Smoke
.
Ann angrily glared down at his collapsed form on the floor of their apartment, the joint he had been smoking now put out and being crushed in her clenched fist.
"Larie Kanker, if you ever even so much as think about doing something like this ever again, I assure you that you'll be sleeping on the couch until we graduate!"
Larie never smoked marijuana or anything else ever again.
.
Birds
.
The question had been on his mind for a little while now, leading him to finally ask, "Why do you call me Turtle Dove?"
Ann stopped and turned to him, a small smile on her face,
"Larie, do you know what turtle doves represent?"
"The second day of Christmas?" he guessed with a shrug
She chuckled as she shook her head.
"Devoted love."
She informed him as she walked inside, leaving him standing outside her front porch, a smile growing on his face,
"Hot damn."
.
Son
.
Ann looked at her three boys then at the monstrosity on her kitchen counter where their coffee maker had once sat.
Her ten year old and her four year olds gave her big, toothy, but obviously guilty gap-toothed smiles as she looked back at them, looking at them as if to say, 'do you really expect me not to notice the difference?'
It was obvious that they had somehow either broke or completely destroyed the coffee maker in the half an hour she was away from the kitchen, trying to get up the stairs and take care of Mildred only to find that Larie was all over it, and made a shoddy looking replacement, most likely hoping that their parents would be too tired to notice the difference until they could find/build a more believable replacement.
She sighed, it was seven thirty am and she and Larie were going to be late if they had to stop for coffee on the way to work and dropping the younger ones off at daycare, so she quickly decided to just try it out.
To her surprise and delight, it worked perfectly and much faster then the one that had been there a half an hour ago.
She quickly poured two to-go cups and began making them to her and Larie's liking, spotting her sons' look of relief from the corner of her eye.
"You would need to get your father and I up a lot earlier then this for either of us to believe that this is the same coffee maker that I left here a half an hour ago." She told them coolly as she turned to look at them.
They hung their heads in defeat and looked up at her, silently begging for mercy.
"However," she said, a little twinkle in her eye, "I'm quite impressed that you three were able to make a working coffee maker to replace it in such a short period of time. I'm very proud of you three."
"So we're not in trouble?" Allbert asked her hopefully, Larry and Terry looking at her with wide, optimistic eyes.
She took a small sip from her cup
"No, you're not in trouble." She replied, then indicated their machine, "But once your father learns that you three made a machine that made better coffee faster in less then half an hour, he'll have a fit that we spent so much money on it in the first place."
.
Daughter
.
Larie nearly dropped the bat he had been holding and stared at the scene before him with his jaw dropped and his eyes wide.
A grown man hung upside down from a tree in his backyard, spider silk wrapped around his legs.
The man had been watching Ann change through their bedroom window, making her scream when she had discovered he had been peeping at her through the window. Larie had been furious and ready to pound the pervert into oblivion, but now he was ready to cry tears of pride and joy at the sight before him.
"We got him, Father." Mildred said, smiling proudly at the grown man she and her younger sister had captured as she twirled her two spider silk guns and blew on the ends as if she was a gun man from the wild west instead of a nine year old girl.
"Did we do good, Father?" Emma asked, her eyes bright with anticipation as she bounced on her toes like the adorable five year old she was, her spider silk guns in her dress pockets.
Larie felt tears well up in his eyes as he pulled his daughters into a warm embrace,
"Words cannot describe how proud I am of you two." He said, his voice thick with emotion as they happily hugged him back.
He then pulled away and held up the bat
"Shall we take the first hit together?" he asked them.
His daughters' eyes lit up with glee as they nodded eagerly, placing their hands on top of Larie's on the bat.
"Ready?"
"Ready Father!" they cried.
Larie gave them each a kiss on the top of the head before they got to work.
.
Hair
.
Mildred and Emma loved it when their mother would play with their hair when they were little
Her fingers were always gentle as they would thread through the strands of blue or black and she was always very careful when she came upon a knot and would manage to untie it without much trouble, their hair feeling like silk when it brushed against their necks and shoulders
She would hum a soft song to them as she worked or tell them funny stories from her childhood in a melodious voice
She would often dot their hair with flowers or sea shells or spider silk or cute little accessories that she would quickly assembled out of anything lying around
But they absolutely adored it when she would finish, she'd hold up a mirror to show them what she had done and always would give them a kiss on their foreheads and call them her little princesses and hug them tight.
So when she was getting ready for her and their father's 50th Anniversary party,
Mildred and Emma were happy to offer their assistance with her hair.
.
Story
.
Allbert held a book of fairy tales to his chest, an excited smile curled up his cheeks,
Tonight he would read a bedtime story to Larry and Terry.
He had never done it before, normally it was his mother or father who read to them and Allbert was eager to tell his younger brothers a story all by himself.
He had picked out the perfect one, it wasn't too scary or romantic and had enough action to entertain, but not keep them awake either, he was so proud that he had thought of everything and was well prepared.
When it was finally bedtime he hopped onto his parents bed, where they waited for him with each of his little brothers in his parent's arms and a space between them for Allbert to settle in and read to them.
He quickly slipped in the spot his parents had left for him and eagerly opened the page to the story he had so carefully chosen
"Once upon a time…" he began, being careful not to talk too fast and rush through the story.
Then the lights went out, making his brothers start to cry and Allbert yelp.
Once Larry and Terry were calm once more, Allbert then realized that he couldn't read them their bedtime story in the dark.
He felt tears well up in his eyes as his lip quivered and he started to sniffle, he had been looking forward to this all day and now he couldn't tell them the story he had especially picked out for his brothers because the lights went out.
