“Nah,” Cody said with a shake of his head. “But that’s okay.”
“It just means if Ma marries Coach Joe her name will be Mattie Marino, right, Ma?”
Uh-oh. Mattie glanced from one of her sons to the other, wondering what on earth was going on. Connor’s comment had triggered her mother’s early-warning alarm system, and right now it was on full-scale alert.
“Yes,” Mattie said carefully. “That’s right, honey.”
“But what would our names be?” Cody wanted to know.
“That depends,” she said carefully. She hesitated a moment, wondering if she was about to step on a land mine. “What’s all this about me marrying Coach Joe?” she asked, her gaze going from one to the other. She wanted to groan. They were up to something. Again. “Okay, boys, fess up. What’s all this about?”
“Nuthin’,” Cody said, hunching his shoulders defensively and glancing out the window to see if Coach Joe had arrived yet.
“We was just wondering,” Connor said.
“Wondering,” Mattie repeated, setting the sweaters and the package on the cocktail table. “Come here, boys.” She held out her arms, waiting while they exchanged another silent glance before they walked over to her.
“I want you to listen to me very carefully.” She draped an arm around both of their shoulders, then gave them a comforting smile. “Coach Joe and I are just friends. Now, I know that we’ve been spending a lot of time with him, and you both like him very much—”
“Lots,” Connor said.
“Real lots,” Cody confirmed, making Mattie smile.
“I know, sweetheart, and he likes you two a lot as well, but just because we spend a lot of time together and just because Coach Joe and I are friends doesn’t mean I’m going to marry him.”
“But you said you liked him,” Cody protested.
“You’re right. I did,” she admitted. “But I like Mr. Clancy, too. That doesn’t mean I’m going to marry him.”
“Yeah, Ma, but Mr. Clancy’s old.”
“Real old.”
“Like Grandpa.”
“And you never kissed Mr. Clancy, Ma.”
Well, Mattie thought, the kid had her there.
“But you kissed Coach Joe,” Cody thought it necessary to point out. “You kiss him a lot.”
“Yes,” she admitted hesitantly, feeling herself flush a bit. She had become so comfortable with Joe, she hadn’t realized how much they’d been kissing. In front of the boys, which she realized had given them the wrong idea. “I have kissed Coach Joe, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to marry him.” She grinned. “And for the record, boys. I have kissed Mr. Clancy, too.” On the cheek, numerous times, but she didn’t think it necessary to point that out.
“Why’d ya kiss him?” Cody asked.
“Because we’re friends,” she said, straightening Cody’s tie.
“I’m sure glad we don’t gotta kiss our friends,” Connor said in relief.
“Yeah, I wouldn’t ever wanna hafta kiss Bobby Dawson.” Cody made gagging noises to show his disgust.
“Or Amy Bartlett,” Connor interjected, clutching at his stomach and making gagging noises as well. “She might puke on you,” he said, laughing.
“Yuck.” Cody clamped a hand over his own mouth as if to protect it from any offending female kisses.
“Okay, boys, that’s enough,” Mattie scolded gently, wanting to make sure she’d handled this situation so they understood it. “So, now do you understand? Coach Joe and I are friends.” She looked from one to the other. “Just friends,” she specified, wondering why, for the first time in her life, she felt as if she wasn’t being totally honest with her children. “And sometimes friends…kiss, or hug, or do nice things for one another. That doesn’t mean they’re going to get married. Do you understand?”
Cody and Connor exchanged silent glances. “Yeah, we understand, Ma,” Connor said glumly, realizing they were going to have to figure out another way to convince Coach Joe to be their dad.
They thought because he liked their mom, maybe he could marry her and then he’d hafta be their dad. That was a rule, Bobby Dawson had told them. So, they figured if they could just get Coach Joe to marry their mom, well, their problem would be solved.
Finding a dad wasn’t as easy as they thought it would be. But they’d better hurry up, or else their grandma was going to make their grandpa be their dad ’cause she said they really needed one. Another one of those rules, Connor thought dejectedly.
But they wanted a dad of their own, one who could do all the things they liked to do. One who could run and play baseball and maybe even knew ’rithmetic. And they hadn’t had a chance to ask yet, but he and Cody were pretty sure their grandpa didn’t know nuthin’ ’bout doing ’rithmetic.
