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Since I had an early meeting, and had to finish up preparing for it, I said my goodbyes to Nat, and went home. Both of the boys were sitting around in the living room.
"Hey Dad!" Don looked up from some files and greeted me.
"How'd dinner with Aunt Rach go?" Charlie asked.
"It went well, though she had some concerns. You know how she is..." I told them, trying to downplay it.
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"Yeah..." I said as I looked at my case files. Good old Aunt Rach; always saying what's on her mind.
"I'm going to prepare for a morning meeting" Dad excused himself. As soon as he was out of earshot, Charlie smiled.
"Oh...what I would not have given to be a fly on the wall!" he lamented.
"Tell me about it, buddy!" I said, then, tried to imitate her voice "She's young enough to be your daughter! What are you thinking?"
Charlie laughed, then remembered something and sighed."It's my birthday is next week. Dad's gonna bring Natalie to the party I'm having here at the house" he stopped grading and began to sulk.
"Whatever she gets you, smile, and say thank you like you mean it!" I reminded him.
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The next day, I started to think about what to get Charlie for his birthday. Carl, a partner of the clinic had some advice in between patients. I had known him since we were residents.
"My dad hired a belly dancer, once for the birthday of one of my step brothers. He loved it, and it melted some of the ice between them!"
"Sounds like a great idea!" I said. I had seen belly dancing and had liked it.
The day of the party came. It was at Alan's house. All of the same people from Don's party were there.
"Need help with the cooking, Babe?" I asked him.
"No! Not at all!" Alan insisted. "Go enjoy yourself." Poor man was running around doing several things at once! They should have catered! After some more shooing from him, I left the kitchen.
I kept looking at my watch. The dancer was to come at six, half an hour before dinner was to be ready. I thought that it would be better to have her come before the meal in case people wanted to dance with her.
"Waiting for someone?" Don asked me. He noticed that I kept looking out the window.
"No! I'm just checking the weather" I said lamely. It was already five fifty five.
Finally, at six, the doorbell rang.
"I'll get it!" I ran to open the door.
"Hi! Is this the residence of Charles Eppes?" the dancer, who had long, black hairto her shoulders,asked. She was full figured,and wore an emerald green costume with gold plated trim.
"He's over there." I pointed to him.
"Who are you?" Don came to the doorway. I guess years in law enforcement taught him to be suspicious.
"She's a belly dancer. I hired her." I told him.
Soon, she turned on her music on her mini boom box, set it down on the coffee table, and began to dance.
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"Come on Charlie! Aren't ya gonna dance with her?" Colby asked me after he joined her himself.
"It's okay, I don't know how" I wasn't much of a dancer. Besides, this bothered me. It was as if, Natalie thought she could bribe me or something. Why else would she go through the expense?
"She can show ya!" Colby said as he tipped the woman. "Come on!"
"Your dad sure knows how to throw a party!" David told Don, who sat next to me on the couch. Larry looked at the dancer in surprise.
"He didn't hire her. Natalie did" Don said.
"What's going on?" Dad came out of the kitchen. I guess he had noticed a change in the music.
"She's got it going on!" Colby said, referring to the dancer, who soon did her rounds by dancing close to every one of us. She was very close to my lap, doing a thing with her shoulders and hips that involved shaking them side to side.
"For the birthday of a friend of mine" Amita began.She had come to sit next to me. "We went to a Moroccan restaurant and we had a belly dancer during the meal"
"Who hired her?" Dad asked with a puzzled face.
"I did!" Natalie admitted. "I figured that Charlie would like it."
"Oh..." Dad raised an eyebrow.
The Belly Dancer went back to the floor after finishing her rounds. Colby joined her again. He tried to imitate her hand movements, but sucked at it.
"Remember what I said, buddy" Don whispered in my ear.
"Natalie's trying to bribe me!" I whispered back.
"Try to dance with the Belly Dancer. At least for a minute" Don urged. "It'll make Dad happy if you like the gift"
"I'll go if you'll go" I promised.
