Standard disclaimer. I'm pretty sure this is a G-rating (anybody can read it?). Indubitably indulgent - I wanted to see Ray and Benny at home.
By Sealie Scott
The Vecchio house reverberated with the sound of childish laughter and screams over the general hubbub of the entire family enjoying themselves. It was a perfect day of warm summer sunshine to celebrate the arrival of a new addition to an already sprawling family. Nephews, nieces and cousins ran from house to garden and back again, most in a state of complete undress, playing an unfathomable game involving mainly chasing and screaming. Ray Vecchio, expertly balancing a tray of ice-cold beers, side-stepped one of his young cousins.
"Watch out."
"Va bene," a young voice responded absently.
The sitting room was a relatively quiet haven of peace. Running was banned from the room where the baby reigned, watching a brand new confusing world with large luminous brown eyes. Ray cracked a can and set it next to his best friend who held his newest nephew under the watchful glare of prune-like Great Aunt Rosa. Ray planted a kiss on his Aunt's wrinkled cheek and placed the Miller in her hands, she smiled toothlessly.
"Your mother told me not to give your Aunt any alcohol." Fraser objected mildly.
"When you get to be ninety-seven I think you're allowed a beer." Ray counted.
Great Aunt Rosa clucked away in Italian evidently agreeing with her great nephew.
"Is he behaving himself?" Ray nodded at the small baby as he sat down gently next to Fraser.
Fraser regarded the baby critically - it looked back at him with an equally sombre expression.
"Yes, we're getting on fine."
"I'm surprised you got a chance to hold him." Ray tweaked a tiny foot poking out of the enveloping blanket.
"Your mother passed him to me and told me to sit in here quietly until the house calmed down."
That explained the beers Ray had had thrust upon him moments before by his Ma with instructions to head to the sitting room. Fraser's expression must have been getting a bit frayed as he sat in the kitchen surrounded by too many boisterous family members. Ray took a slug from Fraser's beer - he knew he wouldn't mind.
"If he falls asleep should I put him in the cradle?" Fraser nodded at the carry-cot under the window sill.
"If you can get him to sleep. Sis says he hasn't discovered that particular talent."
Fraser rocked the baby, just a little bit, a small smile crossed the boy's face.
"He smiled." Fraser smiled in response.
"Wind." Ray said knowledgeably.
"Smile."
"Wind."
Great Aunt Rosa nodded and then clucked in Italian, obviously addressing the mountie. Fraser directed his somewhat piercing attention at the venerable old woman but was unable to translate her comment.
"Ray?" He cocked his head at his best friend.
"She's just reminiscing out the good old olden days," Ray said too offhandedly.
"Ray?" Only Fraser could be wheedling without appearing childish or pathetic. "Tell the truth and shame the devil."
"It seems that once I was that small." Ray pointed at the baby.
Fraser eyed his friend with askance.
"Nobody who has seen you in diapers can take you seriously - you must know that, Benny."
Fraser's expression, if possible, became somehow more questioning and less intrusive.
"It looses something in the translation." Ray said shortly.
Fraser wisely let the subject drop. Great Aunt Rosa chuckled to herself. The baby, sensing the change in the atmosphere, chose that moment to squall.
"Oh, not happy." Fraser jigged the baby onto his shoulder. Too small to do anything about the change in position except complain the baby increased volume by several decibels.
"Nice one, Benny. How can something so small make so much noise."
Uncharacteristically, Fraser did not expound a lecture on the vocal qualities of new-borns and their effect on maternal instinct.
"Is his foot still poking out of the blanket?"
"Yeah," Ray said dubiously, "why?"
"The fleshy base of the foot, massage it in the smallest circle possible."
"What?"
"Please, Ray, just do it." Fraser said wincing at the noise drumming against his sensitive ear drums.
Intrigued, Ray caught his howling nephew's little foot and rubbed it as directed. The effect was almost instantaneous; the baby hiccuped as he stopped screaming mid-yell and sagged against his nursemaid.
"Keep rubbing," Fraser said grimly as he rocked the baby.
"How did you do that?" Ray asked incredulously.
"Acupressure. It only works on some children; I think it depends on how emotional and excitable they are." Fraser mused.
Ray stopped massaging, somehow that sounded almost insulting. Luckily for Fraser, Ray Vecchio's nephew did not awaken. Fraser continued rocking the baby, oblivious to his friend's glare.
"Bed!" Ordered an authoritarian voice from somewhere in the large house. The reply from the host of children was indistinct but the tone gave away the tone of complaint.
"I don't care. It is past your bed-time. Bed!" Ray's sister had a penetrating voice. "If you are not in bed by the time I count to five, everybody is going to bed. One, two, three, four, five. Right, that's it, I've had enough - you're all going."
Ray grimaced, and hunched down beside Fraser without being aware of what he was doing.
"She just sounds like Ma." Ray reminisced. "If one of us didn't co-operate - we all got it in the teeth."
"Grandmother just had to bring out the switch and I would go straight to bed."
