Authors: Theresa Ragan
He looked down at his blue short-sleeved button-down shirt, the one his sisters had given him last Christmas. It wasn’t horrible, but he could have done better. If he’d known Jill was going to go all out, he might have taken a little more time getting dressed this morning.
“Howiewood!” Lexi said, hopping around Jill so that she could latch onto Derrick’s leg.
Jill winced. “Is that your bad leg she’s holding onto?”
“No worries,” he said as he patted the bouncy curls on Lexi’s head. “I took a couple of ibuprofen, and besides, the little squirt is a lightweight.”
Jill smiled again and this time a cute little dent appeared below her left eye, something he hadn’t noticed before.
Sandy came to the door next. She was holding Ryan in one arm and a large bag stuffed with baby bottles and diapers in the other. “Here’s your son,” Sandy said as she handed Ryan over to Jill. “Lexi,” she said, “go get your coloring books so Hollywood can keep his promise and color with you today.”
Lexi let go of his leg and ran back into the apartment.
“Are you sure your parents don’t mind Lexi and I coming along?” Sandy asked.
“Positive,” Derrick said. “Mom’s a big believer in ‘the more the merrier.’”
“Do you have extra diapers at your apartment?” Jill asked. “I was going to call you, but I didn’t have your number.”
He pointed inside Jill’s apartment. “I’ll go inside and write my number down for you.”
“You don’t have to do it now,” she said. “I can get it from you later.”
“I’ll do it now before I forget.”
“We have to wait for Lexi anyhow,” Sandy added.
He went to the kitchen where he knew he’d seen a pad of paper the last time he was here. While Jill and Sandy fussed over Ryan, he opened a couple of kitchen drawers until he found the paper. He also found a picture of Jill. She looked like a million bucks dressed in a long formal gown. Her hair was pulled up and lots of jewels glittered from her ears and neck. The guy next to her looked like a weasel, tall and reed thin with slicked back hair and big ears.
Lexi appeared out of nowhere and said, “That’s Tommy. He’s bad cuz he makes Jill cry a wot.”
“A
LLot
,” Derrick repeated with emphasis on the L sound as he bent down so he was eye level with the kid. “See how my tongue hits the back of my front teeth when I say a word that starts with ‘L.’ A
L
ot,” he said again so she could see. “A
L
ot. See? It’s easy.”
Lexi opened her mouth wide and put her tongue on the back of her teeth like he had done and said, “A Wot. A Wot. A Wot.” Then she smiled.
“Yeah, keep working on it kid.” Lexi was stealth, sneaking up on him like that. She was also very perceptive for a four-year old. He wiggled the picture and said, “Jill must like him a Lot if she keeps his picture around.”
Lexi shook her head.
If anyone knew what was going on around here, he was confident it was Lexi, and her head shaking told him Jill was through with ol’ Tommy Boy. For reasons he couldn’t explain, he was glad.
“She doesn’t wike him,” Lexi explained, “she WUVS him.”
Derrick dropped the picture back into the drawer, and then rifled around for a pen. “That’s too bad,” he said, and he meant it. “Jill deserves someone a Lot better than that weasel.”
“Do you make Jill cry?” Lexi asked.
“Never.”
Lexi’s eyes grew round. “Maybe you can WUV Jill and then she can fowget Tommy.”
He looked seriously at Lexi for a moment before he burst out laughing. Rubbing the top of her head, he said, “You’re a funny girl, a very funny girl.”
Forty-five minutes later, Derrick didn’t think Lexi was very funny anymore. If he had to listen to another round of “Old MacDonald” on his CD player, he was going to have to pull off at the next exit and call her and her mother a cab. He had hoped to have a conversation with Jill and Sandy on the ride to his parent’s pony farm—get to know Jill’s friend a little better before they all spent the day with his family. He could only hope his brothers and sisters would be on their best behavior, although the odds were against it. The law of attraction must be at work, he figured, because just as he thought of his family, the music shut off and the console rang.
He hit the On button and like magic his mother’s voice replaced
the moo moo here and the moo moo there, here a moo, there a moo, everywhere a moo moo
. He’d never been so relieved to hear his mother’s voice—that is, until she finished her first sentence.
