A/N: As you may have noticed I was working on the story during Thanksgiving, but I didn’t put out a special chapter. Well that’s where this comes in. I did hint in the Christmas chapter that Spitfire and Andrew’s parents have met, well this is that chapter. After the next chapter we will be all caught up and can proceed without having to double and triple check everything to make sure it matches up. Also I am using this year’s Thanksgiving for the date, which is the 27th.
Chapter 18: Turkey, Pumpkin Pie, and Family. Oh my.
November 24, Briggs residence
I was sitting on the couch with Spits again, we were watching The Smoking Gun Presents… World’s Dumbest Criminals 21, it was an old episode, but it’s still funny as ever. We were just through laughing at an idiot who was trying to steal a big screen LCD from a fast food restaurant then proceeded to accidentally smash it. On the TV the caller ID came up showing my mom’s name and cell number, a split-second later the phone started to ring.
I pressed the button on the remote that put the phone on the TV’s speakers. Technology, gotta love it. “Hey mom,” I greeted her.
“Andrew, how did you know it was me? Oh right, caller ID. I keep forgetting about that,” she said thinking that the last part was not heard by us. Spits stifled a little chuckle. “Is Sam there too? I swore I just heard her.”
“Yeah Mrs. Briggs, I’m here,” Spits replied.
“Sam you know you can call me Madeline. Anywho I’m glad I caught both of you hopefully at a good time.”
“We were just watching TV mom, there's nothing really important going on right now,” I replied.
“Good, good. Well I just wanted to call you guys and invite you both to Thanksgiving dinner.”
“Well that’s awfully nice of you Madeline,” Spits said with sincerity.
“Well thank you Sam. I expect you two the day before. Oh and bring a dessert too,” mom said before hanging up.
“I hope she realizes that it’s a good six hour drive,” I comment.
“So what was that about a dessert?” Spits asked.
“It’s a family tradition, each family member coming to the dinner brings a dessert or side dish to the dinner. Either we’d make it there or bring it pre-prepared.” I paused for a moment, “So do you know any family recipes from back home?”
***
November 26
The Nevada desert rolled by as we drove out of the city. I looked over to Spits a good half-hour in and saw that she was staring out the window with boredom in her eyes. That or it was sleepiness, after all it is eight in the morning.
“Hey Andrew?” she asked snapping me out of my thoughts.
“Yeah?” I replied.
“What’s the big deal about Thanksgiving anyway?”
That was sort of a hard question since the holiday was different for each person of any family. “Well for me it’s a time to get together and eat a shit-ton of food with family. Then we sit by the TV and watch the football game until we pass out into a food coma.”
“A food coma?” she asked with half concern and half confusion.
“You know, where you eat so much you get sleepy?” I replied and she nodded. “Well that’s a food coma, and the most infamous food of causing that condition is turkey, which happens to be the main dish to begin with.”
“Ok that answers the coma part, but how did it all start?”
Come on high school American history, don’t fail me now! “Well it all started in 1492 after Christopher Columbo discovered the ‘West Indies,’ which happened to be the land we now call America. Now years later different nations in Europe started laying claims on different areas of land. The main countries laying claim to this ‘New World’ were the British, French, Spanish, and Portuguese. That’s just the set-up for the Thanksgiving story though.
“So now in 1620 a group of settlers from England that we call the ‘Pilgrims’ left their homeland because of religious persecution and sailed over the Atlantic in search of a new home of religious tolerance that the Church of England did not give. Months passed by and finally they landed at Plymouth Rock in Massachusetts. They started their colony and it was going great, until winter started to come in and they were ill equipped to handle it.
“So the Wampanoag tribesman Squanto showed these pilgrims how to survive by showing them how to catch eel and other aquatic life. The chief of the tribe also donated food to the colony which allowed them to survive the harsh first winter. In return for their kindness the pilgrims invited the tribe to a feast of thanksgiving for everything they had. It even lasted for three days. It wasn’t until President Lincoln made an official day to celebrate it nationwide. Today we still celebrate that holiday with friends and family and be thankful for what we have, regardless of whatever religion we are.”
“That’s quite a story,” Spits said.
“I might have gotten a few things wrong here and there, but that’s how it’s been told for generations,” I replied. “So do you have anything like that back home? I know that Halloween and Nightmare Night are eerily similar.”
She thought it over for a while, “We’ve had family feasts before like on Hearths Warming Eve or on a special birthday milestone, but never a specific day like the one Thanksgiving is on.”
