Alan

" 'my daughter' ?"Natalie glowered at me, her eyes full of fury. "I'm her mother, damn it! Just because she's my first and your third, doesn't mean that you can just blow me off, and make all the decisions unilaterally!"

"If you weren't living in denial maybe I wouldn't need to do that" I told her firmly. Living alone with Rach had allowed me to see the speaking issue in a new light.

"So disagreeing with you, is the new definition for 'living in denial'? "She snarled at me.

"What kind of mother doesn't want help for her child??" I demanded.

"There's a fine line between helping and pushing too hard!" my wife countered.

"It's a speech therapist, not a voice coach!" I said in exasperation. Ever since the accident Nat's had this tendency to overly shelter Rach, which isn't the best thing.

"Know what you problem is Alan?" she hissed, "You're too inflexible!"

"Inflexible???" I repeated with annoyance

"Everything and Everyone have to be just so!" my wife continued furiously without pausing. "or else you start having a hissy fit. Like on our honeymoon, when we got lost, or when I wanted to rest instead of doing a zillion activities!"

Realizing that saying anything more would be futile at this stage, I made a retreat. Maybe we could talk about this when she was more rational and not so tired.

Before Nat could yell at me for making a retreat, the doorbell rang. It was Charlie, with a box in his hand.

"I uh...thought we could go out to dinner with Rach..." he trailed off, upon seeing Nat. "Natalie?"

"She came home today" I explained. My wife and I were still in the living room.

"oh...uh...welcome home." he said quickly, and then asked "Where's Rach? "

"In Bed" Natalie told him neutrally.

My youngest looked at his watch. "...right...her bedtime." He looked disappointed. " I uh...had something for her"

"that's nice..." my wife said.

"You can come by tomorrow?" I suggested gently, hoping that it wasn't another toy. I didn't want my daughter to start feeling entitled to them. I had been surprised at the amount of toys Charlie had gotten her while I was gone, but Don assured me that they were supposed to be educational.

"as usual" Nat added, in a tone I didn't like "Rach will be happy about getting another toy"

"As usual?" my son got offended. His trademark scrowl came out. "Do my visits bother you?"

"They do when my daughter gets poison ivy rashes while under your care" she snorted.

"I didn't know the park had poison ivy!" my son protested defensively.

"And that makes getting distracted while she's at a park, okay?" she snapped. "Rach is a toddler, and can't see! Don't you realize that every minute you were in your little world, her life was in danger!!"

Charlie, now angrier, told her harshly, "Statistically, she and I were in the safest part of that park!" He had told me the same thing.

Nat shook her head. "Math doesn't take the place of supervision!"

"And Charlie realizes that!" I stepped in, not liking her treatment of my son. "But you know how quickly Rach gets herself in trouble."

"More the reason for your son to have kept a better eye an her!"

"Rach thrived under my care!" Charlie told her with a growl.

"If you can call getting rashes thriving" Nat glared at us icily.

"Charlie's very sorry about the rashes" I defended my son. I hated seeing anyone speak to my kids this way. "Lay off him"

Natalie looked at me as if I had slapped her. "What did you just say???"

"I said, 'lay off Charlie" I repeated. I never let anyone talk to the boys that way! Not even their mother, when she was alive.

Her face reddened in fury, and her eyes became daggers "God Forbid that you take my side!"

"You're going to wake the baby!" Charlie admonished her coldly. "Why don't we continue this another time?" With that, my son left.

TBC