“Hi, son. I wanted you to know I went to the store for the really good kind of anti-bacterial soap. I made everybody scrub up. Your sisters even gave us all manicures to make sure we’re all good to go. No horse manure smells inside or out. Do you think Jill will let us hold the baby if you tell her we all scrubbed clean?”
He glanced at Jill and noticed her blossoming cheeks. “No need for me to tell her, Mom. We’re on speaker phone.”
“Oh, hello, Jill.”
“Hello, Mrs. Baylor.”
“Please, call me Helen. I hope I didn’t say anything that might offend you in any way. I just wanted—”
“Mom,” Derrick interrupted. “We’ll be there in five.” He shut the Off button just in time to hear the pig oinking here and there and everywhere. He was about to sing along when Jill reached over and shut off the music. He glanced in the rearview mirror in time to see Sandy cross her arms and raise both brows for good measure.
Jill huffed. “You told your mother they couldn’t hold Ryan because they didn’t have clean enough hands?”
“I didn’t put it exactly like that. Don’t forget, they live and work on a pony farm.”
“Ponies!” Lexi shouted loud enough to make Derrick’s ear drums hurt.
Jill released a long sigh.
“I told Mom and Dad that you didn’t want them to make a big deal about your visit—you know—no signs, no balloons, no fanfare,” Derrick said. “I also told them you didn’t feel comfortable passing Ryan around—you know—like a football.”
She groaned.
Sandy continued to glare at him via the rearview mirror, eyes narrowed, lips tight.
Lexi laughed and said, “Howiewood called Tommy Boy a whistle,” Lexi said with glee in her voice, making Derrick realize the apple truly didn’t fall far from the tree.
Jill frowned. “Tommy Boy?”
“Thomas,” he said.
“A whistle?” Sandy asked.
“A weasel, not a whistle,” Derrick corrected.
Jill snorted. “Oh, that’s much better.”
Sandy laughed.
The sound startled Derrick because even though he knew Sandy was slowly softening toward him, despite the occasional dagger eyes and before his mom ruined everything, he still hadn’t thought Sandy was capable of laughing.
Sandy looked into the rearview mirror and wrinkled her nose. “What are you looking at?”
“Just checking to see if you’re laughing at my expense.”
She laughed some more. “Definitely.”
“It’s not funny,” Jill told Sandy. “Tommy Boy—I mean, Tommy—I mean Thomas— is not a weasel.”
“But he makes you cry,” Lexi said, her voice much too serious for a four-year old.
“Not any longer,” Jill said.
“Howiewood said he would never make you cry. I think he wikes you.”
Although he kept his eyes on the road, he figured Jill was looking his way—probably trying to figure out what his problem was. Sandy had already made it clear that he was a dead man if he ever hurt Jill. At least they were no longer focused on what Mom had said about his entire family sterilizing their hands before they got there. No matter how he looked at it, there was no getting around the fact that this was going to be a long day.
It wasn’t long before Derrick parked the car on the curb outside his parent’s ranch house. The first sign he might be in bigger trouble than he already was came in the form of an assortment of foil, Mylar, and latex balloons—in every shape, size, and color. The second sign was an actual sign—a ten-by-three foot expanse of white paper hanging over his parents’ front door with big red letters that spelled out, “Welcome, Jill and Ryan!”
He figured Jill hadn’t noticed since she had already climbed out of the car and was busy fiddling with the buckles and belts on the child seat. When she was finished, she kissed Ryan on the tip of his nose and then handed Ryan to him.
As he held Ryan in his arms, he gazed upon his son for a long moment, almost as if he was looking at him for the first time. It hit him like a bolt of lightning. His son was here to meet his parents for the first time. Why that particular thought would make him feel as if a multitude of moth wings were flittering around inside his gut, making him feel all woozy and emotional, he didn’t want to know. He’d never been big on emotions. He didn’t do woozy and emotional, and he certainly didn’t see any reason to start now. Swallowing the knot lodged in his throat, he blinked a couple of times to get control of himself.
Jill collected Ryan’s things and then looked at him. “Are you okay? You look pale.”
“We never should have brought him here.”
She smiled. “You’re the one who was worried about clean hands. Don’t worry,” she said, “your secret is safe with me. And stop worrying about Ryan. He’ll be fine.”
Derrick grabbed her arm, stopping Jill from heading for the house. Sandy was already chasing Lexi across the yard. “I’ve wanted to tell you all morning how much I enjoyed last night.” He shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “I’ve seen better movies, but never with better company.”
