Full of Schmidt
By N.H. Reese
"I don't know if it's the caramel, the pecan, or the chocolate. What I do know that whatever it is, it wants to be in my mouth all the time," Jeannette Schmidt explained as she wiped her mouth of the excess chocolate. Her brother, Ted Schmidt, looked at her and her bucket of caramel pecan clusters, both of which were currently in the Liberty Diner across from him, in awe. "What?"
"It's been five minutes and we haven't bickered."
"Well, I've been eating."
"I seem to recall a Thanksgiving where you managed to call me 'wormy' while making your way through a pile of stuffing."
"I'm a good multi-tasker." Jeannette took a drink of her water. "Besides, I want something."
Ted nodded in acknowledgement. "I knew it."
Jeannette rolled her eyes. "Snap out of the moment, Ms. Cleo. You always think people want something from you."
"Because they usually do," Ted shrugged in a non-plussed way; it never bothered him that people wanted something from him. It actually flattered him a bit.
She waved a hand as if to remove any building tension. "Truth is...I need a place to stay."
"I seem to recall that you inherited a house a while back...?"
"Uh huh."
"And you do realize that your situation of needing a place to stay would be easily rectified if you were to move into said house?"
"Uh uh."
Ted blinked once for shock of wondering what was wrong with his family home. He blinked a second time for understanding that it wasn't about what was wrong, but..."What happened to the house?"
"Like I'm going to move me and my kid into a house that I hated growing up." Jeannette shrugged. "I sold it."
"By the way, thanks for telling me." Ted shook his head. "Why don't you buy a new house?"
"Apartment. I don't want a house."
His account sense tingled. "You don't want a home?"
"We were raised in a house, Theodore. Look how wonderful we turned out."
"So buy an apartment!"
"What a splendid idea! Why didn't I think of something so clever?" Jeannette rolled her eyes. "I'm looking. But my lease to my apartment is up this month, and I don't want to renew it for another year."
"Why? What's so wrong with it?"
"I can take a shit and cook pasta at the same time. It's that small. If I have a baby, it's going to have to sleep suspended from the ceiling, because it's the only free space available."
Ted paused before responding to his sister. "It?"
"Yeah. Baby Schmidt."
"You don't know what it is yet?"
"I want to be surprised."
"Won't you be surprised enough if the kid only has nine fingers or has blue eyes?"
Jeannette pointed a finger at him. "There's a good chance at the blue eyes!"
"Because in the past five generations of the Schmidt family, we have had a grand total of zero blue eyed babies."
"Well, when you're pregnant, maybe your baby is going to have brown eyes. Mine is going to have blue." A waiter came over and put two plates down in front of them. Jeannette rubbed her hands eagerly above the lukewarm food. "So, can I stay with you?"
"Are you taking pre-natal vitamins or heroin?"
"Come on, Theodore, it'll be like the old days."
"The days where I burned your Barbies' because it made you cry?"
"If you'd like. I'll stop by the store today and pick a few up. I'll even buy the matches."
Ted shook his head. "I can't. I'm sorry, Jeannette, I can't."
Jeannette dismissed her brother's defiance. "Sure you can. You have a three bedroom condo. I promise I'll be long gone before I'll need to use the other bedroom."
"Will you listen to me? I can't."
Jeannette's grin stopped as she threw her fork down. "Why the hell not?"
Ted opened his mouth to answer when a tall, fabulous drink of water stood by their table and cleared their throat. "One of these things is not the same, one of these things is different..." Emmett Honeycutt sang while going to sit next to Ted.
Ted and Jeannette looked at each other, daring the other for the introduction. Ted caved. "Emmett, this is Jeannette. She's my sister."
"Wow! The famous Jeannette, we meet at last!" Emmett smiled as he waved at her. After it was done, he leaned into Ted in what appeared to be a kiss, but was also an ideal positioning for whispering, "Since when do you have a sister?"
"Jeannette, this is Emmett...my boyfriend, Emmett." Emmett leaned over to shake her hand, but was treated to her giggling.
"You have a boyfriend?"
"Yes."
"An non-imaginary one?"
Ted's eyes sobered up as Emmett's interest piqued. "'Imaginary one'? Teddy, are imaginary cheating on each other?"
"No, just embarrassing moments from childhood that no one is going to talk about!" Ted threatened. It didn't do him much good.
"Harrison, I believe his name was. English...demanding...a younger Rex Harrison, if I remember your journal right." Jeannette smiled as she took another bite of her food.
"Oh, I loved Rex Harrison!" Emmett clapped his hands as Ted glared.
Ted pulled out his only ace. "Weren't you just begging me to let you stay at my place?"
"Weren't you just saying that you couldn't take me in? All bets are off, Theodore." Jeannette smirked as she presented the phrase, "It's Hammertime."
Ted's face paled into translucence.
"What was that?" Emmett asked, becoming more and more aware of the awkward situation that was happening.
Jeanette grinned at the obvious effect she had on her brother. She still had it, and she was about to flaunt it. "Did Ted ever tell you about his first real date with a guy?"
Emmett shook his head as Ted sat still.