Then his father pulled out a flashlight from a drawer beside his bed, turned it on and held it over the book,
"Go on, All." He urged.
Allbert smiled gratefully at his father before continuing to read to them, his little brothers snoozing as he neared the end of the story. Allbert then soon fell asleep as well, smiling as he, Larry and Terry were happily held in a warm embrace by their parents as, they too, fell asleep.
The next day Larry and Terry both took their first steps towards a bookshelf and managed to pull a thin children's book from the shelf and walk over to their brother and hold it up to him, crying out their first word, "Allbert!" in unison.
.
Babysitter
.
Allbert looked at his parents with an angry pout on his face,
Ann and Larie were taking Larry and Terry to their first doctor's appointments and then running a few errands
Leaving him at home with a babysitter.
He frowned just thinking of the word, he wasn't a baby, he was six for goodness sakes! He was perfectly capable of taking care of himself while his parents were away, thank you very much!
The doorbell rang and Ann went to answer it while Larie was latching his brothers into the duel baby carrier that they had gotten as a hand-me-down from his Aunt Anny and Uncle Tee.
Allbert grumbled under his breath, which was very unlike him, but being only six, he was allowed to be immature at times.
"Hey, All!" he heard a familiar voice call.
Allbert froze for a moment, then a smile curled up his cheeks as he turned to see…
"Luca!"
Allbert cried cheerfully as he raced over to give the fourteen year old a hug.
"Thank you again for agreeing to watch Allbert while we're out, Luca." Ann said. Luca smiled, "No problem, Ann, you and Larie take Larry and Terry and go, I've got All."
"We'll be back in a few hours." Larie informed the teen, "Call us if you need anything."
"Sure thing, Larie." He said with a nod.
"Bye Mother, bye Father!" Allbert said, now excited to have a babysitter around to play with.
.
Secret
.
Larie jabbed at his food with his fork
This sucked
Of course friggin' Derek would be working at the same university as him
And of course at the dinner they had for the professors and instructors, they'd seat Larie, Ann and two week old Allbert at the same table as him, along with the other new teaching staff.
Larie stabbed at his food again as he hardly listened to Derek go on and on about his boring research that nobody really cared about and such, then he felt his wife's hand gently pat his shoulder and he perked up, hoping she would ask if they could leave.
"I need to use the restroom," she whispered sheepishly, "Could you take Allbert?"
Larie nodded, smiling as she gently placed his baby boy in his arms and smiled even wider when she gave him a sweet kiss on the cheek before excusing herself and getting up to the bathroom.
He cradled his child, beaming as he watched a small smile crawl up his sleeping son's face.
"But you wouldn't know anything about that, would you, Kanker?" Derek asked in a loud, taunting voice, waking the sleeping babe and making him start to cry.
Larie glared at him, "What the f… heck is wrong with you?" he demanded as he rocked his son to calm him, "My kid was sleeping!"
"And you weren't listening to a word I said, talk about rude." Derek replied with a sneer, "And can you make your brat keep it down, I'm trying to have a conversation here." He said snidely, then motioned towards him as if to say, 'Can you believe this guy?'
Larie was ready to rip him into pieces, only for a fork to suddenly fly into Derek's hand.
The table was silent as they processed what had just happened for a moment before Derek began freaking out, Larie quickly turned to see where it had come from and his jaw to drop, his eyes bright with amusement.
"Lennard, what happened to your fork?" His mother-in-law asked her husband.
"Oh, I must have dropped it." he said nonchalantly, glancing over at Larie and winking. Larie gave him a smile and an appreciative nod as Ann returned to the table, looking concerned at their crying child and Derek running around like a chicken with his head cut off and shouting, holding his fork-hand in the air.
"What happened?" she asked him, grabbing Allbert's binky to help sooth their sobbing infant and gently slipped it into his mouth.
Larie shrugged,
"No idea."
.
Fixed
.
Larie and the kids looked at Ann, upset for her, as she crouched on the floor and, with shaking hands, gingerly up the pieces of her vase
It had been her grandmother's, and she had always admired it, even as a child, so when she learned that her grandmother had left it to her in her will as a wedding gift, and she had been touched and overjoyed by the gesture
And now it was shattered on the floor
She felt tears in her eyes as she slowly began picking up the bigger pieces and placing them into a dust pan to be thrown away.
While they had all been eating dinner, someone had thrown a rock that crashed through their window and smashed into the vase.
"I'll go catch that son of a…"
"Larie." She said, cutting him off, "It's fine, none of us were hurt and that's what's important."
"This is all our fault." Terry said, lowering his head in shame and guilt. Larry nodded solemnly in agreement, his head lowered as well, "We should just resign from that contest and…"
"You will do no such thing!" Ann said firmly, reeling around, "You two have worked so hard to win that robot making contest and you are not backing out because some… some..."
"Brute?" Allbert offered.
"Monster?" Mildred supplied.
"Poop head?" Emma guessed.
"Dead man." Larie growled.
"Some bully threw a rock at the house!" she finished, then put down the pieces of the vase and gently cupped her twin boy's cheeks with her hands, "Don't you dare give whoever did this the satisfaction of you two backing out of that contest because of this." She said, her eyes soft but firm, "Alright?"
"Yes Mother." They replied in unison, looking a little determined.
"Good." She said then went back to cleaning up the vase.
The next day, Ann looked over at the mantle and saw her vase was back in one piece, with a note beside it.
'Thank you, Mother for convincing us not to withdraw from the robotics contest.
Father, Allbert, Mildred and Emma helped us repair your vase as best we all could, at least until we get the prize money to get a professional to fix it.
And don't you worry,
we'll give whoever did this what's coming to them.
Love,
Larry & Terry'
.
