Heeeey guuuuuys! It's me again! And I bring with me the official sequel to my story Peaches, Puzzles, and Problems! I actually had this story more or less planned out when I wrote PPaP, but it took me a while to write it because, well, the last story was like 230-something pages and I needed a break. But now I'm back, and so is the whole motley crew to bring the latest story to all of you.
Thank you, thank you, thank you Beta Readers! You've stuck with me this far and I hope that you'll stick around for even longer!
Quick warning to my readers- when I wrote Peaches, Puzzles, and Problems, I was still in college and didn't have a real career at the time. I have a definite plot written down, but it'll probably take me longer to write and publish all the different chapters than it took the last time. As long as you're all okay with that, we should be just fine. But don't worry- I have no intention of leaving this story out to dry. It'll just take a bit longer to finish.
I don't own TMNT or any characters therein. So please don't sue. And now, without further ado, I present to you all…
Chapter One
My name is Irma Rose Langinstein. Up until about a year ago, I lived a fairly normal life (I say fairly because I think I'm incapable of really being normal), had a simple but enjoyable job as a librarian, an occasional fling, a ridiculously over-achieving family who looked down on me, and two failed marriages. Alright, one failed marriage. The second husband was the one I got the divorce from. The first one died in a car wreck.
The point is I had a regular, uneventful existence, unlike my best friend April O'Neil's life. And really, it's her fault that I'm still not an oblivious, run-of-the-mill person. Now I run her antique store after my apartment and library were set on fire, and I'm dating a ninja turtle named Donatello who, granted, would not usually be my type, but he's got gorgeous eyes, a fantastic physique, and he treats me like a queen. Also I love him more than I can say.
It's a long story. I'll explain a little bit.
I met the turtles when April was attacked by a rogue group of ninja that had splintered off of the Foot Clan. She had been seriously injured by some explosions and while I was visiting her in the hospital, those same ninjas snuck in hoping to slit our throats. The turtles came in to rescue her, and consequentially myself as well. We didn't know each other at the time. It was a happy coincidence. That was also the first time Donatello saved my life.
Over the course of the next year, the turtles and Master Splinter became sort of my new family, and they were closer to me than my own was. Donatello and I grew even closer than that, although it took us a great deal of time, a psychopathic ex-Foot ninja, a magic peach, and my own near death for us to realize it.
Like I said, it's a long story. I'll have to tell you guys about it some other time. It's a very important one because it was the first chapter of my own tale with Donatello, and it's the best one in my life. Not that this one is any less wonderful. Actually it might be a little bit better than my own, because this story belongs to the most unlikely of Donatello's brothers. His name is Raphael. Normally, I wouldn't really discuss this myself because it's pretty personal, and I honestly try not to stick my nose in that sort of thing. But I'm taking it upon myself to tell it because it kind of started with me. Well, with my ex-husband. The second one.
Sit back and enjoy. You're gonna love this.
It was in the early hours of the morning. The sun hadn't yet risen and the streets of New York were (comparatively) quiet. I had awoken from my sleep a few minutes before, but, still feeling that lethargy that sits in your limbs once you're comfortable, I decided to remain in bed and simply enjoy the feeling of my soft, warm pillows and blankets. My eyes stayed closed as I tried to remember what I had been dreaming of only seconds before, and at the same time I found myself thinking "I'll come up with my own ending."
I had no idea what time it was, and neither did I care. All I knew was that I was sleepy, warm, and cozy, and if anyone tried to mess with me and my peace, they were going to be quickly dismembered. Not two minutes later, I heard a window in my kitchen slowly slide open, and the sound of someone carefully crawling through the small space. I sighed in my sleep and reached over (with my eyes closed) for the mace that I had hidden by taping it to the wall behind my nightstand just in case it was a robber or serial rapist. I really should have been freaking out at that point and dialing 911, but I was sort of numb to it. Being almost killed several times seems to have a thing about curing a person of that. Hence the mace. And besides that…
A foot crossed the threshold of my bedroom. My hand wrapped around the mace and I sat up, eyes open, prepared to pepper the intruder mercilessly, but then a force lunged at me, tackled me to the bed, pinning my hands down onto my mattress. My eyes had closed instinctively from the force that had caught me, and when I opened them my vision was filled with green. I couldn't focus because I wasn't wearing my glasses and the person was too close. "Your reactions are still slow," the green blur said.