"He landed this pretty cute guy from a community college. I don't know how they met. Anyway, Theodore's date was taking him to the MC Hammer concert. I'm ten years old at this point, and I come home from school and my brother -- my Maria Callas, Puccini loving brother -- has taken my Hammer tape from my room and is trying to...I believe you were trying to dance, but I don't have the words for what it was that you were actually doing. Tell me, Theodore, after the concert, was he 'too legit to quit' or was it purely 'can't touch this'?"
Ted looked up at Jeannette and glared. He also made a mental note to keep his sister far, far away from Brian Kinney.
Jeannette smiled. "Usually, Theodore does his best to try and kick my ass when I tell that story. I think this may be the only time that I may be able to tell it and not have to suffer the non-existent pain of a your butterfly punches."
Emmett squinted his eyes in confusion at Ted. "She's pregnant," he explained.
"And you don't have a place to stay?"
Jeannette shook her head. "Ted says that there's no room at the inn."
Emmett grinned. "Next thing you're going to tell me is that it was an immaculate conception!"
"Well..." Jeannette stretched, "it could have been. I've had breath mints that have bested the time span of the sex that led to all of this."
Emmett shook his head in sympathy. "Well, my roommate just moved out and I am looking for a new roommate--"
"Emmett, you shouldn't--" Ted began.
"No, no! It'll be fun! I think." Emmett looked at her, taking a second to picture living with a breeder.
"Look, we have something in common; we worship dick."
"Well..."
"I promise to never be naked in front of you."
"So far so good..."
"Since I'm pregnant, it will never be that time of the month."
Ted laughed. "It'll be more 'that time of the hour'."
Jeannette glared at her brother before going on. "I cook."
"You do not!" Ted accused.
"I happen to be a fabulous cook, Theodore!" Jeannette proclaimed. "Any dish you can cook, I can cook better."
Ted's eyes went wide. "I can cook any dish better than you!"
"No you can't."
"Yes I can!"
"No you can't."
"Yes I can, yes I can!"
"Whoa, Annie and Annie...no need to get a gun." Emmett looked at the pair of siblings glaring at each other and made a decision. "I'd love to have you as my roommate, Jeannette."
Ted nodded. "You say that now, Em--"
"I'll be at your place most of the time, anyway, Teddy," Emmett offered as he looked at his watch. "My shift begins shortly. The denziens of gay Pittsburgh cannot be trusted to dress themselves without my expertise." Emmett got up and kissed Ted. "I'll see you later tonight." He leaned over and gave Jeannette a hug. "I'll see you later this week."
Jeannette watched Emmett walk out as Ted allowed himself a little smile. "He's great."
Ted nodded. "He is. For all the right reasons." He began to eat his breakfast but stopped in mid-bite. "I would have let you stay at my place--"
"But Emmett is usually there and that's why you didn't want me there."
"It's not about you--"
"It worked itself out."
"I don't want you to think that I'm an asshole--well, an even bigger one than you already think I am."
Jeannette winced. "I don't think you're an asshole."
"You hate me."
"I don't."
"You said you did."
"I was angry..." Jeannette offered. "I was, and still am, jealous."
Ted closed his eyes and took a breath. "Of me having it easy because I'm gay."
"Because you have everything I want." Jeannette took a drink of her orange juice before continuing. "A successful business in the entertainment world, your own home, car...a group of friends I know nothing about but are obviously a huge part of your life...you have a rich amount of security and I have nothing."
"You've got drive. I only recently got mine." Ted removed his hand from his fork and took her hand. "When you told Mom that you weren't interested in going to Horton or becoming an accountant--"
"You mean the time I nearly gave her a stroke?"
"I had never been prouder of you. Despite all my protests." Ted shook his head. "I couldn't do that. I could only escape into this version of security she had built for me." Ted took his other hand and covered hers. "And no matter what you have, you have me."
Jeannette slowly exhaled her breath as she nodded. "I guess I do."
"And you have your baby." Ted paused as he let go of her hand. "Tell me you have at least a name picked out."
Jeannette beamed. "Same ones I had planned since I was twelve."
Ted groaned. "Carly or Simon?"
"You got it."
"You know, music has gotten better since the seventies."
"Says the man who goes to a bar almost every night that idolizes the entire disco movement."
"And says the man who bought you your first Carly Simon tape."
"You are so vain."
"I haven't got time for the pain."
"Nobody does it better."
"I...I have no clue what else Carly Simon has written."
"Blasphemy, Teddy!"
Ted's features softened. "You haven't called me that in years..."
Jeannette smiled. "I'm having a mood swing. It's on extremely happy. I'll be back to calling you Theodore in no time. Enjoy my hormones." Jeannette took a fork and went back to work on her food. "Hey, everything is cold!"
Ted shrugged. "Get used to it. My food is always cold when I eat it, too."
post¬|5ÝXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXcate Rß‹?¬|5ÝLºi!dºŽ d2m1šcat @Rß‹?¬|5ÝLºi!dºŽ d2m1šÿÿþaux 4SURL,http://thesecretword.0catch.com/schmidt.html