Of Scotsmen and SurroundSound
Firechild
Rated PG13
Disclaimer: If I owned any of these characters, Danny would be sore a lot more often and Jamie would be a lot more loved-on.
Warning: Contains the parental spanking of a bagpiper, a movie critic, and a turtle. Also contains comments on shenanigans that are against the rules for a reason. You've been warned.
A/N: This is for Marie—hope it tickles you!
"Well, anyway, I'm tellin' you," Danny said as he and Erin laughed their way through the front door and out of their coats, "by the time we got there, the thing was as big as a cantaloupe and just as ugly!"
"Ewwwwwwwwwww!" The oh-so-dignified assistant district attorney responded. "I'm sorry I asked." She looked over into the living room, and of course her eyes first found the back of her daughter's head over the top of the couch. "Hey, Niks, how's it going?"
Nikki twisted around. "Shhhhh!" She turned back around, and her mom and older uncle came over to see why, Erin trying not to be offended. What they saw in the living room made being shushed and brushed off worth it.
Nikki was curled up on the couch, like nothing so much as a pixie perched on an overstuffed lily pad, but the focus of the room was on the floor—Jamie, still in uniform, back against one of the recliners that had been turned to face the center of the room, legs straight out in front of him, uniform shirt open, Sean in his lap and Jack tucked against his right side, while his left hand held a tattered paperback book. The boys, who had been sick for three days with chicken pox and had been brought to their grandfather's house when their mother had surrendered in exhaustion, looked quite content snuggled up to their younger uncle; Danny and Erin had to smile when they saw that Jamie also looked half-asleep, though he was resolutely (if hoarsely) plugging on through the middle of 'The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle.' Jamie had always been the most affectionate of the Reagans, and given his age, he'd basically been the kids' jungle gym, so seeing him buried in children wasn't all that unusual, but Jack and Sean were as much their father's sons as they were their softer mother's, and it had been a good while since any of the kids had appropriated their uncle Jamie.
Danny and Erin took in the scene for a couple of minutes, but when Jamie's voice started going in and out like a bad CB, the older two moved in, rounding opposite ends of the couch and going to the puppy pile on the floor without needing to discuss their plan. Danny leaned down and lifted Jack while Erin got hold of Sean, and as the adults stood up, the boys revived enough to complain a little bit. So did Jamie, who pointed out that they hadn't gotten to finish the story.
Erin lovingly cupped the back of her smaller nephew's head while she smiled down at her baby brother. "Jamie, somehow I get the feeling that you could recite that book in your sleep. Which you might actually have been doing a minute ago." She carefully turned and followed Danny as they toted two tired, spotty little boys up the stairs toward lotion and bed in Danny's old bedroom.
When the adults came back down about ten minutes (and lots of rubbing and goodnight kisses) later, Nikki had commandeered Jamie's book and was reading it from the beginning while the young officer did basic stretches from his position on the floor. Erin went around and lifted her daughter's feet, sitting down where they had been on the couch and putting them in her lap—none of which Nikki seemed to notice, as both her being buried in a book and her mother repositioning her were normal for them. Danny blinked a couple of times, surprised that Jamie was still in uniform and still awake. He walked over and sat in the other recliner, leaning forward over his knees to stretch his lower back and to be closer to his brother's eye level.
"So what's with the uniform, kid? Thought this was your day off."
Jamie shrugged one shoulder between stretches. "Afternoon, anyway. By the time I finished my fives, I didn't have time to change before I got the boys." He (slowly, stiffly) pushed himself to his feet and started to shake out his arms and hands, working his feet into a stationary band march.
Danny eyed his brother critically, growing more confused by the second. "What are you doing? When we came in, you were more asleep than the boys. Now you look like you're getting ready for a track meet. What gives?"
Jamie shrugged as if it should have been obvious. "Trying to wake up. I've got a graveyard to get to soon."