I grinned and sat up a little to press a kiss to the blur's forehead. "I just woke up and I'm not wearing glasses. Give me a break, Don."
The kiss was returned, pressed against my nose, and my turtle's voice had a hint of laughter in it. "What've your glasses got to do with anything?"
I shrugged my shoulders. "Not much. Just wanted to use it as a defense. Now, would you mind letting me up? I need to get a head start on the day."
The fingers around my wrists tightened ever so slightly. "Not yet," I heard him whisper huskily above me. "The day can wait a little longer. Besides, this is too good of an opportunity to waste." And when he pressed his lips against mine I decided that I didn't care to argue with him.
A couple of hours later, I stepped out from the shower and walked into my room to see Donatello still laying in my sheets, his bandana and armguards strewn wherever they had fallen in my room. He opened his eyes sleeping to watch me cross my room to get clothes from my drawers, a slow smile crossing his lips.
"See something you like?" I asked teasingly as I pulled out my outfit for the day.
"I see several things I like and one thing I love," he responded, and then yawned.
"Long night?" I asked, pulling the clothes on.
"M-hmm." He pulled my blankets over him and rolled over to my side of the bed, propping my pillow up under his head. "We were out from eleven until six, and then I came here. Stopped six robberies, two muggings, and what I strongly suspect would have been a rape."
Pulling my shirt on, I walked over to the bed and then leaned over to kiss his forehead. "My hero," I said softly before brushing a thumb over his cheek. He caught my hand in his and kissed it before letting it go. "You coming here tonight?" I asked turning back to grab a pair of shoes.
"Maybe," he said. "Splinter might have me stay in and train though."
"Oh. You want me to come down to visit?" I debated over which pair of earrings to put on when I heard him chuckle behind me. "Nope. Splinter thinks you might be too much of a distraction."
"Alright then." I finished accessorizing and then started walking towards the door to my apartment. April's pawnshop, Second Time Around, was right underneath, and I worked there by myself usually. April loved her store, but she loved being in the action even more, so she and her now-fiancée, Casey Jones, were usually out in the field, looking up artifacts and having crazy adventures together. Then whenever she got home, she'd have more adventures with the four turtle brothers. Personally, I had more than enough adventures to satisfy me without going out to look for more. Smiling wistfully at the bo staff that Donatello had stood in the corner of my living room, I recalled all the times he had used it in my defense. And all the times I had borrowed it to smack something. Or someone. "Help yourself to anything in the fridge," I called back to him as I walked to the front door.
As I turned the handle, his voice came floating in from the bedroom. "Irma!"
"Yeah, Don?" I called back.
"I love you!"
I could feel my cheeks flushing and a shy smile crossing my lips. "I love you, too!" I called back.
The Second Time Around wasn't an overly popular store, at least not at first glance. Walk-in customers weren't that common and the stock didn't look too much like what regular stock was supposed to. But to be honest, the real clientele preferred to contact us via phone or email. That was because the usual clientele were people in museums or who owned private collections. Our stock consisted mostly of very rare and very valuable items that were stored elsewhere, so what was in the actual store was mostly books and old jewelry, along with some paintings and figurines. Basically the store was sort of a front for the larger work we did. I was supposed to handle the store and take care of any customers that came in, and I did, but I also managed deliveries and took orders. I know that all this makes it sound like we did black-market stuff, but the secrecy was more because a lot of our customers wanted digression. It was true that occasionally we went into the black market to get what we wanted, but we sold only to upstanding citizens. Or people who could pass as such.
Usually when I worked in the store I was on the computer working around orders or trying to communicate with April, who was out of the country at the moment trying to find some old crucifix made by Italian monks in the fourth century. Or something like that. I actually kind of liked it when she was gone. When she was home she tended to get into trouble, and she tended to involve me as well. Last time she did this, we were almost arrested twice and I blew up a car. Well, not on purpose. Someone had planted a bomb on the car that I stole- borrowed, really, because it belonged to some cartel lord and stealing from them doesn't really count- and Leonardo had found out in time to contact me so I could jump out. But then it blew up and took two other cars with it. Anyway, the point is that some of April's escapades were only borderline legal, and I had trouble toeing that line. Mostly because I just didn't have the grace to pull off the odd jobs, nor was I certain that my heart could hold out in the constant pressure. Besides all that, Donnie didn't like it when I was in the middle of all the dangerous activity. The Hamato family worked closely with April and Casey's crime-fighting escapades, and all of them were trained to avoid nasty things like death. As for myself, Death and I were practically best friends.
