blue hearts

begin again

2011-06-26T04:39:00.062-05:00

There was just this uncertainty Geoff sensed when he felt Dayton's kiss press deeply into the corner of his mouth. He must have been dreaming. This was unexpected... out of nowhere when he got home.

"What is going on with you?" Geoff couldn't help but smile as Dayton smoothed the whiskers down his face. "Are you on something." Dayton was already undressing him in the bedroom.

"I just missed you, you know. Us." Dayton kept his eye on him. As warm and tender as this felt at the moment, Geoff took Dayton's hand before he reached for what was in his pants.

"Hey..just..just slow down." Sure it was thrilling and mesmerizing, but they just couldn't-

"I don't want to." Dayton tensed.

"Are you all right?" Geoff watched as if he didn't know if this was for real or just a way to not face what was really going on. "Are you going to tell me what you did or not?"

Dayton took a step back to do his tantrum, turning away from him as if Geoff put him pure agony. "Why do you say things like that! Why! I didn't, do anything!"

"Well, it feels like it." Geoff buttoned up his shirt. Yes, he'd spoiled the moment. It was three in the afternoon. "Where's Nancy?"

"Buying groceries or something." Dayton still wouldn't look at him. There were possibly tears in Dayton's winced eyes. He hugged himself as if he were in some sort of pain. "How in the hell should I know! She never tells me, anything."

"I'm sorry." Geoff supposed he'd over reacted. He should have just went with it. Thrown caution to the wind. It had been awhile since afternoon sex. He reached for Dayton. He wouldn't dare say, lets start over. It was best to rekindle what he could before it was too late. He pulled Dayton back. "God, just don't ever think for a minute you're not sexy..because, you are."

Geoff tugged Dayton's shirt off of him. Finally, Dayton unbuttoned Geoff's shirt again. He felt Dayton's fingers on his chest now and as they kissed more, nothing else mattered. Not the thunder storm brewing or the car-door slamming too. Yeah, this was definitely a moment worth keeping. Whatever it was that started this in motion, Geoff was glad it had happened.

what it could be

2011-04-04T19:29:00.000-05:00

"Just don't listen to her, OK?" Oliver summed it up in one sentence. There was no need for Dayton to be depressed. After all, Oliver knew he was working his ass off with shelving books. "You're a good dad, I've seen it."

He almost saw Dayton's sad face change. But he didn't want to make it so noticeable.

"Really?" Dayton didn't sound to confident about it. His lanky body gaped over the books on the cart.

"Yeah, I mean it." Oliver let a smile spread across his thin face as he pushed his messy blond hair behind his ear. "Look, I know, its hard. I really do. But you've got Geoff. And..and that baby loves you. OK?"

Dayton just nodded.

"It sucks. I get that. The circumstance. But you gotta look past that. All right? You and Geoff have a family." Oliver so wanted to be inspiring. Of course, he could only do so much. He just wanted to be there for Dayton even if Bex would have a hard time understanding it.

"You're the best, Oliver." Dayton started to smile all over.

Next thing Oliver knew Dayton was kissing him like he was more than just a co-worker he could confide in.

Oliver winced, pushing him off of him there in the stacks of the Mystery fiction in the back of the library.

"OK, I think we took it a little too far there." Oliver cleared his throat. One more thing, he hoped Bex didn't find out about.

takes one to know one

2010-04-23T13:19:00.006-05:00

Why? Why was Dayton like this?

He knew something was up. Nancy could sense it by the look he gave her. It was as if he'd walked in on her and Chuck. He knew. He knew what they were doing.

"Why can't you just run away with him?" He was doing his best to match socks and be the roommate he should be.

"Why can't you just..just shut up." She had trouble sometimes saying what she wanted. She looked at him bitterly.

"I don't want too." He looked at her ominous.

"Face it, you are stuck with me, and..and, do I do anything at all to keep you away from Geoff?" She wanted to know.

"You are his goddamn wife." Dayton winced hard and stomped off to the kitchen with the tea towels to put away.

"Jesus, Dayton, you make it sound like a real relationship or something, and you know its just on paper." She followed him into the kitchen.

She knew he was mad. He jerked out a chair and sat down at the table with his hands over his eyes. He was crying. Very discreetly.

"Come on, Dayton, you don't need to be baby-ed, now do you?" She sat down next to him and put her hand on his back. Naturally, he flinched. "Just stop thinking about how awful all this is. What do you want? You want him to marry you."

"I just want you to go away!" He screamed at her then.

"You are a real piece of work, you know that." She squinted in disgust at him. "Seriously, you have anger issues and you should be on meds."

He shook his head, no. It was as if everyone else was sick around him, but not him.

"I just don't know why you have to be this way. I mean, we are a family. A strange one, no doubt. But we have to get along. Think about Trent. Will you?" Her frown swelled as she got up to get back to the laundry.

She folded towels. Finally, he came back to match more socks.

"What are you talking about?" He looked at her as if she hadn't made sense to him.

"I'm just saying, if he sees you, act like you do around me, he's going to start acting just like you. He will. And for sure they'll write him off with a learning problem. Because he can't get along with other. Do you want that?" She looked at him.

He didn't say anything. He nursed his bottom lip then as he put socks in a basket to put away.

There. She had silence. Of course, she didn't know if anything she said was true, but if it could make him think... maybe he'd settle down and Nancy wouldn't wish he was the one she hoped would leave.

hit and miss

2010-04-10T12:09:00.003-05:00

"I'd kind of just like for her to go away." Dayton found himself saying to Max.

"That doesn't sound good," Max said looking back at Dayton who was suppose to be helping him with some cleaning at the church.

"Of course, it doesn't. Its just, you know, I think everyone needs a chance on their own. She should just go away with Chuck. We'd have Trent, all the time. It would be so easy." Dayton shrugged who was cleaning down the pew.

"You have to learn to compromise."

"Compromise my ass!" His words echoed through the church. "That's all I do."

"You have to stop thinking about it so much." Max looked at him. They were alone. Just the two of them.

"I know. I try." He sat down in the pew as if he might have a moment with the lord, right now. "Geoff, its all his fault. He should have never married her in the first place."

"But then you'd never have Trent with you." Max reminded him.

"OK, I know. How come it works that way? Good things coming out of bad situations." Dayton sighed.

"You have not embraced the situation." Max told him as he took the dust mop one more round by the choir area.

"Yeah, I'm not really much of an embracer, if you've noticed." Dayton looked at Max then.

"You are too. Look at you and Trent. That is amazing, in its self. I was so sure you were not going to handle that at all. And you did. You are a great father. You are, and you can't deny that. Its just you have to have some faith. Geoff needs you. He loves you. This is what you have to remember. Some things you just can't change. You've got to adapt. And I know you have it in you, to do so."

Dayton just nodded. He wished he could absorb every word Max said, again and again, but he seemed to have forgot what Max said ,after the line You are a great father.

watching you watching me

2010-03-20T21:31:00.003-05:00

Bex was trying to warm up to spring. Only, it snowed again. Of course, Oliver kept reminding her it was a spring snow. It would go away soon enough. He'd already planted some beans out back.

And if that wasn't enough, their two crawlers were itiching to walk. More like running. It was never ending.

"That's the way its suppose to be." Oliver assured her. Of course, his hair was getting long and he was tieing it back, again. Perhaps, things did stay the same, she was beginning to believe. A lot like her stomach not ever really shrinking.

She'd look at these women, all skinny. It was irritating. She was on a diet. She went to the gym. Just what was their secret. And Oliver, he'd never gain weight. Never.

"You just have to stop thinking about it." Oliver told her. And she was. Well, trying, at least.

Oliver did have a way of taking those thoughts away. Just being himself.

Some times, she wanted to ask him how he could love her. But there was no need to ask. Especially, when he showed her everyday. And she knew she took him for granted.

"Well, I'm going to do more things this spring." She told him she'd cook more. She'd take swimming lessons with the kids.

"We both will." He told her she couldn't have all the fun.

Yes, there would be fun. Bex had to think fun. It had been a very cold winter, and she decided it was time to thaw out. No more grudges with Dayton. More phone calls with her mother. Or she could just watch Oliver play with the kids. Teaching them a new song with their hands, and getting them messy with paintings from pudding.

lets do it, again

2010-02-20T08:54:00.004-06:00

Geoff had been thinking about it for an awful long time now. And even when he and Oliver started on the art project, he knew it would take forever at the church. At least now it was starting to shape up. The garden painting in the baptistry.

It was back breaking, actually. But Oliver seemed as excited about it as he was, painting those leaves on trees. Pink and yellow flowers. So detailed. Rich greens and shadowy browns.

"And to think I wanted to cover the whole sanctuary in a mural." Geoff just smiled. It was good to get away from everything. This was what he loved to do, and yet their were certain individuals he loved too. It was just, this didn't aggravate him so much. He knew what he was doing.

"I'm glad you didn't." Oliver kept looking at their work. There was still water to paint at the base of the painting.

"You got that right." He sighed.

"To bad we can't put a unicorn somewhere in this." Oliver smiled.

"I think it might be frowned upon." Geoff nodded.

"Yeah, I'm sticking with leaves and grass." Oliver told him. He put his hands in his back pockets and studied the painting.

"I like doing this with you." Geoff gave him a pat on the back. "We have to find more gigs to do together."

"Really?" Oliver looked at him.

"Well, one a year is enough for me. Its not that murals are a big thing, anymore." He shrugged. "I think of this little art professor I had in college. She had a huge book of all the murals she'd done during the late 50's and 60's. She did one in New York City, Barcelona. A lot in Mexico."

"Yeah, its kind of a lost art." Oliver nodded. "That's why I only do bathrooms, anymore."

Geoff just chuckled. It gave him an idea. Maybe that was something he and Dayton could do. His mind was full of ideas of the landscape of his life. Paint a mural in the bedroom. But he didn't see that happening anytime soon. Just too much to do. Maybe some day.

brave in the cold

2010-02-15T11:40:00.003-06:00

It couldn't be more perfect.

Nancy got flowers at the principal's office where she worked as an aid. She didn't really think she did much there other than take phone calls and direct students to the right places. Well, she did grade papers but nothing big. Nothing unnerving. It was a sweet little world to be in, and everyone treated her so kind because her husband was the art teacher. Everyone loved her there.

Of course, Geoff made her nausea how everyone went on and on about them. It must be so wonderful. She guessed it was. Even if they had a complete different scenerio in their head than what it was really about.

No one knew about Dayton. Well, not at school. Honestly, he did a lot with the baby. He seldom bothered her. Sometimes, she had to wonder if he was actually there. OK, at night. Yeah, he was there for Geoff. Always. Behind closed doors. She was the outsider. She was.

And it made her so malancholy. She wasn't sure what to do with herself. Trapped, she supposed. But then again, where would she be without them? Naturally, she had to fake a smile, but someone needed to know the truth. She hated keeping all this inside her. It was annoying, worse than a dull headache, sometimes.

"Well, sometimes, I feel bad about everything." Nancy found herself crying when Chuck came by to leave something that someone else had given him. A heart shaped cheese cake. She just looked at it. So this is the way it was. Passed off gifts from someone else. Nothing special for her. Even if she supposed the pink roses were at work.

"You just have to keep thinking positive." Chuck was all comforting as a pastor could be. She guessed. But she didn't want him to be that way. "Just think about how wonderful, everything is."

"But its not that wonderful." She wanted to scream, but she barely got it out over a whisper. "If this is ..is all there is."

"Nancy, you can't-you can't take care of yourself, right now. And its a blessing you have so much." He assured her.

"Yeah, of course, of course." She could keep saying that, again and again, and really it was just a line to say like clock work. Couldn't he tell she was miserable? Just miserable.

As soon as he took her hand, there in the livingroom, all alone, no where else to go, Nancy took it as a sign. A good sign. They'd just have to make do in the silence. She kissed him before he had a second to think about it. She didn't want him to think. Not now. Not this time.

looks so deceiving

2010-02-10T01:36:00.003-06:00

Oliver noticed Riley at the library once again. He was here everytime Dayton was which was everyday.

"Is something going on between you too?" Oliver had to ask. He just couldn't help himself.

"What do you mean, going on? He's my friend." Dayton snapped. "I get enough grief from Geoff over this. Its nothing, OK. Nothing is going on." He was in the back mending books.

"Sorry, its just, you know, maybe he does like you." Oliver shrugged.

"Like what?" Dayton squinted back at him.

"Romantically." Oliver shrugged.

"Are you kidding me?" Dayton scowled. "Of course not, never, all right. Believe me. NEVER."

"OK." He didn't want to upset Dayton about it. But he'd seen it time and time again at the desk. The old man who kept stealing books from the library everytime he talked to the volunteer who helped at circ on Friday afternoons. The boy genius who practically drooled everytime Bex checked him out while he was checking her out. And of course, his giggly fan club of geeky girls who said they couldn't get enough of his help, helping them with their Jane Austen book club. "Its not the end of the world, Dayton."

"Who said it was?" But he could see the look in Dayton's face that he was horrified at the thought that Riley just might be falling in love with him.

so now what

2010-02-05T01:26:00.002-06:00

"So what are you gonna do about this?" Dayton came right out and asked Chuck after church one Sunday.

Chuck gave him a stare to shut up. People were coming out of church. He couldn't talk about Nancy right here. Finally, the chapel was empty, and naturally, Chuck gave him a spill about how happy it was to see him at church. He didn't come that regularly.

"Look, Nancy is a very good friend." He winced. This was true. That was all it would ever be. He'd seen her in the worst of times with the stroke after the birth of her baby. It was great to see her, almost back to normal.

"Its because she's got that kind of limp to the left isn't it?" Dayton nodded.

"No." Chuck winced. "We are just friends."

"Yeah, I bet. You come out and see her everyday. Something has to be going on. Has to be." Dayton acted as if he knew exactly what was going on.

"Not everyday." Chuck methodically put his hair behind one ear and then the other. Why couldn't Dayton just go away? He did not need this.

"You know, she's not sleeping with Geoff. Never has." Dayton looked him in the eye.

"Can we not talk about this?" Chuck knew Dayton would be talking about homosexuality in the next breath, and he didn't think the sanctuary needed to hear that. He prodded him toward the door.

"Look, Dayton, it looks like they are married and that's the way it should be, so..so you have to accept that."

"It shouldn't be accepted," Dayton looked hurt that he was brushing him off this way. "Look, I know she likes you. She does. She loves you. That's what it is. She loves you, man!" Dayton pressed his index finger straight in Chuck's chest. "And you have to do something about that. You do."

"Dayton, I have no desire to come between a man and wife."

"Wife! My ass." Dayton gritted. Just then some older women were coming up the side walk. Dayton striaghtened his neck then hugged himself. "I'd do something about this, if I were you."

Chuck almost smiled. He so wished he could, but he needed this job at the moment.

right or wrong

2010-01-30T10:32:00.003-06:00

Honestly, Dayton felt this was his year. It really was. The whole public announcement thing was taking off about being a teenage father. Even Trent was in on it. And that made him more proud that he could be part of it too. Of course, he'd gotten some stupid feedback about promoting teenage fatherhood, but he didn't care. Why did people have to be so negative? And Dayton was definitely not being negative.

No, he was still thinking of Riley. Wondering if he could help him, some way. He'd found him dates from time to time even if they never panned out.

"I don't know why you're doing this?" Geoff didn't like the Riley situation.

"I have too." Dayton shrugged. "He needs social situations." Even if it was like throwing Riley into the shark tank each time. Nobody had eaten him up yet.

"What will you do if there is someone, huh?" Geoff looked at him puzzled. "Can he handle it? Really?"

It hadn't gotten to that point. As far as Dayton could see, Riley was always going to be there, at the library. If not at the grocery store or the movie theater. Really, Riley needed a friend, and that's what Dayton was doing.

"Don't be jealous." Dayton decided. "He's not going to win me over or anything, you know."

"I'm not jealous. I just think you are over your head with him, and it could just, you know, back fire." Geoff meant it too. There in the kitchen one night when he was finishing up dinner on the stove.

"Back fire!" Actually Dayton meant it as a question. "What about-" He didn't want to even go there with Geoff and his so called wife, Nancy. Dayton didn't want to be bitter about this, but he really thought they should be divorced by now. Why did she still have to be there?

"I thought you were OK with Nancy?" It was as if Geoff knew where this was going.

"I'll never be OK with Nancy!" Dayton informed him.

"I don't get you, you can be nice to complete strangers and..and she's family." Geoff reminded him.

Dayton nursed his bottom lip. He didn't want this to go wrong. He didn't.

"Fine." He'd have to let Geoff have his way. It was always his way because evidently he was always right. Dayton always felt he was wrong. If it wasn't one thing, it was something else.

in the dead of winter

2010-01-07T10:14:00.003-06:00

Christmas just wasn't long enough for Bex, and then New Years was nothing much. Maybe it was this cold winter that was depressing her so much. But there was Oliver all happy at work. As if the wind chills didn't get to him at all, even if it did take a good thirty minutes to warm up the car everyday for work. Just how did he do that?

"What is your secret?" She winced wishing she was on a sunny beach somewhere instead of seeing how high the snow drifts were getting outside.

"What?" He smiled.

"You, always happy, I don't understand it." She was serious. Yes, she knew she was extra sensitive about so many things and probably never sensitive enough to anyone else's problems.

"What's there to understand?" He looked at her as if she was not making sense. "Look, there are so many things you don't have control over. You just have to look for the little things to enjoy, and that's never easy. So if you smile, that's a start, Bex."

She wasn't even sure she could make the effort. But she lived with the man who always found his glass half full, not half empty. And he could always soften the gruffest person who might come in.

It would make her a little mad when he'd mention something about her being his wife and someone would say. "That was the last thing I expected." What was that saying about her? They were never going to look like brother and sister. Obviously.

"You know what they say," Oliver would come back with. "Opposites attract."

But now she really felt she needed to take some happy course with Oliver. She hated the angry looks patrons could give her. So she'd do as he said. Start with a smile. Work on her happy skills. She hoped they got a vacation soon. Yes, that's what filled her thoughts. Otherwise, winter was going to drive her crazy.

Of course, Oliver would just laugh. "Oh, if it isn't winter, it would be something else."

Bex would just sigh. He knew her so well. He truly did.

snow day

2009-12-10T07:55:00.003-06:00

Chris was none to happy with the snow happening. Funny, how he'd stayed home that first snow day with Chloe because it was just horrible out there. Winds blowing. Snow in the air. Visibility close to zero.

Really, it was so nice and toasty inside. Now a care in the world. It was just he and Chloe.

Max had to go in early and stay late, as it was. Chris felt so far from the frightful weather. He just wished he could stay in with Chloe, who was very happy they'd stayed home. He read her all her favorite stories. They experimented with jello painting. Really, he was impressed with her artistic skills, and he was surprised how her babble was actually turning into real talk. He loved listening to her call him Daddy so much.

It was a far cry from being in the cold, with a wet nose and smelling of gasoline most days. He wouldn't want to miss these little moments with Chloe. He felt happy and sad all it once. In spite of the chicken roasting in the crock pot.

"I wish I could do something else with my life," He said to Max late in the evening after Chloe went to bed.

"What are you talking about?" Max smiled and put his arm around Chris. "I thought you had everything you wanted. You have your own business, a family, a house."

"Yeah, I know, but you know, its not that much fun, putting myself out there, like that. Got to be an easier way." He had decided.

"Oh, really? Like what? What would you be rather doing." Max was a bit startled.

"Staying home." He grinned.

Max almost laughed.

"Give you a day off and you take a week holiday," Max said as they sat together, contemplating this on the couch. "True, you need more vacations, but I have a feeling you'd miss the shop. You would. You love engines. You enjoy seeing things work. Its a part of you. "

"I guess, but not right now. Not really. I really wouldn't miss it." Chris told him.

"Well, you take another day off tomorrow. Don't think the weather will be any better." Max sighed.

"You should take off tomorrow." Chris smiled.

"Maybe I will," Max said. "At this rate, neither one of us might not want to work if these snow days keep showing up."

on his own

2009-12-07T05:40:00.002-06:00

"Just slow down," Geoff said into his cell to Dayton as he was coming out of the school to his truck.

"The guy already left." Dayton sounded as if it were all his fault that Riley had had a bad moment.

"What happened?" Geoff was thinking the worst about Riley and his kind of date. "He didn't take his clothes off or anything did he?"

"No," Dayton said. "The guy just freaked. I didn't know exactly what I could say to make things smoother. But once he saw Riley's spaghetti, I guess he knew Riley didn't have all his marbles. Actually, ketchup with buttered noodles, isn't half bad. You know, if you don't have anything else in the house to eat."

"So what's Riley doing now?" Geoff got in his truck and sat there a while to talk.

"The dishes. He kind of likes everything spotless, but he won't shut up about how he'll never go on an actual date. I just don't know how to leave." Dayton sighed.

"You don't know how to leave?" Geoff winced.

"Well, I keep trying to tell him I have to go, but he just doesn't believe me, and could you..could you just talk to him." Dayton begged.

"OK. just hand him the phone and I'll see what I can do." Geoff told him.

Before long he got Riley's muttering about his date. It made not much sense to Geoff who could hardly get in a word.

