"Serendipity"
Disclaimer: Love 'em, don't own 'em.
(2/4)
"You are liking the baseball?" asked Mr. Park, peering intently across the counter at Detective Felton.
"Baseball?" Beau waved a hand to indicate 'so-so'. "I'm more of a football guy."
The store owner indicated a photograph taped to the register. "My nephew in Seoul. National team. Very fine pitcher. You like some fresh fruit for Mrs Felton? Very fine."
"Well, we're not supposed to accept. . .damn, but those are some nice peaches!"
In the back of Park's store, Megan Russert looked up from the telephone and smiled. First he almost gets killed by Frank Pembleton, now he's ready to compromise both of us with illegal gifts.
"Hey, Sarge, did you page me?" Megan asked the receiver, and listened to Lonnie Sixsmith recite the previously vital stats on Dontay Ellis. "Yeah, we knew most of that." She nodded. "We've spent all morning helping homicide canvass on the off chance we'd find somebody who knows something. Plus, Pembleton will owe us a favor."
"Pembleton?" The sergeant chuckled. "Felton's still alive?"
"Amazingly," Megan answered. "Beau dragged me into this Korean grocery store to answer your page. He explained to me how the guy owes him one for chasing some dealers off his corner." She imitated Felton's voice. "You know how those Orientals are, they're so gracious. The gospel according to Beauregard Felton, on race, immigration, and ethnic stereotyping 101."
"I don't wanna know," said Sixsmith firmly. "And I don't wanna know if he's quote- unquote shopping for anything, either. I suppose it's too much to hope you've toyed with Felton's heart and broken it in the past three hours."
"Perish the thought," she said slyly. "I'm a married woman."
"Too bad, would've been entertaining. Dunno why else you'd ever ride with the guy."
"Because, Lonnie," said Megan, looking to the front of the store where Beau was knocking enthusiastically on a row of melons. "It's fun."
Russert hung up and heard Beau exclaim, "Listen to that echo!" If he can shop for fruit, she thought, I can make a personal call. She took a breath and dialed.
"At least the morning wasn't a total loss," Beau said, pawing enthusiastically through the bag of fruit. "Banana?" he asked, handing one to Megan.
"Yeah, you alienated a fellow detective and took a bribe." Hands on the wheel, eyes straight ahead, she asked, "Got a pear?"
Felton polished a juicy Bartlett with his shirt and handed it to Megan. "According to his culture, it would be some kind of mortal insult if I didn't accept." To her skeptical gaze, he nodded solemnly. "Dane told me so."
"Oh, and Dane Stevens from Bump-ASS, Virginia is the resident expert on Asian cultures?"
"Dane did two tours in 'Nam. And it's pronounced Bump-us, OK, don't let Dane hear you say it like that."
"I was stationed in Seoul for . . .Damn, that's a good pear," she sighed, catching the juice with her tongue. "Can't complain now, I'm tainted."
"That's the idea. Wanna take some grapefruit?"
"Maybe I'll - look, I have to go home for lunch, might be a little long."
"Caroline?" he asked.
"Yeah," Megan heard herself lying. "She's been. . .sick, at home." She tried to disguise the hesitation by finishing off the pear.
"My husband is - staying with her - taking some time, but he's got to do some - stuff, and - "
"They got all that touchy feely family leave stuff at Gant and Donovan?"
"Mike does, seeing as he's Donovan."
"Dunno why you didn't change your name to Donovan," Beau snickered, and sang "Dum-de-dum-de-dum. Mellow yello-o-o."
"I'm surprised you know that song, Beau. I had no idea you were so in touch with your inner wuss. Anyway," she snapped. "Bet you'd have freaked out if Beth wanted to keep her name." She wasn't sure why she was provoking him. Maybe to change the subject from her own marriage. Maybe to take revenge on herself for enjoying his company too much.
Beau snorted. "Beth Higenbotham, of Boring, Maryland. Believe me, she was just as anxious to ditch the name as the town."
"Long lunch," Megan repeated. "OK? No more than an hour and a half."
Beau rubbed his chin, musing, "Will the war on drugs still be going on if Megan takes an extra half hour for lunch? I'm gonna go out on a limb and say yes."
Maybe I shouldn't, thought Megan, poised with her hand on the bedroom door. Maybe I should turn around, go back to work, and let him play whatever game it is he's playing. If it makes him happy, who am I to say. . . No. Tiptoeing around to avoid confrontation had never been her way. Besides, she didn't want him to have to hide things from her. Or, she admitted, to be able to.
