Everybody familiar still belongs to Janet. Olive, the puppies, and the mistakes, are mine.
"Hi, RangeUncles ... we're home!" Steph announced, at the same time I opened the lobby door for her and Olive back at our Trenton building.
Gene smiled over at her and waved to Olive, but Santos took a different approach and was tapping a pen annoyingly against the front desk he's loitering by.
"So you're glad to be back home with us?" He asked Steph.
"Yup. We have a lot to catch you guys up on."
"Is that why those Miami pretty boys are already sending you flowers even though you only left there a couple hours ago?"
Steph's look of complete confusion puzzled Olivia, so she poked her Mama's face and encouraged it to move back into the smile she walked in with.
"Flowers?" She asked.
"Yes," Bobby added, but when he turned his eyes to Olive, he lost some of the poutiness he displayed after stepping out of the stairwell.
Knowing Steph would relinquish our baby to him once our daughter's pink muppet-skin coat was removed with a 'We're not in Miami anymore' comment from Steph, Brown waited until he was holding Olivia before continuing the inquisition.
"And not just any flowers," he informed her, "two dozen roses. What the hell did you do to them? I didn't think Launcher was aware of anything around him unless it can be blown up ... preferably by him."
"Oncle Lanceur is a total teddy bear. Olive was smitten with him until her GodDad Tank showed up."
Santos covered his ears. "Make your wife stop," he told me. "Oncle Lanceur my ass."
"I'm just teasing you," Steph said, calming the children. "You guys are big, but not so big that Olive can't love all of you. Why are you blaming the Miami guys for the flowers anyway? Did you read the card or something?"
"No, but we know Ranger would eviscerate any guy who wasn't 'a friendly' sending you anything. And since these aren't his style, that leaves the RangeBeach Team. Unless someone in this building isn't copping to them, trying to avoid a beatdown for showing us up. FYI ... Hal is out getting pizza as we speak so we can have a pizza party on five now that you're back."
My wife looked at me, but I gave nothing away. "I had this welcome home planned out in my mind," she told us, "and now someone threw a flower into the works." She reached out to brush our baby's hair back from her grinning little face. "At least Olive will be happy. She's taken a liking to anything she can hit people with."
Finally Santos stopped sulking. "Like Daddy like Daughter. I pissed Ranger off once ... and my ribs still remind me of it on cold days."
"That's age talking," I told him.
"No, I'm pretty sure it's the residual effect of your fist gloating."
"It feels so good to be home," Steph commented. "Ranger ... release the hounds and then we'll go see which guy I need to send thank you Pastelitos to for the flowers."
"Yeah, go ahead and make the Miami Men fat. That'll cut down on their sunbathing time and maybe they'll get some work done."
"Be nice, Lester. They're good guys."
"Sure they are or Ranger wouldn't have hired them, but we're still better. Wait ... what did you mean by release the hounds?"
"Just wait for it ..." she told him.
I texted Tank and told him to come in.
"What the hell?" Santos said, as Olive started waving her arms in 'there you are!' excitement.
That motion had two tails wagging in sync with each other, though they remained still until I gave them permission to inspect the place. Olivia was another matter.
"Meet our new family/team members," Steph told the guys, "Gunner and Ammo. The a-hole we rescued them from was the human incarnation of Scooby-Doo's Shaggy, so clearly with the guard dog choice and tough-sounding names, he'd been overcompensating for a small dick and even smaller mind. I've been told I have balls to spare, so they're Gunny and Mo to me. We figured bringing back mugs or T-shirts from Miami wouldn't be real memorable reminders of the city, so we brought home two dogs instead. Thank God and Rangeman for the private jet access."
"Couldn't you have just brought back Julie?" Santos asked.
"We tried, but Rachel and Ron nixed the idea before I even finished voicing it. Bobby, if you put Olive down, she can show you her new party trick."
"I just got her back and you want me to let her go?"
But he did reluctantly release her after kissing her cheek and giving her a careful hug. We all watched her sit herself down with one leg bent at the knee. The left lavender, flowered high top sneaker that matched the color of her shirt, tapped against her jean-protected leg as she scanned the lobby ... refamiliarizing herself with her surroundings. And then Olive put knees and hands to carpet and crawled to Ammo, our Doberman-looking Beauceron.
He's so laid back, her grabbing the tip of his ear in her little fist didn't faze him.
"That shirt may give her angel wings," Santos commented, "but she rules with an iron fist."
Steph knelt down beside our baby. "Olive, remember what we promised Daddy so we'd get to keep these guys? We have to be really gentle with them."
She unclamped Olive's hand, spread our daughter's palm flat, and helped her pet both heads equally.
I noticed the sweat beads popping out on Brown's forehead. "What's with the sweat?" I asked him.
"I just flashbacked to the night we babysat her. She was a diapered-tornado then, but I know walking comes after crawling. There'll be no hope in hell of stopping our Olive-Pit now."