"Riley? Riley! Enough! Dayton has to go home. He can't stay there with you. Do you understand? He has a son who's hungry. Who has waited all day to see him. Dayton has to go home."

Riley kept his monotone monologue going how he'd cooked and he'd cleaned and he thought he was the one. He just would not shut up. Geoff tried to tell him to give Dayton his phone back. Finally, Geoff hung up, wondering if Dayton would ever get his phone. Dayton was on his own on this one.

not a problem

2009-12-05T01:56:00.002-06:00

Dayton was pretty happy that this commerical gig wouldn't be happening real soon. January some time.

So he had plenty of time with mending. Really, he found it quite theraputic. Alot like watching Baby Trent sleep. Funny what little pleasures he found to get him through the days these days.

He'd just glued a page in an old book when his cell went off. He was sure it might be Nancy, but she was at work and Trent was with Nancy's Mom. It was Riley.

"Riley? What's up?"

"I found someone." He just said.

"Found someone?" Dayton winced wondering what that meant.

"Yeap, I asked him over for lunch."

"What?" Dayton winced more. "A guy? You just invited him over."

"Uh-huh."

"You know we talked about this. You need some practice dates. We were, Geoff and me, were thinking you could just go out to dinner with us, or something, you know. I don't think you should cook for him. I mean, its a first date. Get coffee or something." Dayton told him.

"Its too late. I'm cooking lunch for him." Riley sounded all confident.

"OK." Dayton shut the book and rubber-banded it. "Do you even know how to cook?"

"A little."

"A little? What are you cooking?" Dayton asked.

"Spagatti."

"Oh, really," Dayton said. "How do you make it?"

"All you need is ketchup, you know." Riley informed.

"Oh, boy." Dayton hung up. This might be an emergency. He sure hoped this dude was into Riley.

moving forward

2009-12-02T04:38:00.003-06:00

Nancy had to face facts. Things would never be the same again. She had a bit of a limp on her left side and her left arm wasn't as strong as it used to be. There was a lot she couldn't do with her left hand. She had a small slur too. But her diction was getting better.

"I just didn't know how good I had it until I lost it." Nancy told Bex when she took her Christmas shopping. They'd missed the black Friday sales because Bex was afraid of germs and Nancy didn't want to fight the crowd.

"Well, you look great. Really, you don't look different at all." Bex was being a good friend. Nancy knew she looked different. She felt it. And when she looked at Geoff and Dayton together she always thought she would have been out of their lives by now, but she wasn't. She felt so dependent on them. She hated being a burden. "And Geoff got you a job at the office in the high school. You must be happy about that."

"Well, I probably wouldn't be there if it wasn't for TLF. I get to start working all day next week." She had to take as many of these easy days as she could. And in a few days she'd be home in her old room again. "I going to miss TLF, so much."

"Oh really," Bex just smiled as if she knew why.

"Yeah, I know, I'll miss Chuck." He was her new best friend. "He'll have someone else to see instead of me."

"I kind of doubt that. You two get along really well." Bex reminded her as they found a place at the mall to park that wasn't too far from the entrance. Bex had the handicap hanger on her rear view mirror so all was proper.

"I shouldn't want anything from him." She shook her head, feeling a threat of missing him already when she'd see in a little while. Naturally, the first store they went into, she was drawn to all the things she'd like to see him in. An elegant coat. Beautiful dress shirts. Detailed ties. A sleek black vest. She would love to make him over, yet she wouldn't want to change a thing about Chuck.

that other day they don't speak of

2009-11-29T16:20:00.004-06:00

It didn't matter that Thanksgiving was late or if they'd already had one at Geoff & Dayton's...Chris and Max still had to make it out to Chris' parents.

"Well, I just don't think its fair that you have to do all the deer stuff." Max spoke up in his defense. It was as if all his sisters' husbands had waited until the weekend for Chris to come out and dress all the deer that had been shot. A total of six bucks.

Max looked at all of them as if they were taking Chris for granted.

"Maybe you should start taking your venison some place to be processed. Chris can't do it all." Max explained. "And he shouldn't. He has a family too, and...." He was like a festered pimple ready to pop. "Chris isn't going to do it."

He got a lot of looks from everyone in the dining-room who were waiting for Chris to get started out in the cold barn. The deer were hanging, waiting to be skinned. Chris gave a weak smile.

"He's battling a cold as if it, and well, he came out here because you all make him feel he's obligated." Max loaded up Chloe in her car-seat. "I think we'll be going." He looked at Chris who was as solemn as ever. They went to car then.

"My throat isn't that sore." Chris whispered.

"Well, it will be if you have to do all this work." Max looked at him. "Thanksgiving is a holiday where you give thanks, not skin a deer day, you know. In your case, half a dozen. Then you cut all up." Max gritted.

"Wait!" Chris' mom came out then as they were ready to go. "Come back in here. We haven't had pie yet. And, I know things have changed." She hugged herself then. "We've taken you for granted. And you're our only boy, you know. We all love Chloe so much, and Max too. Just come back in. We won't ever speak of venison, again."

Chris looked at Max.

"All right." He sighed.

Chris almost laughed. It would take Max to get his way. He was good at that kind of thing.

back in the saddle

2009-11-24T03:45:00.002-06:00

Dayton squinted at the screen on his laptop. Granted it was the smallest and cheapest, but still it was his that Geoff somehow thought he needed. Only, he was never on it. Lord knows, when he checked his e-mail. Finally he had. And there it was.

They were interested in him making another PSA.

"Huh." He squinted hard. "Would you look at this?" He asked Geoff.

"What? You need glasses now." He winced back with a sigh.

"Its probably nothing. Probably too late. I dunno. They could have called, don't you think. Maybe its nothing?" Dayton shrugged.

"Well, they want to use you for a teenage father campaign." Geoff smiled.

"What?" Dayton looked a tad worried.

"You'd really be good." Geoff told him.

"But I'm not really a teenager." Dayton looked at Geoff.

"So what, you look like one. You think anyone is 16 on 90210?" Geoff chuckled. "I think this'll be great. It seems a lot of teenagers don't know there is help out there for them. Did you hear about that teenage guy who threw his baby down the stairs, and it had to have brain surgery?"

"God," Dayton squinted hard. "That's awful." It made him sick to think about it.

"Well, e-mail them. Tell them you'll do it." Geoff looked at him.

"OK." Dayton nodded. "Can you tell me where the spellcheck is again?" He looked up at Geoff.

"All right, I'll write it for you." He scooted Dayton over.

Dayton bit at his bottom lip. This sort of stuff made him nervous. But maybe this was what he was suppose to do.

enlightened

2009-11-21T10:45:00.003-06:00

Oliver wanted something different for Thanksgiving. He was sure it would be the same old thing with Bex's mother. An up to do meal, beautifully done but cold conversation, none the less.

"Why not just go to the church this year." He thought out loud.

"Can't we just do it here?" Bex wasn't in the mood to go anywhere. Really, she was quite stay at home these days. She was battling work and an online class, as well.

"All right." He supposed he should have thought smaller, some how. "Oh yeah," he's almost forgot, Dayton had mentioned something about Thanksgiving too. "We could go to Dayton's."

"What?" Bex winced still thinking of a tiny meal that might be made up of stuffing and turkey mixed together. She'd listened to someone - about how they should cook the turkey this weekend. De-bone it, freeze it then let it warm in the crock pot for dinner on Thanksgiving.

"Well, it wouldn't be just us," Oliver winced back, who was getting out the turkey just as she said. As it was, she'd shout out what needed to be done and he'd do it. Some team effort is was but it was called normal at their house. "Nancy will be there. He just wants people over, you know."

"So." She wasn't giving in.

"Come on, it would be nice. Perhaps easy. We'd bring turkey in the crock pot." He wasn't giving in, either. She rolled her eyes, but she didn't say, no. He got on his cell then and called Dayton to ask if they had their turkey yet.

"That's just what were going to do, today." Dayton told him it was rather a slow go. There was a cold fog out, and they didn't want to get the baby sick.

"Would you be offended with crock pot turkey?" Oliver asked.

"Turkey is turkey." Dayton didn't care.

"Good, we'll bring the turkey then."

"I asked Max and Chris too," Dayton reminded him. "And they said they'd bring pies. Something about a cranberry one and a pumpkin."

"I thought they'd be at the church?"

"Well, they are. You know, its not happening til the evening."

"Oh, right." Maybe Oliver would help out at the church, after all. They were taking food to the shut-ins.

He had to get started on the turkey. If only he didn't have to worry about the next couple days at work. He supposed he should think about Thanksgiving, everyday. Just in new ways.

you said you would

2009-11-15T20:44:00.003-06:00

This was news to Geoff. This Riley.

He listened while Dayton changed Trent's pamper.

"Oliver seems to think we should invite him over." Dayton shrugged. "You know, to have dinner or something. You know anyone we could set him up with?"

"I'd have to think about it." Geoff was tired. Other things were on his mind. Like Nancy and Chuck. He'd found them talking down at the home where she was living. They were pretty chummy. But she wouldn't say a word about it to him. He was hoping she would.

"You have to know someone." Dayton looked at him as if he was suppose to know the answer to everything. Geoff took the baby from him. Trent was holding himself up so alert and ready to play. He definitely took Geoff mind off so much.

"I can't think of anyone." He tickled Trent's plump tummy in his sleeper. Naturally, Trent returned the favor with kicking his legs and blowing bubbles. "Besides, I dunno, if we should get involved. Riley sounds kind of strange."

"Well, it would be like a practice date, you know." Dayton kept his hands in his back pockets.

"A practice date?" Geoff looked at Dayton with a wince. "Well, why don't you be the guinea pig and I'll coach." He gave Dayton a smile then.

"Are you kidding me?" Dayton squinted.

"No." Geoff laughed. "He's your friend. Besides I think I've dated more than you have."

"Well, thanks a lot." Dayton looked a bit hurt as he took Trent from him.

"I guess that means I'm cooking dinner tonight, huh?" He watched Dayton with the baby.

"I guess you are." Dayton gave him a sly smirk.

just one more thing

2009-11-08T09:39:00.002-06:00

Dayton sat there gluing pages together in books. There were lots to be mended. Not that he was a professional or anything, but damn, he was pretty good at this. But that's when Oliver explained a few things about Riley.

"You're not gonna make me teach him mending, are you?" Dayton glared at Oliver that this was really his solo act that he come to love. He really didn't need any help.

"No." Oliver shook his head. "I'm just saying he does have Asperger. And, you should also know, he's gay."

"Now how do you know that?" Dayton winced.

"He told me."

"And you believed him?" Dayton wondered where this was going. "Don't tell me he'd got a crush on me?"

Oliver tried to stop from laughing.

"I just wanted you know. I didn't want him to catch you off guard, you know." Oliver cleared his throat.

"Well, what am I suppose to do about it?" Dayton looked at him blankly.

"He likes you."

"Like how much?" Dayton winced. Damn, this was all he needed. He liked this job. He wanted to keep it.

"I dunno."

"This makes me tired, just thinking about it." Dayton got the book set and started putting rubber-bands around it to put in a stack of books they needed to sit for a few days.

"Well, you know, you only see him Fridays."

"Yeah." Riley made Fridays awful to close up. Because he wouldn't shut up. Maybe Dayton went to easy on him. "I don't want him to like me."

"I know you'll think of a way to let him down. You have it in you to be just the friend you need to be to him." Oliver smiled.

"Ha ha ha..." Dayton rolled his eyes and went to another book. Honestly, he had no idea where this faith was coming from. Dayton wasn't sure he deserved it.

oh, right

2009-10-20T21:15:00.002-05:00

Bex was waiting for Oliver to have a clever idea about costumes for Maisy and Monty.

"We have to show them off, you know." She told him while he was searching in the bathroom for something. It seemed he was on a mission of some kind. Inspiration, she thought he said, but she wasn't sure.

"Just how many bottles of lotion do we have in the bathroom?" He called for Bex. The babies were in their cribs.

She leaned against the bathroom doorway watching him.

"I have no idea." She shook her head.

"Is there an expiration date?" He took a sniff of a big bottle of lotion and handed it to her to smell. Bex just winced.

"I think I'll take a load of this stuff in the closet here and just see how long it last at work." He nodded.

"I don't care. As long as I have my stuff, I'm OK." She hugged herself.

"That's just it, Bex. This is all of yours." He put the bottle back in the closet.

"What about the costumes?"

"I dunno." He winced and followed her into the nursery. Naturally, she was drawn to Maisy and he took Monty. "With all this sickness around, I kind of want to stay home."

"I can't believe you said that." She looked at him. "I'm the one who says things like that. Not you." She tickled Maisy then and she smiled so big. Monty on the other hand was all serious as he studied Oliver's face.

"Everything has just gotten freaky, lately. Snow in early October. The school might close because of the flu. I just want to stay at home as much as possible." He told her.

"I know." Bex sighed. "You think they'll be mad if we don't go to the Halloween party."

"Believe me, the kids could care less about the party at the library." Oliver assured her.

"No, I mean, you know, the library. Are they expecting us to be there?" She wondered as she went to go check Maisy's pamper.

"I don't think so. And I don't care if they get mad. Its the children's department. Circulation has nothing to do with that party." He hugged Monty.

"Oliver," she looked back at him after she'd changed Maisy as the changing table. "I think I'm changing you." She grinned then.

"Naturally, you'd see it that way, now wouldn't you?" Oliver shook his head.

Bex just laughed. She knew they had to enjoy these little moments with the kids as long as they could. Possibly, he was changing her for the better too. They just didn't have to talk about that.

a helping hand

2009-10-11T18:25:00.003-05:00

Chuck had brought brownies. As it was he was there everyday to help Nancy with therapy. He went so much to putting in a little extra something. It might be encouraging words. Helping the nurse get her on the equipment to make her strive a little harder. Slowly, some results were happening. She was walking. Still it was a struggle to lift her right arm.

She'd read horror stories online from women who never got any feeling back. It was depressing, and she wasn't sure if she even wanted to talk anymore. Of course, he was full of questions. What was her favorite color? Did she have a favorite movie? What kind of music did she like?

She found it a bit perturbing. Was it the fact that he was so happy to help? Or the fact he didn't remember her at all. She wouldn't remind him.

"Why are you here?" She finally managed to get the words out.

"That was very good, Nancy." He smiled brightly as if it didn't matter what she'd said, but she'd said something.

"No. Why? Why do you-" She winced.

"Because we're like Nancy and John Red Corn on King of the Hill." He chuckled. "Maybe we could dress up for the Halloween party here."

She said nothing to that. Was that a hint? He did remember? Well, it was a mystery and she felt very uncomfortable around him. It was just not fair.

"I'm sorry, didn't meant it... like you think." Chuck winced. "I mean, you're married and all. I was just teasing. You know. Your name being Nancy and all."

She almost smiled. He'd caught himself. After all. Well, it was still doubtful he remembered her. Better to keep it that way. She nibbled on one of his brownies then. The taste of the heat scorched her mouth.

"Oh, I put red pepper in those, what do you think?" He grinned then.

its going around

2009-09-25T13:23:00.002-05:00

"I don't know, its just kind of strange, you know."

Bex overheard Dayton talking to Oliver at the circulation counter.

"I mean, I want to be here, but its like, do I know what I'm doing? All I can think about is Trent. And I know he's with Geoff right now, and he's with Nancy and yeah, she needs to see him. Its just 4 hours. I can do this." He nodded.

"Well, don't forget to take some time for yourself. You might not be sleeping quite as good with everything. I know a little bit about that." Oliver grinned, and he looked back at Bex who was being her pouty self, as usual, lately.

"I won't." Dayton sighed and he caught Bex staring. She crossed her arms and wished to give him the evil eye.

Dayton walked toward her to the back where the computers were where she worked. She naturally, turned her back on him as if she didn't want a thing from him.

"Look, I know I meant to hurt you," Dayton said. "And I did, and I shouldn't have. Its just everything is weird with me, lately."

"Maybe you need meds to control your little rages." She said so matter of fact like. She could hurt him just as easily. She knew.

"I'm sorry for what I said. But it could be true." He sounded so certain.

"I'm not that awful." She could barely get the words out. "Yes, I thought it too. I did. What if, you know. I had your brat. Maybe it did cross my mind. To have an abortion. But I didn't."

"I thought you were past this," Dayton said.

"You brought it up." She reminded him. Maybe they'd have a stare down now. Well, she'd win. She could.

"You know how you are, you never let anything go, do you?" He kept glaring.

"Maybe I don't." She told him.

"Yeah, you know, I really think thats what kept us together for as long as it did. It was the arguing. Wasn't it?"

"No." She shook her head.

"Well, sometimes, I don't think their is all that much difference in love and hate. You get used to one thing and you just keep it going," Dayton said. "Just hope you don't get wicked on Oliver. That's one guy who's gone out of his way to make you happy. Tell me, Bex, you done anything lately to make that guy happy?"

He left it at that.

Bex just winced. How dare he talk about things he knew nothing about, she thought.

what's the fuss

2009-09-20T09:44:00.004-05:00

Dayton thought he might be looking at himself right there in the library. It was this kid who had enough energy for a speed racer. He was about nine. Fierce. And knew what he wanted.

"I want Pokemon!" He demanded. All the while he was running around the new books display and almost ran into an elderly woman with her cane.

Naturally, it became a shouting match with his mother who looked somewhat beaten down and desperate for a cigarette. While this little monster had eyes of a lit up angel and the most perfect hair. He could have been the next star on an ill-fated WB show if he could sit still enough. And he couldn't. And he didn't.

Dayton just stared and had to think if he'd been ever that much trouble to his mother. After all, he was high strung. Some teachers found him rather unteachable, and he'd spent a good long time in Special Ed. Resource trying to channel the certainty that he was much smarter than he'd ever let on.

"Can you help him?" Oliver looked over to Dayton who was pushing a cart of books through in front of the circulation desk. Oliver was pretty much bogged down with Sunday afternoon patrons. Some demanding books to put holds on that weren't even in stores yet. And of course, the bitter battle of overdues and lost books.

"Sure thing." Dayton nodded and looked over at the kid who was determined to find the Pokemon stuff. "So what is it you're exactly looking for?"

"Digimon." He looked at Dayton as if he should know.

"I don't think we have anything like that. You might just want to look at some of the juvenile graphic novels." Dayton suggested. Thats what all the kids were going for these days unless it was dinosaurs or King Tut.

"I don't think so." But he walked over with Dayton to the graphic novels.

"What grade are you in?" Dayton asked which seemed to shock the kid that he'd ask him. Perhaps no one bothered to know.

"4th."

"Well, what do you read?"

"I don't read. I hate reading." He stared at Dayton. "I won't Pokemon."

"All the stuff we have on Pokemon is pretty much outdated." Beat up too, but he didn't want to mention that. "Ever hear of this series. Warriors?" He held up a new copy of the graphic novel.

"Yeah, I see the smart kids in class reading the novels." He shrugged.

"Well, you get pictures in this one." He showed it to him.

The kid took it and looked through it and handed it back.

"You should give it a chance, then you'd see what the big deal is about. Its not that bad." Dayton handed it back.

"You read them?" The kid looked into Dayton's eyes that he better not lie to him.

"Yeap." Dayton nodded. "Look, I'll find you a Pokemon handbook. Don't think its what you want. Check that out. See which one you like better."

"OK." He was quiet then as he followed Dayton into the children's area to find the book. Dayton managed to find him a chapter book on Pokemon too. Dayton looked back at him and smiled. He had to wonder if all this kid's trouble was the fact that his Mom talked to him like an animal. He seemed pretty down to earth. It just occurred to Dayton that he better apologize to Bex. But he guessed she thought of him as an animal too.

not another sundae

2009-09-15T01:45:00.003-05:00

Chris was bringing Chuck some goodies for his Wednesday night potlucks at the church.

"Max got me a Cusinart ice cream maker for my birthday." Chris told him. "I'm not much of a cook, but I sure know my ice cream. Thought I better bring the church some so we won't get fat at home."

"Just going to share the joy are you?" Chuck smiled as he took the plastic containers from him.

"I've strawberry ice cream, which is amazing. And chocolate, even some coffee ice cream we were experimenting with." Chris nodded.

"Sure you didn't put any Kahlua in there? Might really get the crowd going then." Chuck laughed as he put them in the freezer. "Thanks."

"No problem. The more I make the more I'll share. Promise." Chris beamed. He had Chloe with him too. She was really running around now and quite the little lady even if she was in overalls and sneakers. He grabbed a hold of her before she got too far. She sucked on her pacifier and played with his hair then. "So how's Nancy?"

"Make it sound like something is really going on there, Chris." Chuck looked at him. "I don't think she likes me."

"Well, its hard to tell." Chris winced. "Maybe when she's talking more, it'll help."

"Yeah, well, I scare her. Don't think she likes my kind much." He shrugged. "Maybe some wild Indian tried to scalp her once in another life." He humored Christ then. "I'm just kidding, but I'm not sure I'm the one who should be visiting. I feel really sad for her. I wish I could do something. She really gets to me. Maybe I'm too emotional." He had tears in her eyes just talking about her.

