Saturday, July 28 12:30pm-
Antonia pulled into her regular parking space in front of the diner, and immediately spied her sister sitting at their usual table. Her head was in her hands as she stared at the table, and as soon as Antonia saw her, she could feel a tug of anxiety in her chest. "Crap." She mumbled to herself as she flicked off the emergency lights and yanked the key from the ignition, climbing from her truck she rounded it and hit the lock, the sound of which sent her sister's head up and looking straight into her sister's eyes. Antonia watched her close her eyes tightly, and let out a fast breath of frustration as she walked as quickly as she could into the diner.
She hit the door a bit too hard, sending the bell smacking into the door, she cringed at the sharp sound it made. She took a slow, deep breath and pushed down her frustration for a moment, reminding herself that she was talking to her baby sister, and not a suspect in an interrogation room. She walked into the diner, waving to the waitress behind the counter, she could see the pity in her eyes, clearly knowing why she was there.
She walked toward the table, and sat down hard, watching her sister continue to stare at the formica table, her eyes moving across the design on the table as she closed her eyes even tighter. "I'm sorry." She whimpered, looking up at her sister, her blue eyes were crystal clear, the mascara that once elongated her already freakishly long eyelashes was running in darkened streams down her face. Her hair, however, was immaculate, curled and sprayed just so, it hung at her shoulders, with a dark crown of braids that sat atop her head, threads of silver weaved throughout.
"You look absolutely ridiculous." Antonia said, cringing at her tone as soon as it came out, she watched her sister's hands move to her face as she started to sob. "I'm kidding, I'm kidding." She said, reaching across the table, she touched her sister's hand and patted it lightly, unsure of exactly what to say. "You look pretty… Gracie, you look pretty." She said, watching her sister drop her hands, an angry glare on her face as she gritted her teeth.
"Go ahead, laugh at me." She snipped. "Just do it, get it over with."
"Why would I laugh at you?" She asked, watching Grace seemingly unravel. "Grace, what's going on?"
"I just… I don't want to do this."
"Get married, or get married to Jack?" She asked.
"I don't know." She said, reaching across to grab her sister's hands, she grasped them tightly.
"Grace, your hands are freezing." Antonia said, holding her sisters hands tightly, she watched as her sister cried, looking across the table at Antonia, she was finding it difficult to talk to her all of a sudden, as those dark eyes looked across the table at her.
"Is Mom mad at me?"
"Mom is confused. I'm confused, we're all confused. What's going on? What's wrong?" Antonia said softly. "Is it Jack? Did you guys have an argument?"
"No." She sniffled.
"Why are you having a psychotic break?" She asked in an overly coddling tone, gaining the glare that she had expected and earned. "Talk to me, Gracie."
"It's all just… it's so fast." She whispered, resting her forehead in her hands. "It's just happening so fast."
"Grace, you've been in a relationship with Jack Hodgins since the day that you first spit up on one another." Antonia said. "I'm pretty sure that's the baby version of a blood pact." She shrugged.
"Shut up." Grace said, trying not to laugh, she sniffled and coughed a little. "I just mean all of this." She sniffled. "One second I'm being shot, and I'm in a relationship with a sleaze bag… and in the next, I'm engaged to my best friend, planning our wedding and… and he's talking about how he wants to have like a litter of children, and I'm just… I'm just like… slow down, slow down." She said, shaking her head as she stared at the table, looking up at her sister to see her looking at her with wide eyes. "What?"
"Nothing." Antonia shook her head, laughing a little to herself. "You waited until today to have this particular freak out?"
"He said it last night at the rehearsal dinner." She said softly. "Toni, I don't know if I ever want to have kids." She whispered. "I can't do that to him. I can't do that to Jack, Toni. He's too good for that." She whimpered. "He deserves happiness, he deserves…"
"He deserves you." Antonia said, watching her sister's eyes narrow. "I don't mean it like that, Grace. I mean I think that you two have talked enough through your last twenty something years to know what the other wants. I think he knows your views on kids." She shrugged. "He's not marrying you in order to have kids, he's marrying you because he loves you…you, Grace, not some possible dream for the future. He wants to be with you."
"Toni." She shook her head. "It's not… I don't… You don't understand. You wouldn't understand."
"Why?" She asked, suddenly feeling a bit defensive from her sister's response.