Connor sighed, wondering what they were going to do next.
“Joe’s here,” Mattie said, unable to stop her grin as she watched him pull up to the curb. Her heart began a quick two-step just at the sight of him.
“Can we give him his present now?” Cody asked, reaching for it.
“Not yet,” Mattie laughed. “Let him get in the door first.”
After smoothing down the skirt of her summer dress, Mattie took a deep breath and answered the doorbell.
“Hi,” she said as she pulled open the door.
“Hi, yourself,” he said with a grin. “You look gorgeous.” She was wearing a white summer shift, sleeveless. It skimmed her knees, leaving her long legs tan and bare. On her feet she wore a pair of sinfully sexy strappy sandals that made his mouth water.
Trying not to drool, he leaned forward and brushed his lips against hers, aware that both boys were standing behind them, watching intently in wide-eyed fascination.
Joe drew back and his eyebrows lifted. “Ties, Mattie?” His gaze shifted from the boys to her and he tried not to smile. “You made the boys wear ties?”
“She said we gotta look nice,” Cody muttered, giving his tie another flip.
“Do you guys want to wear ties today?” Joe asked as Mattie stepped back to let him enter.
“Uh-uh,” Cody said with a wild shake of his head.
Grinning, Joe motioned toward the boys. “Come here.” Both marched obediently toward him. “Let’s get rid of these nooses, okay?”
“Okay!” Thrilled to have a comrade who apparently didn’t like ties either, the boys beamed as Joe helped both of them off with their ties, tossing them carelessly atop the television.
“Now, is that better?”
The boys beamed at him. “Yeah. Much.”
“Good.”
“We got a present for you, Coach Joe,” Cody said, bouncing up and down and almost dropping the heavy frame he had clutched in both hands.
“Yeah, it’s just for you. Ma made it.”
“She did, did she?” Joe’s gaze shifted to Mattie’s and he grinned. “Well, that was very nice of your mom, wasn’t it?”
“Our mom’s nice,” Cody pointed out, earning a surprised look from both Joe and his mother. “Real nice,” he added.
“And she reads good stories, too,” Connor added.
“Cody,” Mattie cautioned in a voice her sons knew well. “Connor.” She waited until they both looked at her. “I don’t think Joe needs a laundry list of my…niceness,” she said, trying not to laugh. She knew what the twins were doing, but still, it embarrassed her to think her boys had to point out her assets to Joe.
“We helped Ma wrap it.” Cody held out the gaily wrapped package. There was enough scotch tape to hold a battleship together, and almost enough paper to wrap one in as well, but it was the most beautiful gift Joe had ever seen.
“Wow, you did this?” He took the package. “I’m impressed. It’s beautiful. The best wrapping I’ve ever seen. Maybe you guys could help me at Christmastime. I’ve got tons of presents to wrap every year.”
“We’d love to, Coach Joe,” Connor said, beaming.
“Can I open my present now?” Joe asked.
“Yeah, open it
.”
“Open it.”
Slowly, Joe unwrapped the present, his eyes softening in surprise when he saw the framed picture of himself, the one Mattie had sketched. “It’s beautiful, Mattie,” he said, more touched than he’d been in a long time. “Just…beautiful.”
“You like it, Coach Joe?” Connor asked.
He grabbed both boys up in a quick hug. “I love it, guys. And I really loved the wrapping paper, too. I’m going to hang this in my house and one day I’ll be saying, ‘Oh, that’s an original Mattie Maguire, personally drawn for me before she became famous.”’ His confidence in her and her abilities filled Mattie’s heart with joy. “Thanks, Mattie. This means a lot to me.” He leaned over and gave her a kiss, aware that the boys were wide-eyed, watching.
“Are we ready?” Mattie asked.
“In a minute.” Joe hesitated. “Mattie, I came early because there’s something I want to talk to you about. You and the boys,” he said, glancing at them.
“Okay, Joe,” Mattie said, wondering what on earth was going on. Joe rarely, if ever, seemed this serious. “Come sit down. Do you want something to drink?”
