"Of your own mind; and trying to teach me.
Your tears will teach you."

"Antigone," Translation by Richard Emil Braun, Lines 911-912. Used without permission.
 

ALLY:

I've always been scared to get up and dance in public, at least without the benefit of Jose bolstering my meager courage.

I'm still kind of nervous about this.

Granted, in this place, we're not an oddity. People do dance here, and Langly, well, he's surprisingly good on his feet.

Better than some people I know.

If he senses I'm tensing up, he'll catch me, dead in the eyes, and say, look at me.

And I do. Focus. If you focus, you won't lose step...

"Hey, relax." He's got his face pressed against the side of my hair, and his breath is warm and moist on me. I can tell that my hands are trembling a little against his back.

The song ends. I breathe a sigh of relief. I did it and survived. I drop my hand...

"Hey, where're you going? Stay here." He pulls me back into him, holding my face against his chest. "C'mon, admit it. It feels good."

It does. But my old insecurities threaten to force me into surrender...

He won't, though-and he'd probably dispute it, but he's at least as stubborn as I am.

I recognize the next song. It's Leann Rhimes, 'How Do I Live?'

And how would I?

It's a little easier this time, even though at moments I feel myself getting mildly dizzy. Fear...or lust?

Maybe a little of both.

"Y'see, Ally, I figured it out," he says to me, very softly, a big smile on his face.

"Figured what out?" If anyone has figured anything out, please, tell me, I'd like to know...

"Know what our problem is?"

"I have a feeling your answer and mine are different."

"We don't slow dance enough."

"Really."

"Hey, I'm not kidding." He coughs a little-Christ, isn't he ever going to get over this?-and then presses his face back into my hair, planting a kiss on top of my head. "You gotta admit, girl, it's pretty good."

Yeah, it is.

I keep thinking, I could stay here all night like this with him...just like we are.

Reality check time.

"Langly, I think we should get home to the kids soon. I did tell them we'd be back in time so that Miranda could go out."

"Girl's a regular social butterfly, but yeah, you're right, we need to see 'em." A guilty look crosses his features. "One more, then we'll go?"

"Okay, one more."

It's another sappy country song...and I don't mind at all.

Based on the lyrics, I'm guessing the title is, 'For You I Will.'

Yes, Langly, for you, I will.

Anything.

Just hold me.
 

MICHAEL:

"So what're we doing about dinner?" Les demands.

I didn't know Kelly and me were on food detail, but apparently she thinks so.

"Don't eat here, unless you're an afficionado of death-camp cuisine," Dad warns us. I don't think he eats much.

Christ, he's skinny these days!

Or maybe it's the clothes.

Nope, he's skinny. He's gotta get more meat on those bones, get back to like he used to be.

"I dunno. You buying?" I ask her. Never happen. Les is a poor grad student, and she's cheap, besides.

I'm expecting her to snap back, dream on, fuckrag, but she's like, she actually thinks about it.

"Gonna have to be cheap," she says.

What's this? My bitch of a sister is actually offering to buy us dinner?

What the hell happened to her? Les, if you're in there...

Don't bother coming back out, thank you very much.

"Like how cheap?" There's cheap, and there's cheap.

"Burger King cheap."

Well, it's not as if I never had Burger King for dinner before-hell, are you kidding? For me, it's a dietary staple. Which is why I had to swim so much this summer.

"Michael, go in the cupboard, hand me my wallet." It's Dad.

"You gonna let me have your Visa?" I tease him.

I get this totally withering look. "Not even when I'm in hell, boy." I hand him his wallet, he sort of massages it like, wow, this is part of my real life, I want it back.

Then he grabs 2 20s out of it and hands it to me.

"Take your sister and your girlfriend someplace decent."

"Martha coming back tonight?" I ask him.

"Not tonight, she's on again." He looks kind of bummed about that. "She'll be going home with me tomorrow."

Les gives me this look like, you know something I don't, and you better fucking give, or I'll kick your ass.

I try to signal to her like, later, you idiot. Not here!

"You want us to come back?" Kelly asks him.

Dad lets his eyes wander over all of us.

"Leslie can come back, since she has to leave tomorrow night-"

"I'm staying, Daddy."

"Oh, no you're not." Dad gives her that Dad look.

"Daddy, please," she's whining now.

"No. You're going back to school tomorrow night."

"Daddy, I told you, I don't wanna be a psychologist anymore."

Dad takes this in. Then he glares at her.