Danny's brow furrowed as the detective turned that over in his mind; he knew that things weren't adding up here, but he didn't have long to mull it over before he heard Nikki telling her mother that the boys were just about settled on dressing up as Holmes and Watson for Halloween, provided that they were well enough to talk their mother into letting them enjoy the festivities. The mention of the upcoming holiday had Danny grimacing. "Man, I hate Halloween."
insert convo about how they feel about the holiday
With a put-upon sigh, Danny cut his eyes to his niece to make sure that she was again absorbed in the book, and then turned back to face his baby brother, relaxing a bit and letting the memories sort themselves for the telling.
"I was fifteen…"
~flashback~
10-31-89
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care. No, really—Danny's JV football team had had to practice this afternoon for the state championship in nearly Biblical rain and mud (apparently, Father Mulcahey really had disappointingly little humor when it came to finding the Body and Blood of Christ languishing in a gym locker, kept company by some questionable nacho cheese and a cutout of Kathy Ireland from the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition) and so now the oldest Reagan spawn's socks, along with of the rest of his uniform, were drying in front of the fireplace and filling the room with a smoky lavender detergent scent that would cling to those clothes for weeks. His mother had taken rather a dim view of the whole sacrilegious affair, too.
Danny knew that he was lucky that his mother had chosen a passive-aggressive response, and would be luckier still if his father chose to let the situation pass (and didn't decide to pull his grandparents into it, though he sort of suspected that his grandfather would see the humor;) he knew that he should lay low and keep his nose clean and continue his good-as-gold routine for at least the rest of the day. But he couldn't—he was just so mad. Everything had been going fine today so far—his English teacher had given an extra day to review for the test that should have been this morning, he'd aced his chemistry quiz, Maggie Fraser had sat with him at lunch, and he'd survived football practice without having to specify whether or not he'd had anything to do with the prank. To top it all off, Harvey Spann had sidled up to him yesterday between third and fourth periods to invite him to Harvey's brother's Halloween frat party. Score! So why couldn't his parents give him a break, too? He'd already put together his costume for the party and had done extra chores for two days without being asked in order to soften his mom for when he made his case for being allowed to go 'hang out' with his friends rather than taking his siblings around the neighborhood like a big baby. Danny hadn't been proven guilty of the prank, and he knew that he could sweet-talk his mom into just about anything, especially since she was already too tired to argue.
Everything would have been perfect, if the phone hadn't rung just then (Danny would never have thought that he'd actually wish Erin had stayed on the phone longer, not that that would have stopped his dad from getting through. But it could have put him off long enough for Danny to make his exit.) Frank had called, had a very short conversation with his wife, and just like that, everything went to pot—Mary had gotten off of the phone and announced that all evening plans were summarily cancelled and that no one was setting foot outside of the house, so they might as well all finish their homework and get comfortable. She'd seemed surprised when not just Danny-the-hothead, but also Erin-the-sensible, had objected, demanding to know why. Danny had immediately come to the conclusion that his father had heard about the prank and was assuming that Danny was guilty, and the teenager really hadn't bothered to wonder then why Frank would also be punishing his siblings. When their mother said that their father had simply issued the decree and that she had no explanation and wasn't obligated to provide one in any case, that had really kicked up some fuss. Mary had been adamant, but she had also offered to make popcorn and hunker down with her little terrors and some Halloween movies (and that was sort of a big deal, since it was a school night.) But that did nothing to placate Danny and Erin, who stormed up to their rooms, each too self-absorbed to wonder what the other was thinking.
Oddly, the king of Halloween himself, the twelve-year-old meant-to-be-Michaelangelo, hadn't lost his cool, seeming to accept the situation with a shrug. He'd finished his homework about ten minutes before Frank's call, so he'd been free for the evening. He'd picked out a movie to watch with Mary and had gone upstairs to put away the Ninja Turtle costume that he knew he would outgrow long before next Halloween, and on his way back to the stairs after a quick pit stop, he'd overheard his brother talking on the phone in his room. Joe had heard enough to know that Danny was pacing, grumbling… and calling for a cab to take him to NYU. Joe might've gotten away with eavesdropping, had he not taken a step without paying attention and tripped over the cord that attached the upstairs phone to the wall jack across the hall. Danny had dragged Joe into his room, glowering and threatening, and the younger boy had made a solemn vow not to rat out his older brother. Knowing that Joe was good as his word, Danny had relaxed some, and Joe had been just about to leave when he'd spotted movement outside the second-story bedroom window and had gone to check it out. The two boys had discovered, to their great surprise (and grudging pride,) a pajamaed Erin climbing out of her own window. The three had held a mostly-hissed conversation, in which Erin managed to blackmail Danny not just into silence, but into sharing his cab and directing it to drop her at one of the theaters, and giving her money for snacks, so that she could meet her friends for a pajama-party-horror-movie-fest that they all knew she'd never have gotten permission for anyway. Apparently, she'd been planning to ask to sleep over with her friend Shireen in Manhattan and catch a cab to school in the morning, counting on her history of 'sainthood' to buy permission.
