" 'Always and Forever'? Maybe I should get one that says 'Irony Reigns'."
Chapter Three
Barbara Jean knocked three times on Kyra's door and entered. "Kyra?"
Kyra was sitting with her back to the door, crossed legged on her bed. She didn't make a sound.
"Kyra, sweetie, can we talk?" Barbara Jean asked nervously, sitting beside her. Kyra turned slightly to her, staring at the floor.
"I saw the papers," she said finally.
"You did…?" Barbara Jean asked quietly.
"Yeah. You left them on the table. So…why didn't you tell anyone?"
Barbara Jean sighed. She had a feeling this was just a lull before the storm – she was lucky she had time to prepare for it, though. Reba didn't have a lull, she just went right to the storm.
"We thought it would be easier to accept if we got it done and no one tried to talk us out of it," Barbara Jean explained. After a stony silence from Kyra, she asked, "Are you mad?"
Kyra shook her head but didn't look up yet. She wasn't sure how she felt through the numb of shock, depressed, surprised? When she did finally looked at her step mom, she spoke with a voice that broke with emotion. "I just want a family again."
Barbara Jean felt tears form in her own eyes and held Kyra tightly to herself. Kyra closed her eyes and hugged her back.
Reba felt herself go very red, and jumped to her feet, glaring at Brock.
"What are you talking about, I don't have a tattoo!"
"Reba, it's on your back. I saw it." Brock rolled his eyes.
"…Oh." Reba, embarrassed enough, picked up the towel and headed to put it in the laundry room. When she came back, Brock had still not returned to his sandwiches.
"Brock, snap out of it!" she demanded.
"I can't, Reba! YOU, with a tattoo! It's just weird!" Brock exclaimed.
"Gee, thanks. I got that tattoo a long time ago, quit freaking out about it," Reba ordered.
"But what – why? And what's it say, I wasn't close enough to read it ."
Reba sighed. "It says 'Shut up and eat, Brock'!"
"C'mon, Reba, what's it say?" he pressed.
"No, Brock, you'll just make fun of me!" Reba snapped.
"If you tell me now, I won't tell everyone else that you have a tattoo later!" Brock promised.
"…Craap!" Reba muttered, knowing Brock had won. "Okay, it says 'Always and Forever'. Ya happy?"
"How can I believe you?"
"You'll just have to trust me, wontcha?"
"Let me see it, Reba," Brock grinned, teasing her.
"Oh, please, no, Brock!" Reba moaned.
"Let me see it, or I tell the kids!" he grinned even wider, knowing she couldn't bear that humiliation.
"FINE!" Reba turned around and pulled up the back of her shirt. "Now are you happy?"
Actually, Brock just wanted a chance to see her back, but he acted nonchalant. "It-"
Unfortunately, Kyra and Barbara Jean walked in just in time to see Reba exposing her lower back to Brock. They came to an abrupt halt as they observed the scene.
Reba and Brock, realizing how strange this looked, both laughed nervously as Reba straightened out her shirt. "Uh…hi, we, uh, he, that is to say-"
"I was just-"
"He was getting a dead fly off of my back…it…fell!" Reba fibbed.
Barbara Jean and Kyra exchanged a 'who do they think they're talking to?' look. Kyra said, "Oh, that's nice. So, Mom, why would it be down the back of your shirt?"
"Good question…! Uh…?" Reba shot a look at Brock. "You make something up, it's all your fault!" she ordered.
"Okay, I don't think we wanna know," Kyra decided and headed to the fridge for a water. Barbara Jean, on the other hand, looked excited.
"That is soo sweet! Brock killed a fly on Reba!" she squealed.
"C'mon, Barbara Jean, it's obvious Dad was just checking out her back," Kyra muttered, taking a drink.
"Kyra," Brock said seriously before Reba could start yelling. "Did Barbara Jean – "
"Yes, she told me, and unlike Mom I am not gonna freak," Kyra finished for him, smirking at Reba.
"I didn't freak!" Reba said defensively.
"Mom, Barbara Jean had to carry you upstairs like a five year old."
