the_lawless (the_lawless) wrote in the_colony, @ 2010-03-22 22:44:00 |
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Entry tags: | ^ week 05, leo parker |
Week 5 - Saturday
Characters: Kathleen Forbes, Leo Parker, and Walker
Location: Siena Suites, Kathleen's place
Summary: Kathleen makes breakfast while Leo helps put together the nursery. Another argument over how Walker's disability should be handled ensues, until Kathleen gets sick and makes a mad dash for the bathroom.
Rating: H for Helpful
Thank goodness for Buttermilk Complete Pancake mix for a post-apocalypse world, just add water. How simple was that? Kathleen stirred the mix with filtered water in a large bowl, and thought about her ideas for the nursery. Originally she had made a case for a two bedroom suite, so she could keep the spare room for patients, but after Dr. Griffin arrival that changed. The room would be where she would give birth and then become a nursery.
Leo, having been the one to haul the boxed baby station out of the trailer and into Kathleen's suite, knew exactly where to find it. He slid the flat, heavy box out from beneath the bed, suddenly remembering what a terrible pain the ass it had been to move in the first place. Once it was situated in the middle of the room, the man sat back on his heels and used his pocket knife to slice away the thick plastic bindings. Lifting the lid, Leo peered inside at a chaotic mess of plastic wrapped wooden pieces, white styrofoam, and baggies filled with screws and bolts and allen wrenches.
It was nearly enough to make his brain explode; Leo had never been very handy. He pulled out the booklet of directions, printed in five different languages, and gave them a quick glance before tossing them back into the box and shutting it again. It was just going to have to wait until help arrived.
Walker, who had been instructed on the way to Kathleen's place, to not jump on any of the beds except the ones that they owned, was bored and pacing between the nursery and the kitchen, curiously eying the pancake batter from a safe distance.
Kathleen started on the first pancake and ladled the batter onto the griddle, which seem to work well enough for her to ladle three more portions. She made a slight adjustment to the temperature control, and then stepped back to eye Leo unpacking the baby station in the next room. She felt lucky to come across such a helpful group of people.
She caught Walker looking her way and at the bowl. "Hungry, huh?" He bobbed his little head. "I promise you'll be the first one I serve, just wait a few minutes more. You can help set the table." She opened the drawer, and took out 5 sets of forks and butter knives. "Here take these." She handed him the utensils, and then grabbed the places which she already set aside on the kitchen counter, and then walked him to the table. She showed him where to set the forks and knives, and quickly left him to to flip the pancakes at the griddle.
"Who did you say was coming by?" Leo appeared and hovered in the living room while Walker set the table, meticulously placing the silverware in the proper spots like Kathleen had shown him. She might have caught him staring at her swollen belly a little more often than he usually did. Leo had explained to him that she had a baby in there, which the little boy found both fascinating and disturbing.
The smell of pancakes started to fill the air, making both boys feel anxious to eat.
"Chris and Grace," she answered with her back to the counter and facing toward Leo. "They might be a little late, so there is no point letting little Walker wait. Are you ready for some buttermilk pancakes?"
Walker helped himself to a seat, pulling out one of the kitchen chairs to sit down at the table, his scrawny elbows pointed out to the sides as he folded his forearms atop the table and rested his chin there to stare at an empty plate.
"I think he is," Leo couldn't help but smile slightly, unfolding his arms from across his chest to join Walker at the table. "Need any help?"
"Can you get the milk and the orange juice out of the frig for me? I'll get the pancakes," she turned around and started to move the pancakes off the griddle and on to a larger plate. Kathleen hoped the powder milk mixed well and the reconstituted frozen orange juice tasted better this time. The last batch of juice she made was too watered down.
"As long as it isn't breast milk," he smirked, recalling her previous joke, and stood back up, his chair scooting noisily out from under him. Pulling open the door to the fridge, Leo bent and peered inside, ever curious to see what other people kept in their refrigerators. He was always the type to snoop through peoples' medicine cabinets, and to peek into their underwear drawers in hopes of catching a glimpse of porn or toys. Now that all the houses were empty of their owners, the snooping had lost its thrill.
Leo set the two pitchers on the table and tried to stay out of Kathleen's way as he rooted through the cabinets for glasses.
Kathleen came to the table with the plate of pancakes and a squeeze bottle of maple syrup, then place both in the center of the table. She smiled at the little boy, and sat down next to him while Leo went back for the glasses. She served the boy with the first pancake. Her pancakes were about half the size of the plate. "Syrup?" she asked him, and the little boy nodded. "Okay, tell me when to stop." It was worth a try to see if he would say something, so she began to pour.
"He isn't gonna tell you anything," Leo reprimanded over his shoulder. He wasn't as aggravated as the last time, just determined to make Kathleen understand. Walker watched the syrup pool over the top of his pancake and only shook his fork from side to side, a bit nervously, as a signal to stop when the syrup was verging on flooding his whole plate. Leo almost laughed and set the glasses down one by one. "I think that's enough."
She stopped pouring, and gave Leo a look. "We have to try to encourage him to speak up." She returned the bottle, and grabbed a pancake for herself. "Suppose there was an emergency?"
"First off," Leo sat down, bristling with defense, and gripping his plate just a little too hard, "don't talk about him like he's not here or he can't hear or he's retarded. You're makin' him feel like a turd." True enough, Walker was uncomfortably pushing the thick syrup around with the prongs of his fork, though it was partially because Leo was getting riled up. He'd seen the man angry, and he'd seen him lose his temper plenty of times; the mere rise of his voice was enough to make Walker squirm nervously. "Just 'cause you're a doctor doesn't mean you know everything."
