DISCLAIMER: They felt bad. They weren't being used in a weekly show
anymore. Please, Your Honor, the characters BEGGED me to write fanfiction
with them. Honest. ALLRIGHT, I stole them. I'd do it again, too! I used
them shamelessly for my own purposes completely disregarding the rights of
the legal owner, TNT. My bad.
A Patient Explanation for an Attic Adventure Gone Awry
Sid woke up suddenly. The shadows on the wall made the clock impossible to read, but he instinctually knew it was after midnight. The moon was unnaturally bright on the floor, making his room look strange and unearthly. He barely resisted the urge to wake his twin; he knew this was something he had to do alone. Sid had to look at the silver case again.
He crept out of bed and listened at the door to his parents' room for a long moment before being completely content that they were both asleep. He managed to find the light switch on the attic stairs, and he shut the door behind him firmly so that no one would wake and see it. With ceremony he approached the trunk and slowly lifted the lid on its hinges. Sid pulled the silver case out of the trunk and set it on the floor delicately. With a silent prayer to an unknown god, he opened the unlocked case and put the first DSA he saw into the reader.
The boy, Jarod, daddy, was in a strange plastic bubble. He was hot. He was thirsty. They were pressuring him without pressuring him, pressing him to give up and forcing him to continue at the same time. It looked torturous, but he was choosing it, so it couldn't be all bad, right? He slid a second DSA in.
They addicted him to a drug. He was seizing, shaking, trembling with need. It hurt everywhere and nothing would stay in his stomach until the one thing his body craved was surrendered. In horror, Sid ejected the DSA before it ended. In utter trepidation, he slid a new disk in, begging God that it would erase the horror and explain that these weren't real.
They stopped his heart. They killed him. He was dead. He wasn't moving. Daddy was dead. Sid screamed. He screamed and threw every spare molecule of oxygen in any of his cells into the scream, making it as loud as possible. Then, he screamed again and he didn't stop screaming until he felt warm arms enveloping him. Safe in his living father's arms, he switched over to whimpering, unable to look into his face as he made soft, soothing noises.
Mommy came running up the stairs then. "Is he alright," she asked breathlessly.
"He's just a little frightened, I think," Jarod said, gesturing to the open DSA case.
"Oh, God, which did he watch," she begged, a look of horror implanting itself on her face.
"Obviously a bad one," Jarod replied wryly, his voice still soft and soothing as he rocked his young son back and forth.
"It was real," the boy croaked, tears streaming from his eyes. "It wasn't like TV: that was really daddy."
"Yes," Jarod said, his voice still soothing, "but I'm fine now, and I promise that will never happen to you."
"But it was really you," he sobbed. "You were dead!"
"What's wrong," Sophia asked sleepily stumbling up the stairs. Immediately she snapped awake when she saw her parents hovering over her crying brother, the DSA player open in the background. "Why'd you come up when they were home," she asked incredulously. Both parents shot inquisitive looks at her making her feel much smaller than she usually did.
"Do you come up here a lot," Parker asked as her husband's attention returned to their badly shocked son.
"Not so much," Sophia whispered hopefully.
"How often is that," she asked, her tone demanding nothing less than the absolute and complete truth immediately.
"Twice, three times now, I guess. It was my idea at first, when Sid found that case. He just had to know what was in it, so even when he figured out we were probably breaking a rule even if you'd never told us not to come up here, he came with me. Last night, when Grandpa Sydney fell asleep, we came up here again and Sid managed to get it open after a really long time," she shot a look at her terrified twin. "We didn't see anything scary then, just some kid making a building. We thought it might be daddy, because it was his, and his name is Jarod like the kid, but we didn't know." Her voice was soft and apologetic, Parker didn't have the heart to yell at her, although she desperately wanted to be angry at someone.
"It's okay, this isn't your fault," Parker said, lifting her daughter into her arms. "We'll need to talk about this in the morning, but you're right, we never actually told you not to come up here. We'll get you back to bed for now, though, it is way past bedtime."
"What about Sid," Sophia asked, her eyes already closing as her head fell against her mother's shoulder.
"He might want to sleep with us tonight, don't worry about him," her mother advised. Sophia was dead to the world and carefully tucked into her bed when Parker rejoined her boys in the attic.
