Chapter 18

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December 17, 2006

Kevin held the kitchen door open for Jemma. Once she was in, he steppedin behind her, stomping the snow from his boots. She did her best toimitate him. He laughed and knelt to help her take them off. Rachel walked into the kitchen, shook her head and smiled.

"Well, thanks for tracking up the floor, you two! I just got things cleaned up in here! How was school, Jemma?"

Jemma exchanged a happy, we've-got-a-secret look with Kevin and grinned up at Rachel. "School was great! We practiced our play today." She pulled off her coat. "You're going to come see it aren't you?"

"Of course we are," Rachel smiled, taking the wet coat from her. "We'reall looking forward to your first performance." She looked down at thecoat. "What did you do on the way home? Make snow angels? This issoaked."

Jemma giggled. "No, we didn't make snow angels! We-."

"Shhh, Jemma," Kevin stopped her. "Not yet!"

"Okay, Daddy!" She hugged him and scampered out of the kitchen and up the stairs to change her clothes.

Rachel raised an eyebrow as she looked at Kevin. He returned the look and grinned at her. "Got any coffee made?" he asked, rubbing his hands together. "I'm chilled through."

"Coffee's not going to help that," Rachel smiled. Obviously he wasn't going to tell her what was going on. "Why don't I fix some hot chocolate? The kids can have some too."

"Sounds great," he smiled. He pulled off his boots and slipped on the pair of deck shoes he usually wore in the house, then went to get a mop for the floor. Rachel started the water for the hot chocolate. Then she turned and watched Kevin as he started to clean up the wet mess he and Jemma had made.

In the three weeks since Nick had brought him home, Kevin had steadily improved. His eyes were clear and his skin had recovered its healthy color. At the moment his cheeks and nose were still slightly pink from the cold outside. He hadn't had a drink since he had arrived, and Rachel now knew that his behavior in the past was not an indication of a serious addictive problem, but rather isolated binges triggered by his emotional state. She also knew that he was suffering from nightmares, though she hadn't said anything to him about them. Almost nightly she had listened to his anguished voice and the frantic pacing when he awoke. And on two separate occasions, she had gone to his room in the night when she had heard him cry out. Both times, she had managed to disrupt his dream cycle just enough to end the nightmare, but he hadn't wakened. At least she didn't think he had. He never mentioned it to her, so she felt that either he had just slept right through, or he wasn't ready to talk about it.

The teakettle started to whistle, and Rachel turned her attention to fixing the hot chocolate. Kevin finished cleaning up the puddles and put the mop away. He sat down at the table and stretched his legs out as he leaned back in the chair. "How about some peppermint in that hot chocolate?" he asked. "I think there's some in the cupboard."

"Fine," Rachel smiled. And suddenly all hell broke loose upstairs.

* * *

Jemma had raced up the stairs to change her clothes. She and Daddy had a surprise, and she couldn't wait to show it to Rachel and Aaron. She frowned. Why was Ri still taking a nap? Everything always had to wait for him. He was such a baby. She finished changing and decided that she didn't want to wait any more for him to wake up. She marched into his room and jumped onto his bed.

"Wake up, Ri!" she crowed. "Naptime's over!"

Aaron ground his fists into his sleep-heavy eyes and sat up. "Jemma! What'd ya do that for?"

"Cause it's time to get up, Ri! Wait'll you see what Daddy and me did!"

She was grinning and bouncing up and down on the bed. Aaron scowled at her. 'Daddy and me'! He didn't want to know what 'Daddy and me' did. It didn't include him-that was for sure. "Cut it out, Jemma!" He tried to crawl back under the covers. But Jemma wasn't going to let him. She hopped off the bed and yanked the quilt off of him. She couldn't wait any longer. "We got the Christmas tree!" she grinned. "Daddy took me, and we went out to the woods and I picked it out and he cut it down, and we pulled it all the way-." She didn't get to say where they had pulled it to, because Aaron, with a strangled cry, had launched himself off the bed directly into her stomach. She fell backwards, and he took advantage of the fact that he was sprawled on top of her to get in two or three serious punches before she recovered enough to shove him aside. She was screaming at him, but he wasn't through. He was on the attack again, grabbing for her hair and yanking as hard as he could. It was a toss-up, who was crying harder. Jemma because of the pain he was inflicting, or Aaron from the frustration and hurt at being shut out of being with his father-again.

Suddenly his was swinging at the air. Strong hands had yanked him up and off his sister and were restraining him. He saw Rachel flash past him and drop to the floor next to Jemma. He looked up and found himself inches from his father's face, looking directly into his green eyes. And those eyes were clearly angry. He wilted against Kevin's chest.

Jemma was sobbing in Rachel's arms. "I didn't do anything," she whimpered. Kevin abruptly set Aaron down on his bed.

