Brie had heard David’s office door shut and the lock engage. “Jona, honey, will you excuse me for a moment? I need to go check in my husband.”
Jona nodded with a smile. “Of course. I’m probably going to go find ‘Miah here soon anyway.”
“Check out back. He’s probably playing soccer with his brothers. They do that every now and then”, Brie said as she stood.
“I’ll do that. Thanks, Mrs. Draiman.” Jona stood and headed out back to find her man.
Brie headed upstairs and knocked softly on her husband’s office door. “Baby, is everything ok?”
She heard him clear his throat. “Yeah, I’m fine, hon.”
“Liar. Open the door and let me in before I pick the lock.” Not a sound but a sniffle. She reached up and pulled a couple of bobby pins from her hair and did exactly what she threatened. It was rather simple. The lock on the door was ancient by the standards of the time.
When the door swung open, David was shocked. “HOLY FUCK, WOMAN, IS THERE ANYTHING YOU CAN’T DO?” he asked.
She smile brightly. “No, not really. Having a big brother helps. Matt taught me a lot of what I know. Now, are you going to keep lying to me or are you going to tell me what’s going on?”
He sighed and stood from behind his desk. “Shut the door behind you and lock it again, please.” She shut the door quietly and locked it behind her as he moved to take a seat on the large leather couch that he’d had put for extra seating. “It’s really nothing, love. Just allergies and that kind of thing.”
“Fine, David, don’t tell me, then. I’ll go start on dinner. Spaghetti sound good?”, she responded with a shrug as she turned to leave again.
He sighed again and caught her hand. “No, don’t go. I’m feeling a bit insecure at the moment.”
“Then, talk to me about it, baby. What’s going on?”
“I couldn’t help but overhear you talking to Jona about how you single handedly kept this house afloat while I was away. I feel like such a fucking failure as a husband because I wasn’t here as much as I should have been.”
She sat down next to him and caught his face between her hand, turning him to where he was looking at her. “David, you’re not a failure as a husband or a father. You couldn’t be a better parent or lover. Our children understood when you had to leave and if they were too young to understand it their older siblings explained it to them. They couldn’t be more proud to call you their father. In everything they do, they strive to emulate you. If it weren’t for the single- minded determination that Jake saw from you, he wouldn’t be a Nobel Prize recipient. If Jordan and Malachai hadn’t seen how passionate you are when you go on stage, they wouldn’t be the recording artists and entertainers they are today. Reckless Disregard is called, ‘The New Disturbed’ because our children and their cousin push Caleb to step up his game so that they can be better than everyone else out there.”
“But, there were so many games and concerts I wanted to be at but I couldn’t because I was clear across the country… or on another side of the globe.”
“Because you were doing your job. If it weren’t for you going out and doing what you do best, baby, then keeping this house afloat would have been a hell of a lot more difficult than it was. David, I knew what I was getting when I agreed to marry you. I knew that there would be times when I would be laying in that monster of a bed of ours alone. I knew that I would be spending days, weeks, and months on end alone in this huge house with our ten children, trying to keep things together. That’s what I was here for. That’s what I’m here for now.”
One hand came up to caress her cheek. “What did I do to deserve you, my angel?” His thumb rubbed gently across her cheek bone.
“You’re a good man, David. But baby you’re not Superman. Whoever it was that told you that you had to be lied to you.”
“You know, there are times I can’t believe that you’re still here; like you should have run for the hills screaming by now. I still find it hard to believe that a woman like you could love a guy like me.”
“Honey, you saved my life within a day of meeting me. You showed me that you actually cared about me as a person rather than just as your charge. I love you, David. I’m not going anywhere.”
He smiled softly at his soul mate and did the only thing he could think to do. He kissed her.
---------------
Brie spent most of the afternoon trying to comfort and reassure her man. Everyone was entitled to their moment of self- doubt, even David. She knew that. When she came downstairs, she’d changed into some of her nicer clothes. She and David were going out. Jake and Delilah looked at her strangely. “Mom, where are you going?” Jake asked.
“Your father and I are going out tonight. Why?”
“No reason. You look beautiful.”
She smiled. “Thank you, Jacob.”
“Where are you two going?” Delilah asked.
“Dunno. Dad has someplace in mind that he wants to take me, but he won’t say. You know how he gets. He likes to surprise me to keep me on my toes.”
“He’s good at that, I’ve noticed”, Jake laughed.
“It’s what he does.”
“What does he plan to do afterward?”
“I plan to wing it”, David said when he walked into the living room.
“Whoa. You don’t have a plan, Dad?”
David shook his head. “Nope.”
“That’s shocking”, Delilah said with a laugh.
“There’s nothing wrong with being spontaneous.”
“No, there’s not”, Jake said. “You two have fun and we’ll see you when we see you again.”
---------------
After his parents left, Jake and Delilah sat in awe. Jake was curious as to just what had happened to make his parents go out on the fly like that. “Dad usually spends months planning date nights for him and Mom. What the hell just happened?”
Delilah shrugged. “I have no idea, my love. I know how your Dad usually operates and for him to just on the spur of the moment say, ‘I’m taking your Mom out for the night’, is strange. You and I both know that your father is more of a planner than spontaneous.”
Jona and Jeremiah came in from outside where the rain had picked up again. It was a rainy winter in Colorado Springs for some reason. “I think I know why your Dad’s doing what he’s doing”, Jona said shyly.
“Why is that, Jona?” Jake asked.
She looked at Jeremiah who told the story. “She and Mom were sitting down here talking after the fittings about how Mom kept the house afloat after the War while he was away recording or touring. She explained how she kept things organized while he was home and away doing whatever he had to do.”