"Why don't you sleep with us tonight, okay," Jarod offered to the quivering boy who nodded slowly and allowed his father to lift him from the ground. Parker closed the DSA case and replaced it in the trunk before following her boys down to bed. Sid was far too young to deal with what his father had been forced to endure. For the first time she fully understood her husband's anxiety about their intelligent children. Jarod was a taken at this age. It was bad enough having Sid witness the horrors her husband suffered, what would she do if he had to face them?
Maybe it was time to sit her children down and explain what the Centre was slowly and clearly, not just hide it in a bedtime story. Her inner sense hinted that they would be able to understand, and from her own upbringing Parker knew lies were never a good thing to raise children by. She curled into bed, sandwiching her son against her husband comfortably. In the morning she would consider it further.
At breakfast, Parker made an announcement. "Sophia, Sid, we're staying home today."
Sid, who was feeling much better in the sunlight with his parents simply nodded while Sophia asked why.
"You have both realized by now that most five year olds don't read chapter books without help, but you've been really good about pretending to be just like your classmates in school. We don't want to lie to you about anything ever, so we've decided to tell you why," Jarod stated in a grave and serious voice.
"Because you don't want our hearts stopped," Sid said quietly, his stare boring a hole in the table before him.
"In essence, yes," Parker said, putting a reassuring hand on her son's shoulder.
"Hearts stopped," Sophia asked, fear in her voice.
"When I was your age," Jarod began slowly, "I was taken from my family because I was, like you, special. I was a genius with the added ability to pretend to be anything I wanted to be."
"Like a FBI man, a doctor or a fireman," Sophia asked slowly, piecing a few things together in her mind.
"Yes, although the identifications you found were not form my time at the Centre but later," Jarod answered, a small smile finding its way into his grave eyes. "The Centre is the name of the corporation that stole me. They made me do simulations, research. It wasn't a lot of fun. I was deprived of my freedom, I had to eat yucky green stuff every day, and I had to do whatever simulation they wanted me to. I didn't like it much there and I wasn't even allowed to have friends for a while. They kept me for thirty years before I realized that my work was being used to hurt people, not help them. Then, I ran away."
"Were the simulations when they hurt you and stopped your heart," Sid asked, his voice barely audible.
"Yes," Jarod answered, his voice soft and reassuring. "Some of what they did to me was physical torture, but most of the simulations weren't that bad."
"What happened after you ran away," Sophia asked, not wanting to think about someone who was strong enough to hurt her daddy.
"The Centre sent your mommy and Grandpa Sydney to find me and bring me back," he answered honestly, but moving to wrap both of his arms around his wife to demonstrate to both her and the children that he didn't hold a grudge.
"Did she catch you," Sid asked, astonished that his mother could have worked with such horrible people.
"Only when I let her," he answered, earning a snort of laughter from his wife. "Okay, so not just when I let her, but she always let me get away. Her daddy, Grandpa Parker, ran the Centre. When she was a little girl, he would bring her to work with him and we met. When she had to chase after me as a grown up, she remembered we were friends and didn't try too hard to catch me."
"So mommy just pretended to chase you like you pretended to be a fireman or a doctor?" Sophia cocked her head curiously at her parent.
"I guess that's a good analogy," Jarod agreed, winking broadly at the other red file. "Eventually, as thick headed as I was about everything, and as many times as she beat me over the head with proof, I realized she loved me as much as I loved her. We decided to run away so that they would never find us again, and we've been okay so far. Grandpa Sydney still works for them, but he told them that it would be pointless to take me back. Grandpa Parker agreed with him and we're fine for now. We are worried that you will be taken like I was, though, and there will be no mommy or Grandpa Sydney to help you like I was aided."
"I understand," Sid says. "But you've made it sound better than it was, haven't you, daddy," the little boy looked up at his father with sad but shrewd eyes.
"I have," Jarod said seriously, hugging his son tightly. "I won't lie to you, but I don't want to scare you. It was not a fun thirty years."
"So Grandpa Parker was the one who made them do bad things to you," Sophia asked with trepidation.
Parker sighed, "Yes, my father allowed all of the atrocities that daddy endured, but he also helped keep us free so that we are all safe now. He will protect you."
"What is an atrocity," Sophia inquired.
Both adults looked at Sid to give him a chance to answer before fielding the query. "An atrocity is a horrible occurrence," Sid answered deftly before turning his full attention back to his mother. "Neither of you really trust Grandpa Parker, do you?"
"Not completely, but I trust that he will do what he thinks is best for your sister and you. I know he won't subject you to what Jarod or my brothers were subjected to," Parker answered frankly.