"Well, maybe you can get some of the ladies to go with you." Chris sighed. "I dunno. Max and I stopped by a time or two, but you know, it was short and all and well, you know, I know its not easy. Just don't be too hard on yourself. All right."

Chuck nodded then.

"I'm glad you're here. I think you're perfect for the congregation. You are quite a storyteller." Chris wanted him to know.

compromising

2009-09-13T10:38:00.003-05:00

It was true. Nancy's mother did make Dayton a little nervous. He didn't know why she'd showed up at the house. Things were fine here. The baby was doing great. It was so quaint and cozy until now.

"Aren't you suppose to be with Nancy?" Dayton brought her the last of the coffee. He wondered if she was here to inspect the place. What had he done now?

"I don't see the point, sometimes." She was sour to the world, and he guess he should have expected it. He could tell this thing with Nancy had put some age to her. She looked very tired and the frown wrinkles around the edges of her lips shown harsh.

"But they say she's improving." At least Geoff had told him. He saw her everyday. He would bring Trent with him every night too. It wasn't like Nancy didn't have some time with the baby.

"If you think one stutter here or there is improvement. She can't move." Her mother was a bit testy even talking about her.

"Well, maybe if you're away for a few days then you can tell." Dayton winced. Not that he wanted her here, either. "Maybe you need to go shopping." Wasn't that what women needed to do in times like these?

"I'm very proud of you Dayton," she then said which surprised him. He thought he might faint. He never expected to hear her say it. "You stepping up like this. Must take a lot out of you."

"No," he shook his head, wondering what she was getting at. "Not really. I-I can do this. I have to. I want too."

"Do you plan on going back to work?"

"Eventually," Dayton nodded.

"Would you let me watch him in the afternoons?" She wanted to know.

"Sure." He nodded, "But give me another week or two with him and then he's all your. All right?" He knew he'd have to make a compromise. After all, she was the grandmother. He got it now. She did want to see progress. Maybe she'd seen too much of Nancy as of late. "But right now, I know Nancy appreciates you being there."

"What about you? When are you going to see her?" Her mother wanted to know.

"I dunno." Dayton shook his head. He didn't want to ruin it for Nancy. He was afraid if she saw him it might set her back. "I think right now I need to stay here." He doubted her mother would understand that, but Nancy would.

counting the ways

2009-09-08T21:38:00.003-05:00

Well, the library was falling apart. At least Oliver thought it might without Dayton there to mend books and put them away. As it was he was having to do it himself when he could.

"Oh, so now you're saying he's the best shelver we ever had." Bex had her arms crossed, following him to the stacks.

"How about you put a book away, Bex..." He wasn't asking. He was ordering. He shoved the fat book of Fountain Head toward her.

"Stop being on his side." She snapped.

"Bex. I'm not on anyone's side. I'm just trying to get this done because there are about six more carts to get too." Oliver sighed looking back at her who just held the book as if she might drop it on his foot as to put it away.

"You should fire him." She told him.

"I'm not going to fire Dayton." Oliver chewed the inside of his cheek to keep from yelling.

"Well, you should." She watched him put fiction books away.

"Just to make you happy, I suppose." He sucked in a breath.

"I don't understand this." Bex shook her head. She was talking back about the beginning when she was with Dayton and Oliver was just someone in the library. "What changed?"

Oliver stopped what he was doing and almost did a little stomp when he looked back at her. "You know I love you, it doesn't mean I have to hate him, you know."

"But you did. You did." She was so angry.

He grabbed her by the shoulders then.

"Look, I hated the things he did to you. What he put you through. You were not happy." He looked her in the eye. "Didn't mean I was going to go out and try to cut every finger off his body, toes too, just to count the ways I could make his life miserable, Bex."

She gritted then. He gave her a hug. He thought for sure she was going to drop that heavy book on his foot.

"We'll get through this," he told her. "Finish this cart. I'll get another one started. Try not to suffer to much through this, Bex."

somehow

2009-09-06T01:13:00.003-05:00

"How's it going with Nancy?" Max wasn't sure he could offer anything much to Chuck about his visits with her. "She really needs some time from all us, but still, she needs a lot of support. I'm glad you're making some visits."

"Yeah, I just get funny looks, but maybe it'll change," Chuck said as if he had to be upbeat about this. "You think she hears me?"

They were down at the local diner near the hospital having a late lunch.

"Yeah, her hearing is fine."

"Maybe she's ignoring me," Chuck shrugged. "But the Wednesday meetings are up at church. Especially, with the Wednesday night dinner. And we've got the thrift store going. People like that buck for a bag of clothes."

"You've done so much in such little time," Max said. "I'm amazed."

"Everybody seems to like me, but Nancy." Chuck sighed as he chowed down on the liver and onion's special.

"You just keep those visits up." Max nodded. "I'm sure you'll get through to her, somehow."

especially not

2009-09-04T22:52:00.004-05:00

Nancy knew she'd really messed this up. She had. She wasn't sure how, but she had. And she laid there like a brick in the hospital bed while everything else moved around her.

She'd hear her mother talk from time to time about how well she was doing. So well, but Nancy could barely say three words as of yet. Why was she having such a hard time? And it was so slow with the left hand. What if she never used her arm or any of it ever again?

It was useless. All so useless. She was ready to give up.

Wasn't this what she wanted, anyway? Not exactly. But she hadn't really wanted to have to take care of the baby. It scared her a little and then there was the thought that she'd had Dayton's baby. Maybe.

She got kind of a look at the baby, but not really. It was fuzzy in her mind now. Nancy however recalled how the baby felt when it was pulled out of her stomach. It wasn't painful. She knew it would have been if she hadn't had the surgery. But she doubted she could ever actually look at the scar.

Geoff had. He told her it was nothing to worry about. It was small. She was still her frail self.

Warm tears just appeared out of no where from time to time. She couldn't even reach for a tissue. Of course, she was the most impatient person in the world, and she thought she might go crazy with all this waiting. Of course, she didn't know where she'd go if she could anyway. It was even difficult to swallow. Was it suppose to be that way? There seemed to be no way to talk about it. She didn't care how far she'd came from the day before. She didn't notice any changes. The exercises were a struggle and tiring. If only they could give her something to sleep.

"Well, you have been sleeping," Geoff said in one of those afternoons he came right after school.

She tried to shake her head, no. The next thing she knew he wasn't there. Someone else was and it wasn't Dayton and the baby. He'd come with Geoff usually, but not always.

This was a stranger to her, yet not. She knew she knew him from somewhere. She knew him. She did. How had he found her? She struggled to sit up and listen to him, but she wanted Geoff to be there too. She didn't want to be alone with him. She didn't. She especially didn't want him to see the baby.

the good, the bad and the ugly

2009-09-02T01:25:00.005-05:00

Geoff didn't know what had brought this out in Dayton. It didn't seem possible. Ambushing Bex that way. Saying those things he never imagine would come from Dayton. What had got into him?

He took baby Trent from him.

"I think maybe you've been holding the baby far too long," Geoff said. After all, he really hadn't had his chance to know the baby at all. His head had been full of thoughts about Nancy and if she'd be in this zombie state for good. He prayed not. He wanted the nightmare to be over so she could have her life with the baby as it should be.

"I'm sorry." Dayton could barely say to him.

"Why don't you wash up. Take a shower, you know, relax." Geoff nodded. Everyone was leaving now. The food had been put away. It was quiet now and Geoff held the baby who was so asleep. He was so tiny and nothing like Nancy at all. It was amazing how he got here, Geoff thought to himself after Dayton went to shower.

He touched baby Trent's cheek. Geoff imagined Trent was Dayton's baby. There was something about him that he knew. He knew deep down and Dayton knew it too. Geoff didn't want this to hold such an importance to him, but it did. Basically, he wanted to provide a home for the baby. No matter who might be the father.

Yet, it came to him like a burst of happiness that he was the baby's father. He was. Perhaps not biological just the same, Trent's father. Geoff suddenly started to weep. He couldn't help it. Possibly, it was the pure sensation of knowing he would need to be there for the baby. The good times and the bad.

Geoff heard the shower cut off. He looked up a the ceiling hoping the times weren't always bad like now.

"I didn't mean to upset you," Dayton promised when he came back in his flannel pants and wet hair. "Really. I just always knew it was like that. I did. I know how Bex feels about me. And it makes me so sad to know, I'll always be that to her. And I guess Nancy thinks just like her. You know, about me. And I know this isn't about me at all. But still-"

"She doesn't hate you," Geoff shook his head. "Nancy, wanted me to find you that night when I married her. She wants you around. She does."

"I wish she really had someone." Dayton nodded as if it were something he wish he could give her.

"I just want her back to being normal." Geoff nodded.

Dayton put his arm around him. They looked at the sleeping baby. Geoff sighed feeling Dayton's strength weighing on him.

the hurt

2009-08-30T01:50:00.003-05:00

"Are you sure, he knows what he's doing?" Bex was stunned. How could Geoff possibly trust him with a newborn?

"He's fine," Oliver put his arm around her shoulder before she could even approach Dayton with the infant.

"I'm really scared." Bex winced. "He could-" She didn't even want to think it. She squinted so then as if she might have taken a bitter pill herself. "And Nancy, Oh God, I never wanted anything so bad to happen to her." She cried into Oliver's shoulder then.

"We'll see her when she's up for a visit, all right." Oliver promised as he stroked her thick hair.

She felt like biting his pale oxford shirt at the shoulder. Just the thought of the agony Nancy must be going through made her ill. And not even able to be with her baby.

"She didn't really want the baby," she heard Dayton say who was cradling it as if he was the only one who could.

"How can you say that?" Now she was pissed as she turned to him.

"Well, she didn't." He was calm about it. "From the get go, she didn't want it. So she doesn't have to see him, does she?"

"You're evil, you know that!" She glared at him.

"Bex, please," Oliver grabbed her hand before she took one step closer.

"You would have been the same damn way if you thought you were having my kid." He looked at her as if she could go to hell, too. "I know you. You would have had an abortion if you thought the slightest possibility, that your kid was my kid."

"Stop talking like that." She winced.

"Why should I? When I know its true." He looked at the baby then as if it was just the two of them against the world. No one else.

"I didn't think you wanted to have anything to do with Nancy's baby," Bex reminded him.

He didn't say a word to her. He ignored her. Completely.

She kept staring at him, waiting for an answer.

"Bex, maybe we should go," Oliver wrapped his arm around her waist before she took one step closer.

She was furious with him, but Oliver got her in the car.

"Am I the only one afraid that he might go off and do something to that child?" Bex said on the ride home.

"You have to stop thinking that way. He's thinking in his head that everyone thinks he's responsible for what happened to Nancy. And its his way to fight back, I guess. He's going to be OK. Its like he found a hurt ground squirrel, and he feels responsible for it."

"Its not a ground squirrel, Oliver!" She reminded him.

"Well, Geoff is there. It'll be OK." Oliver nodded. Bex hoped he was right.

at home

2009-08-28T01:30:00.003-05:00

Chris and Oliver along with Bex and a few other from the church were waiting for them when they got home. Nancy's mother was still at the hospital with her.

Chris couldn't take his eyes off Dayton who was carrying the baby.

"Ruby got me ready for all this, you know." Dayton grinned and showed Chris the baby.

"He looks like he could be handful." Chris smiled back taking a good long look at the baby and then Dayton.

"You think he looks like me?"

"I dunno." The baby had a thick head of dark hair. He was dark. Chris could see a bit of Native American in him which looked normal to him with all the infants he'd looked at over the years that his sisters had. "Did you take the test?"

"Not yet." Dayton put Trent in his basnet.

Of course people wanted to know how long the baby was. How much did he weight. What sort of formula he was on. Naturally, Dayton knew the answers to all the questions.

Chris brought Dayton a plate of food. They'd brought comfort foods. Roast beef and mashed potatoes along with gravy and mixed vegetables on the side.

"How's Nancy?" Chris asked.

"It doesn't look good." Dayton winced.

"It looks promising." Geoff said. He went to check on the baby then.

"Max thinks Nancy should be Chuck's first obligation at church. To go and see her." Chris told them. "He's the new pastor."

"Chuck?" Dayton squinted.

"Ruby's Chuck," Chris said. "But they broke up."

"They broke up?" Dayton looked as if he had something to do with it.

"He wanted her to go to college. He felt that was more important." Chris sighed. He looked over at Geoff who didn't want a thing to eat while Dayton ate up anything he could get on his spoon and couldn't wait to get into the cherry cheese cake.

That no one could ever look at me like you do

2009-08-26T01:52:00.004-05:00

Dayton hadn't meant to step out of bounds on this, but somebody had to step-up, didn't they?There was some confusion about the father of the baby. Naturally. Especially, when a nurse told Geoff he couldn't touch the baby since he wasn't the baby's father.

Dayton finally explained that Geoff was the baby's father. Possibly a big fat lie. OK, it was clearly a lie on so many levels. At least Geoff fumbled around and said something to the fact that Dayton was his cousin, and his cousin really felt the baby needed to be around family while Geoff was seeing about his wife's needs. Max said his peace to about the matter so it didn't get too far out of hand.

"Thank God, that's over." Dayton was all smiles as they were getting ready to take the baby home. At least Geoff was holding the baby.

"But you named the baby, you didn't give Nancy any say in the matter," Geoff was not in the best humor as they were getting ready to go.

"I- I'm-" Dayton just couldn't say he was sorry about the baby's name. "She'll be OK, with it."

"You don't know that." Geoff slightly snapped. After all, he was taking the baby to see her as if that alone would create a break through.

Of course, she just stared. Dayton felt like he was glaring at a zombie. It was so uncomfortable. He could take everything else, but not her looking half crazy and practically a statue. He kept hugging himself, thinking there was no way she was going to get better. Why did they have to be stuck with her? He hated to think it, but it was true. They were stuck with Nancy.

But Geoff was sweet and kissed Nancy's forehead which made Dayton grimace. He tried to let her hold the baby, but Trent was slightly fussy with his first days cry.

"Let me have him." Dayton knew they were going to drop the baby. Finally, Dayton took him while Geoff was all thoughtful with words of encouragement. Everything was going to be OK. Dayton knew he had to be quiet. He had too.

Finally, they managed out of the hospital with the baby.

"You're not mad at me, are you?" Dayton had to know as they got baby Trent into the car-seat in Geoff's pickup truck.

"No, I'm not mad at you." Geoff drove slowly home. "I don't know what to think. Its like I'm sure what ever I do will be wrong." He squinted tears.

"Don't say that." Dayton told him. "You know, it would be a hundred times worst if you hadn't came through for her. She wouldn't have the insurance to help her get better. And we're here. We can take care of Trent." He smiled at the baby then who let out an impressive yawn as he floated back to sleep.

"I guess so." Geoff was quiet. Dayton hated to see him so sad. It was all Nancy's fault. She'd done this to him, and Dayton wasn't sure if he knew how to get Geoff back the way he wanted him.

scared

2009-08-22T02:28:00.004-05:00

"Trent, I really like the name Trent, don't you?" Dayton was changing the baby's pamper right in the nursery.

Max stood back and watched. Dayton was really getting into this baby stuff. It was amusing.

"Trent is a cool name." Max smiled.

"So manly, you know." Dayton smiled. "I hope Geoff likes that name because I really do." Dayton wrapped the infant up. He was snuggled in his blue cap. Dayton carefully sat down with him in a nearby rocking chair and fed him a bottle.

Max couldn't help but wonder what had come over him. It was amazing. Had Dayton just been scared shitless?

"I might have to take some time off from work," Dayton said looking up at Max. "I don't know what they're going to do about this Nancy thing. Its scary to think about."

"Most cases they'll send her to a stroke patient facility where she'll get therapy 24/7." Max told him.

Dayton nodded.

Max noticed that Dayton was wearing the bracelet that said he was the father. Max looked at it closer. Geoff's name was on the bracelet.

Max shook his head. Dayton was so sly and yet so caring with the baby.

to be with you

2009-08-20T01:35:00.003-05:00

"What does this mean, exactly?" Geoff shook his head as he listened again to the young doctor in his blue scrubs. He looked far too young to even know what any of this really meant. Especially, what Nancy might be going through right now at this very moment. He kept listen but the words meant nothing to him.

Nancy had had a stroke.

"But the baby is all right," Dayton said as he held on Geoff's arm. They walked by ICU to see Nancy as if maybe she was dead and just hooked up to life support.

"We'll have to see how tomorrow goes and the next day after that." The doctor sounded it might be weeks, perhaps months if that, to recover.

Geoff shook his head. How was this possibly? He hadn't wanted to stay late after school, but there was a meeting he'd forgotten about. It seemed to go on forever. If only he'd been at home on time. Why had she let her Mom go so soon? Someone should have been with her.

"You didn't take the paternity test, did you?" Geoff looked at him then. It was as if everything was on schedule. Wasn't it? Everything but Nancy.

"That's the next thing," Dayton nodded.

"Don't. I just want to sign the birth certificate, all right." Geoff stared at Dayton as if that was the way to go.

Dayton just nodded.

"You go sit with her, and I'll see if I can bring the baby down here." Dayton gave Geoff a pat on the back.

Geoff was still in the state of shock.

"You're sure she's not in a coma?" Geoff wanted to know, but a nurse told him she'd been awake and had gone back to sleep. He grabbed her hand, hoping she might squeeze it back, but she didn't.

There was talk of moving her to a private room. He guessed it would be soon. Never in his wildest dreams did he ever imagine this. How had it happened? Had it been her blood pressure? Had she been dehydrated. He shook his head.

They'd taken the baby by C-section. As of yet, he hadn't seen the baby, and he felt a bit envious of Dayton. Really, deep down he wasn't sure if he wanted the baby to be Dayton's. He might envy him more then. But he wouldn't dwell on it. There was no time for that. He just wanted Nancy to come out of this. To know, she was a mother now.

fading fast

2009-08-18T01:17:00.005-05:00

Nancy had never been in such terrible pain. Nasty stuff. Even Dayton said so. He took off her shoes after he made the call. He was being so, so nice. She guessed. But she didn't want to talk to him.

He told her about his cat when he was a kid that had three kittens.

"Each one had a different father. One was an orange tabby, another was white faced with a black coat, and a black one, that I accidentally killed." He began to cry so much.

Nancy gritted in pain.

Dayton was squeamish as he jerked at her short leggings that were so wet under her baby-doll maternity dress.

"I dropped it in a big box and forgot about it." Dayton told her.

She wished he'd stop talking about the kitten.

Thankfully, the sirens came and so did a fire truck for some strange reason. Here came the pain again as the medics appeared and put something in her arm for the pain and strapped her in some contraption to take her away. Dayton went right along with them. He held her hand as if he had too. Yet he was going to do a little as he could. No way was he having this baby for her.

"Its really going well," Dayton smiled but his eyes were so red. She just couldn't trust him. "I wish you'd say something."

She made a noise, but it wasn't a word. It finally occurred to her that maybe she couldn't talk. Maybe. She felt as if she was losing something. She wasn't sure what. But she laid there calm. So calm.

And when they got to the hospital they rushed her down the emergency hallway. And Dayton ran as fast as he could but somehow he got jerked away in the process. Someone said it was happening. But she didn't know what was happening as words got muffled. Her head jerked back from one face to another. It was uncontrollable. Nancy didn't want any part of it. They were taking her into surgery.

"Something is happening..." She thought she heard someone say, but she wasn't sure because everything went black after that.

derelict

2009-08-16T03:50:00.006-05:00

Riley helped Dayton close the library at five in the afternoon. It was Friday, and not the 13th. They'd spent an eternity together, or so thought Dayton. It seemed this dude knew where everything should be put away and kept talking about storylines from this book and that book. Of course, Dayton wasn't sure he believed him or not. Really, Riley liked to talk.

Maybe he had Asperger's or something. Was that where you made an ass of yourself at a party and never knew it, he thought. No, sure enough he'd have it then. Maybe that's what his problem was. He had it. Only Dayton knew he wasn't a genesis and usually genesis had that sort of Autism. Well, it was something to think about on the way home.

He just wasn't expecting so many freaky people at the library, but he'd have to get used to it. The world was a freaky place, after all.

When he got home, he noticed Geoff wasn't there. He wasn't suppose to be alone with Nancy. Now was he? Of course, when he came in the house he felt so alone. Everything was so damn quite. He was expecting a note on the kitchen table. Maybe they'd gone to the hospital. And he could breath a sigh of relief.

"I bet they didn't have time for a note." Dayton went to the fridge then and found some juice. No one was around so he drank from the carton and yawned. He just might take a nap. Riley had bore him stiff. Would that guy be there every Friday?

He put the juice away, and he was about to turn on the TV and then he heard something. Something just not quite right. But it might have been something outside. He'd check Nancy's room just to be sure. Her room was behind the white door where everything was quite white and very crisp and so old fashioned. Geoff had found her a very old iron bed that he'd painted white and got a new mattress. Really, he treated her like a princess.

He didn't knock, he opened the door and he saw her laying there. She was hugging a pillow and squinting so. Like a bad dream might be happening or she needed to get up and take a really good shit. Well, Dayton wouldn't say it.

"What are you doing here?" He asked.

She made a slight moan.

"You, all right?" He took a good look at her.

He walked around to the other side of the bed. To his surprise the bed was dripping of something ever so slightly.