Megan eased the door open, walked in slowly, and sat on the bed. He slept on his side, with the sheet pulled over his head; he always did when she let him. She thought of a shroud and quickly uncovered his face. His skin looked yellow next to the white cotton, and for a panicky second she doubted he was breathing. Then he stirred, and the back of her hand came to rest on his cheek. God, it was like ice. She pulled her hand away, but then she bent to kiss the same spot.
"Mike?" she whispered. He emerged from the sheets slowly, rubbing thin fingers over the ruins of his eyebrows.
"Caroline," he muttered. Facing Megan with a puzzled look, he said, "Day-care. I'm -supposed to - take - Caroline?"
Megan smiled and leaned forward to kiss his cheek again. "That was this morning. I did it for you. It's twelve-thirty now, and I'm home for lunch." He stared at her, then at the clock, nodding in slowly dawning comprehension.
"Me too." Nodding faster. "I came home - for lunch."
She lowered her head and stared as she inched closer to him on the bed. Reaching out for his pajama sleeve, she said, "How'd you get through three years of law school, and still be such a bad liar?"
"All right." The kind of 'you-caught-me' grin the guilty use to hide their greater sins. "I didn't go in to the office today." He nodded at a pile of papers on the desk. "I brought some files home to look at." Still the stare from Megan. "What?"
"I called the office, and your secretary let slip you haven't been in all week."
"Damn Janet!" he cried, slipping down into the bed.
"I told you to fire her." She lifted her feet to the mattress and lay down beside him. "This makes up for all those messages of mine that she garbled."
"What can I say, hon, I feel like crap." He ran a hand over the black and gray hairs that were just starting to sprout from his skull. "I've been out of chemo for a month. Aren't I supposed to start feeling better at some point?"
"Everyone's different," Megan answered, forcing a smile. "Just like being pregnant." Slipping her fingers down to touch his scalp, she thought of the dark, messy curls that had covered that skin for thirty-seven years before that awful spring. The changes from the treatment had been gradual enough that she had to look at old pictures or summon distant memories to realize how much the chemo had aged him. His thin face had become gaunt, the line of his crooked nose even sharper. Megan forced herself to focus on his eyes, deep and serious as ever. That's the thing about eyes, she thought. Nothing changes them. She squeezed his shoulder and said through gritted teeth. "Don't lie to me, Mike. It doesn't do any good."
"Hmm." He pulled up the sheets and turned his face from her. "Maybe it does me some good."
"What?" She cringed at the sharpness in her own voice.
"Maybe it helps me," he repeated, still not facing her, "when you don't look at me like I'm a poor sick little puppy dog."
"Mike, for God's sake." She willed herself to sound reasonable. "I just want you to take care of yourself. Don't push things too hard."
"Right, because we all know bedrest cures cancer. You should go work for the CDC, you and my mom with her chicken soup."
"Mike," she sighed. Then, "sorry." She inched closer and squeezed his hand. He pulled the blankets aside so she could climb under. She kicked off her shoes and slipped in next to him, rubbing a hand along his neck. "Damn, I could use a nap."
"Right," Mike whispered. "A nap." His right hand brushed her breast and his left stroked her inner thigh. He rolled toward her and caught her lips in a full-mouthed kiss. Under the blankets, he worked on the button of her slacks. Megan shivered as his fingers brushed her, but then she caught his hand with her own. She pulled away from the kiss and warned: "Mike."
"What?" he spoke sharply and reached for her waist again.
"This isn't a good idea now. You'll just get all worked up for nothing and. . ." Eyes wide in disbelief, he let her go and slammed his body back onto the bed. "Don't get mad at me!" she protested.
"Right, because this is my fault."
"Mike!" Megan brought his hand to her mouth and kissed it softly. "You know I don't mean that." She rubbed his scalp again with her thumb and forefinger and whispered, "You're still not strong, and you're taking a lot of medicine. OK? Give it some time, all right?" she soothed. "Remember what the doctor. . ."
"Yes, Mom," Mike muttered.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Too sharply again.
"You talk to me like you talk to Caroline."
"You act about as mature as she does sometimes."
"You just don't want me to touch you," he grumbled, and she heard a three year old's petulance in his voice.
"Look, you . . ." Megan leaned across his chest and met his lips. They were cold, even his tongue was cold, but she kept kissing him for a long time. Finally, it was Mike who brought a hand to her face and coaxed it aside. She brought her mouth down by his ear and whispered, "Look, it'll take some time, but this part will pass. Your medication - we can talk to the docs about it. Then, when you're feeling better, we should. . ." She patted his arm and sat up. "Go on a trip. It's been too long. St. Thomas or Puerto Rico."