"That too," Ray's expression clouded. "Is he going to stay asleep?" Ray asked changing the subject.
Fraser shifted the softly breathing scrap of humanity in his arms, the little boy didn't move.
"Yes?"
"Carry-cot." Ray directed.
Moving much more carefully than was really necessary Fraser glided across to the cot. He settled the baby in the correct position as dictated by informative brochures at the local library. In the cot was the little furry rabbit that Diefenbaker had insisted that the mountie buy for the new arrival.
"Let's escape to the back garden - all hell's gonna erupt in here when Maria puts them all to bed."
"What about...?" Fraser gestured at the cot.
"Aunt Rosa can look after him. Kids sleep on their own all the time. They'd be only be one kid in a family otherwise."
Ray ushered the mountie from the room before he could object.
*
They bypassed disgruntled kids and Frannie by the simple expedience of ducking into the pantry. Diefenbaker was already in the pantry with a sublime, stuffed smile on his face. A morsel of danish clung to his muzzle. Fraser shook his head at the unrepentant wolf but couldn't chastise him as on the other side of the door a Vecchio Drama involving Frannie was breaking out. Sandwiched together the two friends waited until the coast was clear.
"You do realise that some people would have a field day with this scenario..."
"Yes, Ray."
While Ma Vecchio shepherded an escapee upstairs they snuck out the back door, not before Ray retrieved a six-pack and a paper-back book from the kitchen table.
"We really should help tidy up?" Fraser said worriedly.
"We were at work until six; we're allowed to disappear when they tidy up, it's part of the rules. They would be disappointed if we didn't play.
Fraser digested this information and then filed it in 'Incomprehensible Vecchio Family Affairs' and followed his friend. Ray ventured deep into the Vecchio back garden. It was surprisingly large. Near the kitchen was a well tended vegetable plot with a nice lawn and an assortment of swings and climbing frames and Frannie's sun chair. The back of the garden was left to its own devices, the grass grew high and the trees and shrubs bushy. Needless to say it was the Vecchio children's preferred hunting ground. Fraser followed Ray quietly, dropping into his soundless walk, despite the fact that they were in the heart of Chicago. Diefenbaker dived into a bush with a gleeful yelp. Probably attacking a milk dud, Fraser thought acidly. The trees enveloped them. Ray stopped and sighed with satisfaction.
"I knew it and I told them not too."
Curious, Fraser stepped around Ray. Suspended from a tree was a crude wigwam constructed from one of Ma Vecchio's best stripy sheets. A small camp fire, embers burning, was surrounded by stones. Copious amounts of blankets and cushions were thrown around the fire. It was a stereotypical ideal of a kid's perception of a red-indian camp-site courtesy of Warner Brothers.
"I guess you better tell them more about Inuit and Timshim life styles. Although I dread to think what they'll use to make a sweat lodge. They haven't stopped playing this game since you told them that story about the manitou and Walks-with-Thunder." Ray laughed. "I wonder where they found the matches this time?"
"Are they allowed to play with matches?" Fraser asked as Ray dropped bonelessly onto an enormous pile of cushions.
"'course not. I'll speak to them tomorrow. Or you can give them a lecture on the Caribou mating habits as punishment."
Fraser joined Ray beside the dying fire, more by force of habit rather than necessity, on the warm summer evening, he fed some fresh twigs to the embers. Diefenbaker crept out the bushes cringing with embarrassment: the squirrel had got away. He curled up on a pillow and wrapped his tail over his muzzle.
"What's the book, Ray?"
Ray grinned, he knew that Fraser would be intrigued.
"I picked it up at a second hand book shop." Ray said deliberately not answering the question. He turned the book very slowly in his hands. "It seemed like a good idea at the time."
"What is it?" Fraser's fingers twitched.
"It's a book of names," Ray peered at the cover, "with origins and meanings."
Fully aware of how he was irritating the book loving Fraser, who was dying to get his hands on the book, he flicked through the pages.
"I bought it for Maria. She was having problems picking a name for the baby - months ago. It was a big mistake; last time I heard they were going to name him Huxley Bryce. Ma put her foot down at that one." Ray grinned. "I mean, he's almost a week old and we haven't named him yet - that's very unlucky - the Christening is tomorrow,"
Fraser could tell that Ray was leading up to something, and a prompt was always necessary with Ray. "So..?"
"So." Ray grinned. "each person here tonight gets to chose a name and it goes into a hat. The baby get the name that's picked. You got a favourite name, Benny?"
"I can't." Fraser contained a shudder at the argument which was bound to ensue mere seconds after the name was chosen.
"'course you can." Ray relaxed into the pillows and thumbed to a specific page. "You know what your name means, Benny?" Ray didn't wait for an answer. "Blessed planter of Strawberries," gales of laughter followed.
"Is that Fraser or Frasier." The mountie asked a tad snarkily.
"Oh, my," Ray mimed a heart attack, "I've actually made you bite."