"I'm not saying you have to be a psychologist-God knows I'd have a lot less social embarrassment if you didn't-but you will go back, you will finish your dissertation, you'll do your oral defense, and you'll graduate. Then you get to decide. Not before."

I'm waiting for her to start crying or railing on him or both. Believe me, she can work my dad like nobody's business. I mean, she is his little girl.

And she looks real pissed. Les doesn't like him telling her what to do. Hell, she doesn't like anybody telling her what to do.

I kind of know what that's like.

But she just sort of sighs, this big old Les sigh that she's so good at, and looks down at her feet.

"Okay."

I think somebody's putting drugs in her water.

I wonder if I can get them to increase the dosage.
 

We go to a Mexican place that Ally and Langly turned us on to. El Taquito, doesn't look like much outside, and in fact it doesn't look like much inside. But the food-cheap, delicious, and you get lots of it.

I should really watch the lots of it, but hell, I'm hungry, and I haven't been hungry like this since at least last night.

Les is like, I hope they don't serve yellow cheese, I hate yellow cheese. Kelly tells her it's a real Mexican place, they only serve con queso (white cheese, I learned).

"So Les, like what's this you wanna change your major after being a professional student for so long?" I'm wondering what's up with this.

She's thinking. "I don't know. I thought with my practical experience, I'd be a good family therapist-I do have a fairly good idea of how you shouldn't do things. But I started my practicum, and you know what?"

"What?"

"I hate it."

Kelly's genuinely curious-and a little concerned. I think Kelly's thinking, what if I spend all these years in school and all this money, and then I hate what I can do? "What do you want to do instead?"

Les shakes her head so hard her glasses just about go flying. "I have no idea."

"That's my line, Les." I'm joking, but it's lame, and you know what? It's really not a joke.

"Have you told your mom?" Kelly asks, and I see her wince a little-I think thinking about moms is still hard for her. Even though there's no way she and her mom would've probably ever talked about what she was gonna do when she grew up. At least, not like talking about, what do you like to do, what gets your juices flowing?

"Not yet." Les just looks down at the chips and salsa. I'm amazed, she hasn't killed them all. Les can be greedy at the table.

Like I can talk.

"Not gonna spoil her fun for her wedding?" I ask.

"Do you know she won't let me bring Pam?" Les is real mad about this. You can tell.

"That sounds like Mom." Sad to say, it does.

I know if I couldn't bring Kelly, I'd be real pissed.

"I'm thinking about not going."

"Mom'll be bummed."

"But I want to bring Pam."

"It's Mom's day." Yeah, it is. But still. "You want me to talk to her?"

Did I just say that?

I'm really losing it here.

She looks at me real hard and suspicious. "You'd do that?"

"Yeah, why not?"

She chews on that. "It couldn't hurt. I mean, after all, you are the golden child these days." And she sounds kind of nasty about it.

"Hey, Les, I wasn't trying to be her favorite, huh? So lay off. If she thinks I'm cool, I'm gonna let her think it, because it's like the first time she ever has. I mean, I had to listen to her go on about you all those years, about how cool you were and how rotten I was, and all our teachers--"

"Okay, okay, enough!" Kelly holds up her hands in a truce gesture.

"So you want me to talk to her or not?" I ask her.

"If you would." Les doesn't look up.

"Okay. I'll do it."

I mean, no skin off my nose. Right?
 

Food comes, and we sort of get off this topic, which is good. I still think it's kind of weird that my sister likes women, but hey, whatever. She's got someone makes her happy, well, I guess it's no big deal if they're a woman or green or purple spotted.

"Mikey, what's the deal with this lady Martha?" Les asks me between bites of enchilada. With white cheese. She's happy.

"Meaning?" I'm not sure how much I ought to say to my big-mouthed big sister.

"I think Daddy's got a crush on her."

"No shit," I tell her, downing a chunk of chicken burrito. I went nuts and got too much food.

I gotta find time to start swimming again.

"And she's got one on him. Big time."

Les finds this amusing. "On Daddy?"

"Yeah. No accounting for taste, I guess."

"Michael, that's mean!" Kelly slaps me light on the arm.

"Sorry." But not really. There is no accounting for taste. I mean, look at Ally and Dr. Scully already.

"Are they..."

"I don't think Dad's up for a boinkfest, if that's what you mean," I say, downing some rice. I am gonna be so sorry for this tomorrow.

"I meant before he got sick, dummy!"

"Nope."

"You're sure about that."

"I live with him." Not that that means anything with Dad.

"You think they'll..."

"Les, I got no idea."

