DISCLAIMER: Don't own anything associated with the show… I just like playing with the characters in it from time to time. Dance Monkeys! Dance!
RATING: Teen
SPOILERS: None - No. 6 in the Discovery Series
PAIRINGS: GSR/Yo!Bling/Etc.
SUMMARY: The continuing years of the Discovery Series storyline. The family storyteller gathers up some photos and shares a perspective on the past. (including a "photo album")
A/N: I'm flying solo on this one now, because the beta most familiar with this story is currently beating her head against the brick walls of higher education. And besides, who has time to ferret through another 12 page mammoth of mine all the time. ;)
A/N2: I know it's been a while and I apologize, but Darth Real-Life is a vicious master sometimes. Right now I am trying to catch up with the graphics side of things. I already have the next chapter written, but I have a lot of pictures to manipulate, so I will have to beg for your patience. Thanks for still sticking with this series!
REVIEWS: Reviews are the way I know if people are enjoying the work or not. So, if you leave one, THANKS! And if not, I hope you found at least a little something to brighten your day, and thanks for taking the time to read.
"Wow!" Michael stood up, marveling at the progress they had made in just two days. "I can't believe how much we've gotten done, Mom."
Stephanie was quite proud of herself, as well as her assistants. "It's amazing how much faster it goes when you have company."
As they looked around the table at all their work, Michael noticed his cousin Lilli deep in thought as she stared at one of the pages. He nudged his mother with a soft elbow and pointed in Lilli's direction.
Clearing her throat, Stephanie asked, "Hey Lilli, when you're done with that one, make sure it goes on the top of the stack, will ya?"
Lilli's head popped up and she looked surprised to find the others staring at her. "Oh, I'm sorry… What were you saying?"
"Something bothering you, Sweetie?" Stephanie stepped closer to the young woman in order to look at the page she was holding.
"No, I was just thinking, is all." The faraway look in her eyes told Stephanie a different story. "It's just weird… You know, looking at these pictures of my Dad when he was younger." She looked up and Stephanie could see a hint of sadness in her eyes. "He was just so young in these, and I guess I can't even imagine him ever being like that."
Nodding her head, Stephanie laid a hand on Lilli's shoulder and squeezed. "Yeah, I understand. The first time I saw a picture of my father when he was a rookie beat cop, I thought it was somebody else. My Pop couldn't have possibly been a young guy, ever. To me, he was always seasoned and wise, so there was no way I could think of him as young and foolish, not ever."
Lilli's shy smile told her all she needed to know. But when she spoke again, it was confirmed. "I feel like Daddy had this whole other life before us, like he was another person entirely, and maybe we missed out on knowing him better because of it. To know what it was that made him the man he is today."
Stephanie sat down beside the woman and sighed. "You're really lucky, kid."
"Why? What do you mean?" Lilli's confusion was evident on her face.
"Because I didn't learn that lesson until it was way too late to do anything about it." Stephanie turned to face her young protégé and said, "I'm going to say to you the same thing your father once said me. Do you love him for who he is now, for who he has been to you?"
Shocked by the question, Lilli reared back and shook her head in disbelief. "Well, yeah. Of course I do."
"Then none of the rest matters." Stephanie smiled as she took Lilli's hand. "And here's where you're luckier than I was… If you want to know something about the man he was before then ask him. Ask him about his first year as a CSI. Talk to him about what it was like to grow up on the beach. Get him to tell you about his time in the L.A. County Coroner's office."
Shaking her head, Stephanie sighed once more before she finished. "It was too late for me. He was already gone by the time I realized my Pop had that other life. Our fathers were not conventional men, Lilli. They went through a lot, and they sacrificed for many years. But they also gave us so much more than most of the men who grew up with their children ever could have. We were the culmination of all the living they did before we came along, and they made us the center of their worlds. I wouldn't have traded any of that for something as foolish as the chance to play basketball with my Pop."
Lilli nodded, and Stephanie knew that she understood. "Besides, I had Uncle Gil to do the silly stuff with me, and Pop was always there to cheer us on and laugh."
"And I've got you… Well, and Mom, too." As the two women embraced, Michael and Danny slipped into the kitchen.
Danny went straight for the fridge, while Michael put the things from the dining room into the sink. From the other side of the refrigerator door, Danny chuffed. "Crazy, huh?"
"What?"
He shrugged as he came out of the fridge with big bottle of juice. "This family… Nobody else has a family quite like ours."
Michael chuckled at his youngest brother's analysis as he reached into the cupboard for some glasses. "Yeah, but I wouldn't have it any other way, ya know?"
When he turned to put the glasses on the island, Danny took the first one and started to pour. "Probably because no one else would have you."
"Look who's talking?"
