109 - You Better Sit Down Kids

Tony choked, spluttering his coffee on the table.  “No fuckin’ way!  You really said Jon was happy to find out you were both?”

Leaned back in his  seat with his arm draped over the back of Petey’s chair, Jon nodded complacently and smiled at her with admiration.  “She did.”

Petey cast her eyes downward, away from the group sitting around the kitchen table, toying with the spoon that lay on the table’s surface.   It sounded so much worse in the re-telling.

No it doesn’t.  It sounds exactly like what happened.  You’re simply trying to repress the incident.

“Undoubtedly not the best thing to have said, but I was running on pure adrenaline by then.  In retrospect, I’m feeling a little remorseful about the whole thing.”

“Don’t,” Dorothea ordered bluntly.  “She senses weakness and will take advantage of it.  Be nice because you should, but always let her know there’s a cold-hearted bitch lurking just beneath the surface.  It helps keep the scales tipped the tiniest bit in your favor.”

Both brothers raised curious brows at her. 

“What?” she asked defensively, scowling at both of them. “Did you really think we bonded like mother and daughter for all those years?”

Petey smirked.  She knew exactly what Dorothea meant.  It wasn’t a common occurrence, being friends with your husband’s ex-wife, but she hoped that she and Dot could pull it off.  It would be nice to have someone who understood the position she was in.

“Your ring is beautiful,” she remarked nonchalantly, rubbing an open palm over Tony’s forearm. “It suits you, Petey.  He did good.”

“He did,” she agreed readily, leaning in to touch her lips to his.

Jon shifted in his chair, Dot’s intimate gesture stirring uncomfortably in his chest and Petey’s kiss feeling out of place in this setting.  Maybe getting married here was stupid.  There were memories of his other life haunting the hallways and corners. 

Dorothea met his eyes with her typical acute perception, and modified her caress of Tony’s arm to an impersonal pat.

“Bunny, will you go get the kids, so they can hear the news?  I’m sure Jon and Petey have other places to go today.”

He tried to control it, but Jon knew horror claimed his face.  She was calling his brother Bunny??

Tony honest-to-God turned red.  “Yeah, but you’re gonna pay for that too,” he told Dot in a low voice, rising from his chair. 

She didn’t back down, merely cast him a bemused smile.  “I know.” 

At the same time, Petey rose.  “I need to steal away to the powder room,” she excused herself, leaving the kitchen right behind Tony.

Former husband and wife sat in their previously shared kitchen, staring silently at one another for a solid ten seconds.  Dorothea was the first to break the quiet.

“We have to talk about it.”

“I got no idea what you mean.”  He stood and moved to the counter, where an open bottle of wine awaited.  While the others had been having coffee, he’d chosen a different poison.

“Jon,” she chided quietly.  “It’s not taboo.  We’re divorced.  Moving on is perfectly acceptable.”

He leaned heavily against the cabinet, regarding her from beneath hooded eyes.  “Doesn’t make seeing your affection toward Tony any less awkward.”

“You’d better get used to it.  Eventually he’s going to ask me to marry him, and I intend to say yes.”

The lines bracketing his mouth dug deeper under his unhappy frown.

“Stop being a baby,” she snapped after another moment’s silence.  “Your fiancée has been sitting in my kitchen wearing a breathtaking engagement ring that you obviously took great care in choosing and , while I look on, she’s kissing you with her heart and the stars in her eyes.  You’re getting married here, for Pete’s sake!  If I can deal with all that, you damn well better deal with my touching Tony.”

There was no two ways around it.  She was right.  End of story.  He still didn’t like it.

“You’re the father of my children, Jon.  I want us to be friends,” she continued less vehemently.  “That doesn’t mean shielding you from the things you don’t want to acknowledge.  This is my life now.  Tony is my life now.  You’ve got to accept it.”

He knew that.  He knew that.  It was all still too fresh for him to be hunky-fucking-dory with everything, but he was trying.  Couldn't he get a little credit?

You’re not trying hard enough.  She should get to live her life without your drama.

“Dottie, how do you really feel about me getting re-married in this house?”