Fraser plucked the book from his friend's hands and found the offending pages - it was indeed true.
"Your name means 'Great Protector'," Fraser smiled, his normal good humour suddenly restored, "how appropriate."
"Sappy." Ray snatched the book back. "You're impossible. How does the name Giglielmo sound or Guistino or Michele."
"Michelle." Fraser said quietly.
"No, that's a girls name." Ray shook his head at his friend's ignorance. "Michele."
"My little sister was called Michelle." Fraser said distantly lost in his thoughts.
Ray levered himself up on one elbow, concerned. "Was?"
"She died." Fraser said simply. "There was something wrong with her heart. I was very small. I remember peeking into her cot just before Mum took her to the hospital. That's it, one memory, I must have only been about two. She had the most incredible black hair."
"I'm sorry, Benny." Ray said sincerely.
"Oh," Fraser shook himself out of his reverie. "No, Ray. I'm sorry for bring up a singularly inappropriate topic of conversation given today's celebrations. I was just thinking about her earlier..." Fraser rifled through his wallet and pulled out a grainy photograph and proffered it to his friend.
Ray had never seen a photograph of Benton as a child, even back then he had a serious expression and a clear penetrating gaze. Brother and sister were sitting on a enormous couch. Benny held his tiny sister in a firm, protective grip.
"She looks like you." Ray passed the photograph back.
"Really?" Fraser scrutinised the picture.
Ray cracked two cans. Fraser took his wordlessly - despite the fact he normally didn't drink.
"A toast: to Michelle."
"To Michelle."
"So how about a name?" Ray said changing the subject before Fraser could become morose.
"Daniel. I've always liked Daniel." Fraser said after a moments thought.
"Daniello." Ray mused. "Ma would like it."
"Is that necessary? I mean he is Maria and Tony's child."
"Benny, Benny, Benny." Ray remonstrated. "This is an Italian Momma you're talking about. This is my Ma. She is not going to take him to the park and yell: 'Homer, come to Grandma!'. Daniello she could handle." There was a little childish giggle from the rhododendrons. Ray grinned at Benny then mock scowled at the quivering bush.
"Come out, come out, whoever you are."
A pair of brown eyes emerged from behind a leaf.
"Hi, Paulie." Ray drawled.
"Hi, Unc Ray, " Little Paulie reluctantly emerged dragging his baby sister behind him. "Hi, Unc Benny."
"I see you escaped the round up." Ray said containing a smile with difficulty.
"Uh huh." Paulie sidled up to his uncle accurately reading that he was going to be a soft touch. The two children were Vecchios to the hilt - small skinny frame, with that half starved expression which Fraser knew full well was at odds with the amount of food any Vecchio could put away. Connie, Paulie's sister, stared beseechingly up at the mountie sucking her thumb firmly.
"What can I do for you?" Fraser asked - she had Frannie's eyes..
Connie pulled out her thumb out of her mouth long enough to lisp: "a stowy."
"One story," Fraser bargained - a slight smile on his face, "then bed?"
"Yes." She whispered.
Fraser snuck a glance at Ray who nodded indulgently. Both children immediately snuggled trustingly in-between the two friends. Diefenbaker stood aloof for a moment (he was a wolf) then he inserted himself beside the two children. Connie clasped ecstatic arms around her bestest fwiend in the whole world and burrowed her face into Dief's neck. Paulie much older (all of eighteen months) restrained himself to stroking Dief's back. Lifting Paulie onto his lap, Ray settled back to listen as Fraser spun his tale.
"Once upon a time there was a mountie who lived alone in the cold Northwest Territories of Canada who came to Chicago and met a detective..."
*
"More?" Paulie asked plaintively.
The sun was just setting on the horizon illuminating the leaves a golden brown. It was a quiet, introspective time and time for adults to be left in peace.
"We agreed one story." Fraser said equably.
Unable to withstand Fraser's sense of fair play - Paulie climbed reluctantly to his feet sister in tow.
Diefenbaker rolled his eyes at Fraser, he had just lost a very comfortable pillow called Connie. The wolf padded over to the opposite side of the fire as far away from Fraser as possible and still near the burning embers. Fraser mouthed: you're getting soft. Dief looked away. Fraser shook his head, resignedly, the wolf's motto was: out of sight; out of mind. The children paused by the beaten down path.
"Scoot!" Ray said menacingly.
They scooted.
The adults relaxed back into the cushions comfortable in each other's silence as the sun slowly set. Fraser's expression was openly content. Ray smiled at his friend as he amused himself throwing leaves and twigs onto the embers and watching them ignite. Suddenly he chuckled. "You do realise that we're in trouble now."
"No, why?" Fraser asked unconcerned - nothing could possibly spoil this evening and as far as he knew neither himself or Ray were in trouble with either of their superiors.
"Well, Maria and Ma have probably been looking for those two for hours and..." Ray paused leadingly.
"And." Fraser prompted becoming worried.
"Only two Vecchios got to hear that story."
"Oh, dear."
fin