Chapter 58

They had all rushed back after Nadine's frantic phone call, but by the time they had gotten through the rush hour traffic and arrived, the fire had been out.

"What the hell started this?" Paul asked, both annoyed and anxious.

"The dryer in someone's apartment, from what I was told," Nadine answered, trying to calm two fussy twins. Briana reached out, taking Bella and trying to quiet her.

"It's all right, sprouts," Brian said, taking Brett. "Mama and Papa are here."

"Poor kiddos," Briana said, "all this noise probably scared them."

"It scared the hell out of me too," Nadine said. "All it took was me seeing smoke and I grabbed these two and booked it out of there."

"You left my place to burn down?" Paul asked.

"It was either that or dead kids. Guess who won that choice?" Nadine looked the now-calm twins over. "Should we have them checked to make sure they didn't inhale any smoke on the way out here?"

"I'm sure they're both fine," Briana answered, "but it certainly wouldn't hurt for someone to have a look."

They went over to a group of EMT's that had been treating a few of the other residents. Two had taken the twins and looked them over thoroughly, assuring Briana that they appeared to be fine. "Call their doctor to make sure," one added.

Nadine looked at Paul. "You can crash at my place tonight and we can figure something out for you," she offered.

"Thanks. Let's see if I can salvage any of my shit in the meantime," he replied gratefully.

Several hours later:

"Oh this is bullshit," Paul grunted, going through items in the gutted apartment. "If I find out which fucker had that faulty dryer, I'm going on the kill."

"Be thankful you weren't here or you'd been toast…literally," Nadine said. "Besides, the apartments up here aren't as bad as those downstairs."

"Are you shitting me? This place is a goner. What the fire didn't do, the firemen did."

"Well, it looks like some of your stuff may have been spared. There's quite a few things here a trip to the Laundromat won't cure," Brian said, taking out several clothes. "Unfortunately for you, your porn collection is dust."

"Go ahead, ass wipe, rub it in. My porn collection, Batman stuff, my comic collection, most of my action figures. This fucking sucks. Some of that shit can't even be replaced. But I will say one thing."

"What?" Briana asked.

"I just thank God, Jesus, Mary and Joseph that Nadine and those little ones got the hell out of here. Now those thing could never be replaced."

Several weeks later:

After temporarily residing in Brian's basement for the last several weeks, Paul finally found another place to live. Luckily, he hadn't been around much, so he hadn't really driven them nuts very much, and he had been able to replace most of the things lost in the fire in the process.

"We should have a party for him," Briana offered, "preferably on a night when you're home."

"That's a good idea," Brian grinned. "I needed an idea to thank him for helping me set up the basement anyway. How about a dinner at his new place?"

Briana thought a moment. "I like it. You can make that broccoli and beef pasta stuff he's crazy about and I can do the chili receipe I stole from him."

"Does he even know you have that thing?" Brian laughed.

"No, and I certainly can't make it for too many people without burning holes in their stomachs."

"Or have flames coming out of their asses," Brian added. "But yeah, this will be great. Any plans for tomorrow?"

"No, why?" Briana wondered.

"Dude's going to need more stuff for his new digs," Brian replied. "I'm going to need a woman's opinion what to pick out."

"Nadine has to work tomorrow, so we're going to have to bring the kids too."

"So much the better. They don't get out with us too often anyway. We can make it a family project."

"Brian, they're sixteen months. What will they know?" Briana couldn't help but chuckle a little.

"Still, they need somewhat of a normal life. I think I've been sheltering them too much."

"Your character is a cocky type without a family," she reminded him.

"Yeah," he nodded, "but this is the real me, and he's a much better guy, don't you think?"

"I certainly won't argue with that. Come on, let's get started on some ideas."

The next day:

"I don't know what was more of a bigger challenge," Brian sighed, exhausted, when they arrived back home with several packages and bags, "working on picking something out for Paul or keeping two sets of little fingers out of every other thing."

"Now you know what I deal with on a daily basis," Briana smiled, starting to unpack the parcels. "If we hadn't kept them in the cart, they've been running all over the place and we'd never found them."

"Yeah, more of a handful since they started walking, huh?"

"Wait until they're teenagers."

"Oh God, Bree, do not remind me. That moment in our lives where they will put us through adolescent hell will be here soon enough. Better to enjoy them now while they're still babies."

Briana studied an item taken from one of the bags. "You got a really good deal on this juicer," she said. "I think Paul will totally love this."

Brian nodded. "He's always into the kitchen shit. And he has the balls to say I'm like a woman sometimes? Jesus."

"You are," she giggled. "Sometimes you're more anal retentive about things than I am."

"So how many do we have on the guest list so far?"

"Fifteen," Briana replied. "And Tina's husband volunteered to cook out."

"Works for me. This is coming together pretty good so far."

"Question now is how are we going to get Paul out of the way until everything's set up?"

Brian winked. "I have that covered. I've made him an offer that he did indeed couldn't and didn't refuse."

Briana shook her head and smiled. "I'm not even going to ask."