Marriage and Family
Chapter One
Martin slowly walked around the empty house, pausing when he passed one of the seemingly hundreds of pictures detailing his life with Sam and the development of their family. When he reached the fireplace he stopped, picking up a picture of their wedding day. It was taken over twenty-five years ago but he could still remember every single detail about that day. Their physical appearances had changed slightly over the past twenty-five years, but he concluded that Samantha was just as beautiful now as she had been back then—if not more beautiful.
With a sigh, he put down the photo and headed for the stairs. There were photos of their kids along the entire length of the stairs, arranged by age. Claire, since she was the oldest, had her photos at the bottom of the stairs. Her baby picture was hung right next to a picture of her in her wedding dress.
Martin's smile was a bittersweet one, as he remembered both the happiness he felt for his daughter when she was committing herself to the man she wanted to spend the rest of her life with and also the sadness that he felt over giving away his oldest daughter.
He had to admit that he was always amused when he thought about Claire's first meeting with her husband. He wasn't there, but Sam had told him all about it.
Sam found her daughter engaged in a major fight with a boy over a box of crayons. They were both tugging at the box and it looked like the box was going to tear open at any moment. She was so focused on going over to Claire and helping her daughter that she didn't notice Olivia was following her over to that scene. "Claire, what's going on here?"
"He stole my crayons!" Claire exclaimed angrily, giving another tug on the crayon box.
"Is that true Nikolas?" Olivia asked the boy in a stern voice.
"No mom!" Nikolas replied. "I swear I didn't!"
"Yes you did!" Claire yelled, pulling at the crayon box.
"No I didn't!" Nikolas yelled back, giving another strong tug.
Sam looked over at Olivia, who was looking at her. "Looks like our children have already met."
Olivia laughed. "Yeah, looks like it."
Sam reached over and pulled the crayon box away from Claire and Nikolas, setting it down on a nearby table and eliciting a cry of protest from both children.
"Alright Nikolas, why did you steal Claire's crayons?" Olivia asked her son as she knelt down to his level.
"I didn't mom!" Nikolas defended himself.
"Nikolas, c'mon. Don't lie to me. I know you better than that. Just admit it." Olivia commanded in a softer tone.
He knew that he was caught and decided to give up. "Ok. I did it."
"I knew it!" Claire yelled.
"Claire, that's not very nice." Sam softly scolded her.
Nikolas continued on. "I stole her stupid crayons, but only because I needed a new green one for my drawing. I couldn't draw purple grass. It would look bad."
"Why didn't you just ask her to let you borrow a green crayon?" Olivia asked.
"I dunno." Nikolas shrugged.
"I think you should apologize to her." Olivia pushed him over towards Claire.
"I'm sorry." Nikolas reluctantly apologized.
After being gently nudged by her mother, Claire replied, "I forgive you."
"There we go." Sam smiled. "Problem solved. Now why don't you two just share the crayons and play nicely together?"
"I think that's a great idea." Olivia nodded.
"Ok." The kids replied in unison.
Before she let Claire go back to drawing, she pulled her daughter aside. "How are you doing sweetie?"
"Fine." Claire put on a small smile.
"You sure?" Sam asked.
"Yeah." Claire nodded. "I don't think I like Nikolas though."
Sam looked over at the boy and then back at Claire. "Why don't you give him a second chance before making any final decisions?"
"Ok." Claire relented.
He never would have guessed that his daughter would end up marrying Nikolas Patterson and that his little girl would be pregnant with twins right now. It didn't seem like she could be old enough to be having children yet, even though he had to constantly remind himself that she was twenty-six.
As much as he hated to admit it, and never would tell anyone other than maybe Sam, Claire was probably his favorite child. But that was only because they had bonded together in a way that wasn't possible with Sean and Rachel.
Claire was there when he and Sam were going through the roughest patch of their marriage. She was there to send him drawings when he was separated from his family. She was and always would be his little princess.
That didn't mean that he didn't love Sean and Rachel too though, because he did. He loved his children with all of his heart. But Claire was definitely the one that he had the closest bond with. She was the easiest out of the three to talk to. Whenever she would come to visit, they would sit out on the porch and talk for hours. Her curiosity and zest for life, coupled with her big heart, were what made her so special.
