Terra Es, Terram Ibis
 

MICHAEL:

Dad has his faults, but his cooking isn't one of them.

Not especially since he started watching the Food Network. I mean, I don't get into it, but I sure do love the results.

Whatever he's got working, it smells awesome.

Of course, I can start salivating within a block of Burger King, for Christ's sake, but still...

I bet Les is gonna be mighty surprised. I think she was expecting to get fed takeout or another night at the Greeks.

I just hope it's not so tasty she's gonna think about staying.

I mean, the weird thing is, I'm not sorry she's here. I mean, she's nice to Kelly, as nice as Les can be to anyone, and she really hasn't been all that bad to me...considering...

I just don't want her to stay. So long as she heads back to NJ tomorrow, and only turns up once in a while, I'm okay.

Plus I want my damn bed back.

Right now, Dad's got it all together...he's got that timing thing down pretty good now, too. Used to be, when he was first doing it, the dishes would all come out the wrong times, or we'd eat like one thing, then the next thing would come out, but he's gotten past that. Now everything comes out together.

We're just hanging in the living room, me and Kelly and Les and Dad, Dad and Les are having elephant piss, Kelly and me are going for the gusto with classic Coke...

Almost like we're normal people.

Weirdness.

What's real weird is, everybody laughs. We're all here, and we laugh. I think the last time that happened, Les and me were real little.

Of course, everybody's laughing at my expense right now...they're recounting my clothes-trying on woes from the Gap, and Dad and Kelly and Les think it's
hilarious.

What the hell. I always say, fuck 'em if they can't take a joke.

And this time the joke's on me, but I might as well laugh. Everyone else is.

God, would things be like this if they didn't happen the way they did?

I have no idea.

But being right here right now is okay.

So long as I don't think how Kelly looks in a pair of Daisy Dukes.

Now THAT would be embarrassing.
 

I never had cheese souffle, and neither did Kelly, but we both like it. Les says she's had it and tells Dad it's wonderful.

Nothing like buttering up Daddy. I wonder what the hell she wants.

Not that she'd have to work hard at it. I mean, he's got a real soft spot for Les. She's his daughter. What do you want?

I bet if I had a daughter, I'd have a soft spot for her, too.

Especially if she looked like Kelly...

Whoa. Back up there, boy.

You and Kelly are NOT having kids. You're too young, too broke, and too uneducated. At least right now.

And make sure when you do it, they're not crawling from the wreckage.

Les and me, we're still crawling from the wreckage. We will be probably for a long time, too.

But I don't think she hates me so much anymore. Not like she used to when we were growing up.

I still think she's a bitch.

But I may be able to confess in public that she's my sister and not die totally of embarrassment.
 

Dad does this every fucking time.

He makes this killer dinner, you eat to where your jeans are bursting, you don't have room for another mouthful...and then he brings out dessert.

And he KNOWS I can't resist dessert.

I don't care if I'm borderline exploding. Show me something sweet, I'll eat it.

And it's raspberry pie. Oh God. His is just too awesome for words.

I mean, he does like this crust that you eat it, it just melts, it's real buttery...and then it's got this tart filling, and tons of it...throw on some vanilla ice cream, and you've got this amazing mix of tart and sweet and hot and cold...the closest thing I get to an orgasm that doesn't involve Kelly.

Not that I'd mind an orgasm with Kelly.

I'm watching her nibble on pie and ice cream. She has the sweetest mouth.

And I know some other things that mouth can do.

I wonder if we can sneak out and have another helping of dessert.

At her house.
 

We finish up, Dad makes US do the dishes. Says he cooked, he doesn't have to clean.

That's always his excuse. I end up doing the dishes a lot.

Maybe this is why there's always so many used ones in the sink.

Of course, there's really no point in doing them until you need them, right?

I tell Dad I got to take Kelly home...I might hang out there a little while...

He says, fine, whatever, go.

I mean, I know my sister's here. But I spent the whole day with her, and most of last night...

