The Dinner; Part 8.5?

Yeah. Whoops. I fucked up. 

I'm not actually sure if any of you even saw it, but I mis-posted late last night. I accidentally skipped one of the dinner scenes. So I've deleted the one I posted (the horror!), and am posting the correct one now. But I'mma call it 8.5 just in case any of you read 9 before I deleted it. I will re-post 9 tomorrow.

Sheesh. No one cares, right?

Anyway. Here's the REAL next vignette for The Dinner!

Enjoy!

*****************

Jonah felt tired and tense and distinctly like a court jester treading a fine, fickle line between pleasing the tyrant king and stepping a toe into the murky area that could lose him his head.

Throughout dinner he was constantly blunting Velvet’s more innocently pointed questions to the couple about living arrangements, honeymoon escapades, how Grey’d proposed, why they’d decided on elopement, and their plans for a family; good God, it might have been comical if he’d been watching from the outside.  It was as if she were blithely and blindly probing directly into the couple’s secret, into the truth behind their sudden nuptials.

And when it wasn’t Velvet’s innocent but accurate probing it was Avalon’s barbed comments and deliberate baiting of her brother that Jonah had to contend with.  His sweet, even-keeled daughter had entered his home this evening on the war-path and he had to admit he felt ill-equipped to handle her at present.  She was behaving like a jealous harpy, and no matter how often he’d diffuse one of her loaded little passive-aggressive comments, she’d charge again with another uncharitable, unfriendly gem.  He was embarrassed that Miss Ramirez was meeting his family like this.

And of course there was Grey’s barely concealed animosity toward him, his resentment at being shackled into this loveless marriage and the fact that he placed the blame squarely on Jonah’s shoulders.  There wasn’t much remedy for that but patience, he supposed, patience and a commitment to helping the boy out any and every other way he could.  He still wasn’t confident that Grey wouldn’t go to Velvet with what he suspected about that awful weekend two weeks prior.  So he’d dedicated himself to playing the part of referee this evening, doing his part to steer conversation toward calmer waters when threatened by the gorgon to his right or by the unwitting siren song of his doe-eyed wife at the opposite end of the table. 

He’d ask about Maggie’s plans for school, Grey’s opinion on the new appliance line; he’d asked about Mr. Ramirez and the restaurant and about Maggie’s younger sister—a topic which proved to be a good detour, one that allowed Velvet to spring off into multiple innocuous tangents, such as: had Maggie had a quinceanos party? And maybe both families could get together for one huge wedding celebration in honor of Grey and Maggie and in order to get acquainted! Of course the last comment had prompted Avalon to suddenly need something from the kitchen and she hadn’t come back for quite some time.

Through it all the twins remained unflaggingly positive and buoyant, and Ben Sinclair proved to be upbeat and kind as well, and Jonah gave silent thanks for having them all at the table.

And then there was Viola.  Who’d seated herself next to him.  Who insisted on moving her knee against his and searching for his foot with her own under the table.  Who pulled her top lower and lower over the course of the meal and who insisted on trying to use her sister’s fiancé as a prop in her little burlesque designed to make him insane with jealousy.  The result was surprisingly effective and he chided himself for it.  Especially because he took one look at poor Ben Sinclair and could really only pity him, so uncomfortable and trapped did he look by the fifteen-year-old’s maneuvering and manhandling.

At one point Jonah pretended to drop his napkin so that he could get close enough to his daughter to send her a discreet but definite warning.  “I want you to stop what you’re doing to your sister’s fiancé, young lady, I want you to stop it and begin to behave yourself like you should.”

It had worked.  In part.  She layed off Ben, which was nice because it freed the boy up to chat with Maggie, and Jonah believed Maggie appreciated the perspective of the only other ‘new addition’ to the Delaney clan.  However, for whatever reason, Viola had interpreted Jonah’s words as a command to pay all due attention on him.  She lavished him with her interest.  She behaved in the cloying, suffocating manner of a teacher’s pet, or worse, like she believed herself to be a geisha or a harem girl. 

Jonah was very glad there was so much going on at the table, so many conversations serving as distraction, that hardly anyone spared Viola a glance all night.