Still lying on his side, Mike shook his head without lifting it from the pillow. "Somewhere we haven't been. Spain."
"Run with the bulls?" Megan suggested. Kissing his cheek, she got to her feet and shrugged. "Why not?" She walked to the desk and started checking the due dates on a pile of neglected bills. Busy month.
He rolled on his back and stretched his arms over his head, pushing his hands against the wall. "Speaking of vacations and big dumb animals, who's taking care of you while Doug's at sea?"
"I'm gonna pretend you're delirious and forget you said that." She hesitated, then added lightly, "Felton."
"Beau Felton?" She could hear the scowl in Mike's voice. "Isn't he the guy who told Doug. . .?"
"That he thought I was quote unquote hot, yes. When he was three sheets to the wind on a barstool in the Wharf Rat, in a room full of cops who were celebrating the birth of Beau's second child - talk about class, huh." Mike snorted and Megan grinned. "Hon, Felton is neither competing with you nor harassing me, all right?" She dropped the bills and leaned down over the bed to kiss him. "Doug just told you - and everyone else in Maryland, apparently - because he thought it was funny." Another scowl, another kiss. "It is funny. Now. . ." She flattened down the bedspread to erase her own form. "I'm gonna get some lunch. Hungry?"
"Not for food," he sighed. Megan turned to leave the room, and Mike said, "I've been thinking that maybe we should have another kid."
The shock that ran through her was so powerful that she thanked God Mike couldn't see her face. She turned slowly back and saw him searching her for a reaction. She sat on the bed again and said, "That's a little sudden."
"Why?" he challenged. "We've always said we wanted Caroline to have a brother or sister."
She nodded. "No, you're right, it's just - now, with everything uncertain."
"Megan," he coughed. "You know what it's been like between us since . . . If we want to. . .the next few months might be it for us. I mean, unless you're into freezing sperm, we may not have another chance."
"Don't talk like that!" Megan snapped.
"Right," Mike sighed, shifting against his pillow. "Bed rest and chicken soup and not talking about it - listen, we don't have to talk now. But think about it." He stared at her with those eyes that were just like his daughter's. "Please?"
Megan nodded. "I'm thinking."
End part 2
Disclaimer: Love 'em, don't own 'em.
(2/4)
"You are liking the baseball?" asked Mr. Park, peering intently across the counter at Detective Felton.
"Baseball?" Beau waved a hand to indicate 'so-so'. "I'm more of a football guy."
The store owner indicated a photograph taped to the register. "My nephew in Seoul. National team. Very fine pitcher. You like some fresh fruit for Mrs Felton? Very fine."
"Well, we're not supposed to accept. . .damn, but those are some nice peaches!"
In the back of Park's store, Megan Russert looked up from the telephone and smiled. First he almost gets killed by Frank Pembleton, now he's ready to compromise both of us with illegal gifts.
"Hey, Sarge, did you page me?" Megan asked the receiver, and listened to Lonnie Sixsmith recite the previously vital stats on Dontay Ellis. "Yeah, we knew most of that." She nodded. "We've spent all morning helping homicide canvass on the off chance we'd find somebody who knows something. Plus, Pembleton will owe us a favor."
"Pembleton?" The sergeant chuckled. "Felton's still alive?"
"Amazingly," Megan answered. "Beau dragged me into this Korean grocery store to answer your page. He explained to me how the guy owes him one for chasing some dealers off his corner." She imitated Felton's voice. "You know how those Orientals are, they're so gracious. The gospel according to Beauregard Felton, on race, immigration, and ethnic stereotyping 101."
"I don't wanna know," said Sixsmith firmly. "And I don't wanna know if he's quote- unquote shopping for anything, either. I suppose it's too much to hope you've toyed with Felton's heart and broken it in the past three hours."
"Perish the thought," she said slyly. "I'm a married woman."
"Too bad, would've been entertaining. Dunno why else you'd ever ride with the guy."
"Because, Lonnie," said Megan, looking to the front of the store where Beau was knocking enthusiastically on a row of melons. "It's fun."
Russert hung up and heard Beau exclaim, "Listen to that echo!" If he can shop for fruit, she thought, I can make a personal call. She took a breath and dialed.
"At least the morning wasn't a total loss," Beau said, pawing enthusiastically through the bag of fruit. "Banana?" he asked, handing one to Megan.
"Yeah, you alienated a fellow detective and took a bribe." Hands on the wheel, eyes straight ahead, she asked, "Got a pear?"
