A/N: Just to pre-warn everyone I'm about to go on a rant, so you can skip this entire author's note and go right on to the chapter if you don't want to read it. Also, I feel like I should say that this rant has nothing to do with most of the wonderful reviewers I have on this story…this rant is just the result of too many months of…well, you'll see.
Okay, here it goes. I've held my tongue on this subject for…how many stories have I posted here? I think this is my sixth and I'm sorry…I just can't do it anymore. I would like to take a minute to point out a few things. First, this is called FAN fiction and in my definition fan fiction is written by fans, for fans. I'm not writing this story in the hopes that it gets on the New York Times Bestseller list or Oprah gushes about it for her freaking book club. I'm writing this (and all of my other stories) for my pleasure. The fact that other people seem to enjoy them as well is an incredible bonus that I feel really fortunate about.
Second, as this is fan fiction and not the Great American Novel I do !GASP! care what my readers think, what my readers like to read, and what makes them happy. I apologize to anyone that this mortally offends, but again…FAN FICTION. I can assure anyone out there that I ONLY write what I want to write and if that happens to involve writing a little scene that makes my readers happy, so be it.
Lastly, only I know where I'm going in a story and I can assure you, it's always pretty well thought out. Just because I haven't written it yet doesn't mean I don't know exactly where my story is leading. That being said, I don't change the outcome of my story just to please others. I think we can all agree that that would be ridiculous.
Oh, and I guess I'm not done yet. I have a piece of advice…lay off the "I hate reading another story about Joe in Jep…and Frank being all concerned and stressed". I have a news flash for ya; these are the boys' personalities and I for one am not going to change them. Joe has a tendency to get himself in sticky situations and Frank just can't help but be the concerned older brother. If you have a problem with that I suggest you take that up with the original author, who happens to have passed away since he's written those original Hardy Boys books. The books where he so foolishly gave the boys personalities that you wouldn't like eighty years down the road. Perhaps there is a great grandchild of Franklin W. Dixon that you would like to call and berate for his unfortunate choices in character personalities.
I've said it before and I'll say it again, if you don't like the story don't read it. It's pretty simple.
Okay, thanks for letting me rant…but I guess it's been six stories in the making. I have a low tolerance for people being mean just for the sake of being mean and I reached my limit a long time ago.
Now, I would like to thank all those who have taken the time to read and review. I must admit, your thoughts matter to me because I want you to enjoy the story just as much as I do. So, thank you! I hope everyone enjoys this chapter!
Four Times Too Many
Chapter Eleven
Maggie woke early the next morning and pushed herself up slowly to a sitting position. Every part of her hurt, every part of her screamed in protest as she stretched her arms above her head. She let out a low moan as her back throbbed painfully from the cramped position she had held it in all night. The bruises she had sustained two nights ago from John ached and seemed to echo in her head. She gripped the edge of the sink and pulled herself up.
Maggie had spent the night on the bathroom floor.
She had tried to sleep in the big bed she had shared with John for so many years; she had really put a concentrated effort into it. After three hours of imagining hearing a car door slam, the front door slam, the bedroom door creak open Maggie had given up. Too much tossing and turning, not enough sleeping.
And she had refused to call Nancy. She had told Nancy she was fine to sleep the night in her house by herself and by God, she was going to do it.
If that meant dragging the comforter off the bed and grabbing a pillow to sleep in the tiny bathroom–the only door with a lock in the entire house–then so be it. She didn't have to tell anyone she had slept the night on the bathroom floor; it would be her little secret.
She stared at herself in the mirror now and grimaced, she certainly looked as if she had spent the night on the floor. Quickly she grabbed a change of clothes and got gingerly into the shower. The hot water served as a balm to her ragged soul and she imagined all of the pain and fear being washed off of her and slide away as she watched the water circle the drain.
Today was a new day, today she was going to sit down and evaluate her life. Today she was going to go to work, a job that she actually enjoyed and she was going to make plans for the future.
