Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.
Jim walked in the front door to…nothing. His declaration of “I’m home!” echoed through the quiet house. He glanced in the kitchen and saw pots simmering on the stove - but no Pam, no kids - so he continued on to the family room. He sat the tote on the corner desk where it promptly tipped over, spilling a flock of paper animals onto the desktop. Jim looked around. Nobody here either. Maybe his children had decided to go live with a less boring, better dad, he brooded.
As he lifted his messenger bag from his shoulder, he heard muted sounds from the laundry room and then a loud ”twhack!”
“Pam?!”
“Yeah, in here, the laundry!”
On his way to the laundry room, he heard, “Crap!” and then another “twhack.” He made it to the door just in time to see Pam hitting the dryer door with the heel of her hand. After administering one more blow, she immediately punched the button on the control panel, and the machine lurched to life, tumbling the laundry round and round.
“What are you doing?”
“Darn door isn’t making a good connection. You gotta to smack it.” Pam pulled a stray wisp of hair from her face, lifted her chin triumphantly, and flashed a satisfied smile.
“Why don’t we just..um..call somebody and get it fixed?” he asked, placing a hand on the door frame above.
“Didn’t we agree that we’d try to put off expenses so maybe we can actually get to the beach with the kids this summer?” The wisp of hair fell back over her face but this time she just pursed her lips and blew it to one side.
“Yeah, we did, but…”
“Besides,” she interrupted, “I don’t think they can fix it and we’ll just be out a lot of money for a new dryer.” Now she lowered her chin as if to look over glasses that weren’t there. “Instead. Whap!” she said, delivering an imaginary blow into the air and grinning. God she was cute, he thought in spite of his mood.
“So, how’d it go?” Pam asked, and walked abruptly past him toward the kitchen. “Can we talk on the move, I have stuff on the stove – dinner’s almost ready.” She continued without waiting for him to answer. “Must have gone okay, because the kids have been out back for a couple of hours playing ‘zoo.’ You must really have sold those paper animals,” she said as she shot him an admiring glance.
Oh no. Does she think it’s from the paper animals? he groaned to himself. Better clear this up right now. “Pam, they’re…” But before he could tell her the unfortunate truth, their conversation was interrupted by a bloodcurdling scream from the backyard.
Pam glanced quickly toward the simmering pots and Jim took his cue – “Got it” he said, and quickly disappeared out the back door. In a few minutes, he appeared in the kitchen toting Daniel with one arm, his little cheeks still red and wet from crying. CeCe gripped her dad’s other hand possessively.
“You okay, big guy? “ Pam asked. Daniel drug his sleeve across his face to wipe his nose and nodded, still sniffling. “Dinner’s ready,” Pam said, adding for Daniel’s benefit. “We’re having macaroni and cheese! Your favorite.” His eyes brightened immediately and he wiggled down out of Jim’s grasp to the floor, heading to the table at a run.
“Hey, walk - walk young man,” cautioned Jim, but Daniel was already climbing into his booster chair. Jim turned back to Pam. “I rescued the dog from the playhouse,” he said wryly.
“He was our wolf,” corrected CeCe, and then continued, “Daddy, Mommy said I couldn’t have any Verona Arizona tennis shoes because they cost too much, but I really want them. Hannah has some. So does Grace. Please!”
“They’re twice the price of the regular ones,” Pam explained, “ and the only difference is the name stamped on them, Cecelia.” She rolled her eyes.
“Well, maybe we could swing it, sweetie. We’ll see,” Jim contradicted his wife, earning him an angry glare that promised they’d talk about THIS later.
“What was the problem out back?” asked Pam, changing the subject for now. She filled the kids’ glasses with milk as Jim and CeCe took their chairs.
“CeCe said I was a monkey and I had to be in a cage,” accused an incensed Daniel, scrunching his nose at his sister.
CeCe’s head tiled back matter-of-factly, and she stated coolly, “Well, he was acting like one.” Sometimes his little girl was seven going on thirty seven, or so it seemed to Jim.
“Enough, you two!” Pam said decisively, and sat down at her own place. “Let’s eat.” She started the bowl of peas around the table.
