by James, Sandy
He sipped his coffee, obviously contemplating my words. “I don’t like it,” he finally grumbled.
“I don’t, either.”
“How’s the ankle?”
“Nice way to change the subject. The ankle’s sore. Do you think you could take me home? Nate will be there, so I won’t be on my own. I think you need some alone time with Kathy and Carly.”
“Jackie, you can’t even walk.”
“Nate can help me. Please, Mark. Please. You need to spend time with your daughters, and I really need to sit Nate down and try to talk some sense into him.” I handed him my now empty coffee cup. “I’m exhausted, I hurt like hell, and I want to catch a long nap.”
He nodded. “I’ll get your crutches.”
***
Patrick’s car was parked next to Nate’s in my driveway.
“Shit,” I mumbled under my breath.
Mark was still a sore point with my oldest, and I really didn’t think any of us needed another confrontation today.
“What’s wrong?” Mark asked as he turned off the Honda.
“Both my boys are here.”
“That’s good. They can help you if you need anything.” He crawled out of the car and came around to my side. “Can you stand up?”
I nodded and awkwardly got to my feet. Instead of reaching in the back seat to get my crutches, he immediately scooped me into his. He kicked on the door leading into the house until it suddenly opened to reveal Patrick. I watched my son’s eyes flash with barely contained fury.
“What in the hell happened?”
This day just kept on giving. “I sprained my ankle. Think you can move so Mark can put me down?”
Patrick moved aside.
Mark carried me into the living room and deposited me on the couch. He grabbed a pillow, put it on the coffee table, and propped my foot up. “Want some ice?”
“No, but I need it anyway.” I glanced up to find my oldest staring holes through me.
Patrick jerked his thumb at Mark. “What did he do to you?”
“I sprained my ankle, Patrick. Mark didn’t do anything to me.” I had a flash to how Kat must have felt when she was getting the inquisition from Mark. Why was I defending my life to my child? “I was hiking and I tripped over a tree root.”
Patrick shot a glare at Mark when he returned with a bag of ice that he set on my ankle. “You had no business going away with this...this...guy.”
“I don’t see how that’s any of your business, son,” Mark said in a stern voice that told me he’d reached his limit.
Patrick’s scowl could melt metal. “She’s my mother and—.”
“I’m old enough to know my own mind,” I interrupted. “We’ll talk about it later, Patrick. Mark?”
“Hmm?”
“Thanks for everything. Why don’t you go home and get some rest? It was an awfully long night.” My face instantly flushed, realizing how dirty what I’d just said probably sounded to my son. “We didn’t get much sleep.” Oh, yeah, that made things better. “My ankle throbbed all night. Mark was getting me ice and—”
“I’ll bet,” Patrick snidely replied. “I’ll bet that’s all he did. Get you ice.”
Watching Mark set his stubborn jaw, I figured the best thing to do was diffuse the time bomb by getting him to leave. But I really didn’t want him to go. I wanted his arms around me. I wanted him to get me my ibuprofen and ice when I needed it. I wanted him to make me forget the pain with a kiss or two.
I had been a horrible coward for most of my adult life—always taking the path of least resistance instead of pushing for what I wanted, what I needed. Whenever David and I made plans, we always ended up doing exactly what he wanted to do. I guess after years of never getting what I wanted and never winning a single battle, I’d lapsed into a state of learned helplessness. I simply gave in.
Well, I wasn’t going to give in now. If I wanted Mark around, then, damn it, Mark was going to be around.
“Patrick, sit down. We need to talk.”
“You want me to go?” Mark took my hand, his anger seemingly abated.
“No. I want you to stay. That’s the point.” I glanced over at my oldest. “Patrick?”
My son stared back at me, folding his arms over his chest.
“Mark and I are going to be together. You’re just going to have to get used to it.”
There. Better to lay it all on the line.
“But, Mom...”
“No. No, but, Mom.”
“You don’t even know this guy.”