"Holy Crap!" Dayton cringed. He got out his cell right away and called 911. Really, he tried to feel nothing. Not a thing, but he felt he was about to jump out of his skin. If this didn't go right, it would be all his fault.

And when he got on the line with the 911 person, he began to cry like an idiot. He just couldn't get the words out the way he wanted. "What am I suppose to do!"

mystify

2009-08-14T02:41:00.003-05:00

Oliver supposed Dayton really hadn't expected Riley to follow him around at the library while he was putting books away. To the naked eye Riley looked like something of a misfit. He was skinny as a snake, and his eyes were just ominous slits that followed you around. And it was even creepier that he sounded like a bad ass Jack Nicholson. But really he was harmless. And a recluse for the most part. He usually called Oliver several times a day to put books on hold and take him off of holds as well.

Riley was also going to write a book. This was something Oliver kept persuading him to do over the years since he'd talk up so many stories that he thought were in novels he was reading, but then he'd figure out, "I must have dreamed that up because it wasn't at all like I'd hoped it would be." He'd tell Oliver from time to time who'd just shoot back to Riley, "Well,then, why don't you write the story?"

Of course, this took a lot of preparation reading books on how to write a horror novel. Oliver had found books for him at different libraries across the country to study the craft of writing. Riley read everything Dean Koontz to James Patterson.

"So how's the writing going?" Oliver asked one day.

"Well, it hurts my fingers an awful lot." Riley nodded.

"That's just too bad, Riley, really it is." Oliver shook his head.

The thing about Riley, Oliver never knew his age. He could have been twenty-two or forty-two. He was like an ageless vampire of some kind. Lean, mean looking and almost sporting a bit to stubble on his face. One more thing Oliver was never sure of. Could he not grow a beard, or did he always have to shave?

But if you got close enough to Riley, you'd see he had beautiful golden eyes. There was just something not of this world about him. He was a mystery, and now the mystery had found someone to mystify. Dayton.

all in a days work

2009-08-12T01:25:00.003-05:00

Max found Chris in the rocking chair in Chloe's room asleep. She was in his lap asleep too.

He wanted to snap at him, but he couldn't. It was sweet. Where was his camera when he needed it?

He started to take her from his arms, but he could see Chris coming undone the moment Chris knew Chloe might be taken from him. It was like waking up an old dog who was sleeping with his prized bone. Chris was not having it.

"You're home," he finally said, letting go of Chloe before she awoke. Max laid her on her back in her crib.

"Sorry, I'm late." Max was in his blue scrubs and dead tired.

"I made that potato casserole you like." Chris said as he got up to get it.

"I dunno." Max yawned catching Chris' hand and pulling him back to him. "I'm not hungry." They kissed and went to the couch in the living-room.

"I think you're working to much." Chris told him.

"But they're always short handed." Max nodded.

"But still, you said you weren't going to work so many hours." Chris reminded him giving him a back rub. Before Max knew it he was laying his head in Chris lap and stretching out on the couch as if he might as well be in bed. He smiled when he felt Chris' fingers in his hair. It felt so good to be home with him and Chloe asleep.

"I know. I will. I mean, I won't." Max sighed.

"I may have found someone to help at the church." Chris told him.

"Really?" As of yet, no one had officially applied at the church for the associate pastor position.

"Who?" Max winced.

"Uh, Chuck. Ruby's friend."

"That guy she's living with?" Max almost laughed. "Are you serious?"

"He thinks he could do it?"

"Why?" Max looked back as Chris.

"I dunno, maybe because Ruby isn't around." Chris shrugged.

"What happened?"

"I guess they broke up. She went to UT. Didn't even tell me. He stopped by earlier." Chris looked at him as if it might be good news or did he just have something else in mind.

"Maybe you should call Ruby and ask her about him." Max said as he sat up to stretch his arms. Naturally, Chris was there to meet him. He smiled as if this Chuck was already hired. They kissed, and Max thought maybe things were even better than he remembered. He didn't know how that could be, but somehow they always had time for each other.

more than a rain shower

2009-08-10T03:55:00.004-05:00

The sky was rumbling. Big clouds were rolling in and finally the fat drops of water began to come as Chris was driving home from work. He'd picked up Chloe and was trying his best not to get her wet from the pickup to the front door, but there was Chuck waiting for him on the porch.

"What are you doing here?" Chris struggled with her and the key to get the front door open. He was still a bit nervous when anyone saw him with Chloe as if they'd stop him and say, "Hey, I don't think you're holding the kid right." Of course, no one ever said that to him, but he couldn't help but wonder if people were watching him and Chuck kept staring a Chloe who really wanted a piece of his silky black hair. He took her as if he was used to having kids crawl all over him.

"Ruby left," he said as he followed Chris into the house.

"She left?" Chris took Chloe back and put her down to her box of toys in the livingroom. "Where did she go?"

"Well, we got to talking about how you felt about her giving up her scholarship and you know, we sort of had a fight."

"A fight?" Chris glared at him then, wondering if he'd hurt her.

"A discussion." Chuck shrugged. "I told her she had to do this. I didn't want her missing out, and I didn't want her blaming me one day about it, you know."

"Oh." Chris went to the fridge then to get some drinks out.

"This is your daughter, Ruby was talking about?" Chuck smiled and went over to pick up the picture of the three of them, Max and Chris with Chloe. "Thats the other dad?"

"Yeah, Max is at the hospital right now."

"Something happen to him?" Chuck took the soda Chris offered and sat down on the couch.

"No, no, he's a nurse." Chris smiled. He watched Chloe play with one of the push button toys she played with that said things to her about colors and shapes. She was so studious with her pink pacifier steady in her mouth.

"A nurse? I thought he was a preacher?" Chuck looked at him.

"He does that too."

"How in the world do you two ever find time for her?" Chuck wanted to know.

"Its not like he works everday. And its just Sundays for church these days. Actually, he's looking for someone to help out during the week. You know, someone who can do Wednesday nights. He'd like to have sort of a potluck going for those who might need a meal mid week. You know, its casual." Chris pressed his lips together wondering why he was even telling Chuck this stuff. He doubted Chuck was even religious.

"That's all you'd have to do?" Chuck asked.

"Yeah, I guess." Chris wasn't sure what all the details were. "You interested or something?"

"I might be." He shrugged.

"But you live on an Indian reservation." Chris told him.

"Doesn't mean I have to work there," Chuck said.

"Yeah, but its like a good hour drive from here."

"Aw, its nothing to what I had to drive when I was a kid when I lived in the Black Hills." He smiled.

Chris just shook his head. How on earth did they get on this about being the new pastor at church?

a slice of pie

2009-08-08T03:31:00.003-05:00

Geoff could see Dayton was excited to tell him all about his day. Really, he could see he was enjoying himself. Geoff couldn't help but smile. Dayton's grin was contagious. He had to kiss him at the kitchen table.

"Where's Nancy?" Dayton asked after dinner was done and Geoff was cutting him a piece of Cherry pie.

"Resting?" Dayton winced at the clock, "But its just after nine o'clock."

"Its OK. She needs her rest." Geoff set next to him with glasses of milk.

"I've been thinking, she needs a boyfriend." Dayton took a gulp of milk in then with red cherry still on his bottom lip.

"Are you-" Geoff knew he might say something he might regret. "Really, its just not a good time for her to be thinking about dating, you know."

"It might make her feel better about things." Dayton shrugged.

"No." Geoff didn't want this anymore complicated than it already was.

"Well, she needs somebody." Dayton was serious.

"She has us."

"If she had someone who actually wanted to be with her, she wouldn't be all cranky." Dayton fretted as he ate the pie.

"Nancy's not cranky." Geoff didn't believe that.

"What? You're saying I'm the one who makes her cranky." Dayton pout.

"Possibly." Geoff crossed his arms then and just looked at his pie. "Look, romance takes time. And I don't even know if she'd be up for something like that."

"OK." Dayton nodded. "But when it walks in to your life, you know it. You do."

"Are you sure?" Geoff smiled then.

"OK, it happens when you least expect it." Dayton told him.

"I guess." Geoff had to think on it. "Sure, I knew I wanted you the minute I saw you. It didn't mean it was going to happen, that moment."

"So how many times did you see me before you actually got up the nerve to say anything to me?" Dayton wanted to know.

"I dunno." Geoff chuckled and he gave Dayton a playful jab in the ribs. He knew one thing for sure, he was just going to have to take Dayton's mind off these Nancy worries. Really, matchmaking was not Dayton's calling.

the simple of things

2009-08-06T03:52:00.002-05:00

Dayton couldn't wait to get home and tell Geoff that he gave Bex a hug. He'd be proud of him. But then, he didn't want him to think he'd done it just for him, either. Best to keep it to himself, he guessed as he went right to work with all the books that needed to be mended.

He found it rather theraputic. It gave him good thoughts about a lot of things in his life. Everything, except Nancy. He knew he had to work on that. He just kept putting it off. A lot like a book you meant to read, or a movie that was on your list to watch, but it never got done and then you forgot there was even a book or a movie that you were waiting for.

Dayton wished it was that simple.

He looked through the pages to find the cracks to glue in the binding. He tried to remember the first time he ever met Nancy. He didn't like her. She thought she was all that. Of course, that was a time when he thought he was all that, too, or tried to be. Maybe they were too much a like. Maybe.

He mashed the book tight then to keep it straight. Then he rubber banded it again and again until all the lines made little squares holding the book tight.

Suddenly he remembered...Geoff said they'd do the paternity test as soon as the baby was born.

"Well, can't you do it with me." Dayton thought of the HIV test. Geoff had just given him hug and told him, no. There was no need for him to take the test.

Dayton nursed his upper lip now as he took care of another book. He taped the insides where the book was first openned. Why was he so afraid that kid would be his? He knew it was. He wouldn't be surprised. Not really. He knew what he said before. He just didn't want it to be true.

Now he kind of hoped it was his.

He cringed at the thought of Nancy with that old guy who was probably old enough to be her grandfather. It just made him nausea at the thought. How could she?

About two and a half hours later, he stacked up the books then that he'd mended and went to clean up the glue and rags. It was time to get started with the shelving.

It was then as he was finishing up with the mending... he knew what he should do. He needed to find Nancy a boyfriend.

it might be nice

2009-08-04T02:01:00.004-05:00

"Is it really his first day?" Bex wasn't ready to see Dayton. She still detested him. Bex always did her best to be nowhere around when Dayton was around.

"Uh, huh," Oliver said who had his hands in his dark pin-strip suit pants. He was stylish as usual with just a white T under his open pin-stripe vest. And he smelled of apple pie. Really, no wonder how he made so many teenage girls so giddy. They teased him that he should be in the next Twilight movie. "I told you last night, remember, before we went to bed."

Other things had been on her mind then. Like Oliver, up close and personal and that three hour window when the twins were still asleep. Not this stuff about Dayton.

"Maybe I won't see him at all." Bex shrugged about the Dayton matter now.

"Maybe you will," Oliver looked at her. "Then what will you do?"

Bex just shrugged. She'd rather act like she didn't know him, but she wouldn't dare say that to Oliver. She knew he'd helped Dayton get the job.

Oliver shook his head, and walked away then.

She knew what he was thinking. He was thinking she'd start something just to start something. Well, she wasn't.

Just as she turned to walk back to her computer to do what she was supposed to be doing, finding records on the books in the library to be properly edited for their data base. There Dayton was coming in the back door.

She just stopped and stared. He didn't look a thing like she remembered. He was smiling. He looked happy. Bex felt a tickle in her throat. She wanted to cough, but found herself laughing instead. Well, a slight laugh. Not a major one, but a smile slipped on her face as if this cold cloud of anger had somehow been subdued.

"You can put your stuff in this cupboard," she said, taking him to the room where she used to work on the new books that came in from the book orders. He would now be mending book there.

"OK." He shrugged. Of course, he didn't have much, but a small messenger bag for books he might checkout and some snacks.

She stood there looking at him after he shut the door to the cupboard. He looked at her intently in the eye for a moment. It felt bit like a stare down competition.

Finally, Dayton hugged her. It was a shock. All Bex knew to do was to slowly hug him back very carefully.

down the same old road

2009-08-02T01:02:00.001-05:00

Max didn't think they'd be walking in to anything horrible. Of course, after listening to Bex talk about Nelson's drug problem, he wasn't so sure he wanted to go with Oliver.

"Listen, he's harmless, really," Oliver squinted as they drove there. "So maybe I got my little baggie of weed from him once a week. Used too. I don't anymore. You've met him at church."

"That was a while ago. Wasn't it your wedding?" Max remembered.

"Was that the last time I saw him?" Oliver shook his head. He knew the way, and they were there in a jiffy out on an old country road where a trailer house set back in the woods aways.

"I used to walk here all the time." Oliver told him as they got out of his car. They went up the steps of the wooden porch and tapped on the metal door. No answer. Just a warm calm breeze. There was no car around. It was hard to say if Nelson had just left or hadn't been back in months.

"His grandmother lives here. She has to be here." Oliver told Max.

Oliver called out her name, Mavis. He tried to look through the windows, but it was dark inside.

"I think some-body's in there," Oliver said.

"Maybe we should leave," Max said. But Oliver shouted out his name to her.

Finally, they heard someone come to the door. It was a very old woman who could barely walk with her cane.

"What happened?" Oliver knew that was Nelson's grandmother.

"You don't want to know," her voice was grave.

"Maybe you should come with us." Max helped her out the the door. She was in bad shape. He wondered if she'd eaten or had the medications she needed. "We should take you to the hospital."

They helped her into the car. Made sure things were locked up.

"What in the world is going on?" Oliver was concerned.

"That boy has gone and got himself in some trouble." Mavis just shook her head as they drove out of there toward town. "Thought he'd do better selling that cocaine. I guess. It was nothing but trouble."

"Where is he now?" Oliver looked back at Mavis.

"Lord help him," she shook her head. "I'd be the last to know."

They took her in to the emergency to get her checked out. Her blood sugar was high, and she had a lot of bruises on her that she wouldn't say where they'd come from. She was scared.

"Nelson didn't hit you, did he?" Max asked.

She shook her head, no. "Its those men who want my Nelson."

"How long has he been gone?" Oliver wanted to know.

"I can't remember. A long time." She stared at Oliver for a moment while they hooked her up to an IV. She was dehydrated. "It was the day that woman came out to talk to him. He left with her."

"A woman?" Max squinted.

"She'd been here before. They used to go out ever so often. Play Keno, you know." She nodded.

"Sounds like something my sister would do." Oliver smiled.

"That's who she was," Mavis said. "I remember Nelson telling me a while ago who she was. That was the woman he left with."

"Sounds like your sister is alive and well, somewhere." Max stared at Oliver.

little surprises

2009-07-31T01:40:00.004-05:00

Chris wasn't so sure he cared for all this openness with Dayton. He kind of liked him better when he used to give him the silent treatment. Really, all he needed was to be alone to work on a truck in peace, but there Dayton was down at Chris' auto shop.

"Really, I don't mean to be jealous. I don't want to be jealous," he went on to tell him. Chris just nodded while Chris paced and used his hands to talk.

"But its when he touches her, that just gets to me, you know." Dayton scowled. "Why does he have to do that?"

"Its just breathing exercises, Day." Chris sighed looking back at him.

"I know. Its driving me nuts, her breathing all over Geoff." Dayton shivered as if was just nasty.

Chris just rolled his eyes and tried to get back to repairing a fuel line.

"Are you wanting to do something?" Chris had some inventory he could start him on.

"Not particularly." Dayton just stared at him.

"Everything else going all right?" Chris wiped his hands on a old red towel then.

"Yeah," Dayton smiled. "Geoff doesn't spend all his time with her."

Chris just nodded.

"So how's Ruby?" Dayton smiled rather impishly.

"About that? What is going on with you two?" Chris squinted.

"What?"

"You got the hots for my sister?" Chris looked at him then.

"Well, there was a time it might have been possible." Dayton confessed. "I was really thinking about it. Like I could start over or something and if we had a kid then you could really be his real uncle and all, but you know, it was just a thought. It wouldn't have happened." He shrugged.

"Well, that's good to know." Chris sighed.

"So what about you and Max? Are you two going to try to have anymore kids?"

Chris could barely hold in a laugh. "I think we've got our hands full."

"I still can't believe you're with a preacher." Dayton smirked.

"I thought you were used to Max by now." Chris scratched the side of his forehead then.

"I am. Really, he's cool. Maybe we could all go out sometime. Just don't know where." Dayton squinted.

"That's a thought."

"Oh, we did get our tests back. Everything is A OK. So we should celebrate. And I got a job." Dayton smiled.

"No, kidding." Chris smiled.

"Yeah, at the library, who would have thunk it?" Dayton laughed.

"You know, something, you're as giddy as school girl." Chris popped him with the towel then.

Dayton had to tease him back. Chris just smiled. He felt as if they were truly old friends now.

around the corner

2009-07-28T02:43:00.003-05:00

The lazy days of summer were coming to an end. Pronto. Next week, Geoff would be getting ready for his classes. Luckily, he hadn't had to do much this summer. He guessed he would be ready. It would probably be a rehash of last year, but everything would still be fresh and new. That's the way art worked.

"Well, you know I'll be at the library," Dayton said while Geoff was going through his art supplies out in his little studio out back that Dayton kept referring to as the shack. "You can come and see me. It's just down the hill from the high school."

"Of course." Geoff smiled. "We'll do lunch."

"I like that idea." Dayton smirked. "We haven't officially celebrated you know since getting the good news about no HIV."

"Right," Geoff nodded. "What do you have in mind?"

"Actually, some place for just the two of us-"

"We can't do that. Nancy has to go with us." Geoff looked at him as if he couldn't forget Nancy.

"So what's it going to be like when you start school?" Dayton looked at him. "Am I suppose to stay with her all the time?"

"You have a job, remember." Geoff touched Dayton's nose with a paint brush then as he edged toward him.

"Yeah, but you gonna be stuck worrying about her forever?" Dayton wasn't smiling as he backed away slightly.

"Her mother's going to stay with her while we're at work."

"Why can't she just stay with her parents right now?" Dayton fretted a bit.

"Because. She would hate it. She likes it here." Geoff shrugged.

"Well, what if she and her Mom can't get along when she's, you know, with her while we're gone?" Dayton looked at Geoff.

"I'm not too worried. I would be worried if you were the one having to do all the watching after her." Geoff explained.

"But-but I've been really nice to her." Dayton told him.

"Yes, you have, and I know it takes a lot out of you, too." Geoff leaned in with a smile. Finally, Geoff saw that look in Dayton's eye. They were home with each other. Geoff kissed him then.

"Oh, so that's what you've been up too." Dayton smiled and kissed him back.

where in the world

2009-07-26T03:24:00.004-05:00

Oliver took a look at Nelson's library account. It had been months since he'd seen his drug dealing friend. It wasn't like he got out there anymore to buy anything from him. He'd quit that some time ago, but he did try to see him, occasionally. Only the weeks slipped into months and it had been forever, or so it seemed.

His books were overdue. No dvds. Just books on building things. Something about electricity. Just old books that no one had a hold on.

He called Nelson's number and got a recording that his phone had been disconnected. This made Oliver a bit uneasy. It wasn't like Nelson not to have a working number. Thats how his operation worked. He was always just a phone call away. Had the cops been on to him? Was in jail? Or had he left town?

"I need to check on Nelson." Oliver told Bex.

"What for?" Naturally, she gave him that look that she didn't trust Nelson or was it she didn't trust him when it came to Nelson?

"I just want to know if he's all right, you know," Oliver said, knowing Bex would never realise how close their friendship was. He just wasn't his friend when he needed him. They talked. Nelson was down right one wise dude.

"I hope nothing happened to him." Oliver bit his bottom lip. "I hear about all these shooting on the north side of Omaha, and they're always decent black guys, usually with families who have never done anything wrong, who get killed in these drive by shootings. Its awful. I'd hate for something bad to happen to Nelson. He's a good man. What if-" Oliver didn't want to think about Nelson getting shot.

He knew Bex could never see it his way.

"Just stay out of it," She looked at him concerned. "I don't want anything to happen to you. Please, leave him alone."

Her words were so powerful when she'd said them at the kitchen table. She'd told him again at work. He guessed she was right, but he couldn't stop worrying about Nelson and where he might be.

you never know

2009-07-24T03:12:00.002-05:00

Dayton knew Oliver meant well about offering him the shelving position, but he wasn't sure if it was for him.

"But we're desperate," Oliver looked at him as if he really needed him. "I'm serious."

"You're sure?" He didn't want to take somebody else's job. It just seemed kind of funny that he'd working here with him and Bex. "You talked this over with that dear sweet wife of yours?" Of course, he didn't really find anything sweet about Bex other than having Oliver.

"She knows." Oliver sighed as they walked to the back where there was a shitload of books to be mended.

"You talked to her about it?" Dayton smiled wondering just how that conversation went.

"Yeah, she's OK with it because she sees as you contributing to your family instead of being a freeloader."

Dayton just nodded. It was still hard to think of the word family when it came to him and Geoff, but then he had to remember Nancy and the baby. So much to look forward too.