But lately things had begun to change a bit. With Casey and April's upcoming nuptials, the husband-to-be was trying to get the stubborn red-head to calm the heck down in an attempt to avoid body casts on the big day. Which was unannounced. Still. As the maid of honor, I had had words with my friend about this, and she had responded with "I'm working on it, Irma, just give me some time." Finally I had just thrown my hands up in the air and had said "Oh, to hell with it."
That had been a couple of weeks ago. Now I was downstairs getting ready to open the store when I noticed the mailman getting out of his truck to make his usual delivery. I met him at the door with a friendly smile and took the mail before turning to go back inside.
"Wait, wait," I heard the man say. I looked back at him and he was getting a package out as well. "Here you go. For an Irma Langinstein."
I was surprised. "Well, that'd be me." I wracked my brain, trying to think of what could be in there. I hadn't ordered anything. April hadn't said anything about sending me something. My family most definitely weren't the kind of people who would send me anything. I signed off on the package and took it with a small frown. "Huh," I said to myself. "Now what could you be?"
I waved at the mailman as he left and then went inside to see what was in the box. I set it on the counter and grabbed a pair of scissors. And that was when I noticed it. The person who had sent the box was my ex-husband, Paul Keating.
At first I instinctively wanted to get a matchbox and burn the thing. He and I hadn't exactly parted on the best of terms. I had set fire to his favorite suite and he had shattered a crystal vase from my great aunt, who I hadn't actually liked at all, but it was a crystal vase and you just did not pull that crap! But I gave myself a minute and took a breath. If it was something particularly nasty, I could just go to the police and sue him. Or slash his tires. Or something. Taking the scissors again, I quickly slashed through the tape and opened up the lid, my apprehension making me slightly nervous. Luckily the contents of the box weren't nearly as scary as I had thought.
Inside there was a post-it note from Paul that said "Found this box of junk and didn't want it, so you can have it back." I could practically feel the restrain radiating from the note. I was surprised he hadn't written something with more bite, like "I don't want your crap and you're lucky I didn't put it up on the internet." The box was filled with things that I recognized that I had while I was married to him. There were a few picture frames, a couple of books, and… I froze for a moment and then slowly reached into the box to pull out a stack of letters. I knew what these were. I didn't even have to open them to know what was inside.
When I was dating Paul, and even in the first year of our marriage, I had written love letters to him. Just short, sweet things that I had stuffed into his bag, or his coat, or his papers, so he could find them later and read them. Several of them were a bit on the steamy side, yes, but the majority were just cute. Not that he had really appreciated them. He had tossed most of them aside in his haste to do whatever it was he was doing. From what I heard, it was typically to get some other woman's clothes off. But that just made my blood pump, and I set the letters aside to see what else was in there. "Oh, for god's sakes," I muttered to myself. Paul had been thoughtful enough to include in the pile of junk our wedding photo album, still sitting in its lovely white and gold book. I was sure, judging from the fine layer of dust on it, that he hadn't opened it in years. Not that he ever had before either. I tossed the album back into the box and set it on the floor behind the counter for the duration of the day. Later that night, when brought it all upstairs with me, I dumped it on the coffee room table. It had brought back memories from before, and while they annoyed me, they also made me a little sad. The letters and the pictures had been from a time when I had been happy and thought I was in love (looking back now, I hadn't really been, but that didn't make it hurt less). I hadn't decided what I was going to do with them yet, but I knew one thing for sure- if I kept them around, they were going to be trouble.
I didn't know until later just how right I was.
One chapter down, who knows how many more to go! If you've read Peaches, Puzzles, and Problems and are wondering how long it's been since that story ended and this one began, it's been just a few months, so not too much has happened in the meantime. Things will continue to get interesting as time goes on, and Lord willing, it'll be fun to read and write.
If you see any issues with the story, please let me know and I'll do my best to rectify the situation. Or if you just want to review and say you think it's fantastic, that's fine too! I know I'd appreciate it! See you next time!
