Five Kids, One Christmas (The Brannigan Sisters)

by Ramin, Terese

  By contrast, Nat’s parents, Katherine and David Crockett, were reserved and quiet, drawing their son aside to pass on a message that had been left on their answering machine by mistake, about calling his oculist. Then they greeted the grandchildren happily, but withheld comment on the day’s festivities even when Helen’s sisters descended on them, ostensibly to commiserate with them over their acquisition of the Colonel as a daughter–in–law. His brother, Jed, less reticent, took one look at Helen and pumped Nat’s hand in effusive congratulations. It was he who finally divulged the secret of her appearance to Nat: harried, tousled, glowing, scoop–necked, slim–fitting, lots of little tiny buttons and a knockout.

  Halfway down the aisle created by a frightening number of people he didn’t know—relatives, uniformed and civilian friends, opposing attorneys, the children’s services caseworker and the two cops who’d come with her when she’d interviewed the children on Veteran’s Day, and a few people Helen was later sure had simply wandered in off the street—an overly anxious Max threw up onto the pillow holding the rings, and a buzz went round the room that Helen had stuffed the turkey raw, undercooked it and given Max salmonella poisoning when she let him eat some of it before the ceremony.

  Four grandmothers, half–a–dozen aunts and a couple of uncles were there in a trice to take care of him, but it was "Kern’l" and "Nat" from whom he sought comfort, whom he finally allowed to lead him away to get cleaned up after receiving assurances that the wedding couldn’t possibly, and wouldn’t, proceed without him.

  And it was an indignant Libby—naturally—who, on learning from Zach what her mother was being accused of this time, enthralled, appalled and thoroughly entertained the shocked, gasping, snickering and mirthfully tearful spectators by climbing up on a chair, tuxedo and all, and leaping to Helen’s defense with an incensed tongue lashing, informing her listeners her mother couldn’t possibly give anybody Sam–and–Ella poisoning by stuffing a raw turkey because she didn’t have any idea how to make real stuffing and besides had had a ton of other things to do with her time than to stick it inside anything, much less a dead bird, and anybody who didn’t believe her could just follow her right out to the kitchen and see all the boxes of Stove Top waiting to be fixed. And not only that, but the turkeys, all three of them, were in the oven right now, and Libby herself would show anybody who wanted to see them that the birds had oranges, celery, onions and a little flour in the oven bags with them, but not one of them had anything inside it except their carcasses.

  So there.

  And Cara, hands on her nine–year–old, beginning–to–form, taffeta–covered hips, nodded her head hard and said, "Yeah."

  And Jane, without understanding anything except that Libby and Cara were mad at a whole bunch of people, stamped her precious little foot, stuck her bottom lip out as belligerently as her sisters and said, "Me, too."

  The crowd roared.

  The actual exchange of vows was somewhat anticlimactic after that—except to Helen and Nat.

  Their vows to each other were thoughtful and circumspect, halting and dry mouthed. Helen’s hands trembled inside Nat’s; his wrapped around hers, hard and strong and tight even as his voice went hoarse and he had to clear it several times in order to articulate all the things he needed to say to her.

  They didn’t use the word love they used respect. Instead of honor they chose trust. In place of cherish they put appreciate, care for, shelter and defend.

  They hadn’t, and didn’t, lie to each other or themselves or those gathered. They held each other’s hands and didn’t pretend; they made a contract. Their reasons for getting married were as plain and unconditional and irrevocable to them as they were to their multitude of witnesses—so plain, in fact, that nobody had offered to take the children so they could honeymoon.

  Convenience or not, they were getting married for the same reasons settlers and immigrants had chosen from time immemorial: because marriage suited the purpose, filled the need and protected the children.

  That they were neither settlers nor immigrants, but modern people in modern surroundings with modern careers and personalities, was something they simply promised to try hard not to let get in the way.

  And in the end it all came down to the same thing: a signed, witnessed and notarized piece of paper and a judge who proclaimed, "Now by the powers vested in me by the State of Michigan, I pronounce you husband and wife…."