“Hearths Warming is the one that’s in December, right?”
“Yeah it’s our equivalent of your Christmas Eve. The weird thing about Hearths Warming is that it happened in the spring but got moved to winter because of the events in the story take place in a wintery setting.”
“That sounds oddly like how Christmas was too,” I noted.
“How so?”
“Well if you take Christmas in the historical setting as it was written by ancient Christian scholars in the book of Luke, it says that the shepherds were out in the fields at night watching their sheep. They wouldn’t do that in winter since it would be too cold to do that.” I saw the look that Spits was giving me, “Yeah I know that Israel is a desert nation, but it still gets cold at night in the winter there. It turns out that some Christian leader during the reign of the Roman Empire decided to put the holiday on a pagan holiday that ran in December, making it less suspicious and making it less likely for them to be imprisoned by the Romans. Ever since then we’ve been using December to host Christmas.”
“That’s really weird,” Spits commented.
“I know right?”
***
I pulled into the driveway and put the car into park. I look to the passenger seat and see Spits snoring away. To be honest, her snores are kind of cute. I nudge her, “Spits.” Nothing happened, I nudged her again, “Spits,” I said a little louder. “Spits,” again nothing. Time to go for broke, “SPITFIRE!!!” That woke her up.
“WHAT?” she yelled in equal volume.
“We’re here,” I said calmly as I stepped out of the car. I was almost tempted to respond to that with “danger zone.”
“You can be such an ass sometimes,” she snapped.
“What? I tried to wake you up the nice way,” I shrugged. “Come on, my parents are expecting us.” We left the bags in the car and walked right up to the front door and rang the doorbell. I looked back to the driveway and saw that there was one other car in the driveway, and it was not my parents’ SUV. It was one of those really annoying Prius models. I only knew of only one person who drove that.
“Andrew!” a male voice said as he opened the door.
And speak of the devil, “Pete, brother, how are you doing?” I asked rhetorically.
“Ah good,” he said as he allowed us to come inside. He looked at my Evo, “I see you’re still driving that gas guzzling sports car.”
“Really? That’s how you open this whole holiday weekend?” I ask dumbfounded. I lean over to his ear, “You know I can kick your ass six ways to Sunday, so lay off.” He may be my brother, but he’s a total ass.
“And who is this beauty?” he asked as he saw Spits.
“I’m Samantha,” Spits said donning her alias.
“And she’s spoken for,” I added literally shoving Spits wedding ring in his face.
“Oh of course she is, I read the family newsletter, don’t you?” he replies with a snarky attitude.
“Andrew!” my mom exclaimed as she came over and hugged me. It would be a miracle if she didn’t feel the wings hidden expertly under my shirt. “It’s so good to see you here,” she finished as she released me. She then turned to Spits, “And it’s nice to finally meet you in person Sam,” she said as she took Spits’ hands in her own. She then looked Spits over, “I’m surprised that you’re up and about. Going through what you went through you’d think you’d be bedridden for a little bit longer.”
“I guess I’m just a quick healer,” Spits replied with a sheepish smile.
“It seems as though you are. Please, come, sit down and visit,” she said while gesturing to the couches in the living room. “Ooh and I see you brought a desert,” she added pointing to the cooler I was carrying. “I’ll go ahead and take that.” She left the room with it leaving me, Spits, and my ‘holier than thou’ brother in the same room. This was going to be fun, if I don’t shoot him first in the foot.
***
Later that night…
“And here’s your room,” my mom said to us as we come to my old room, which oddly had been redone to be a guest bedroom now complete with a small bathroom. I really hope they didn’t throw away my comic book collection, I had some really good issues in a box somewhere. “Try to get some sleep now, alright?” she said with a wink before walking out. “I know how you newlyweds are,” I could hear her trail off while going to her own room.
We went inside and started to change into our sleepwear after closing the door. “Well that was an interesting day,” Spits said donning her tank top and sweatpants. “Your brother is nice,” she added while stretching her wings out.
“Pfft, when he’s not being ‘holier than thou’ all the time,” I snap back taking off my own shirt and stretching my wings as well. It’s really hard keeping this a secret, I just want to tell my parents so I can walk through the house with my wings out like I do at home. Then again there’s Pete, and he’s a blabbermouth and can’t keep a secret for shit.
“What are you talking about? He seems like a nice guy,” she echoed as she walked into the half bathroom and started to brush her teeth.