"All right. Don't want to be a freeloader." He would just take that goddamn job then. He grabbed an apron and got busy with the books.

"See you could do some extra houses on the mending," Oliver nodded. "You could work up to thirty hours a week."

"Thirty hours a week?" At least he'd be out of Nancy's hair. "Sounds fine to me."

"And we'll need you every night during the week but on Friday and you'd have weekends off." Oliver told him.

"Nice." This was getting to look like sunshine to Dayton. "Would I see Bex?"

"Not unless you want too." Oliver then said.

"I don't really want too."

"She never works nights." Oliver nodded.

"Oh." Dayton rubbed his index finger on his bottom lip. This job looked perfect. He got busy then. He was definitely not stirring up trouble. He just needed to stay the course. Slow and steady, isn't that what everyone wanted to see out of him these days?

lunch

2009-07-22T03:26:00.004-05:00

"I don't know what Geoff sees in Dayton." Bex told Nancy. She'd invited Nancy over for lunch. Of course, it was nothing special. Just a salad and lots of jello for afterwards.

"Potential, I suppose." Nancy just smiled. "Thank God, somebody sees something in him."

"And you're OK, that he moved back in?" Bex still wasn't quite sure she understood it.

"Where else is he going to go? You want him at your house?" Nancy smirked.

Bex shot her a look. "No way would that ever happen." Bex was sure of it.

"Well, Day was getting pretty chummy with your pretty boy, there." Nancy couldn't keep from laughing.

"Oliver was only being nice to him," Bex said. "Oliver is that kind of nice guy which I'm not."

"Tell me about it," Nancy sighed as she played with her salad.

"So you're feeling, OK?" Bex knew she was in her last trimester now. It wouldn't be long now.

"I just wish it would hurry up and get here." Nancy sound frustrated.

"Don't say that, you enjoy every moment of the peace and quiet you can." Bex sighed.

"Well, you're looking great," Nancy said. "You've lost weight."

"I can now get into the maternity clothes I first bought." Bex smiled. "I've got a ways to go. I'm so afraid I'm going to be diabetic now or something. I'm really trying to live on less."

"Really?"

"And I exercise as much as I can." Bex nodded.

"I am not looking forward to that."

"You'll probably look like you never were pregnant as soon as you have that baby." Bex envied her.

"No, I doubt that." Nancy shook her head.

"And you still don't want to know what it is?" Bex asked.

Nancy shook her head. Bex wondered if Geoff knew, already. If he did, he probably would, tell.

just do it

2009-07-20T01:44:00.004-05:00

Dayton was being his quiet self. He did as much as he could to stay out of Nancy's way. He guessed it was hard for Geoff to split up his time. It wasn't like Geoff was really doing anything with Nancy. After all, Dayton was sleeping with Geoff. Nancy wasn't. He definitely got the better end of the deal. He felt.

"So should we be taking HIV tests?" Geoff asked him one night just when Dayton broke a nail in the quick just when the dishes were done. It was horrible timing as far as he was concerned.

"I feel just fine." Dayton told him except for the thumb nail with might take forever to grow back, he thought as he stared at it.

"I'll take one if you take one." Geoff told him.

"You ever had one before?" Dayton was curious.

Geoff nodded as if there was nothing to it.

Dayton wasn't sure he liked knowing that about him now. He wasn't sure why it bothered him. Perhaps the idea that Geoff had been with someone else instead of him. Funny, he didn't think of being with Izzy as being with someone else.

"I think we should call Chris and Max and see if we can all go down to the clinic and just get it done together." Dayton then said as if they could have a party or the horror that there was some sort of dormant virus in every-one's body just waiting for the correct time to be exposed. Which meant needles would be involved. He guessed. And that scared him as much as just the idea of HIV.

"Quit being silly. You can take a test at home, but I'd like for us to find out something quicker like in twenty minutes or so, you know." Geoff informed him.

"Really?"

"Look, its for peace of mind. We don't need the threat of HIV hanging over our heads with a baby coming." Geoff sighed.

"All right." Dayton closed his eyes. He'd do whatever Geoff wanted. He just hoped it wasn't bad news.

National HIV testing day June 27th.

better safe than sorry

2009-07-18T01:32:00.003-05:00

Nancy didn't want to start anything with Dayton, but she knew something was different.

"He's not telling you everything," Nancy said to Geoff. They were alone. She couldn't possibly stay in the same room with Dayton even though she was trying.

"What do you mean?"

"I dunno. Just a gut feeling. He won't tell you. I know he won't because that's the way he works. I'm not trying to say that, like I hate him or anything. Its just he can't express himself in certain situations. I suppose. What I'm trying to say, he was probably with someone. I'm not saying he's in love with someone else or anything. I kind of think he'd just do it because he hates himself so much." Nancy told him.

"Wow," Geoff smiled. "I didn't think you'd have so much to say. Sounds like you might be writing a thesis on him."

"Just be prepared. All right. Tell him he needs to get an HIV test." She glared at Geoff then.

"Seriously?" Geoff glared back.

"Yeah, I'm serious. Maybe it'll scare him if anything else. And that way you'll feel safe with him." She nodded.

Geoff nodded. She could tell it left a bad feeling with him, though. She didn't mean for it to be like that, but it was better to be safe than sorry.

questions

2009-07-16T03:48:00.004-05:00

Chris hated to go alone, but he was afraid to take Max with him just in case there was trouble.

"What are you doing here?" Ruby asked as soon as she opened the door to a place that might as well have been a barn.

"What are you doing here?" Chris was still in a state of shock that his sister who'd just graduated high school had moved in with....this guy. "Aren't you suppose to be getting ready for UT or something."

"I'm not going there." She looked at him as if that was past history.

"But you got a scholarship." Chris looked at her. "You got a 4 year scholarship?"

"I don't want to argue about it." She let him in and it was there he met Chuck who looked older than Ruby. Perhaps Chris' age. Her sister was suppose to date high school boys, not guys like Chuck.

"So how did you meet?" Chris decided he was getting no where with the other questions.

"A Bright Eyes concert." Ruby told him.

"Bright Eyes." Chris nodded, thinking of Dayton. They'd been to a few of those concerts together. "And you've been seeing each other-"

"A while, since Thanksgiving."

"But you didn't bring him to any Christmas stuff or you know-holiday-"

"When have you brought Max to anything?" That's when Ruby told Chuck about her brother being gay.

"Well, thanks for sharing that Ruby, but did you have to?" Chris looked at Ruby. He wasn't sure he wanted to look at Chuck.

"Do I have to share everything with you?" She scowled.

"Yes, I want you too." Chris looked at her hard and then said to Chuck, "Max and I have a daughter."

"So what about Dayton?" Chris wanted to know.

"What about him? We just found him out by the river, walking."

"Just walking?"

"Yeah, pretty much. He didn't say much about it. He just wanted me to tell you he'd been with me all this time." Ruby shrugged.

"Do you know who he was with?" Chris looked at both of them.

"Not really. But he looked pretty sorry about who ever he'd been with." Ruby told him.

on the mend

2009-07-14T02:44:00.003-05:00

Seriously, Oliver didn't expect to see Dayton anytime soon. As it was Oliver was deep in the summer reading program. A shelver quit to go on a trip to the Peace Corp, and there were high stacks of books to be mended.

"He was our best book mender," he told Max. "At least he and Geoff are talking it out. It sounds pretty normal now."

"Well, he kept asking for you," Max told him while he'd brought Chloe to pajamma storytime. She could hardly keep still in the stroller. She wanted out of it and she wanted books.

"I wonder why?" Oliver shook his head. "Probably trying to put off the envitable. Dunno why he's that way. He adores Geoff. I think he banks on everything ending badly, you know."

"I guess that's possible. He even told Chris he'd been with his sister. Who in their right mind does that?" Max shrugged.

"Well, things are back to normal now. He's moved back in with Geoff and Nancy. Smooth sailing." Oliver smiled.

"Yeah, I'm sure its all smoothed out now." Max agreed.

"Is Chris all right?" Oliver was concerned.

"You know, him, he beats himself up about everything." Max told him. "He's still dead set on talking with his sister. She went back to the Indian Reservation."

"Why?"

"Chris is going to find out." Max informed him.

"Are you going with him?" Oliver wanted to know.

"I don't think so." Max winced.

"We could always keep Chloe, you know." Oliver shrugged. He had to get back to work, but he took a good long look at her. She was growing like a weed. She was about to give her pacifer up.

"You have your hands full as it is." Max smiled.

"But we want her to get know her cousins." Oliver touched the top of Chloe's head. Thinking this was about as close as he'd ever get to her.

"And how are those little blessings." He remarked.

"Almost sleeping through the night if Bex will let them." Oliver chuckled.

floating on

2009-07-12T01:00:00.004-05:00

Dayton liked to think of the two of them, he and Geoff, in white somewhere floating across the water on a lazy day. Perhaps it was a raft, maybe a boat. It changed in his head from time to time. And it was just the two of them. Alone. It wasn't lonely, either.

And now when Geoff's hands came around his shoulder, he thought he might be healed. Maybe. It was possible because as much as he believed he'd fucked it all up. Everything. Even the goddamn job with the public service announcements... he let it melt away because he knew a part of him felt he was Geoff's.

He didn't try to think it the other way around. Although, Geoff always let him take as much as he wanted. It was always Geoff who was the responsible one.

"I promise I'll do better. I promise." The words were just there on his lips even now even if he'd cried real tears about it.

Geoff grinned as if they were just words. Maybe words he didn't trust. Maybe he didn't care. He got a nod out of him, and when they kissed it was a wake up moment for him of how far they'd came in this journey together, and it felt like an energy of its own. A huge weight off Dayton's shoulders that he could be who he really could be. Caring, nurturing, full of laughter. A human being.

"I don't ever think of you as the housewife though," Dayton said wondering if that was his job.

"I don't see you that way, either." It sounded like a promise to Dayton. It made him smile.

He knew he could tell Geoff all the things that he was that Geoff, already knew. What was the point?

Of course, Izzy came to mind, days later. Days that had gone by when they'd slumbered, and he'd watched Geoff shave and they'd played around and made up for all sorts of things they'd missed in one another. Couldn't he forget about it now? He wanted to forget her. That trip. That stupid moment of getting in the car with her.

Some things needed to be covered up, buried deep and yet if felt so lodged in his heart. He thought he might be dying sometimes when he'd wake in the middle of the night. It left him in a cold sweat.

"Maybe you need to get checked out?" Geoff told him on the third morning they were together.

"Why?" He was certain Geoff knew it already.

"I dunno." Geoff shrugged. "To stay healthy?"

"I feel just fine." Dayton didn't need this.

"Are you sure?"

"I'm very sure." Dayton lied. He hadn't had an out break in a very long time. Nothing could go wrong now, could it?

innocent

2009-07-10T02:20:00.006-05:00

You said everything
Let is show
Let it breathe
You know you make me sick

You've got your house
Your car
A big backyard
Don't state the obvious

Fall is on it's way
No more sunny days
It gets dark you know

Smoke your cigarette
Try not to forget
That you know
They make
You sick

Things never turn out
The way I want them to
But we're all
All born innocent
Take what you can
Take everything you need
But save some for me
Or save it for yourself

Write me a letter and explain
We're all born innocent
Yes we are
Your job is perfect as it was
I know you're not guilty here
You sit right down
Close your eyes, shut your mouth
Listen now
The conversation's done
So it's all down to money as it were
He was born
Born innocent

Things never turn out
The way I want them to
But we're all born
To this world

Things never turn out
The way I want them to
But we're all
All born innocent
Take what you can
Take everything you need
But save some for me
Or save it for yourself
Just save it for yourself
-aidan hawken

Max could have told Geoff that Dayton was in Alaska, and he would still gone alone. At least he had Max and Chris to stay with Nancy. He felt safe about leaving. This was something he had to do alone. Pick up Dayton.

They met at a truckstop. It was so hot and humid. It felt like a good day to jump in the river, but he didn't see that happening. Of course, Dayton kept hesitating, like maybe he didn't want to go with him. It was as if maybe he wanted to stay with Ruby, but she was with a pretty good sized Lakota-Sioux with silky black hair down to his waist, and he certainly wasn't bringing Dayton back to his place.

Finally, they were left on their own. Ruby went back to the reservation with Chuck.

"What are you going to do now, beat me up?" were the first words that came out of Dayton's mouth when he got in the truck.

"I was never going to beat you up," Geoff looked at him out of the corner of his eye. "I only held you down because I didn't know what was going on in that freak'n mind of yours. Didn't know if you were gonna hurt me or Nancy."

"Maybe I was just going to hurt myself." Dayton wouldn't look at him.

"Is that what this is about?" Geoff gave him a hard look then.

"No." Dayton winced but Geoff didn't quite believe him.

"Why didn't you call me?" Geoff started up his truck then, thinking they really needed to go somewhere to alone, but he really didn't know where. It just didn't feel right to take him to a cheap motel, especially, if all they were going to do was possibly scream at each other.

"I dunno. Maybe my battery is dead on my phone."

"I left you plenty of messages." Geoff told him.

"You did?" He looked over at him, but then looked away as soon had Geoff noticed.

"I was hoping we could have made up-"

"Maybe I don't want to." Dayton acted as if he might open the door right now and hop out while Geoff was going 70 miles an hour.

"You know, this isn't all about you." Geoff told him straight. "You're not the only one in the picture, you know. "

"I know. Nancy." Dayton sighed as if Geoff had been off having a honeymoon across the states with her.

"No. This isn't about Nancy."

Dayton gave him a wild look. Finally he blinked.

"Its the baby. The baby. There is a baby that needs a family. And you're gonna have to do your part sooner or latter. Do you understand me?" Geoff told him.

Dayton swelled a frown then. He didn't say a thing.

all in a row

2009-07-08T02:09:00.005-05:00

"Do you want us to come and get you?" Max spoke to Dayton on the phone. "Geoff is worried sick about you."

"Is he?" Dayton seemed happy about that. "Well, I think Ruby could, you know, get me home. I mean, we're just in Iowa, you know."

"Where are you going to stay?" Max questioned.

"I'd like to stay with you if I could, but how does Chris feel about that?" Dayton sounded as if he'd gotten off to a bad start with Chris.

"Geoff wants you home. He told me so, himself. He wants you come home." Max told him.

"Home? The farmhouse?" Dayton sounded as if he didn't know where that was.

"If you want to come here first, I can go with you if you want."

"I want Oliver." Dayton then said. "I want to see Oliver."

"Well, I guess I could do that, but what on earth for?" Max squinted as he watched Chris now with Chloe. He was rocking her in their favorite chair. She was taking a bottle.

"Just because."

"Will you call Geoff?"

"Well..." Dayton didn't have an answer to that.

Max was giving Geoff this number as soon as Dayton hung up. Really, this shouldn't be his nor Chris' problem.

catapulting

2009-07-06T02:54:00.002-05:00

When Ruby called, Chris stood there at the kitchen phone expecting the worst.

"Well, can I talk to Dayton." Somehow it would not be true until he heard his voice. There was a pause and Chris suspected that Dayton didn't want to hear his voice, after all.

"Hey." He sounded as if he was trying to be high. Chris just sighed.

"Are you all right?" Chris winced wishing he could slap him. Slap that stupid smirk of his as if he was the coolest, and there was no other as quite a cool.

"Sure I am." He sounded all fun as if he'd taken a stroll on the beach or a dip in the pool, and he really didn't have time for this.

"What did you do?" Chris wanted to know.

"What did I do?" There he went again, all laugh no seriousness. "Well-well, I was with Ruby."

"Are you shit'n me?" Chris was angry now. Why would Ruby do such a thing? Not his little sister. "You're shit'n me, aren't you?"

"I would not shit you, about this." Dayton was keeping to his story, and he was sticking to it. How he'd some how convince Ruby to hide him, to be with him because she was his angel.

"I want to talk to Ruby." Chris needed a straight answer.

"Jesus, its not her fault, Chris." Dayton told him. "Don't you go blaming her on any of this. She is just fine. I'm fine. We are fine."

"I want to believe you, but I can't!" Chris tensed. "What did you do to my sister?"

"Nothing she wouldn't want done to her." He said so casually.

Chris sucked in a breath. He noticed Max staring at him with Chloe. He handed the phone to Max then and took the baby. "You talk to him." He said above his breath. "Maybe you can talk some sense into him."

dust in the wind

2009-07-04T02:57:00.005-05:00

Dayton left in the end. He knew she wouldn't shoot him. Of course, he drove down more backroads with her than he ever thought possible. All that he did know- on a dusty road she kicked him out near the river.

It felt like a new day after she was finished with him. There was a time or two that he was gonna tell her about himself, but he figured it was just as well not too. Oh, she told him a few things. And it kind of made him grin from time to time when he thought about it on his walk back.

Of course, it couldn't have been true. No, it was just a laugh, that's all it was. The things she said about Oliver. He could hardly hold in the laugh. It was something to savor then, but as he walked on with a few rocks in his shoes and a dry throat...Dayton was starting to think differently. Shit, he thought, he hated her now. Hated her through and through. The things she'd done to Oliver when he didn't even know it. He hated the fact he'd been with her too.

He tried to choke it down like an after thought now. He wouldn't think about it. He wouldn't speak of it. He shook the thought he really did know the truth now. He knew it, and it filled him with sadness. He might never find his way home. He might be lost for good. Possibly good for nothing. He just hoped Geoff was happy now.

And then a white pickup truck pulled over to the side of the road, and a girl stepped out. She looked at him. "Dayton, what are doing on an Indian reservation?" It was Ruby.

on the edge

2009-07-02T02:46:00.004-05:00

It was going on three days.

Geoff hadn't felt well. Not since the wedding. Nancy was surprised he'd cuddled with her on their wedding night. But she had a feeling now that maybe he needed her more than she needed him.

"He's fine. I just know it." She told him then. She told him now. She just wished Geoff was fine.

"What if he's dead in a ditch somewhere?" Geoff could barely talk as it was.

"He's probably doing it on purpose. You know that," Nancy said. She hated to see Geoff waste all his time on him. She thought of all the things they could be doing. It was just getting hotter outside, and she felt her body stifling. Except the baby kept kicking when Geoff was around and perhaps that was the only thing to help him get through this was the future to look forward too.

Nancy wanted to tell him that this was the way the real Dayton worked. He'd cut you off when ever he damned well pleased. She expected it of him. He hadn't changed. No one could change him.

But to see Geoff so devastated, she felt so sad for him. Really there was nothing she could do for him, but to let him alone. Let the quietness sink in. Ever so often she could hear him sobbing in another room. Was this all there was to look forward too?

of moons, birds and monsters

2009-06-30T01:28:00.005-05:00

Why'd you cut holes in the face of the moon base?
Don't you know about the temperature change
In the cold black shadow?
Are you mad at your walls
Or hoping that an unknown force can repair things for you?
Pardon all the time that you've thrown into your pale grey garden?
If the ship will never come you've got to move along

Even a bird would want a taste of dirt from abyssal dark
The prick of a feather could make a kingdom burn and the bloodshed start
The falling apart
Made me a shadow in the shape of wonder
The waves of black
If she's going under I can hold my breath till the sky comes back
Or drown like a rat, rat, rat
He's a rat!

To catch a monster
We make a movie
Set the tempo
And cut and cut its brains out
It will inspire on the burning pyre
Half the distance
Half the motion
Communication
It's easy as the ocean -mgmt

"I don't know if I know how to do this or not?" Really, Dayton didn't know anything about banks.
But this is the way they played. First the banks then the casinos. He thought he got that in the right order.

"You don't have to do anything," she told him. "Just drive the car. Can you drive the fuck'n car?" She was dead serious. She was the meanest. Nancy couldn't hold a light to her. Her nicotine teeth exposed an ugly side of her. A side that was true. A side that meant business.

"Who in the hell are you?" He was coming down. He was a bit dizzy. His heart was already beating fast, and they hadn't done a damn thing, yet.. but set back at that rest stop in the woods. He was beginning to think that laying in the sun on a cement picnic table was looking rather good. So he did it... while she and the other fat black dude, she picked up at a casino, were digging in the trunk of the car.

And suddenly like an awakening, Dayton jerked himself up. "Holy shit!" He threw his cigarette on the ground. "You're Oliver's fuck'n sister, aren't you!"

She aimed a pistol right at him then, and she laughed.

keep moving on

2009-06-28T02:11:00.004-05:00

"Where do you think he'd go?"

Chris looked at Oliver unaware he was actually talking to him.

"Why would I know?" Chris finally croaked.

"You think he's done something stupid, don't you?" Oliver didn't take his eyes off Chris as they both pondered what to do next.

"The cops would think we were nuts if we called, you know." Chris crossed his arms.

"What are you saying, we should just leave this alone?" Oliver winced.

Max had Chloe and they were with Bex back home.

"I dunno." Chris just shook his head. "He was with my sister. I don't know what to think."

"Why would he want to get back at you, Chris. You guys are good." Oliver told him. "He's just a little crazy, you know."

"I know, and he's crazy when he wants to be. Do you know-" Chris squinted hard then. "He could be anywhere."

"You don't think he'd try to kill himself?" Oliver questioned.

"No." Chris didn't want to think that.