"Because you don't have any friends, Toni. You don't know what it's like to have a friend like Jack." She snapped quickly, trying to catch herself, she swallowed hard. "You… you don't have a friend like Jack, I mean." She said, watching as her sister's ears turned red, a sure sign that she was holding back her tongue.
"Get into my car now." Antonia said with a slightly sharp tone.
"Toni." She whimpered, looking at her sister, she could see that if she didn't move quickly, that the scruff of her neck might very well be in her sister's hand.
"Do not argue with me Grace. The car, now." She said, standing up, sending the chair sliding into the chair behind her, she stepped out from around the table and looked down at her sister. Grace looked up at her, her eyes holding a pitiful expression, one that didn't affect Antonia one bit. "I will drag you to the car by your pretty, pretty hair if I have to." She growled under her breath.
Grace sighed and slid from her seat. She stood up and looked up into her sister's eyes, seeing exactly what her mother always said was their father's strength shining back at her. It was dark, it was intimidating, and somehow Antonia had managed to master it. Grace turned, her head down as she walked through the diner without looking at anyone else. Antonia let her have a little headway before she followed after her, waving to the waitress with a polite smile as she slipped out the door behind Grace, unlocking the door to the truck. She stood in front of the car for a moment, waiting for Grace to climb in, then walked into the street to get into the driver's side.
As she sat down in her seat, she watched her sister slide the seatbelt around her gingerly, her fingers trembling as she did so. "Are you taking me to my wedding?" Grace asked softly, watching as her sister simply looked into the rearview mirror and, backed slowly, as she eased out of the parking space. "Toni?" she whispered, unnerved by her sister's silence, she watched her sister's set jaw and the way she drove silently through the streets, obviously not heading toward the wedding venue. "Toni, I'm sorry." She whispered. "Please talk to me."
Antonia kept her eyes on the road, winding through a suburban neighborhood by rote memory, she pulled into a cemetery that she hadn't been to in many, many years. She could hear her sister's voice, small and nervous, but didn't understand her words, as her heart was beating too loudly in her ears. She pulled the truck toward the familiar oak tree, a patch of grass beneath it hadn't been visited or worn down since she was a child, but she remembered that tree, and these visits. She parked the car and stared out at the cemetery, the stones rising from the ground like fingertips reaching for the sun. She took a slow, deep breath, calming herself before she spoke.
"I've never talked to you about the way it was before Dad came back." She said, her voice was low, serious, and calm.
"No." Grace said softly, swallowing hard.
She closed her eyes, feeling a chill through her body as she remembered. "I never told you about the nights when Mom would cry herself to sleep because she thought that she lost the one person in her life that made her feel whole, or the nights when she'd wake herself up, her face wet with tears and sweat, sobbing." Antonia said softly. "I never told you about the visits from someone that I thought was invisible."
"I know about Deuce." She whispered, suddenly the subject of her sister's stare. "I know that Dad visited you."
"Deuce was not Dad, Grace. Nobody seems to understand that. Deuce was my friend. He was my friend when I was small and needed a friend. He was the person that I talked to, prayed with. He was the only other person that knew about Mom's pain. I didn't know that he was the cause of it." She shrugged.
"Toni, you don't have to…" She started, watching as Antonia looked out at the patch of grass where the stone used to be, where the stone that had her father's name had sat over an empty coffin for so many years.
"His stone was right there. She'd come here for his birthdays, or Christmas. I stayed in the car, warm and cozy in my car seat, thinking of my friend, never knowing the truth, holding my little stuffed elephant." She whispered. "Then I was taken… out of my home in the middle of the night by strangers."
"Toni, no." Grace said, closing her eyes tightly. "Stop."
"No." Antonia said, nodding her head. "I need to... Deuce saved me that day, and I thought he was dead, that he was gone, and in a way, he did die that day." She said, swallowing hard, as if there was something stuck in her throat. She paused for a moment, clearing her throat, and took a deep breath. "When I was rescued, my friend was gone. My friend was gone, and Mom cried even more in her sleep. I know, because I couldn't sleep. I could hear her calling to him, calling for me, calling for help." She sighed, glancing to her sister. "I lost my friend, Grace. He was my one true friend."
"But… but it was Dad." Grace whispered. "Dad didn't die, you still had him." She whispered.
