"I'm so glad that you came," Harriet said when she opened the door to let Harm and Mac in.
"You've got Harm to thank for that. He's the one who convinced me," Mac said. She knew that it was going to be great with an evening together with their best friends like that, but the piles of things to do at home were still firmly stuck in her head.
"I think we all need to have at least an evening off considering how much we've worked lately," Harm said.
"I definitely agree that's why I thought of this dinner."
"I'm sure it will be great," Mac said "I just don't know if I'll be able to relax enough to enjoy it."
"Getting everything in order before you leave is important to you, isn't it?" Harriet said and looked thoughtfully at Mac.
"Yeah. I don't want to leave everything for Harm and Mattie to sort out, you know."
"Well, let's try to forget about that for a few hours. Sturgis and Varese are already here. We're having drinks out in the back yard. It's such a nice weather, we thought we'd eat outside."
"That sounds great," Harm agreed.
Back outside they were heartedly greeted by the people they had left at the office just a few hours ago. Varese had just gotten back from a small tour on the west coast and Mac and she were catching up. Bud forbid all talk about work, but that was still what was running through Mac's head, though she pretended to be concentrating on other things. She was so stressed she couldn't think about anything else. Varese noticed that she wasn't focusing on their conversation, but realized what the reason was and didn't comment on it.
Harm wanted Mac to get to see what the house would really look like when it was ready before she left too, but he didn't see the point of working yourself sick because of that. He couldn't take that away from Mac and he knew that Mac was trying to take it easier as well, but not succeeding very well.
All of a sudden Little AJ came out of the house. He had been upstairs in his room on a time-out and had finally been let out by his mother.
"Hello Harm and Mac."
"Hello AJ. How are you?" Mac asked him.
"Mom made me stay in my room."
"And why was that?"
"I pushed Jimmy sort of."
"Well, that wasn't very nice." Harm commented.
"He pushed me first," AJ protested.
"But still, he's smaller then you so you can't push back or you might hurt him."
"That's what mom said too."
"Maybe she was right," Harm tried to convince him.
Harriet had been watching from a distance, but now she saw Jimmy, whom she had been trying to keep apart from AJ because they had a habit of provoking each other into fighting and screaming as soon as they were within touching distance, toddle over to where AJ was standing. Sometimes having children who were early in learning things were definitely not an advantage. Before Jimmy had started reaching out for the small football AJ was holding in his hand, she pulled him back and lifted him up to rest on her hip.
"AJ, go and say hello to Sturgis and Varese too, please," she told her oldest son and joined Harm and Mac. "Doesn't this make you long to have more then one child?" she said jokingly.
"I think one is definitely enough for us at the moment," Mac said and Harm nodded in agreement.
"I can't wait to get her home though," Harm said.
"It's just another week, isn't it?" Harriet commented.
"Yep, just another week."
The dinner passed quickly in the nice company. Harm and Mac excused themselves early stating that they needed to go home, because they had to go up and work so early the next day. The truth was that a bigger motivation had been the toe-flirting that had been going on between the two of them during the whole dinner.
"You know," Harm said when they were lying in bed after their latest, but probably not last session of the night. "Seeing Little AJ got me thinking about something. Remember that deal we made a little more then five years ago?"
"Mm hm, I guess it turns out we did go through with it."
"You mean Mattie."
"Do we have any other children together that I don't know about?" Mac smiled and moved a little closer to him again. Her hand was on his cheek.
"No, but Mattie is a rather large baby, don't you think?"
Mac just looked at him and nodded.
"So maybe we don't have to completely remove that idea of having a baby together from our heads?"
"You want to have a baby with me?" Mac asked him looking straight into his eyes.
"Yes, I do. But only if you do too of course."
"I do. Of course I do... Why don't we revisit this conversation when I come back from the Patrick-Henry?"
"Sounds great," Harm whispered. "But do you know what I want to do now?"
"I can't guess..." Mac said and cried out with laughter when she was quickly turned over to lie on her back.
Mac was sitting on the living room floor doing the same thing she had done last night and would continue to do all of today and most of tomorrow; she was sorting out all of the boxes that were still piled up in the living room. There were books, papers and little things that were really of no use. Tomorrow night Mattie was going to walk into the house and she wanted to get the worst of it done before then. Harm was in the kitchen unpacking the rest of the things that belonged there. They had had so little time to cook and eat that they hadn't really needed anything more then the absolute necessities.
There was a knock on the door and Mac sighed. Now she was going to get even less done. Not that they would be able to do everything anyway.