"Charlie..." he warned me."Natalie hired her for you!"
"If we both dance, it'll make Dad twice as happy!" I argued. "Don't you want to make Dad happy?"
With the roll of his eyes, Don got up, and so did I. Then we joined the dancer, after I said thank you to Natalie.
"That's what I'm talking about!" Colby yelled in encouragement. We awkwardly tried to follow the dancer's movements, Dad saw us with a dropped jaw. Then, Colby invited Megan, Amita, and Natalie "Why don't you ladies join us?" All of them refused.
Don tried to do the shoulder shaking thing, but it looked like he was having a seizure. I attempted to do some move I had seen the belly dancer perform that resembled the slithering of a snake.
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Frankly, I was very surprised to see my boys belly dancing, or at least trying too. Charlie seemed to have taken the present very well. He hated for things to be sprung on him like this. He liked to try new things, but at his own terms. I learned this the hard way, when during his fifth birthday party. I had hired him a clown for the party, as a surprise. The boy was quiet and sullen during the performance. Then, refused to volunteer when the clown wanted to do some magic trick with him... Don did, though, and then sabotaged it. I sent him to his room, and paid the clown extra. Margaret later explained to me that I should have warned Charlie about the clown because he likes to try new things in a controlled fashion.
Charlie and Don stopped dancing after a few minutes, and sat back down. Then, dinner was ready. I called everyone to the table.
"Let the dancer have a break while we eat." I said, and then turned to her. "If fact, you can join us" Why hadn't either of the boys invited her to eat something? Honestly.
She said "No thank you. I'll be fine."
"Okay"
Don and Natalie helped me serve.
"Everything smells great, babe!" Natalie told me as I handed her a platter to put on the table.
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The rest of my party went great! We had a wonderful dinner, saw the dancer for a while longer, opened presents, and finally had cake. This birthday would have been perfect except for one thing: Mom wasn't here. I missed her at dinner, how she used to sit next to dad, or how she always insisted on having a corner slice from the cake. I guess you can't have everything.
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After the party, Charlie and I cleared the table, while Dad and Natalie loaded the dishwasher.
"She thinks she can buy me!" Charlie muttered as I picked up some utensils.
"Charlie..." I shushed him. "She'll hear you!" I couldn't help but think that while the polite brother, namely me, only got a towel, Charlie, the one who did the most sulking, got the belly dancer. My brother might have a point.
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A week later, it was just me and Don having dinner out at our favorite diner. Dad was gonna go, but Natalie called him at the last minute to go to a movie. Both of us said,' have fun dad', but were kinda disappointed that he couldn't come. We don't see as much of him.
"So, do you still keep that towel?" I asked Don.
"It's in a closet somewhere" he told me with a shrug. A server handed us our menus.
"It's the most tasteless gift I've ever seen!" I shook my head. What was that woman thinking?
"At least you got the belly dancer, buddy!" he teased me.
"Only because she's trying to buy me off!" I roughly turned the pages of the menu with a scrawl.
"At least Colby enjoyed the belly dancer" Don chuckled.
"Dad's reaction to us dancing was a surprise, but not in a bad way" I added.
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"What are you getting Don?" I asked him after a few minutes...
"I think I'll just have the steak sandwich." He told me.
"I'm getting a burger." I said, and then added. "Last Saturday, Dad came into the house wearing a stupid shirt that said 'Real Men love cats!' Can you believe it?"
"She probably bought it for him, and he wore it to please her" Don suggested.
"Probably…." I sighed. Dad had changed. "How long before dad will make the four of us get together again?"
"I dunno" Don answered.
"When's this breakup you've been talking about gonna happen?" Don's prediction had yet to come true. As far as I could see, they were getting along great.
"Charlie, Dad's a persistent guy. Be patient" Don insisted.
"What if they decided to move in together?" I asked Don with worry. "We're gonna be stuck with her whenever we wanna see Dad"
Don paused, as if he were thinking "That might not be such a bad thing"
"What?" I demanded. Has he gone insane?
