AN: I've been busy as hell, and it's really making me a little bit pissed. There will probably be some questions concerning some of the characters in here and, yes, they will be explained. A lot has happened since the Mardi Gras ball. Affairs, divorces, recoveries and, of course, returns of 'lost' characters. Anyway, I do so hope this was worth the horrible wait.
Stupid
Where am I today? I wish that I knew I'm holding my heart out but clutching it too Standing on a darkened stage, stumbling through the lines We get distracted by dreams of our own And climb high to the highest rung, to shake fists at the sky
'Cause looking around there's no sign of you
I don't remember one jump or one leap
Just quiet steps away from your lead
Feeling this short of a love that we once knew
I'm calling this home when it's not even close
Playing the role with nerves left exposed
Others have excuses, but I have my reasons why
But nobody's happy while feeling alone
And knowing how hard it hurts when we fall
We lean another ladder against the wrong wall
While others have excuses, I have my reasons why
- Nickel Creek, 'Reasons Why'
Chapter Four
"I— Ryan and I—"
Kendall stopped, sore where her heart lay in her chest, staring at him, wishing he would do something other than stare at her like that, standing there. Smoothing sweaty hands down her maternity dress, she licked her lips, looking away from him, dropping her eyes to her swollen stomach, hating it for a moment. She was supposed to love the baby because, like Ryan and Erica said, she was supposed to just love him…
"I gathered your marriage from the ring on your finger."
She flinched, wanting nothing more than to spin on her heel and dart away but not wanting to at the same thing, something that made her hurt even more, feeling like someone was rubbing salt into that vicious ache in her. Jerking her hands behind her back, the ring a heavy weight on her shaking fingers, she shook her head unhappily. "We're married, me and Ryan… he… he and I have decided to try again…"
"How wonderful for you."
Short, clipped, viciously cutting in its chilled emptiness, missing something she'd never realized was there until it was gone now. Swallowing roughly, tears burning at the back of her eyes, she continued to stare at the floor, or at least at her stomach, feeling like the life had gone out of her with just a few words.
"Bianca's coming back for a few weeks, for the—for the birth and… well, she's bringing Miranda home with her..."
Zach turned away, leaving her to struggle to breath. He had the door pushed half-open and one foot out of the room before she finally managed to ask, "You want to see Miranda, right? I mean, she really adores you, Zach no matter what… no matter what went on between the two of us…"
"I think it's best if she just visits with her aunt, Kendall."
With Little Adam standing by the car, both hands pressed obediently against the side, Erin hooked the strap of the workbag over one shoulder and across her chest, unfolding herself from the backseat of the car and straightening. Slamming it shut, she grinned at the little boy holding out one hand; he only let go of the car with one hand when his other had slipped into hers.
JR Chandler had spent many an hour teaching his son things like that, always living in that constant state of panic at the idea of losing him again. Adam Chandler the Third, like the brilliant child that he was, followed the rules, especially when he was out with his nanny.
Heading into the park, first touches of spring easing the bitter chill from the past months, she let him swing their linked hands happily, listening to him babbling about the song birds fluttering through the trees, hopping between branches and resettling, chirping and peeping right back at the happy child.
Finally getting close enough to the playground with its myriad of happy, screaming children, Erin let go of his hand and he took off, loose jacket flapping furiously as he streaked up the side of the hard plastic play set, climbing like a monkey up the large handholds. Erin, still aware of his movements, paused, eyes falling on Maggie, who sat with bag at her feet and baby stroller to her side.
Maggie and Bianca's move back to Pine Valley had been cause for stress for the already Erin. Long sleepless nights of worrying before, finally, she had headed over to the house that the two women owned and asked what Maggie wanted to do. The med student, a petite thing with dark hair and rich eyes, had been shockingly kind and shockingly understanding of what was causing Erin such stress.
Still, she always worried about crossing the line with Maggie Stone, always worried about being disrespectful to the woman who always understood so much of how many things were going on between everyone in the entangled Kane/Hart/Lavery family. Erin liked Maggie and she, personally, thought Kendall was one of the nicest women she had ever met.
Erin had understood when Kendall had put her foot down, not wanting Jonathon alone with her child without someone else around. Moreover, somehow, in the resulting conversations, Erin had realized that she had gained something of Kendall's respect, especially when a series of odd things happened and Erin had found herself being called Little Adam's nanny.
