Home Movies

Tony stood up, stretched, and looked around the attic, satisfied.

He and Angela had sacrificed their Saturday morning to finish the clean-up that had cost him his grandfather's bottlecaps. An incident for which Tony had long since forgiven her, seeing as the loss of the bottlecaps had brought about the posthumous naturalization of Grandpa Micelli. Had Angela not thrown away his precious keepsakes, Grandpa might never have become an American citizen.

So, as far as Tony was concerned, all was right with the world again. Especially now that the attic was as clean and well-organized as never before.

"You almost done over there?" he asked.

"Hm?" Angela looked up from where she was sorting through the contents of a large trunk.

"You almost done?"

"Oh, yeah. In a minute," she said, sounding distracted.

"Find something interesting?" Tony walked over to her and saw that she was examining a stack of flat, square-shaped boxes. "Are those films?"

"Yeah," she said softy. "I had no idea they were up here. Michael took them when Jonathan was a baby."

Tony reached over her shoulder to pick up one of the boxes. The label read 1977, scrawled in handwriting he didn't recognize. "You ever watch any of them?"

"Not in years. I think I gave Michael the projector when he moved out."

"Uh, no. It's over there." Tony pointed at the gray leather case that had been covered in a thick layer of dust until half an hour ago. "And there's the screen." He gestured at an oblong shape that was leaning against one of the large roof beams.

A dreamy expression spread over Angela's face. "Oh, you should have seen Jonathan. He was such a darling baby. Did I tell you I found his teeth the other day?"

"Yeah, you did. Showed them to me, too."

She sighed. "Tony, where does the time go? One day they're tiny, and then you turn around and they're in junior high school."

"Tell me about it. Marie and I didn't take a whole lot of pictures when Sam was little. Somehow, we never thought of it. And I was on the road so much."

Angela gave him a sympathetic smile.

Then he had an idea. "Uh, Angela, do you- would you like to watch those movies again? I'm kind of curious to see baby Jonathan."

What Tony didn't say was that he was even more curious to see a younger Angela.

Over the years, he had caught glances at some of her baby pictures and he had seen photos from when she was a child and later a teenager. But except for an album of wedding pictures, which he had come across in Angela's secret safe behind the painting on the wall of her study (it was a long story), there was a gap of more than a decade between her college years and when he and Sam had moved to Fairfield.

Also, after sharing so many memories of his time with Grandpa Micelli, and in light of how much Angela had done for him, helping his grandfather become a citizen, Tony felt a visceral need to reciprocate, to learn more about Angela and her life before … well, before.

Angela's eyes lit up. "I guess since today is Saturday."

Tony understood where she was going with this. "Movie night?"

"Movie night," she confirmed, smiling brightly. "Eight-thirty?"

"You've got it. I'll make popcorn."

ooooooooo

It was eight-thirty on the dot when Tony dumped the second pot full of hot, buttery popcorn into a large glass bowl and added some of his top-secret Micelli seasoning. Angela loved his signature popcorn, and it had quickly become a staple of their Saturday movie nights.

When neither of them had a date, which was the case more often than not these days (and not something they ever really discussed), they took turns renting movies. It was usually action or crime fare or the occasional western when Tony got to pick, and romantic movies or foreign films when the choice was Angela's.

Tonight's genre was a first for them. Nobody in Tony's family had ever owned a film camera. But of course, being a filmmaker, Michael would have taken films of his young family.

Tony picked up the bowl and pushed through the swing door into the living room, where everything was set up for a night of home movies. Angela was sitting on the couch with her glasses perched precariously on the tip of her nose and a couple of film boxes in her lap.

"These aren't really labeled," she sighed, "so I guess we'll have to be surprised."

"Well, you're the one who knows what kind of stuff Michael liked to film," Tony joked. "I trust there isn't anything on there you wouldn't want me to see."

Angela threw him an amused look over the rim of her glasses. "Not that I necessarily remember everything, but I think you'll be fine. Let's just start with this one."

She waved one of the boxes in the air, got up from the couch, and then Tony watched as she expertly loaded the reel onto the arm of the projector and fed the beginning of the film into the front.