"Charlie, dating someone, and living with them are two very different things, buddy" Don told me.
"Oh?" I remembered that he had lived with Kim. A part of me was still annoyed that I didn't find out until three years after the fact.
"All the bad habits, little quirks, become more of an issue" He began.
"Like needing a separate rack for your CDs?" I teased.
"Anyway..." he gave me a look. "Think about it, they're twenty some years apart, and don't seem to have much in common."
"This could be the kick Dad needs!" I finished for him. The server returned, and we ordered. I really hoped that he was right. Watching the game wouldn't be much fun with her around.
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"Yep" I told Charlie. I also knew that at his age, it might be harder for Dad to adjust to living with someone new. He had his little quirks and routines.
"Larry seems to like her" he told me.
"Really?"
Charlie did air quotes. "He thinks that she's 'intelligent and charming' "
"I don't know about the charming part..." I shook my head. She talked too much about her work.
"Neither do I" Charlie made a face.
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A few days later, after teaching all of my classes, I came to the house and noticed Dad and Natalie unloading boxes from their cars.
"Hey!" I tried to sound casual, despite how annoyed I was. Dad kept forgetting that it was no longer his house.
"Hey Charlie!" Dad put a box down with a grunt. "The storage place Natalie uses is going out of business, and I told her she could store this stuff in the garage, for now. We already squeezed as much as we could in her garage."
"Oh...what kinda stuff is it?" I couldn't help but wonder.
"My old dominamatrix gear!" she told me wickedly as Dad rolled his eyes. "That's how I paid for Vet school"
This was starting to be too much. First, I have to see her on my birthday, now she wants to store her stuff in my house!
I managed to say "We might have a little room" if only for Dad's sake.
Dad dragged me into helping them. Man it was a lot of boxes! More than I thought! Damn! I needed the space to work.
"Just how many boxes do you need to store here?" I asked her as we walked again towards her car. "See, I kinda need space in the garage to work." I tried to sound diplomatic.
"It's only temporary Charlie!" Dad insisted and gave me a look. "Just until she finds another good place and can find the time to move all her stuff."
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"Look, I thought that you'd be okay with it!" I told him. Alan acted so much like the house was still his that I often forgot that Charlie had bought it a while back."If you're not, I'll make other arrangements." The last thing I wanted to do was cause problems between a father and his son.
"There's no need to! The garage has enough space." Alan glared at Charlie.
"Not if I want to be able to work in it!" Charlie snapped. He wrinkled his forehead, scrounged his face, and gave his father a hard look.
"I'll just put this in the storage room at the clinic" I started to say. It wasn't the best solution, but what else could I do?
"There's no need to!" Alan insisted.
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After work, I decided to drop by at the house. When I got there, I noticed that Dad and Charlie were fighting in front of it. Natalie stood by .Quickly; I got out of my SUV, and went to see what the deal was.
"What's up?" I asked.
"Dad wants to store Natalie's things in the garage, but I need the space for working" Charlie complained. "So I can't fit all of her stuff"
"I thought that it was okay!" Natalie told me.
"It's only temporary!" Dad argued.
"Just store some of the stuff in my old room!" I suggested. After all, I wasn't using it.
"Are you sure, Don?" Charlie asked me.
"Yeah, buddy."
"Thank you Don!" Natalie said. "I usually have this stuff in a storage place, but it's going out of business, and I need time to find a good spot for the right price!"
"No problem." I told her.
Charlie sighed.
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As I prepared a lecture, the next night, curiosity got the best of me, and I went to the garage to check out her boxes. One was marked,'JAVMA 89-92'. Curious, opened the box only to find that it was a professional journal for Vets. She had several of them. I flipped through some articles, and put the periodicals back. Just as I was about to open another box, someone dragged it from me. I soon realized that this someone was Dad.
Angrily he demanded "What the hell are you doing?"
TBC