Author's Note: Special thanks to Sparky She-Demon, Adelled, Jojo, ladypuercoloco, Meg, BrittanyLS, JJ2008, Jayne Leigh, and pandorabox82 for the reviews! I hope this confrontation doesn't disappoint. It won't be the last!
Tantrums and Fights
"What the hell was that?" Mary demanded.
Marshall didn't answer her, but turned and raced to his kitchen. Mary followed close behind him. She stopped in the doorway, surprised by what she saw. On the table lay spilled chocolate milk and a child, no more than four or five, had thrown himself on the floor, flailing his arms and legs as he screamed at the top of his lungs.
"WNADSOSCRUFF!" the boy yelled.
"Owen!" Marshall said, sharply, trying to pick him up. "Ssh, Owen. It's okay. Tell me what's wrong."
Owen continued to throw his fit, seemingly oblivious to Marshall's attempts to sooth him, repeating, "WNADSOSCRUFF!"
Mary glanced from the scene on the floor to the table where there was a plate containing a sandwich. She suddenly realized what Owen was carrying on about. "He wants his crusts cut off."
"What?" Marshall hollered.
"He wants his crusts cut off," she replied, patiently.
Unable to completely comprehend what she was telling him, "he repeated, "What?"
Rolling her eyes, Mary snatched the plate from the table. She marched over to counter where the knife that Marshall had used to make the sandwich and cut off the crusts. She knelt down beside Owen. "Here you go, kid. The crusts are cut off."
Owen looked up at her with his big, blue eyes. He slowed his breathing back to normal and sat up, taking the plate from Mary. "Thank you."
"Sit at the table, buddy," Marshall directed, standing up. He helped Owen settle and cleaned up the spilled milk before turning to Mary. "How did you know that's what he wanted?"
"I have two girls at home, Marshall," she answered. "I've been through a few tantrums."
Rubbing his temple, he replied, "Two... girls?"
Mary looked at him, startled. "Delia didn't tell you?"
"I haven't-" He cleared his throat. "I haven't talked to Delia about you."
"Oh." That truth hit her harder than she expected, but she was unwilling to examine it any further standing in the middle of Marshall's kitchen. "Brandi took off and left her kid with me."
Marshall frowned. "Before or after you left Albuquerque?"
Mary lowered her head. "Before."
"Right." His response was tinged with anger as his earlier gratefulness abated with the reminder of her flee from Albuquerque and from him. "What are you doing here, Mary?"
"I came to talk to you." Her own ire rose with his. "Where the hell were you today? You sent me with a rookie, a damn kid! Were you trying to get me killed? That's it, isn't it?"
"What?" Marshall exploded. He grabbed Mary's arm to drag her out of the kitchen when Owen jumped. "How you could you even think that?"
Mary shrugged. "What else am I supposed to think?"
Marshall flung his hands from his head in disbelief. "You were my best friend! I spent years trying to protect you! I didn't walk away from you, Mary! You walked away from me!"
"I wasn't the one who stood on the balcony and destroyed our friendship," she replied, calmly. In the back of her head, she marveled over their switch roles, where she was normally the one yelling and he was the one being annoyingly cool. Things had really changed over the last year or so.
"Destroyed our friendship?" His eyes widened so much that Mary was actually afraid of a split second that they might pop out of his head. "All I did was ask you not to call me all the time!"
"No." Mary held up a single finger, surprised to find tears in the back of her eyes. "What you said was 'I need you to release me' so that's what I did. I released you. I let you go."
Marshall stumbled backwards a step. "That's... that's not... That's not what I meant and you know it."
Mary shook her head, looking away. "You wanted me out of the way because Abigail was insecure. At least be man enough to admit it since you could be man enough to be the one to walk away from me."
That shot a spark of fire back into Marshall and he turned to her, his eyes blazing. "I never wanted to walk away from you! I just couldn't make you number one in my life anymore when I was never number one in yours! You twisted my words around to justify once again running away just like you do every single time things get tough!"
"What the hell are you talking about?" she shot back. "I'm the one that sticks around! I raised my sister, took care of my drunk of a mother. I have two little girls at home depending on no one else but me because I'm the only one that bothered to stick around for them!"
"And yet you've always run from me, Mary!"
"When?" Mary challenged.
"After I got shot," he replied. "After I helped you through your panic attacks after your kidnapping. Faber. Every time we got close, you ran as fast as you could in the other direction! You may have stuck around for your family, but you sure as hell never stuck around for me." Marshall took a deep breath. "What are you doing here, Mary? What could you possibly want from me?"
Mary stilled, studying, really studying, her former partner for the first time since she returned to Albuquerque. He looked older to her, though his hair wasn't any grayer and she couldn't see any new wrinkles. There were dark circles under his eyes; they reminded her of the ones that she had when Norah and Teagan were both infants and she slept for no longer than three hours at a time for months. His blue eyes held no spark, no joy. Mary turned from him, taking in the living room. She could see trucks and blocks scattered everywhere along with Marshall's and Owen's clothes. There were piles of shoes near the front door, but not one was a woman's.
"Where's Abigail?" she asked, quietly.
"What?" Marshall said, bewildered. "I don't really think Abigail is-"
"No!" Owen screeched from the doorway of the kitchen. "No, Aunt Abby! No!"
Mary watched in amazement as Owen tore through the living room, throwing any item that he could get his tiny hands onto across the room. Marshall followed close behind him trying to simultaneously clean up the thrown items and prevent Owen from tossing new ones. The result was an even bigger mess. Owen screamed so loud that Mary could hardly believe that the police hadn't shown up at the door already.
Owen had just reached the dvd stand when Marshall's cell phone rang. He glimpsed at it, briefly, and said with a sigh, "It's Stan."
"Take it. I'll get him," Mary promised. She stepped over to Owen when Marshall hesitated and snatched him up. Marshall stepped into the hallway. Owen punched and kicked her as she brought him to the couch, but Mary held onto him until he stopped fighting her. "See, kid, that wasn't so bad, now was it?"
"Huh?" Owen asked eying her suspiciously.
Mary chuckled. "Why were you throwing stuff around?"
Owen's blue eyes narrowed. "I don't want Aunt Abigail to come back."
That was definitely an interesting development, Mary thought to herself. She opened her mouth to say more, but was stopped by Marshall returning to the room. His face was pale. "What did Stan want?"
"I've been suspended."