Let him deal with her for a while.

Besides, she's been drinking, and I notice after a couple drinks, she gets a lot snarkier. I don't know how many more she'll have, but if she gets smashed, I'm betting she's a mean drunk.

She's capable of inflicting enough damage when she's sober.
 

We get to Chateau Langly, and Ally and Langly are both sleeping on the sofa. Miranda's waiting for Jesse to come get her, they're going to some slasher flick.

I'm kind of surprised that the dog doesn't come and knock us down. Usually, Tiny sees me, she's all over me.

I don't even see her right now.

Kelly notices this, too. Tiny likes her a lot, not the way she likes me, but she still likes her, and Tiny pretty much wants to love everyone to death. 75 pounds of lap dog.

I ask Miranda if she's seen the dog, and she gets all huffy, says something like she's not on Tiny watch.

That girl is such a bitch sometimes.

Kelly and me check around the living room and dining room...no Tiny.

And she's not out back. She'd be jumping around and running after us if she did.

Did somebody lock her in the offices? I check, no dog.

Sometimes Tiny goes in Kelly's room. She's not there.

We check Miranda's room-the one room on the planet that's messier than mine-and Ally and Langly's room and the photo lab and the bathrooms.

We finally find Tiny in the laundry room.

And she's shaking, and her head's bobbing, and her eyes look all weird.

And she puked, too.

Oh man. Tiny's sick. Shit.

And I don't know much about dogs or medicine, but I do know when somebody looks bad...and Tiny looks real bad.

I got to tell Langly and Ally about this. They're not gonna be happy.
 

"Langly." I shake him, and he groans and wraps himself real tight around Ally. She's spooned inside him, so they can both fit on the sofa.

Let's see them do that when she's nine months pregnant.

"Langly. Get your useless ass up."

He mutters something to the effect of 'fuck you,' and puts his face in Ally's hair.

"Langly, your dog is sick!" I hate to be so rude, but I don't think being subtle ever worked with Langly, and I don't think it's gonna work this time.

Ally hears the words 'dog' and 'sick' I think, and she wakes up first. "Wha-you said the dog was sick?" She's still groggy.

"Tiny looks real bad."

"Okay, okay." She swings her feet off the sofa, but she doesn't wake up her useless husband. Which she should.

"She's in the basement."

Ally goes down first, and Kelly and me follow her. I try to stay close to Ally, she's pretty sleepy and I know she's not feeling too great lately.

"In the laundry room."

We cleaned up where Tiny'd puked, but since we went to get the First Couple of the house, she did it again. Ally strokes Tiny's real soft ears and she's like murmuring to her, and then she starts to cry.

"She needs to go to the vet. Let me get Langly."

Maybe she'll have better luck than me.
 

He comes stumbling down the steps with his hair everywhere. A newly woken up Langly is a scary sight. Ally's with him. She's crying.

He talks real soft to the dog. He asks me to help get Tiny out in his car. Ally tries to help and he yells at her to go back upstairs, and this only makes her cry harder. I mean, I know he's worried about her, but he shouldn't scream at her, just because he's stressed.

Okay, he's not just a little stressed. He's major stressed.

Still. Ally didn't deserve that.

She wants to go with us, it's her dog after all, Tiny's been hers since Miranda was a baby, but Langly tells her she's gotta stay home. I think I actually hear her mutter 'bastard,' but it's sort of hard because she's crying so much.

Kelly says she'll stay with Ally. Which is probably good. Ally looks REAL upset.
 

Animal emergency is in Reston, which is kind of a drive, but at least they're open 24/7.

Tiny's doing way worse when we get there. She can hardly breathe.

Oh God. I feel like I'm gonna cry. I love this dog. She liked me when nobody else did.

She's a real nice dog, too. To everybody.

She's a real old dog, too. Fourteen. Almost fifteen.

The vets on call look her over. They think she had a stroke, but they got to do some testing and stuff, observe her overnight.

I hate leaving her here. Least when I was sick, I had everybody I cared about all around me. And that was good.