"It wasn't the same." She shrugged. "I wasn't special anymore. I had to share him with Mom, and Parker, and Ace, and you." She said. "I lost my friend, and I had to move forward with nothing. I was pulled from that warehouse, but I could never see my friend again." She said honestly, turning her eyes on Grace. "That's why I don't have friends, Grace. That's why it is so hard for me to get close to people. I know what it's like to lose my best friend, my most trusted ally. I know what that's like to feel alone, abandoned."
"Why are you telling me this?" She whispered, tears dropping down her cheek as she swiped at them with her hand.
"Because when you were rescued, who was there for you? Who was there for you when you were rescued from your kidnapper? Why didn't you wake up in the middle of the night screaming for your best friend?" Antonia said, staring out the window at the patch of grass for a moment.
"Toni." Grace said, her tone more serious.
"Answer my question, Gracie. I told you my story, now tell me yours." She said, turning her eyes onto her sister. The coldness had left them, they almost looked relieved, lighter in some way. "Who was there for you? Who knows your secrets? Who knows about your dreams, about your fears? Who was there for you?"
"Jack." She swallowed hard.
"That's right." Antonia shrugged. "Jack."
"Who was sitting by your side in the hospital when you were shot? Who stood in the operating room when they took that bullet out of your shoulder? Was it your boyfriend? Was it your partner? Who was there when you woke up?"
"Jack." She said with a sigh.
"Why was he there, Grace? Was it because he was standing there imagining the kids you were going to have? Was it because he wanted a future that you didn't want? Why did he bring you flowers? Why did he sit with you through the snowstorm? Gracie, come on."
"Because he loves me." She whispered.
"Yeah. He does. And if you walk away from that today. If you leave him standing on that altar in front of everyone, alone. You will lose him. And trust me, you might be able to heal from that, but I don't think he'd ever forgive himself for being the reason that you walked away, for losing his best friend." Antonia said with a gentle sigh, reaching her hand to her sister, she felt her hands in hers as she gripped it tightly. "Besides, Gracie. Sometimes we fight so hard against things that we don't think we want, that when the unexpected happens, you can't help but think that it's the way things were always meant to be."
"Like you and Aiden." She said softly.
"Like Aiden, Melody… this little surprise." She said, placing her hand on her abdomen as she watched her sister. "I mean, did you ever think that I would be a mommy?" Antonia said, watching Grace pause before she answered. "It's okay, I didn't either." She shrugged. "I want you to be happy, Grace. Jack makes you happy. He has always been the one to make you happy." She said, rolling her eyes, she let out a laugh as Grace giggled. "I mean, remember the time you had chicken pox, and he insisted on talking to you through the living room window, because he didn't want you to be lonely?" Antonia laughed.
"Or the time we went camping." Grace giggled. "And he wanted to find a bear in the middle of the night, and all we ended up finding was a very angry Dad with a flashlight." She laughed.
"You have a lot of memories, Grace. Don't stop there." Antonia smiled. "You have to talk to him and be honest. He's a reasonable person, he is on your team."
"I'm sorry." Grace whispered to her sister, watching as Antonia nodded knowingly. "I am." She said. "I didn't know."
"I know." Antonia said, smiling slightly. "I love you very much, Gracie."
"I love you, Toni." Grace whispered, leaning across, she carefully gave her sister a hug, though the seatbelt restrained it quite a bit. Grace took a deep breath, pulling from the hug she looked to Antonia. "Okay." Grace said, nodding her head. "I think I'm ready now." She whispered. "I think I can do this now." She said, swiping at the tear on her cheek.
"Yeah? Are you going to be prepared for my freak out, when it's my turn to get married?" Antonia laughed.
"Yeah." Grace giggled. "Yeah, I am just going to handcuff myself to you." She said, watching Antonia smirk at her.
"Alright." She said as she started to back out of the parking space. "Let's get to that wedding." She said, turning the car around, she drove to the exit of the cemetery. She pulled to the road and turned on the emergency lights. "And if you don't mind, we need to stop to get a quick bite. Your nephew is starting to get angry." She said, touching her belly as she drove. She glanced to her sister and watched the slow smile on her lips. "That information, by the way, is confidential, and considered to be your wedding gift."
"Noted." Grace nodded, reaching over to give her sister's hand a supportive squeeze, as they made their way through the streets of the city, and to her awaiting nuptials.