Then everything had blown to hell…
When she crouched before the baby stroller, Maggie just flashed her a smile and a nod and she lifted the soft screen, studying her nephew's face with a broad smile. Reaching in, she teased one foot for a moment or so helplessly, finally managing to pull her hand back and move away from him to settle on the bench. "I swear, he's getting so big, I can't believe it."
Sighing, leaning back, Maggie stifled a yawn behind one palm, setting the college book in her lap to the side, and then regarded the redhead at her side with her eyes on the youngest Chandler now engaged in a game of Tag with Miranda. "Him and Miranda, I swear, one minute she's chewing her fists and the next minute she's annoyed that what she's wearing isn't Kane enough."
Erin snorted at that, forcing a smile, something the other women caught and questioned her about and, for a moment, silently, she considered playing quiet. However, breaking under the force of the other woman's worry, she looked over, brows creased in slight worry. "Ryan... it's about Ryan," she finally divulged, and the relief that flooded her system threatened to choke her.
Now Maggie was alert again, leaning forward and closer to Erin. "What…? Come on, Erin, spill…"
Erin's childhood had been based around keeping Jonathon safe and, for so many years, she had been the one to help him clean the blood up and hide the bruises when he went out. Now, she had a steady job and she was trusted with the most precious thing in JR's life… JR, the man she… the man she cared about. "Jonathon's therapy," she finally muttered, quietly and under her voice.
"Is Jonathon trying to stop?"
Erin gave her a sharp look, eyes narrowed for a moment before she shook her head furiously. "No, Jonathon… he's doing all the things he's supposed to, Maggie. All of his appointments with Dr. Nelson, like Bianca wanted and we're both going to the group and…" She hesitated, gnawed a lip and finally, despite her attempts, blurted out harshly, "Ryan doesn't think he needs the therapy anymore, Maggie."
Complete silence and she could hear the wheels turning in Maggie's head, the sharp Stone intelligence. "What does Jonathon have to say about this?" she finally asked carefully and Erin shook her head tiredly. "Jonathon wants to get better, he wants to stop the nightmares and he wants to have the chance to make himself worthy of something… but Ryan's getting really insistent, Maggie. He keeps saying that Jon's fine and that he doesn't need anymore help and he's wrong, Maggie, okay, Ryan… Ryan is wrong."
She heard Maggie flip open her phone, begin dialing and felt comforted for the first time since Ryan had started his insistence that therapy and help wasn't needed anymore. Standing, moving away from the bench and closer to where Little Adam was swinging, legs pumping and excitedly yelling at Miranda to go as high as him.
For the first time in her life, she felt something akin to hope and happiness and she'd be damned if she would let Ryan ruin it just so he could live in his happy go-lucky hero world… No, she had been through too much and Jonathon had been through too much to let all of their work be destroyed because Ryan was convinced he was right.
"So… you're Erica Kane's son?"
Collette, a pretty little blonde with eyes like the ocean and lips like Angelina Jolie's without the freaky puffer-fish quality, hovered behind him as he flicked his way thoughtfully through the junk that circled his feet in the abandoned condo. "Yep." He was aware of the fact that when she came back from getting the next box, her blouse had displayed more generous amounts of cleavage than it had before.
Maybe some men would have been quietly disturbed by how eager some women were to get close, very close, to him in order to, just maybe, meet mommy Kane but, as always, Josh was not some man and he never had been one. Quietly noting how nice that blouse fit on her, he kept up his own search through records while keeping a half-eye on her and her movements, tight fabric of her shirt clinging tight to long legs and missing one of those panty-lines most people had.
Collette wasn't wearing any panties.
Maybe after he had gotten Kendall and his nephew away from the Browed Wonder, he'd come back and visit Collette of the Non-Existent Panty-Line and Displayed Cleavage? From where she was now, hovering around him like some nervous hummingbird, he could see just right between the buttons of her blouse and, had he not been so dedicated to the problem at hand, he'd most definitely be promising her that she'd be meeting Kane soon enough.
Damn brotherly instincts…
Kicking away a useless box of junk, finding nothing to aid him in his hold quest, Josh tried to ease the crick in his neck and then turned to Collette, nodding to the next cardboard box with a slightly put-out expression on his face, only half-interested when she bent, displaying her skirt-clad behind.
Who needed a long-time relationship when he had this?