“No, no, I’m fine,” he said as he sat on the couch and set the package back down on the cocktail table. Both boys scrambled to sit next to him, one on either side, and Joe absently draped an arm around each of them.
“Whatcha’ wanna talk to us about?” Cody asked.
“Well, son, I wanted to talk to you about Johnny.”
“Who’s Johnny?” Connor asked.
Joe took a slow, careful breath, aware that Mattie was watching him carefully. “Johnny is my twin brother.”
Cody’s eyes rounded in excitement. “You gotta twin brother, too?” At Joe’s nod, Cody grinned at his own twin. “Cool.”
“Yeah,” Joe said with a laugh. “It is cool. But my twin, Johnny, is just a little bit different than I am.” In his experience, kids could understand and accept anything as long as it was explained to them.
“How come?” Connor asked. “Doesn’t he look like you? I look like Cody and he looks like me and we’re twins.”
“I know,” Joe said with a smile. “Johnny looks just like me, too. And I look just like him. We’ve always looked identical.” Joe hesitated for a moment, wanting to make sure he explained this so that the boys could understand. “But we’re not exactly alike,” Joe added, taking each of the boys’ hands in his. “A long time ago, when Johnny and I were about twelve years old, he had an accident.”
He heard Mattie’s quick intake of breath and glanced up. Eyes wide, her slender hand was pressed to her throat and he could see the empathy in her eyes. Some of the frost that had surrounded his fragile heart for so many years seemed to begin melting.
“What kind of accident?” Connor asked.
“Johnny and I were riding our bikes to the park. It was summer and we went to the park every day to play baseball.”
“Johnny likes baseball, too?” Cody asked in excitement.
Joe nodded. “Loves it, and in fact, he’s a better player than I ever was.”
“What kind of accident did he have?” Cody asked, and Joe sighed. A bad one, he wanted to say, but didn’t. The memory of that day had remained fresh in his mind, in his heart, as if it had just happened yesterday. As did his guilt.
He’d never stopped blaming himself for Johnny’s accident. If he hadn’t suggested they race to the park that day… Deliberately, Joe forced the thought away and continued.
“Johnny and I always used to race our bikes, to see who could get to the park faster.” Joe managed to smile a bit at the memory. “That day, I was beating him. I’d crossed Main Street first simply because Johnny slowed to avoid hitting a stray dog. He didn’t look before he pedaled into the street. He was still worried about the dog, and had turned back to make sure the dog was all right.”
“Oh, God. Joe.” Mattie’s heart was racing and she had a horrible premonition of what was coming.
“There was a car coming. Johnny didn’t look before he raced into the street, and the driver wasn’t watching where he was going. He had just glanced down to change the station on the radio, and his car was going faster than it should have when Johnny darted in front of him and the man hit Johnny with his car.”
“Did he get hurt?” Connor asked solemnly, and Joe nodded.
“Yes, Connor, he did.” He looked down at the boy. “Some of Johnny’s injuries were physical.” He rushed on to explain at the look on the boy’s face. “That means his body was hurt.”
“You mean like a broken leg or something?” Cody asked, eyes wide.
“Exactly. Johnny had a lot of broken bones, but he also had some injuries that weren’t on his body, but…in his brain where you couldn’t see them or fix them.”
“Oh, Joe.” It was all Mattie could do not to get up and wrap her arms around him. She could see the anguish in his face and it tore at her heart.
“Anyway, Johnny stayed in the hospital for a long, long time. Most of the injuries to his body finally healed, but the injuries to his brain didn’t.” Joe took a deep breath, then looked at the boys carefully, trying to judge how much of what he was saying they understood.
“How come?” Cody asked.
“Because sometimes, Cody, when you injure your brain, there’s no way to fix it.”
“So what happens when you can’t fix your brain?” Cody wondered.
“Well, even though Johnny looks exactly like me, and is as tall and as big as me, inside where his brain was injured, he’s still like a little boy.”
“You mean kinda like us?” Connor asked, and Joe nodded.
“Yes, that’s exactly what I mean. He’s kinda like you boys. But because Johnny looks big, and is big—”
“Like a grown-up person?” Cody said, surprising him.
