They settled themselves in the living room, their drinks of choice in front of them. Boone sipped at his club soda and lime. He figured he'd probably have a glass of wine with their meal, but wanted to keep it together till then, he still had to get dinner on the table. It was a bit ironic, really. Here he was in catering, which was the business of entertaining, but they so rarely entertained themselves, they were a very insular family, keeping to themselves for the most part. The infrequent company they had over mostly consisted of members of their closely knitgroup of Oceanic flight 815 survivors. He glanced over at Shannon, smiling at how luminescent she appeared, even with the bruise on her cheek, totally on her game in front of visitors.
She sensed his scrutiny and grinned over at him, dipping her head a bit in girlish enthusiasm.
They caught each other's eye, and lost the momentum of the conversation for a heartbeat. Their smiles faded as they only existed for each other.
Andrew caught on to what was happening with them and silently groaned to himself, 'Oh no, not now.' He hoped they could pull it back together before they embarrassed all of them. He was seated beside Amy, on the floor in front of the fireplace, only a hands breadth of space between their knees.
Shannon breathed deeply and turned from him with effort. "I'm sorry, what?"
"The car in the driveway," Tim prompted.
She tried desperately to refocus, how ridiculous was this? She'd been married to the man for nine and half years, how could he still leave her breathless and wanting?
"The car?" she asked, stupidly, needing to feel his arms around her.
"In the driveway?" Tim asked.
Boone shook his head, trying to clear it. "It's a rental." He took a stab at guessing that might be the answer to whatever the man had asked.
"Yeah, I figured as much, given the Colorado plates, and the fact that you probably wouldn't have driven all the way here from LA." He laughed. "I was asking how much it was to rent." He shot a look at Anne, who was staring fixedly at a knife stuck in a piece of firewood on the hearth.
"I don't know, I didn't ask." Boone shrugged.
"Must be nice," Tim commented, without any trace of envy.
"What?" Shannon frowned.
"Not having to ask the price of things. I didn't know catering was so lucrative." He explained.
Andrew waited to see what Boone was going to say. He wasn't one to flaunt their wealth.
"It's our first family vacation, ever, so we're going all out. Believe me Boone's usually pretty careful with a dollar." Shannon side stepped the question.
Boone excused himself to go to the kitchen to finish dinner.
"Can I help?" He turned from the stove at Anne's voice.
He reminded her that she was company and that she wasn't expected to do anything. Her response was that she was hoping to get some free pointers in the kitchen.
"Well, I don't usually get help at dinner, but sure." He shrugged and smiled.
He was so used to delegating in a kitchen that they easily fell into a pattern, Boone providing her with guidance on a number of occasions as he watched her work. She smiled appreciatively after each one.
"That's it we're done, let's finish our drinks, and then we can eat." He announced.
Back in the living room he thanked her and turned to Shannon, "See, some people actually help in the kitchen." He noticed that Andrew and Amy were no where to be seen.
"And, some people, regardless of the help, still manage to slop food all over themselves," she retorted, pointing at his sweater.
He pulled the bottom of the garment away from himself so he could look down its' length, and grimaced at the grease mark half way down, starting to rub at it with his thumb.
"Go and change your top, otherwise you're going to drive every one nuts with your fidgeting. Plus you won't be able to carry on an intelligent conversation, not that you ever do, because you'll be worrying about the fact that you haven't put it to soak, and the stain won't come out." Shannon turned to the Cooper's, "He's a total OCD victim."
"I am not," he protested.
"Then tell me, just what are you thinking about right now?" She knew very well that she was right.
He stared at her flatly; wishing the chair she was sitting in would come to life and eat her.
"Fine," he spat, turning on his heel and heading for the stairs.
She turned back to Anne and Tim as Anne started gushing about the tricks she'd learned from Boone.
"Shannon," Boone bellowed from upstairs.
"Excuse me, I'll just go and…" wait, she thought. Boone bellowed? Those two words didn't go together. Boone never bellowed. He yelled, he whined, he talked dirty into her ear, but he never bellowed. "Find out what's wrong." She finished. "He's probably broken something again, hopefully not a limb."
She headed up the stairs. He was standing in the hall, Andrew in front of him, the boys' arms kind of hanging strangely, probably because Boone had a fistful of the back of his t-shirt and was almost holding him off the ground.
Boone's lips were pinched tight, he had bright red spots on both cheeks; Andrew was looking both frightened and desperate. Amy was standing in the doorway to Andrews' bedroom, trying to be small.
He shook the boy slightly, "They were kissing."
"Oookay," she gave him a 'so what' kind of gesture.
"What the fuck do you mean, okay?" Every time he spoke, he jostled Andrew, the kid moving involuntarily according to Boone's motions, not unlike a puppet.
"Put him down, Boone." She held her hands palm out in a soothing motion.
He suddenly seemed to realize what he was doing. "Right," he forced his hand to release Andrews' shirt.
"Now, you want to tell me what's going on here?" Shannon asked in a soothing voice.
"They were kissing." Boone repeated.
"You already said that, why are you over reacting?" As he opened his mouth to answer she walked over to him and grabbed his hand, telling the two children to go downstairs. She dragged him down the hall to their bedroom, shut the door, and pushed him up against the inside of it, kissing him hard. He put his hands between them to push her away, but when her fingers brushed up the length of him, through the fabric of his jeans, he slid his arms around her instead. She continued till he was good and hard; then pulled away, stepping back. He continued to lean against the door, his eyes closed; his mouth hanging open like that of an uncooked fish on a bed of ice at the grocery store.
