a job in the silver mines of Horse Creek. She was glad and sad, too, that her wish had come true for she had wanted her pa to find a job, but she hadn't wanted him to have to work so far away from home. Well, that wish had come true, so she decided that if she made another wish that it would just have to come true, too.

She held out her hand with the penny in it. Closed her eyes tight and then tossed the penny into the water. She made her wish. Suddenly she felt something around her waist, and her eyes shot open. She looked down and saw hands. Then she felt a body near her.

**************

Dreamville, Nevada

Dreamers Hotel

****************

Turning her head around, Jess saw him. He smiled at her, and then let go and stepped aside. “Sorry, I thought you were going to fall in.” She smiled back at him and then took a step back from the pond. “And I didn’t think it was time for your bath yet.” She smirked and shook her head.

“I was fine. I wasn’t going to fall in.”

“What were you doing? If you don’t mind me asking?” He stepped up and looked into the little pool of water. “What did you toss in there?”

“A penny.”

“A Penny?!”

“Yes,” he was looking at her, and she knew that she might as well tell him why, otherwise, he’d keep pestering. “I made a wish.”

“A wish? What kind of wish?”

She didn’t want to tell him what her fancy was because wishes don’t come true if you tell what they are, “Just a birthday wish.”

“Aren’t you suppose to do that with candles on a cake?” Joshua inquired.

“Yeah, and in wishing ponds, too.”

“How do you know this is a wishing pond?”

“Because my pa told me so.” Seeing his unbelievable expression, she continued, “And I made a wish for pa to find a job and he did right afterwards.”

"Hmmm . . . I have a penny maybe I should make a wish." Joshua took a penny out of his pocket and showed it to her.

"Now why would you be needin' to make a wish? What could you probably want that you don't already have?"

"Well, maybe I'd like to have a date for the dance tonight. Did ya ever think of that?" He moved closer to the pond thinking about throwing his penny in and making a wish.

"Well then, why didn't you ask someone to the dance?"

"Cause I was afraid she would say no." He turned and looked at Jess.

"Well, if it was Mabel you were going to ask. I think she would have said yes."

"It wasn't Mabel."

"Then who did you want to ask?” She couldn’t think of another girl that Joshua spent much time with but Mabel. She knew Mabel liked Joshua, and she knew if Joshua had asked her to the dance that she would have accepted in a heartbeat. “If you were to afraid to ask a girl, you could have asked me-" Joshua was taken by surprise of Jess’ bluntness and was about to say something when she continued, "I would have found out if the girl likes you, and if she would have went to the dance with you if you asked her. So why didn't you come to me for help?"

"I . . . I," he was at a loss for words.

"Don't tell me you were afraid that I'd tell everybody that you have a crush on whomever it is? You know I wouldn't do that." She saw him shaking her head. "Well, is it someone close to me? It's not my sister that you want to ask to the dance is it?" Still he shook his head no.

"No, it's not your sister." He said with a frown on his face.

"Well, are you going to keep me guessing, or are you going to tell me?" She wanted to know who Joshua liked because if he did like someone other than her than she didn't want to keep feeling these strange emotions that she was having about him.

Joshua just shook his head. He didn't want to come right out and say that he wanted to take her to the dance. "We should be getting home." He turned and started walking.

"Wait, why don't you want to tell me?" Jess ran up and grabbed him by the arm. "Do you think if you tell me that I'll get mad? Is it someone I dislike?"

"Just forget I mentioned it."

"No, I can't. I want to help you. If there's a girl that you like, maybe I can find out if she likes you, too." Even though getting Joshua together with another girl would hurt her, she would do it because she wanted him to be happy.

"I'll make you a deal. If you tell me what your wish was then I'll tell you who I want to take to the dance." He paused, thinking that there was no way that she would tell him what her wish was, and then asked, "Is it a deal?"

Jess didn't know what to say. She just starred at him for a minute, and then she said, "That's not fair, Hannibal." She always called him that when she didn't like something he was doing or saying or when she was mad at him for something. He winched when she called him that. He didn't like her being mad at him. "If I tell you my wish, it probably won't come true." Come to think of it though if Joshua didn't know how she felt about him then her wish probably wouldn't come true anyway, and if he wanted to take someone to the dance then he probably didn't have the same feelings towards her as she had for him, so the wish probably didn't matter anyways.

Thinking that Jess wasn't going to tell. He turned away from her. "We better get home."

"Wait, I'll tell you what my wish was." Joshua stopped in his tracks. He couldn't believe he had heard her right. She was going to divulge her wish to him.

"My wish is the same as what you were going to wish for."

"Huh . . . you mean you want someone other than Jed to take you to the dance?" Jess nodded. "Who?" He waited but when she didn't answer, he said, "Whom did you wish to take you to the dance?"

"Well, I . . . well I," she might as well tell him, "I wanted-" she chickened out at the last minute. "I wanted a fella to take me."

"Jess, that's obvious. What fella?"

"Well, he's the one who sits a couple of rows over and has light brown hair, brown eyes and a cute charming smile." She paused, “A boy in school.”

"Hmmm . . . well, are you talking about George Roberts?" He watched her shake her head, "how about Robert Thompson?" Again she shook her head. There weren’t too many more boys in the class, especially those with light brown hair. There were two others but they were kind of young, but he decided to mention them anyway. "James Graver or Willie Poole?"

"No way, they're way too young for me."

Then that only left him. He was the only one left with light brown hair in their classroom. Jess cast her eyes towards the ground. She couldn’t look him in the face. She knew he had run out of light brown haired boys in their classroom. “Jess you don’t mean that you want me to ask you to the dance, do you?” Still keeping her head tilted towards the ground and her eyes focused on the weeds, she nodded.

Joshua smiled. He walked over to her and putting his hand on her chin, he pushed her head upward so that her eyes would be looking at him. He then leaned down and gently pressed his lips to hers. His grin grew wider and his eyes sparkled afterwards as he realized if he hadn’t had grabbed and held her tight to him that she would have probably fallen to the ground because as he loosened his grip, she seemed to be drifted downwards, so he swung his right arm around her, gripping her back and holding her close again. She melted into him, leaning the side of her face into his chest, and he held her for several minutes, stroking her back and telling her that he loved her and would take her to the dance. For the two of them that was the happiest moment of their lives, and both of them didn’t want to let go.

*****

“Heyes, Heyes,” Thaddeus said as he shook the bed. When he knew that he had his buddy’s full attention, he continued. “It’s time for supper. I’m hungry. Come on.”

Heyes swung himself off the bed and followed Thaddeus out of their hotel room and downstairs to the dining area where Marta took their order.

During supper Heyes didn’t talk much. He was contemplating on a plan of action in order to find his childhood sweetheart.