Some Romantic Evening
Acepilot
AN - #7 in the "Road" series. Takes place between "Domesticity" and "Waiting Rooms". Hope you enjoy.
Oh - and to TinySweetHeart - thank you for reviewing my stories, especially considering that Splintered Reflections is the first AGU fic I ever read, and my inspiration to start writing them! (please update soon, I'm going mad!)
Disclaimer - AGU characters are property of KlaskyCsupo. Nocturama and No More Shall We Part are both Nick Cave albums.
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I took one last deep breath and looked out over the apartment. It was pin-drop neat - I know he doesn't normally have it this neat, but it also wouldn't do for it to be the chaotic mess he always accuses me of leaving it in. The candles were on the table, the music was playing softly. The wine was ready, the glasses were out. The food was almost done. I lit the candles, and smiled.
Who said I couldn't be romantic?
Me.
Oh well.
There's a knock on the door.
Showtime.
I sidle over to it, grinning broadly, and open it wide to reveal -
The wrong Finster.
"Angelica?" Kimmi's eyebrows are raised, and the bag on her hand has fallen to her feet. Her jaw is hanging slightly open.
Well, this could go very badly.
"Kimmi," I greet her happily - or as happily as I can manage. "How are you?"
In response to that, she just sobs.
Oh, this could go very badly indeed. I finally notice that her eyes are red-rimmed and puffy, and that there are clothes peeking out of the bag's zipper.
God give me strength.
"Is Chuckie here?" she manages between tears.
I shake my head in amazement. "No, he's not home yet."
She peers at me through her tear-misted eyes. "Then what are you doing here?"
Lie. Lie, lie, lie. "Uh..." Shit. I'm meant to be good at lying. This is what I do...Chuckie's gotten me soft. "I had a fight with my roommate," I tell her, "and I have a spare key for here." So, not a lie. Fairly holeproof. Hopefully she won't question it too much.
"Ah," she nods, and then goes back to crying.
Do I hug her? Do I try to comfort her.
Maybe find out what's going on first, then decide what to do.
"What happened?" I ask.
"Phil...he..."
Oh, god. Phil. Philip DeVille. One of these days, this girl is going to give up on him. I think he knows it though, so he oughta be on his best behaviour.
Evidently hasn't been today.
I grab Kimmi's bag and usher her inside. This is probably not a scene she wants to have in the hall. She thanks me - sort of. I think she was thanking me. I can't really make anything out through her sobs. Something about Phil, something about "moving too fast". Or something like that.
He proposed to her. And now he thinks they're moving too fast?
A decision will be made after Kimmi's calm.
"Can you smell smoke?" she asks as she sits down on the couch.
The candles. Cripes.
I casually wander over to the table and extinguish them before circling back over to sit in Chuckie's chair.
"Do you want to talk about what happened?" I ask, now that she's down to an occasional sniffle.
She nods. "It's Phil...I think -"
There's a knock on the door.
Oh, this could go very badly.
I open the door to the sight of a somewhat dishevelled Phil deVille, trademark black coat missing, wearing just a dark green top and black trousers - both wrinkled. "Is she here -" he looks up and doesn't see Chuckie. "Angelica?"
I nod. "I'm getting that a lot tonight."
He gives me a slightly confused look before shaking his head. "Alright. Whatever. Is she here?"
I simply stare at him.
"Okay, so she doesn't want to see me. I guess I deserve that." He hangs his head. "Could you just tell her...that...I'm sorry. Please?"
I nod.
"Thanks." He turns to go, and his brows suddenly knit in concentration. "Can you smell something? Like...roast?"
The roast. Oh, god.
"Uh...yeah," I smile, but it's forced, "must be next door. They're good cooks - or so Chuck tells me." You don't live here, Angie, remember that!
"I'll...just...wait, somewhere," he tells me, before wandering off down the hall.
"Wait!" Comes a voice from the living room.
Oh, this could go very badly indeed.
Phil spins around faster than I've ever seen a male move in my life, and pushes past me into the apartment. I pull the door shut behind us and move quickly into the kitchen to turn down the roast while the betrothed couple work out their differences in the lounge room.
The bottle of Jim Beam that we keep in the top cupboard is really starting to tempt me.
They yell. They cry. They're a couple. Chuckie's late. I'm gonna kill him.
There's a knock on the door.
Yay! At last.