"Are you two at it again?" Bethie flounced into the kitchen right in the middle of their conversation.
Michael bumped her with his hip when she came to stand beside him. "Are you kidding? We never stopped." After she rolled her eyes at her big brother, Michael asked, "So, what's on your social calendar for today?"
"Um, I told Mom I'd help with the scrapbook thing today." Bethie reached forward and took one of the glasses of juice, which prompted Michael to pull another glass down from the cupboard.
"You might try waking up before the crack of noon then… We're already done." Michael winked at Danny to let him join in on the fun.
"Yeah, slacker… Do you really think Mom's gonna let it get much closer to the big day before it's done?" Danny finished pouring the juice and turned back toward the fridge before Bethie could see the grin threatening to overtake his face. "No way! We knocked out five pages this morning and just closed up shop."
"Oh man! And I promised Mom I'd help." Bethie slumped into her big brother's side with her exclamation.
Stephanie chose that moment to walk into the kitchen. "Help with what?"
Standing up straight as a rail, her nerves on end, Bethie launched into an apology. "I am sooooo sorry, Mom. I swear I didn't know you were finishing up the scrapbook this morning. I wouldn't have gone out with Duncan and Lily last night if I knew, I promise."
Eyeing her two sons closely, she knew they were up to something, but she also knew where their devilish streaks came from, and so she played along. "Well, I needed to get it done, and with your brothers and Lilli here, we were able to crank through a lot this morning." Stephanie set the two more plates inside the sink and shrugged as she asked, "Did you three have a good time last night?"
"Well…yeah, sure." Bethie was knocked completely off-balance by her mother's question.
"Then that's all that matters." Stephanie drove home the final nail in Bethie's coffin with her comment.
"Geez, Mom. Why don't you just kick my puppy, instead? It might be less painful." Bethie slumped back into her brother's side again and Michael laid an arm around her shoulders for comfort. He would later regret his move.
"Well, I guess, if you wanted, you could just help us with the rest after lunch." Bethie looked up with wide eyes as her mother lowered the boom. She then looked at her brother Danny, who was about to burst with laughter, and then to her brother Michael, who just beamed at her.
With the full force of an NCAA Women's Basketball player elbow, she jabbed her big brother's ribs with a heaving shove. "Jerks!"
"Owwww!" Michael's arm went from her shoulders to his side as he gasped for air. "Damnit! That thing hurts!"
Storming off into the next room she hollered back, "It wasn't meant to tickle."
Danny cringed as he watched Michael raise up his shirt to inspect the damage. "Note to self: Never stand close to Bethie when playing a joke on her. It looks like it hurts."
Lilli walked into the kitchen and sneered, "You oughta know…you both have Steph's temper."
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Everyone else had either gone home, gone to bed, or was just plain gone shortly after lunch, leaving Bethie and her mother to work diligently on the remaining scrapbook pages. They passed the time with casual remarks, talk of school, talk about basketball strategies and workouts, discussions about the principles of theoretical math and how it related to the universe; typical mother daughter talk. That is, typical for this family anyway.
Bethie was very much her mother's daughter, and as the youngest, as well as the only girl, their time together was always precious to them both. She missed being able to sit down with her mother at any hour of the day or night and just chat. While she felt very strongly about going away to school, Bethie still wished she could have stayed closer to her mother as well.
It was hard being the youngest in such a dynamic family. Everything had already been done, probably even twice, by the time she got there, so standing out from the crowd was not an easy feat. And though she struggled to make her own identity, she also grew up knowing no doubt when it came to how very much she was loved and appreciated.
Growing up, her mother had always called her the miracle child, but not until she went away to school did she ever find out why. Bethie always assumed it was because she was the only girl after her mother had given birth to four boys. But one night, while having a heart to heart with her Aunt Kirsten she learned the truth about her mother's miscarriages, and how her parents had given up their dreams of more children because of the pain.
Bethie always knew she was an oops, but she never understood until that moment exactly why she was a miracle to her family. The pain and loss her parents endured gave her an immense amount of respect for them, and it actually made her feel even closer to both of them.
Occasionally looking up, Bethie kept stealing glances at her mother as she worked to arrange the photos on the wedding page. She had been working the courage up to talk to her mother about the miscarriages ever since her conversation with Kirsten, but something always managed to get in the way. As she clipped the various family photos of her Uncle Gil, Bethie began to chew on her bottom lip while she tried to work out the perfect way to bring up the topic.
"You got that from your Aunt Sara."
Startled, Bethie looked up to find her mother still working on her page. "What?"
"That lip chewing thing… Your Aunt Sara used to do that all the time. Drove me nuts." Her mother reached over and grabbed another handful of pictures as she spoke.