"Uncle Ethan was at the Centre too," Sophia asked curiously.
"Ethan and my other brother, Lyle, who you've never met, were both side projects of a Doctor Raines. They were not kept physically at the Centre, but they were both hurt terribly by experiments preformed on them. I fear that Lyle was driven completely insane, which is why I've never arranged for you to meet him."
"Could we make a family tree," Sid asked innocently, "I'm getting a little confused."
"Sometimes it helps to think in diagrams, doesn't it," Jarod asked getting out a piece of paper and pulling a pen from his pocket. "Alright," he began, writing the names of his parents on one part and Catherine and Mr. Parker opposite them, he drew himself and his full siblings before adding Parker, Lyle and Ethan to the family tree."
"How did Grandma Catherine and Grandpa Major have Ethan if they aren't married," Sophia asked curiously and Jarod had to remind himself once again that his children were still children.
"Ethan was created a little like Uncle Jay," Jarod said, adding his clone to the diagram. "Uncle Ethan was implanted in your grandmother without my father's knowledge."
A childish duet of "oh" reverberated briefly before the question sprang from Sophia's lips. "Where do normal babies come from," she inquired innocently.
Parker sighed, knowing that she had dodged the question long enough with her precocious twins while Jarod began coughing violently. "Well," she began, adding Bridgette and her youngest brother to the diagram, "do you remember not long ago when we talked about how your body is made up of cells?"
"Yes," Sid said happily, "They are living Legos!"
"Exactly, well, at one point in time, you were just one little cell inside of me," she explained patiently while her husband found his voice. "I have a lot of those special cells, gametes, that could grow into a child, but to have that many children would be horrible because I couldn't possibly take care of all of them. This is why these cells do not grow into a child until they are fertilized by merging with another gamete from the father. Fertilization is also important to mix the gene pool, we'll talk about that when you are older and we study genetics, as smart as you are that is a very complex subject."
"How do the gametes come into contact so they can merge, mommy," Sophia asked.
Jarod fell into an entirely new coughing fit while his wife thought about the best way to answer. She seized the family tree and flipped it over and drew a rough diagram of the female uterus.
"This is already a part of your body," she informed Sophia, "but your ovaries," she circled the part of the diagram she was referring to "will not begin to produce and release eggs until you are about twelve years old. They will release one every month into your womb here and if it goes unfertilized the egg and the lining of your uterus will leave your body and be replaced. We'll discuss that further when you're old enough to start worrying about it. Boys have a similar organ that produces their gametes and they can inject this gamete into your uterus after they hit puberty. Again, this is something you don't really need to worry about yet, I'll explain all of this to both of you when you're older."
Sid looked unconvinced. He noticed how uncomfortable both of his parents were with this subject so he knew it couldn't be as boring as they were making it sound, although Sophia looked fairly fascinated with the vague discussion. He decided his parents felt uncomfortable because they were explaining adult matters to children, although they were never bothered by age when Sophia asked for engine diagrams. He reminded himself to ask again when he was older and changed the subject.
"So how does Grandpa Sydney fit into the family tree diagram," he inquired, concerned for his namesake.
Jarod looked gratefully at his son and answered quickly. "Sydney was my mentor while I was at the Centre, he was more like a father to me while I was growing up than Grandpa Major. I hope you won't tell this to Grandpa Major because it will make him feel bad, but I will always think of Grandpa Sydney as my father because he was the man who raised me."
"So in summation," Sid stated slowly, "the Centre stole you from your family when you were small and treated you terribly, but you met mommy and Grandpa Sydney so it wasn't as horrible as it could have been. You escaped and helped people while mommy chased you without intending to catch you until you realized you were in love and married her. You then had us by merging four gametes to create two cells that grew into two babies inside of mommy's uterus. You didn't tell us this before because the Centre is scary, but you never lie to us about anything. Is that correct?"
"One hundred percent, it deserves a sundae," Jarod said seriously, scooping his son into his arms.
"Do I get one too," Sophia begged.
"Ice Cream before lunch, Jarod," Parker asked, pretending to be strict.
"It's nearly eleven," Jarod replied. "An hour before lunch is almost as good as after," three pairs of sad eyes turned on Parker.
"Fine," she capitulated, "but small sundaes and I get one too!"
"Of course, dear," he said with a light smirk, "after all of that explaining, you deserve one."
When their children had safely rushed ahead to the kitchen, Parker returned the smirk and slapped her husband playfully in the stomach. "After your little ploy to dodge the question, I deserve an extra cherry."