Joe had tried to talk them out of their plans, reasoning that even if he volunteered nothing, they were bound to be caught one way or another, but neither sibling felt like listening to him, so in the end, he'd told them to be careful, and then he'd gone back downstairs, cracking out a board game to accompany the movie that his mother wouldn't really care for anyway. He'd really wanted her to be able to relax—over the weekend, Jamie had toddled into the corner of the coffee table and had spent a night and most of a day in the hospital, and while he'd been stitched and observed and medicated and released, he'd been understandably queasy and cranky ever since, which meant that their mom hadn't gotten any rest, either. Joe had spent the next couple of hours keeping his mother entertained with a silly series of Mastermind matches and a running comedy commentary on 'The Fly,' and he'd pretty much forgotten about the other two, until…
~present day~
"Until what?" Jamie perked up a little bit, his gaze still fixed on his brother as he accepted another refill of coffee with a grateful nod for Erin.
"Until reality arrived and blew up their skirts."
Danny opened his mouth to comment on his brother's obvious need for rest, which would have been a great way to steamroll a subject change and get himself out of admitting to anything more, but he'd been so absorbed in retelling the 'safe' part of this memory that he jumped half a foot when he heard his father's voice. Jamie snickered a little, but Danny was so perturbed by the fact that his father had been able to sneak up on him that he barely noticed. "Uh… hi, Pop."
Frank smirked as he pushed off from where he'd been leaning against the wall where the kitchen led into the living room. "Hi, yourself. I see we're discussing ghosts of Halloweens past." He walked around to sit on the couch, lifting his pixie of a granddaughter and taking her place and then settling her in his lap for some rare cuddles. Erin shot him a mock-pout before her expression sank into apprehension; Frank had obviously figured out which story Danny was telling, and he was also obviously planning to stick around. That never boded well for even Danny's evasive steamroll. Their father just had a bigger roller, and there was no getting around that fact. Especially when they really, really wanted to.
Danny tried, he really did, but no amount of asking about their father's day or tossing out ideas for Sunday dinner or temporizing about Frank having much better stories would get them out of finishing this. Frank was obviously highly amused, and by the time he'd thoroughly shot down Danny's arsenal of better ideas, he was out-and-out grinning… and Danny was out-and-out squirming. Jamie, still sitting on the floor with his knees bent and his arms around his legs, saw that his sister was also looking distinctly uncomfortable. He was used to people dishing dirt on him—for most of his life, that was just about all that his older siblings had known about him—and it was a little bit nice to be on the other side for once, especially since this was a family story and wasn't going to end up all over IA and the Post.
Danny prided himself on being a tough guy, but even he wasn't so tough (or so masochistic) that he was willing to tell the rest of this story, and Erin wasn't exactly chomping at the bit to take over, so Frank gave them his deceptively mild 'okay, whatever' look and picked up the thread himself.
