In Truth
As Erin exited the interview room she saw Jamie's partner Eddie coming out of the women's locker room out of uniform. She glanced at her watch and realised Jamie must be coming off shift. She headed towards the men's locker room to wait for Jamie to see if he wanted to grab a drink. As she stood waiting she couldn't help but overhear Jamie's voice and quickly realised he was on the phone. Unable to resist the temptation, she eavesdropped on his side of the conversation.
"Hey, it's me...yeah, I'm just getting changed now, I was thinking I could pick us up some takeout...sure, you want the same as last time...ok, I'll be home in about 40 minutes...I love you, bye." He finished. Erin stood there stunned, curious to see whether this was an open secret she kept waiting.
"Oh, hey Erin." He said as emerged from the locker room minutes later.
"Hey Jamie, I just finished up here and thought you might like to grab a drink?" She asked casually.
"I'd love to but I'm actually on my way to meet some law school friends, sorry." He lied.
"Oh, ok then, I'll guess I'll see you on Sunday." She replied trying to hide her shock.
"Ok, see you then." He said with a smile as he hurried off. As she watched him leave she couldn't help but wonder about the woman he would lie to keep secret.
A couple of days later she found herself in Danny's precinct and decided to see if he could shed some light on Jamie's mystery woman.
"Hey Danny, you got a minute?" She asked as she approached his desk.
"Hey Erin, sure, what's up?" He replied looking up from his work.
"Did you know Jamie's has a girlfriend?"
"Yeah, how'd you know?" He asked surprised.
"You first." She pressed.
"Ok, well, remember a few weeks ago when he took the day off sick?" He asked leaning back in his chair.
"Yeah." She confirmed.
"Well, I went to check on him, and I as I was leaving I remembered something I meant to tell him so I went back. Anyway, he hadn't closed the door fully and I saw him in bed with a woman, and they were laughing about how easily everyone believed he was sick. He spent the day in bed alright, he just wasn't sick." He explained eyebrows raised.
"No way!" She exclaimed stunned to hear of her brother playing hooky.
"Yeah, so how do you know about her?" He asked again.
"Oh, I was at Jamie's precinct two days ago, I was waiting outside the locker room to invite him to get a drink and I heard him on the phone. He said he'd be home in 40 minutes, not over in 40 minutes, but home in 40 minutes." She explained.
"What, you think they're living together?" Her brother asked.
"I don't know, maybe, oh and he ended the call with I love you." She added.
"Must be serious then, Jamie's not one to throw around the L word." He concluded.
"So what are we going to do?" She asked.
"Let me guess, you want to confront him at dinner on Sunday?"
"Yeah, are you in?" She asked with a grin, enjoying the thought.
"Oh I'm in." Danny grinned back.
Three days later Danny and Erin were in the Reagan family kitchen when Jamie arrived for dinner. They greeted their little brother and shared a look, wordlessly agreeing to confront him at the table. Not long into the meal, during a lull in conversation Erin decided it was time.
"Hey Jamie, how's your girlfriend?" She asked offhandedly.
"W…what?" He stuttered caught off guard.
"You know, your girlfriend, the one you spent the day in bed with and then told everyone you were sick." Danny joined in.
"Yeah, the one you went home to after telling me you couldn't grab a drink because were going to meet your law school friends." Erin added. Hearing all of this the whole table stopped eating and stared at Jamie, who sat there with a surprised and guilty look on his face.
"Jamie, do you have something you'd like to tell us?" Frank asked gently.
"Ok, I have a girlfriend, sorry I lied to you Erin." He admitted.
"Apology accepted."
"Although, given what you did with information that was obviously private, can you blame me." He added annoyed.
"He has a point." Smirked Danny.
"Shut up Danny." Erin scowled.
"Jamie, why didn't you tell us about her?" Henry asked.
"It's complicated." He replied not willing to elaborate.
"Something wrong with her?" Danny teased.
"No." Jamie growled defensive.
"Then why haven't you told us about her?" Nicky asked genuinely curious.
"Because Nicky, she's different, she's not like other women I've dated, she comes from a different world, one that's impossible for most people to see past." He explained to his niece.
"You think we'll judge her." Linda stated slightly hurt.
"I think you're human, and it's human nature to judge people." He answered honestly.
"Except for you, you never judge anybody." Danny remarked.
"That's not what I'm saying, it's just because of how we met I knew exactly what kind a person she was from the very beginning, so who she used to be never bothered me."
"And how did you two meet?" A now very curious Frank asked.