"It's a good thing you went and got a spare bulb this afternoon," she remarked as she fiddled with some of the little screws and levers. "The one that was in there burned out the second I switched the projector on for the first time."

"Wouldn't want a burned-out bulb to ruin movie night," Tony said, proud of himself for having thought of this possibility.

"Alright. Ready?" Angela asked rhethorically as she walked to the light switch next to the kitchen door. The room went dark, and then she started the film.

While the screen flickered, she made her way back to the couch and sat down to the left of Tony, just not touching him, he noted. But her mere presence next to him was enough to make the bare skin of his forearm tingle. It was disconcerting, the way electricity seemed to spark between them when they were this close to each other.

Tony took a handful of popcorn to distract himself from the sensation and directed his gaze straight ahead, at the screen.

Black and white numbered frames appeared, counting down from three, and then there was a hand, holding a white sheet of paper with black, hand-written letters into the camera.

Christmas 1977

"Oh," Angela squealed, and Tony looked at her out of the corner of his eye. She sat with her knees curled under her and her chin resting on her clasped hands.

On the screen, a Christmas tree came into view, brightly lit and silent. Right, Super 8 film didn't have an audio track.

Tony didn't recognize the room the tree stood in, but he guessed that it was the apartment that Angela and Michael had lived in before they bought the house.

The camera moved, and was now focusing on a door, which soon opened, and out came: Angela. A little younger, a little heavier, and just as blond and beautiful as ever. She wore her hair in a long, feathered cut that reminded Tony of Farrah Fawcett.

It was probably Christmas Eve, or maybe Christmas Day, judging from the way she was dressed. She wore a thigh-length dark blue dress with lacy white trim on the hemline, collar, and sleeves, and knee-high black boots. The neckline was low-cut by Angela's standards and revealed a surprising amount of cleavage. But of course, 1977 Angela had just had a baby three months ago, so that probably had something to do with it, too.

On the couch next to Tony, Angela giggled. "Look at me."

"I am," he almost said, but swallowed drily instead. She looked gorgeous, and his stomach lurched.

The camera followed Angela as she walked through the apartment. Aside from the tree, the place was bare of Christmas decorations.

"Is that where you lived?" Tony asked.

"Uh-huh," she said. "Upper West Side. We moved here in '82, when I made vice president at Wallace & McQuade. So Jonathan could have a yard."

On the screen, Angela walked through a short hallway and opened another door. The camera followed her into a bedroom. Michael's and Angela's bedroom, Tony concluded. He took note of the double bed at the center of the room and swallowed again.

"Oh, I remember," Angela sighed next to him. "We still had him sleeping with us."

Tony recognized the white crib that was set up next to the bed. It was the one he had gotten down from the attic for baby Clint years ago.

On-screen Angela reached into the crib, then she looked back at the camera and smiled. She said something and inclined her head just so, in a gesture that read 'come here and look at this'.

The camera moved in closer, and there was baby Jonathan. Almost bald, with large hazel eyes, and as chubby as a little Cupid. When he saw his parents, he smiled and wriggled, reaching for Angela with outstretched arms.

She picked Jonathan up, holding him against her shoulder so the camera could stay on both of their faces. During Michael's close-up, Tony took in Angela's rosy cheeks and her blue eye shadow, her plump lips, and the way her brown eyes shone as she went back and forth between looking at Jonathan and at Michael behind the camera.

"Oh my God, wasn't he adorable?" Angela breathed.

"Yeah." Tony cleared his throat. "Very cute." In his mind, he added 'both of you'.

Angela laughed. "Looking at him today, you'd never think that he was such a big baby."

"He looks well-fed for sure," Tony agreed.

Angela continued to show off baby Jonathan for the camera, kissing his cheek and caressing the fine wisps of blonde hair on his head. On the couch, Angela looked briefly at Tony before she spoke again. When she checked in with him like this, it usually meant that they were entering more personal territory.

"He was big from the start," she started. "Almost eight pounds. And I- well, it was difficult. It took a long time, and in the end I had to have a C-section."

"Oh, I didn't know that." Somehow, they had never talked about this before.

"It wasn't what I wanted, and I tried, but ultimately, there was no other choice."