Chris sat down in a pew then and pushed his palms in to his eyes and began to cry. "You know, I keep thinking if I could have just you know, tried harder." He shook his head. "Maybe-maybe none of this would have ever happened."

"What are you saying? You have nothing to do with Dayton's reaction to, you know-"

"No." Chris shook his head. "I'm not talking about that. I'm-I'm talking about from before.." He blubbered more tears then.

"Chris, he would have never treated you right. It would have been wrong. Besides, you would have never been Chloe's father then. It all worked out. This'll work out to." Oliver put his arm around him.

"How do you know?" Chris looked over at him.

"I dunno. Just something my mother always said. It'll all work out in the end. You just have to keep believing it." Oliver pressed his hand on Chris' shoulder. "Come on, lets take a drive. We'll see if he finds us."

into the big blue

2009-06-26T01:46:00.005-05:00

She had whiskey. She had pills. But still it took a while to get numb, and she was really booking it too.

Well, Dayton didn't much care where they were going. Looked like Iowa from what he could tell. Hell, he was already out of the state.

"What were you doing back there?" He grinned, lit another cigarette. This one was much cooler and he was feeling it, man. Feeling something good for the first time. Not that rotten shit that was rotting him away.

Hell, what if he was leaving it all behind? Wasn't he supposed to be at the University tomorrow practicing some crap about being drug free.

"Hahahaaaaaa..." Dayton laughed and laughed.

"What's so damn funny," she finally spoke.

"Nothing." He shook his head. It was so hard to keep the laughter from slipping. He looked out the window then back at her. She looked liked somebody he knew, but who?

"So what were you doing back there?" He asked again.

"I like to see how busy the church gets, sometimes." She sounded vacant. Nothing sweet at all about her voice. Not the way she looked. Not the way she should be. "Who was getting married?"

"My boyfriend, that's who in the fuck was getting hitched. Bastard," he grunted.

"You don't look old enough to know what you want," she said looking him over.

"Believe me, I'm old enough," he looked at her. "OK." He tossed the cigarette out as they left the city limits of Council Bluff's on the interstate going North.

"Yeah, sure you are kid." Her plush lip smirked, and she drove on at full throttle.

bleeding heart

2009-06-24T01:33:00.004-05:00

By the time Geoff walked around the church, he just got a whiff of smoke in the air, the street was empty down on the corner. No sign of Dayton.

A chill stung Geoff then in all the sweat he'd felt. He stared down the street thinking he heard tires squealing in the distance. Maybe it wasn't. But it was faint.... and yet he felt as if someone had taken a knife and sliced his heart open.

Geoff knew it was his own damn fault.

"I guess he's gone." He heard Oliver behind him then. "He was doing so well, you know, I thought he was going to be fine."

"Me, too." Geoff felt a lump in his throat. "I should have been easier on him. But he can be such a wise ass, you know."

"Yeah, I know. He's like a graduate of Tough Love or something, and you feel like you have to be just as tough, sometimes." Oliver sighed.

Geoff sucked in a breath.

"I don't want him to do anything he's gonna-" He didn't want to finish that sentence. "You gotta find him Oliver. You have too." He walked back toward the church.

"All right." Oliver put his hand across Geoff's back and walked with him. Geoff felt a bit of comfort. Maybe.

what to do

2009-06-22T01:21:00.005-05:00

Dayton didn't want to smoke right outside the nursery. Hell, he really wish he hadn't lit a cigarette at all. He was out on the side walk just down from the church, pacing. After a few puffs, the nicotine set in, and he was getting a calm buzz of some sort.

It was then he noticed the car on the corner. It was an old beat up Grand Torino And there was a woman inside it with shades on. Her hair was dark blond and a mess of curls. There was something vaguely familiar about her, but he didn't know why.

He turned, took another drag. Wondering what was he suppose to do. Yes, there was Tony's. But he didn't feel much up to it.

A part of him wished he could ask Ruby if they could go somewhere. It wasn't that he wanted to fuck her, but he would if she asked him too. He just wanted to be with somebody. Somebody, who reminded him of Chris. He guessed. He'd felt OK with her. He just didn't know why.

He shook his head, no. Bad idea. He could kick himself for thinking it. Idiot, he told himself. But he was torn, and he wanted someone to put him back together again. He was oozing here with pity. Dayton could hardly stand himself. He was so weak but needed to be strong.

He looked back at the woman in the car. Staring at him with those shades. It was a pretty shitty car. And he felt like shit. Maybe she felt like shit.

"Hey," he walked across the street toward her car. He didn't even invite himself in. He just got in the passenger side. "Got anything planned?"

at the edge

2009-06-20T01:05:00.004-05:00

Geoff guessed he would look. But it might have been a little too late. It was odd to him wondering just how to approach Dayton even if he did find him.

Someone said he was in the kitchen. Another said they saw him with Oliver.

"Have you seen Dayton," Geoff glared at Oliver as if he'd know what to do.

"Huh, not for a while," Oliver said. He was getting more punch for Bex who was sitting.

"Everything, all right?" Bex looked at him who was pulling cake crumbs in to bits and then taking her time eating.

"I guess, Nancy just wanted me to find him." Geoff shrugged, looking the loner that he actually was. His ties was undone now, and he felt a bit restless.

"I think he might be in the nursery," Oliver then remembered. "Yeah, I think he's hiding out there."

Geoff sighed. What a fine time to go to the nursery. He felt as if the wedding was finally sinking in. He was some-body's husband. He'd be a father soon. The thin hallway was stifling. He could hardly breath. Suddenly, it felt as if a panic attack might sink in. Did he really want to find Dayton now?

thinking on it

2009-06-18T06:57:00.001-05:00

Nancy was so exhausted. Really they needed to leave. People could think what they wanted. Happy Trails! Whatever. She needed to be home to rest.

She looked at her ankles. She thought they might be swelling. She hoped not.

Everyone was packing up the truck. She expected to see Dayton, somewhere. He was here. She'd seen him earlier, but not now.

"Where do you suppose he went?" Nancy winced.

"Who?" Geoff looked at her kind of funny.

"Who do you think?" She was stressing now. She had to see him. They needed to talk. She wanted him to know that she was fine with things. Fine with him and Geoff. But she felt she might make things even more strange if she said another word. "Dayton. You should find him."

"Me?" He looked as if that was beside the point.

"Well, then get someone to find him for you." Nancy was sure of it now. They needed to go home together.

what next

2009-06-16T01:32:00.005-05:00

Dayton watched one of Chris' sisters put a pamper on one of Bex's babies.

"Now, you have to change Chloe," she told him.

"Are you serious?" He gave her a dead stare, "Right now?"

Ruby was all of seventeen maybe, and she was an old timer at this. She wasn't like the rest of the bunch, all talk and what not in the nursery at the church. She was somber and looked the type who could mysteriously find ways out of places that anyone else might get stuck in.

Dayton sighed. He had nothing better to do. He just couldn't go in to the reception hall. It would be pure hell. But here he had the kid who looked the most like Oliver blowing bubbles at him.

"Are you gonna be nice?" He talked to Chloe as if she needed to work with him here.

Her big blue eyes stared at him and the instant he pulled the tape off the pamper, Chloe kicked like crazy.

"Now was that nice?"

She kept kicking and cooing, he barely managed to grab the wet pamper before it went off into the floor.

Dayton found himself smiling. He didn't know why. Chloe was funny, full of energy.

"You are just a wild Indian, aren't you?" He tickled her tummy then as he waited for her to slow down, but she didn't.

Ruby handed him a baby wipe.

"But she's really not-" Dayton scowled, thinking did he have to touch a baby's butt with a wet baby wipe. Really, was it necessary?

Ruby gave him the look that he best do what needed to be done. So he did. It was tough, but he managed the pamper over Chloe's chubby legs. Actually, it looked kind of pathetic, but she was hard to keep still.

Ruby finally fixed that and dressed her.

"You have a lot to learn," she told him as if she were the old wise one, and she might be calling him 'grasshopper' any moment now.

"Well, thank you for showing me and fixing it and, you know." He managed to say.

She almost smiled. It was Chris' smile.

He thought she was very shy, he guessed. Maybe it didn't do much good to talk at all. She might think he was crazy, and he knew he liked her for all the false reasons.

He had no idea what he was doing after this. Really, where could he be going after this. It was unnerving and he hated the thought he would be alone. But then he hated the idea that anyone would have to put up with him, either.

He was on the verge of tears, again. He hated how this happened. He'd be fine. Then he wasn't.

"I better get out of here." His eyes were watering. She didn't need to see that. She made him think of Chris. So much. He wished he didn't think of him. God, it was confusing, but she really didn't know what a comfort she was. She'd never know what a comfort she really was to him, just to be in her presences.

Maybe a cigarette would do him some good.

we can be happy

2009-06-14T01:39:00.005-05:00

It was done.

Geoff kept smiling. It felt like a plastered smile, somehow. He didn't dare look at Dayton. He couldn't. He might lose it. What if they found a broom closet to make out in and someone found them? No, he couldn't. He wouldn't.

This was Nancy's moment. He wouldn't dare spoil it.

Of course, then he found himself looking for Dayton, and he was no where in sight.

Geoff found himself going through the motions then and the camera snapped photos of them. Raising glasses of ginger ale. Cutting the cake. Feeding each other cake. Really, it was a very small affair by so many standards. Ceiling fans churned the hot air above. Everyone in a state of a small sweat. So many happy faces coming around to shake their hand. Strangers giving them money. Someone had made a yellow quilt blanket for the baby. It was mesmerizing. Geoff felt so happy, yet sick of himself too. As if this was some sort of sham. Is that what it was? He so didn't want it to be. He could hardly take it. Hardly.

"I think we should get out of here soon," he leaned in and whispered in Nancy's ear. She nodded.

The hard part was finding a way to get out of the masses. The floor was thick with people. Where had they all came from? He thought he might pass-out from all the excitement. People were bringing presents.

Chris and Oliver had pulled out a huge circle of chairs around the room. One by one they found their seat. There were the presents behind the circle. Oliver lead Geoff and Nancy to the seats with pink and blue ribbons.

"Its time to open the gifts now," Oliver said.

Geoff looked at the table piled high with white boxes, mostly. He was sure it might take a good three hours to get through them.

what a world

2009-06-12T01:37:00.008-05:00

Chris was with Dayton when he upchucked on a bed of rose bushes just off the side porch of the church.

He shield him from anyone else knowing.

"You all right?" Chris gave him a pat on the back.

"Of course, I am." Dayton nodded with tears in his eyes, but they were dripping. "Weddings always do this to me."

"Really?" Chris wondered if Dayton had ever been to a wedding before. He couldn't think of it.

"You think you'll marry Max?" Dayton wanted to know after people had moved along to the reception hall.

Chris cracked up. Really, it was the last thing he ever thought would come out of Dayton's mouth.

"We'd have to move to Iowa, you know."

"Yeah, so, its cheaper to live there than in Nebraska, isn't it?" Dayton looked him in the eye with a look, what the hell are you waiting for?

Chris just smiled.

today is the first day of the rest of your life

2009-06-10T01:29:00.005-05:00

It was real, and it was happening.

The old piano played a haunting melody of the wedding march. Dayton thought he might crack, crumble, choke. Something. But he didn't. He gritted back any urge to cry. He could do this. He could get through this.

Really, Nancy looked a whole lot better than he ever thought she would. How in the hell did she do this? If anyone could see her for what she was, she'd have horns sprouting all over her head and she'd find a way to make that look sexy too, he guessed.

Oliver put his hand around his shoulder then, just in case. Dayton looked back at him, noticing the humidity had made his hair all frizzy and yet that didn't stop him coming as he was. Dayton fidgeted while he listened to an opening prayer from Max.

"Lead us and guard us in the right direction." He ended.

What the fuck was he going on about? Dayton did not know. He felt faint though. Maybe he'd pass-out. Maybe he'd stop the show, but he didn't. It went right on. She said I do. He said I do. Nothing was stopping them. Rings exchanged. Shit, this was the real deal. One moment, Dayton was in a sweat. The next moment his teeth were chattering. He was going to be sick. But he'd have to wait to throw up he guessed. He guessed.

almost time

2009-06-08T01:20:00.003-05:00

Really, Bex thought Dayton looked like Johnny Cash's grandson in that black suit Oliver had him fixed up in. Right down to that old -fashioned tie that was just a thin black ribbon in a loose bow.

Naturally, Bex was already in a sweat. She'd barely got into this cheap cotton sundress they'd told her to put on.

"Really, you look-" She knew Nancy would have to think on this a bit. After all, Nancy looked so sweet in her outfit with her little baby bum. Disgusting, thought Bex. She really should have been a pregnant model for some runway show. "Amazingly sexy."

"Yeah, right." Well, Bex didn't feel it as she pulled the yellow floral scarf around her shoulders. "Lets just get this over with." The sooner the better. She could get out of the sausage suit and back into her pajama pants and tank and get back on that tread mill of her and walk this fat off.

"I really want you to know, I'm glad Oliver's taking care of Dayton," Nancy said in all the sincerity that Bex had ever heard. "I know he's hurting and..and I don't think Dayton will kill me now, thanks to Oliver."

Bex just nodded. Seriously, she didn't know what the hell Oliver was trying to prove. But it was working. Hell, Dayton was just about trained. She guessed. He was saying 'yes, mame', 'please' and that beautiful 'thank you.'

"All right. Fine." Bex sighed. "Can you please get married now?"

There was a full house out there. They better cut that sheet cake in tiny squares or it wasn't going to go very far this afternoon.

not in the rules

2009-06-06T01:01:00.004-05:00

Chris had Chloe to watch during the wedding.

"Are you serious?" Her sister took her right out of his arms. "Now you are going to enjoy that wedding."

"Enjoy?" He winced. What was there to really enjoy? He'd rather have Chloe with him.

"You're very protective. We can watch her, you know." Kelly informed him.

"But, but she gets into everything now. She's so fast." He watched her like a hawk as it was.

"You're so silly," Kelly smiled. "I love that you really are her father, but you need to be there for your friends." She nodded.

"Friends?" He shrugged.

"You know, Dayton." Kelly looked at him blankly. "He needs you more than ever."

"No, he doesn't." Chris nodded as if she'd been mistaken.

"You are his oldest friend. And he needs you."

"How do you know that?" Chris squinted, thinking what else were they saying behind his back.

"Chris," Kelly smiled. "You know he was your first."

Now Chris' eyes lit.

"What?"

She laughed. "I can see it so clearly now. I figured it out after I watched Slaughter Rule, you had feelings for him. He had them for you. Its just neither of you knew what to do." She was so matter of fact that she made Chris squirm now.

"What movie are you talking about?" Chris wish she hadn't seen it if that's what got her thinking about him and Dayton.

"Its this indie movie with Ryan Gosling. You should really watch it."

Chris rolled his eyes.

"Now, go, will you. Have some fun for me, all right?"

Chris nodded, shoved his hands in his pockets. Now he had no excuse not to sit with Dayton.

the Wal-mart wedding

2009-06-04T02:46:00.004-05:00

Nancy didn't want to spend a lot on a wedding. After all, maybe it could be more of a baby shower than anything. She didn't know as she wondered around Wal-Mart after midnight with Geoff.

They were looking at sundresses. There were some white ones that were very cheep with spaghetti straps and a ruffled skirt. "I probably shouldn't wear white." She said out of the blue.

"Why not?" Geoff shrugged and picked one up.

"Need you ask?" She laughed at him.

"Come on," He put a small in the cart along with an extra large for Bex. "We'll get a pretty pink floral scarves, and you can wrap that around you, along with some pink roses, and I think you'll be set."

"Lets get the yellow for Bex," she said when she saw the huge scarves. "That's her color."

"I really think we can get everything we need under two hundred dollars." Geoff smiled. "And your Mom's getting the cake, and ginger ale."

"There won't be that many people, will there?"

"Did you invite anyone?" Geoff looked at her.

"Just Bex."

"Well, I invited Tony and his daughter."

"You think Dayton will be there?" She winced.

"I think Oliver is set on getting him there." He sighed.

"You think he's OK?" They walked to the shoe department then.

"I guess we'll find out."

She found the bright pink sandals. She had to have those. She got a yellow pair for Bex. "I so love these." She was back on track. This wedding was on.

in the company of others

2009-06-02T02:50:00.005-05:00

Dayton finally woke up from his brink of misery he guessed, but still he felt himself finding comfort in Oliver's stillness. It had caught him off guard. He guessed. He hadn't meant to do it. But it just felt right.

"Maybe you need a soda or something," Oliver finally mentioned.

"Maybe." He rubbed the tears from his eyes. "God, you think I'm coming on to you, don't you?" He said quite miserably then.

"No." Oliver shook his head. "No, of course not. You have a lot on your mind."

"Everything is changing, you know. I dunno what to do?" He felt a bit shaky. He couldn't remember the last time he ate. He wasn't even hungry.

"Here have my Twix bar, I'll get you something to drink." Oliver wanted to know what he liked so he went to get Dayton a Dr. Pepper while he sat down an opened the Twix bar.

"I know I keep saying I'm all right, but hate it, Oliver, I hate this. I really do." Dayton told Oliver when he got back with the drinks.

"Its tough, but you'll manage. You will. You have to have faith in Geoff. You have to be there for him even if he doesn't want to talk to you." Oliver advised.

"You make me feel I have to become a priest or something." Dayton sighed.

Oliver smiled back.

"All I can say is that I would have been Bex's friend if thats all I could have been. There's no one else for me, and I would have waited. I didn't want too, and maybe I really didn't." Oliver told him.

"Oliver, don't you know how miserable I was with Bex?" Dayton then confessed.

"You really wanted to be with her, though?"

"We looked good together, and I did try and well, I thought the same thing about Nancy. We really did look good together. But that doesn't matter to me, anymore. Looks can be so deceiving." Dayton squinted.

"I don't think Geoff's marrying Nancy because it looks good. He's just trying to help her and you know-"

"I know." Did Olvier really have to remind him? Dayton shut his eyes tight. Just when he thought he was growing up, always something had to set him back.

embracing the situation

2009-05-31T01:34:00.006-05:00

Honestly, Oliver didn't know if Dayton was listening to him or not. He felt he had to keep him pepped up instead of down about this, Nancy and Geoff nuptials coming up. He'd put him to mending books at the library. Actually, Dayton was pretty good at it. It was something to concentrate on, Oliver supposed.

"Now, you're going to embrace the situation," Oliver told him.

"I'm letting it go is what I'm doing." Dayton sighed as he carefully put the glue in between pages.

"Precisely." Although, Oliver wasn't so sure he meant it. Exactly. "You just have to put a bit a joy in to it. And who knows, her child is possibly your child, you know. And you'll all be family then."

"But its not my kid." He was on the fence again about that.

"But what if it is?"

Dayton shook his head, no.

"Its not."

"All right, but you could still be a good uncle." Oliver gave him a pat on the back.

"Why won't he talk to me, Oliver?" Dayton looked at him quite sad.

"I dunno." He wished he knew what to do. But what was there he could comfort him with? "It'll take some time, I'm sure Geoff's just busy with everything, right now."

Dayton frowned, slamming the glued pages of the book shut. Next thing Oliver knew Dayton hugged him so hard. His clingy self was perhaps embracing something Oliver wished he'd thought about. Something entirely different from what he'd mentioned.

Oliver's eyes shot open. They were in the backroom where Bex used to work. Oliver just sighed realising, he would just have to wait. Let Dayton get this out of his system. It just seemed to be taking longer than Oliver expected. Why does he have to have his fingers in my hair, Oliver then thought.

dirty laundry

2009-05-29T03:07:00.004-05:00

"I don't know if I can support it." Bex had a to find a way to get out this so called wedding of Nancy's.

"But she wants you to be the matron of honor," Oliver said. Matron seemed to be the only word Bex could hear ,and it made her sick to her stomach. She didn't want anyone seeing her in a bride's maid dress. That was just as bad as asking her to wear a swim suit she thought.

"I just had twins for God's sakes!" She was adamant about that.

"Well, Nancy's pregnant and she'll be in a bride's dress." Oliver told her this over his lunch break from work. There were still plenty of casseroles to finish off at home. At least, she could watch him enjoy them.

"Do you know how awful this is for me?" No one seemed to understand how breast feeding was taking a toll on her. She could see her breasts lactating at such an event. Wouldn't that be lovely?

"It'll be just this afternoon thing. Won't last longer than fifteen minutes. Max said he'd make it short." Oliver reminded her.

"Yeah, but-" The fact remained Nancy looked pretty damn hot to be pregnant. She was all tiny with her little baby bump. It was amazing and disgusting to Bex. She now felt like like Kirstie Alley on the rebound from Jenny Craig. "I'm the size of a house!"

"Jesus! Bex! This is not about you!" Suddenly, Oliver laid down the law. "This is Nancy's wedding. You are her friend and...and she needs all the support she can get at the moment."

"Fine." No use being evil about it, Bex supposed. Best to get on her happy face and just get it over with. She didn't see this marriage lasting til the water got hot. "What about you? Aren't you Dayton's friend?" She hated to bring it up, but wasn't he suppose to be the enemy?

"I told Dayton I'd sit with him," Oliver told her.

"You'd do that." She hugged herself. "He shouldn't even be there."