Nate sheepishly entered the room. “And he hurt you. And he’s Kat’s dad. It’s just too...weird. I mean, a woman your age... It’s gross.” He stared at his shoes.
I rolled my eyes. “Thanks a heap, Nate.”
Mark’s grip on my hand tightened—he was fighting to hold his temper in check.
Perhaps this hadn’t been a good idea after all.
That’s what I get for trying to be brave.
“Yes, I’m Kat’s father,” Mark finally said, breaking the stilted silence. “I wasn’t happy with what we stumbled across this morning at my house, but we can talk about that later. Your mother isn’t over the hill. Not by a long shot. Right now I need you guys to understand that I love her and I—”
Both Nate and Patrick started shouting, drowning each other out so I couldn’t understand either one of them.
I put two fingers to my lips and blew a loud whistle.
They stopped yelling and gaped at me.
Mark arched an eyebrow and glanced my way.
“Enough. Mark is here. He’s going to be a part of my life now, so you better get used to the idea.” Patrick started to say something, but I cut him off. “I know you don’t like it, Pat. But I’m a grown-up. And I love Mark.”
“Really?” Nate asked, barely above a whisper. “You love him?”
I nodded.
My tenderhearted son suddenly understood. I could see it all over his face. He took a couple of steps and held out his hand to Mark.
Mark shook Nate’s hand. “You better be good to her,” Nate said with more sternness in his voice than I could ever remember hearing before. “You better not hurt her again.”
“I won’t. I made that mistake once. I won’t do it again.”
Patrick snorted. “That’s why she’s on crutches.”
He wasn’t going to be nearly as easy to win over. Mark was smart enough not to poke that sleeping dog by trying to shake Pat’s hand.
“I’m exhausted,” I said with a yawn. “Is the high drama over for the day? Because I really need a nap.”
“Here or your room?” Mark asked.
Patrick snorted again, still standing there with his arms crossed over his chest.
“Catching a cold there, son?” Mark asked.
“I’m not your damn son.”
“Patrick David Ryan. I didn’t raise you to be rude.”
He turned on his heel, stomped to the door, and slammed it as he left. A few minutes later, I heard tires squealing as Pat drove away.
I didn’t complain when Mark carried me to my room. He propped my ankle up on some pillows, lay down beside me, and covered us both with my afghan. Then he curled up against me, threw his arm across my belly, and was contentedly snoring in a few minutes.
Dear God, what a mess.
My oldest son hated my boyfriend.
My boyfriend was pissed because his oldest daughter was sleeping with my youngest son.
And the only person who seemed entirely satisfied with the totally baffling situation was my boyfriend’s youngest daughter.
Calling Jerry Springer!
As I felt sleep start to work its magic and scatter my thoughts, I smiled.
I loved Mark. And Mark loved me.
Life had definitely taken a turn for the better.
CHAPTER TWELVE
“You’re having everyone at your place?” Abby asked, sounding incredulous.
“I thought you hated to cook,”
Suzanne chimed in.
“I do, but this is a chance to try to smooth out some of the rough edges,” I replied. My friends’ reticence was starting to shake my confidence. “The kids need to get to know each other a little better, and maybe if we try to act like a family...” I shrugged, wondering if even I believed that having the four kids together with Mark and me for a nice traditional family Thanksgiving might make things any better.
What exactly was I wishing for? Was it to meld our two separate groups into one? It wasn’t as if Mark and I had ever talked about moving in together or about having a future together. We were taking it one day at a time—yet in the recesses of my mind, I speculated about the next step and the next.
It wasn’t going to be a smooth road.
Patrick still resented any attention Mark gave me. He’d had a month to get used to it, but he was his father’s son in so many ways. Stubborn, arrogant, and always thinking he knew what was best for everyone else. He wasn’t out and out rude to Mark. Well, he wasn’t rude all the time. But he wasn’t friendly, either. At least they only saw each other on weekends.
