Okay, this part is up a little sooner. Thank you for your patience. :)

Now, on with the story . . .

***

The resonance of the knife striking the cutting board echoed across the room. No one was paying any attention to the sound but her. It was a background noise to them, but it was providing her a sense of satisfaction. Thump. She wished that she were chopping a nice smelly onion so she could cry and no one would think to ask any questions.

She felt someone's hands on her shoulders right before she heard her sister- in-law's voice. "Tanya, would you mind finishing up these tomatoes?"

Francie strained to smile and said, "Tanya has enough work to do, Amy. I can finish these up and take a break in a couple of minutes."

"Francie." Tanya laid her hand on her boss's arm. "Go with Amy. I can finish the tomatoes."

Francie turned to find that every one of her employees was looking at her. Not one was moving in the usually hectic kitchen. They looked as if they were expecting her head to roll off her shoulders. And she thought she had done a great job faking normal all morning. "I look that bad."

Tanya nodded. "Yeah, hon, you do. Go sit down with Amy. We can run this place without you right now."

She wanted to protest. She wanted to do her part, but she knew her heart and mind weren't in this kitchen today. "I'm getting in the way, aren't I?"

Tanya, a woman who had worked closely with her for over five years, grinned. "For the first time ever, yeah, honey, you are. You're here in body, but not in soul." She leaned in closer and whispered, "And considering the fact that you were in labor the first day I worked here, and I never even realized it until you were about to pop, I think you need to take today off. Hell, as your manager I'm ordering you to go home. I'll call in Sally to fill in. She wants the overtime anyway."

Francie looked around the room at all the people who were a family to her. She hated seeing the worry in their eyes, and if she stayed they would be concentrating on her instead of getting their jobs done. She nodded. "Yeah, I think I will."

"If that man of yours cheated on you," Margaret, a cook, said as she strolled by with a hug pan in her arms, "go home and cut his peepee off. That'll stop the straying real fast."

Francie was stunned by the thought, but she could tell a few of the others had already discussed the idea. Anger flashed in Amy's eyes, but before she could say anything Tanya popped up. "Margaret, she's married to Will Tippin. There wasn't any straying."

"Any man's capable," the older lady proclaimed. Margaret's first husband had left her for his secretary. Her second husband had recently run off with her best friend. Men were not her favorite creatures right now, even if they were her favorite topic.

"Will isn't," Tanya answered before turning her attention back to Francie. "Now get out of here; I have a lunch rush to prepare for."

Giving Tanya a hug, Francie whispered thanks into her ear. "You've always been here for me."

Francie could feel Tanya's blush. "Well, you gave me a job when no one in their right mind would have. Then, you were crazy enough to promote me to manager."

"You deserved it. No one works harder," Francie replied, pulling away.

"Except you. Now go!" Tanya gave her a gentle push and turned to assign someone the task of slicing the tomatoes while she called Sally.

***

"Mom called me," Amy said after they'd left the cool confines of the restaurant. The noise of the street surrounded them. A man stormed past them, yelling into cell phones. A mother walked by fusing at her kids. A car horn honked. The sound of a diesel engine roared through the air.

Francie somehow still felt disconnected from it all. It was familiar, and she usually loved everything about living in a city, about her restaurant, but right now everything felt unfamiliar, unrelated to her.

She nodded and sighed. "I didn't want to worry Patsy, but--"

"Mom's always worried about us," Amy said. She held open the door to Sam's, a neighborhood bar that the Tippins' frequented.

"Moms are supposed to worry," Francie answered as she slid into their favorite booth in the corner.

Amy held up two fingers, and Danny the bartender nodded. "She told me that you asked her and dad to pick up Johnny tonight; you wanted them to keep him for a week or two."

"Until life gets settled again," Francie said. Until his mother's world stopped spinning out of control. She tried to smile as Karen, their usual waitress, sat down two bottles of beers in front of them. Amy muttered a thank you at Karen, whose eyebrows shot up in concern before she left them alone.

Amy took a long swig of her beer and then began playing with the label. She glanced up and then focused back on fingers. "So, the arguing is that bad?"

Francie closed her eyes. "No, Amy, it isn't. We haven't even fought about this, yet. We talked a little last night, but I couldn't handle it." She sighed. "And this morning, Syd came over for breakfast, and we all sat around talking. No, actually, they sat talking about things that don't make any sense to me. Handlers and K-Directorates and--."

She opened her eyes. "Johnny can handle arguing. It's a part of life; I've always made sure that John knows that when his daddy and I fight that it's okay, that mommy and daddy still love each other."

She shook her head and took a swallow of her beer as she watched a man enter the bar. He was talking on a cell phone, laughing at whatever the person on the other side was saying. "But I can't be the mom he needs right now. I'm living with a stranger, Amy, and I don't know--"

"Francie, he's still Will. Last night, when he stopped by my house, the first thing he did was fuss at me for not having my door locked. Said my boss needed his head examined for giving me that promotion because I didn't have the sense to lock the nuts out." She grinned. "I told him that he was a jerk."

She lost her smile. "And then we talked about the big surprise last night, and he hinted at what he really did for a living, and told me that he'd lied to protect you and us." She took a sip of her beer. "I told him was he was a jerk."