Jarod apologized, not looking remotely sorry, but when he served the sundaes, Parker's got three cherries.
A Patient Explanation for an Attic Adventure Gone Awry
Sid woke up suddenly. The shadows on the wall made the clock impossible to read, but he instinctually knew it was after midnight. The moon was unnaturally bright on the floor, making his room look strange and unearthly. He barely resisted the urge to wake his twin; he knew this was something he had to do alone. Sid had to look at the silver case again.
He crept out of bed and listened at the door to his parents' room for a long moment before being completely content that they were both asleep. He managed to find the light switch on the attic stairs, and he shut the door behind him firmly so that no one would wake and see it. With ceremony he approached the trunk and slowly lifted the lid on its hinges. Sid pulled the silver case out of the trunk and set it on the floor delicately. With a silent prayer to an unknown god, he opened the unlocked case and put the first DSA he saw into the reader.
The boy, Jarod, daddy, was in a strange plastic bubble. He was hot. He was thirsty. They were pressuring him without pressuring him, pressing him to give up and forcing him to continue at the same time. It looked torturous, but he was choosing it, so it couldn't be all bad, right? He slid a second DSA in.
They addicted him to a drug. He was seizing, shaking, trembling with need. It hurt everywhere and nothing would stay in his stomach until the one thing his body craved was surrendered. In horror, Sid ejected the DSA before it ended. In utter trepidation, he slid a new disk in, begging God that it would erase the horror and explain that these weren't real.
They stopped his heart. They killed him. He was dead. He wasn't moving. Daddy was dead. Sid screamed. He screamed and threw every spare molecule of oxygen in any of his cells into the scream, making it as loud as possible. Then, he screamed again and he didn't stop screaming until he felt warm arms enveloping him. Safe in his living father's arms, he switched over to whimpering, unable to look into his face as he made soft, soothing noises.
Mommy came running up the stairs then. "Is he alright," she asked breathlessly.
"He's just a little frightened, I think," Jarod said, gesturing to the open DSA case.
"Oh, God, which did he watch," she begged, a look of horror implanting itself on her face.
"Obviously a bad one," Jarod replied wryly, his voice still soft and soothing as he rocked his young son back and forth.
"It was real," the boy croaked, tears streaming from his eyes. "It wasn't like TV: that was really daddy."
"Yes," Jarod said, his voice still soothing, "but I'm fine now, and I promise that will never happen to you."
"But it was really you," he sobbed. "You were dead!"
"What's wrong," Sophia asked sleepily stumbling up the stairs. Immediately she snapped awake when she saw her parents hovering over her crying brother, the DSA player open in the background. "Why'd you come up when they were home," she asked incredulously. Both parents shot inquisitive looks at her making her feel much smaller than she usually did.
"Do you come up here a lot," Parker asked as her husband's attention returned to their badly shocked son.
"Not so much," Sophia whispered hopefully.
"How often is that," she asked, her tone demanding nothing less than the absolute and complete truth immediately.
"Twice, three times now, I guess. It was my idea at first, when Sid found that case. He just had to know what was in it, so even when he figured out we were probably breaking a rule even if you'd never told us not to come up here, he came with me. Last night, when Grandpa Sydney fell asleep, we came up here again and Sid managed to get it open after a really long time," she shot a look at her terrified twin. "We didn't see anything scary then, just some kid making a building. We thought it might be daddy, because it was his, and his name is Jarod like the kid, but we didn't know." Her voice was soft and apologetic, Parker didn't have the heart to yell at her, although she desperately wanted to be angry at someone.
"It's okay, this isn't your fault," Parker said, lifting her daughter into her arms. "We'll need to talk about this in the morning, but you're right, we never actually told you not to come up here. We'll get you back to bed for now, though, it is way past bedtime."
"What about Sid," Sophia asked, her eyes already closing as her head fell against her mother's shoulder.
"He might want to sleep with us tonight, don't worry about him," her mother advised. Sophia was dead to the world and carefully tucked into her bed when Parker rejoined her boys in the attic.
"Why don't you sleep with us tonight, okay," Jarod offered to the quivering boy who nodded slowly and allowed his father to lift him from the ground. Parker closed the DSA case and replaced it in the trunk before following her boys down to bed. Sid was far too young to deal with what his father had been forced to endure. For the first time she fully understood her husband's anxiety about their intelligent children. Jarod was a taken at this age. It was bad enough having Sid witness the horrors her husband suffered, what would she do if he had to face them?