“And he was standing at the top of the stairs eavesdropping”, Jake chuckled. “Why does that sound like something Dad would do?”
“Because we all know our father and what he gets like at times.”
“I feel kinda bad though”, Jona said. “I think that my bringing it up is what brought this on because it made him feel bad.”
“Jona, there’s no need for you to feel bad. Yeah, our father’s a strong guy, but even he’s entitled to feel weak and insecure every now and then. He’s only human after all”, Jake said. “All ten of us know that Dad feel pretty guilty about missing the things he missed while we were all young, but we all understood that if he didn’t leave to go record with our uncles, or if he didn’t go out on tour, that the money wasn’t made and the schools we went to didn’t pay for themselves. Our school supplies and uniforms didn’t just jump into our backpacks and closets on their own. We realized that. But, Dad still feels bad because he would miss a lot of Malachai’s basketball games, or my soccer games. He’s missed Jay’s football games too. Hell, he even missed birthdays. He’s missed something for all of us at least a dozen times. But, we understand it had to be that way.”
“But he still carries that guilt of missing things that he didn’t necessarily want to miss.”
“And Mom reassures him that we all totally understood that he had to work. Of course, there were times when we’d be pissed when he’d miss something huge, like a birthday. But, he’d always be sure to call to tell us ‘Happy birthday’ and he’d bring us a gift for the birthday he missed and tell us that he was sorry that he missed our birthdays. The two years he was sure NOT to miss were when each of us turned 16 and 18. He was here when we all turned sixteen and eighteen because he and Mom bought us each a car for our 16th birthday. Jordan included.”
“Even though by the time she was 16 she had several million dollars in the bank?”
“Yeah, several million that she couldn’t touch until she was 18. That was the stipulation that Mom and Dad put on her bank account.”
“That was messed up”, Jordan said when she came into the house. She looked around the living room and only saw her siblings. “Where are Mom and Dad?”
“Date night on the fly”, Jake said with a chuckle.
“Date night on the fly? You mean Dad didn’t spend months planning the night so that he was just right?”
“That’s exactly what happened. Apparently, Dad had a moment of self- doubt and decided after Mom spent a good portion of the afternoon reassuring him that he’s not a complete failure that he was going to just take her out somewhere. It was spur of the moment.”
“Now I know that Dad can be a pretty random guy, but I’ve never known him not to spend months planning a date night with Mom”, Jordan said with a laugh.
“He was having one of his rare moments, Jord”, ‘Miah said in response.
She nodded slowly in understanding. “Oh, one of those moments. The ones where he feels like he let us all down because he wasn’t around as much as he wanted to be.”
“Yeah, those moments. It was brought on by Mom explaining that even though Dad wasn’t around as much as he wanted to be, she still kept the house running like clockwork.”
“Yeah, that’s sounds like Mom. But, Dad really shouldn’t feel bad. He was around as often as he could be. We understood.”
“But, he still feels bad about it at times”, Jake said with a shrug. “I mean, if it weren’t for Dad, how many of us would have the success in our given fields that we have?”
“None of us, not even Maddie”, James said when he joined the conversation. He’d been listening at the foot of the stairs.
“Maybe Maddie would”, Jake said. “Remember, she, Delilah, and Jona took over Mom’s already successful business. Maddie would likely be the ONLY of us that’s successful. But, I certainly wouldn’t have won the Nobel Prize if it weren’t for the example that Dad set.”
“Malachai and I wouldn’t have the success that we have now if it weren’t for watching Dad go onstage and pour every ounce of himself into what he was singing. That’s where I get it from”, Jordan said.
“I certainly wouldn’t have pursued Philosophy if Dad hadn’t done it before any of the rest of us did”, Jeremiah added.
“I would have thought that Dad would have gotten that we all look up to him from the Kennedy Center thing”, James said.
“I think he did, but he was just feeling a little insecure. He’s not Superman, you know”, Jake responded. “Like anyone else on the planet, he’s entitled to feel weak upon occasion.”
---------------
He across the table from the woman he loved and held her hands in his. “God, you’re so beautiful tonight”, he said with a smile.
“Of course”, she laughed. “Like I’m going to go out on the town with you and NOT look my best, baby.”
“I know you wouldn’t, but there’s something about you tonight that just makes you all the more beautiful.”
She looked at him with curiosity. “Oh? Maybe it’s the candle light?”
“No, I think it’s more than the candle light, love.”
“Hmm… more than the candle light? Then what do you think it is?”
“I don’t know. I can’t tell what it is, but I know it’s there.”
“I can tell you what it is, David.”
“What is it?”
“I’m a woman who’s madly in love with the man she’s sharing a table with and has been for a very long time. David, you and our children are my everything. I wouldn’t trade what I have with you for the world. We have ten wonderful children, eight beautiful grandchildren with more to come. I couldn’t be happier than I am right now. I’ve got everything I love surrounding me. Why wouldn’t I glow from that?”
He nodded. “Good point.” He brought her hands up to his lips and pressed a kiss to the back of her hand. “Thank you.”
“For what, babe?”
“For saving me from a lifetime of loneliness; for being the sweetest, most beautiful person on the planet in both body and spirit. Everyone’s always telling me that I’m an inspiration to them. Well, you’re my inspiration; you and our kids.”
She smiled. “David, I do my best to keep you inspired and on your toes. That’s my job, my love. If I can keep you on your toes, then you can keep the people on theirs.”
“You’re such a beautiful soul, Brie. What have I done in my life to deserve you?”
“You’re a good man, David. I don’t know how many times I have to tell you that for you to believe me, but I’ll keep saying it until you finally do. Maybe even after."
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