10-31-89
Captain Frank Reagan rubbed a hand down his face, trying to stave off the weariness and frustration, and mostly failing. He and his department had been chewing on this case for nearly sixty hours straight, and he hated himself for thinking that the tip they'd gotten, that the scumbag who had been lacing candy with tetrodotoxin was planning to hit a Halloween costume party tonight and watch his or her handiwork in person, was a blessing. Of course, the problem was that this was New York City, and there would be thousands of parties tonight, almost as many parties as there were cops. And the cops didn't have name or description of the perp, who had already been responsible for three deaths in as many days; if not for a particularly observant and curious nurse at the hospital where two of the victims had been pronounced, they'd probably still have no idea that the deaths were connected, let alone how. The nurse, who'd been born in Sendai, Japan, had seen customers of her family's restaurant die from badly cut pufferfish, and had listened to her gut when the little boy from the Bronx and the middle-aged woman visiting Manhattan from Toronto had presented with the same symptoms. The cops had since gotten the two local restaurants which served pufferfish to stop, but nothing about them or their suppliers had popped in investigation, and in a city with such a huge shipping industry, the perp most likely had private supplies without anyone being the wiser.
So all the cops had to go on now was that the perp might be attending some form of Halloween party, possibly dressed as the Joker (which was only the most popular costume in the country this year,) and wielding who knew how much laced candy of all types. They'd tried tracing needles and syringes, they'd tried tracking the candy back to the point of the tampering; the candy came from different manufacturers and had been purchased at different places, and there was no real way to tell how much of it had been tampered with, or how much of that had been sold to whom. They couldn't very well outlaw Halloween—and if they tried, they'd wind up with twice as many parties on their hands just out of sheer New York cussedness.
Frank was secretly glad that, as a newly minted captain and not the deputy chief of Narcotics, he hadn't been the one to have to explain all of this to the commissioner—his father was the NYPD's biggest fan but also its toughest critic, and both of those counted triple for Frank himself.
He hated Halloween.
Captains were supposed to ride desks, and ride herd on their departments, but just now, Frank wanted to be moving, wanted to be in the dirt getting things done, so when he was divvying up his squads to check out parties, he made an executive decision and inserted himself into a team heading for NYU, where the Sub-T 21 fraternity held nearly legendary costume parties every year and seemed a good place to start; besides, in his current mood, Frank thought that he might enjoy putting the fear of God and the NYPD into some of the people who liked serving minors alcohol and drugs.
The Sub-T house was teeming with everything from Greek gods to angels and devils to California Raisins to gorillas to Howard the Duck and Jessica Rabbit and Elvira (and two couples dressed as televangelists,) but the captain, two detectives, and one uniform didn't see any Jokers, and the only Batman there was too drunk to see straight. He noticed with some disgust that the kids were using a hot plate and a coffee pot to heat up the beer, and then dropping in everything from Reese's cups to Smarties to licorice sticks to Jolly Ranchers, and carrying around their 'beverages' in steaming plastic cups. The only people who seemed too attached to the tables of kegs and candy were two kids dressed as Vincent and Catherine from Beauty and the Beast and a dwarf dressed as a candy corn, but just to be safe, Frank had the contents of the refreshment tables—all of them—quietly confiscated for the lab. He had busted some underage partiers and their servers, and was about ready to call campus security to clear the shindig—he and the city cops had more parties to hit and didn't have time—when he sensed something… off. Frank scanned the swarm once more, hoping for a buzz that would hand him the perp and end this night, but what he got wasn't a buzz—it was a boil. He'd thought once before that the bagpiper looked familiar, but it was only now, when he was in position to catch a better look, that he realized why he cared about the short but athletic reveler.
That was his little bagpiper.
In full regalia. From the furry black hat to the laced white shirt to the green tartan sash to the sporran to the kilt to the knee socks to the shiny black shoes. Really, he was kind of cute. But he was also 15, supposedly confined to the house, and holding a red plastic cup. Daniel Riley Reagan might be planning to blow his pipes, but Frank Reagan was about to blow his stack.
Ten seconds later, Frank had his kid by the elbow and was growling in his ear that if Danny didn't want everyone there to see exactly what he was wearing under the kilt while Frank lit it up, then the teenager had better keep his mouth shut until his father said otherwise; the threat, which Danny knew was less a threat than a statement of fact, shut the kid up and had him going a little pale. Frank got them outside and into a cab, and didn't speak directly to Danny until they were away from the neighborhood where most of the universe's clubs had their houses. When he turned to Danny, his look warned the kid not to say anything that didn't answer his father's questions. "So you were out at a party." Nod. "A frat party." Nod. "Tell me, were you home when I called your mother and asked her to keep all of you home tonight?" Nod, and a look like he wanted to say something but stopped himself. "Interesting. I confine you to the house, then find you two hours later at a college party, carrying around a beverage you are nowhere near old enough to touch. Is there anything else I should know about?"
