Carter's Duty - 10. Chapter 10

June 9th 2003

It was utter chaos; within just minutes Will knew what it must have been like to be a part of the Blitzkrieg, to suddenly turn around and find himself a victim of an invasion by a malicious occupying force that was intent on taking over utterly. That was how it felt for Will at that moment. When Jeff had said family, Will had assumed just his parents. Instead he now had brothers, a sister, and a pair of grandparents as well. All stuffed into his little split-level townhouse. There were only two guest bedrooms, meaning that the couches in the living room and the den had been commandeered as well. With only one bathroom to share between everyone, things were about to become very crowded.

He had retreated to the kitchen balcony while everyone settled in. The sounds of pots and pans rattling in his kitchen heralded doom for his plan to order food. Jeff's mother and grandmother, old-school Italians, had taken one look at the pizza when it arrived and decided to cook a real meal. He winced, so much for that idea. Andrew wasn't too happy about having to postpone his dinner again, but Will couldn't exactly refuse Jeff's mother's insistence that she repay the hospitality in this manner. Even if the pizza had been paid for.

At first Will had thought to retreat with Andrew to the living room, but Jeff's father and two younger brothers had discovered the digital-cable box, and more importantly, the hockey game on the sports channel. Andrew had settled onto a couch with them. But Will wasn't about to subject himself to another attempt to understand the damn game. He would leave that to the French-Canadian and the three Italian-Canadians who hooted and yelled at the television at every call.

He had sat for a while as he tried to make conversation with Jeff's gruff father. Mr. Sternosti was a severe man who worked as a contractor back in St. Catherines. But the man had flatly ignored Will every time a burst of excitement erupted on screen.

Jeff's two teenaged brothers weren't much better; they laughed as they joked in Italian to each other and Will understood that they made fun of the teams on the screen, but much beyond that he was lost.

And he had given up altogether. He preferred to find a corner to brood over the preferred methods of exacting his revenge on Jeff.

Even his den/study had been overrun. Jeff's 18-year-old sister had claimed that as her makeshift room, and was downstairs blasting his stereo as she unpacked her mountain of suitcases. Will reflected she seemed set to spend a week somewhere exotic rather than a few days in Ottawa. But for the St. Catherines-born-and-bred girl, this was her first chance to go to the big city.

"Where do you keep the strainer?" Jeff's grandmother, a thickly-accented, wizened, Italian woman asked through the open screen door.

"The colander is in the second cupboard to the right of the stove," Will replied, wondering for the umpteenth time how he had allowed Jeff to talk him into this. He was too nice for his own good he surmised; it was only for a few days, he reminded himself.

He rested his arms on the rail and loosened his tie; the bedroom arrangements would have to be planned out. Jeff's grandparents would have to take the master bedroom; he couldn't expect them to weather the futon in the guest bedroom or the narrow single bed in the third. It was the only considerate thing to do. Breaking the news to Andrew wouldn't go well, especially since Jeff's parents had already set their belongings into the room with the futon. Andrew hated the narrow bed, and for the two of them to have to share it, Andrew would only be more aggravated.

It was only for a couple of days. That was becoming his mantra lately.

Jeff stepped out of the house, gently sliding the patio door closed on the kitchen. "Hey Will, thanks, eh?"

Will contemplated several acrid responses before he shrugged, "Yeah, well what's a best man for?"

Jeff joined Will at the rail looking down at the rented minivan that had displaced Will's Jeep out onto the street. "Mum brought some of her spaghetti sauce with her, it's her specialty."

As if on cue the patio door slid open and the aged grandmother looked out, "These mushrooms are no good!" she declared as she held up a zip-lock baggie containing dried mushrooms, "they bad, make you sick!"

Will winced, "I know Mrs Sternosti, just leave them where you found them..."

She shook the bag again; adamantly "I will throw out for you." She turned and before Will could react, emptied the bag into the sink, turning on the trash disposal with a flip of a switch.

Will rounded on Jeff, "Remind me once again why I am such a nice guy?"

Jeff held up his hands, "I'm sorry, look I'll replace them..."

Will returned to his view, "Don't bother, they weren't going to get used anyway..."

Jeff shifted uncomfortably.

"What now?" Will asked, as he began to feel his annoyance bubble into anger.

"It's just that..." Jeff shifted uncomfortably again.

"What?" Will closed his eyes, what else could go wrong.

"It's just that my family aren't that open minded..." Jeff looked pleadingly at Will.

Will's eyes narrowed, "No!" he stated firmly.

"It's just for a few days," Jeff begged, "they won't understand..."

Will's temper finally flared, "This is my house!" His voice hardened, but dropped to a whisper, "I am not going to deny who I am in my own goddamned house!"

"Will," Jeff's voice dropped as well, looking back at the open patio door, "Please!"

Will chewed on his lip and followed Jeff's gaze back inside his home, "What did you tell them?" he asked after long consideration.

"That you and Andrew are just roommates."

"Well, that is going to be hard to explain when he and I are sharing a bed tonight," Will replied as he shook his head. "And Andrew isn't going to like this at all." He swore again, this time in resignation, "All right, so I guess I'm the one stuck having to tell him... oh, you owe me big for this one, Jeff!"