Francie stared into eyes that had always reminded her of Will's. "When he came back home last night, he tried telling me that he's the same Will, but I know that's a lie." She swallowed. "See, the Will I knew would never ever lie to me. Not even about the unimportant stuff. He would never hide anything from me. And, see, that Will doesn't exist." She grasped the bottle with both hands. "Maybe he never did. Or maybe he did before he was 'car jacked'."

Her sister-in-law looked at her with a question in her eyes, but Francie found that she couldn't answer it. Will needed to take care of explaining his own lies. She couldn't talk about them, any more than she could talk about watching her husband and best friend share their secrets over toast. Watching them talk, she thought about how many years she'd watched Will yearn for Syd, and she wondered if he still did.

"Syd named her son Will," she mumbled.

Amy smiled and motioned for another beer. "This--this--whatever it is--is just weird. Really weird."

Karen sat down two more bottles in front of them. Francie could see the worry in her eyes, but she didn't have the strength to offer even fake "I'm okay" statements. "Yeah," she said with a sigh. "I was sitting there eating breakfast with my husband and my 'dead' best friend--who happened to be dressed as a smelly bag lady--thinking that I'd slipped into the twilight zone."

Amy whistled the familiar theme. Francie laughed with her until she thought about the scene at breakfast again. She stopped laughing, and she hoped she had the strength to hold back the tears. Amy was really worried about her and Will; Francie knew she was, and she didn't want to burden Will's kid sister, but--

"Syd was smiling and telling me about her little Will, and I looked over at my Will and realized that Jonathan had been named after Jack." She snorted and leaned back into the bench seat. "My son's named after a man I never even liked. Hell, I don't even know why, because as far as I know, Will didn't even really know Jack."

Francie drowned down the rest of her second bottle of beer. She wished that she didn't need to pick her son up from daycare and get him ready to stay with his grandparents. She wished he wouldn't cry about leaving his mom and dad, although she knew he would. Just like she knew he would love his time away from them once he got settled in with Robert and Patsy. "I would love to get drunk," she announced.

Amy grinned. "I'm planning on getting drunk. I've already invited Jason over with strict orders to bring pizza and booze. He thinks I want to celebrate my promotion."

"It's getting really serious, isn't it?" Francie asked.

Nodding, Amy sighed. "Yeah, it is. I'm afraid it is."

Francie leaned over and rested her elbows on the table. "Amy, honey, you're going to make him a great wife and he's going to make you a great husband. Jason's a great guy."

"Well, he hasn't asked or even hinted at anything that serious, yet," Amy said with a grin. She smiled at Danny, who nodded his understanding and reached for two more bottles.

Francie laughed. "Don't tell me that my wonderful, modern sister-in-law thinks the man should do the asking when it comes to marriage?"

Amy shifted around and grinned. "Well, yeah, sort of. It'd be nice to be the one asked." She laughed as two more bottled appeared on the table. "But if he doesn't get around to asking soon, I might just get impatient."

Laughing, Francie picked up her beer and tilted the bottle in Amy's direction. "Now that's my girl."

"Well," Amy told her, "it won't be tonight. Tonight is about getting drunk, stuffing myself with comfort foods, cuddling on the couch, and watching some nice brainless dick flick."

"Oh, lord, are the summer releases already out on DVD?" Francie moaned.

"Yep, and Jason wants to watch every one of them," Amy said with a laugh.

Francie tried to smile, too. "What's wrong?" Amy asked.

She wanted to lie, to say that she was okay, but she just didn't have the strength. "I'm just thinking about--" She shook her head. Tears started to flow from her eyes, and she angrily wiped at them. "Yesterday, I would've wanted to punch Margaret for even daring to suggest that Will would even look at another woman." Francie could see that Amy wanted to protest, but she wanted Francie to talk more. The strain of holding her tongue was showing on her face.

"I would've counted to ten--and then counted to ten again--before reminding myself that she's having a rough time right now. That it wasn't personal. But today, when I heard those words, I wondered." She didn't even bother to hide the tears now. It was getting hard to speak, and she hated hearing how choked up her own voice sounded. "Amy, Will's willing to lie for his country. How can I be sure he's not willing to fuck for it, too?"

Amy waited a minute before she answered. "My immediate response is that there's no way in hell that my brother would do that you." She ran a shaking hand through her brown hair. "But then, I'm also having this really hard time picturing Will being James Bond, too, so I--"

She leaned forward. "Talk to him, Francie. Let's order us some lunch, go do some shopping or something until you're ready to face Jonathan, get him over to Mom and Dad's, and then you spend the night talking to the jackass."

Francie tried to smile. "That sounds like a plan." She nodded and waved at Karen. "If he's home," she whispered. Instead of out saving the world with Sydney. Maybe he would be home because he knew he needed to be with her. Maybe they'd already found Syd's family and had shipped them off to somewhere new. And maybe pigs would fly one day.

Karen was smiling as she yanked out her pad. "What can I get you for lunch?"

My old life back is what Francie wanted to order. Instead, she asked for a hamburger with all the fixings.

*** End 3/?

Next: Francie asks Will some tough questions, and she hears some answers she doesn't want to hear.