His eyes opened and he blinked a few times in confusion. "Why'd you do that?" Shannon wasn't sure if he meant the kiss, or the stopping.
"To prove a point," she replied. "What'd you think was going to happen between them, Boone? What we just did? Cause if so, you're seriously fucked in the head."
"Well…no, of course not…no," he looked a little deflated.
"They're kids, they try things, they're going to experiment, but they're not going to get carried away. It was only an innocent kiss. I'm sure even you must have kissed lots of girls before it ever went any further. He's not even ten yet, for Christ's sake, give him a few years. But he's going to grow up eventually, and you'll give yourself a stroke if you keep reacting like an overprotective mother hen."
"It's just that I want him to be a kid for as long as possible. He's already so much older than his years, half the time he acts older than we do. I just want to be sure he has a proper childhood, and does lots of kid stuff before he tackles the adult shit. I don't want him to grow up too fast. I don't want him to be me." Boone finished quietly.
"God you're such an idiot, why the hell I married you I don't know. I'll chock it up to momentary insanity." She shook her head. "He's not going to be you, Boone. Jesus, you love him more than anything. He's already gotten more love from you in ten years than you've gotten from that bitch in thirty-two."
He smiled a small smile and nodded, "We should be getting back downstairs. We can talk about it later. They're going to start wondering what we're doing up here. In fact, right now,Andrew's probably already assuming that we're having sex."
"You might want to do something about that, then." Shannon gestured at his crotch.
Boone looked down at the bulge in his pants. "You're a right cock tease, aren't you?"
"You know it, brother," Shannon laughed.
"I wish you wouldn't call me that at times like these," he grimaced and winced as he pushed at the front of his jeans.
"Take a chill pill," she waved her hand in dismissal, "and change your sweater, it's what you came up here to do in the first place." She waited for him; then they headed back to their guests.
Down in the living room they apologized for taking so long, Boone looked over at Andrew and Amy, seated, once again on the floor in front of the fireplace. Tim caught the look.
"They told us what happened. It's not a big deal, though I don't think that they should be alone in Andrew's bedroom again." Both kids had the good grace to look slightly embarrassed.
Boone glanced at them again, then past them, noticing that the fire needed attention. He crossed the room and picked up a log, without really noticing which one he'd grabbed. Opening the fireplace doors, he swung the log to throw it on the fire the butt of the protruding knife hit him squarely in the stomach. "Oof, shit, I forgot all about that," he muttered absently, pulling the knife free, and casually flicking it into another piece of wood a few feet away, putting the log in his hand on the flames.
Anne and Tim exchanged a puzzled glance. Shannon explained the presence of the knife, carefully leaving out the part about Andrew. The Coopers' probably already thought they were kind of strange, without adding circus style knife throwing into the mix. She laughed as she pictured Boone clad in colourful silks flinging knives at her as she stood up against a wall dressed in one of those stereotypical female assistant skimpy dresses.
"Let's eat." Boone suggested, picking up on her thought and smiling to himself.
He brought out the food, putting a large casserole dish on the mat above his place setting. The potatoes he'd been slicing earlier were arranged on top of the contents in overlapping lines, like fish scales. He cut a square out of the corner and plated it, handing it to Shannon who held it up, looking at the layers, then passed it to Anne.
"What is it?" Shannon asked not recognizing the dish.
"Scalloped fish pie, I guess you'd call it." He shrugged, explaining that basically it was a layer of spinach, topped by fish in a saffron cream sauce, with potato slices on top, there was a bit more to it than that, but that was the gist of it.
"I've never seen it before." She passed the bowl of baby carrots in an orange glaze, and took her own plate from Boone.
"I just made it up today, if it's any good, I'll add it to our catering menu." He finished serving everyone and set a plate in front of himself.
"It's delicious," Anne told him. "We don't eat fish at all, but this could change that. How'd you make it?"
He went into more detail, trying to come up with quantities and measurements for her. He cooked by instinct alone, not actually writing anything down till he had to instruct his staff.
"Did you learn to cook from your mother?" Tim questioned.
The three of them almost choked, Shannon actually had to get up and thump Boone on the back. He wiped at his streaming eyes, waving his hand at her to answer.
"Sabrina doesn't cook. I don't think I've ever even seen her make a piece of toast. We always had a cook on staff." Shannon explained, before realizing just how pretentious it sounded.
"On staff," Tim repeated, at the same time as Anne said "Sabrina?"
She looked at Boone sharply, "Carlyle? Your last name's Carlyle right?" Boone nodded, uncomfortably, waiting for it.
"Your mother is Sabrina Carlyle?" she asked, incredulously, switching her gaze from Boone to Shannon.
"Not mine, his." She corrected in a flat voice, not wanting to be mistaken for her evil step-monsters' daughter. It was bad enough that she was married to the ice queen's son.
The rest of the dinner conversation, unfortunately for Boone, mostly focused on his mother, Shannon, with great difficulty, trying to keep her tongue in check, Andrew throwing in a comment every now and then. They didn't air their dirty laundry in public, that was just a given, and they all knew it without having ever discussed it.
As a result, Sabrina came off surprisingly well.