"Well, it is an unlikely threesome," Oliver nodded finishing off the devil eggs then. "But apparently, I think it'll be fine once it comes out of the wash of it. It'll just need time."

"I can't believe you said that." Bex glared at Oliver.

Oliver just smiled at her.

ever after

2009-05-27T02:50:00.005-05:00

Chris supposed he had to be on Dayton's side. After all, he'd invited him over to dinner.

"You don't mind, do you?" Chris felt as if he was between a rock and hard place.

"Its the least you could do," Max was with him on this. "We have to show him he can still be," Max couldn't think of the best thing to say. "OK, supportive. He can be as far away as he wants from then, but he needs to be supportive.

"I want to go to wedding," was the next thing they both heard over burgers and beer with Dayton at their house.

"Are you serious?" Chris wasn't sure that was a good idea. It would be a lot like him asking Dayton if he wanted to come and live with them. No way.

"Yeah, I think I am." Dayton looked half dazed as he talked about it. Like something else might be on his mind. "I'll wear a suit. I'll bring flowers."

"You don't really have to bring flowers," Max assured him.

"Well, whatever, I'm going."

"That's nice of you, Dayton."

"I guess. I don't really want it to happen, but what other choice do I have. Just bite the bullet, you know." Dayton nursed his beer.

"I'm sure everything is gonna be all right." Chris sighed.

"He doesn't love her, you know." Dayton concluded. "He loves me, and he's doing this for me."

"Yeah. Sure." Chris didn't quite see it that way, but usually, it was best to agree with Dayton or face the consequences.

"Maybe I'll go on the honeymoon." Dayton just said.

"I'm not sure they'll have a honeymoon." Max squinted, taking Chloe in his lap before she got fussy.

"I just thought everyone had to have a honeymoon." Dayton smiled as if he liked the idea that they wouldn't have a wedding.

taking care of matters

2009-05-25T02:37:00.005-05:00

"Are you out of your mind?" Max didn't want Geoff to rush into this, but if he didn't marry them then somebody else would, and he certainly wasn't going to charge anything to do it.

"I think the sooner the better," Geoff nodded who was thinking about insurance and that sort of thing instead of that word Love.

"This could be the biggest mistake of your life," Max had never sounded so depressing in his life as a preacher, but he was talking to Geoff as a friend.

"We'll be fine." Geoff nodded as if he knew what he was doing.

"But its a commitment."

"Yes, I know very well what it is." Geoff stared back at him as if his mind was made up.

"And this is what Nancy wants?" Max got behind his desk at the church office and looked at his calender.

"Most definitely."

"Well, I'm free day after tomorrow. Is that enough time for you two to get ready for a wedding?" Max looked up at Geoff.

"Yeap," Geoff nodded. "I've already got the marriage license taken care of."

"Then I guess we got us a date," Max shrugged. "What about Dayton? Is he going to be your best man?"

"Hardly." Geoff smiled.

"You haven't had a falling out about this, have you?" Max winced.

"I don't think so." Geoff shook his head. "I hope not. OK, we had a fight, but it was nothing. Really."

Max could only imagine what that must have been like. He knew that did nothing for a relationship.

"Well, if you want me to talk to him-"

"I don't know if it would do any good." Geoff remained even lipped. Finally Max said. "Well, we'll see you at two in the afternoon then."

"All right." Geoff smiled.

Max hoped he knew what he was doing.

anymore

2009-05-23T01:26:00.007-05:00

Dayton liked to think of it just temporary. This whole thing with Nancy. Perhaps Geoff would see the light somehow soon that this was not the right thing to do. Even if he'd flown off the handle about it. He felt pretty bummed about the fight. It felt like something he and Chris would do. But in the end he felt Nancy had contaminated his life for good.

Meanwhile, he was staying at Tony and Hillary's.

"But what if he does go through with it?" Hillary wasn't exactly being on his side in this even if he was making his famous brownies for her.

"I dunno." He blinked back, "Just don't make me feel, childish and selfish, will you." He was doing his best to keep calm about this. As it was he was knee deep in learning lines for STD commercials. What a way to spend his summer. But at least he was busy, and he tried not to think about Geoff being with Nancy. Really, Geoff couldn't actually be with her. He was just doing her a favor. That's all there was to it. Believing that kept him sane.

"Well, maybe there's a reason." Hillary shrugged.

"Yeah, because I wouldn't." Dayton told her. It was just stupid to him.

"Maybe he wants a family." She winced.

"Of course." As if he didn't know. It didn't make it any easier to swallow. He just couldn't make himself want to sit down and talk about this with Geoff, yet he didn't want anyone else, with him, either. He missed him so much.

"I think you want a family, too." She told him.

He almost winced in tears when she said that. "I just don't want to talk about it, all right." Geoff had to find a way back to reality, didn't he? "He's just trying to save someone, that's all. And then when that's done, then what, huh?" If left an awful fit in the bottom of his stomach. Really, he felt as if his world had been turned upside down. It had never been the same since Nancy. He really hated her. It was true. And now she had his boyfriend. He felt so screwed. Dayton didn't even know what to fight for, anymore.

is it something that comes natural

2009-05-22T01:44:00.004-05:00

Whatever you wanted
What could it be
Did somebody tell you
That you could get it from me,
Is it something that comes natural
Is it easy to say,
Why do you want it,
Who are you anyway? -Bob Dylan

"WHAT!"

Nancy heard Dayton's voice carry through the old house. He and Geoff were in another room. The kitchen. She wasn't so sure she was happy yet. Not really. She knew this hurt Dayton. She hadn't meant it too, but she knew he wouldn't believe her.

Why couldn't he be calm about this? Was it all her fault? Really? She winced as she heard their voices low. She strained to hear but wouldn't go. See what was it about. It might have been a pushing match. And she didn't need to be pushed. Not right now.

She'd wait it out. Hope things would simmer down, but a chair scraped the floor in the kitchen. And then she heard the sound of dishes crashing about the floor. Nancy's eyes lit as she listened, wondering what Dayton might do next. What if he came in to her room? What if-

She got up and locked her door then.

Why was he like this? He hadn't changed. Geoff said he had. She didn't believe it now. Nancy shut her eyes tight thinking how it might be if Dayton had a gun. He'd kill somebody. She just knew it. And she'd be the first on his list.

Finally it was quiet. No words. No sounds of a scuffle. Nancy took a deep breath and unlocked her bedroom door and took a step out down the hall toward the kitchen. She peaked around the corner to see Geoff had Dayton wrestled to the floor in a choke hold of some kind. Both were breathing hard. It seemed to be a stale mate, perhaps. Nancy knew it wasn't over. Couldn't be.

"He's leaving." Geoff told her, but he didn't let go of Dayton who was motionless now, but he breathed hard like some feral animal. Nancy backed away. She hoped Geoff knew what he was doing.

sort of like a childhood disease

2009-05-20T02:45:00.005-05:00

Geoff found Nancy crying. Big gulps, too. He hated to see her in this state. She couldn't make herself sick now. He wasn't sure what to do.

"What did you do this, time?" Geoff went straight to Dayton who was in the kitchen drying dishes.

"Nothing." Dayton winced. Then he let a sigh. "She wants me to marry her just because her Mom said something. No way, can I do that."

"Well, you didn't have to be so harsh," Geoff told him. "You were harsh, weren't you?"

"I wasn't-" Dayton started then said. "It wouldn't have mattered."

"You know, we've talked about this." Geoff stared at him as if he should remember how he was going to act around her.

"I know." But he was even getting gruff with him. Geoff knew he should leave it, alone. He went back to Nancy's room.

She was still crying. He put his arm around her. Immediately, she turned and cried into his shoulder as if it would never get any better. Her life was horrible. There was nothing to be happy about. Nothing.

"Suppose we got married." He blurted out without even thinking. Suddenly, it was like an epiphany of some kind. Why hadn't he thought of it sooner.

let alone

2009-05-16T02:29:00.000-05:00

Bex felt as if she was all thumbs or something when it came to the twins. She felt like a bumbling idiot, half the time.

"Maybe something is wrong with me," she said not long after they were home while they had plenty of help in the house. Chris' sisters were there nonstop and pretty much angels when it came to keeping babies content. At least Bex got some rest. She'd hoped Oliver would too, but he was rather hyper these days.

He'd decided to paint a mural in the church baptistry.

"I don't know where he gets all this energy." Bex couldn't explain it to Nancy who seemed to envy that Bex had so much help.

"Well, you have Geoff and Dayton. I'm sure they'll step up once the time comes." Bex reminded her and Nancy had the whole itinerary mapped out as it was. There was the date not long off for the arrival for the baby. It was well planned for her to have a c-section. She was sad about that still.

"Don't knock it," Bex told her. "You should be glad you've got it so well planned."

"Not exactly a wedding." She huffed. Her parents still didn't understand why Dayton wouldn't marry her.

"You didn't tell them about him and Geoff?"

"No." She winced. "That would stupid."

"It would be honest." Bex looked at her. "You shouldn't be playing games about this. Leading them on that everything is so right with you and Dayton when you know far from the truth that its now. He still doesn't think its his baby."

"As if he'd believe it if they gave him a piece of paper." She didn't want to talk about it and Bex was sorry she'd brought it up.

"I'm sure it'll all turn out all right. It might be unconventional, but I'm sure Geoff will make it work."

Nancy just nodded. "I wish he had twin or something. You know, where I could have my Geoff and Dayton could have his. It would be so much easier."

"Well, you two certainly aren't making it easy on Geoff." Bex wanted to tell her they both needed to grow up, but then again, Nancy and Dayton were far better now than they used to be, she guessed. It was still hard to be her friend. Even harder to be friends with Dayton. It was impossible. But then Bex was trying to grow up herself. And yet, she felt so fragile. In a state of evolving emotions.

She so wanted to be a good mother, but could she, really? She'd never know until she was actually alone with her children.

that other sense

2009-05-14T01:39:00.005-05:00

Dayton was afraid he might breathe on Chloe. Maybe this was a very bad idea, but she was very inquisitive. She investigated the studs on his face, right away. She didn't let the gages in his ears go unnoticed, either. Poking her little fingers in them.

Dayton looked at her wide-eyed and was now thankful he hadn't gotten the gages the size of quarters like he'd wanted or she might have pulled them out. It was all so foreign to him, but nice. Really nice. Like a sweet comfort of some sort, and he hated to admit that she had this 'nice' effect on him. He didn't know how to react.

"She really is in to avocados now," Chris mentioned. "Mushrooms too."

"Are you just trying to make her a vegan?" Dayton winced.

"Never to early to expose them to vegetables." Chris nodded.

Expose? Woe, Dayton never thought he'd ever hear Chris talk like that. What had Max done to him? Educate him?

"Oh." Dayton just said thinking Chris might want her back, but he didn't.

"What are you doing here?"

"Well," Dayton shrugged. "Oliver sent me a photo of the twins, and I just thought I'd check it out, you know."

"Really." Chris winced as if he didn't know they were friends.

"Yeah, who would have thunk it, huh? Ollie and me. But its cool." Dayton nodded.

"So everything is all right? You and Geoff and-"

"God, Nancy," Dayton fretted some. "Yeah, she's living with us and it sucks. But-" he sighed trying to manage something sane about it, "Geoff keeps saying its the right thing to do. I guess he's right."

Still as he held Chloe, Dayton wasn't sure anyone could melt his heart quite like Chris' baby. She might have looked like Oliver, but still there was something very Chris about her even if she was just a baby. He wasn't sure how he'd feel about Nancy's baby once it was here to see and feel.

looking in

2009-05-13T01:22:00.005-05:00

Chris was total amazed at the resemblance between Chloe and Maisy. They could be sisters. They were cousins. They would be good cousins. He'd see to it. Of course, he had only looked at the twins through the nursery window, watching Oliver and Max with the babies. Chris took pictures with his digital camera. Even his sisters wanted to see the twins. They were already popular and didn't even know it.

A bunch of women from the church had already brought food over to Bex and Oliver's. His sisters had planned the whole next six weeks to bring food and help out with the little ones. Chris had no idea just how giving they were. It amazed even him. They'd even joined Max's church.

And here Max thought he'd quit Serenity while all of Chris' sisters with their families had rushed in to join. Of course, Chris knew they all thought Max was sexy and what better way to spend Sunday morning than listening to a sexy preacher. Chris wanted to say that had to be sacrilegious, but what ever worked. After all, they wanted to help.

Evidently, they weren't the only ones, when he turned back in the hospital corridor, there was Dayton, and Chris couldn't remember the last time he'd been this alone with him.

"You've got your hands full, " Dayton said. Chris had Chloe on his hip and it was a struggle to take pictures too. Chris didn't know what to say. He supposed he could hand Chloe over to him which evidently surprised Dayton. Chris thought he might fall over with her.

"Damn, she's heavy," he sounded surprised. "What are you feeding her?"

Chloe didn't whimper but just looked at him as if he was interesting and new as she sucked on her pacifier. Chris just smiled. It was kind of funny seeing Dayton, holding a baby. He had to take a picture of that.

true colors

2009-05-12T01:16:00.002-05:00

Maisy and Monty Mulberry. Oliver was quite satisfied with the names. Hopefully, Bex would be too. Really, Maisy did look more like Oliver than Monty did.

"But he's a right handsome rascal, now isn't he?" He'd shared with Max. Of course, Monty had a great set of lungs.

"Completely Bex." Max just smiled.

Oliver laughed. Hoping he could rest. At least Bex was sleeping and yet he felt it was vital to keep watch over the two of them. He could only hope things would go smoothly. So far so good. Their birth-weight had been fairly normal. Close to six pounds each. They some how equaled out which he thought had been remarkable. That wasn't the way it always happened, and he was grateful this time had come. And yet it felt as if he'd need all the strength he had to pull himself up and get going again. Did he really have it in him to spread himself with good measure between the three of them now. He was sure Bex would always be his biggest baby to contend with.

"You wouldn't even know they were cut from the same cloth." Her mother chimed in. Naturally, it gave Oliver a slight panic. True, Maisy was the hairless creature with big pale blue eyes and Monty already had a nice head of dark hair and eyes almost black. No one would think that could be Dayton's baby, could it? Just a hallucination. Not even nightmareish. Why couldn't this woman let well enough, alone?

"At least we can tell them apart." Oliver grinned as if this to would pass. Hopefully soon. He put his arm around Bex's mother, hoping to bring warmth instead of coldness. She smiled and kissed him on the cheek. He took a picuture then on his camera phone to send to his mother.

finally

2009-05-11T04:18:00.004-05:00

All she ever wanted was to be knocked out of her misery. Really, couldn't they do something for her. Bex was having twins, after all. Why couldn't it be that simple?

When some one mentioned "spinal" she hated the thought of what that meant, and then they give her a shot in her back. And it was the hugest needle she'd ever seen.

"You'll be fully awake." A nurse told her.

"Do I have to be?" She cringed. But as the sedative sat in, Bex thought for sure she was having an out of body experience for some reason. Perhaps she was dying, or just delirium. She felt she was floating away. Listening to their shop talk. Somewhere there was Oliver. She guessed. She hoped. It was all so fuzzy and then she could tell something was happening. Perhaps not feeling the pain, but they were pulling something out of her stomach even if she couldn't see what it was. It felt as if would just keep going and going. Couldn't they be any quicker?

Her first glance was something dripping in cottage cheese, she thought. She was sucking her fist and looking at her with her open eyes. Those were Oliver's eyes. Not her eyes. She's knew those eyes, anywhere. It was both amazing and frightening at the same time. And then she heard the crying from the second one. All moody and angry. Perhaps more like her.

"Fraternal." Someone said. Bex smiled. At least she could tell them a part. After all, one was male and the other female.

at first

2009-05-10T01:26:00.005-05:00

It was happening. Oliver could tell right away when he saw that strange look on Bex's face.

Sure they'd done all the planning. Suitcase packed. Breathing exercises. Not that she'd ever need to know Lamaze stuff. Naturally, they'd argued over that. No, they wouldn't just let her go in to labor, now would they?

Of course, he couldn't tell her she was being ridiculous. That would have been the end of it, he supposed.

But now it was just starting. And she looked worried.

The last few weeks she'd been on bed rest. Because. She was worried, mostly. Worried that she might start spotting or having contractions. Something. But nothing ever happened. Only the days were slower and she was more tired and she'd lay on her side. And every little pain she might feel, could be. It.

But this time she screamed in pain. Gut wrenching horror. It hurt Oliver's ears. Definitely a signal that perhaps they should go to the hospital.

So Oliver loaded up the car. Got Bex loaded in the car. Called Max and it was off to the hospital.

Naturally, she told the nurse right away who just so happened to be Max, "I want a C-section! Now!"

She pulled his hair then and he winced.

"Just slow down. Has your water even broke?" Max asked.

"Water? What are you talking about?"

"This could be nothing Bex. They might send you home." Max got her into a wheel chair and wheeled her down to the hall to where she could be hooked up to all sorts of monitors. Naturally, she looked back at Oliver as if she might never be coming home.

He felt sure a storm was brewing. Hopefully, they'd hurry up and figure out Bex was ready to be a mother.

filled with laughter

2009-05-07T01:26:00.004-05:00

When Bex got home, she wasn't expecting a crowd. Especially, in the nursery. It seemed everyone was over. Well, everyone she hadn't expected. Dayton. Nancy and Geoff.

"Oh," she felt she'd walked in on something. Geoff was putting his signature on the sunflower field too.

"Surprise," was all Oliver could manage. It really was a pleasant surprise. The mural. But it still baffled her why Dayton was here.

"I wanted to help," he nodded and gave her a half smile but stepped away as if he might bump into her accidentally since she wasn't hard to miss.

She found it so hard to be nice to him, but she would try. Maybe. She found Nancy, who gave her a smile as if she was glad she came.

"So how are you feeling?" She asked Bex.

"OK." And she was. It had been a long day. But the ladies at the library had made over her. They'd shopped. Lunched. Shopped more. It had been a good day. And she felt closer to all of her co-workers because of it. "What about you?"

"Good." She smiled. "Even work has been better. Just going there in the mornings now." She nodded. "And I'm just having one kid. You're having two."

They talked a bit more about movies and concerts, and how they needed to do things together before the babies came.

Just then the doorbell rang, and Dayton went to pay for the pizzas. Bex sat back and relaxed. She thought she might be dreaming.

"No, you're not dreaming." Oliver told her.

"Yeah, but it feels that way." She smiled. "The next thing you'll tell me, the babies are here." She just grinned. He kissed her on the cheek.

"Wouldn't that be nice." Oliver put his arm around her then. She thought this might be one of those days she had to embrace to the fullest.

living on a prayer

2009-05-05T01:04:00.006-05:00

Nancy knew she'd got her way, again. She loved it and hated it at the same time. Yes, she knew Geoff was Dayton's boyfriend. Not her boyfriend, but for a little while she could imagine he was. Or at least people who saw them could think it, couldn't they?

She knew it wasn't true, but it felt nice to even think it for a second. That they were both someone else, and Geoff was going to be the best Dad in the world. The father of her baby.

It was a nice feeling to have. It was as if she had a choice in the matter now. She could pick who she wanted. And it was Geoff. She so wanted it to be true. She thought she could have a better life because of it, too.

And they would be together. It would be a family. It would be so simple. She wasn't asking for that much, now was she?

There was so much she was thankful for. Even if there were those worries with her health and the herpes too, still things were going so well. She'd found out recently, someone she'd gone to high school with just had a baby, and something was the matter with it due to the mother being HIV positive. He would be taking medication every-time he ate for the rest of his life and most times the medication made him throw up so his weight was really low. Nancy didn't want to think about things like that. She was only asking for this one little thing. That everything would be all right and Geoff would be there for her and the baby.

She knew it was a lot to ask for, but she could hope for it. So she prayed for it, everyday.

can't hardly wait

2009-05-03T22:30:00.004-05:00

Geoff thought he should call Dayton to see what he was up to. Perhaps he wanted to go to the movies, too. They'd had lunch at the farmhouse.

"You know he won't want to go," Nancy said instantly.

Geoff looked at her, wondering how he could change this. He felt he was in charge of two unruly kids who'd barely speak to each other as it was.

"What do you mean?" Geoff winced.

"The Soloist, does he look like the type who could see something like that. Maybe you two could see that art house film Little Ashes of Robert Pattinson's where he plays the Spanish gay guy." Nancy shrugged. She was ready to go to the matinee.

"I have my doubts he'd go for that." Geoff sighed.

"We could go, you know." She was up for it. All smiles now. Happier than usual, he thought.

"Star Trek?"

"Come on, we'll be late." Nancy pulled him along.

"But I should call." He looked at her.

"What, he has you on a short leash, is that what you're trying to tell me?" She walked on to his pick up truck then. He direct dialed Dayton.

"What's up?" Dayton sounded friendly enough.

"What's up with you?" Geoff smiled.

"Just chill'n in the clouds."

"What?" Geoff smirked. "Look, Nancy and I were going to see The Soloist, you want to come?"

"I'm kind of busy. Old Ollie here has me painting clouds." Dayton told him.

"Painting clouds?" Geoff just smiled.

"Yeah, you should stop by and see it." Dayton then said.