"Hey, as long as you were both okay, right?" Tony said.

"Yeah," she said softly. "Still, I would have liked to be awake when he was born. They didn't let me hold him until hours later."

"I know what you mean," Tony said and felt Angela give him a look.

On the screen, younger Angela was now carrying Jonathan into the living room. Then she put him down on a rug in front of the Christmas tree, under some kind of toy bar. The camera stayed trained on Jonathan, while she left the frame.

"I wasn't even in town for Sam's birth," Tony volunteered. "She came early, when I was at an away game in Cleveland."

"Oh, no," Angela said. "Did you want to be in the room?"

"Good question," Tony said. "I think I would've liked to be there. You know, see my kid come into the world. But in the old neighborhood, everything was still pretty traditional. As a man, you stayed in the waiting room, and then you'd smoke a cigar and go for drinks with the guys. Anyway, I wasn't there, and Marie's mother went in with her."

The reel continued to play. Jonathan made faces, waved his arms about, and kicked his legs on the rug. Eventually, Angela came back into the picture. She sat on the ground next to Jonathan, smiling into the camera, stroking his cheeks, and rubbing his belly.

Then she gestured at the camera and said something. The picture shook, and Michael either put the camera up on a tripod or found another way to set it up so he wouldn't have to hold it, because after a little while he joined his wife and son in front of the lens.

Tony had only seen Michael Bower a handful of times: First when he had shown up at the house for a short-lived attempt at reconciliation with Angela not long after Tony and Sam had moved to Fairfield. And then when he had announced his plans to marry Heather, and they had all flown out to California.

After that, it had mostly been short visits when Michael and Heather were on layover on the East Coast on their way to or from assignments abroad. And once they had picked Jonathan up for a trip to see Jonathan's paternal grandparents who lived outside of Boston, but whose relationship with their son – and consequently with their grandson – was quite distant.

The thing was, Tony didn't especially dislike Michael. Ever since he had given him a call, letting him know he was leaving Fairfield and asking him to take good care of Angela, Tony felt like Michael was somehow in his corner. At least where a potential relationship was concerned.

Even the almost-battle for custody of Jonathan was a positive memory for Tony, and not only because they had won. Of course, he didn't like to remember seeing Angela so hurt and anxious. But he felt that the whole ordeal had brought them a lot closer as a family. (Okay, maybe not as a family in the traditional sense, but as some kind of family nonetheless.)

1977 Michael had wavy, chin-length black hair without a trace of gray, and he wore a tight-fitting black turtleneck sweater. Before he sat down on the floor next to Angela, Tony spied a pair of brown corduroy bellbottoms.

"I didn't know Michael was such a hippie," he said and nudged Angela with his elbow.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her grin. "That was part of his charm. If I'd wanted a husband who went to work in a suit and tie every morning, I could've had my pick in business school," she said lightly.

Tony did not miss a certain undertone in her voice and wanted to steal another peek at her face while she took in the screen. But Angela wasn't looking at the movie, she was looking at him.

Their eyes met for a split-second, and he felt something fizz between them. Then they were quick to break eye contact and face forward again – just in time to see Michael and Angela kiss each other on the lips for the benefit of the camera. It wasn't anything inappropriate in the context of a home movie, but it wasn't just a chaste peck, either.

"Angela, can I ask you something?" Tony ventured.

"Of course," she said, sounding slightly flustered.

"When did things between you and Michael, you know – when did they turn bad?"

"Oh," Angela sighed. "I guess … When he wanted us to have a second child when Jonathan was two, but I wanted to work. I had just gotten a promotion, and it wasn't the right time. We agreed that we'd wait, and then I got another promotion, and then another one, and Michael got assignments in South America and Australia, and we basically never saw each other. That was when things started to fall apart. I resented Michael because when he was working, he was gone. Out of the country. And he resented me for working at all and leaving Jonathan with Mother or with the nanny. I guess buying the house was kind of a last-ditch effort to save our marriage."

"Sounds tough. I'm glad you did it, though."

"Did what?"

"Buy the house. It's a nice house."

"Yeah." He heard a smile in Angela's voice. "It is."