Nate had accepted Mark without a struggle, which was a bit surprising since Mark was still obviously unhappy with Nate and Kathy’s relationship. The kids both tended to stay in Bloomington, preferring to call us rather than visit. I missed seeing Nate as much as Mark missed seeing Kathy.
The one weekend they came home, Kathy had a hard time concealing her resentment of me, barely speaking a few words in response to any of my attempts at pleasant conversation. Did she think I was trying to replace her mother in Mark’s life? Or did she just not like me? Maybe she simply thought it was too bizarre to have your father dating your boyfriend’s mother. Either way, Kat was going to be another obstacle I’d have to clear.
Carly embraced our relationship wholeheartedly. She had no trouble calling me “Ms. Delgado” at school and “Jackie” at home. She implied she’d like Mark and me to move in together, constantly dropping hints about how expensive it must be to have two houses when we only needed one. And she pointed out diamond ads in magazines as if Mark wasn’t smart enough to figure out that we belonged together without her helpful advice.
God love her.
“That’s the way we all became the Brady Bunch,” Abby sang, clapping her hands.
Julie rolled her eyes. “I think you should take them all to a restaurant like you’ve done with your boys the last couple of years. You hate to cook.” She frowned. “This could be a nightmare, Jackie.”
“Thanks for that heaping dose of confidence.” I pushed what was left of my salad around on my plate. “Look, I’ve already got all the groceries. I’ll make the pies and noodles tonight. Everything else, I can just get up early and work on before everyone gets there.”
“When did you take the turkey out of the freezer?” Suzanne asked before she sipped her Diet Coke.
“I’ll take it out tonight.”
She put her soda can down and stared at me with wide eyes. “You mean you haven’t defrosted it yet? How big a turkey did you get?”
“I think it was fifteen pounds or so. I don’t remember.” I was suddenly alarmed at her reaction. “Why?”
“Because they usually need several days to thaw.”
“No, they don’t they...” Great. Just great. “Days? They need days?”
Suzanne, Julie, and Abby all nodded.
Shit.
Julie patted my hand. “Best you can do is pull it out of the freezer when you get home and defrost it in some warm water. Read the label, Jackie, or Google the directions. It’s not that tough. Is Nate coming with Kathy? That must be weird.” She gathered up her lunch debris and piled it on her brown tray.
“It bothers Mark more than it bothers me. I think they’re good together. I’m more worried about Pat. He boils over every time he spends any time with Mark.”
I wasn’t sure Pat would ever come around where Mark was concerned, just like I wasn’t sure if Mark would ever come around where Nate was concerned.
I had a bad flashback to the type of family Thanksgiving the Delgado family would endure each November in my childhood years, with aunts and uncles bitching and moaning, and Grandma Delgado thoroughly drowning in all the preparations that most of my relatives took for granted. Once the beer and wine began to flow, there was at least one fistfight over the outcome of some stupid football game.
What in the hell had I been thinking trying to get both of our families together and hoping we’d work past our differences?
My heart was so full of Mark, I wanted my boys to love him too. But I wasn’t being fair to them. They already had a father, and Mark didn’t need to be thrust at them like some surrogate. Yet I wanted their acceptance—needed their acceptance—of Mark in my life.
It wasn’t fair to his girls, either. I knew Carly loved me—just like I loved her. To her, I wasn’t Elaine’s replacement; I was Mark’s girlfriend. But I wanted Kathy to at least like me. As it stood, we were no better than casual acquaintances.
Why did this always seem so easy on television and in the movies? Why couldn’t it be as easy as it was for the fucking Brady Bunch?
Abby brought me back from my thoughts. “I can come help tonight, if you’d like.”
“Thanks, Abs, but I think I’ve got it all under control.”
***
The droning smoke alarm wouldn’t shut up and neither would Jellybean.