Danny shook his head, then stopped, closed his eyes, and put a hand over his face. Frank was starting to worry that Danny might've gotten some poisoned candy after all, or more than one beer, when the boy groaned, "Erin."
Frank could practically feel the steam coming out of his ears. "Now, you listen here, young man—your sister did not get you into trouble, and even if she had, you—" He stopped abruptly when he saw Danny frantically shaking his head. "What?" Frank snapped out.
"No, I know she didn't tell on me. I—"
Frank had no patience for temporizing or hesitation. "If you're having trouble speaking, I'm sure I can ask our driver to pull over while I loosen your tongue."
Danny looked absolutely panicked at that, which suited his father just fine. "No! I can't, I promised! And you… you wouldn't!"
Frank raised a brow and turned. "Mo, was it? Mo, would you mind pulling over for a few minutes, just over here? I know the meter's running—this won't take long. My child and I just need to preview the conversation we're going to have later."
Danny protested strenuously, but Frank was out of patience and understanding. His only concession to the circumstances, more for the driver's benefit than for Danny's, was that he kept it short and covered, handily proving that he could and would put his teenage son over his knee and loosen his tongue. When he plunked Danny back in his window seat, the boy was squirming and refusing to look at anyone, his arms wrapped around himself, but he was ready to admit that they couldn't just go home because he was supposed to pick up Erin in an hour from a movie theater in Manhattan. Frank was stunned when his daughter's part in all of this came out, but he knew when Danny was lying, and this wasn't it—especially since Danny was a lot of things, but stupid enough to lie to his father about his little sister under these circumstances was not one of them. Add to that, no matter how much they fought (and that was a lot,) Frank's kids were each others' best friends, and when Frank looked worried about Erin being at the movies tonight, Danny obviously picked up on it.
The movie theater staffers took one good look at the armed, badged police captain storming through their building and were only too willing to let him into the cinema where a bunch of oversugared little girls in pajamas were squealing their way through the first of four horror movies that the theater was showing in honor of the holiday. Only a few of the girls noticed an extra scream as a very large man grabbed and lifted Erin Kathleen Reagan straight out of her seat and toted her, literally kicking and screaming (and punching, and squirming, and biting, and threatening death-by-daddy-and-big-brother-and-grandfather) out through the lobby and into the night. The cold air seemed to shock her to her senses, and she twisted to look up at her captor… and squeaked when she realized that she wasn't being kidnapped by some horrible monster. No, this was much, much worse.
Her father buckled her into the other window seat, planting himself between two miserable children who only thought things looked bleak now.
Half an hour later, Mo accepted a generous tip and turned his cab back toward the city and all of the drunken partiers needing rides, shaking his head and thinking to himself that, with parents like that guy, there might be some hope for the future yet.
Frank had unbuckled and gripped both teenagers in the cab, and didn't unhand them until all three Reagans were locked safely in the house. Mary came out of the kitchen, where she'd been making drop candy for All Saints' Mass and taking a break from The Fly, and she looked shocked to see her kilted son and chocolate-smeared daughter in the company of their ragged and furious father. When Frank quietly filled her in, she gave her children disappointed looks that seemed to hit them as hard as their dad's fury, and then she personally escorted them to their rooms, checking and locking windows but saying nothing. When she got back downstairs, she broke down into tears, apologizing for not realizing that two of her children were gone, but Frank pulled her into his arms, assuring her that it wasn't her fault, that they were responsible for their own actions, and that holding her was the only good thing about this night. He did so for several minutes before sighing, releasing her, and encouraging her to go back to the movie and keep Joe company, because things were about to get a little loud. At the last minute, he remembered to ask about Jamie, and she assured him that the baby seemed a little better tonight and was snoozing in his father's recliner.
