38. Happy Birthday
Hannibal laid still and waited for the movement of the mattress to stop as the other occupant of the bed tossed and turned and rolled over and punched his pillow, trying to get comfortable, and all it seemed to no avail. When the fine imitation of rough waves on the sea stopped, he couldn't help asking, "Problem, Lieutenant?"
"No," Face replied from the other side of the bed, "Everything's fine…I just can't get comfortable."
Hannibal jerked when he felt the mattress sag in the middle as Face rolled over onto his other side and made a dip in the center of the mattress.
"I'm glad that my room's coming already furnished, I can leave this thing behind for the next poor sap who gets this place," he said.
Face didn't respond and tried burying his face in the pillows. He'd been in a bad mood all day, and Hannibal knew why, but he said nothing. He decided to let the Lieutenant work through this on his own, and so far he was doing just as expected, not working through it. This had been a most uneventful evening except for the fact that Face was here with him. Murdock and B.A. hadn't been over to his apartment that day, for which Hannibal was glad because he knew right now that Face didn't want to see either one of them very much, and again Hannibal knew why. They'd been dancing around this circle for over 10 years and it seemed they always would, but Hannibal figured one of these years they'd finally break the Lieutenant of this annoying habit.
Face spent another fifteen minutes readjusting his position on the bed until Hannibal was just about seasick, before he finally seemed to have found a spot he was comfortable in, and slowly drifted off to sleep.
"Well," Hannibal said quietly to himself as he pulled up the covers, "That went better than I thought."
But he immediately changed his mind when he looked over and saw that Face had indeed fallen asleep, and with the dim light shining in from the lamp in the street, Hannibal saw the Lieutenant had fallen asleep with his face buried in the pillow, but still not enough to hide the silent tears that had rolled down his face in his sleep. Hannibal reached over and gently patted Face on the back, and then settled down on his own side for the night.
It had rained during the night, there had also been the occasional thunder and lightning, some of it very bright and very loud, but Face slept through it all while Hannibal stayed awake and listened to the elements outside.
He laid on his back on his own side of the bed and looked up at the ceiling, every so often pulling his arm out from under his head and checking his wristwatch. Finally when it neared 5 A.M., Hannibal slowly sat up, pushed back the covers, crept to his feet and tiptoed out of the bedroom and out to the living room. He heard sounds coming from the other side of the front door and he undid the bolt and opened it up to let everybody in. Several sets of feet padded towards the bedroom and several low giggles were futilely choked back or suppressed before a warning 'shhhh' silenced them all.
Hannibal was the first one back in the bedroom, he stood with his finger at the light switch, just waiting for the right moment to flip it up. He waited until everybody else had sneaked in behind him and then he threw on the lights.
"Up and at 'em, Lieutenant! That's an order!" Hannibal barked.
Face's eyes snapped open and he tried to turn over onto his back to get up but something heavy pinned him down. B.A. sat on his back, careful not to put his full weight down or he'd snap Face's spine like a potato chip, just enough to make sure that he couldn't get up and couldn't wriggle loose.
"Time for your birthday spankings, Facey," Murdock said as he came up with a thin board in both hands and swung it up and swatted it down against Face's backside.
"Yeouch!"
"One, two, three, four, five," Murdock counted and then moved out of line and handed it to Amy, who took over.
"Six, seven, eight nine, ten," Amy counted as she swatted him like a jumbo fly, then passed the board to Jean.
"Eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen…" instead of moving out of line, Jean leaned over and asked him, "By the way, Face, how old are you?"
Face was too busy groaning and digging his feet into the mattress to try and maneuver himself out from under B.A., with no luck.
"We have him listed as being 38 today," Hannibal said as he took the board from Jean, "So we'll have to step it up."
"Hannibal!" Face yelled.
Hannibal ignored him and continued with the swattings, "Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty…Murdock."
Murdock came back, took the board and continued again, "Twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three, twenty-four, twenty-five."
Amy came back around and took another turn, "Twenty-six, twenty-seven, twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty."
"YEOUCH!"
Jean came back behind Amy and added, "Thirty-one, thirty-two, thirty-three, thirty-four, thirty-five." Then handed the board to Hannibal.
Hannibal swung the board and counted off, "Thirty-six, thirty-seven, thirty-eight!" Then he drew back, only to swat Face one more time unexpectedly and told him, "And one to grow on!"
B.A. got up so Face was actually able to move now, he rolled over on his side and was groaning and huffing and puffing and his whole face was turning red as he glared at them all like he'd like to bury them.
"It could be worse, Face," Murdock told him, "You could be 50."
"Or we could'a drilled holes in the board to cut down on wind resistance," B.A. pointed out.
"Or we could've just let B.A. use his hands," Jean added.