Her foot games became more ardent, and more than once he’d felt a hand below the table, groping around for him.  He’d spent most of dinner twisted awkwardly in his seat to avoid physical contact with her, accidental and otherwise, and by desert he had a pinching ache in his back from the unnatural contortion.

And her eyes rarely left his face.  She laughed heartily at all his jokes, nodded sycophantically while he told anecdotes about Grey’s childhood, her fingers moved suggestively on her utensils, she called attention to her lips and mouth while she ate and the result had Jonah’s stomach churning with nausea and his plate remained largely untouched.

And when dinner was done and Velvet suggested they take desert in the living room while Jonah tended to the clean-up, Viola jumped to volunteer herself as his helper. 

Just as he was ready to fall to his knees and accept whatever punishment the gods had to dole out, rather than put himself in temptation again, rather than allow himself to be alone in the kitchen with her again, to his enormous surprise Avalon ousted her little sister from the job, insisting that she help their father instead.

“Go help Mum with the shortcake.”  She commanded bossily while doggedly gathering up half-empty serving dishes from the diningroom table.  “I need to talk to Dad.”  He heard her hiss when her younger sister whined and needled.

“Fine.” Huffed his youngest before turning on her heel and stomping toward the living room in a temper.

When she was out of sight Jonah felt himself breathe deeply for the first time in hours and the sudden expanding of his lungs caused him to feel dizzy.  He leaned heavily over the table and closed his eyes.

“Dad?”

“I’m fine.”  He said, his lips slack, his voice ragged.

“No you’re not—“  She crossed to him and he felt her small hand on his back. 

He smiled.  And wanted to cry with relief.  It felt like a hand.  Just a hand. It felt familial and harmless and completely unremarkable in any way.  Thank heaven.  He’d begun to fear… had been careful to avoid most physical contact with not just Viola but all of them, just in case.  A peck on the cheek here and there, and otherwise he’d been completely reserved in his normal comfortable expression of affection.

“I am, I’m fine, I just, I think I’m coming down with a cold or something.”  He assured her, gesturing to his barely eaten dinner.

She kept her hand there, on his back, until he pulled himself to standing and met her eyes with a reassuring smile.

“You sure you’re ok?”  She asked, unable to conceal the deep concern in her eyes, despite her admirably controlled expression. 

“Thank you Honey, yes.”  He answered and placed a gentle kiss on her forehead.  He could have crowed with relief at how natural it felt.  How paternal. 

Why in God’s name, or whosever name, couldn’t he manage this with Vi?  He felt another wave of nausea threaten to spill up and out and he swallowed hard against it. 

They moved around the table in opposite directions, she gathering up stemware, and he piling plates.  Avalon couldn’t stand touching people’s used plates, she never had been able to manage the chore without gagging.  They made their first trip into the kitchen in silence, deposited their first load of dinner cargo without a word, and didn’t break the quiet until their second trip in, arms laden with more detritus from their excessively elaborate dinner party.

“She made enough to feed three times the guests here tonight.” Jonah commented with a fond smile.  He loved his wife.  He loved her idiosyncrasies and her adorable excesses and her unswerving commitment to splendid hostess-ing.

“Dad, I’m really sorry about before.”  Avalon said in a less-than-steady voice.

He looked up from his task of scraping leftover morsels into the compost bin and stared at his eldest daughter for a long moment.

“I am too.”  He admitted.

She took a breath and hesitated.

“What’s really bothering you honey?”  He asked gently, resuming his task to take the pressure off her, allowing her time to find her breath and choose her words.

“Grey, I guess.”  She answered.

Jonah pursed his lips thoughtfully and reached for another plate to scrape.  “No, I don’t think that’s it, not entirely.”  He responded, sounding like a scientist pondering a riddle.

“He’s always pulling stunts like this—“  She qualified and he nodded in agreement.

“He does tend toward dramatic gestures.”  He allowed with a weak smile.

“And right before Ben and I are getting married?!”  She began loading the stemware into the dishwasher, needing, like Jonah did, to keep her hands busy with a task.