I rush to the door, shooting out of the kitchen at a rate that seems to startle Phil and Kimmi, who are standing on opposite sides of the dining table, staring at each other with tears in their eyes.
I fling open the door to reveal -
The wrong redhead.
"Angelica?"
"Dil?"
He sounds curious. I sound pained.
He offers me a slight wave. "What are you doing here?"
"I'm..." keep the alabi consistent, Pickles... "I had a fight with my roommate."
"Oh, sorry to hear it," he tells me. "Can I come in?"
"Uh - " Hang on a minute. I raise an eyebrow. "What are you doing here?"
"Didn't Chuckie tell you? We're staying here during orientation." Dil looks quizzical. But then he often does.
"He said it was next week!" I cry out.
He nods. "Yeah, it was. They changed it. I called him on his cell today to tell him that we'd be a week early."
Finster, I'm going to kill you for not keeping me in the loop on these things.
I finally catch up with something Dil just said. "We?"
He nods. "I think you know Amanda," he tells me, stepping aside so I can get a good look at the very attractive brunette standing behind him. I've known that Dil had a friend named Amanda for years - but the images I can recall from any Pickles family gatherings she'd been too were years old.
The years, it turn out, had been good to her.
I nod. "Amanda."
She returns it. She's shaking slightly.
Nervous.
Hmm.
Last I'd heard, they'd had a falling out.
Isn't that interesting.
"Can we come in, then?" Dil finally asks.
I shrug.
This could go very badly.
"Sure, why not?"
I open the door fully and the pair walk in, to be greeted with the sight of a very emotional Phil and Kimmi standing in the middle of the room. "Hey, guys!" He smiles at them both in that vibrant way of his.
Okay, he's way too happy. Even more so than his normal.
Phil and Kimmi aren't all that happy. They smile at Dil, but it's forced. He knows it.
Awkward silence. Done pretty well to come this far and this be the first time the room's silent.
Dil's smiling, but it's starting to waver and look slightly maniacal. Phil's smile is somewhat marred by the fact that it shows far too many teeth and doesn't reach his eyes. Kimmi can't even produce a grin. And Amanda is standing there smiling shyly and shaking like a leaf.
They've probably hooked up. And me with no-one to bet with.
Someone's gotta break this silence.
And, characteristically, it's Dil.
"Hey, what music is this?"
Some soft jazz. 'Mood' music.
"I dunno. Chuckie must have left it on." I subtly hit the shift button on the remote and the CD changes to Chuck's copy Nocturama, with strains of Wonderful Life filling the apartment.
Not the best song to play, under the circumstances. I kill the music entirely, rather than risk No More Shall We Part being in the third tray.
"So, want to put your bags in the study?" I ask Dil and Amanda, ushering them towards the room that I used to sleep in.
"No, it's okay," Kimmi stops us, "we'll go and finish this in private."
She starts walking towards Chuckie's bedroom.
Without thinking, I shout, "No!"
Dinner was not the only thing I had planned.
Kimmi turns around in shock.
Quick. Justify. Justify.
"Why not use the balcony?" I ask, pointing towards the pathetic excuse of a first-floor patio that we had.
Kimmi put her hands on her hips. "Why?"
Why? "Because Chuckie's very private about his room. No-one goes in there but him."
"How do you know?" Kimmi asked.
How do I know? "I've been here when he hasn't even let girls he's dating in there. He doesn't let most of his friends in there." True enough.
"I'm his sister," the smaller girl quite sensibly points out.
She's his sister. "Yes, but don't you want to be better safe than sorry? Make sure you don't offend him?"
She huffs quietly but stomps toward the sliding glass door all the same.
Phew. I shake my head slightly to clear it, before turning to Dil and Amanda. "Can I get you something to drink?" Might as well be courteous.
Dil nods. "I'll just have coffee, if Chuck has any." He turns to face Amanda. "You want anything, sweety?"
My cousin just called someone sweety. In my presence.
God, I think I'm going to be ill.
She nods. "Coffee's fine for me, too. One sugar, milk."
First words I think I can remember her speaking.
I smile and grab Dil by the arm. "Come on Dil, I might need some help."
It's a bald-faced lie, but I think me and little cousin need to talk.
I drag him into the kitchen and start bustling about immediately. Chuckie always gets a kick out of it when I've got something on my mind, or so he says. Says I'm 'amusing', the way I determinedly carry out everyday things when I'm worried about something else.
I think he just likes the fact that I tend to cook a lot when I'm frustrated.