“That’s what I’m talking about, he ‘seems’ like a nice guy. That’s fine and dandy, but you heard what he said to me immediately as he answered the door. That my car is a ‘gas guzzler.’ We both know that I took it into the base a month or so ago and got an experimental hydrogen cell engine installed just because we could, I mean I fill the fucker up with the garden hose,” I replied as I too started to brush my teeth.
“Well it’s not like he knew,” she shot back.
We both finished and got into bed, getting comfortable under the covers, “Ok and how is he talking about how he was talking about himself during dinner? ‘I did this,’ ‘I did that,’” I mimicked my brother as best as I could in a whiney sounding voice.
“Well it’s not like we can talk about our work out in the open with people who haven’t signed the agreement that we both had to.”
“He didn’t even let me have a chance to even come up with something to talk about. Not even the drunk bastard I punched when he was getting too rowdy at the bar before I got these,” I gestured to my wings. “What’s even worse is that he was saying how his political views are better than mine. What have I always said?”
“That you don’t talk about religion and politics with family and friends,” Spits recited as if she had heard it many times before, which she had considering I have said that before.
“Exactomundo!” I said loud enough to make a statement, but soft enough to not make a scene. “You know that’s why I joined the military, to protect freedom of speech regardless of whatever you believe in politically or religiously.”
“I thought you did it for the GI Bill of Rights?” Spits asked with a raised eyebrow.
“Ok well it was a little of both, but you get my point.” I sighed, “You know I just wanted this to be a nice little family get together without anything to fight over, even if it is just for a few days out of the year.”
“Well maybe if you talk to him he’ll-”
“You haven’t thought I’ve tried?” I said cutting Spits off. “Years and years of this have gone by and personally I’ve had enough.”
“What if I talk to him tomorrow?” Spits suggested. “Surely he’d be willing to listen to a ‘lovely lady.’”
“Well you’re welcome to try, but prepare for disappointment. He’s usually impossible.” I reached over and pulled the chain on the light. “Night,” I said as I gave her a quick peck on the lips.
“Goodnight,” she echoed back. Soon enough we were both falling asleep.
***
The next morning…
I woke up with a small ray of sunlight hitting my face. I reached over to my phone and saw that it was seven in the morning. Not bad for having no alarms set if I do say so myself. As I get up I’m careful to wriggle myself out of Spits’ embrace around my waist as well as her wings wrapped around me. She has that habit of doing that in the middle of the night. I discovered it the first time we started sleeping together in the same bed. It’s not that I don’t welcome it, but it can be a little bit of what can be described as walking through a minefield without a metal detector. I had to manipulate her fingers and arms as well as the joints in her wings to become limp enough to move oh so very gently. Not doing it right would cause her to wake up.
I went and changed into the workout clothing I brought with me so I could do a little run. I also put my pistol into a small holster behind my back. I know I probably won’t need it, but I’d rather have it and not need it rather than need it and not have it. Some areas are safer than others and it’s been a while since I’ve been in this part of town. Before walking out of the bedroom I covered up Spits’ wings with the blanket so if my parents walked in our little secret wouldn’t be exposed.
I left through the garage, thankfully my parents still used the same four digit passcode for the garage door opener that we used back when we lived with them. I ran a good five miles down the road before stopping at a McDonalds for a cup of coffee before turning around and running back to the house. It took me a good hour and a half to run all ten miles, even with the stop for coffee.
I returned back to the house and walked inside. At the table I saw Spits wearing a bathrobe, a not bad way to hide her wings by the way, sitting with my parents and brother. “Hey Andrew, where’d you go?” my mom asked as she took a drink of coffee.
“Ten mile run,” I replied taking a glass from the kitchen and filled it with water.
“I see you’re still following the routines that the Army drilled into your head,” my brother commented as he took a bite of his nasty-ass cereal. I mean it’s not even some of the fun stuff like Cap’n Crunch. Who doesn’t like the Cap’n? Ok I'm a kid at heart, I'll admit to that.
“And I still see you’re eating glorified bird food,” I counter before taking a drink of water.
“Hey it’s high in protein!”
“Cardboard has more protein than that,” I shot back.
“YOU TAKE THAT BACK YOU GOVERNMENT GIMP!”
I marched over to the table and leaned over into his face and with a big huge smirk I said, “Hipster.”
“I’M NOT A FUCKING HIPSTER!”
“Only hipsters deny being hipsters,” I counter.
“I dare you to say that one more time motherfucker, I dare you…”
“Boys, please,” my mom said as she tried to intervene. “And Pete, language,” she scolded Pete. I may be the older brother, but I know how to press his buttons just right.