Maybe it was time to sit her children down and explain what the Centre was slowly and clearly, not just hide it in a bedtime story. Her inner sense hinted that they would be able to understand, and from her own upbringing Parker knew lies were never a good thing to raise children by. She curled into bed, sandwiching her son against her husband comfortably. In the morning she would consider it further.
At breakfast, Parker made an announcement. "Sophia, Sid, we're staying home today."
Sid, who was feeling much better in the sunlight with his parents simply nodded while Sophia asked why.
"You have both realized by now that most five year olds don't read chapter books without help, but you've been really good about pretending to be just like your classmates in school. We don't want to lie to you about anything ever, so we've decided to tell you why," Jarod stated in a grave and serious voice.
"Because you don't want our hearts stopped," Sid said quietly, his stare boring a hole in the table before him.
"In essence, yes," Parker said, putting a reassuring hand on her son's shoulder.
"Hearts stopped," Sophia asked, fear in her voice.
"When I was your age," Jarod began slowly, "I was taken from my family because I was, like you, special. I was a genius with the added ability to pretend to be anything I wanted to be."
"Like a FBI man, a doctor or a fireman," Sophia asked slowly, piecing a few things together in her mind.
"Yes, although the identifications you found were not form my time at the Centre but later," Jarod answered, a small smile finding its way into his grave eyes. "The Centre is the name of the corporation that stole me. They made me do simulations, research. It wasn't a lot of fun. I was deprived of my freedom, I had to eat yucky green stuff every day, and I had to do whatever simulation they wanted me to. I didn't like it much there and I wasn't even allowed to have friends for a while. They kept me for thirty years before I realized that my work was being used to hurt people, not help them. Then, I ran away."
"Were the simulations when they hurt you and stopped your heart," Sid asked, his voice barely audible.
"Yes," Jarod answered, his voice soft and reassuring. "Some of what they did to me was physical torture, but most of the simulations weren't that bad."
"What happened after you ran away," Sophia asked, not wanting to think about someone who was strong enough to hurt her daddy.
"The Centre sent your mommy and Grandpa Sydney to find me and bring me back," he answered honestly, but moving to wrap both of his arms around his wife to demonstrate to both her and the children that he didn't hold a grudge.
"Did she catch you," Sid asked, astonished that his mother could have worked with such horrible people.
"Only when I let her," he answered, earning a snort of laughter from his wife. "Okay, so not just when I let her, but she always let me get away. Her daddy, Grandpa Parker, ran the Centre. When she was a little girl, he would bring her to work with him and we met. When she had to chase after me as a grown up, she remembered we were friends and didn't try too hard to catch me."
"So mommy just pretended to chase you like you pretended to be a fireman or a doctor?" Sophia cocked her head curiously at her parent.
"I guess that's a good analogy," Jarod agreed, winking broadly at the other red file. "Eventually, as thick headed as I was about everything, and as many times as she beat me over the head with proof, I realized she loved me as much as I loved her. We decided to run away so that they would never find us again, and we've been okay so far. Grandpa Sydney still works for them, but he told them that it would be pointless to take me back. Grandpa Parker agreed with him and we're fine for now. We are worried that you will be taken like I was, though, and there will be no mommy or Grandpa Sydney to help you like I was aided."
"I understand," Sid says. "But you've made it sound better than it was, haven't you, daddy," the little boy looked up at his father with sad but shrewd eyes.
"I have," Jarod said seriously, hugging his son tightly. "I won't lie to you, but I don't want to scare you. It was not a fun thirty years."
"So Grandpa Parker was the one who made them do bad things to you," Sophia asked with trepidation.
Parker sighed, "Yes, my father allowed all of the atrocities that daddy endured, but he also helped keep us free so that we are all safe now. He will protect you."
"What is an atrocity," Sophia inquired.
Both adults looked at Sid to give him a chance to answer before fielding the query. "An atrocity is a horrible occurrence," Sid answered deftly before turning his full attention back to his mother. "Neither of you really trust Grandpa Parker, do you?"
"Not completely, but I trust that he will do what he thinks is best for your sister and you. I know he won't subject you to what Jarod or my brothers were subjected to," Parker answered frankly.
"Uncle Ethan was at the Centre too," Sophia asked curiously.