For the remaining minutes of the reel, Michael and Angela tried to get Jonathan to interact with the wooden toys that hung down from the bar above his little body.

Tony had loved seeing Angela interacting with baby Clint, and he loved watching her with her own baby. If only he had films of Sam as a baby, and of Marie with Sam.

"How did you spend Christmas that year?" Angela asked.

"'77?" Tony thought out loud. "We were at my dad's. Well, you know his place." The apartment that he had finally been able to let go of with Angela's help. It was one of his most treasured memories of their first couple of months together. (Not together, together, of course.)

"Was Marie-" Angela asked hesitantly.

"That summer," Tony said. "July 23rd."

"Right, I knew that."

"Yeah," he said quietly. "I was really scared of our first Christmas without her. Sam was only five, her mom was gone, and I was still with the Cards, so she spent a lot of time at Mrs. Rossini's, or with my dad, and then I would come back, and she'd be with me for a couple of days. I think it was all kind of confusing for her. But Christmas went okay."

And then, in the spring of 1978, he had hurt his shoulder, and his traveling days were suddenly over. Even though Tony grieved the untimely end of his baseball career, at least it had brought him much closer to his little girl.

"It's funny to think we were both in the City," Angela mused. "I mean – not that that's funny, funny. Just … we were both living in New York, but we didn't know each other."

"Yeah," Tony said, but then corrected himself. "Except that we did!"

Angela looked at him.

"Make-out Rock?" he said, waggling his eyebrows.

"Kissing Rock," Angela said, again with some kind of undertone that made Tony pleasantly nervous.

"Whatever," he said lightly, "but yeah, I know what you mean. It's kind of funny."

Meanwhile, the reel had ended and the projector was beaming a bright rectangle onto the screen.

"You want to watch another one?" Tony asked.

"Sure," Angela said.

She got up from the couch and switched on the light. Then she let the projector rewind the reel that they had just watched and looked at the labels on some of the other boxes.

"I have no idea what's on these," she said. "I know Michael brought the camera to the hospital when we brought Jonathan home. And he had it on his first birthday."

"Just pick one," Tony said, "I bet they're all cute." Again, he wasn't entirely sure whether he was referring to baby Jonathan, or to Angela, or to both of them.

"Alright. Let's see …" Angela selected one of the boxes and exchanged the reels. Then she re-started the projector.

The light in the room went off, and the screen flickered. First came the numbers again, then bright sunlight and a parking lot. Judging from the shrubs and the sand, they were somewhere near the shore. The sky was an unreal shade of blue above the rows of cars.

"One of those yours?" Tony asked.

Angela nodded. "We had a green Plymouth. But I don't know where …" she trailed off.

The parking lot scene ended abruptly, and suddenly they were on a beach with waves lapping at the sand, the sun shining, and a couple of seagulls sailing overhead.

"Ah!" Angela said. "I think I remember. We went to Montauk for 4th of July weekend."

The camera focused on a small figure in the distance.

"Is that you?" Tony asked.

"Uh-huh."

The figure waved.

Then Michael stopped filming and started back up again when he was a lot closer to Angela. She wore her hair in a loose bun near the top of her head, with loose tendrils flying in the breeze. Angela smiled into the camera and waved again.

She wore no make-up this time, but that didn't make her any less breathtaking. Tony blinked. She looked … soft and wonderful, there was no other way of putting it, and something about her was decidedly different than in the Christmas film. Her face was fuller, and when she smiled at Michael, there was a glint in her eyes.

The visual hit Tony in a special place, deep down where only Marie had been able to affect him before, and when Michael zoomed out, and Angela's whole body came into view, he realized why that was. She was wearing a striped sleeveless summer dress that flared out below her breasts. The wind on the beach pushed the fabric against her body, and Tony saw that she was pregnant. Jonathan's birthday was on September 5th, so this put her at seven or eight months.

"Oh, look at me," Angela said, squirming in her seat. "I'm as big as a house."

Tony gave her upper arm a gentle slap. "No, you're not. You're pregnant. And you're beautiful." The words came out before he could think about it.

"Thank you," Angela said and briefly touched Tony's hand that was resting between them on the couch. "That's sweet of you to say."