"…okay, so I freaked. Now you two still need to tell Jake," Reba blushed, directing the coarse of the conversation somewhere safer.
"I'll do it, man to man," Brock said. "Where is he, anyway?"
"Upstairs with a video game he just got back. Poor kid, I grounded him for two weeks."
Once Brock was gone, Barbara Jean turned and asked, with a huge smile, "What happened, Reba?"
"What are you talking about?"
"C'mon, we walked in here and you were flashing your back. What's going on?" Kyra asked, just as curious.
"If I told you, you'd laugh. I'm not saying anything," Reba insisted.
"Mom, we're already laughing. Spill, or we tell everyone else something crazy- and when I say crazy, I mean crazy for THIS family."
Reba could hardly believe that so many members of your family could threaten the truth out of you so easily in one day.
"Fine!" she huffed, blushing. "I got a tattoo and Brock saw it when I was wiping up some beer that fell on the floor."
"You got a tattoo?" Barbara Jean shrieked.
"No fair, I want one!" Kyra pouted.
"Kyra, no! Oh, Reba! Did it hurt?"
"Who cares!" Kyra waved the notion away like a cloud.
"Enough!" Reba ordered, holding up her hands.
"Can we see it?" Barbara Jean begged.
"NO!"
"Oh, c'mon, don't be a party pooper, Mom! You let Dad see it!" Kyra complained.
"Fine! Geeze, anything to make you shut up!" Reba turned around and showed them.
" 'Always and Forever'? Maybe I should get one that says 'Irony Reigns'."
"Kyra!" Barbara Jean scolded. "You are not getting one!"
"What, because you guys have worked so hard to set a good example?" Kyra scoffed, gesturing to her mother.
"Will you two stop it! Sheesh!" Reba huffed and started over to clean the counters. Unfortunately they were already clean, so she started on the dishes, only to find that they were done. She sighed again, exasperated, as her daughter and friend watched her, amused that she was so desperate for anything to do.
"Mom?" Kyra finally said. "Calm. Down."
"I am calm!" Reba yelled. It took a moment for her to realize how she had said it.
"You know what," Barbara Jean said thoughtfully. "Whenever I'm a little jittery or bored I go to the mall and splurge."
"Really?" against her will, Reba was curious. "Well maybe I should do that…huh." She thought a moment longer before heading out the door, picking up her keys and purse. "Later."
'Later' was at six o'clock that evening. By that time, there were about sixteen missed calls on Rebas phone from her family and when she walked in the front door, it was to seven clueless family members, four of which were worried sick. Two were asleep in front of the couch, and the other was, well, Kyra, who didn't really care. Jake, who had taken the news of the divorce with a shrug and 'okay', was at a friends house.
"Mom, where have you BEEN?" Cheyenne shrieked.
"Shopping!" Reba answered innocently, holding up three rather small bags.
"And that's all you got?" Barbara Jean asked incredulously, peering at them. They were from Chicos and Nordstrom.
Reba gave a nervous laugh. "Uh…not quite." Setting them on the table next to the door, she held up a finger and was gone for moment. When she returned, each finger held a considerably larger shopping bag.
"Whoa, Mom, you got all that today?" Kyra hurried over. Brock was more concerned over what was inside of them, and asked:
"Reba, are you crazy, what did you buy?"
"Stuff," she answered after a quick look inside her bags.
"I cannot wait to see all of it!" Cheyenne squealed and took some of the bags from her mom.
Kyra, just as curious, took the ones from the table, and they all went upstairs, Barbara Jean squealing, "How much did you spend at Victoria's Secret alone?"
Van, who hadn't moved from the couch or picked his jaw up off the floor, finally let out something between a scoff and a choke. "Victoria's Secret? She spent the day at Victoria's Secret? Damn, if she wasn't my mother-in-law..!"
"Van!" Brock glared at him. Relaxing, he sighed. "What got into her, I mean, it's not like Reba to just up and spree like that!"
"She is of the female persuasion, you know."
"Good point. But still, do you think she bought all that for herself?"