Felton polished a juicy Bartlett with his shirt and handed it to Megan. "According to his culture, it would be some kind of mortal insult if I didn't accept." To her skeptical gaze, he nodded solemnly. "Dane told me so."
"Oh, and Dane Stevens from Bump-ASS, Virginia is the resident expert on Asian cultures?"
"Dane did two tours in 'Nam. And it's pronounced Bump-us, OK, don't let Dane hear you say it like that."
"I was stationed in Seoul for . . .Damn, that's a good pear," she sighed, catching the juice with her tongue. "Can't complain now, I'm tainted."
"That's the idea. Wanna take some grapefruit?"
"Maybe I'll - look, I have to go home for lunch, might be a little long."
"Caroline?" he asked.
"Yeah," Megan heard herself lying. "She's been. . .sick, at home." She tried to disguise the hesitation by finishing off the pear.
"My husband is - staying with her - taking some time, but he's got to do some - stuff, and - "
"They got all that touchy feely family leave stuff at Gant and Donovan?"
"Mike does, seeing as he's Donovan."
"Dunno why you didn't change your name to Donovan," Beau snickered, and sang "Dum-de-dum-de-dum. Mellow yello-o-o."
"I'm surprised you know that song, Beau. I had no idea you were so in touch with your inner wuss. Anyway," she snapped. "Bet you'd have freaked out if Beth wanted to keep her name." She wasn't sure why she was provoking him. Maybe to change the subject from her own marriage. Maybe to take revenge on herself for enjoying his company too much.
Beau snorted. "Beth Higenbotham, of Boring, Maryland. Believe me, she was just as anxious to ditch the name as the town."
"Long lunch," Megan repeated. "OK? No more than an hour and a half."
Beau rubbed his chin, musing, "Will the war on drugs still be going on if Megan takes an extra half hour for lunch? I'm gonna go out on a limb and say yes."
Maybe I shouldn't, thought Megan, poised with her hand on the bedroom door. Maybe I should turn around, go back to work, and let him play whatever game it is he's playing. If it makes him happy, who am I to say. . . No. Tiptoeing around to avoid confrontation had never been her way. Besides, she didn't want him to have to hide things from her. Or, she admitted, to be able to.
Megan eased the door open, walked in slowly, and sat on the bed. He slept on his side, with the sheet pulled over his head; he always did when she let him. She thought of a shroud and quickly uncovered his face. His skin looked yellow next to the white cotton, and for a panicky second she doubted he was breathing. Then he stirred, and the back of her hand came to rest on his cheek. God, it was like ice. She pulled her hand away, but then she bent to kiss the same spot.
"Mike?" she whispered. He emerged from the sheets slowly, rubbing thin fingers over the ruins of his eyebrows.
"Caroline," he muttered. Facing Megan with a puzzled look, he said, "Day-care. I'm -supposed to - take - Caroline?"
Megan smiled and leaned forward to kiss his cheek again. "That was this morning. I did it for you. It's twelve-thirty now, and I'm home for lunch." He stared at her, then at the clock, nodding in slowly dawning comprehension.
"Me too." Nodding faster. "I came home - for lunch."
She lowered her head and stared as she inched closer to him on the bed. Reaching out for his pajama sleeve, she said, "How'd you get through three years of law school, and still be such a bad liar?"
"All right." The kind of 'you-caught-me' grin the guilty use to hide their greater sins. "I didn't go in to the office today." He nodded at a pile of papers on the desk. "I brought some files home to look at." Still the stare from Megan. "What?"
"I called the office, and your secretary let slip you haven't been in all week."
"Damn Janet!" he cried, slipping down into the bed.
"I told you to fire her." She lifted her feet to the mattress and lay down beside him. "This makes up for all those messages of mine that she garbled."
"What can I say, hon, I feel like crap." He ran a hand over the black and gray hairs that were just starting to sprout from his skull. "I've been out of chemo for a month. Aren't I supposed to start feeling better at some point?"
"Everyone's different," Megan answered, forcing a smile. "Just like being pregnant." Slipping her fingers down to touch his scalp, she thought of the dark, messy curls that had covered that skin for thirty-seven years before that awful spring. The changes from the treatment had been gradual enough that she had to look at old pictures or summon distant memories to realize how much the chemo had aged him. His thin face had become gaunt, the line of his crooked nose even sharper. Megan forced herself to focus on his eyes, deep and serious as ever. That's the thing about eyes, she thought. Nothing changes them. She squeezed his shoulder and said through gritted teeth. "Don't lie to me, Mike. It doesn't do any good."