"Or they could've taken your pants down like a little kid," Amy added with a smirk on her face.
"My mother believed in 10 extras to grow on," Hannibal said with a small smirk, "And an extra 5 on top of that: one was incase I did something wrong and she wasn't around to see it, the second one was incase I already did something and she didn't know, the third was incase I liked whatever it was, the fourth was incase she forgot to spank me before for it, and the fifth was an advance on next time."
Face groaned and reached around with both hands to rub his backside which no doubt was as red as his face and sighed. "You guys are worse than the nuns at the orphanage."
"Alright, now that that's over, let's get your birthday under way," Hannibal said.
Everybody moved out of the bedroom and went to the coffee table in the living room to pick up the presents they'd brought for Face, who just watched everybody leave and followed after them, completely dumbstruck.
"What's going on here?" Face asked.
Hannibal turned back to him and grinned, "Well come on, Face, you didn't really think we'd forget your birthday, did you?"
This was another aspect of their lives that most outsiders would not get. When one of the men on your team was an orphan, and to boot one who just walked into the orphanage when he was five years old, no mother, no father, nobody who could fill the priests and nuns in on any of the details, how did you establish a time to acknowledge as his birthday? To not have one was simply out of the question, Hannibal wouldn't have any of that. Of course there was always the idea of celebrating the date in which Face joined Hannibal's troops in Vietnam, since it was the end of his old life and the beginning of his new one. But as it had turned out, there had actually been a date established by the priests at St. Bartholomew's Orphanage as Templeton Peck's birthday, but it wasn't the day he walked into the place. Instead, though there wasn't much money in the place, the old priests did make an effort to acknowledge a 'birthday' for each child as establishing a bit of 'normalcy' in their already confusing lives, and for Templeton they picked a date in a 'slow' month when there weren't a lot of other children celebrating so it was easier to remember. As it turned out, for St. Bartholomew's, about the slowest month they had in that regard was April. So they carried on with this tradition, of course now that Face was an adult he met each coming birthday with initial resistance and borderline depression, of course that always changed once they got together and got the celebration started.
Face wasn't sure what to say. He had figured that they'd forgotten; he'd made no mention of the upcoming date in hopes that everybody would forget, but when it seemed they actually had he'd felt even more depressed that they would. He should've known though, they'd been doing this enough years, why would they forget now, just because it wasn't official? And he felt like a real idiot for doubting their memory, he especially would when he sat down for the rest of the day too.
Everybody got in line and picked up their present for Face, and everybody had something large and colorfully wrapped with them, all for show he was sure, otherwise it looked like he was going to get about 5 small television sets.
"Alright, who's going first?" Hannibal asked.
Usually Murdock would be bopping up and down doing his Horseshack imitation going 'ooh ooh ooooohhhh!', but this time he held onto the present in one hand like he was palming a basketball and said, "I'll wait till last." Face wasn't sure what to make of that.
"Fine, I'll go first," B.A. said as he went over to Face and shoved the wrapped box into his hands.
Face couldn't resist shaking it to try and get a handle on what it was, he couldn't tell, "Don't tell me, B.A., is this going to be like last time when you gave me a basketball that exploded?"
B.A. growled and told him, "Just open it, fool."
Face ripped at the paper and lifted the flaps on the box and said, "I was right!" and pulled out a new basketball, "What'd you do this time, B.A., put firecrackers in it?"
"No," B.A. told him and pointed out, "All the kids at the center signed it to thank you for coming in and helping out."
Face was flabbergasted. "Ah…gee, I don't know what to say, B.A., thank you."
Murdock couldn't resist poking B.A. in his protruding stomach and saying, "How come when I helped out at the center, all I got was turned into a maypole?"
"Because you' a crazy fool, that's why," B.A. told him.
Murdock pouted.
"My turn," Amy said as she moved to the head of the line and handed her present to Face.
"I can just imagine," Face said as he carefully removed the paper, "Knowing you, probably a hoard of attack scorpions just waiting to sting as soon as I open the box."
"No fair, that's what I got you," Jean said.
Face took the lid off the box and picked up a brand new black blazer.
"It should fit perfectly," Amy said, "I had it measured by one of your jackets."
Face slipped it on and saw how it fit him and he smiled at her and said, "This is really great, Amy, thanks," and went over to hug her.
Jean pushed to the front and said in a singsong tone as she held her present up over her head, "My-y-y-y turrrrn!"
"I can hardly wait," Face groaned as he took her present and opened it up.
For a minute he thought he'd fallen for one of Jean's jokes that only she thought was funny, he opened the large box and didn't see anything in it. He looked clear down into the bottom and saw a rectangular piece of paper. He pulled it out and saw it was a pass to an upcoming car show. He looked at Jean questioningly and she explained, "I figured seeing as how you can talk anybody into anything you ought to be able to talk one of those models who sit on the cars into a date, hence only one ticket, I can just imagine the havoc that would ensue if Murdock went with you."