"You certainly seem to know your way around here, Angelica," Dil tells me, looking around the kitchen in a daze. "Almost as if you were living here."
I neatly field the mug that I nearly just dropped. "Yeah, well, I'm here a surprising amount."
"Ah."
Dil's always been too observant for his own good.
"So, what's going on with you and Amanda?" I ask, still determinedly focussed on the cups of coffee.
I've set out four. Christ. Dil. Amanda. Me. Chuckie.
Instincts are irritating.
I subtly push Chuckie's to the back of the bench and continue to work on the other three.
"We got together a few months ago," he tells me, pulling himself to sit up on the bench.
I want to tell him to get down. I always tell Chuckie off for sitting on the benches, it drives me nuts. But this isn't my apartment. Must remember that.
"I'd heard you guys had had a falling out," I inform him.
I catch his answering nod out of the corner of my eye. "Yeah, that's right."
I look over at him. "So what happened?"
"She faced her feelings," he told me. "The oven's on, by the way."
God almighty.
I reach over and flick it off. If my roast is ruined, I'm going to kill him. It should be done by now, but...
"She faced her feelings?"
He shrugged. "I know, it sounds wierd. But there were some problems, which we sorted out. And so we're together now."
I smile at him. "Good for you, little cousin. Who knows about it?"
"Phil, so presumably Kimmi. I don't trust Tommy not to tell Mom, and I haven't told either her or Dad yet."
Reasonable. "Do so soon, kiddo. Or you'll have problems, I guarantee it."
I hand him two cups of coffee. "She seems nervous."
He nods. "She's terrified."
I chuckle quietly. "Who wouldn't be?"
There's a knock on the door.
I sigh. At last. At bloody last.
I walk quietly, determinedly to the door, leaving my mug in the kitchen. Dil and Amanda have settled in to the couch, and are talking about something or other. Phil's inching closer to Kimmi out on the balcony.
I look to the cieling, and open the door, to reveal -
Another cousin.
What did I do? Who did I offend? All I wanted was a nice, romantic evening. This is everyone's subconcious revenge for all the terrible things I did when we were children. No-one knows they're ruining my evening, but they're all doing it on purpose, on some level.
"Angelica!?"
"Tommy?"
He sounds shocked. I sound like I've been hit by a truck.
"Angelica?"
Lil too.
This could go very badly.
It's karma. Bugger personal revenge, this is the world getting back at me. Because it takes something bigger than six subconciouses to organise a mass-meeting of the sort we only otherwise have every few years, on the exact night that I could have done without it.
"Hey, guys. What are you doing here?"
"I could ask you the same thing," Tommy offered.
I shake my head morosely. "I think you'd better come in."
Tommy and Lil came in. Thankfully without bags.
Tommy was the first to notice Dil and Amanda curled up on the couch. Lil noticed Phil and Kimmi now tearfully almost-embracing on the balcony. Then they both followed the other's gaze.
They both turned to me.
"I had nothing to do with any of it," I tell them, and stomp off to the kitchen.
The Jim Beam is looking ever more tempting.
I grab my cup of coffee and walk back out into the lounge, where Dil is now smiling somewhat nervously at his brother, and Amanda is looking for a convenient escape route.
Phil and Kimmi come back in, faces tearstained but otherwise happy. Phil spots his twin and brother-in-law first. "Hey, guys. What are you doing here?"
Tommy smiles at him and looks at Lil. "You ready?"
"Yeah, but where's Chucky?"
I hang my head and stomp over to the table, sitting down agressively. In my huff I knock the bottle of wine off.
Tommy grabs it quickly before it hits the ground. "Hey, nice wine. I wonder why it was out?"
I grab it off him. "He was probably going to have some later or something. I'll just put it in the kitchen."
Once in the kitchen, I place the bottle on the bench and look at myself in the glass-fronted cabinet. I look nice.
Or I did. Now I look frazzled and exhausted.
I take a deep breath and return to face the music once again.
"What's this big news?" Phil is asking as I walk back into the lounge.
"Well, we wanted to tell Chuck first, but..." Tommy shrugged. "Seems everyone is here but him. So - "
I'm the only one who hears the turning of a key in the lock.
Lil's face lights up and she takes a deep breath.
The redhead making his way through the door is reading over his mail and doesn't look up. "You would not believe the day I've had -"
"I'm pregnant!"
I hang my head.
This could go very, very badly.
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please r/r!