Frank steeled himself before knocking once and then opening Erin's door. She was sitting cross-legged on her bed, staring at her yellow comforter and absently picking at the lavender polish she'd used on her toenails. She was startled when he came in, and as her eyes widened and started to glisten, her father thought to himself that at least she was already ready for bed. He shut the door behind him and walked over to sit next to her on the bed. He hadn't even asked when she started spilling everything that had happened tonight and apologizing. He let her talk for a couple of minutes, let her get it out, and then told her that he loved her and forgave her but that he expected more from his children and would hold her to the same rules and consequences as he did with her brothers. Then he ordered her over his knee, and when she'd complied, he adjusted her position and pulled down the pajama pants, leaving her underwear in place but warning her that if this happened again, he'd paddle her bare. He gave her thirteen sharp swats, one for each year of her life, and while he could have made them much harder, they were enough to leave her bottom hot and to have her squirming and pleading and trying to catch his hand. Then he took her wrists and pinned them to her sides as he held her against him with one arm firmly around her waist, and with the other, he pulled out the paddle that his father had secretly passed down to him when Danny was born. Frank hadn't used it often—he hadn't needed to, and truthfully, the thing kind of gave him the skeeves, it having worked over his own backside more times than he would willingly admit—but for certain infractions, he'd use it to drive a point home, especially if he had reason to think that his own formidable hand wasn't going to be enough.
He gave Erin two swats with the paddle, one to each sit spot, waited a couple of beats, and then gave her one, just a little bit harder, to the undercurve, telling her that the last was for trying to stop the spanking. While she sobbed, he rubbed her back and told her that he was her father and it was his job to protect her and help her grow up to be her best, and he would never forgive himself if something happened to her, so he'd do whatever he had to do to keep her safe and on the right track. Then he stood her up and pulled her into a hug, letting her lean down on him for a few minutes before standing himself and scooping her up to cradle her and tuck her into bed. He kissed her temple as she settled on her side.
It really wasn't any easier to punish Danny, regardless of gender or age or penchant for getting into trouble, though Frank doubted that his son would ever believe that. It was more familiar, though. And this time, Frank didn't feel the need for a long lecture beforehand—Danny had already admitted to his transgressions, and mostly they needed to talk about how much responsibility fell on Danny for Erin. Danny and Erin made each other crazy, but they were also crazy about each other, and Danny took being the big brother a bit more seriously sometimes than he probably should. Frank agreed that Danny should have done all that he could to discourage Erin from doing something dangerous and disobedient, rather than letting himself be blackmailed and extorted to protect his own backside (ah, how well that had worked out,) but he told his son that Erin was old enough to take responsibility for her own choices. He knew that Danny had heard Erin getting spanked, and Frank pointed out that he wouldn't have done that if he hadn't been sure that she deserved it, just like he wouldn't discipline Danny on a whim or because he was in the mood. Frank also knew that Danny had had more than one friend who'd been abused, and his son understood the difference.
Danny wanted to know why they'd been ordered to stay home, saying that it wasn't fair to give orders like that without a reason, and Frank told him point-blank that parents don't have to explain themselves to their children and that the attitude wasn't helping his cause. Frank ordered Danny over his knee, and Danny balked, claiming that he was too old for that, too old to be spanked at all. Frank narrowed his eyes, grabbed his kid's arm, pulled him down over, and flipped up the kilt, pausing for a second as he realized that his kid was nothing if not thorough—the boy really had gone commando to be authentic. Well, either that, or to impress a girl. That thought relit Frank's paternal seething; Danny wasn't allowed to date yet, and Frank wasn't ready to think of his kid and sex in the same sentence. He didn't really care what the rest of society thought—it mattered to him.