“Yeah, Cody, because Johnny looks like a grown-up person on the outside but is really just a little boy on the inside, it sometimes frightens people and they don’t like Johnny or want to be around him.” Joe hesitated. “And sometimes they even call Johnny mean names.”
“That’s stupid,” Cody said with a scowl, making Joe smile.
“You’re right, Cody, that’s very stupid. But sometimes people can be stupid even when they don’t try to be.”
“Bobby Dawson.” Cody glanced up at Joe. “Sometimes Bobby Dawson is stupid and he doesn’t even try.”
“Or mean,” Connor added solemnly, playing with a button on his shirt. “Sometimes Bobby Dawson is mean to me.” He lifted stricken eyes to Joe. “Sometimes,” he added quietly, hoping his mom wouldn’t hear ’cuz she’d get all worried, “he makes fun of me.”
“Connor, why does Bobby make fun of you?” Joe asked softly. This was the first he’d heard of this, and from the look on Mattie’s face, the first she’d heard of it as well.
“’Cuz I can’t run as fast as the other boys.” He hesitated a moment. “And because I wear glasses,” he added, pushing his dreaded glasses up his sweaty nose.
“I see,” Joe said quietly.
Embarrassed, Connor continued to stare at the button on his shirt. “And sometimes Bobby calls me…a retard,” he whispered so only Joe could hear.
“That’s a very mean word, Connor,” Joe said. “And a very mean and stupid thing to say to someone. You know that, don’t you? And just because someone says something about you, mean or not, it doesn’t make it so.”
“I know,” he said glumly, trying to blink back tears. “But I hate when he calls me that.”
“Coach Joe?” Cody tugged on his shirt, and pulled Joe down so he could whisper in his ear. “When Bobby calls Connor that, I sock him.” Not certain if he was going to get scolded or not for the admission, since he wasn’t supposed to be fighting, ever, Cody flashed a guilty glance at his mother, who, sitting across the room, couldn’t hear what he was whispering.
Joe ruffled Cody’s hair, proud as a peacock of the kid, but one glance at Mattie told him he probably shouldn’t express that opinion
at the moment, so he tempered his words a bit.
“While I don’t think it’s a good idea to just go around hitting people, Cody, I think it’s wonderful that you stick up for and defend your brother.” Joe grinned. “Johnny always stuck up for me and I always stick up for him.”
“’Cuz that’s what brothers do, right, Coach Joe?”
“That’s right.” Joe smiled, making a mental note to have a little chat with Bobby Dawson and his father. “Then you understand what I mean about people calling Johnny names because he’s different?” He glanced at both boys and they nodded in unison.
“It’s mean and it makes you feel bad,” Connor said. “And sometimes it makes you cry,” he added.
“You’re right,” Joe responded, tightening his arm around Connor and drawing him closer in comfort and support. “That’s why it’s important to accept everyone for who they are and what they can do. And not call them names or hurt them just because they’re different.”
“Coach Joe, does Johnny live with you?” Cody asked, and Joe shook his head.
“No, son. Johnny has to live in a very special place where there are people who know how to take very good care of him. That’s where we’re going today, to the place where Johnny lives.”
“How come Johnny can’t live with you?” Cody wanted to know.
“Well, son, remember I told you that Johnny had some injuries to his body?”
Both boys nodded.
“Well, because of that, Johnny needs to have special nurses to take care of him and make sure he stays healthy.” Joe held his hand out, palms up. “And unfortunately, I’m a certified nursing idiot,” he admitted, making both boys giggle.
“Does he like it at that place?” Connor asked and Joe grinned.
“He loves it, Connor. Johnny has his own bedroom, and his own television, and all of his favorite things around him.” Joe leaned down to whisper, “He even has his own dog.”
“A dog?” Excitement had Cody and Connor bouncing up and down on the couch. “Johnny’s got a dog, really?” They turned to their mom. “Ma, Johnny’s got a dog. A real live dog of his very own.”
“I know, honey. I heard,” Mattie said with a smile. She hadn’t been able to take her eyes off Joe. Now she understood so much more about him. So very much more. And what she understood only made her feelings for him stronger.
Daddy Patrol Page 19