That cute little dent of hers appeared again…until she frowned. “What is wrong with you? You look as if you’re about to take the death march.”
“You haven’t met the entire family all at once.”
“I thought you were excited about this—about your family meeting Ryan?”
“You’re right. I am excited. I’m fine. They’ll be fine. You’ll be fine. Everything will be fine.” He let go of her arm and then looked at Ryan, who seemed to be growing at the speed of light.
“Come on, Howiewood!” Lexi shouted.
“We’re coming,” Jill answered.
Ryan was sucking on his fingers again.
“I think the little guy is hungry,” Derrick said as they headed for the house, hoping to distract Jill in case she hadn’t noticed the assorted balloons affixed to the mailbox or the big Mylar ones swinging from the branches of the elm tree in the front yard.
“We can feed him when we get inside.” She looked over her shoulder at him. “No signs, no balloons, no fanfare?”
“You noticed, huh?”
She rolled her eyes. “I’m surprised the local news trucks aren’t here for the big event.”
“I think aliens abducted my family. Not once in my life have I seen a sign, let alone balloons, in a quarter of a mile radius of my house before today.”
“I wike balloons!” Lexi said, running toward the tree. Sandy continued to chase after her.
The door to his parents’ house came open and his mom and dad stepped outside, followed by his brother Lucas, and then Jake, and his sisters Rachel and Zoey.
Once again Derrick found himself hoping that it wasn’t a mistake bringing Jill to meet his family. After today, Jill might waltz into the mediation room next month with enough ammunition against him to convince the mediator to never allow him to see his son again.
His father had stopped to talk to Lexi and Sandy while his mother headed straight for her grandson. She and Jill hugged, squeezing the life out of one another since they were both natural-born huggers. They released each other long enough for his mother to turn toward Derrick and focus her full attention on Ryan. With a hand over her heart, Mom let out a noise that sounded like she’d died and gone to heaven right then and there. “He’s the most perfect baby on this earth,” she crooned.
“That’s what you said about Garrett’s baby,” Derrick reminded her.
“True, but now we have one perfect little girl and one perfect little boy.”
Mom looked squarely into Jill’s eyes. “I can’t thank you enough for allowing us to meet Ryan today. I thought my heart would burst if another day went by without getting to see him.”
Before Jill could respond, she was bombarded by the rest of his family, everyone asking questions and talking at once. His sisters oohed and ahhed at the baby as they all moved up the walkway and through the double doors leading into the house.
Derrick hardly had time to finish introducing Jill before Mom ushered everyone out the sliding glass door and into the backyard for a feast of finger foods, including cream cheese and garlic crostini and overcooked hamburgers and hotdogs. His mom had taken his son from him before he could stop her. She was holding Ryan close to her chest as she walked side by side with Jill, heading for the picnic benches.
While Derrick watched the subtle sway of Jill’s hips as she moved across the yard, one of his brothers shoved a plate into his hands and pointed to the food, telling him to eat. Derrick had no idea where Sandy and Lexi had disappeared to, because from the looks of things, more and more people were pouring into the backyard with every passing minute.
First to enter through the side gate were Mr. and Mrs. Cooley from across the street. And he was pretty sure the man with the moustache and squinty eyes who came in behind them was Dr. Frost, his dentist from way back. Two elderly ladies entered the backyard from the kitchen sliding door. One woman he didn’t recognize and one he did: Grandma Dora was here—and that meant trouble.
Judging by the never-ending line of people streaming into the backyard, Mom had invited most of Arcadia. Figuring he better eat before making the social rounds, he placed a crostini, which was basically cream cheese and onion on bread, and a ham roll next to his overdone hamburger. His parents weren’t the best cooks in town, but they always had two or more long tables covered with enough food to feed the neighborhood.
After chatting with Mr. and Mrs. Cooley for a while, Derrick sifted through the crowd. As far as he could tell, Jill had found something to nibble on while his mother and sisters hovered around her and the baby. He spotted Sandy across the yard and noticed that she had made a friend of his brother, Jake, which worried him a little because as much as he liked Lexi, he couldn’t imagine coming to his parents’ get-togethers only to be scowled at for the rest of his life. Besides, Jake was too young for Sandy.