"Hey!" Murdock replied.
Hannibal chuckled and told her, "Alright Jean, I'm next, get out of the way."
Face wasn't sure what to expect from Hannibal of all people, once more he shed the layer of decorative paper onto the floor and opened the box. And this time he pulled out a framed photograph of a upright piano that had a nice varnish job to protect the dark brown coloring of the wooden body.
"Okay…" Face looked at Hannibal with a confused expression, "What is it?"
"Well we couldn't very well bring the whole piano here to show you, could we?" Murdock asked.
"We all went in on it," Jean explained, "Hannibal saw it in a shop and said that it would be perfect for the new house given how well you play."
Face looked at the picture of the piano again in disbelief. It was true that was one hobby he'd picked up over his younger years, and he did enjoy it, but he certainly hadn't had too many opportunities over the past several years other than any place he could scam that already came with one in the house somewhere.
"Aw geez, Hannibal…I don't know what to say," Face said.
"That seems to be a running gag today," Murdock commented.
"Shut up you crazy fool," B.A. told him, "Why don't you take a lesson from the Faceman and be quiet for once?"
Murdock stuck his tongue out at the mudsucker in response.
"Hey, it's Murdock's turn," Jean said.
"Oh yeah," Murdock picked up his box and marched to the head of the line and gave it to Face and said, "I think you're really gonna like it, Facey."
"Murdock, if you picked it out, I'll love it," Face said as he tore off a large strip of paper from the top and moved for the box lid immediately. This box was a bit heavier than the others had been.
"I hope so," Murdock said as he shoved his hands into his sleeves to cover the fact that he was crossing his fingers.
Face removed the lid from the box, looked in at the contents, and about dropped the box completely, and his heart about followed suit all the way down to his stomach. In the box was a very old scrapbook with a very well worn cover that looked like it might've been leather once upon a time, but who could tell anymore? But he recognized it. With one shaking hand, he reached in and pulled it out, and ran his hand over the cover as if he was trying to place the feel of the old book. He opened it up and everybody saw what he did, the book was full of the old Dick Tracy detective strips from the late 40s and early 50s and the Crimestoppers' textbook strips.
"Oh my God, Murdock," Face said as he finally managed to pry his eyes off the scrapbook and up at his best friend, "How did you ever find this? Where did you find it?"
"Courtesy of a couple of old priests at St. Bartholomew's Orphanage," Murdock answered, "Father O'Malley called the house when you were out last week and said that he and Father Magill had been going through some old boxes in a storage room, and they found a bunch of stuff they thought they'd lost years ago."
Face felt his knees turn to jelly and his eyes rolled back in his head a split second before he hit the floor and passed out, Amy screamed in surprise and everybody crowded around him to see what had happened.
"Hannibal, Face still ain't awake yet," Murdock whined.
Hannibal washed down his second piece of cake with a cup of coffee and told the Captain, "That's alright, we'll save him a piece of the cake."
After his initial fainting spell, Face had regained consciousness long enough to get his head bandaged up, and to get the candles on his cake lit and blown out, but immediately afterward he had taken back to Hannibal's bed and was sleeping off the blow he'd sustained in the fall. Hannibal had to admit, the Lieutenant did look kind of cute curled up newly reunited with the old teddy bear he'd had as a kid. That too had seen better days, though Murdock had managed to get it cleaned up a bit before putting it in the box with the scrapbook. A pitiful thing, one eye was faded away to just the white, one ear was half chewed off, and he had stuffing come out of all his seams. Fortunately Hannibal knew of a place in the city that worked on restoring old toys and he was sure they could get an appointment squeezed in for Face's teddy bear, if he was going to be hauling it around with him when he went to bed at night, they couldn't have it looking like that long term, but for right now it would have to do because asleep Face maintained a grip on that bear like the slogan about guns, 'You can have it when you peel my cold dead fingers from around it'.
Well, of them all it seemed this birthday provided the most shock for Face, but at the same time Hannibal thought it was one of the better ones for the Lieutenant. Murdock's present had certainly been a hell of a shock, but a good one, after so many years somebody had managed to dig up part of Face's past and return it to him, something that nobody else could do. Nobody but one crazy pilot and two softhearted old priests.
Hannibal got up from the kitchen table, tiptoed over to the bedroom and poked his head in and saw Face still asleep, curled on his side, hugging his bear against him, with a small smile on his face. Yes, it seemed that, unorthodox though it definitely was, more so than birthdays among the Team members usually went, this was definitely a good birthday for Face.