Sipping a hot hard cider, Jonathon sat watching Giorno and Josie joke around in the back garden from the deeply shadowed wraparound porch of Octagon House. A coyly smiling Dio leaned on his shoulders, toying with his dark hair with a black fingernail, waiting for twilight to set in after tossing another log into the chimnea they'd had custom made in Mexico.
"Thank's f'havin' us over." Mike Schmidt rumbled over a local artisan beer. It was obvious the big cop was uncomfortable, but he'd settled somewhat over homemade pasta after Raina, his wife, scolded Puck for breaking the antique Italian vase Jonathon bought Dio during their honeymoon.
Wearing one of Giorno's flower crowns and matching fairy wings, Maggie wandered into view, photographing the Fall displays they'd scattered around the big yard.
Those too, were mostly Giorno's ideas made real - Giorno always had a knack with his hands.
Flower crowns, furniture, bridal bouquets, weaving, woodworking – you name it. Fascinated, he'd watched Johnathan sand and fill teething marks from a chair leg before climbing onto the bench beside Jonathan, demanding, "Me do! Me do NOW!" while trying to take the sandpaper out of Jonathan's hands.
By eleven, Giorno had his own basement workshop. Anything he didn't like got sold on Etsy or set out on the curb for anyone to take– his parents didn't mind: a little extra pocket change was good for a boy to have.
Anyway, the house was nicely furnished and the yard got them prizes and at least one full spread in Martha Stewart Living.
Dio kissed Jonathon on the cheek "Time to go."
Jonathan rose and stood, "Sorry to cut drinks short, but Tepes and the school board – well, you know, how it is. Two unemployed fools get frisky with the lead and now we all have to reconsider our safety. Anyway, Tepes wants ALL of us RADS and allies there for the big final policy reveal. Anyway– thanks for coming. We really appreciate how you handled that shooting; pasta alfredo was the least we could do… Giorno, ready?"
Giorno nodded and trotted over, only to stop dead in his tracks. "Dad? Really?"
"Yes. Really," Dio teased, hands on hips. "Our Wonderful Miss Lisa Lisa at the club in Utah loaned it to me. Why wouldn't I wear it?"
"Daaaaaaaaad," Giorno groaned, "It's hot pink and fluffy. Please, at least change into a suit?"
"Why? I'm taking the night off! Anyway, it matches the boots, son of mine. You never break up a matching set!"
"Oh-my-gawd, Dad, the boots TOO?" Blushing furiously, Giorno slapped his forehead, squashing his nearly bullet-proof victory rolls, "My first year in a real school, with real friends my age, and you do this to me?"
"Grow a sense of humor, kiddo." Jonathon said, planting a kiss on Dio. "Constant humiliation's good for the soul – prepares you for life."
"I can't help it if I'm the most fashionable DILF out there." Dio posed, smirking. "Or is that my husband? Anybody? Care to debate? Oh don't bother, I always win!"
"Please don't describe yourselves as DILFs – and NOT at the school board meeting, PLEASE!"
"Just get in the car." Jonathan laughed while extinguishing the chimnea, "Save you seats?"
"Yeah." Mike nodded, putting his empty stein on the marble outdoor kitchen table before putting his official peaked cap on followed by his duty belt as Raina pulled on her flight jacket and called the girls over. Soon they were on their way to the school for yet another meeting about how the shooting would change everything.
"All right, misiu, what the fuck's wrong with you,?" Raina angrily leaned across the workbench past midnight in the Stein's garage where Mike was cleaning and adjusting his temporary legs as carefully as he would a rifle after the latest "loudly going nowhere" policy meeting at the school.
"I SAID, what the FUCK'S wrong with you?" Raina, the only girl raised in a family of men didn't mess around. Her mouth got her in a lot of trouble over the years, but sometimes you have to be blunt, and now was the time.
Mike carefully put the gleaming individual titanium/steel components of his left leg down and looked at her across the scarred wooden surface, the harsh fluorescent shop light mercilessly showing where he'd been cobbled together by the Steins and then repaired over that - his new whole body epidermis was taking forever to grow in the tank beneath the Stein's home lab floor.
"Nothing."
"Mike, misiu, don't bullshit me. You've been an asshole all evening since dinner with the Joestars. Does their lifestyle bug you? If so, I have news for you, things have changed since we went into Circus Baby's and came out decades later the way we are!"
"No." Mike said quietly. "Ain't none of our business and they ain't breakin' any laws." He heaved his torso upright before walking flat-handed down the tidy bench to the pegboard behind it with its carefully arranged gleaming tools, leg sockets gleaming below his tattooed torso. "Giorno's a good kid. Weird but harmless and knows how to work - I don't mind him bein' around Josie and the other two."
"Then… what?" Raina slammed her own hands down on the bench, "For the first time in years we have FRIENDS, adult FRIENDS, people who don't mind us being what we are, people who let us into their HOUSE, and you sat there like a fresh steaming dog turd on a Detroit winter sidewalk – I had to be the polite one!"
"Nothin'."
"Nothing?"
"Nothin', let it go!"
"Mike, I know the shooting was rough, but we can work it out if you'd just goddam talk to me. Hell, if you'll just take up Tepe's offer of free counseling— but all you do is go from one job to the next— the girls and I never see you!" Raina took the socket set in its red case from Mike, "I was looking forward to getting to spend time with you tonight. Your body was there, but you weren't!"
"Babe, you're gonna wake the neighbors." Taking the set away from his wife, Mike, ears reddening, turned his back and settled leglessly on the bench where he began reassembling his legs in between squirts of WD-40.
"Fuck the neighbors!" Raina came around the bench and faced him, saying, "Mike, if their lifestyle doesn't bother you, and you're not bothered by the shooting, then what?"
Mike looked away, large hands working on his legs, "NOTHIN', dammit!"
Finally, after what felt like forever, Mike folded.
"It ain't their lifestyle. Hell, they work hard for everythin' they have, the big house, the antiques, the big yard, the good school, the basement workshop… but I can't give the same to you and the girls no matter how hard I work – no matter how hard I work, no matter what I do, no matter if I ever manage to buy us from Charlie, I'll always be some lot lizard's unwanted kid!"
"What?" Raina stared at Mike, trying to digest what she'd just heard. Finally she said, "What the hell are you talking about?"
And that was when, for the first time in the thirty years or so they'd known each other, Raina found out why Mike never once introduced her to his family.