She climbed out of the shower feeling considerably better and wrapped a towel around her hair as she got dressed. She paused with one leg in her jeans when she suddenly remembered.
She wasn't going to work today. She wasn't going to start planning her future. Things weren't starting to get better.
Today she would find out how much John's bail was. Today she'd find out if John was going to come back after her. She couldn't help it that while she continued to get dressed, she trembled.
Vanessa sighed as she flipped through the mail neither she nor Joe had looked at yesterday. She sipped her first cup of coffee for the day and plucked the bank statement out of the mail. She ripped it open and smiled. Their checking account was always fluctuating but at least had a decent padding to it.
The savings account however, was the real reason Vanessa was smiling.
"What is it?" Joe asked as he walked out of the bedroom.
"This," Vanessa said dramatically, "seeing this never gets old." She handed him the sheet of paper and Joe broke out into an identical grin.
"Me neither," Joe said happily, "that money my parents gave us sure is nice to look at."
"I know," Vanessa smiled, "we should probably figure out what we're going to do with it before too long."
"I was thinking about that actually," Joe said as he handed the statement back to her and walked to the kitchen for a cup of coffee of his own. "We've pretty much got the wedding part handled, finance wise."
"Yeah, finance wise," Vanessa agreed thinking of all of the details she still had to work out for the big day.
"So, I thought that maybe we could use that money as a down payment for a house," Joe said and walked back out of the kitchen, "it's something to think about anyway and we don't have to do anything about that right now. Planning a wedding and looking for the house of our dreams might be a little too much to handle."
"Maybe," Vanessa agreed and she smiled, "a little."
"Yeah," Joe sipped his coffee, "so what do you think?"
"What do I think about buying a house with the man I love and plan to marry? I think it's a genius level plan, I think it may just be your second best idea yet," Vanessa grinned and wrapped her arms around Joe's shoulders.
"Second best?" Joe asked.
"The first was wanting to marry me, of course," Vanessa laughed and kissed Joe's cheek. She turned and sorted through the rest of the mail before asking, "no word from Frank yet?"
To her surprise Joe laughed, "no, not yet."
"Why is that funny? Aren't you guys fighting?" Vanessa drank the last of her now lukewarm coffee.
"We are. Kind of," Joe shook his head. "Biff called me a few minutes ago to tell me he stopped by Frank's house last night and found him steamed. Cursing me and working up a decent sweat abusing a basketball." Joe sounded extremely satisfied with himself.
"Okay," Vanessa drew out the word, "and this is good because?"
"Frank doesn't get mad, as a rule. So any time I can get him riled up is a bonus, besides…he needs to break. He tends to think clearer and more rationally after a good mad. I can almost guarantee that he'll be ready to talk as soon as I get to the office this morning. We'll have it worked out in no time."
"Wow," Vanessa shook her head, "I'm glad you've got Frank pegged so well, but what happens if you're wrong?"
"Then we start the whole process over again, we fight, he goes home to sulk, the next day we hug it out, the end," Joe smiled. "It's a very scientific process we've been working on for years. We've almost got it down to a T. There was only one time when Frank and I fought for longer than a day or two."
"Really?" Vanessa asked, "When?"
"We don't like to talk about it in the Hardy household," Joe said with a smirk, "we call it The Great and Terrible Fight, yes that's all caps. Frank was ten. I was nine and there was a pretty girl at the ice cream shop that gave us both free samples of ice cream on different days. Frank claimed she was in love with him, I claimed she was in love with me and a week later we found out she was happily married with two children. We try not to let fights get in between us now."
Vanessa laughed, "You two are so lucky to have each other."
"I try not to think about what I would do without Frank," Joe said seriously, "In fact, I never think about it, if I can help it."
Vanessa smiled and leaned up to give Joe a kiss, "don't worry, Frank will always be there for you."
"I know," Joe smiled and looked at his watch, "speaking of, I've got to run if I want to be at work twenty minutes late as usual."
Vanessa laughed, "Perks of being the boss's son."