“Yes mother,” we both said at the exact same time. If we weren’t related it’d be quite creepy because of the timing.
“Good, now Andrew why don’t you sit down and eat some pancakes that your brother won’t touch.”
“Because he’d rather eat the birdseed instead,” I said under my breath, which Spits caught and caused her to giggle. “Hipster.”
“THAT’S IT!” Pete yelled as he tried to strangle me from across the table.
***
One fight later…
Spitfire came out of Pete’s room and sat down next to me, a frying pan in her hand. Why the frying pan? Well my brother has a tendency to hit on women who are taken, and to be honest I have no idea why. “He won’t be bugging you about your past or the car anymore,” Spits said.
“What’d you say to him?” I asked taking the bag of frozen peas away from my jaw. Pete had gotten a good sucker punch in, I’ll give him that.
“That if he didn’t lay off I’d cut his balls off,” she replied with a straight face.
“You didn’t,” I stated in disbelief.
“No I didn’t.” Well there goes that fantasy. “I just told him since that this was my first Thanksgiving together with your family I asked that he’d lay off and in return I’d introduce him to one of my hot friends.”
“But you don’t have any single hot friends here-,” I trailed before realizing it. “Nice.”
“You know I noticed that Pete has a lot of luggage and junk in his room, what gives?” she asked as she put the pan down. My mom was busy in the kitchen and my dad was busy getting the grill out for grilled sweet potatoes.
“He lives here,” I replied before reapplying the peas.
“How old is he?”
“Twenty-two this year.”
“So he’s two years younger than you.” She walked over to the fireplace mantle, “Who’s she?” she asked pointing to younger, slightly taller, girl in the photo.
“My older sister.”
“Where is she at? I thought your mom said that she invited both of your siblings.”
“Emily’s off with her in-laws this year, we’ll probably see her at Christmas.”
“By the way why does Pete live with your parents still? Can’t he go out and get an apartment?” she asked while placing back the picture.
“Well he doesn’t have a job, all he does all day is play online video games with his so-called ‘friends’ on online gaming services. Usually drunk. I used to play a few games here and there with him, but he became unbearable and I had to remove him from my friends list and pretty much block all communications online with him.”
“He's that bad?”
“He is. Do you know what I was doing when I was twenty-two? I signed up for the Army reserves while still in college full time holding a job part time, then I got to travel the world for half a year on the government’s dime.”
“Didn’t you just go to Afghanistan?” Spits asked with a raised eyebrow.
“Well there was a connecting flight in Sicily on the way here and a stop in London on the way back. Yeah now that you think about it I only saw one set of cities all in one country. Do you know where I’ve always wanted to go?” Spits shook her head, “Paris, Berlin, Cairo, Rome. Those kind of places. I could add national parks as well to the list, but you get the idea.”
“Those do sound like some exciting places, maybe one day we’ll be able to see them,” Spits replied snuggling next to me.
We sat there for a while just staring at the TV while the hosts kept talking about the different floats in the Thanksgiving Day parade. I looked at the wall clock later and saw that it was already 2pm. “Hey I’m going to check up on my dad, why don’t you pop into the kitchen and see if mom needs any help. Perhaps you can talk to her about the dessert you made yesterday.”
“Ok,” she said popping up but before walking away give me a quick peck on the forehead.
I walked outside and saw my dad still fiddling with the grill, “Forget to get a new tank of propane?” I asked sarcastically.
“No Andrew I think the valve is bad,” he replied still fiddling with the valve leading to the tank. “So I see you and your brother are getting along.”
“Not really,” I shoot back quickly.
He leaned out just far enough so I could see his facial expression, he did his best Nick Cage impression, “You don’t say?” He finally got the valve working again and lit the grill. “You really should try to get along with him.” He started putting the sweet potatoes on the grill.
“You think I haven’t tried? I sign up for the Army, he berates me for being a part of the, and I quote, ‘fascist war machine.’ We both know I mostly did it for the GI Bill of Rights.” My father nodded in reply, signaling me to continue. “I drive a really nice Mitsubishi Evolution that I paid good money for, money I saved up, and he has a shitty-ass early model Prius that he was gifted by a friend moving away that didn’t want it anymore. Then there’s his gaming habits, have you ever heard him online?”
“No I don’t think I have,” dad replied.
“He’s unbearable. Trash talking here and there. Blaming others for his own incompetence and lack of skill. Rage quitting-”
“Rage quitting?” my dad asked with a raised eyebrow.