"I can't go into it without telling you her story, and I think that's something you should hear from her." He explained.
"So when do we get to meet her?" Erin asked keenly.
"I'll bring her to dinner next Sunday." Jamie sighed.
"Only if your ready." His grandfather said kindly.
"Like I have a choice, we all know I'm not going to hear the end of this until you meet her." He replied defeated.
"Probably not even then." Smiled Frank.
The week passed slowly for the Reagan's who were all dying to meet Jamie's mystery woman but too fast for Jaime, who spent it worrying about how the dinner would go. Early Sunday evening Jamie and Lizzie were walking up to Frank Reagan's front door when Jamie stopped.
"This is it." He said as he turned to her.
"Wow, you're really nervous aren't you?" She asked.
"Uh...yeah." He admitted. She just smiled, stretched up and kissed him. He wrapped his arms around her and kept the kiss going. After awhile she pulled back.
"Jamie, dinner." She reminded him.
"Do we have to?" He said with a pout. She laughed as she gently shoved him towards the door, he opened it and stood aside to let her in. She entered the foyer and almost immediately found herself face to face with all eight Reagan's.
"Lizzie, this is my grandfather Henry, my dad Frank, my sister Erin, her daughter Nicky, my brother Danny, his wife Linda and their boys, Jack and Sean." As he introduced each family member she shook their hand.
"Everybody, this is Lizzie." He said as the group assessed her.
"It's nice to meet you all, I've heard so much about you." She smiled warmly.
"All good I hope." Frank returned her smile.
"Why don't we all go sit." Henry suggested ushering the group into the dinning room where they all took their usual seats and she took the one that had been added between Jamie and Nicky. It wasn't until everyone had helped themselves to dinner and begun to eat that the questions began.
"So Lizzie, what do you do for a living." Inquired Frank.
"I'm an editor at a publishing house." She answered happily.
"Sounds interesting, you must love to read." Said Henry.
"Yes, I've always loved escaping into a good book." She explained.
"So how did you and Jamie meet?" Erin asked impatiently.
"I suppose you all heard about the murder outside Amore four weeks before Christmas?" She asked the table.
"Yeah, the cops found a young woman's body outside the club, she'd been strangled to death, but that was the Christmas before last." Danny recalled the case.
"You've been seeing each other since December 2015?" Linda inturrupted.
"I met Lizzie early December 2015, we didn't start seeing each other till early February, it's was our one year anniversary on the second." He admitted garnering surprised looks from his family.
"Go on." He smiled encouragingly at Lizzie.
"Well, I saw the story on the news and the follow up story about there being no leads and no one willing to talk. I know the club is run by the mob, so I knew no one was ever going to talk. I went to the precinct, which happens to be Jamie's precinct, to offer my help."
"Help how?" Erin asked.
"By getting an undercover cop a job at the club, I know the owner."
"You know Vincent Cardello, the mobster?" Asked Frank.
"Yeah, I went to college with his kids but more than that Vinnie knows my father." She nervously explained.
"Your father?" Asked Danny. Lizzie took a deep breath and Jamie, visible only to Henry and Nicky, took Lizzie's hand under the table.
"Anthony Moretti." She spoke quietly, a silence fell and all eyes were on her. She glanced around the table and saw looks of shock and distain.
"Anthony Moretti is your father?" A disturbed Frank asked and Lizzie nodded.
"And Sal Moretti?" A stunned Henry asked recalling a name from the past.
"My grandfather." She said as she recalled having this same conversation with Jamie.
"And Tony Jr and Carlo..." Danny couldn't help mentioning the Moretti's he was most familiar with.
"Are my older brothers." She finished his thought and the table remained silent. They all sat there taking in what Lizzie had just told them unsure of what to say next.
"So anyway, Lizzie got me a job, I worked weekends at the club and after six weeks we had enough to pick up Vinnie, who almost immediately rolled on the killer. We would never have caught the guy without Lizzie." Jamie explained proudly, trying to help.
"Baby Betty Moretti." Henry said seemingly out of nowhere confusing even Jamie.
"Many years ago there was a story about my father in the paper, the picture they used was one of him holding me, it was captioned with my nickname." Lizzie explained.
"Baby Betty Moretti." Henry repeated still reeling from the realisation.
"I was named after my father's mother Elizabetta, who always went by Betty, hence the nickname. I don't go by that anymore, I legally changed my name when I left home." She corrected him.
"You changed your name?" Asked Nicky fascinated.