Mac opened the door and the sight was a total surprise to her. Outside were all their friends from JAG with tool boxes and mops in their hands.
"Harm, we have visitors," she shouted towards the kitchen, not sure what to say to the people that were standing in front of her.
"Hello Mac. We thought you might need some help and besides we really want to have a house warming party and it seemed like this was the only way to get one," Harriet waved towards the rest of the people that were here.
"We do need some help," Mac backed into the living room and almost hit a box so it fell over. The room was now being filled with people; Harriet, Bud and their boys were there. Meredith, the admiral, Sturgis, Varese, Coates, Tiner and some other people that also worked at JAG were crowding the hallway, kitchen and living room.
"You just need to tell us what to do and we'll do it," the admiral said and looked around making sure that all of his subordinates were agreeing on this. They were of course here voluntarily, but the fact that Harriet had convinced Admiral Chegwidden to come had made a lot of the other people more easily convinced.
"OK, well," Mac looked around the living room. There was hardly even room for all of them and the boxes as it was. She didn't know where to start and neither did Harm.
"Then... first of all someone take the boys outside," the admiral nodded towards Little AJ and Jimmy. Little AJ had started going around and picking things up from the box with Mac's vases and setting them on the floor. Harriet rushed forward and promptly lifted him away from the box.
"I'll get them outside. If you have anything I can do out there. Just say so."
"Well, I cut the grass yesterday, but there's a lot of weeds there in the flowerbed," Harm started carefully feeling extremely awkward asking for help with these things. Harm and Mac loved the flowerbed with the red and white roses that surrounded the whole back yard, but they had neglected them in the past weeks when they had lived there "I mean only if you want to..."
"I'll do it, sir. That's why I'm here," Harriet interrupted him and took the children outside to the back of the house.
The rest of the work of putting the bookshelves together and filling them up with the books, cleaning out the cupboards of the kitchen and putting cleaned plates in them and repainting what was going to become Harm and Mac's office in a much less nauseating color, was divided up between the remaining people. Harm and Mac watched how all of their remaining work with the house was slowly, but steadily disappearing by the hands of their friends. They were of course not just watching their friends work, they were working harder than anyone else there, but everything went much easier now when there was actually some hope that they were going to be able to get everything done. The nice company made the whole day seem more like a social event then a workday.
For lunch they ordered in some different kinds of take-outs and once they were ready for dinner the rest of the gang all went home just to come back tomorrow again. By six o'clock on Sunday when Mac and Harm had to go to the airport absolutely everything in the whole house that could possibly need any cleaning up, putting together or unpacking had been done. It looked wonderful and all of them had had a lot of fun working together like this. Harm and Mac were so grateful to their friends for all of the help they had gotten. There was no way that just the two of them would have been able to get everything done even if they had worked day and night.
Harm and Mac left for the airport and the rest of the gang stayed at the house starting the barbecue and making some salad and other side dishes.
Harm and Mac were at the airport anxiously looking for Mattie. It felt like it was just yesterday that she had left, but also like she had been gone forever. So many things had changed during her time away. They were now living together in a house and the two of them were much more comfortable with their relationship. They knew that the plane had landed and any minute now Mattie should show up. Harm reached for Mac's hand and they held on to each other as they watched the opening where Mattie was going to show up. And then Harm got a glimpse of her curly hair.
"Mattie," he shouted and waved his hand.
"Where? Where?" Mac asked and Harm pointed her in the direction. He needed to shout a few more times and then all of a sudden Mattie was in their arms.
"Oh honey, we've missed you so, so much. Are you OK?"
Mattie took a step back and just laughed and nodded. She was smiling the whole time and just seemed like a completely different and much lighter person. Mac and Harm looked at her trying to get every single part of her into their head.
"I can't believe you're home," Harm said and brought her and Mac back into his embrace. "You can never ever leave again."
"And neither can you," Mattie said towards Mac "Do you really have to go there?"
"I do Mattie. I know it might be hard to understand, but that's what it's like to be in the Marine Corps, or in the Navy, you serve where they want you to serve not always where you want to be."
"But I don't want to understand that... I... I just want us to be together. I think you belong here with us."
"I think I belong here too."
"Have you got all of your things?" Harm looked down on the floor and saw a whole bunch of bags. Many more then she had had when she left Washington.
"Eh, I went shopping with Trish a couple of times and..." Mattie tried to explain and Mac and Harm tried their best to hide their laughs. They both got some of the things and together they walked to the car.