“When you get so angry while playing a game that you quit out of rage in either two ways. One being you turn off the machine in the middle of a match in the hopes that your loss and kill/death ratios aren’t recorded. And the second being physical rage taking out on the machinery, like throwing a controller at the screen.”
“I see.”
“Dad I’ve tried every time to at least try to be nice to Pete, but he intentionally sabotages any effort based on what I think is jealousy. He’s jealous that I’ve got a nice house. He’s jealous that I not only have a nice sports car, but a classic model motorcycle as well. And most of all I think he’s jealous of everyone but him finding love. Did you see the way he was looking at Sp-Sam?” I almost slipped up there.
“But he’s been on dates before.”
“Yeah, but how long do those relationships last? Two, three months tops if that?” I sighed, “Well at least Sam got him to can up for the rest of this weekend though, and that’s nice.”
“Well I suppose I’ll have to talk to him about this stuff sometime in the near future,” my dad commented while turning over the sweet potatoes. “So what are you doing these days?”
“Well I bartend-”
“Andrew, I’m your father and I’m the one who showed you that little trick in seeing the truth in someone’s eyes and body language. I’ve seen your house in Vegas, what are you really doing?”
He stared at my awkwardly. As a child this would get my siblings and I to spill whatever secret we had almost immediately. In all honesty, mom’s stare was way worse. Now though I considered my options, I could tell him the truth about everything. He’s my dad and he’d love me no matter what, but I’d be breaching my non-disclosure agreement and would be subject to jail time. Or I could just say enough to keep him satisfied, but also keeping the little secret we’ve got going on. Yeah I think I'll do the latter.
“Well dad I can’t quite tell you what’s going on, but what I can say is that is what I’m doing with Sam will change everything about how our world works once it’s completed. Please dad, I legally can’t say anything else,” I answered very hush-hush like.
He stared at me again, analyzing every eye movement to any muscle twitches. After a few more minutes of intense staring he finally let up, “Alright I believe you. Now let’s get these inside and see what our ladies are up to food-wise.”
We walked back inside with our bounty of grilled sweet potatoes and yams, which I swear are the exact same thing, only with a different name. We came into the dining room and saw that the table had already been set, turkey and all the sides included.
“Well ladies, and Peter, I do believe we can get started,” my dad said putting the plate down as we took our places at the table. Me next to Spits appropriately. Dad said grace before carving the turkey up. Time to eat.
***
Later after a lot of turkey, cranberry sauce, potatoes and gravy, and rolls
I let out a content sigh as I laid back on the couch while the big game played on the TV. As usual Detroit was playing, but I really didn’t really pay attention to who was playing them though. The food coma is starting to set in, I blame the turkey on that one. Spits landed next to me and let out a content sigh as well. I started to nod off a few times before Spits nudged me.
“Andrew?” Spits said slowly as if she too were going to fall asleep.
“Yeah?” I replied just as sleepily.
“Your parents can be a little odd.”
“It was the question during dinner, wasn’t it?”
***
Earlier…
Everyone had gotten a nice thick slab of turkey as well as the ‘fixins.’ You know, potatoes, stuffing, cranberry sauce (as well as the jelly), and rolls. There’s more but that would take a while to list them all. We were all enjoying our meals until we got to the point where we would slow down in eating and the conversations would start.
“So Andrew,” mom said before taking a sip of wine. “When are you two going to start giving us some grandkids?”
Spits and I both spat out our drinks in a picture perfect spit take. Spits spraying the wine over towards the potted plant and me towards Pete. “WHAT?!?” we both asked at the same time.
***
I chuckled at the recent conversation, “Yeah they can be that way some times.”
“All in all though I did enjoy this holiday with your family, even if your brother has wandering eyes and your parents ask the most awkward of questions.”
“Well they’re meeting you for the first time in person so I think they should get a free pass on those. I think your parents would probably have done the same thing,” I said with a small tired sounding chuckle.
“Yeah I bet they would,” Spits in turn chuckled as well.
We watched the game and slowly drifted off into a food coma induced nap. Before we slipped I could feel one of my wings relax and one of the feathers at the tip of my right wing was exposed at the hem of my shirt behind our slouching forms. Just before everything went into blissful oblivion I felt another feather touching it, one that was not mine. I looked behind and saw that Spits’ wing was also exposed only at the tip, peeking out from the hem of her shirt. Her feather interlocked with mine gently as if we were making a pinkie promise. I smiled before blinking a few more times, surrendering myself to the mistress called sleep.