98 - P.S. I Love You

I was going to wait another day to post, but since you have gone three days without an update, I couldn't make myself do it.  That doesn't mean I have anything else written though, so please be patient as I get caught back up.  I'll update as often as possible, but it I may not get back to dailies for a few days.  To reward your patience (ha!  Patience!), here's a pic from the weekend for Dark and Light Siders alike, graciously shared by a friend (thanks Denise!)   ♥blush

Easing open the door of his Durango, Tony stepped out onto Dorothea’s driveway and patiently waited as she put her car in the garage.  He tipped his head and squinted one eye in the bright sunlight, keeping the brightness at bay.  The sunlight did a number on his eyes, and sometimes the transition lenses weren't dark enough to protect them.

When she finally appeared, her boots clomped solidly against the concrete with an excessive amount of force, he thought.  The wind was whipping her hair across rosy cheeks, but her mouth was smashed into a harsh line and there was nothing for him in the usually warm brown eyes. 

“I’m mad at you.”

She didn’t slow her stride, merely uttered that one simple sentence as she sailed on by. 

It’s your own fault.  You knew where she stood before you walked out last night.

Tony matched their footsteps and walked alongside her to the front door.  “I kinda expected you to be.”

Dorothea frowned at him over her shoulder as she pushed in the door.  To her credit, she didn’t slam it in his face, but left it open so that he could follow her inside.  He slipped his coat and scarf off.  After she’d hung her own, she held out her hand for his.

“Did you come to talk or to beg forgiveness?”  She wasn’t looking at him when she closed the closet door and didn't stop to wait for an answer before plodding off toward the family wing.

“I don’t think my dumbass moment exactly requires begging.”

She glanced back with the lift of an eyebrow.  “You don’t, huh?”

Tony bit his tongue and followed silently behind to the kitchen, where she started moving around to make coffee.  He would let her have a couple of jabs.  She was entitled to that much. 

“You left when I asked you not to.”  Water splashed onto the counter as she filled the coffee maker, and she snatched up a towel to wipe it away.  Flicking the power on the machine, she turned to him defiantly.  “You thought it was easier to leave than to tell me that your mother upset you.”

“Easier?”  he snorted.  “No, it sure as hell wasn’t easier, but it was what I needed to do.”  His eyes narrowed suspiciously.  “And how do you know it has anything to do with my mother?”

“Oh, please.  I’m not stupid.”  Cabinets slammed as she dragged coffee cups from their shelves, then set them forcefully onto the counter.  He was frankly surprised that they didn’t break from the impact against the hard surface.  “You went to tell your parents about us and then became a totally different person.  You were quiet and hiding something.  It wasn’t exactly a mystery.”

Sighing, he leaned against the island, resting his palms on the countertop at his waist.  “Mom said some stuff that bothered me.  I had to deal with it in my own way.”

Dorothea snorted into the refrigerator, and then emerged with a small pitcher of milk in hand.  “Stuff like how you shouldn’t be sleeping with your brother’s leftovers?”

Tony’s head snapped up, the corners of his mouth turning downward.   The main reason for his silence had been to keep that very thing from her.  How did she find out?  “Are you doing that crystal ball thing again, or have you been talking to her?”

The steel door slammed shut, and she twisted around to put the pitcher beside the coffee pot before squaring off against him.  “Talking to her.  That’s where I was this morning.”

“Dammit, Dorothea, you weren’t supposed to find out about that!  Why do you think I didn’t want to talk about it?”

“I don’t know,” she drawled sarcastically, glowering at him.  “Because you’d rather pout and suffer unnecessarily all on your own?”

That made him feel like Romeo, being a silly little boy.  She was going to find out that he was anything but a little boy.

“No, because I was trying to protect your feelings!  It’s bad enough that I had to listen to it.  Why would I want you to find out somebody was talking about you that way?”

She didn’t back down an inch, propping both fists on her hips with a glare.  “Because this is supposed to be a relationship – a partnership!  I don’t want my feelings protected when it means yours get sacrificed in the process!”

“Well, that’s just too damn bad, because if it’s within my power to protect you, I’m going to do it."  He crossed his arms defiantly over his chest and glared right back at her.  "Every.  Single.  Time.”

She growled with frustration, smacking at his shoulder.  “Tony, you are not going to shut me out of your life - or certain parts of it - whenever you see fit.  I won't tolerate it.  It’s all or nothing, do you understand me?”

For the first time, Tony’s temper spiked.  Granted, things had been unrealistically perfect in their relationship so far.  An argument between them was inevitable, and even though it was the first time he'd been angry with her, this particular argument he was okay with.  It wasn’t true anger over doing something ‘wrong, it was more of them finding their way and what was going to work for them as a couple.  They needed this, and even mad, he could acknowledge that she wasn’t being unreasonable. 

But they needed all of the cards on the table.

“Understood.”  He unfolded his arms, grabbing her by the shoulders and pulling her the two steps necessary to bring her directly in front of him.  “Now you need to understand something.  I don’t have a problem sharing all the parts of my life with you.  Nor do I have a problem with this being a partnership, because I have more respect for you than anybody else.  I do however have a problem being treated like one of your kids.”  He leaned close, his face hovering close to hers.  “I love you, but that doesn’t mean you get to pussy whip me.  I’m a man, not a child, Dorothea.  If I have to remind you of that every day, so be it.”