Her eyes narrowed for a moment.  It was a patented Dorothea move that he recognized well.  She was contemplating whether to sugar coat and put a positive spin on her words or let them fly uncensored.

She let them fly.

“I hate it,” was her blunt response as she flipped back her hair.  “It hurts my feelings that you want to come into my house – into our house – and start your new life of married bliss when you couldn’t find bliss here in your old married life.”

Ouch. She definitely didn’t sugar coat that shit.

“I’m sorry.”  He tipped up his wine for another swallow, nodding thoughtfully as it drained down his throat.  “We’ll do it someplace else.  It was tactless of me to ask.”

“Yeah.”  Her brow arched with condemnation.  “It was.  But what’s done is done, and with that idiot Daniel traipsing around New England, I want to know my kids are safe when they attend Daddy’s wedding.  Besides…”  She smiled wickedly at him.  “This means I can have a Spring wedding on the terrace in Soho if I so choose, because you wouldn’t dare tell me no.”

Chin dipped to his chest, he curbed a grin and lifted his wine glass in salute.  “You’re right.  I wouldn’t.  You’re a class act, Dottie.”

“I still love you too, you ass.”

This time he couldn’t withhold the grin or the bark of laughter that accompanied it.  Through no doings of his own, they could and would still have a good relationship.

“Well if that isn’t a heartwarming Hallmark moment, I don’t know what is,” Petey remarked wryly as she re-entered the room. 

Dorothea smiled smugly and stood to take her coffee mug to the sink.  “I like her Jon.  That should scare you.”

“Nah.”  His eyes danced with devilry.  “I’m more scared that she likes me.”

Petey didn’t have a chance to reply before the kitchen was overtaken by a small, blonde cyclone.

“Daddy!  You came to see us!”  Romeo skidded to a stop before his father, who set the wineglass aside and scooped the boy into the air.  Tony was following close behind, accompanied by Jake.

“You betcha!”  God, nothing could make him feel the way his kids did.  Unconditional love was an amazing thing.  “How was school today?”

“Was okay.  I’m learnin’ to spell now.  It sucks.”

“Romeo!”  Dorothea reprimanded over the muffled chuckles of the men, returning to her seat.  “You’re not allowed to use that word.”

Balanced on Jon’s hip, he looked hard at his mother, his brown eyes matching hers for intensity.  “You and Daddy say it.  Jesse and Steph say it.”

“Well, you can’t say it – at least until you get to high school.”

“Did you hear that Jake?” Romeo addressed his brother with the weight of the world on his shoulders, intent upon sneaking the forbidden word in one more time.  “We can’t say stuff sucks anymore.”

“You could always say stuff stinks,” Petey offered solemnly from her seat at the table.  “It sounds kind of the same.”

His little face furrowed with concentration as he considered Petey’s suggestion.  He was still thinking about it when Stephanie entered the room and gave her father a hug on the side that wasn’t covered with Romeo.

“Hi, Daddy,” she greeted him with a smile and kiss on the cheek.  “What are you doing here on a Monday?”

“Yeah, Dad.  What’s up?” Jesse chimed in on his way to the refrigerator.  Jon remembered being a perpetually ravenous teenage boy.   Once in a while he still had those days.  The difference was that he no longer had the metabolism of a teenage boy and couldn’t indulge.  That sucked.

Taking a breath, he set Romeo on his feet and looked around the big, open kitchen.  Petey and Dorothea were seated side by side at the table, Tony’s hands were resting on Dot’s shoulders as he stood behind her, Jesse was leaning against the sink eating an apple, Jake and Romeo were climbing the cabinets in search of cookies and Stephanie was getting bottled water from the fridge.

“Petey and I have something we want to tell you,” he began, moving to the center of the room and folding his arms.  She had her hands in her lap, keeping the ring hidden away until the announcement had been made, but offered silent encouragement with her eyes.  The barest hint of a dimple appeared in her left cheek, and he continued, fortified.  “We’re getting married on Saturday.”

With the proclamation hanging in the air, each adult surreptitiously scanned the faces of the children, seeking out their reactions with concern.