  Together they drew a tremulous breath, smiled, laughed a little nervously. Then Nat framed Helen’s face with his palms and drew her toward him while he leaned toward her.

  Their kiss was warm and dry, tentative and careful—a plain and simple seal on their pact.

  Nat’s pulse leapt anyway, something inside him cried out, heat coursed in tatters through his bloodstream. He wanted more, but he forced his rebellious body to take less. Accept it.

  With the touch of his lips on hers, Helen felt her heart thud and race, then splinter and shrink inside her chest; felt suddenly afraid of the power of a thing so chaste it might be shared between siblings. She wanted less, oh God, please, because it would be so much easier that way. Found herself instinctively leaning into Nat for more.

  They parted, breathing a bit frazzled, and Helen was glad Nat couldn’t see her face, couldn’t read what she feared he’d find printed there.

  He was glad that his blindness prevented her from seeing what lay inside his soul, afraid of revealing something to her that he had no intention of revealing even to himself.

  This had nothing to do with them other than peripherally; this was for the kids.

  Holding hands, they faced the assemblage, smiled and laughed self–consciously through the applause, the calls of welcome to the Colonel and Mr. Crockett. Then Nat took Helen’s arm and they retreated down the aisle amid back patting congratulations and a confetti of rose petals.

  And they both knew with misgiving that neither of them had gotten what they wanted out of that kiss.

  Nor what they needed.

  Chapter Seven

  ~THANKSGIVING—PART II~

  "I’ll sleep on the couch in the sitting room," Nat volunteered much later.

  Reluctantly.

  It was late and it had been a long day—longer even than it seemed on the surface, and that was pretty long—filled with… incidents masquerading as family, but he was hardly ready to sleep.

  He was ready to tear apart a granite wall with his bare hands to relieve his tension.

  He’d been standing or sitting near, talking with and about Helen all day. Her perfume was in his lungs; the infinitesimal taste he’d had of her mouth lingered on his lips. The husky, not particularly musical quality of her voice seemed to have affected the balance of his inner ear, leaving him light–headed and preoccupied with waging a battle to control the behavior of the more uncontrollable aspects of his anatomy.

  The occasional feel he’d had of her skin, the contact with wisps of her hair against his cheek when they’d cut the wedding pumpkin pie together, the sensation of all those "little tiny buttons" going up the side of her dress and resting under his palm when he’d slipped an arm around her waist during their wedding pictures had made his fingers itch with longing to undo them, to count them, to find and taste the heat he could feel building beneath them. And he knew intimately that Helen hadn’t failed to note his reactions to her, that she hadn’t failed to react in kind, because when the photographer had arranged them so they were spooned together, standing with Nat’s arms wrapped around Helen’s waist and his hands resting on her belly, her rump tight against his fly… He’d been hard and aching, had become even more so when she gasped slightly and shifted a tad to place air between them and he’d held her where she was.

  He’d felt the fluttery quality of her breathing beneath his hands, the staccato rhythm of her heart pounding like a primitive drum against his chest. His constant awareness of her and his cognizance of the civilized "forbidden" clause in the contract they’d made between them had dr
iven him slowly mad with want.

  Now, alone with her in a room that not only housed a bed but came equipped with a lock on the door, remaining civilized was the last thing he wanted to remember.

  "You can’t," Helen informed him—also reluctantly, equally as aware of him as he was of her, equally wanting.

  Equally determined to maintain the distance she felt was the only hope for this… liaison’s success.

  She’d spent the same time near, thinking about or speaking with or about him as he had her. He’d teased her and she’d enjoyed the teasing. He’d touched her, naturally—a hand on her arm, trusting her to guide him around obstacles in his path. His hand covering hers when they’d cut the pie together. His fingers at the small of her back while they’d stood in the receiving line and collected knowing and, once or twice, somewhat snide and perfunctory congratulations.