"Hmm." He pulled up the sheets and turned his face from her. "Maybe it does me some good."
"What?" She cringed at the sharpness in her own voice.
"Maybe it helps me," he repeated, still not facing her, "when you don't look at me like I'm a poor sick little puppy dog."
"Mike, for God's sake." She willed herself to sound reasonable. "I just want you to take care of yourself. Don't push things too hard."
"Right, because we all know bedrest cures cancer. You should go work for the CDC, you and my mom with her chicken soup."
"Mike," she sighed. Then, "sorry." She inched closer and squeezed his hand. He pulled the blankets aside so she could climb under. She kicked off her shoes and slipped in next to him, rubbing a hand along his neck. "Damn, I could use a nap."
"Right," Mike whispered. "A nap." His right hand brushed her breast and his left stroked her inner thigh. He rolled toward her and caught her lips in a full-mouthed kiss. Under the blankets, he worked on the button of her slacks. Megan shivered as his fingers brushed her, but then she caught his hand with her own. She pulled away from the kiss and warned: "Mike."
"What?" he spoke sharply and reached for her waist again.
"This isn't a good idea now. You'll just get all worked up for nothing and. . ." Eyes wide in disbelief, he let her go and slammed his body back onto the bed. "Don't get mad at me!" she protested.
"Right, because this is my fault."
"Mike!" Megan brought his hand to her mouth and kissed it softly. "You know I don't mean that." She rubbed his scalp again with her thumb and forefinger and whispered, "You're still not strong, and you're taking a lot of medicine. OK? Give it some time, all right?" she soothed. "Remember what the doctor. . ."
"Yes, Mom," Mike muttered.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Too sharply again.
"You talk to me like you talk to Caroline."
"You act about as mature as she does sometimes."
"You just don't want me to touch you," he grumbled, and she heard a three year old's petulance in his voice.
"Look, you . . ." Megan leaned across his chest and met his lips. They were cold, even his tongue was cold, but she kept kissing him for a long time. Finally, it was Mike who brought a hand to her face and coaxed it aside. She brought her mouth down by his ear and whispered, "Look, it'll take some time, but this part will pass. Your medication - we can talk to the docs about it. Then, when you're feeling better, we should. . ." She patted his arm and sat up. "Go on a trip. It's been too long. St. Thomas or Puerto Rico."
Still lying on his side, Mike shook his head without lifting it from the pillow. "Somewhere we haven't been. Spain."
"Run with the bulls?" Megan suggested. Kissing his cheek, she got to her feet and shrugged. "Why not?" She walked to the desk and started checking the due dates on a pile of neglected bills. Busy month.
He rolled on his back and stretched his arms over his head, pushing his hands against the wall. "Speaking of vacations and big dumb animals, who's taking care of you while Doug's at sea?"
"I'm gonna pretend you're delirious and forget you said that." She hesitated, then added lightly, "Felton."
"Beau Felton?" She could hear the scowl in Mike's voice. "Isn't he the guy who told Doug. . .?"
"That he thought I was quote unquote hot, yes. When he was three sheets to the wind on a barstool in the Wharf Rat, in a room full of cops who were celebrating the birth of Beau's second child - talk about class, huh." Mike snorted and Megan grinned. "Hon, Felton is neither competing with you nor harassing me, all right?" She dropped the bills and leaned down over the bed to kiss him. "Doug just told you - and everyone else in Maryland, apparently - because he thought it was funny." Another scowl, another kiss. "It is funny. Now. . ." She flattened down the bedspread to erase her own form. "I'm gonna get some lunch. Hungry?"
"Not for food," he sighed. Megan turned to leave the room, and Mike said, "I've been thinking that maybe we should have another kid."
The shock that ran through her was so powerful that she thanked God Mike couldn't see her face. She turned slowly back and saw him searching her for a reaction. She sat on the bed again and said, "That's a little sudden."
"Why?" he challenged. "We've always said we wanted Caroline to have a brother or sister."
She nodded. "No, you're right, it's just - now, with everything uncertain."
"Megan," he coughed. "You know what it's been like between us since . . . If we want to. . .the next few months might be it for us. I mean, unless you're into freezing sperm, we may not have another chance."
"Don't talk like that!" Megan snapped.
"Right," Mike sighed, shifting against his pillow. "Bed rest and chicken soup and not talking about it - listen, we don't have to talk now. But think about it." He stared at her with those eyes that were just like his daughter's. "Please?"
Megan nodded. "I'm thinking."
End part 2