Danny tried to take advantage of the hesitation, trying to slide sideways out of his father's grip, but one fierce whack with the paddle (how had he not seen that coming?) shocked him into stillness for a moment; he was still rosy pink and tender from the 'preview,' and Frank decided that since the kid was a flight risk, he turned the tables and took advantage of Danny's shock by trapping the kid's legs between his own, getting the boy into the idea position before using the paddle to paint every inch of the backside an angry red. Then he put down the paddle and waited for Danny to catch his breath again, feeling the tension and trembling under his left arm and between his knees as his boy fought against giving in to unmanly tears and pleadings. Frank knew that Danny had put every bit of his will into the fight, trying to avoid experiencing the paddling by focusing on being tougher than the paddle or the pain or the guilt, so it was time to switch tactics. As it was, Danny wouldn't be able to escape the lingering soreness over the next few days, but Frank wanted him, all of him, here and now, facing reality; so after giving Danny a few minutes to breathe, and his nerves a few minutes to resensitize, Frank started to talk, and as he spoke, he swatted, slow and hard and rhythmic, coming down every few words, this time with his hand.
"I am your father. My most important jobs are to protect you and to help you grow up into a good man. I do not make rules or give orders to cramp your style or ruin your fun. I do not measure your value by how tough you are or how you make me look. If I didn't love you, it wouldn't matter what you do or say, but I do, so it does. You will not fight me. You will not spite me. You will not pit your will against mine—trust me, son, if you do, you will not win. Is that clear?" He waited, flexing his hand, until Danny realized that he had to respond, and he nodded between sobs. Frank nodded to himself, patted his son's sore bottom, and said, "That's my boy." He wearily helped the boy stand, letting the kilt fall where it may, and then stood himself and looked into his son's eyes, his hands cradling the smooth jaw. "You do realize that the McFallon tartan is yellow, right?" Danny nodded, startled. Frank almost smiled as he thought about what his mother would say if… when… she got a load of her grandson in another clan's colors, but he shoved that aside for now. "Okay, kid. Go wash your face and change your clothes; you're gonna want to be in bed when your mom comes up." He pulled Danny's earlobes before letting go and leaving the room, absolutely sure that he would be obeyed.
When Frank got back downstairs, he found the rest of his little family in the living room, one asleep and the other two staring at the television like they could drill holes through the screen with their eyes. 'The Fly' was sticking out of the VCR, and the tv was on PBS, so he could only assume that Mary and Joe had heard what was going on upstairs and were trying very hard to look like they hadn't. Frank shook his head to clear it, then scooped up Jamie from the recliner. The boy still looked like he'd gone a couple of rounds in a boxing ring, and the stitches on his head were nightmarish; he hadn't even napped for more than a few minutes at a time for days because of the headache and queasiness from the concussion and the shock, and now he was out?
"I sat him in your chair so I could finish Joe's turtle shell, and next thing I knew, he'd lain himself down and dozed off." Mary leaned down from behind and slipped her arms over her husband's shoulders. "Either that's a remarkably comfortable chair, or your baby is as much a sucker for you as you are for those stupid cigars." Frank chuckled a little and gave the toddler a brief cuddle and kiss before handing him to Mary. "How about you go tuck him in and then go look in on our little Houdinis? Joseph and I can clean up in here, and then maybe you can draw a bath for two, and I can dig up some M&Ms for my M&M." Mary whispered in his ear exactly what she thought of that idea, and then she couldn't seem to get out of there fast enough.
Frank enlisted Joe's help to clean up the living room, telling him not to throw away the Ninja Turtle costume just yet, and then he sat down on the couch and called the 11-year-old to him. "You knew." Frank phrased it as a statement, and Joe's eyes widened, but then he hung his head and nodded.
"Yes, sir."
"You also knew it was wrong."
"Yes, sir."
"Then why didn't you do the right thing and tell your mother?"
Joe's head shot up. "I'm not a rat! Besides, I tried to talk them out of it, I really did. But they wouldn't listen, and they trusted me. I'm not a rat!"
"No, Joseph Connor, you're an accomplice—you may not have done the thing yourself, but you helped them do it, and that makes you guilty, too."
Joe gave that some thought, then nodded sadly. "Can I ask a question?" His father nodded. "Who told on me?"