"Perks of the boss being out of town," Joe corrected with a smile and kissed Vanessa goodbye.
The whole way into work Joe congratulated himself on a job well done. He could only assume that Nancy had worked her magic last night on Frank and that this morning he would be ready to talk it out and apologize for his actions.
He was really looking forward to seeing Frank look uncomfortable and he was really going to try hard not to gloat.
Joe was all but whistling a happy tune when he got out of his car in front of Hardy and Sons Investigations and walked up to the front door. He went inside and saw that Frank was sitting at his desk doing something nerdy with his computer, "morning," he said and congratulated himself on injecting just the right amount of annoyance into his tone.
"Morning," Frank mumbled and had Joe frowning. He didn't sound contrite, as Joe thought he should. He didn't sound repentant or worried, he sounded…distracted?
Joe huffed and sat down at his desk, waiting for Frank to start apologizing, start talking about what was bothering him. He was so sure that Frank was going to open up to him he was surprised when the first words out of Frank's mouth were, "I know you helped Nancy with that ambush yesterday."
Because he was so caught off guard all Joe could say was, "huh?"
Frank turned to face his brother, "I know what you and Nancy planned yesterday and it worked. Thank you."
"What?" Joe shook his head, "thank you?"
"Yes, thank you," Frank nodded.
"You're not going to apologize?" Joe asked.
"Apologize for what?" Frank was confused.
"For not trusting me enough to tell me your problems! For expecting that just because you're the older brother you have to suffer alone, that you're the protector all the time!" Joe threw his hands up in frustration.
"Oh, that," Frank frowned, "well, I guess I am sorry that I don't tell you my problems all the time like I should. To be fair, I do tell you most everything."
"Ugh!" Joe said and shook his head.
"What?" Frank asked.
"Are we going to talk about what happened in that warehouse or not?" Joe asked, his eyes flashing angrily.
"Oh," Frank looked down, "Um…that."
"Yeah, 'um that'," Joe said sarcastically.
Frank took a deep breath and kicked himself for doubting whether or not he could tell Joe his fears. He'd always been able to in the past, but in the past it hadn't been nearly as important. "Joe, it's just…I wanted to kill Greg Atkinson."
"I know that, I was there," Joe said in exasperation.
"No Joe, I wanted to kill him. In cold blood when he was already beaten and bloody. It wouldn't have been self defense," Frank rubbed a hand over his face, "and I've been living with that guilt for the last five weeks."
Joe was silent for a moment before an idea struck him, "you didn't think that I would…think less of you because of this, did you?" The look in Frank's eyes confirmed Joe's statement, "geez Frank! How could you think that?"
"I don't know! Because I'm always the one who's in control and I lost it in that warehouse Joe, I lost it," Frank shook his head in shame.
"Not to toot my own horn or anything like that but I think I'm being pretty truthful when I say that you kinda like me," Joe said.
"Joe, you know I love you," Frank replied.
"Exactly and I'd say that we're pretty close for brothers, in fact I'd go so far as to say that we've got a pretty unique bond. Would you agree?" Joe asked.
"Yeah," Frank agreed.
"Then don't you think it would be just a little justified if you sort of lost your head for a minute when you saw your brother, your closest friend and confidant in the whole world being tortured, bruised and bloody?" Joe asked his tone matter of fact. Before Frank could say anything Joe continued, "I can't speak for everyone, but I can speculate that they will agree with me, but I don't think less of you for that thought. How can I when I would have had the same dilemma, the same crisis of conscience you did? Before you go blaming yourself anymore try thinking about it if I were you. I would have done the same damn thing."
Frank was silent for a moment, "okay, he said. "Okay," he repeated, "I'm really sorry I kept this to myself."
"You're forgiven, but you're going to have to buy me lunch for a week to make up for it," Joe smiled and Frank grinned right back.
And just like that, everything was fine between the two brothers.
Sorry so short, but I wanted to get the "Frank we love you, you can forgive yourself now" portion of the story concluded before moving on to the next bit. :)
