Chapter 28: I Am Not Old!

"Cuchi, cuchi, sweetheart," Tony said turning to look at Angela as a sly smile spread across his face.

"Tony," Angela replied rolling her eyes good-naturedly.

"What on earth does that mean, Dad?" Sam asked raising her eyebrow.

"Well," Tony said with a laugh. "After Angela finally came to her senses about good ol' Geoff, she became a bit of a wild child for a moment. Or as Mona termed it, she finally got around to sowing some wild oats. One of those things being her, let's just say, unorthodox choice of clothing when she was trying to win the Armando Ghia account."

"What?" Angela said shrugging her shoulders but the blush in her cheeks gave her away. "C'mon, you loved it," she said teasingly giving Tony's shoulder a nudge. "You couldn't stop staring at my legs the day I wore that dress to Armando's office."

"Guilty," Tony said pressing a quick kiss to Angela's lips. "But the whole getup was very cuchi, cuchi Charo, you have to admit," he said with a wink.

"Who's Charo?" Katie asked quickly.

"Too hard to explain, honey," Angela said shaking her head.

"Oh, I remember that crazy dress," Jonathan said. "I think I asked you something like whether your legs grew, since the skirt was way too short, Mom," he finished with a shake of his head.

"Depends on your perspective, Jonathan," Tony said slyly as he squeezed Angela's thigh. "I'd love to see these legs again in that crazy outfit sometime."

"Well, maybe you'll get your chance someday," Angela said giggling. "I never did end up throwing it away."

"Eww," Jonathan said. "I don't need that image in my head!"

"So, what's so significant about the dress and the Armando Ghia account?" Katie asked quickly trying to steer the conversation back to safer territory.

"Well, nothing really, other than as your dad said, it took me a minute to reconcile everything that had happened over the previous few months," Angela said as she flashed back to how tumultuous her emotions had been, and how, yet again, Tony had kept her from going too far.

She remembered their flirtatious dance in the living room after Tony had told her she didn't get the account. Then, later that night, she'd had the most incredible dream of the two of them, in a billowing all-white ballroom, dancing together; her in a gorgeous sparkly blue designer gown and him in a handsome black tux with a blue cummerbund that matched her dress. She was then reminded of waking up in her bed all alone, so disappointed, wondering if their time would ever come.

Of course, that was just the tip of the iceberg. It was only a week later that she set out to complete her "wild" list of all the crazy (well crazy to her) things that she hadn't done in high school, and again Tony was along for the ride to keep her from going completely off the deep end.

"Maybe I should wear that dress up to Inspiration Point," Angela said turning to Tony with a smile.

"Angela!" Tony exclaimed his face turning red. "What has gotten into you all of a sudden? It's like you're turning back into wild child Angela. I guess I should have known that she was still lurking somewhere inside of you!"

"Oh, this sounds juicy," Katie said clapping her hands. "So, what else did Mom do?"

"Well, she put together this list of all the 'wild' things that she didn't do in high school and then dragged me along with her to do most of them, well, except for one of the last ones," Tony said rolling his eyes.

"Jake the Snake," Angela said shaking her head. "I haven't thought about him in years. What a disappointment that turned out to be. Well, at least, I mean until…" she said her voice trailing off as she was instantly transported back to being in Tony's van as they drove to Inspiration Point after he had "rescued" her from a drunk and passed out Jake.

"Are you sure about this?" Tony asked, as they climbed into the van, after she had remarked that it was such a disappointment that the ratty old sofa in the back room of the bar had turned out to be Inspiration Point. Tony had mentioned casually, as they walked to the van, that there was a real Inspiration Point not too far away, and before she could stop herself, she asked him to take her there.

"I'm not sure about anything," she had replied. "After these past few months, I'm not even sure who I am anymore," she said quietly.

"Ay-oh-oh-ay, you're still Angela Bower. A strong, independent and beautiful woman," Tony said before he could think about it. "Ah, I mean, you've just had a lot going on with Geof and everything else…" he said his voice trailing off.

"I know, and I want to thank you, Tony, for allowing me to go a little crazy. I'm so glad to have a friend like you," Angela said softly as Tony put the car in park.

Quickly changing the subject, she looked up at the moon and then out at the shimmering lake before saying, "Oh, this is so beautiful. Now, I can almost finish my list," as she pulled it out of her pocket.

She remembered how Tony had grabbed it from her, and when she had indicated that make out at Inspiration Point had yet to be crossed off, he had leaned over and French kissed her to within an inch of her life or at least to the point that her glasses fogged up. When he pulled away, he had grabbed them off her face and unfogged them. Then, they had both sat there in stunned silence until he finally cleared his throat.

"Uh, Angela," he had begun tentatively. "I'm sorry. I'm not sure what just happened. I know this is probably the last thing you needed right now. But, I mean we're up here all alone and you're beautiful, and I uh…"

"Oh, Tony," she said quickly cutting him off. "Don't apologize. We just got lost in the moment, and I know we both feel that pull or whatever it is when we're together especially when we're alone," she said softly. "I know it's been a crazy year, but maybe it's time we try what we talked about in Mexico last summer? But let everything happen naturally and not try and force anything based on our, um, feelings in the moment."

"I'm ready if you're ready," Tony responded as he took her hand in his and gave it a quick squeeze before letting go and turning the engine back on.

"Wait, wait, wait," Sam said snapping Angela back to the present. "You guys had another secret make-out session that we never knew about and then did actually date for a bit?"

With a sigh, Tony shook his head before answering, "Well, no. We did decide that we were going to give it a shot. But then Mona thought she was going to help her brother run that hotel and moved to the city for, what turned out to be, the blink of an eye. And when I moved into her apartment, I thought that might be the perfect opportunity to give normal dating a shot, since we technically weren't under the same roof anymore and could, um, possibly have a little privacy. But that turned out not to be the case."

"If I remember right," Angela said with a smile, "When you first moved in there, Philly tried to get you to go out on the town to meet women, but it didn't exactly work."

"Well, of course not," Tony said. "The only woman I was interested in was back home at 3344 Oak Hills Drive."

Angela smiled and said, "I remember blowing out the pilot light on the stove that one night to have an excuse for you to come over." She thought back to how warm, comforting and right it felt to have Tony back in the house, and as they had talked about years later, why that stopped them yet again from taking the next step. He had felt the same way, and again the fear of ruining this incredible friendship they had, trumped their desire to act on their feelings any more than they already had. They also acknowledged that, at the time, they both felt that, like with Geoffrey, their relationship would probably be tested again, but that was the price they were going to have to pay in order to not lose what they had.

Little did they know the next test was just around the corner, and it would change their relationship forever…