Her pupils dilated, and he fully expected her to bitch him out in no uncertain terms.  To his great surprise, she stood stock-still and said quietly, “Are you going to act like a man and stay and talk, even when it’s not the easy thing to do?  Every time?”

Tony's hands fell from her shoulders and he laced the fingers of his right hand with the fingers of her left, taking a deep breath.  His answer was as much of a promise as anything.  “Yes.”

She tipped her chin up and he could see the brown depths begin to soften around the edges. 

“Are you going to hide things from me?”

“Only hurtful things.”

The soft eyes grew hard again and the dark curtain of her hair swished when she shook her head.  “Unacceptable.  An affair would be hurtful.  So would you being sick, or one of the kids getting hurt.  I told you, it’s all or nothing, Tony.  Being two separate people with two separate lives, who hook up for a few hours at a time, doesn’t work for me.  I did that, and I'm not interested in doing it again.”

“Dorothea –“

“No.”  She held up her free hand to interrupt him, resting it against the buttons of the same shirt he wore last night.  “I know this wasn’t supposed to get so serious already-“

He put a gentle finger against her lips.  “You and I both know it's serious or we wouldn’t have braved the family drama in the first place.  Tell me what you want, bottom line.  Let's see where we can find some common ground or compromise."

Her fingers circled his wrist and guided his hand downward, away from her mouth.  “It’s you and me against the world, not me watching you against the world.  We do this together.”

Tony nodded thoughtfully.  “Think you can remember that together thing for yourself?  'Cause I’m not Jon.  I’m not going to let you run roughshod over me because I'm carrying around some kind of guilt.  I'm not gonna be doing anything to make me feel guilty.”

“You’d better not,” she decreed with a soft smile that faded slowly away. “I know you're not Jon, and I really want this to be different, so I'll do my best.  If I slip up every now and then, you're just going to have to remind me, okay?"  When he nodded his smiling agreement, she took a deep breath.  "Since we’re putting it out there, I’m going to put it all out there.”

“Okay…?”  This moment was building into something that he hadn’t anticipated.  There may not be candlelight, a ring or a romantic setting, but this was starting to feel a hell of a lot like the commitment that went along with those things.  And the weird thing was that he wasn't the least bit freaked out by it.  He hoped that he could say the same after the 'all' she was going to put out there.

“Do you want babies?”

“What?”  That was so far out of left field that he couldn’t have predicted if his life depended upon it.  “What brought that up?”

She fastidiously avoided his question.  “I’m almost fifty, Tony.  I won’t be having any more babies.  If having your own biological children is important to you, then you need to consider that.”

He frowned, bringing his thick hands to settle at her waist.  “Mom put that in your head, didn’t she?”

“It’s a valid point, regardless of where it came from.”

“Babes…”  He should have told her this before, but it was the first time the subject of children had been broached.  There had never seemed to be a really appropriate time to bring it up, so he hadn’t.  “I can’t have kids – with you or anybody else.”

Her brow crinkled with confusion, and he explained.  “I had a vasectomy over ten years ago, and the quack made such a mess of it that I couldn’t have it reversed if I wanted to.”

“Oh, honey, I had no idea.”  Dorothea, of course, was immediately sympathetic and softly palmed his cheeks.  “And evidently your mother doesn’t either.  When was this?”

He chuckled.  “Not exactly something I wanted to advertise, and it’s none of her business.  My first-”  Tony broke of his words and coughed.  Don’t say ‘first wife’, idiot.  There’s only been one wife.  “It was during my marriage.  She didn’t want kids, and I was okay with it.  I’m still okay with it.”

The hands at her waist slid around to the small of her back and pulled her against him.  “I love your kids and I always have.  I’m good with being Uncle Tony.  But…”  His hands roamed down her backside, squeezing the curves he found there.  “I still like doing that thing that makes babies.  How long do we have until the kids get home?”

She offered a sneaky little smile and slipped a hand up behind his neck, pulling his mouth to hers for a soul-searching kiss.  When his brain was as useful as oatmeal, she withdrew, scratching her fingers through his goatee and swiping a thumb across the dampness on his bottom lip. 

“We still have important things to talk about.  Where you were last night, what your mom actually said and Petey.”

His hands slid under her sweater, teasing the sensitive skin at her rib cage.  “Can it wait?” he breathed against her cheek, fogging up his glasses at the same time. "I want you Dorothea."

“I suppose it can wait for a while.”  Her hands were doing some roaming of their own.  “Tony?”

“Hmm?” His reply was muffled, seeing that his lips were buried in the crook of her shoulder.

“I love you.”  Dorothea pulled away as far as his arms would allow, looking him in the eye and stroking a gentle thumb along his cheek.  “I love you. I don’t give a shit who your brothers are.”

A slow grin curled the corners of his mouth, and he turned his lips into her palm.  “I love you too, Babes, and I don’t give a shit who your ex is.”