Fresh from the shower and dressed in a pair of boxers and old tee shirt, Stephanie padded into the kitchen. She opened the oven a crack and peeked in. Suddenly a pair of arms encircled her waist and pulled her close, kissing the side of her neck. She couldn't help but smile to herself.
"Mmmm. You smell good. All shampooie and spaghetti sauce. And I love you in my underwear." Joe told her kissing her neck some more.
Stephanie couldn't help but laugh as she turned around to face him. "Hopefully I only smell all shampooie and the chicken smells like sauce."
"Smells good, looks sexy in my underwear and cooks. What a woman." He teased, leaning her into the counter as he kissed her some more.
"Down boy!" She told him, putting a hand to his chest. "Food first." She disentangled herself from him, grabbed the pot holders and pulled the casserole dish from the oven as he put his keys, phone and gun on the counter then opened the fridge and grabbed two beers. "And don't get too excited, I didn't cook so much as re-heat. Apparently chicken was on sale, so your mother made us up a bunch of batches of chicken." She nodded towards the freezer.
Joe closed the fridge and pulled open the freezer door and peered into the freezer which was now much fuller than it was this morning. "Works for me." He told her, closing the door.
"You're pathetic, letting your mommy fill your freezer." She teased him.
"Says the woman who happily will live on leftovers. Especially if she can miss the original family meal." He grinned at her.
Stephanie waved a hand at him. "Totally different." She said as she plated up the chicken. "My mother has to cook for my father anyway. Your mother cooks for you."
"And you." He leaned in and kissed her on the nose. "She makes the saltimbocca because she knows you like it. Besides, it makes her happy."
Stephanie picked up the plates while Joe got the beers and silverware and they headed towards the living room. "That's true. Maybe we should give her grocery money." She suggested, sitting on the couch.
Joe shook his head as he sat down beside her. "I've tried. She won't take it."
Stephanie took a bite of her chicken parmigiana. "Maybe if we gave her a gift card for ShopRite and then placed orders for stuff. Sort of like her own little business."
"Maybe. It's worth a try." He told her eating some more of his dinner before spying the DVD on the coffee table. "Your rented a movie?"
A sigh escaped Stephanie as she did a small eye roll. "Yes. Grandma Mauzer had rented movies that needed to go back to Blockbuster. And of course they were late because she couldn't get a ride to return them."
At that Joe grinned. "Your grandma huh? She get anything good?" He teased, nudging her with his knee.
She made a face. "I don't know. I was afraid to look. I figured it was safer to look around and find something for us and let her deal with her own late fees and check out. Maybe I should set her up a Netflix account. Then she can order any crazy thing she wants and no one else has to be involved."
Joe laughed out loud. "I don't know! Does Netflix rent porn? At least porn up to your grandma's standards?"
"You are so not funny! What if this was your grandmother we were talking about here?" Joe gave her a skeptical look before she continued. "Oh my god!" She exclaimed around the bite of chicken she had just taken. "I forgot to tell you! Guess who I saw today!"
"Who?" Joe asked, drinking down his beer.
"Mario!"
"Mario who?" He asked, confused.
"Zook Mario! But he's going by just plain old Mario now. He's working at the Blockbuster."
"Really? How's he doing?" Joe asked, genuinely interested.
"Sounds like they are all doing pretty good. Dom's working, so it sounded like that was helping Loretta out a lot. He said things were going good. I asked him and he even said he'd been staying out of trouble."
Joe leaned back into the couch. "That's good. He's a good kid." Stephanie eyed him from her side of the couch for a moment. "What? Don't try and look innocent, I can tell you're thinking something." He told her after she tried to look away.
"It's nothing."
"What? Just say it." Joe told her, having a feeling he knew where this was going.
"Well….. did you really never think Mario was yours?"
"I told you." He said leaning forward and setting his plate on the coffee table. "No. I never really worried about it. I never remembered anything with Loretta in high school. And besides, I was always careful."
Stephanie just gave him a look. "Right. Careful. With everyone but me."
Joe did a small eye roll before taking Stephanie's plate from her hand, setting it on the coffee table next to his, putting an arm around her and pulling her over to him. "I told you, you were special."
"Uh huh." She leaned back into him, wrapping his arm around her waist more. "That's like code for desperate and unprepared."
"No."
"Yes." She said with just the slightest of an almost laugh.
"Okay, maybe a little." He told her, kissing her on the head. "But desperate for you."
