geeky_agent | OOM: Visiting Family

Current Mood: worried

OOM: Visiting Family

She almost wishes Caiti would be there.

It would mean more questions and more problems, yes. They'd still have to explain Caiti having met Jack already in Morocco two years prior and she just knew that wouldn't go over well.

Still, she can't help but wonder if maybe it would be better to get everything out in the open now. (Not everything.) Caiti had always been good at dealing with problems between her sister and brother and it sounded like she and Jack had gotten along pretty well and she hadn't seen her in months...

This had probably been a bad idea but it was too late to back out now.

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Jack looks up at the passing road signs, then down at the map, dragging his finger along their route. "Okay, looks like the turn-off should be coming up on our right in the next couple minutes."

Glancing over at her, he gives her a slightly nervous smile; her nervousness is all over her face, not that he can blame her. "We should be there about when we said we would, relax."

Ryan's smile fades as they leave the room. Jeannie hands Tori a sippy cup and Tori seems to remember the coloring she'd left during the excitement of a new person and her Aunt Chrissy. Once their daughter's occupied for a few moments, Jeannie finally makes eye contact.

"That bedroom is next to Tori's," Ryan says quietly.

Jack follows Chris up the stairs to the bedroom Jeannie had mentioned, heaving the bags onto the bed. It's a nice room; comfortable, with a nice view out the window, looking out over the trees.

Unzipping his suitcase, Jack gives Chris a small smile. "Why do I get the feeling Ryan isn't too happy with the thought of us sharing a room?"

Dinner is quiet, tense, as by unspoken consensus they keep to small talk, Tori gleefully filling the silences by talking about the dog that lives next door or her preschool. Once the dishes are cleared and washed, Tori drags Chris off to look at something, Jeannie heading outside.

Jack walks out into the living room, looking out at the view for a minute, then moving over to a table with photos on it. He smiles, spotting one of Chris and Ryan Jr. sitting on a dock, grinning; Chris is missing one of her front teeth. Behind it, there's one of Ryan Sr., helping Chris hold onto a fish. Chris looks about seven or eight, beaming at her catch, while Ryan looks down at her with a kind of amused pride.

Despite everything, he still can't help but feel a small stab of guilt, knowing that Ryan will never get the chance to come back to this place, won't get to meet his granddaughter or see his other children again. But that blame needed to be put at Stephen Saunders' door.

Coming in from outside, her arms full of Tori's toys and other things they'd left outside, Jeannie casts a quick look over at Jack and Ryan talking over by the living room windows. They're talking quietly, their expressions serious, but not antagonistic. That's something at least she thinks, hoping that conversation is going well. She wants to like Jack; she does like him, from what little she knows about him so far. But she has to admit, the main reason she doesn't want to find fault with him is because Chris has been so distant, they don't need something else pushing them apart. Not just for Ryan's sake either; she and Chris had been friends before she met Ryan, and she misses that friendship.

Walking up the stairs to the second floor, she can hear Tori chattering on excitedly, hear Chris' occasional question or comment, when Tori lets her have a chance to get a word in edgewise. At least it looks like one conversation is going well, she thinks, smiling to herself.

Pushing the door open, she smiles at Chris for a minute before turning her attention to Tori. "Time for bed, sweetie. Auntie Chris will be here in the morning, so you can tell her everything else you want to then. Go and brush your teeth."

After saying goodnight and after Jeannie and Ryan have headed upstairs, Chris and Jack go outside by the lake. It's still warm outside, even with the lake so close, and the only thing that can be heard are the crickets and the sound of the waves.

"So," Chris comes up to Jack and slides her hand in his. "How'd the cross-examination go?"

For reasons she doesn't quite know, Chris wakes up before everyone else. Trying to fall back asleep doesn't work and if she stays in bed, she'd only wake up Jack more than she already has.

The only obvious solution to her is to go downstairs and make breakfast for everyone.

Over the pop of the sizzling bacon and the sound of coffee brewing, she hears someone walking down the stairs and assumes it's Jack. "Hey, you decided to get up after all!"

"You really think that will be a problem?" Amusement and concern in her voice, she paused from getting the food ready to look at him.

"This is Chris we're talking about here. I don't think we need to worry. She has had boyfriends before."

"You think Dad would have let them stay in the same room?" Ryan walks over to the fridge and pulls out a bottle of water. "He's at least forty and while Chris has had boyfriends, there's something about this guy I don't trust." He twists off the cap and takes a sip.

"What do you know about him?" As he talks he wanders over to Tori and she hunches over the table, her arm protecting the picture from view.

There's a scoff at his first statement. They did share rooms together, if only to save space, and they were much younger than Chris and her friend.

And not always on their best behavior.

"She's a grown woman," Jeannie reminds him, setting a platter of food on the island top. Though her amusement falters at his last question.

"Not that much," she shrugs and turns back towards the food. "They've been together for a year and he works for CTU."