Jeff clapped a hand on Will's shoulder, "I know."

By the time they re-entered the house, the chaos had escalated to a fever-pitch as the table was laid and the places set. Nothing quite compared to an Italian-Canadian family preparing to eat, there was so much regimentation; it was almost a disciplined hierarchy of who sat where. They had pulled Will's table out from the wall and had collected chairs from everywhere to ensure people had places to sit. And every inch of it had been covered by plates of food. It looked more like a feast than dinner.

Grandmother Sternosti laid plates as Jeff's sister Maria was setting the cutlery. Will glanced at the table a moment before he reached out to pick up the wineglass from the place setting at the head of the table.

"I don't drink," he stated, as he returned it to the cupboard. He blatantly ignored the glares grandmother Sternosti threw at him. He had to make some kind of a stand, a small gesture; but it was the small things that made him feel marginally better, after all it was his home, and he wanted to remind everyone of that. It wasn't that he wanted to be inhospitable -- he appreciated that Jeff's family had their own way of doing things -- but there were limits to his patience.

He poured himself a cup of coffee and smiled when he realized it wasn't one of Andrew's. He allowed people to filter to the table before he returned to the table and sat down, a ghost of a smile on his face. Andrew looked at him quizzically.

Will reached out to pick up the platter of pasta, and hesitated as he noted that everyone around the table was watching him. The tension in the air was palpable and he looked down the table at Jeff.

"Grace-?" Jeff's mother inquired softly, "Would you mind if my husband..."

Will held up a hand, "No, it's fine, it's my table after all. I'll do it." He narrowed his eyes at Jeff as he began, "For what we are about to receive, we are truly grateful."

"Amen," rang out around the table as people scrambled for food in a no-holds-barred race to get to food first.

Will watched the pandemonium and the rush of conversations, and he realized that his position at the top of the table left him isolated from Andrew who was stuck down at the foot with Jeff's younger sister. They appeared deeply engrossed in a conversation, and Will listlessly picked up a dinner roll and broke it open as he waited for the first rush to be done so that he could eat.

Jeff's mother sat and waited as well, a shepardess who watched over her flock of rabid wolves. Every so often her hand would snake out to rap the knuckles of one or the other of her sons who tried to pile too much onto their plates at once. In that hierarchy there was no doubt who was on top. Andrew seemed to be the only one at the table she encouraged to pile more on; she murmured something about him being too thin and that he should eat more.

When she noticed that Will's plate was still empty she took it from him and began to heap spaghetti onto it, and before he could protest she liberally poured her sauce over top.

"There you go," she said with an affectionate smile as she murmured, "Such a good boy; such a hard-working one with such a nice house."

Will watched everything with immense, solemn eyes. He supposed it was because he had never experienced such good-natured chaos.

Jeff's brother Jerry quickly grabbed a baton of garlic bread before his mother could give his knuckles another stout rap. She glared at him.

"You have dessert to go!"

Jerry stared down at his half-finished plate of food, "I'm not gonna have enough room, Ma."

Jeff's father gaffawed at him, "Use the washroom, make room."

Will's eyes stared in shock as he tried to focus back on his food. He had never been faced with such a free discussion of bodily functions at the dinner table. He picked at his plate as he tried to think of a way to change the subject.

"So," he said as he turned to Jeff's father, but got sidetracked as Jeff's mother spoke.

"Do you remember when Jeff was little," she directed across to her husband, "and he fell down the stairs?"

Jeff changed colours further down the table, "Ma..." he warned.

Will gave her his undivided attention as she explained. "When Jeff was little I couldn't leave him alone for a minute, he was always running off." She shook her head, "He was always scaring his dear old mother, but this one night his papa had told him to go to bed; but Jeff didn't want to go, so after I put him to bed he wanted to run away. But he couldn't sneak down the stairs to get past us so he decided to go out the window..." She shook her head, "He got as far as the ledge when he realized it was too far and wanted to go back inside, but he slipped and fell off. Now Papa had just mowed the lawn so when Jeff landed he rolled through freshly-cut grass, he was covered in it. Papa went out to find out what the noise was and found Jeff covered in grass and crying. When he asked Jeff what happened he said he had fallen down the stairs..."

"I did fall down the stairs!" Jeff protested loudly.

Jeff's papa shook his head, "You were outside covered in grass..."

Jeff shook his head, "I fell really hard." He looked over at Will, "Don't believe them."

Will glanced over at his own stairs, "Should I be worried you'll hurt yourself?"

Jeff threw up his hands, "That was twenty-one years ago, why won't anyone believe me!"

Jeff's mother leaned closer to Will, "I think he hit his head too hard when he fell."

Will nodded, "Yeah I always thought Jeff had been dropped as a baby."

"Hey!" Jeff protested, "At least its not as bad as the time Dad thought Jerry was a bear."

Will's brow furrowed, "Oh dear."

Jerry winced as Jeff carried on, "Well we were out at the cabin having dinner under the stars..."