They sat in a comfortable silence for a few minutes. "Did you really mean what you said that day? If we hadn't been so lucky that time? About how it would be easier now?"
He thought back to the conversation for a moment. "Sure. It would have been easier. We would have got married, had a couple of kids and skipped all that other crap. It would be good."
She turned and looked at him, eyes wide in amazement. "You can't possibly be serious?"
"What? You don't think so?" He gave her a little grin. "At least it would have saved me a broken leg."
"HA!" She laughed as she did a little eye roll. "Broken leg would have been the least of your worries! Putting aside my father, and your father, who was still around then if you recall, let's think about this.
"You go off to boot camp or whatever you call it in the Navy. Then I drop out of high school, we get married and move down to Maryland.
"By then I'm 17 and pregnant, no skills, no diploma, no hope of getting a job. And you think I can't cook or know anything about kids now? Back then I couldn't even have handled the hamster." She jerked a thumb towards the kitchen.
He grinned with her. "We would have been fine."
Stephanie gave another eye roll of disbelief. "So it would be you, me and a baby, and you were making what? About $12 a month when you were first in the Navy?"
This produced a full on smirk from him. "Maybe more like $15 a month. I would have dependents."
"Right. In other words, we would have been beyond flat broke. Both our mother's would have been sending us money. Which, buy the way I would have had to hide in the diaper bag, because it would have been the one safe place since I so don't see you changing diapers at eighteen.
"Plus if I didn't hide the money, you would have spent it all, out drinking with your buddies in a desperate attempt to get away from your nagging wife and screaming kid.
Still grinning, Joe raised his eyebrows and opened his mouth to defend himself. Before he could get a word out, Stephanie rushed on."Then while I'm home eating Pop Tarts and spaghetti, up to my elbows in diapers, you'd be at some dumpy little bar outside the Navy base. It would be filled with under aged girls, who had actually gotten showers that day and didn't have baby food in their hair, and had all watched Top Gun and were looking at you like you're Tom Cruise and the answer to their prayers.
This got her an eye roll and a snort from Joe. Showing him how an eye roll was supposed to be done, she continued. "Next thing you know, you'd be cheating on me and chasing anything in a skirt. Finally you'd realize you'd turned into your father and start drinking even more. Eventually, I'd leave your sorry ass, moving home to my parents. You'd go ballistic. Even though we couldn't stand each other by then because 'Morreli's don't get divorced' so you'd turn into a stalker to get me back, just so we could repeat the whole cycle. It would all end in a restraining order, your wages garnished for child support and court appointed visitation for the kid, probably taking place at your mom's."
During all this Joe had listened to everything she said. The grin had slowly slid from his face. "God that's depressing." He finally said. "It wouldn't have been that bad."
"Yes it would have." She said softly.
"I would have changed diapers."
"You would change diapers now. At eighteen, Joe Morelli, the coolest guy at school, would never have changed diapers." She said, shaking her head.
He thought about that for a moment. "You're right. Back then I never would have changed diapers."
"It would have been a disaster of epic proportions." She said as she intertwined their fingers.
"You're right. You would have strangled me in my sleep."
"Quite possible." She smiled, trying to sound sincere.
"That's not still a possibility is it?" He asked, running his other hand up and down her arm.
"No." She grinned, leaning into him more. "Not on most days at least. And if I did do it now, it would be for totally different reasons."
"Good to know." He laughed as he kissed her on top of her head. They sat there, not speaking for a few moments before he leaned back against the couch again. "I was a real jackass as a kid."
"True. You were too hot and too confident for your own good."
He wrapped his arms around her tighter and pulled her almost on his lap. Leaning in close to her he said softly "You know I'd never do any of that stuff now right? I'm not my father Stephanie. And I'm not that stupid kid."
Stephanie rested her head on his shoulder and looked him in the eye. "I know that. I know it would never be like that now. We're totally different people than we were back then. We grew up. Besides, 'all that other crap' is what makes us who we are now. And I like you much better now than I ever would have back then. I was enchanted by Joe Morelli the boy, but I love Joe Morelli the man. And you're a good man Joe. Nothing at all like your dad. And I do love you.
"I'm glad it didn't happen back then. It may have got us together originally 15 years earlier, but it would never have been what we've got now. What we've got now, finally, is good. Real good. And I'm glad for that too. I love you Joe."
"I love you too Cupcake. I love you too."