Frank had to laugh a little at that. "No one. I'm the dad, remember? And it's not ratting if someone's in danger; sneaking out, disappearing, especially in this city, is dangerous." Not wanting this to be harder or longer than necessary, he pulled Joe over his lap and gave him eleven swats over his school pants. They weren't overly hard, since Joe was younger and smaller and had not put himself in danger, but the boy felt them, and he was crying when he father set him back on his feet. Frank ruffled his hair and touched their foreheads together. "Hey, kiddo. I forgive you. I expect you to talk to your mom and apologize to her, but we're good. Just remember, from now on, a little less pandering to them and a little more respecting us, okay?" Joe nodded and sniffled, and his father sent him up to bed.
The next morning, Frank was uncharacteristically present at breakfast—and all of his kids were required to be, as well. Joe couldn't settle in his seat until he'd talked to his mother in private and gotten things straightened out with her; then he looked much more content. Erin couldn't settle in her chair until she'd found a pillow to sit on. Danny just plain couldn't settle in a chair, so he ate standing up behind his usual seat. As they dug into their oatmeal, Frank explained the case he'd been working on, and watched his older three children lose their appetites as they thought not just about someone poisoning candy, but also how easily Danny or Erin could have been a victim, and how responsible Joe would feel then. Frank let that sink in for a few moments before adding that he expected them to be on their best behavior for school and for All Saints' Mass afterward, and that they'd all be having dinner with Henry and Betty so that their grandparents could see them in their costumes—that brought on groans from Danny, who never wanted to see a costume again, and Erin, whose costume had been just a set of pajamas that she was sure would take her at least a year to live down with her grandfather. Joe perked up a little, though, and Jamie looked healthier than he had for most of the week. Mary promised that she'd come up with something for him to wear that night.
It wasn't until the kids were about to leave for school that Danny thought to ask about the case; Frank told the family that the perp had been caught unloading candy into the bowl at a fire station party near the World Trade Center. A sharp-eyed uniform had been there just to warn the hose jockeys, and had spotted the perp slipping in through one of the engine bays. The firefighters had been so… enthusiastic about the collar that the perp was lucky to have made it to the precinct in one piece.
That night, Betty McFallon Riley Reagan gave gobs of homemade candy to her grandkids, and took three rolls of pictures, seven whirls around her living room to classic Halloween music (once each with her husband, son, Danny, Erin, and Joe, and twice with her little stitched-up grandpanda who was finally feeling more like a little boy than like a headache with lungs,) and one very long lecture to her oldest grandchild for wearing a green tartan and thereby impinging her mother's clan's honor. Then she made Danny attempt to actually play the bagpipes, thereby conclusively proving that all of his hot air was not necessarily good for anything, she let Joe explain the Ninja Turtles to her, and she traded recipes with her daughter-in-law. Meanwhile, Henry quizzed Erin on the events of the night before while playing with little Jamie, who kept trying to use his mittened hands to shove off the soft black and white hood with the little half-moon ears that his mom had sewn on during Mass. Mary had taken a white footed sleeper and dyed most of it black, using a frame to hold the front of it out of the fluid so that it stayed white, and then attached little foam accents to make it look like the feet had little pads and claws; the baby kept picking at the tummy and trying to get rid of the hood, so Henry distracted him with a rubber band ball until the toddler dozed off on his grandfather's shoulder.
By the time Frank finished the story, Nikki was barely awake, and all three of his children were squirming and blushing, though Jamie's embarrassment was more of the 'awwwwwwwww' variety than of the 'owwwwwwwww' variety. At least now he understood why his dad and siblings took a dim view of the holiday. He picked himself up off of the floor again, running to the bathroom before going to the kitchen for more coffee, muttering to himself about getting some Redline at the gas station. He took off for another shift, leaving his family blinking in his wake.
"I thought this was his day off," Frank said, confused.
"Afternoon off, apparently. At least, that's what he told me. He left work to pick up the boys, and he's taking the graveyard tour tonight." Danny glanced at his niece. "And he forgot his book. I'll have to remember to get it back to him on Sunday."
"Nope. That's okay—I'll make sure it gets back to him," Frank said in a mild, casual tone that gave his children a shiver. At least this time they weren't the targets, but they'd heard that tone before, and when their father sounded like that, it meant that he was unsatisfied—and an unsatisfied Frank Reagan was kind of scary.