Langly doesn't look so happy, either. In fact, he looks like shit.

I tell him to give me his keys.

The fact that he doesn't argue with me scares the hell out of me.
 

The Corolla's pretty sweet. I wouldn't mind if he sold this one to me for a buck, either.

Fat fucking chance. This car actually works.

Hate to say it, but I actually feel sorry for the passenger. He's really got it coming at him. I mean, his wife's on the sofa, he's not getting any, the dog is sick, his sister...

Dad says she's dying.

Fuck. I know how much he loves her. He was like so happy when she came to see him...and now, she's gonna go again...this time for good.

No wonder the dude looks like shit.

And he did suck down a few beers last night.

I ask him if he wants to go shoot some pool, he says no, he's gotta go home to Ally.

I don't think the dude needs to go home right now, but hey, it's his car. So we head back to Alexandria.
 

Kelly and Ally are on the sofa. Looks like Ally's pulled herself together a little, she looks sad but she's not crying anymore. I look over at Kelly, Kelly mouths like, she's okay.

Ally gets up to hug Langly, and he just hangs on to her, she on to him.

She and Kelly, they wanna watch 'You've Got Mail.'

I'm definitely not in the mood for that kind of movie. Maybe if they were gonna watch 'Friday the 13th'...

I tell Kelly I'm gonna go do some work in the office, she says go ahead, I promise her I'll bring candy after the movie. She giggles.

Only thing I hear Langly say, I think, is 'love you' into Ally's hair.
 

I got so much work to do and even though it's summer vacation, I'm still behind. And I got to start class in another week and go back to tutoring-shorter time, but it's still gonna be a pain in the ass keeping up.

I'm looking at some memos from some pharmaceutical company execs when I hear the locks come undone and the security code being punched in.

It's Langly. At least a shadow of the dude I think I know as Langly.

"How's it going?" I ask him.

"It's not." I expect him in a way to bite my head off-and in some weird fashion, I keep hoping he will. It'd mean at least he's feeling half normal. Got some fighting spirit left in him.

He hasn't got any tonight. When he says that, he just sounds worn out.

Christ, he's only 37. That's only twelve years older than me.

He sits down at his workstation, which is next to mine, and he's just sitting there with his knees pulled up to his chin and his arms around his legs, which is how he sits when he's real bummed.

"Wanna talk about it?" I ask him, figuring that mostly, he'll say no. He's not shy about bitching about stuff, but sometimes when he's real down, he won't say much.

No answer.

"Sorry about everything, dude," I tell him. And I am.

"Just a real shitty day, that's all."

Uh-huh. Sort of like saying, getting shot hurts a little bit.

"How's Ally?"

"She's okay, I guess. She pulls herself back together pretty good. This is hard, though. She's had that dog forever. And I think she's kinda mad at me for not letting her go."

"Well, it's not like she could pick up the dog."

"Yeah, I know, she knows, I feel real bad about this. I mean, she hates being stuck on the sofa all the time. I know she does. And it's like I feel guilty about 'cause I got her this way."

"She got herself this way, too. Takes two."

"Actually, in our case, took about a dozen." He barks this harsh laugh. "God, I didn't know I was gonna worry this much..."

"Whaddya expect? You're gonna have a new kid! Bet I'd be worried, too!"

"Your dad says it comes with the territory."

"So when did he say he stopped worrying all the time?"

"He said he'll let me know when it happens, but not to hold my breath. And you're like 25, Junior. Jesus. Course, you were my kid, I'd probably have to kill you or go insane."

"Thank you, asshole."