"Probably. Why not?"
"Again, good point, but this isn't normal for Reba. She's usually the one that yells at whoever goes out and spends so much, you know?"
"You don't think it may have something to do with a certain man, do you?" Van hinted.
Brock considered this, then sighed. "Look, Van, I just don't think Reba feels that way. I think Barbara Jean got something mixed up or mistranslated something, you know how she is."
"Mr. H, I wouldn't be surprised. You know, the whole two weeks that you were avoiding us, Mrs. H was her quietest. I could do anything and she didn't yell. She just sort of moped around, kept looking at the door every three seconds. You have no idea how much crap I got away with," Van sighed dreamily. "I ordered pizza and used her credit card, went to the store at three in the morning for chips, wow…"
Brock sat in silence for a minute. Then he asked, "You really think she'd…you know..?"
"In a heartbeat. She probably feels like I usually do when someone finally puts Oreo's on the list again and BANG there in the cupboard…great, now I'm hungry!" Van whined and hurried into the kitchen.
Brock shrugged and spent the next couple of minutes staring at the two sleeping children in front of the TV.
Upstairs, Reba began putting away everything that she had bought.
"Whoa, Mom!" Cheyenne exclaimed, holding up a black lacy lingerie. "Whose this for?"
"Me?" Reba answered as though it was obvious and snatched it away.
"I mean," Cheyenne explained exasperatedly. "Who are you wearing it for?"
"Me, myself and I. There's a pink one, too."
"Reba, what convinced you to buy this, look at the price?" Barbara Jean exclaimed, holding up a dark blue formal dress.
"Well, it matched the necklace!"
"You bought a dress to go with a necklace? Damn you, Mom!" Cheyenne muttered enviously.
"You two don't honestly think I won't share, do you? Those Gucci shoes go with everything."
"YOU GOT GUCCI SHOES? Mom, whose credit card did you use?"
"Mine! I've been saving for awhile now, and it was totally worth it. Anyway they aren't real Gucci, I'm not a rich idiot."
"Oh, adorable!" Barbara Jean squealed, holding up the shoes. Then she frowned in disappointment. "Aw, these are way too small for me..!"
"Don't worry, I got them in your size, too," Reba assured her.
"Mom, okay, before we go any further, what inspired you to go so nuts?"
"Barbara Jean and Kyra," Reba answered simply. "I had to get my mind off some things and this was the best way."
"What things?"
Reba glowered into the back of her closet as she hung up the last of the shirts. "You do not wanna know."
Cheyenne and Barbara Jean exchanged a significant 'I know we already know but we have got to get it out of her!' look and Cheyenne cleared her throat. "Yeah, probably not. I mean Dad said that same thing today and I really wish I hadn't pried."
Reba pivoted to give her daughter a quizzical look. "What do you mean?'
"About what? Oh, Dad? Nothing, nothing…"
"Cheyenne, what?" Reba begged, sitting next to her.
"Mom, you do not wanna know," Cheyenne quoted her mother. Behind Reba, Barbara Jean pursed her lips so as not to let giggles slip.
"C'mon, what's on his mind?'
Cheyenne sighed and looked up at Barbara Jean, giving her the tiniest of winks. She got the hint.
"Oh, Reba…"
But they didn't have a chance to explain. At that moment, a knock sounded at the door and Brock and Van entered.
"Whoa, Mrs. H! Those bags sure can hold a lot of – oh my!" Van broke off, holding up the pink nighty.
Brock, who had to blink several times before he had quite gotten the lovely image of Reba in it out of his mind, said, "Reba, you shouldn't have disappeared like that for so long. We were worried sick – and whose credit card did you use?"
"Mine! Get over it Brock, I had to clear my mind so I went on a spree, is that so hard to understand? Besides, I probably spent a little over what three games of golf would cost you."
"Th-three games…? Oh, crap!" Brock moaned.
Everyone joined in the laughter, but Cheyenne took advantage of the distractions to whisper to Barbara Jean, "Call you tomorrow…we have a LOT of planning to do!"