“So how did the presentations go at school?” Pam directed the question to CeCe as Jim helped her spoon peas onto her plate. “I didn’t get a chance to ask you after school because Daniel cried all the way home.” Pam turned briefly to Daniel to say, “I know that booboo hurt, sweetie,” and then turned back to her daughter, “You and Anne were so busy talking. I guess Daddy was a big hit, eh?” she added, clearly expecting CeCe to gush about her father.
Jim’s heart sank. Yup, Pam definitely assumed that his presentation had prompted the kids’ new interest in zoo animals. Could his day slide any farther downhill?
CeCe forced a smile and said, “Dad was great!” She would not be getting an Oscar any time soon, Jim thought. She was trying to spare his feelings, which on one hand was very sweet, but on the other hand…well…
Pam had always been good at reading him, and now she was clearly aware that all was not as she had imagined. She frowned and turned her head slightly to the side, but said nothing, waiting for more explanation.
Time to get it over with. “Hannah’s dad is a veterinarian at Claws and Paws, didya know that, Pam?” Bitterness crept into his chortle. “He brought rabbits and snakes and some kind of a goat thing…”
“A baby ibex” CeCe corrected.
“Sorry, an ibex. And a macaw. That talked,” he emphasized.
Pam’s demeanor softened as she took in this news, but the well intentioned pity he saw in her eyes only made it worse. Pam must have sensed this, because she quickly turned to help Daniel’s plate with the mac and cheese.
“Nooooo!” the three year old protested loudly.
“What, Daniel? It’s mac and cheese,” she said, bewildered at this outburst.
“It’s the squiggawy kind. I want the other kind. I don’t wike this kind, “ he started to cry again.
Pam shrugged at Jim. “It’s the Rite Aid brand – it was cheaper.”
“I don’t wi-i-i-i-ke it!” he wailed, and tried to push the bowl away.
“Really, Pam, “ Jim scolded. “Surely we can afford a box of Kraft macaroni and cheese.” He wondered at his own harshness even as the words left his mouth, but somehow not being able to provide your toddler son the kind of mac and cheese he wanted was the last straw in his humiliating day.
His wife did not take this well. “Jim, we agreed,” Pam retorted huffily, “ to save money on stuff like this.” She was obviously trying not to cause a scene in front of the kids, but her brow was furrowed in that…that mad way. “Here Daniel, you like hot dogs, have one of these.” She successfully quieted his protests by giving him the entire squeeze bottle of ketchup so he could “do it himself,” and then she attempted to get the dinner conversation back on track.
“Well, CeCe, tell us about the presentations then,” Pam said, shooting Jim a warning look not to intervene this time. Don’t worry Pam, Jim thought as he sat back in his chair and crossed his arms sullenly. I’ll just sit here and be useless. I can’t seem to do anything right anyway. On some level he knew he was being petulant, but right now he couldn’t control his own childish reactions.
Their seven year old proceeded to give an amazingly accurate rundown of all the presentations, and Jim’s awe and pride in his daughter almost pulled a smile from him. Almost. He took some comfort in her description of his presentation as “interesting,” but it was obvious that the vet stole the show. She ended her summation with “Thanks for coming, Dad.” That should be worth something, right? Jim stuffed a forkful of macaroni into his mouth. Daniel was right - the RiteAid brand wasn’t very good.
The meal conversation progressed to other things and soon the kids asked to be excused. They were allowed a half hour of cartoons in the evening, and they scampered off together to the family room to watch, their pre-dinner squabbles long forgotten.
When they were gone, Jim stared down at his half eaten plate of food. “I’m sorry,” he said, and he was. For snapping at her, for contradicting her statements to the kids, for…being such a disappointment. He toyed with the uneaten macaroni on his plate with his fork. For a lot of things.
“It’s okay, hon, I get it now,” she said sympathetically. “Doesn’t seem fair, does it? Nobody could compete with live animals.”
“Let’s face it Pam, I have a boring job.” He began to line up the spirals of macaroni end to end around the edge of his plate.
“Maybe so, but your children adore you.”
“Right,” he agreed sarcastically as he herded the peas into the semicircle of macaroni pieces.
“Oh Jim, you know they do.”
He lifted his head to look at her and smiled a melancholy half smile. If anybody could make him feel better it was Pam. But tonight, her words weren’t quite enough.
“Hey, I’ll clean up tonight. You go watch cartoons with the kids.”
Jim sat, unmoving, so Pam walked over and gave him a gentle nudge. “Go on,” she nodded toward the family room.