  She’d liked the feel of him—his arm about her waist, his fingers on those stupid side buttons on her dress. Liked the restiveness in his hand when he’d moved it, trying to find a place to light where he wouldn’t accidentally undo the buttons. When his thumb strayed north once and grazed the very outside edge of her breast while the photographer tried to take their picture. Liked the feel of his hands on her belly when the photographer repositioned them, the flood of heat that centered there, the sensation of him at her back, warm and solid and secure—

  And horny.

  Been horrified and mortified when, feeling the evidence of his desire against her rump, she’d moved to put a comfortable space between them and found herself instead edging back to settle more firmly against him, while his hands shifted, splayed and tightened at her waist, holding her there. While his cheek rested against the side of her head and his breath created sensory havoc near her ear.

  And she’d wound up wanting more of the same and more beyond that until "want" had created its own universe, become its center, was at present a craving.

  "It’s only a love seat," she continued now. "It’s way too short for comfort, and what if one of the kids gets up in the middle of the night and comes looking for us? Jane looked a little flushed when I put her to bed."

  "Tell ’em we had a fight?" Nat suggested, peeling out of his tuxedo jacket, knowing he’d much rather be peeling Helen out of her dress and, subsequently, her senses. "You kicked me out of bed?"

  "D’you really think that’d be the best way to begin?" Helen eyed the jacket he flung carelessly aside and turned her back on him, went into the bathroom. He might not be able to see her, but she could certainly see him, and the desires on his mind were printed as plainly on his too–expressive face as she was sure her own frustrations were printed on hers. "It’s a good idea, but I’m afraid the kids will think the way we’ve begun is the way we’ll go on, and if we begin with a disagreement that lands either of us on the couch the first night we’re married, how long can it be before they’re afraid we’ll have a disagreement that lands one of us out on the street?"

  Carrying her wedding dress, she came out of the bathroom, robe belted snugly about her waist. "No," she said with a notable lack of eagerness. She was an in–charge–of–herself, disciplined woman, but everything had limits. "There’s no help for it. We have to sleep together."

  There was a moment of silence while they weighed the pros and cons, the value of honesty versus the practicality of starting here and now to lie to themselves and each other.

  "That’s asking for trouble," Nat said baldly. "I dream about you when I sleep as it is, and make no mistake, they’re hardly celibate dreams. They’re lewd, lascivious and a whole lot debauched. Let me into your bed, turn it into our bed… However innocently we intend, I’m afraid…" He shrugged and left the probable consequences unstated but plain.

  Helen’s usually autocratic imagination fastened on the unstated, etched vivid mental illustrations that sent anticipation and heat searing from somewhere near her diaphragm down into her belly and left her unable to breathe through the fire in her lungs. She worked to wet her suddenly dry mouth and swallowed.

  It was a big bed—king–size, in fact, with a firm, relatively new mattress and no low spot formed in the middle yet. There was plenty of room for each of them, no reason for them to wind up anywhere near each other in their sleep.

  Unless they wanted to.

  Or instinct did it for them.

  She was not a big fan of inevitability. She preferred a little choice to anything labeled Fate.

  "This isn’t going to work, is it?" she whispered.

  "Not unless we change the rules," Nat agreed.

  "To accommodate lust," she murmured.

  "And relieve it."

  Again the silence, concentrated with inexorability, broken by the hum of the furnace and the sound of Toby quietly digging himself a bed in the carpet outside the door.

  "No," Nat said sharply at the door, and the digging sounds ceased. The groaning dog circled his spot three times, collapsed audibly, comfortably and fell asleep. Nat returned his attention to Helen, tipping his head from side to side and reaching out hard with all his available senses for clues he couldn’t see.

  She looked at him, forgetting his blindness for a tick, expecting him to look back and see…

  Instead she saw his head tilt, angling for the best vantage not to miss anything she did in the dark; watched his fingers seem to touch the air, gather it, collecting it for sensory analysis. Long sensitive fingers attached to broad, equally sensitive, callused hands.