"I would, but you know, the movie." He sighed. Nancy seemed to have her heart set on it.

"Right? Well, come by afterwards then. We got stuff to do. Cribs to put up and everything." Dayton informed him.

"Really?" Geoff smiled. Perhaps Dayton was getting the 101 in babies from Oliver. "Can't wait to see what you two are up too."

don't know why

2009-04-30T04:45:00.004-05:00

Dayton was glad that Oliver let him help paint the nursery. He'd never painted this much before, and it felt good to help out. Oliver was painting a field of sunflowers and he left the cotton-like clouds for Dayton.

"Man, you're good," Dayton looked at his work. "Probably better than anything Geoff can do."

"Oh, you better not say that," Oliver felt his laugh get stuck in his throat. "I still have a lot of work to do."

"You just don't give up, do you?" Dayton winced.

"I dunno." Oliver acted as if he didn't know what he meant.

"You know, you just take some thing and make art out of it. Its like you take nothing and make it into something." Dayton told him.

"Well, thanks." Oliver smiled and went back to a sunflower to work on. "So what have you all decided with Nancy?"

"Oh, he wants her to move in." Dayton sighed. "Its this huge lie, you know. Her folks thinking we're still together. God, its not like a threesome, you know."

"Well, of course not." Oliver made light of it as he struggled with his thin paint brush on the yellow petal. "Won't it be a foursome anyway by the time the baby gets here."

"About that," Dayton pondered at one of the clouds. It looked lonely. He needed to sponge more clouds. "I don't have one father feeling in my whole body. I just know its not mine, you know."

"Well, think about Chris," Oliver looked over at Dayton then. "He didn't really care who the biological father was, he just took Chloe in, like his own."

"Yeah, well, if I could see it. You know, stranded on the road somewhere and all, I might think different, but this, this is like I gotta be responsible for something I didn't even want in the first place. And it worries me still, that I'll feel nothing even if it is mine, just because Nancy had something to do with it. I don't like her, Oliver. I just can't stand her."

"Well, what I think you really need is just some baby-time. Maybe you could talk to Max and Chris, sometime. I bet they'd be happy to let you hold Chloe." Oliver nodded.

Dayton sucked in a breath. He wasn't so sure he had the nerve to see Chris with Max. It still hurt, and he didn't know why.

some kind of wonderful

2009-04-27T02:22:00.006-05:00

It was the last thing Oliver expected. Really. Didn't know what he was suppose to do about it, but here Dayton was on his doorstep.

Luckily, Bex was out with some of the ladies she worked with at the library. They'd taken her out on a field trip of sorts to go to the old market and a couple of quilt shops. His luck, she'd show up in a wheel chair full of presents. But as it was, she'd just left, and it felt like a lovely day to him to perhaps do some art. One form or another. He needed some time to think about it, and here Dayton shows up.

"You been watching the house or something?" How had he known when to drop in? Dayton seriously knew he and Bex had issues, didn't he?

"No." He just shrugged and came in. "Its just-"

"Just what?" Oliver offered him the last of the coffee and he took it.

"She's at it again." He said so solemn as if it had hurt his feelings, but he didn't want to let it show.

"Who?" Oliver looked at him, trying to imagine what Bex had done now.

"Nancy."

"Nancy?" Oliver winced.

"She's taking up all of Geoff's time." Dayton's bottom lip pouted just a bit.

"Sorry to hear that." Oliver cleared his throat and put out the chocolate chip scones. "What do you mean, exactly?"

"Who knows." Dayton slouched down at the kitchen table stirring his coffee. "Shopping probably."

"Then why don't you go with them?"

"Can't." His lip twitched a little as he just stared at the cup of coffee now loaded with cream and sugar. "Geoff says I make her nervous. He's afraid her blood pressure will get high, some shit like that. And you know, it might be my baby she's carrying and all. It really sucks."

"Yeah, I guess it would." Oliver sipped his coffee.

"So I got all this free time, and I thought I'd see what you were doing?" He sighed and finally drank his coffee then.

"I didn't know, you know-"

"I always liked you." Dayton sprang on him then which took Oliver by surprise.

Oliver cleared his throat not sure what to say. He grabbed a scone then and stuffed it in his mouth.

"I kind of had a crush on you."

Oliver's scone fell out of his mouth and he coughed the rest up.

"Are you doing this to me on purpose?" Oliver looked at him... then the mess he'd made.

"No." There was a great silence as Oliver went to get the trash can and put the scone out of its misery. "Its just if you'd been a girl then- then- you should have been a girl."

Oliver winced back at him. "What are you trying to tell me? I need a sex change."

"No." Dayton squinted. "You're not manly, you know. If you had been, then, well- I like that Geoff can grow hair on his face. I wish I could. God, he's so damn hairy and he's a man, you know."

"You're confusing me." Oliver squinted more thinking this was the strangest conversation he'd ever had with anyone.

"Its just you're the kind of guy I always thought was gay."

"But I'm not."

"Duh. Jesus, you live and breathe Bex, and she doesn't even care." Dayton told him. "I just wish I could be more like you. You're so damn happy about everything. You go out of your way to show you care, and I just can't seem to make friends."

"I guess." Oliver looked at Dayton. "Its never easy. It isn't. Who ever you are or what you are. You just wait. And hope if it, whatever that might be, finds you, you try to make the best of it."

"But you've got this-this something. That I don't have, and if you could teach me, I'd be your new best friend. I would." Dayton promised.

Oliver sighed and just shook his head. "Maybe you already have it, and don't know it."

"Huh?"

Oliver couldn't help but smirk then.

in the garden

2009-04-24T01:43:00.004-05:00

Nancy hated the fact that she enjoyed Geoff's company so much. She didn't want to. It wasn't really going to get her anywhere. Unfortunately. But he was so nice, and he really wanted to know about her. She couldn't remember the last time she'd met anyone like that.

She remembered the boy across the street when she was eleven. He'd been so enamored with her, and she'd treated him like a dog for the most part. Because that's what he was. He was chubby and smelly and walked around just waiting for her to say anything. She felt a little bad that she'd been so mean to him now because he was fat. Now she was fat, and she hated the fact that everyone had to stare at her stomach. Something was going on with her. Everyone knew. If that wasn't enough, her mother had to buy her loads of silly maternity clothes. Couldn't she have gotten anything cool? No, her mother wanted her to be cute with cherry smocks and clothes that couldn't make out her shape at all. She felt like a tent now.

"What's the matter?" Geoff asked while he was out digging in the dirt between his house and the barn while she was setting their slurping down a limeade from Sonic. Nancy felt sure she probably shouldn't even be drinking this, but it was good. "Are you feeling, OK?"

"Yeah, I'm great."

"Sorry, I'm boring you." Geoff packed down the plant's roots in the rich soil with his hands. Nancy had no idea if that was a cantaloupe or a green bean plant.

"No," she shook her head, "Not at all."

"What are you thinking then?" Geoff stopped what he was doing and walked over to her who was on the garden bench . He sat down next to her.

"You don't really want to know." She sighed and slurped more on her big drink.

"Yes, I do."

She sighed then and looked back at him. "I'm thinking how pathetic I'm going to look in my new wardrobe at work."

"Oh." He chuckled.

"How could she do this to me?" She squinted.

"You're her little girl." Geoff told her.

"Thanks."

"Where would you want to look for clothes?" Geoff nudged her then as if they were friends.

"Target." She squinted. "You think I'm selfish, don't you?"

"Did I say that?"

"I'm suppose to be happy with what I've got. I know. I don't want to be a beggar." She told him.

"Maybe you could find you one or two pieces there and then the rest you could find at Good Will or some place and you could just see if someone could use what you have now."

"Yeah, to make curtains out of." Nancy sighed.

Geoff laughed then.

its a start

2009-04-23T02:09:00.001-05:00

Geoff finally got Nancy out of the house at her parents. She would be starting part-time back at the office where she worked. Luckily, her Dad talked somebody into it. Geoff couldn't be sure how happy Nancy was about that, but he knew she needed to keep busy.

"You're looking great," Geoff told her as he drove them over to the nearby gardening center.

"Yeah, right." She was really starting to show now. Of course, one would think she was the baby from the frilly maternity clothes her mother had bought for her. She had her blond hair pulled up in two pony tails, looking like something from a kid's TV show.

"You think you'll be ready to get back to work?"

"I guess." She shrugged looking more blue than he remembered.

"I don't suppose you'd want to plant a vegetable garden with me?" He then asked as they found themselves in the hot house where all the flowers were.

"I never tried before."

"Maybe you can find some vegetables you like." Geoff smile pointing to a tomato plant growing upside down in a bag that you could hang from above.

"I don't like tomatoes." She frowned.

"I take it you won't be going vegan anytime soon." He found some egg plant and squash plants then to put in their wagon.

"What are you talking about?"

He didn't answer, but smiled. "Maybe you and Dayton are just too much a like."

"I guess." She shrugged as if Geoff wasn't suppose to mention his name.

"You know, he's really been working pretty hard, lately. This stuff with the P.S.A.'s have really taken off. He's been even speaking at schools."

"Isn't that just fantastic," Nancy said rather cynical as they walked down the rows of flowers.

"Did you find any flowers, you like?"

Nancy picked up something vaguely looking like a wild daisy of some sort.

"Sneeze weed." Geoff told her as he put it along with the vegetables.

"Sorry." She frowned.

"If its a weed it should grow really good." Geoff shrugged and went on. He supposed he better get her something to eat before the real job started. Planting the garden.

the real deal

2009-04-21T01:32:00.005-05:00

Dayton hadn't thought it would come up so suddenly, but it had. The commercial.

"Shouldn't I be, you know, put through more coaching or whatever?" God, he didn't know what to say. It was just lights. Camera. Action. Take off your shirt. Again and again.

Was this really a spot for staying drug-free? He had to wonder. He didn't have to say anything.

"Just act natural." The director started barking after awhile. Dayton seriously wished he'd done a part or two. Even played an extra in one of Tony's plays. Something to get him ready for this. He really felt a bit insulted, but he didn't let it show. He just kept trying to do his best.

Don't look at me. Just act like you're high.

This was making Dayton moody. He just wanted to get it over with. After awhile, he thought it best not to listen at all, but to remember. Remember how it used to be. When he did smoke pot. When things were better off then, when he was alone and didn't have so much to worry about.

But there he was with all those stupid T-shirts on. Taking one layer off at a time, getting down to the last one and putting on the hoodie with the arrow pointing up.Then walking out the door.

"Hadn't this been done before," he winced after the final take was done.

"Yeah, but we wanted to do a local one, you know, for the personal recognition." Somebody told him on the set at the University where the commercial was filmed.

"Personal recognition?" Shit, he thought, what did they have planned for him next? He looked at the folder they handed him. He'd have to give a talk at schools about the perks of being drug-free.

"Its just a start, you know." The lady with the thick reading cat glasses told him. "You might even move on to other things."

"Other things?" Dayton winced.

"Anything else you're willing talk about?"

Did he really want her to know? Dayton sucked in a breath wondering if he should keep his mouth shut about that. In fact, he'd almost forgot about it, himself.

"I have herpes," he then said.

"We could work with that. We need more PSA's on STDs." She told him.

Dayton just nodded. This wasn't exactly what he'd wanted to be the poster boy for.

a choice

2009-04-19T01:42:00.003-05:00

Oliver was glad Bex was back on her feet. Well, she didn't have to lug around in those boots. Not that she was ready for a marathon, but still it was great to see her legs.

"Are they too pale?" She sat with them sticking straight out on the livingroom couch.

"Kind of hard to tell," He had to stop himself from laughing. "You gotta forest growing down here."

He got out something that was suppose to take the hair off legs. It was a bit like sand paper. He'd gotten it for 9.99 at Walgreen's. Of course, he rubbed her ankle for a bit and nothing. Nothing really happened except to dry her leg out more.

"I think we'll stick with what we got." He sighed.

Oliver imagined taking a bath with Bex just to shave her legs then. Only he couldn't say he could actually reach her legs to shave them if he was sitting behind her. It was best just to get a wash cloth and some warm water. Find his shaving cream and get to work.

So after getting the essential laid out. He went to work on her ankles.

"That tickles." Naturally, she was jumpy.

"Just hold still." He looked up at her, thinking she might kick him in the face. Wouldn't that be lovely? A trip to the hospital. And what would she say. 'I kicked my husband when he tired to shave my legs.'

At this point, Oliver thought anything was possible.

Finally she relaxed, and she didn't watch so he could get the legs shaved.

"Beautiful," he said afterwards. "Just beautiful."

"Really?" She took a peak then.

"Of course."

"Honestly, you are a jack of all trades." She told him. "How did I get so lucky?"

Oliver looked at her dreamily. He was sure he wouldn't be doing half of this stuff if it hadn't been for her. Naturally, he couldn't say it was out of inspiration. Just out of problems that came up, and he did his best to solve them.

Oliver yawned then.

"I think you should go to bed early." She shrugged. "I can heat myself up some leftovers. Make myself a sandwich."

'I know, but let me, OK. Then we can go to bed together." He got up then to put the wash cloth in the hamper and shaving cream and razor in the bathroom. "I just want to do as many things with you as possible." Somehow, that never got old to him.

there is a place

2009-04-17T01:12:00.001-05:00

Max was frazzled. He'd had a 12 hour shift before his two sermons Easter Sunday. Then going to Chris' family Easter dinner was no picnic. He had to be up on his game, so to speak. Naturally, all those sisters of Chris' laughed at about anything he had to say. They kept him smiling.

The men on the other hand, well, it was a little odd. They really didn't want to have anything to do with him. Which was just fine with Chris.

"You wouldn't want to go hunting with them, anyway," Chris told him. "Its amazing no one has gotten hurt yet."

"Why do you say that?"

"If its not the alcohol, its the bickering and they're lazy." Chris summed it up. He wouldn't be caught out on a hunt with them.

"But its Easter, they wouldn't be out to kill a bunny, would they?" Chris was frightening him about these men his sisters were married too.

"Oh, they'll kill anything that moves. Stan's a taxidermist."

"I didn't know they did that anymore." Max just said then on their drive home that day from the dinner.

And soon after that he napped until he had to go to work at the hospital. As it was, he had an hour to come up with a sermon for next week. It was quiet time. Chris was out with Chloe and the time was ticking. And nothing. Nothing.

Maybe it was the slight threat that some day someone would open their mouth about him and Chris and they'd tell them to move to Iowa so they could get married, and they could just stay in that gay lov'n state. A part of him wondered if he and Chris should make the move. Of course, Iowa wasn't marrying anyone quite yet. He was sure some would put a stop to it before it ever actually happened. It was riling up some religious leaders there as well as here. Max had to wonder just how long Iowa could have same sex marriages.

Did they get out now before anything bad happened. What if somebody burned the church? Maybe it was time find another preacher to take his place. Perhaps he didn't justify being a pastor. Perhaps someone could come in here and get the ball rolling on so many projects needed.

It was getting to Max. Perhaps Serenity wasn't what he'd hoped it would be.

at the moment

2009-04-14T02:33:00.002-05:00

Geoff was amazed that Dayton was keeping his cool about this. Of course, it meant for him taking a day off of school to get this all situated with Nancy. As it was her parents were kind of cool about everything. Of course, there was a lot they didn't know. Perhaps the fact that Nancy and Dayton weren't really together. Perhaps the gradual realization would come, but at the moment, all was calm. Everything needed to be calm.

She was going to stay with her parents for a while since she really need someone to look after her to keep her on bed rest for a while. Geoff was just there to help move her stuff out of her place to put in storage for the most part.

"Maybe now I can find all my games," Dayton mentioned to Geoff.

"That's the only thing on your mind right now?" Geoff wasn't sure to laugh or be pissed. As it was Dayton wasn't talking much about Nancy's baby at all.

"Shit no, I got that commercial to do, you know." He looked at Geoff.

"Oh, yeah, that's right." Geoff loaded more boxes into the bed of his pick-up truck. Dayton lifted boxes too. They worked for another hour or so in silence getting all over to the storage place.

"So why did you really, say what you said to Nancy?" Geoff wanted to know on their drive home.

"Maybe I don't want to be right anymore, OK." Dayton told him. "I don't want it to be my fault that something happens to Nancy. Actually, I never even thought about it like that. I didn't."

"She's probably not taking care of herself," Geoff told him. "That's probably the real reason why she's not doing well."

"She certainly never took care of herself when I was around, that's for sure." Dayton shrugged. "She liked to go to clubs and get drunk and be an idiot. Then throw up. I can't think of her eating anything like you make me eat."

"What a pair you two make." Geoff looked over at Dayton and smirked a bit.

"No. No.. don't say that. Don't go there." Dayton shook his head.

"Maybe she can move in with us when school is out." Geoff said.

"What?" Dayton winced.

"Well, her folks think you two are still together, you know." Geoff shot him a look.

"God, are you crazy?" Dayton squinted hard.

"Maybe by that time, her parents will know everything and well, we can be there when the baby comes." Geoff was serious.

"That sounds like a real nightmare to me."

"So you want to just move in with her at her parents?"

"No." Dayton grimaced.

"That's the best I can come up with at the moment." Geoff took their turn down the farm road then. It wouldn't be long til they got hom.

just a tidbit

2009-04-13T03:56:00.004-05:00

"Your family is so fun," Bex said at the circulation counter, standing on her own two feet as she leaned over to take a look at Chloe in her stroller. "I'm so glad they invited us over for Easter."

"I'm not sure fun is the word I'd use," Chris was solemn about it.

"Well, you have to so grateful that they wanted you and Max there and us too. You guys just have a closeness, you know. You have to appreciate that." Bex told him.

"Well, yeah, but it can be a little too close for comfort, sometimes." Chris sighed.

"You know they love her," Bex looked at Chloe who was playing with a toy bunny she got at Easter. "It was just so nice that Oliver could relax a little. I know he would have cooked up a storm. I'm glad he didn't have too."

"Well, you must be happy to be back on your real feet again." Chris smiled as Bex walked around to have a better look at Chloe.

"Yeah, no more casts. Look at me," She made a silly laugh then. "It actually feels like spring now."

Chris just nodded.

She put her hands on her hips and got Chris to walk with her out to the children's area where they could be alone.

"I have a confession to make," Bex then looked at him.

"Shouldn't you do that at church or with Max?" Chris remained even lipped.

"I have to tell someone." She sighed.

"What is it?"

She picked up a board book then and handed it to him as if she were helping him with something.
"See, when I was so bored at home, I got to looking on Craig's List." Bex told him.

"OK." Chris nodded as if he was following.

"Well, I came across something rather unusual." She stared at Chris as if it might be something he'd want to see. "I think someone is stalking Oliver."

"What?" Chris almost laughed. "That sounds out there, you know. What do you mean?"

"They write things about him. You know, what he said to them. Their romantic conversations according to this person... when in fact he was just saying things like 'have a nice day' and when this person needs to bring back their books. Its just I don't know if its a man or a woman."

"You think its a man, don't you?" Chris nodded.

"I dunno." Bex looked at him frustrated. "Could be some tween girl for all I know. It could be anybody."

"Well, I'm sure its nothing. You know, its probably nothing." Chris assured her.

"Yeah, I know, but what if its not. What if it turns into something else?" She hugged what she could of herself.

"Like you need to worry about this stuff." He looked at her bulging belly then. It could hardly hold still.

"I know. I won't. I just had to tell someone, OK."

"Its OK," Chris smiled. "You can talk to me, anytime."

Bex just smiled. Really, it felt good to have family to talk too. She felt closer to Max and Chris more than she thought possible.

even so

2009-04-10T01:10:00.004-05:00

Dayton sat in the chair next to Nancy's bed, chewing on his thumb nail. There was nothing better to do.

It had been weird, seeing her so out of it and then on the floor. He'd seen her drunk before, but he knew she wasn't drunk. This was different. Even past freaky. And he hadn't even seen it coming. Really, he didn't think it could get this complicated. Just because of him.

Out of all the sterile environment around him with the pale walls in the dimness, his throat felt so raw. He didn't know what else to do, but cry. He covered his hands over his face then. Had hearing the news sent her over the edge. Well, he should definitely stay away from women. He most certainly knew that now.

He bit his upper lip then as he looked over at Nancy who was asleep. Dayton knew just any moment she'd wake up and scream, "You Asshole!" But her eyes barely fluttered and she looked really nice like that, but then he got a cold chill. He didn't want her dead, either. She was breathing. All the monitors were hooked up. The baby's heart was beating just fine. Everything was so alive and well, he guessed. As much as he could decipher. She didn't have something that was horrible sounding, preeclampsia, but she might if she didn't take care of herself.

Dayton picked at his thumbnail again. He looked over at her hand free of the monitors and such. He stared for a moment at his own and slowly put his hand on top of her hand. She moved slightly and looked up at him.

"I've been thinking," Dayton sucked in a breath then. "That, that maybe that baby is mine, you know, and its just one less thing for you to worry about." He just nodded. "You and I both know who's gonna make the better parent in all this, right?" Dayton found himself almost. "Its neither one of us. Its just you gotta finish this when its time, and I don't want to make you miserable anymore. I don't."

He held on to her hand. She didn't need to say anything at all.