“Hmmm.”  Commented Jonah pensively.  “I think we’re getting warmer.”  He told her, pulling another plate toward the compost bin.  “What does Grey’s elopement have to do at all with your wedding to Ben?”  He asked gently.

“Errrrr!”  She responded exasperatedly.

Jonah chuckled softly.  “Ava-Bird, you can’t let other people’s actions determine the worth and measure of your own, you know this.”

Having finished the stemware she moved to the pantry to retrieve storage containers for the leftovers.  Jonah always marveled at how Avalon could manage to handle leftovers from serving dishes but couldn’t be persuaded to even so much as look overlong at leftovers on a person’s plate. 

“But now that’s all people will be thinking about at my wedding, about Grey, and his pretty new bride, and how shocking it all was and blah blah blah.” 

Jonah stacked the cleared plates neatly and closed the lid of the bin.  “You have no control over other people.”  He told her as he’d told her a thousand times over the course of her young life.  “All you can control is yourself, and how you respond.”

She lidded the carrots and sighed.  “I don’t feel very in-control over anything anymore.”  She confessed, her lower lip trembling just barely.

He knew how she felt more than he was at liberty to reveal.  “Well, know this: Nobody will be thinking much about Grey and Maggie at your wedding, or about anything else for that matter, because even if this wedding weren’t going to be the biggest event in ten years—“  She rolled her eyes and laughed a little, “Even if you were just getting married in a field somewhere, with no fancy dress and without the flowers and harp music and the five course meal, Avalon—“  He waited until she met his eyes, “Honey, everyone will be captivated by the beauty and love that will be shining from you and the man you love.”  Her face crumbled a bit.  “You understand me?”  He pressed.  “As long as you two are happy and committed and willing to share your love with all your guests, then it wouldn’t matter if a supernova exploded over our heads, all eyes will be on you, all hearts will be with you.  Get it?”

“You’re a romantic.”  She said quellingly.  “You might be sappier than Mum.”

He chuckled.  “I’m a million times worse than your mother.”  He said with a wink, moving to load the plates into the dishwasher when a very peculiar thing occurred.

Avalon began to cry.

Jonah froze.  He was temporarily at a loss.  He hadn’t seen Avalon cry since she’d fallen off the balance beam in high school and broken her ankle.  But there she was, standing in his kitchen, weakly spooning potatoes into a plastic container, and sobbing quietly.

He’d be hard pressed to say who looked more shocked, his daughter or himself.  He shook himself and deposited the plates on the counter as quickly and safely as he could and he went to her.

“I’m sorry!”  She said, obviously mortified at her unexpected condition.

“No, no, no, don’t apologize.”  He laughed, pulling her close.  It was actually something of a relief to see her cry.  Sort of like witnessing a freak occurrence of nature, like comet or a flash flood.  It was humanizing.  Startling, sure, but deeply revealing.  “Shhhhh, shhhh.”  He said, unable to stop chuckling.

“Why are you laughing?!?!”  She choked-out, finally abandoning her half-hearted attempt at storing potatoes and collapsing into his chest, racked with sobs.

“I’m sorry,”  He laughed as he rocked her, “Where’s this coming from?”  He asked her lightly, but she only sobbed harder.  “Shhhh, Oh God, shhh, people are going to think I hit you or something.”  He was laughing deeply now, unable to contain his misplaced merriment.

“Da-ad!”  She wailed, and choked a laugh into his chest.

“Well?”  He demanded, patting her back soothingly and trying valiantly to control his inanity.  “What do you expect?  Someone’s going to walk in here and think I broke your other ankle or something.”

She snorted and then sobbed again weakly.  His shirt was nearly damp through already.  “Shut-up!”  She moaned miserably, but he could hear the smile pulling at her mouth.

“Seriously, what do you think Ben will do to me if he walks in and finds you like this? Hm?”  He put her at arm’s length and shook her a little, playfully.  “He’d take me outside and demand satisfaction!”

Avalon blubbered into a fit of giggles that made Jonah grin from ear to ear.  He gathered her back up against his chest and held her till her giggles and tears subsided.  When once again she was breathing almost normally and he too had calmed down from his bizarre reaction to her outburst, he decided to try again.