He slowly rose and shuffled into the other room, shoulders drooped. He took a seat on the couch between Daniel and CeCe, and they immediately snuggled into either side of him. He didn’t see the tears well in Pam’s eyes as she paused in the door, watching for a moment before returning to the kitchen.
forty five minutes later
“Horrible, hairy hogs hurrying homewards on heavily harnesses horses,” Jim read, emphasizing the “h” sounds . The kids were curled on either side of him, focused intently on the book in his lap – Animalia. He looked up as Pam entered the room. “All done?" he asked her. "Heard you working on that dryer again.”
She nodded and looked pointedly at each child, and then at him. He nodded back, smiling begrudgingly.
“Daddy, this is the page where we belong.”
“What CeCe?” Jim turned his full attention back to his children. Pam was right, he guessed. They did seem to enjoy his company.
“Halperts. We belong on this page. We’re all Halperts.”
He chuckled. “Right, I guess we do.” The impulse to ask suddenly overwhelmed him. “It would be really cool to have a veterinarian for a dad, wouldn’t it?” he ventured the question.
“I guess.”
“I bet Hannah has a really cool time with her dad.”
“Not really,” she answered, raising her eyebrows knowingly.
Daniel’s voice interrupted, “Daddy, I found aww these. Nest page!” he demanded.
“OK.” Jim flipped the page and read the “I’s” in a high falsetto voice. “Ingenious iguanas improvising an intricate impromptu on impossibly impractical instruments.” Both children giggled.
Jim switched back to his normal voice and pressed CeCe with a “Why not?” while Daniel rattled off things he saw on the page.
“Hannah doesn’t see her dad much.”
“Why’s that?”
“She mostly lives with her mom and she only lives with her dad and her dad’s new wife every other weekend. Her real mom hates his new wife and they’re always yelling at each other.”
“Um.” Wow. He had not anticipated this answer.
“I’m glad you and mommy still love each other,” she added, snuggling a little closer.
“Me, too.” Jim murmured.
“Ice cream, there’s ice cream!” Daniel exclaimed – he seemed oblivious to Jim and CeCe’s conversation. He pointed to the tiny cone in the intricate drawing.
CeCe ignored her brother. “I like that you read us books every night. Animals are cool, but I don’t care what you do when you’re at work ‘cause I’m not there. I like that you play with us every day and that you coach my tee ball team and you’re funny.” CeCe hugged his arm. “You’re the best dad ever.”
Jim closed his eyes and felt a warm glow course through his entire body. When he opened them, he saw Pam smiling at him from across the room. ‘I told you so,’ her expression mocked him. And she had, he conceded with a nod.
“Thanks, CeCe. You’re the best daughter ever,” he whispered as he brushed a kiss over the top of her head.
At this point, it became apparent that Daniel had been taking in their dialogue after all. Not to be outdone, he boasted in that piercing three year old voice, “I want to be just like you, Daddy.” Jim smiled, but Daniel wasn’t through. “I don’t want to be anybody ‘portant,” the little boy stated confidently.
The child’s statement hung in the air for a long moment, allowing its gravity to settle heavily upon Jim. The warmth he’d felt only seconds ago turned to an ache. He could feel Pam’s eyes on him, but he continued to stare down at the book.
“Next page!” Daniel prompted, oblivious to the effect his words had on his dad.
Jim turned the page and began reading, his voice wooden. “Jovial jackals…” Though he knew she was still there, he couldn’t make himself look up at Pam.
Somewhere about the “P’s”, he heard her walk out of the room.
Author's Chapter Notes:
Seems I'm longwinded, so this is chapter two of three. Jim comes home after his tough day.
I'm putting my end story comments here because every time I try to put them in the appropriate box, my entire story text gets erased. WTF?
Anyway, I'd appreciate any comments you might have time to leave. If you didn't like it, I'd like to hear why, even briefly. No really, honestly, my lip won't quiver and I might learn something. Any comments would be wonderful. Thanks!
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I'm putting my end story comments here because every time I try to put them in the appropriate box, my entire story text gets erased. WTF?
Anyway, I'd appreciate any comments you might have time to leave. If you didn't like it, I'd like to hear why, even briefly. No really, honestly, my lip won't quiver and I might learn something. Any comments would be wonderful. Thanks!
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