Chapter 2

Chapter 2: "You have a kid?"

It’s Christmas Eve, and Danny and I are in the kitchen making our traditional Christmas meal when the doorbell rang. Leaving Danny sitting at the kitchen table, I went to answer the door. Opening the door, I see my older brother- Dean, and my twin sister- Max.

“Hello. Come on in Dean. Max,” I said softly.

“Thanks, Les,” they said as they walked into the house. “It smells good, what are you making?”

“Chicken..covered with lemon flavoring and Italian herbs,” I said softly. “Mashed potatoes, corn, and rolls. What else did you think was going to be here?”

“Nothing,” Dean muttered looking around. I had managed to hide from my family for the past four years, but they just found me around Thanksgiving. They still didn’t know that I had Danny.

Dean and Max were looking around, and Dean’s eyebrows furrowed. “It looks like a child lives here too...”

“Ummm....about that......” I said before I heard a screech from the kitchen.

Ignoring the weird look from them both, I ran from the entrance hallway till I reached the kitchen. Danny laid on the floor, tears rolling down his face- his eyes flooding with them.  Sima, our beautiful German Shepherd, laid by the door, whining.

Danny’s chair was overturned. Sima must have been running through the house again and managed to knock over his chair. I picked him up and gently hummed to call him down. I let Sima out, giving her a swat on the butt.

I turned around and saw both Dean and Max standing there, as Danny clung to me. I felt the shoulder of my t-shirt, starting to get soaked from the tears. The fall wasn’t big, but enough to bruise his sensitive skin.

“You have a child?” Max asked me, emotion lacing her voice.

“You have a child?” Dean echoed.

“What about it?” I snapped heavily.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Max said, her fingers tapping on the counter, as she looked at me.

“Why should I have told you? Your life was still the same without knowing about Daniel. Daniel was better off not knowing about our family, and the pain we feel when we are torn apart. What happened to us when we were little, I don’t want that to happen to Daniel!” I practically snapped at my twin, as I sat Danny down onto a chair.

Max stared at me for a moment, then said, “You named him Daniel? Is it okay if I call him Danny?”

“It is up to him. I have slipped into the habit, of calling him that,” I said simply.

“Mommyyyyyyyyyyyyy!” Danny wailed as if he wanted to quench the tense feelings between his aunt and me.

“What Daniel?” I said, turning to look at him.

“I want down! I wanna play!” he said in his simple sentences.

“Okay. Go on upstairs and let the adults talk,” I told him, as I set him down on the floor, watching him scamper away after his feet touched the floor.

Dean just watched him go and said, “You have quite a handful. Children- I doubt that I even want some of my own.”

“Don’t be such a sour face, Deany. Danny is not that bad, he is just nervous around people he has never met before. I don’t blame him though Dean. You look very scary,” I said leaning against the counter, my eyes partly closed.

“What do yo mean I look scary?” he asked.

“With your dark clothes, that one single color plaid shirt, that is hidden beneath a scarred, dark colored leather jacket. A face that doesn’t smile a lot, and eyes that are harsh because of everything that we see? I wonder what makes you scary Deany,” I replied.

I hear Max snicker as I finished telling him that. Dean’s hands fisted on the counter. He just glared at me, and I simply said, “Telling it how it is, Dean.”

“What ‘bout me?” Max asked, hopping up to sit on the counter, her boots hitting against the cabinet doors.

“Hmm, you dress like me on the days that we go out. A traditional outfit that Danny is accustomed to,” I told her softly. We both had taken outfit ideas from Sam- the pair of jeans, hiking boots, a gray or white undershirt, a multicolored plaid shirt, with a faded denim jacket.

“Well that is a relief,” Max said with a smile, as I pulled her off the counter.

I heard the doorbell ring and said, “Dean go get the door please.”

He groaned as if I asked him to go out and do yard work. “Fine,” he muttered as he walked through the house, to the front door.

In the kitchen, we heard the muted sounds of the conversation. Sam’s deeper voice. Baillie’s soft reply, Dean’s gruff answer. I turned to stir the potatoes and the corn, humming under my breath slightly. I looked up at the three sets of footsteps that walked into the kitchen. Ignoring them, I moved my attention back to the food that sat in front of me. I sprinkled in salt and pepper into the corn and potatoes.

“Hey Les,” I heard in a deep tone of voice- Sam, and then the softer echo of Baillie.

“Hi, Sam. Hi Baillie,” I said as I turned to face them.

“Why are you so distracted today? You never seem so distracted before?” Sam asked me, his green eyes looking at me.

“Oh. I just have a lot of things on my mind right now, I guess. I mean it’s not like I am hiding anything from you guys or anything like that..” I said.

Sam raised an eyebrow with a questioning motion. “Oh.? The way you just phrased that makes you seem guilty of not sharing something with us.”

Baillie just touched his arm and muttered, “Sam... do not make a scene. Leslie just has a lot on her plate right now. It’s not our place to judge.”

“No. Baillie it’s fine. He’s just concerned about his sister, that’s all. But there is someone I think you’d like to meet. Go on upstairs, first door on the right, and please don’t scare him.”

After about an hour later, I called everyone together for dinner. I knew that center of the meal’s conversation would be the fact that I hadn’t told anyone about Danny until this day.