Climbing a few more steps, Martin found an old baby picture of Sean next to his high school graduation picture. His son was going to Duke University to get a degree in mechanical engineering and materials science.
Sean was smart when it came to all things science related and Martin had to admit that sometimes he had no idea what his son was talking about when he described the types of classes he was taking. But he was a responsible kid, always looking towards the future and planning for it.
Sometimes though, his planning of the future cost him the enjoyment of the present. He had yet to find someone that he was serious about, although he still had plenty of time to find his soul mate. But Martin couldn't help but be slightly anxious for his son to find the right girl and settle down.
He had a good relationship with his son, definitely better than the relationship Martin had with his own father. He had tried extremely hard never to push his son into doing things just to please him, and hoped that Sean would never resent him the way he resented his own father.
He was almost to the top of the stairs when he saw a baby picture of Rachel's sitting next to her high school graduation picture. It was a picture taken about six months ago. She was a very determined young woman, graduating from high school early so that she could advance to college and move towards her long-term goals.
Her long-term goal is to follow in her mother and father's footsteps and become a FBI agent; only she wants to become a profiler. She's currently attending the University of Chicago to get a degree in Psychology. He was sure that she would make a wonderful agent in whatever division she wanted to go into.
Rachel was more like Sam than Claire or Sean were when it came to personality. She was definitely as stubborn as her mother. But she was a good kid who never gave her parents any trouble. She never stayed out past curfew, never came home drunk or stoned, and always tried her hardest in school. The only real problem they ever had with her was the fact that, like her mother, she wasn't a morning person. He learned early on to stay away from Rachel until she was fully awake unless he wanted her to snap at him.
Rounding the corner at the top of the stairs, Martin headed towards the bedroom that he usually shared with his wife. Standing in the doorway he noticed that it looked the same. The bed was neatly made and the lights were on.
The only difference was that Sam wasn't lying on the bed reading a book or already asleep. She wasn't going to ask him how his day was or what he planned to do tomorrow. They wouldn't spend ten minutes talking about the kids and how great they had turned out before going to sleep. They couldn't, because she wasn't here anymore.
She had left a few months ago for Michigan to help Claire. Nikolas was a top executive for Ford automotives and had to go to Tokyo for a few months in order to oversee the building of a new manufacturing plant.
The only problem with that was the fact that Claire was pregnant with twins. He didn't want to leave his wife all alone since this was their first pregnancy, so Sam had volunteered to go spend some time with Claire and help her.
Sam helped by doing laundry, dishes, cooking and just by giving Claire the emotional support that only a mom could give. Her own personal demons with being pregnant made her the best choice to go and help Claire deal with the nerves and anxiety about being pregnant with twins while having a husband that was thousands of miles away.
He was glad that Sam was able to help Claire, and he knew that she loved feeling like her children needed her again. But he couldn't help feeling deserted.
Maybe it was because of the fight they had the day before Sam announced she was leaving to go help Claire. Maybe it was the fact that Nikolas was coming home from Tokyo tomorrow but Sam had yet to make any plans to come home. Maybe it was because she rarely called him. Maybe it was the fact that he felt she was slowly slipping away from him again and didn't know how to fix it.
He was the one that always had to call Claire's house in order to try and talk to her, and even then he only got to talk to her every fourth or fifth time he called. When they did talk, it was always about the kids and never about what was going on with their marriage.
He would have thought that after their break all those years ago they would have learned to communicate better. They had gone through therapy together and had learned good communication skills. He thought that they were communicating nicely, sharing their feelings and thoughts. So now, eighteen years later, why were they slipping back into the same patterns as before?
He sat on the edge of the bed, releasing a huge sigh. How did he get to this point? How did he end up alone in a big house, separated from everyone he loved? How did this happen to him again?
There was another time, over twenty years ago, when he was left living in an empty house all by himself but that felt like ages ago. That time he at least knew that he would eventually be back with his family and back with Sam. This time, he wasn't sure if he'd ever be reunited with Sam. He couldn't help but wonder if she was ever coming back.