On the drive home to the new house they told her about the by now ongoing party there. Mattie was tired from the trip, but since it was still early afternoon to her she was still able to get very excited about the house and the party.
"Did you get along well with my mother and Frank?" Harm asked her.
"Yeah. Frank hasn't been at home so much. At times it can get to be a little too much with you mother though, no offence."
"None taken."
"I mean, she's really nice and I know she cares about me, but she can be a bit too pushy sometimes and it's sort of unpleasant when she talks about Mac..." Mattie stopped talking abruptly realizing she had said too much.
"Why is that then?" Mac decided to ask.
"Well, she," Mattie didn't really want to tell Mac what Trish said about her, but she also didn't want to keep anything from Mac "She..." Mattie said again.
"I know she doesn't really like me. It's OK. I can live with that and I think she can too..." Mac said realizing that she didn't want to put Mattie in that position.
"I just don't understand why," Mattie said not denying that Trish didn't like Mac.
"Well... I think, right now it's nothing either I or we can do anything about at all."
They drove up to the house and Mattie stopped and just looked at it.
"So this is our home,"
"This is our home," Harm said.
"Yeah, isn't that wonderful?" Mac said and was given nods of agreements from Harm and Mattie.
They could hear the rest of the group on the backside, but none of them had discovered them yet.
"Let's go inside," Mac suggested. They went inside and walked through the living room and kitchen and then entered Mattie's room. Except for putting all of her furniture together and in order they hadn't really done anything with her room. If Mattie wanted to repaint the walls, she could and Harm would help her, but they wanted her to pick a color herself. She also went upstairs and looked at Harm and Mac's room(s) and the office. She really liked what she was seeing.
"I don't understand at all what you've been talking about, Mac. You said the house was in chaos, but everything looks just fine."
"We have our friends to thank for that. They've helped us getting everything in order over the weekend."
The little family went outside and was discovered by the others. They had already started eating and offered them hamburgers and drinks.
They were all standing in small groups. Everyone was laughing, except for Little AJ whose father wouldn't let him drink beer like the big men, and the JAG-gang seemed to have mended some of the differences that had torn them apart a year ago. The atmosphere was warm and lovely.
"It's nice to have her back, isn't it?" Harriet came up to Mac who had just returned from the kitchen bringing out some more water. Harriet was standing by the table where they had put all of the glasses, plates, knives and forks.
"Yeah, it's just so sad that I'm leaving so soon. I'm not sure I'll be able to stand being so far away from them," Mac breathed in and out again also attempting a smile "Do you want some water?" Mac asked her.
"You and Harm has gotten close throughout this too, haven't you?" Harriet held out her glass and Mac poured some water into it.
"Yeah," Mac answered. "We've known each other for so long that we know exactly which buttons to push, lately we've simply stopped doing that."
"You know they'll be fine. They'll take care of each other and whenever Harm needs to go away, Mattie can come and stay with us."
"Thank you, Harriet, for everything. I'm not sure if you understand how much I appreciate everything you all have done for us this weekend. It means a lot to me not having to leave the house looking like a dumpster for Harm and Mattie to sort out alone. And thank you for being my friend all these years."
"I'm just glad we could help. Being your friend is a pleasure."
Mac embraced Harriet and they held on to each other for a long time fighting the tears that were slowly making an appearance in the corners of their eyes. Harm and Mattie weren't going to be the only people she'd miss during her deployment.
A few hours later all of the guests had left and it was just Harm, Mac and Mattie left in the house.
"Now the house is just like it was supposed to," Harm said looking around the kitchen and finally letting his eyes rest on Mattie and Mac who were drying up the last of the dishes. He smiled.
"Yeah, but it won't be for long," Mattie said.
"Mattie, are you going to be OK with me leaving? I mean do you understand that I'm not going because I want to, but because it's my duty to go?" Mac asked her.
"Yeah, Mac," Mattie made a small pause "Eventually I will be totally fine with it. I really don't want you to go, I still don't, but I'm not so scared of it anymore. When you first told me about it, I was terrified that everything was going to change because of it. Now I feel like it's going to be tough for those months, but then you're going to come back to live with us and everything will be just like it's supposed to be."
"Yes, I am coming back to you." Mac snuck up to Mattie and embraced her from behind "Are you ready to go to bed now?"
"Oh yeah."
"Me too."
Mattie went to spend the first night in her new room and Harm and Mac went upside to theirs.
TBC