The thought was harsh and he bit back a sigh of weariness, the jarringly clear double-meaning present in his worried mind. He had none of these feelings for the rest of these people, not even little Bianca, who had stepped up immediately, trying to drag him into the family, terrifying him beyond words.
He didn't need another mother; his had been just fine, no matter how horribly it had ended…
Kendall, though, Kendall was something in his blood, something beneath his skin, some connection that he'd once had with Emily before she had finally given into all of her hurt and pain, before the hospital had called him up and informed him, in that cool, unfeeling tone, that she had jumped off the roof and that he was needed to identify the body since, of course, his father was too fucking busy knocking women up…
Kendall, he had finally realized, was the anchor he had lost that night, that connection he had had ripped away and stolen. She wanted nothing from him, wanted no acceptance from him, wanted no extra words or fake promises. She'd understood more, seen more than any of the rest and, because of that, more than anything else, she deserved better.
Kendall deserved to be cherished.
"So, what, exactly, are we looking for in this junk?"
He looked down at the next box, unopened and waiting for him and leaned forward, popping the ties and tugging off the lid. "We're looking for quite a few things, Collette." Noting the flush of color when he remembered her name, he began digging with renewed vigor, knowing this path was probably bust but not really caring.
Everybody had to start somewhere.
"What are you doing?"
Pausing in his conversation, JR Chandler looked up, meeting the brilliant blue eyes that peered at him over the desk, the mess of inky black hair having escaped the ponytail he'd put in just a half-hour before. "I'm talking to someone," he replied, phone cradled between shoulder and ear.
"Who?"
"A…" JR paused, considering his next words carefully, trying to figure out exactly what the connection between him and Bianca, strenuous as it was. There was, of course, their last conversation hanging over them, the off-hand remark that he had a gift for Miranda's second birthday and the vicious fight between Bianca and her sister that it had sparked.
Then, of course, that strained and slightly forced but oddly sincere apology that came from, he knew full well, the only other person in the world who saw Kendall as the amazing and wonderful woman that she was, the one that the rest of these idiotic idiots simply didn't want to see.
Kendall was that link.
"Ms. Bianca's on the phone, honey…" He looked past her, searching for Winnie and found no one. Biting back his sigh, he pulled out the drawer to his side and tugged one of the many toys out and then one of the Dr. Suess books that both Kate and Little Adam adored. "Can you give your big brother just a few more minutes to talk to Ms. Bianca?"
"Hmm…"
That was all, the only response, her head already buried in tales of green eggs and ham, perching herself on the couch along the other side of his office, legs swinging as Kate kept herself occupied. It was a precious few minutes of peace and he took it, restarting his conversation with the sister of his best friend. "You're not making any sense, Bianca—"
"Zach's like a brick wall, JR, it's like talking to some robot or something. I mean, some of the things that he said and some of the looks he gave me… he—" A long silence before, with a slight hint of anger, she added, "Simone called me up last night, going on and on about how Zach isn't mourning Ethan but, JR…"
"Okay, if you're just going to keep pausing for dramatic effects, I'm going to hang up on you—"
"I saw him, when I visited the grave after I got back to Pine Valley and Zach was there but… JR, he was just standing there, staring at the grave, just staring. If he had been talking or walking or something… he was just standing there, JR, just stood there and didn't do anything… he hasn't dealt with Ethan yet."
"That's not new news, Bianca."
"Yeah? Well, Maggie just called me and your nanny told her something."
Erin…? His curiousity now fully peaked, he leaned forward, frowning. He'd been picking up on something odd about Erin, weariness in her movements and her face that he hadn't been able to link to anything. "What about Erin, Bianca?" Everything in the past months, all of this Hell and pain had finally loosened its hold on his heart and, yes, he cared about her even if he wasn't going to admit it to anyone.
"Ryan wants Jonathon to stop his therapy."
If Ryan Lavery had been standing in front of him, in that moment, JR would have shoved the phone where the sun doesn't shine.
"Every time I turn around, JR, my mother and Ryan are laughing about the wedding or going on about how wonderful this second chance is and every time I look at Kendall, I can barely recognize her. I mean, I look at her and I wrap my arms around her and I tell her I love her and she just smiles at me like that's very nice of me to put up with her and just pushes me away."
It hurt to have it all put into words after the long months of watching her slowly crumble under all that pressure and strain, of watching her crack and shatter and finally look at them one day and see nothing but people who put up with her. It hurt. Hurt as much, if not more, than everything that he had been through in the last while.
"What can I do?"