"What the hell is going on here?" he demanded. Aaron hung his head. He felt very alone right now. Empty. Those few seconds in his father's arms had shown him something he'd never known. His Daddy was so strong. And even though Daddy was angry, he'd felt safe when he was in his arms. He wanted to crawl back into his arms and just stay there. He glanced up at him. There was no way that was going to happen. Daddy was really mad. He wouldn't ever want to hold Aaron again.

"Well?" Kevin barked. "I'm waiting for an answer."

"I'm sorry, Daddy," Aaron whispered. "I didn't mean to-."

"Don't apologize to me! You tell your sister you're sorry! And then you can just stay in your room for the rest of the afternoon, so you can think about what you did." Kevin turned toward the door. He stopped in the doorway. "And if you ever hurt your sister again, the consequences will be much worse. Do you understand me?"

"Yessir," Aaron sobbed. As Kevin walked out of the room, Aaron buried his head in his pillow and burst into tears again.

Rachel hadn't moved from her position on the floor, holding Jemma. Her heart sank. She had a feeling that the whole story was not out yet, and that however innocently, perhaps Jemma was more at fault than Aaron was. She looked down at the head of blonde curls resting against her shoulder, and then up to the little body shaking with sobs on the bed. Why hadn't Kevin taken the time to find out what had really happened? It was almost as if, the moment Aaron had taken responsibility by saying he was sorry, Kevin had gladly assigned the blame to him and rushed to conclude the incident.

But Rachel didn't think Aaron was apologizing for hurting Jemma. He was really apologizing for disappointing Kevin, she thought. And then it occurred to her that Kevin had picked Aaron up and held him to get him away from Jemma. And Tim's words at her interview for this job came back to her. 'Kevin's never held his son. Never rocked him to sleep. Never comforted him when he cries.' No wonder Aaron was sobbing as though his heart would break. His first caress from his father-and it was the result of anger and ended with punishment.

Rachel eased away from Jemma and looked down at her. She seemed very subdued. Maybe I can get to the bottom of this she thought. "Jemma? Let's go to your room. I'd like to talk to you for a minute." Aaron raised a tear-stained face to Rachel. She smiled down at him. "I'll be back in just a minute, Aaron," she said softly.

Once she had Jemma in her room, Rachel closed the door. "Now-what happened?" she asked. Jemma looked down at the floor.

"I didn't do anything," she said again. "I just wanted Ri to wake up so we could do the surprise-." She glanced up at Rachel. "So I woke him up."

"Jemma. I know that Aaron isn't the greatest wake up from a sound sleep, but he wouldn't hit you like that just because you woke him up. Whathappened?" Rachel asked again.

"I don't know!" Jemma insisted. "I told him what Daddy and me did, and he knocked me down and started hitting me."

"And what was it that you and Daddy did?" Rachel asked gently.

"We went out and got the Christmas tree," Jemma mumbled, looking at the floor again.

"Oh." Rachel paused. "Well, don't you think that maybe Aaron was upset that he didn't get to go and help you?"

"I guess so," came the reply, even quieter than before.

"So maybe we can understand why Aaron got so mad," Rachel said softly. "What do you think? Maybe he just wanted to spend some time with Daddy too."

"Yeah." It was a barely audible whisper. When Jemma looked up there were tears in her eyes again, but not from physical pain. "Did I make Ri feel bad, Rachel?"

"I think maybe you did, sweetheart," Rachel said as she wiped away the tears. "Maybe you should both say you're sorry. Do you want to go do that?"

"Could I? Daddy said Ri had to stay in his room all afternoon," Jemma reminded her.

"I think that for this, we can let you go in to talk to him," Rachel smiled.

* * *

When Rachel came back downstairs alone, she found Kevin pacing in the living room. He was so agitated that Rachel couldn't even get him to sit down. He wanted to know immediately why Jemma was still upstairs.

"She's resting, Kevin," Rachel said. She hesitated for a moment. "Also, I think maybe it wasn't all Aaron's fault."

"You didn't send her to her room, did you?" he frowned. "She doesn't need to be punished for getting beaten up!"

"Kevin-please sit down. No, I didn't 'send her to her room'. She decided to stay there."

"She's all right, isn't she?" He looked frantic. "He didn't really injure her did he? I swear, I'll paddle his ass if she's really hurt!"

"Kevin-the only thing he bruised was her ego. It was a misunderstanding."

"Misunderstanding?! I don't care if he is only three and a half. If h ever hurts Kristin again, I'll-." He stopped at the look on Rachel's face. "What?"

"Kevin-did you hear what you just said?" He looked at her blankly. "You said 'If he ever hurts Kristin-'."

"Jemma-I meant Jemma." He looked at her in horror and backed away from her. He was out the door before she could even call out his name. She heard the car tires squeal in protest as he roared out of the driveway.

Chapter 19
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