The refrigerator door slammed closed in the ensuing silence and Stephanie’s eyes flew wide with surprise, confusion swirling in their blue depths.  “Married?”

Jesse’s eyes hardened, but he continued to silently chew on his apple.

Jake and Romeo both stopped, sensing that something was wrong, but they hadn’t been paying enough attention to know exactly what.

So much for overjoyed children.

“Yes, married.  It’s kind of sudden, but like you said, Steph – Petey speaks my language.  I want her to be my wife.”

“Is she pregnant?” came the sullen question from his eldest son.

Jon immediately sought out Petey, whose dimple had faded into a wooden smile.  He’d had just about enough of that damn question.

“Jesse,” Dorothea scolded, before Jon could lose his temper and respond in anger.  “That’s rude and you know it.  Apologize right now.”

But Petey brushed it off with a stilted laugh.  “It’s okay, Dorothea.  That’s not the first time we’ve been asked.”  Focusing her reply directly on his son, she firmly said, “No, Jesse, I’m not.”

He nodded, mumbling around the food in his mouth, “Sorry.”

The younger boys were still trying to figure out exactly what was happening.  “Daddy?”  Jake pulled on Jon’s sweater, at the same time Stephanie was hugging Petey.  “What are you talking about?”

“I’m sorry, too,” Jon could hear his daughter apologizing to Petey.  “It’s just kinda fast, you know?  But there’s nobody I would rather have Daddy marrying.”

Thank you, Baby Girl.

“Jakey…”  Jon squatted down and put an arm around the boy while gesturing to his littlest.  “You too, Ro.  C’mere.”  He looked deliberately back and forth between the boys and explained, “Petey and I are going to get married like Mommy and me used to be married.  We’ll live in my house and she’ll be part of our family.”

“No!”  Romeo pushed Jon away, nearly toppling him in the floor as he ran for Dorothea.  “I don’t want a new Mommy.  I want my Mommy!” he cried, climbing into her lap.

“Romey, don’t be stupid,” Jakey said with the escalated maturity of a boy that was nearly two years older than his brother.  “We’re not getting a new Mom, we’re getting a Petey.”

“That’s right,” Jon agreed, affixing his ‘mini-me’ with an unhappy look.  “Except for the stupid part.  Don’t talk to you brother that way, Jake.”

He sighed and rolled his eyes.

God, he really is a mini version of me.

Romeo still wasn’t impressed and curled himself into a ball on Dorothea’s lap, giving Petey his back.  Undeterred, she placed a comforting hand along his spine, reassuring him even after he flinched away from her touch.  “That’s right Romeo.  Your mom isn’t going anywhere, and I’m definitely not trying to take her place.  Nobody could ever do that.  I’ll just be one more person who loves you and wants the best for you.”

“Romey.”  Dorothea coaxed him into look at her.  “What Petey said is true.  I promise I’m not going to leave you.  The only thing changing is that when you go to Daddy’s house, it’s going to be Daddy and Petey’s house.  She’ll be there with him and I’ll still be right here waiting for you to come home again.”

“With Uncle Tony?”

He saw Dottie go blank at the innocent question.  There was no way in hell Jon wanted to field that one, but she was going out on a limb to make things easier for him and Petey.  He felt obligated. 

Jon moved to crouch in front of Romeo.  “Uncle Tony will be here sometimes, I’m sure.  And if Uncle Tony and your mom get married, then he’ll be here full-time, just like Petey will be at my house full-time.” 

He didn’t miss Tony’s hand curling around the back of Dottie’s neck, but the familiar touch didn’t bother him so much this time.  Petey was his future, and Dot was being cool with it.  Jon purposefully took the first step to accepting that Tony was her future. 

Life was marching on.  There were changes coming that some of them would like, while others would not.   It was his and Dorothea’s job – along with Petey and Tony – to make sure everyone survived the changes intact.  Their family unit had grown to include every person in this room and they, as a unit, were responsible for the well-being of that family unit.

For better or worse.  For richer or poorer.  In sickness and in health.