"Oh…yeah, sorry." Bethie tried to focus on the pictures and avoid anymore of her mother's attention.
"What's wrong?" Stephanie continued to trim the photo in her hand.
Bethie attempted to shrug off her mother's question. "Nothing… Not really."
"Riiiiight." Stephanie placed the photo on the page and then leaned back in her chair, her arms folded in front of her. "You want to try that again?"
Hanging her head, Bethie knew when she was beat. Her mother was a relentless interrogator, bested only by her Aunt Sara for sheer will and stubbornness. "There's a little honor in surrender, isn't there?"
"Only when you're doing battle with your mother." Sara walked into the dining room, sealing the fate on any chance Bethie had at getting out of a bad situation. Looking between the two redheads, the older woman held firm and asked, "So, what are we fighting about today?"
Stephanie was the first to speak. "She's picked up a bad habit from you, and she's trying to avoid telling me what's bugging her." Bethie tried to look indignant, but she knew it only made her look like a petulant child. "I let it go when we were at the cabin last month, because I figured she'd tell me when she was ready. But she's still keeping quiet about whatever it is and I'm done."
Sara took the seat opposite the two women and scrutinized the scene. She went first with Bethie. "Okay then, what's bothering you, kiddo?" When she was met with silence, Sara changed tacks and went to Stephanie. "What bad habit?"
"She's been gnawing on her bottom lip so much I swear it's gonna bleed." Sara struggled to stifle her amusement. Stephanie had always hated watching her chew her bottom lip. She claimed that while it was a great way to see trouble, it was a horrible habit and she should stop trying to eat her face. But it was when she noticed the same habit in her own daughter that Sara finally broke it in herself.
"All right… Bethie, you obviously know your mother isn't going to back down, so why don't you two agree to hash this out tomorrow, after all this other stuff is done, and then neither one of you wins outright. How's that sound?" Sara looked to Stephanie first. "Steph? Is that all right with you?"
"As long as I know she's okay…then I'd be willing to let it go until tomorrow." Sara gave herself a little pat on the back for making it halfway. Stephanie was difficult to debate under normal circumstances, but when it came to her children she was downright dangerous. To get such an easy concession from her was practically on the order of a miracle.
Bethie breathed a sigh of relief and nodded her head. She still wanted to talk to her mother, but she would rather not have an audience to do it. "I'm fine, Mom. I swear. It's just something I've been wanting to talk to you about. That's all."
Relieved to have resolved the conflict so effortlessly, Sara smiled and reached into the center of the table for a page to work on. "If I didn't have a temper myself, I'd have made a terrific UN negotiator."
Sara was rewarded for her joke by the spontaneous burst of laughter from the other two women in the room.
"Okay then… Could you pass me that glue thingie, Beth?" Sara smiled at her young niece as Bethie handed her the glue and shook her head.
As Sara looked down at the photos on the page she marveled at all the photos, some of which she had never seen. The one with Steph and Gil playing basketball struck her the hardest. She often wondered what they had lost by waiting so long to have a family of their own, and seeing him trying to wrestle the ball away from his goddaughter gave her a little glimpse of that life. Of course, if he had gone after a family earlier, she may never have known him, and that thought made her a little sad.
"You aren't supposed to tear up while we do this… You'll mess up the pages." Stephanie always had the best timing, as she caught her before she could drop into those dark thoughts.
"Just thinking. That's all." Sara did her best to hide the sadness and she continued to work.
"Which one?" Stephanie motioned for Sara to show her the picture in question. As she did, Stephanie simply nodded. "He was cheating, ya know?"
"Cheating?" Bethie came around the table to see what Sara was working on as she asked for clarification.
"How was he cheating?" Sara asked.
"In that picture… He was cheating. He never would have gotten close to that ball if he hadn't started tickling me." Sara and Bethie both chuckled at her insistence. "Total contact foul."
"Hey… Everything's legal on the blacktop." Bethie winked at her aunt when she passed judgment on her uncle's tactics.
"Don't even go there, missy." Stephanie gave her daughter a mock glare and they all laughed.
Bethie began to flip through the finished pages as she stood there. "Hey, Mom? Who're these people in the middle of the other 'early years' page?" She turned it around so that her mother could see it.
Stephanie nodded her head and answered, "That's your Grandma Mary, and your Uncle Gil's father, Walter. They were at some party or conference thing right here in Vegas at the time they posed for that one."
"But where's Uncle Gil?" Bethie was confused about why their picture would be on a page showing only pictures of her uncle.
"Well, according to your Grandma Mary…" Sara knew that pregnant pause meant trouble whenever Stephanie used it, and she cringed to await the punchline. "He was conceived less than an hour after that picture was taken."
What followed was a chorus of groans to match Stephanie's delighted laughter.