"Yeah, that's what you said last night," Ryan takes another sip of water and slides onto one of the chairs. "After everything I can't believe she's still working for them and now she's dating someone at CTU and we're supposed to accept that most of the work is classified?" Ryan puts down the bottle. "Part of me wants to accept this guy just to keep Chrissy -- " his voice lowers, "and the other part wants to dig out my handgun and re-enact 'Gunfight at the OK Corral.' " He laughs at that thought.

Tori laughs with him and moves to tug on his jeans. "Daddy! I finished the picture. It's Baby!" Tori is referring to their next-door neighbor's dog, who is a tiny white puppy.

Ryan takes the picture from her and pulls her up onto his knee. "It looks just like her, kid." It looks like a cloud with four legs and a tail. "Hopefully, Chris will be down soon and you can show her. But why don't you go with mommy and get ready for dinner now."

Jeannie picks up her daughter, laying a light kiss on her temple. "Very nice, baby. Now let's get washed up while Daddy sets the table."

With a wry grin to her husband she adds, "You should think about what you're going to do when she's ready to bring home boys."

Tori looks from her mom to her aunt. "Are you staying, Auntie Chris?"

"Yes," Chris answers with a nod. "I'm spending the night here, like you. And I'll still be here in the morning and we can go out to the lake. In the morning."

After a quiet moment of what could be thinking, or could be stalling while she colors for a little longer, her niece accepts this answer with a nod and an, "Ok!"

Chris gives her a hug before she walks out of the room, then starts picking up all the toys and crayons that had been left behind.

"I think you're her new favourite person," Jeannie says with a small smile. She kneels, helping pick up some of the toys scattered across the floor as she listens for the sound of teeth being brushed. "I hope she didn't talk your ear off too much."

"No, she just had a lot to tell me about her day camp, her favorite tv shows, the neighbor's dog," she says, trying to list everything that seemed to catch Tori's attention. "I'm surprised at how much she's talking. Last time I saw her it was only a few words here and there and now, full sentences."

It didn't seem like it had been that long ago.

"Kids seem to age fast, especially in the first few years. It's like she was crawling, and then I blinked and she was running around the house," Jeannie says, smiling slightly. She's avoiding the real subject, she knows, but there are so many things she wants to ask, and she's not sure how.

Picking up a few picture books that had tumbled off the dresser, she says, casually, "Jack seems nice." He'd been fairly adept at not talking much about himself at dinner, too.

Ryan's anticipating the day that Tori asks for a dog of her own. Once she gets old enough to use the 'But Aunt Caiti had one' line, he knows part of his time will be spent taking care of the dog and he'll wind up walking it around their Long Island neighborhood during a Nor'easter. Listening to her talk about Baby, though, he thinks that if it makes her happy he'll gladly take on the responsibility.

Jeannie tries to start conversation that doesn't involve Tori but it fails quickly and after dinner Jeannie takes the opportunity of a free babysitter to get some alone time with a new book. Ryan looks out the kitchen window, wishing she stayed, but it's a not-so-subtle hint that, 'Do you want the mustard?' doesn't count as getting to know Chrissy's boyfriend.

Ryan turns away from the window and heads into the living room. Jeannie mentioned that Jack worked at CTU and Ryan has the uncomfortable feeling that he knows more about them than he'll ever divulge. When they get back home, Ryan thinks, he might have to do some investigation of his own.

"Is this your first time up here?"

"He is," Chris says with a nod, glancing over at her sister-in-law. "He really likes the place. I forgot how nice it was."

She was tempted to say more about the cabin but she realizes she's coming dangerously close to rambling.

Jeannie nods. "It's been a while since you were here," she says, trying to not make it sound like she's guilt-tripping Chris for her distance. "So how did you two meet? You said he works for CTU, too."

"Yeah, I know." She doesn't bother with any excuses or explanations for that, instead quietly hoping she'd be able to see them more now that they knew about Jack.

Chris smiles. "At CTU. He was on an assignment and I was his case manager. We talked a lot, at first just about the case... things evolved from there."

"It must have been a pretty slow evolution, over a whole year," she says, still able to sound nonchalant when what she's really wondering is why Chris never mentioned him in all that time. "When did things get serious between you two?"

"Well, he was on assignment. That took priority, a lot of the time," she says with a casual shrug of her shoulders. "Not that long a go. Maybe a few months? He, uh... he and I are living together now."

That gets her attention, and she looks up at Chris, her hand frozen in the act of reaching for another crayon. "Living together?" It was such a large step for her, and considering they hadn't heard anything about Jack's existence before this...

"So you must know each other really well, then," Jeannie says, going back to picking up the crayons, her forehead furrowed in thought.

Her voice is stronger when she says, "Yeah, we do. We have some of the same friends. From work. And I've met his family already."

"Oh?" she says, wondering how long ago Chris had met them. Then again, his family could be in L.A., too, in which case it wouldn't be fair. "How did you get along with them? What kind of family does he have?"

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OOM: Visiting Family

The Meeting

Ryan-Jeannie Conversation

Jack-Chris Conversation

Jack-Ryan Jr. Conversation

Jeannie-Chris Conversation

Chris-Jack Conversation

Chris-Ryan Conversation

Re: Ryan-Jeannie Conversation

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Re: Jack-Ryan Jr. Conversation

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