I grabbed his cage and dragged it out of the living room so the poor bird could get some fresh air. Nate stood on a kitchen chair, trying to pull the blaring alarm from the ceiling. As I came back into the kitchen, the noise pounded in my head and the smoke filled my lungs. No real fire, but the turkey was toast.
I’d been so busy running back and forth to the stupid grocery store to get the ingredients I’d forgotten that I overlooked the damned turkey still in the oven. It had been there since five in the morning because I had neglected to take it out of the freezer the night before and it needed several more hours to cook than what I’d planned. It probably wasn’t much help that I’d jacked the oven temperature so high.
“Shit!” I cupped my hands over my ears. “Can’t you get that thing turned off?”
Nate finally gave it a hard tug, and the alarm came off in his hand. After he jerked the battery out, blessed silence filled the smoky room. He shrugged. “At least we know it works.”
The door from the garage opened and in strolled my oldest. “Jesus Christ on a pogo stick. What happened in here?”
“Mom burned the turkey.”
Patrick laughed at me, and I was tempted to throw something at him. “Mom shouldn’t be cooking. I think there’s some law against it.”
“Bite me, Pat.”
I pulled the pan full of charcoal that used to be poultry out of the oven and dropped it in the sink. I sprayed some water over it to make sure it wouldn’t spontaneously ignite. Tears welled up in my eyes. My first Thanksgiving with Mark and his girls, and I’d ruined it.
Pat came and put his arm around my shoulders. “We can get by without turkey.”
“But it’s Thanksgiving,” I said with a dismal sniffle. “You have to have turkey on Thanksgiving.”
He nodded at the bowls full of food piled up on the table and countertop. “We’ve got plenty. Look—there’s noodles, dressing, green beans, yams.” He walked over to the refrigerator and opened the door. “Salad. Jell-O. A gazillion pies.” Pat grabbed a beer and raised it so I could see. “And plenty to mellow the mood.”
“Put that back,” I scolded. “It’s too early for beer, and I hate knowing you’re old enough to drink. Makes me feel ancient.” I brushed back the few remaining disappointed tears with the back of my food-coated hands, wondering how awful I looked. “You really think it’ll be all right without the stupid turkey?”
Pat nodded as the door opened again.
“What happened here?” Mark walked into my hazy kitchen, fanning his face to dispense the lingering smoke. Then he looked to
the sink and the charred carcass before he burst out laughing.
I wanted to smack him. “I burned the stupid turkey,” I confessed, sounding entirely pathetic. “I’m sorry.”
He came over and kissed my forehead. “It’s fine, babe. I hate turkey anyway. Makes me sleepy.”
Patrick smirked. “I’ll bet it makes you fart, too. I heard it affects old guys like that.”
Kathy had followed Mark inside. Nate immediately moved to her side and brushed a quick kiss on her lips, drawing a stern frown from Mark.
Carly breezed in, took a good, long look around, and started organizing things like a drill sergeant. “Well, it looks like we’re ready to eat. Kat, you and Nate get these bowls moved to the table. Dad, you take that...thing in the sink out to the trash.”
He saluted and got about his job.
“Pat?” she asked.
Patrick snapped his heels together. “Yes, commandant?”
Carly giggled. “Would you please get some plates and silverware?”
He smiled at her. “Yes, ma’am.”
Of all of the unusual family dynamics this odd situation had produced, the relationship between Carly and Patrick was the most fascinating. They acted like an authentic brother and sister would, as if they’d grown up together. They teased, they antagonized, and they genuinely liked each other. They made me very, very happy with their immediate acceptance of each other.
If only the rest of us could manage to emulate them.
By the time Carly was done barking out orders, we were seated around the dining room table, eating a vegetarian Thanksgiving feast. At least there would be plenty of dessert. I hadn’t screwed those up. I’d made six kinds of pie, afraid I wouldn’t hit everyone’s favorite. And I’d used the extra dough to make cinnamon treats. I wanted this Thanksgiving to be perfect. Our first, family holiday was supposed to be perfect.