"Yeah, I'm the king of assholes lately. Christ. I'm at work this week. I got this project. I bust hump to get it done, and I'm like, I know I'm a space cadet right now, so I make this extra effort to make sure I'm thorough. And it's good. It looks real good when I'm done. So what does my fuckrag boss do? He comes and chews my friggin' ass off 'cause I forgot to initial two pages! I mean, Jesus fuck, two pages, my initials, it's a fucking capital crime with him! And he's like, are you gonna be this way just 'cause your wife's pregnant, you got responsibilities, when are you gonna grow up and deal with 'em? I mean, all this because I didn't initial two fucking pages! I get the dressing-down of a lifetime! Which wouldn't be so bad, 'cept he starts hassling me about my hair, which I know is going south, I'm surprised I got any left after this week, like I could do something about that! And it's my fucking fault I got gunboats for feet? I mean, Jesus! What the fuck does he want me to do? Have plastic surgery on my feet? He rags on me about my Docs, for Christ's sake, 'cause they're, in his words, 'yuppie combat boots'!"

"Langly, that's probably the first and only time anyone ever called you a yuppie!" I got to laugh a little. And actually, his mouth sort of crooks up over that one.

Score one for Frohike Junior. I actually got him to smile a tiny bit.

"God, I miss Sheridan. I keep saying I'm gonna find out what really happened to him. I promised him, I did, and it's like, everything else keeps getting pushed out in front, and I feel like shit, the longer I wait, the harder it's gonna be. It was so cool working for Sheridan. He didn't give a shit about anything 'cept you did your work and you did it right, and what else you did was your problem. Going to work with him was fun. He used to give me shit, too, but it was different, you know? More like, you knew he was just busting your rocks for fun, and we used to bust his just as bad. Maybe worse. But like, right now, he'd be like so totally cool about
everything, he'd be busting his ass to do whatever he could for me and Ally. He'd do it for any of us."

"So does your boss just hate you, or does he hate everyone?"

"Hates all four of us in the pit. That's for sure. You oughta see the way he bags on Goldie. Just 'cause Goldie's a Jew. Okay, Goldie's a smartass and all, but man, the guy is GOOD. And Nathanson is such a stupid fuck, he doesn't even realize how good the dude is! It's like with Bryce. When he came and starting bagging on us about our hair, Bryce goes and buzzes himself, and Nathanson's like so happy, you think he's gonna give the guy a promotion or something, but then Bryce goes and gets ink done on the side of his head, so now Nathanson's like, he's an asshole again. Hey, I'm not saying we're perfect and all. We're all four of us a bunch of smartasses and yeah, we got this job 'cause we were bad boys. And Sheridan like, he just knew what we did good and he left us alone to do it, and he was always
cool. This guy, everything's fucking procedure and protocol and it's like it's more important to sign your fucking name in the right place than do a great fucking job on a real piece of work!"

"Ain't it fun getting no respect?"

"Oh, yeah, it's a blast." He takes his glasses off for a minute, rubs his eyes. "I saw Joanie today."

"How's she doing?"

"Pretty bad." He's blinking now, and I can hear him swallow, like people do when they're trying not to cry.

"She come clean?"

No words. Just a nod.

"I'm sorry, dude."

"And she wasn't even gonna fucking tell me!" He yells this time. I jump a bit. I mean, Langly yells fairly often, but I just wasn't expecting it this moment.

"Why not?" Seems odd to me.

Then again, I bet my dad would do the same damn thing...

"'Cause she doesn't want me running around and trying to get her into some experimental treatment and making the last months of her life total hell. And she doesn't want me telling her kids, 'cause she doesn't want the prayer goons hanging over her. You know what's so weird, though? It's like, even after all the shit she's gone through, she's like she still thinks there's a God. I mean, she's a Langly for Christ's sake! I think she's gone off the deep end this time."

"Langly, dude, my dad says she's dying...maybe you'd go off the deep end a little bit too."

"Oh, like I haven't, huh?!"

He sounds pissed, but I see that he's got wet eyes behind the glasses.

I turn away, I don't think he'll want me to see.

"Junior, I get everything in the world I want...everything. And what happens? My life turns to shit. You know why?"

"Because life sucks?"

"That, and I'm such an asshole."

Now he's beyond wet eyes. I can see it running down his face.

I put an arm over his shoulder.

END OF PART 18