"Ethan and my other brother, Lyle, who you've never met, were both side projects of a Doctor Raines. They were not kept physically at the Centre, but they were both hurt terribly by experiments preformed on them. I fear that Lyle was driven completely insane, which is why I've never arranged for you to meet him."
"Could we make a family tree," Sid asked innocently, "I'm getting a little confused."
"Sometimes it helps to think in diagrams, doesn't it," Jarod asked getting out a piece of paper and pulling a pen from his pocket. "Alright," he began, writing the names of his parents on one part and Catherine and Mr. Parker opposite them, he drew himself and his full siblings before adding Parker, Lyle and Ethan to the family tree."
"How did Grandma Catherine and Grandpa Major have Ethan if they aren't married," Sophia asked curiously and Jarod had to remind himself once again that his children were still children.
"Ethan was created a little like Uncle Jay," Jarod said, adding his clone to the diagram. "Uncle Ethan was implanted in your grandmother without my father's knowledge."
A childish duet of "oh" reverberated briefly before the question sprang from Sophia's lips. "Where do normal babies come from," she inquired innocently.
Parker sighed, knowing that she had dodged the question long enough with her precocious twins while Jarod began coughing violently. "Well," she began, adding Bridgette and her youngest brother to the diagram, "do you remember not long ago when we talked about how your body is made up of cells?"
"Yes," Sid said happily, "They are living Legos!"
"Exactly, well, at one point in time, you were just one little cell inside of me," she explained patiently while her husband found his voice. "I have a lot of those special cells, gametes, that could grow into a child, but to have that many children would be horrible because I couldn't possibly take care of all of them. This is why these cells do not grow into a child until they are fertilized by merging with another gamete from the father. Fertilization is also important to mix the gene pool, we'll talk about that when you are older and we study genetics, as smart as you are that is a very complex subject."
"How do the gametes come into contact so they can merge, mommy," Sophia asked.
Jarod fell into an entirely new coughing fit while his wife thought about the best way to answer. She seized the family tree and flipped it over and drew a rough diagram of the female uterus.
"This is already a part of your body," she informed Sophia, "but your ovaries," she circled the part of the diagram she was referring to "will not begin to produce and release eggs until you are about twelve years old. They will release one every month into your womb here and if it goes unfertilized the egg and the lining of your uterus will leave your body and be replaced. We'll discuss that further when you're old enough to start worrying about it. Boys have a similar organ that produces their gametes and they can inject this gamete into your uterus after they hit puberty. Again, this is something you don't really need to worry about yet, I'll explain all of this to both of you when you're older."
Sid looked unconvinced. He noticed how uncomfortable both of his parents were with this subject so he knew it couldn't be as boring as they were making it sound, although Sophia looked fairly fascinated with the vague discussion. He decided his parents felt uncomfortable because they were explaining adult matters to children, although they were never bothered by age when Sophia asked for engine diagrams. He reminded himself to ask again when he was older and changed the subject.
"So how does Grandpa Sydney fit into the family tree diagram," he inquired, concerned for his namesake.
Jarod looked gratefully at his son and answered quickly. "Sydney was my mentor while I was at the Centre, he was more like a father to me while I was growing up than Grandpa Major. I hope you won't tell this to Grandpa Major because it will make him feel bad, but I will always think of Grandpa Sydney as my father because he was the man who raised me."
"So in summation," Sid stated slowly, "the Centre stole you from your family when you were small and treated you terribly, but you met mommy and Grandpa Sydney so it wasn't as horrible as it could have been. You escaped and helped people while mommy chased you without intending to catch you until you realized you were in love and married her. You then had us by merging four gametes to create two cells that grew into two babies inside of mommy's uterus. You didn't tell us this before because the Centre is scary, but you never lie to us about anything. Is that correct?"
"One hundred percent, it deserves a sundae," Jarod said seriously, scooping his son into his arms.
"Do I get one too," Sophia begged.
"Ice Cream before lunch, Jarod," Parker asked, pretending to be strict.
"It's nearly eleven," Jarod replied. "An hour before lunch is almost as good as after," three pairs of sad eyes turned on Parker.
"Fine," she capitulated, "but small sundaes and I get one too!"
"Of course, dear," he said with a light smirk, "after all of that explaining, you deserve one."
When their children had safely rushed ahead to the kitchen, Parker returned the smirk and slapped her husband playfully in the stomach. "After your little ploy to dodge the question, I deserve an extra cherry."
Jarod apologized, not looking remotely sorry, but when he served the sundaes, Parker's got three cherries.