"Yes, I was born Elizabetta Rosa Moretti, I anglicised my first and middle names to Elizabeth Rose, and took the surname Halliday." Lizzie told her.
"Hey, that's Irish." She commented.
"It's the maiden name of my great great great grandmother on my mothers side, I'm mostly Italian but there's a little Irish in there somewhere." Lizzie smiled.
"That's so cool, so you left home, left the Moretti's, can you do that, I mean, just leave, where did you go, what did you do?" Nicky, the only one more interested than disturbed, peppered her with questions.
"It wasn't easy, I left New Jersey on the night of my eighteenth birthday, I left after everyone was asleep, caught a bus to New York and started trying to build a life for myself." Lizzie answered.
"How did you do it, it must have been hard all on your own, right?" Nicky continued her questioning.
"Nikki." Erin warned.
"It's ok Erin, I'm sure you all have a lot of questions, I think the best thing is for me to be an open book. Nikki, I got a room at motel and started looking for work, I managed to get a waitressing job at a diner not too far from the motel. It was a good first job but I quickly realised I couldn't have the life I really wanted on a waitresses salary." She told Nicky aware that everybody was completely focused on her.
"So what did you do?" Nicky asked engrossed in the story.
"Well, at the diner, I worked with these two girls about my age, we became fast friends and I told them I desperately wanted to go to college but couldn't afford it on what we made at the diner, that barely covered expenses. One of them told me she had a second job working nights, she said that she could get me a job too, so I went with her to the club to check it out and after meeting with her manager I got a job as an exotic dancer." She heard a sharp intake of breath at her latest revelation.
"You were a stripper?" Linda asked uncomfortable.
"No, an exotic dancer." Lizzie firmly corrected her.
"There is a difference." Danny interjected confidently. All eyes temporarily turned to him surprised by his apparent knowledge of the industry.
"At work I interview a lot of different people in a lot of different places, you learn things." He reassured his family.
"The difference is strippers take off their clothes, whereas exotic dancers dance in their underwear, usually around a pole." Lizzie felt the need to clarify.
"What was that like?" Nicky asked without judgement.
"It was actually pretty good, I worked at one of the nicer clubs, the hours fit around my studies and the money was good, and if you got any good, the tips were great." She replied clearly not embarrassed by her former occupation.
"So you did go to college?" Nicky kept with the questions.
"Yes, I majored in english lit. I graduated with honours and got an entry level job at the publishing house, I worked my way up from there."
As she finished her story she surveyed the room and saw mostly uncomfortable and disapproving faces, the exceptions being Nicky who was impressed, Jack and Sean who seemed exited to meet someone related to real life mobsters and, of course, Jamie. She finished her last bite of dinner and laid her cutlery on her plate, she looked again around the table wondering who would break the silence. Without a word Jamie stood up and began collecting everybody's plates, once he had most of them he nodded to Lizzie to follow him to the kitchen. Once there he placed the plates in the sink and rested his hands on the edge.
"Are you ok?" She asked gently rubbing his back.
"Shouldn't I be asking you that?" He replied turning around and leaning his back against the counter.
"I've done this before, you haven't." She pointed out as she spotted the tea towel hanging over the handle of the oven and retrieved it.
"I hate seeing them looking at you like that." Jamie vented as he began to wash and she took a place beside him.
"It's a lot for them to take in, hey, it's usually worse, I've been called all sorts of things, at least your family politely stayed quiet." She tried to make him feel better but all he took from it was that she had been dealing with the effects of her past for a long time and it made him feel worse. He placed the plate he had just washed on the counter, dried his hands on the tea towel and pulled her to him. She wrapped her arms around him and placed her head against his shoulder. They looked up when Frank walked in carrying the rest of the plates and some empty serving dishes. It wasn't until he had put them on the counter next to Jamie that they broke apart.
"Guests don't do clean up." He stated as he gently took the tea towel from her hand. He nodded toward the dining room and motioned for her to return. As she left he took her place next to Jamie.
"Jamie..." he began as he dried the clean plate on the counter. Jamie looked up from the sink and could see in Frank's eyes what he was about to say.
"Don't." Jamie commanded stopping Frank before he could start. He put the plate he had just begun to wash back in the sink and dried his hands again on the tea towel.
"Just don't." He sighed and walked away back toward the dinning room.
As he walked toward the dining room he was surprised to hear voices given Lizzie had rejoined the table. Jack and Sean were excitedly asking Lizzie questions as Jamie took his seat.
"Have you committed any crimes?"
"Do you have a criminal record?"
"Have you seen a dead body?"