I wish she'd lay off. I really don't wanna talk about this with her.

We finish up dinner, and I ask Les if she's gonna go back to Rutgers tomorrow like Dad told her to.

She says yes.

Good. I'm not ready for any more strange people in my life. Forget about my house.

We drop Les off with Dad, she can hang with him tonight, and me and Kelly figure we'll go back to the apartment and pop some movies in. Last night we get the place to ourselves before Dad comes home.

Did I mention we were going to watch movies?

We drive off and leave Les to deal with Dad, and Kelly doesn't say anything for a while.

Finally, she gives me this kind of funny look, and then she gets this evil grin.

"Mikey?"
 

FROHIKE:

Finally, I'm being sprung.

Of course I want out of here. Vietnam was worse than this, but not by much.

I want to go home.

And I'm totally nervous about it.

There's the obvious worry that I'll fall ill again. I'm tempted to say, anything like this ever happens again, let me go.

But I won't. For some reason, maybe it's Catholic school, maybe it's 'Nam, I have no idea, I value life and breath, and want more of it. No matter how gruesome it gets.

I'm nervous about recovering from this. What kinds of changes I'll have to make. What things will be different in my life-which will only be everything.

I'd still like to work for Ms. Russell, but I'm probably going to have to restrict what I take on. I want to pay for my son to get an education, but I can only do so much.

The magazine will still be my purview. I may have to take it easy for a while, but I'm not letting that go. Not in this day and age.

How will this change things with my children? How will they regard me? Leslie has only begun to reach back. How will this stilt her point of view?

Thank God Michael didn't go blabbing to her that I was ill. I don't think I could have handled that. She came without the knowledge I'd been seriously ill. I feel better about that.

And Michael. I want nothing getting in the way of his doing well. He needs to figure out what he wants to do and apply himself the way he's begun to already.

He has plenty of distractions.

One, of course, is his relationship with Kelly, although I can't really complain about the results on his grades. I do, however, worry constantly about what could happen should they have a birth control failure-assuming, I hope to God, they're using it, which if I ever find out they're not, I'll kill both of them-or if they decide they can't wait, they've got to get married now...

And while I'm proud of his work on TMB, and I like having him there, I worry that it might be distorting his judgment in picking out a career. I often think that allowing him to work with us was not one of my better decisions. Not everything we do is exactly legal, and the morality of certain things we've done-well, they don't facilitate a good night's sleep, if that's what you mean.

Children. I'm surrounded by them.

I hope that Allison will heed my advice, and that she will be forceful enough with Langly to get him to comply. It's really not hard to get him to comply; she simply has to state herself with some firmness. Which for her is no small task. I don't think they have to become lifelong abstainers-I don't think there's even a chance of it happening. But right now, they need to clear their heads and see each other as they really are.

Byers and Juliet, I haven't even seen their new home yet. I've got to get there, and get them something for a housewarming. Something to let them know how happy I am for them-and I am. I still worry about him; he still has community service to complete, and he's so overworked, and she's still recovering.

I think they can all be all right...but I worry anyway.

I've got to stop doing this. I think it might have contributed to why I'm here.

It's so very strange to have Martha around...someone worrying about me.

I'm not used to it...but I confess that I rather like it.

Not all of her ministrations have been pleasurable-she is a nurse, after all-but all the extra touches she brings to me through her work, they've made this bearable.

I hope she'll still give sponge baths and backrubs.

I wonder if she can cook. I'm afraid I'm going to have to lay low on the cheesesteaks for a while...and as for cooking, well, right now, I feel as if I have very little energy.

This will not, however, stop me from watching Emeril and Julia Child. I know she likes the Food Channel. We've watched it together while we've been here. No, the VA does not have cable...but Langly and Byers managed to rig me up.

I miss the Blonde Boy. He hasn't been permitted to see me with his cold, and I do want to see him.

However, if anyone ever tells him that, I will personally have them hunted down and killed.

I asked Allison one day if he'd cut his hair. She laughed, said he'd rather spend an hour in the morning pinning and tucking and moussing it down.

Maybe that's healthy.

I miss the children, too. I wonder how they all are. Miranda, Shelby, Patrick, the two little Mulders...I miss them all. However, I have to confess, I'm not quite ready for their company yet.

I think the company I want most right now is Martha's. I'm hoping that soon she'll be interested in something other than her clinical duties.

Things like walks, and old movies, and cuddling on the sofa, and...

Frohike, you old dog. You never do give up, do you?

END OF PART 47