"It's the truth," he replied. "You look great. And happy."

"I do, don't I? I guess I was. And you know what? I liked being pregnant. The pressure was off. For once it was okay not to be thin."

Tony nodded. From what he had gathered over the years, most of Angela's adolescence and young adulthood had been overshadowed by weight struggles.

Ever since he had met her, though, Angela had been thin. Almost too thin, he thought.

Some of the offhand comments and unkind jokes Mona liked to make gave him pause, and every now and then he wondered whether there was more to Angela's relationship with food than what he got to see and what she had told him.

Tony disapproved of Angela's breakfast preference of only juice and coffee, and he knew that during stressful times, she neglected her body throughout the entire day: either by not eating at all, or by bingeing on junk food.

He would not have been surprised to learn that these were leftover habits from a darker time during Angela's life. But he would never ask her about it outright. If she wanted to tell him, she would.

Angela on the beach in 1977 said something to Michael and then she pointed to a spot on her stomach, smiling at him. Michael's hand came out from behind the camera, and he touched the spot Angela had indicated.

At the sight, Tony felt heat rise to his cheeks. It was overwhelming, seeing Angela like this, in that dress, on the beach, in the summer sun, pregnant and beautiful, with Michael's hand on her belly. Neither of them had an inkling yet of what was waiting for them down the road. The intimacy between them was sweet, really.

And yet it made Tony … jealous?

On the screen, Angela's hand covered Michael's, the sun reflected off her wedding band, and a sudden realization hit Tony with the force of a Mack truck.

He wanted to experience all these things with Angela. He wanted to take walks with her on the beach, to caress her stomach and feel the movement of their child, to be the one holding the camera and taking film (well, video) of her and their baby. He wanted that, and so much more.

Tony tried to keep his breathing under control, and he was glad that it was mostly dark in the room. Otherwise, his red ears and flushed face would have given him away.

Next to him on the couch, Angela also seemed to be affected by the film. She cleared her throat as if to speak, but at first nothing came. Then she started, haltingly.

"Tony? Do you remember what you asked me when we babysat for little Clint all those years ago?"

Tony looked at her. Had she read his mind? He did remember what he had asked her back then, but he wanted to be sure this was what she was talking about.

"Maybe?"

"You asked me if I ever thought about having another baby."

"Yeah, I remember that."

"And I said that I'd love to, but I didn't know how."

"I know. And I explained it to you," he said, trying to lighten the mood.

"Yeah, you did," Angela laughed a little, but then she turned serious again. "Tony, I still think about it. And sometimes I'm afraid that it won't happen."

"That you won't-" he started carefully.

"… have another baby. I'm going to be 39 years old next spring."

He didn't know what to say. On the screen, the scenery had changed again, and while Tony tried to sort through his jumbled thoughts, he stared at Angela in 1977, reclined in the sand, somewhere in the dunes.

She gestured at the camera, as if to talk Michael out of filming. Eventually, she gave up and turned her face to the sun, her eyes closed. Michael kept the focus on his wife, ever patient, as if lying in wait for some surprising and never-before-captured activity of a rare, shy animal.

"It's not impossible," Tony finally said. "Is it?"

Angela exhaled. "No … but time is not exactly on my side here. You know. First, I would have to … meet someone. Get to know him. Figure out if we want the same things in life. If he wants another baby, too. I mean, a baby. In general. At all," she corrected herself. "All of that takes years. And if he does want a baby, then there's the question of how it will fit into our lives, of course. With his … job, and mine."

Tony shot her a look. What were they talking about here? Over the years, they had gotten good at communicating in code. So good, in fact, that sometimes he wondered whether he detected hidden meanings where there were none and missed others even though they were there.

He recalled their meeting at the hula bar on the wrong side of the railroad tracks on Angela's last birthday. Where she had hidden from the entire family following her nightly confession of love. That evening, they had both admitted to their feelings, sort of. But neither of them had been ready for straight talk back then, and Tony wasn't sure he was ready now.

However, listening to Angela talk about babies brought it home to him that while there was no time pressure to define their relationship, the clock would definitely run out where other matters were concerned.