“So where’d all that come from?”  He murmured over the top of her head.

He felt her shake her head weakly against his chest.  “I have no clue.”  She said, sounding as if that were pretty nearly true.

Jonah was quiet for a moment, enjoying the comfort of the non-threatening, non-taboo, guiltless human contact.  Enjoying being a dad again. 

“Do you have some concerns about getting married?”  He asked as softly as he could manage and still be heard.

“No.”  She answered forcefully, and pushed against him.

He held her tighter.  “Birdie?”

“No.”  She insisted, but ceased her attempt at escaping his embrace.

“Avalon, there’s no shame at all in feeling confused—“

“Ben is perfect.”  Avalon said in response.  “I’d have to be crazy to have any doubts.”

Safely above her head he smiled sadly.  He remembered this song and dance very well.  He’d been engaged to Velvet for three years before his love had finally felt ready to marry him.  And she’d expressed similar feelings: ‘I must be crazy—you’re perfect, you and Grey are the best things in my life, I love you, I’m sorry, I don’t know what’s wrong with me!’  And he’d been patient.  He’d told her there was absolutely no rush.  That he’d be ready when she was.  And it had taken getting pregnant with Avalon to make her feel ready enough to take the vows.

He didn’t doubt for a second that Ben Sinclair would display the same steadfastness and patience for Avalon.  But Avalon had walked herself right into a hugely public corner.  They were planning the damned wedding of the century, and he supposed that pressure, in addition to all the normal doubts and second-guessing, was causing his girl undue stress.

“You’re perfectly human to have doubts, Honey.”

“I bet he doesn’t.”  She said in a pouty voice.

Jonah wasn’t about to touch that one.  “Do you love him?”  He asked instead, no judgments, no recriminations, just a simple question.

“Yes.”  She answered and it rang true in his ears.

“Does he love you?”

She nodded and he heard a weak “So much.”  Against his shirt.

“If there were a JP here now would you think twice about marrying him?”

“Without a wedding?”  The pitch of her voice shot-up precariously.

“Pretend there’s no such thing as weddings.”  He stipulated.

She was quiet for a long moment.  Then she sniffed.  “I’d do it in a heartbeat.”  She answered at last.

Jonah breathed in deep and then exhaled with a smile.  He kissed the crown of her head and unwrapped his arms from around her.  “If that feels true everyday, honey bunch, then you and Ben will have a long, loving, blessed life together.”

She smiled meekly and he chucked her under the chin.  “Now I am pleased to throw you the wedding of your dreams, but don’t you think for one minute, that if it all becomes too much, that I would even bat an eye if you two ran off to Vegas and forgot about the whole shebang.”

Her expression became one of dire warning mixed with amusement.  “Don’t even put those thoughts anywhere near Ben’s head.”  She leveled.  “He already wants to fast-forward right to the honeymoon.”

Jonah felt his face flush but he didn’t comment, and even managed a mild smile.  “I am sorry about the cottage.”  He said.

She shrugged.  “I’m over it.”

He made a skeptical face and a giggle escaped her.  She never giggled like this, hadn’t since she was in maybe middle school.  It was as if she’d made a conscious effort to become a composed and dignified lady, and she’d decided giggling to be beneath her.  And crying.  And very usually profanity.

It was strangely nice to have all three displays of human foible in one evening.

“Ok.”  She admitted, rolling her eyes and wiping the wetness from under her eyes and across her cheeks.  “But I will be over it soon enough.”

He pinched her cheek lightly.  “That’s my girl.” 

With a heavy sigh he surveyed their lack of progress with the clean-up, and made a mental note of all the items that were still languishing out in the dining room.  “Tell you what.  Finish helping get the leftovers in the fridge and I’ll take care of the rest while you freshen up.”

She swiped again under her eyes and groaned.  “I don’t even wanna know.”  She said gloomily.

“You’re lovely.”  He said, his voice heartfelt.  “People always look more beautiful after they’ve had a good cleansing cry.”

She fixed him with a very condescending look.  “My God, you are worse than Mum.”