  Hands that would see her if she let them, explore her secrets, relieve her unspoken, unknown aches.

  Share with her his own.

  She moistened her lips, let out a breath and swallowed.

  As though that was exactly the clue he was waiting for, Nat’s mouth curved, hand turned over and reached out to her.

  She hesitated, looking at it, wary and expectant. Swallowed again.

  They were married now, a union both sacred and secular, even though only the secular law had been physically represented at the ceremony. She’d meant the promises she’d made. And they’d left the "till death do us part" phrase in their vows on purpose—for Emma’s benefit, for the kids’ sense of security, for reasons they’d shied away from exploring, rationalizing instead that the future expiration of their commitments, the end of the children’s need for them to be married to each other constituted "death" in every sense—symbolic or otherwise—that counted, no need to belabor the point.

  No need to worry that Emma or anyone else could take the children away from them simply for setting a bad example, giving in to temptation and enjoying sex without the fetters and expenses of marriage.

  Sex, she assured herself firmly, being the key word, the honest word, unadorned by the glossy euphemism of making love. Utilizing the marriage covenant and the marriage bed to sanction the marriage rite.

  Funny how quick and easy it was to justify and accept doing the very thing you’d rationalized out of existence every day for a month.

  Every night, whether she’d admitted it to herself or not, since she’d first met Nat until this one.

  "Helen." His voice was a warm, rough baritone issuing invitation, hesitating to turn request into command.

  "Yes, Nat." Her voice was breathy, insubstantial, unlike her. Her hands trembled—also unlike her—when she turned to switch off the lamp on the bedside table. No reason she should be the only one able to take advantage of the light.

  No reason he should be the only one allowed to depend on his hands to see.

  He heard the flat snick of the light switch and his smile widened even as the heat surged and rose through him.

  When he invited hoarsely, "Come help me with these damned buttons," there was a hitch in his breath.

  "My pleasure," she heard herself respond softly, without hope of making any other choice and remaining rational, and crossed the room to him.

  His hands stilled instantly where he’d moved them to ease out of his suspenders. The note of despair he wasn’t supposed t
o hear—that she hadn’t meant to strike—reached his ears, stuck there like a dart thrown carelessly at a target so as to intentionally miss its mark, but sticking in the scoreless outside circle nonetheless.

  Of course, simply because they’d made the decision to enjoy the pleasures of the conjugal bed within the confines of their marriage was no reason that the path to it should be free of ruts. But this was one ravine he had no intention of floundering into. Not with Helen.

  He’d been here with Amanda a time or two, ignored the signs—perhaps relying primarily on what his eyes could see did that to a man—and look where it had got them.

  But that was different than this. Because he was not, he assured himself, in love with Helen as he’d been with Amanda. Who’d had the time to fall there, given the insanity of the last month? In lust, yes. Passionately. Irrevocably. And time, the alleged tincture for all things, hadn’t dulled the edge of that hunger at all, as it should have. Helen entered a room and his body recognized her before his mind knew she was anywhere near. She created a chaos in his bloodstream, a mayhem in his senses that Amanda, no matter how much he’d once thought he’d loved her, had never begun to approach.

  He wanted Helen badly—more, he realized, than he’d ever wanted anything in his life. More than he’d wanted her even moments ago. But he didn’t want her coming to him in despair of… compulsion. He would not have her regret anything that passed between them, ever.

  He was witnessing, he suspected, a side of the woman she didn’t let anyone else see: the vulnerable, normally granite–encased heart of her. The woman who dressed to meet each day by putting on an inner uniform along with the outer, defined a tough set of principles and lived by them no matter the personal cost. He didn’t want her to take him between her legs only because she felt the same all–consuming, bestial passion for him that he felt for her, just because their mutual… obsession with an act of the flesh and with each other made her feel she had no other choice because he didn’t, either.

  He didn’t want to begin this marriage with Helen hating herself in the morning.