"No, it doesn't mean I know everything," she pour a little syrup on her pancake. "But you shouldn't be annoyed that I want to help." Kathleen looked at Walker and then back at Leo. "I'm sorry if you think I'm teasing him, but I'm not." She did look down at young boy. "I'm sorry."
Walker swung his feet back and forth beneath his chair, still staring at his plate, even when Leo stole it away to cut the boy's pancakes for him. "I know you're not teasing," Leo reassured her, the same as he had the last time they'd had this conversation. "But I told you before, don't push. Let'm alone about it." He felt so protectively of Walker, that he'd probably not bring him around Kathleen anymore if she kept bringing up the kid's problems. Leo passed the plate back to Walker and dished himself his own pancakes.
Kathleen looked at the boy, and then back at Leo without saying a word. She could not understand why Leo was so resistant to her trying to help. His rejection bothered her. She cut a piece of pancake for herself, but she lost her appetite all of a sudden. Leo's resistance really bothered her, and she had to say something. "I don't understand why you don't want me to help? What are you afraid of?" she asked looking straight into his eyes.
Her green eyes suddenly went wide. "Uh oh." Before he could reply, Kathleen quickly pushed back from the table, got up with her hand covering her mouth, and hurried to the bathroom. The wave of nausea came with no warning. Within seconds she was on her knees bent over the toilet vomiting.
In a fit of impatience, Leo was just about to toss his silverware down on his plate and go storming out, when Kathleen's expression shifted suddenly from persistent defiance to sickened surprise. The woman went darting out of the kitchen and a few moments later a concerned Leo found himself paused outside the bathroom door, though not daring to look in. Not yet.
"Are you okay?" he asked, hidden around the corner, the irritation in his voice having evaporated in an instant. Walker stared, still seated at the table, a chunk of pancake hovering with dangling strings of syrup over his plate.
Leaning over the bowl, Kathleen flushed the toilet for the second time when the dry heaves subsided. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, and then went to the sink to wash up when she heard his voice. "Yeah," she ran the water in the sink. "I feel better now. Sorry."
"Is that normal?" Leo asked, his sense of curiosity leveling up with his concern. "This late?" Of course, he didn't know the first thing about pregnancy. Walker, sensing that all was well, went back to casually eating.
"It must have been something I ate or I'm about to go into labor," she smiled into the mirror while she washed up. Kathleen did not feel anything out of the ordinary other than the brief nausea.
"Something you ate?" Leo glanced over his shoulder and his eyes lingered on the food, a whole new sense of worry falling over him. But then his eyes met hers in the reflection, he couldn't help but allow his gaze to wander down toward her stomach, though from his angle he couldn't really see it. "Maybe I'd better just get started on building that baby... table... thing. I got the feeling your friends ain't gonna show."
"It's normal, Leo. Some women get a little nausea a few days before the big day." She grabbed a hand towel off the rack and dried her face, her eyes watching him in the mirror. "I never had morning sickness," she put the towel away and walked up to him. "I had the flu instead."
Leo nodded, not realizing that at some point he'd leaned his shoulder against the wall. His focus drifted and his mind wandered briefly as he remembered getting sick himself; alone in a cold, hard, dark prison cell where he was absolutely positive he would die. He closed his eyes a moment and leaned up, walking away from Kathleen, only he headed into the spare room instead of the kitchen. "That must have been something," he said finally. "To realize you were pregnant after all this."
She followed him out of her room. "I thought it was a dream when they first told me. Then again I was at forty thousand feet on a C-17 heading back to States and delirious with fever," she said by the table next to Walker, who was still working on his pancake. She tapped the boy on the shoulder to get his attention, and when he looked up. "Do you want another? I'll let you pour the syrup this time."
Walker shook his head, but smiled a little up at her. The boy ate like a mouse, except at night, when he couldn't seem to ever get enough to eat. Leo watched him from the nursery doorway, noting a bit of melancholy had settled over him. It'd been the same way on the morning when Alice had made them breakfast, and Walker spent the rest of the day very still and sober. Of course, he had been very sick the night before.
Turning his attention to the changing station, Leo swallowed hard against the idea that breakfast surely reminded Walker of the life he must have once lived. He probably missed his mother terribly in those moments.
"Hey," Leo called across the living room, shooting a smirking glance in Kathleen's direction. "I'm gonna need someone strong to help me put this thing together. Can't do it by myself." Walker perked slightly and looked between Leo and Kathleen.
"Wait for Chris, there's no rush. It's not like I'm going to have the baby today." She removed her plate from the table. Her pancake was untouched. She no longer had an appetite. Neither did Leo, apparently, because his plate was left abandoned, too.
"What about Walker?" he asked. "He's pretty strong." The little boy peered hopefully up at Kathleen with his fork in his hand, like he was waiting to be dismissed from the table. His plate, unlike the others, was practically licked cleaned.
Kathleen understood where he was going and smiled. "Walker, hmm?" She looked at the boy. "Leo, you're right. He's a strong boy." She nodded. "Do you want to help, Walker?" she asked him. Walker nodded with a big smile, lifting his plate off the table with both hands to offer it up to the blonde. Leo watched from the other room, pilfering through the little plastic baggies within the box.
"Okay," she took the plate from him and let him go. Watching his little legs move him toward Leo in the other room, made her think about the child in her womb. Was he going to be as nice and well behaved as Walker? At that moment, she felt the baby kick inside, and it reminded her that she need to find some wrapping paper to wrap Jack's birthday gift.