Wasn't there a saying that went something like 'there is never a right time'? People liked to say that about when to have kids. But maybe it applied to relationships, too.

It was possible that the 'right time' to discuss their true feelings would never come unless one of them took a step forward. Angela had broached the topic of another baby, maybe now it was his turn to be brave.

In the summer of 1977, Angela was walking on the beach again. Carrying her sandals in one hand, she waded into the surf up to her ankles. The sun played in her golden hair, and she shielded her eyes from it as she squinted into the camera and said something to Michael.

"Maybe you already know the guy," Tony finally said, having gathered his courage. "I mean, maybe you're not as far behind the curve here as you think you are. Maybe it's just a matter of … I don't know. Months? Not years. Definitely not years," he added with conviction.

"You think so?" Angela asked, her voice tinged with guarded hope.

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure. Hey, what guy in his right mind would want to miss his chance to have a kid with you?"

"Tony," she said, touched. "Do you really mean that?"

In that moment, the reel ended, and the screen shone white again, reflecting back at them. Until now, the half-darkness had given cover to their thinly veiled truthfulness. Now, they were suddenly in the spotlight, exposed.

Tony swallowed and turned to face Angela. Thus far, he had surprised himself with his forthrightness, and with his certainty, and he would not chicken out now.

"Cross my heart and hope to fly," he said in reference to the heartfelt conversations they had had surrounding Grandpa Micelli and the lost bottlecaps.

A warm smile spread across Angela's face. "Good. Because I wouldn't want to have a baby with just anyone."

"No. That wouldn't be wise. It would have to be someone who you know and trust, who isn't going anywhere. And, you know, someone you …"

"Love," Angela said simply. "Someone I love."

"Yeah," he agreed. Blood began to rush in his ears, but he continued talking. "And someone who loves you." He looked at her pointedly.

"Love's important," Angela added. This was a callback to one of their most loaded conversations to date. Last year, after Frankie's proposal, Tony had wondered what exactly Angela would have said had Samantha not burst into the living room at exactly the wrong moment.

"It is," Tony said. "It is."

They were still looking at each other, and Tony could tell that Angela was just as overwhelmed as him by the magnitude of what they had just revealed to each other.

She didn't say anything, so he spoke up again. "I guess this was one of those private talks, huh?"

"Yeah."

"What do you say we … really do it this time. Talk about this again. About us, I mean. And soon. So we don't run out of time. I don't want us to run out of time."

"I would like that," she said. "And I don't want that, either."

"Okay." Tony reached for her hand and squeezed it. For a moment, he debated whether he should lean over and kiss her. He wanted to. But maybe that would be too-

Before he could finish his thought, Angela's face was in front of his, and she planted a tender, open-mouthed kiss on him. She smelled so good, and her lips were so soft and her mouth so inviting that Tony did not take long to recover from his initial surprise. They necked for a good, long while. It was an excellent way to get rid of the anxious energy caused by their conversation.

Somehow, it was understood between them that this would not lead anywhere tonight, and eventually, they parted and both sat back on the couch.

Tony was still holding Angela's hand and stroked her knuckles with his thumb.

"You know what else I think we should do?" he said.

"What?"

"I think we should get the video camera out more often. Tape more family stuff. It'll be nice to be able to watch it later."

Angela nodded. "Yeah. We'll do that."

"Okay," he said.

So many things, spoken and unspoken, were in the air between them. But Tony felt that this was enough for one night. They would talk again, and soon, he vowed to himself. He would make it happen. Right now, they needed to get back to solid ground.

"One more?" he suggested and gestured at the stack of boxes on the sideboard.

Angela smiled. "Why not. Maybe we can find the one from Jonathan's birthday party. Mother has got to be on that one. You'll get a real kick out of her, I promise. The 70's were her decade. Well, one of her decades."

She got up from the couch, only letting go of his hand when she absolutely had to.

"Can't wait," Tony said, referring as much to the film as to everything else he knew was in store for them.

ooooooooo

A/N: I am especially frustrated by the writers' failure to properly address the topic of children. It was made clear repeatedly throughout the series that both Tony and Angela would have liked to have more kids, or at least one more kid. So this was my attempt to get them there. Or at least on the way to there. :)