"Has your dad killed people?" The two boys questioned her.
"Boys!" Chastised Linda as Frank retook his seat.
"Linda, it's fine, let's see, yes, I have committed crimes, I really tried hard to embrace that life before I realised that it's not who I am, nope, no criminal record, I guess I got lucky, yes, unfortunately I have seen a dead body and as to whether my father has killed anyone, with his seniority probably not with his own hands, but I have no doubt he has ordered the deaths of many people." She answered honestly.
"Do you love your dad?" Sean asked his final question.
"The thing is Sean, you can hate the way someone lives their life and still care about that person, yes, I love him." The silence was deafening so she decided to explain.
"I won't deny Tony is a bad man, and he has done a lot of terrible things but the truth is, he was a great dad. As a father, he's probably not a lot different from yours Sean. He took care of me, he protected me, he taught me things, like how to ride a bike and how to throw a ball. He used to read me bedtime stories and he always knew just what to say to make me laugh. I know who my father is and I know what he's done, I chose to leave home and cut off all contact but...I still love him." She finished unable to stop the emotion from creeping in to her voice.
"Man cannot learn to forget but clings relentlessly to the past: however fast or far he may run, this chain runs with him." Frank quoted making a not so subtle point.
"Nietzsche." He added when he saw his family looking to him for the author of the quote.
"What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us, Ralph Waldo Emerson." Jamie quoted back.
"Look Jamie, no matter how much distance someone puts between themselves and their past, they will always be, perhaps unfairly, tainted by it and anyone associated with them will be tainted too." Frank cautioned.
"I understand that, but Lizzie's only ever told a handful of people, so as long as nobody at this table tells anyone the chances of it coming out are pretty low and I'm not going to walk away from the woman I love because there's a chance things might go wrong. In any relationship there's a risk that things might go wrong, but if you want to find someone to spend your life with, that's a risk you have to take." Jamie explained to his family, his explanation was followed by more silence.
"Well, I'm impressed by Lizzie." Nicky stated breaking it.
"What?" Erin gasped.
"Yeah Mom, I mean think about what she did, she left the only family and home she had ever known and did whatever she had to do to put herself through college and build a great life for herself, I don't know if I'd be strong enough."
"You never know how strong you are, until being strong is your only choice...Bob Marley." Lizzie this time the one ready with a quote.
"I think you'd surprise yourself Nicky." She added with a smile.
"Thanks." Nicky smiled back.
"I think everyone can agree that what you did Lizzie took a lot strength and courage but...you see..." Frank trailed off trying find the right words.
"I think I understand Mr Reagan, you define yourself by your family, for you being a Reagan is a massive part of who you are, so the idea of someone completely cutting themselves off from their family must be nearly impossible for you to understand, but if you can just accept that I have, I think that's all Jamie and I are really hoping for." She finished glancing at Jamie who nodded in agreement.
"You are correct, I do have difficulty imagining someone having absolutely no relationship with their family, however what I struggle with more, is to understand how someone can grow up in a family for eighteen years and not be, to some extent, shaped by them." Frank replied.
"You would have thought that the people at this table, of all people, would understand what it's like when people hear your last name and think they know you. I thought you all might remember what that's like, how much it we hate it and that because of that you'd never do it to anybody else but, I guess I was wrong." Jamie stood and put on his jacket.
"You don't have to go." Henry told him.
"Yeah, Grandpa, we do, you all obviously need time to deal with everything you've heard tonight and to accept that Lizzie is a very important part of my life now. Come on, let's go home." He turned to Lizzie.
"I knew it, you live together don't you?" Erin asked feeling she knew the answer.
"Yes, we do." He confirmed as he helped Lizzie with her coat.
"It was really nice to meet you all, thank you for dinner." She thanked them and followed Jamie out of the dinning room.
As the pair walked down the front path of the Reagan home Lizzie could see Jamie was lost in his thoughts.
"Jamie." She said to get his attention
"Yeah?" He asked snapping out of it.
"We didn't get dessert." She smiled and he wrapped his arm around her.
"I'm sorry, I'll make it up to you when we get home." He grinned. They fell silent as they climbed into the car, Jamie started the engine.
"We didn't tell them everything." Lizzie thought aloud as the car pulled away from the kerb.
"I know, but I don't they could've handled anything else tonight." He replied as they turned at the end of the street.
"So when are going to tell them?" She asked taking a diamond ring out of her purse.
"I don't know, but we will, I promise." He glanced over in time to see her putting it on the ring finger of her left hand.