LONDON CALLING

Jessie enjoyed supper he wondered why hed not tasted the food fully the first time but this time was like the first , full of flavours and suckulent lean cuts of meat. When Brian spoke of the jigsaw puzzle he nodded " yeah, lets do that" he said glad to now be refocusing his mind on something else. He finished his meal and took his coffee to go so he had something to sip on while he tried to do the puzzle. Heading back to thecabin he paused as he waited for Brain " I'll leave the door open for you, I feel that if I got close to Angus he'd knock my head off then serve it to me al la carte." he said opening teh cabin door and stepping in.

"Thanks. Yeah, I think you should both keep your distance," Brian said. "I'll go get the puzzle and then, I'll order us a couple of drinks. Should we do tea, or perhaps sodas and popcorn? Give it some thought."

Brian made his way down to the other compartment and knocked on the door. Angus and Michael were just ready to leave for dinner. When Brian asked for the puzzle, Angus gladly gave it to him. Brian told him that Jessie believed Angus was angry and that he should just keep his distance. Angus agreed it was best, but he wasn't sure it was because he was angry. Angus wasn't entirely sure how he was feeling. Michael deliberately redirected Angus to going to dinner in the dining car.

Brian returned with the puzzle and asked Jessie whether he had decided what they should drink while they were working on the puzzle.

Jessie saw Brian return and had teh space all cleard for the puzzle to be set up " I was thinking sodas and popcorn becuse were not going to get sodas again while where home" he said " might as well enjoy it while we can" he said with a genuine smileas he looked for the porter nd asked if they could have it sent to the car, finding they could he ordered it " he said it will be here in ten minets, time for me to get out of my tux" he said undoing the tie and hanging the jacket back on the hanger. " mind if I try your trick and shrink my suit?" he asked picking up the guide book Michael had given him.

Sitting down now in his jeans and a tee shirt bear foot he started adding the edges of the puzzle " oh, do you want to do the bottom or the top?" he asked forgetting Brian was helping him.

"Okay," Brian said. He ordered sodas and popcorn and then opened the puzzle and resized only about half of what he intended to do. "I'll enlarge the compartment and the table after the porter brings our order." He didn't want to stay in his tux either, so he changed into a pair of sweats to be comfortable. "Be my guest," Brian smiled when Jessie asked if he could try Brian's trick with his tux. He shrank his tux again and put it back in the book where it had been and closed the book and put it in his bag.

"Either one," Brian said. "You pick, and I'll take what's left."

Angus and Michael went down to the dining car, and Michael ordered an exquisite red wine with dinner, and then he ordered a bottle of Dom Perignon champagne, just what Robert had told them not to do. Michael really didn't care. They savored every little bite of dinner and every tiny sip. Angus enjoyed eating a gourmet dinner with Michael for a change. They both could enjoy simple fare very well but they also had wide enough tastes that they could enjoy both the simple and the finest with equal appreciation. Angus had figured out that his life with Ruby was likely going to involve simple foods and simple things. And that was fine. He saw nothing wrong with it. Every so often, though, he enjoyed savoring a superb dry red wine and a fine champagne. He could do that with Michael, hoping that, maybe, someday Ruby would like some of those things too.

Jessie smiled taking his tux he shrunk it and placed it between teh folds of the book Michael had given him then tucked it into his bag then sat down he looked at Brian as he said he would not make hings bigger until the porter had been and no sooner he finished those words they heard a knock. Jesie stood up and opened the door to find the porter and several sodas with a large bowl of popcorn.

"Thank yo" he said and tookj it from him , setting it down on the bed to then close the door. "alright we have popcorn and soda, shall we begin" he asked waiting for Brian to resize the cabin and table so they could build it easily.

"Alright. Let's make some room." Brian drew his wand and enchanted the room, made the table bigger and made the benches into deep, comfortable armchairs. "That's better. Now, let's see if we can get this thing tackled, shall we? What's your favorite way to work one of these things. I tend to sort out the edge pieces first, but I'm open to whatever you want to do."

Michael ordered a second bottle of champagne for the room, and they returned to their compartment after dinner, changed out of their tuxes into their pajama bottoms and they broke out the backgammon board and the mancala board. They each liked both games, so they spent the rest of the evening challenging themselves to backgammon and mancala while drinking more Dom Perignon.

"I'm going to miss this," Angus said. "I love champagne and wine, and I like both dry and sweet. Ruby is much more about soda, maybe a beer. Not so much wine and champagne."

"Maybe she just hasn't been exposed to it. Maybe she needs to be shown and exposed and educated. I think that's true for a lot of people," Michael said. "Angus, so you know, she knows what happened in Romania. I told her because, first of all, Jessie is getting to be a real safety concern. We can't possibly take him on a mission again until he gets some help. And, second, you would probably have never told her. And, she had a message for you. She wants you to know there is no contest in it for her. She chooses you. She didn't need to think about it. Her life is with you, not her brother. Let me ask you. Aside from your own lack of self confidence, do you have any other doubts about your relationship with her?"

"No," he said. "Not at all."

"Then you two have no problem. I think she's going to be as glad to have you home as you're going to be to get home."

"Michael, do you suppose there's anything wrong with wanting her all to myself for awhile? I mean, it isn't that I don't want kids. I do. But, once they're here, then all of that private time to ourselves is just gonna be gone for the next twenty freaking years." Michael laughed out loud.

"Well, I'm not any kind of an expert on that subject, but, I don't think there's anything wrong with feeling like that--unless you don't explain it to her. But, don't think that you won't ever be able to hire a sitter for an overnight and get away, because your kids are going to have relatives out the ying yang. You could have more opportunities for adult time than most if you took advantage of it. And besides, even if you went home and got pregnant straight off, you still have that whole nine months thing to deal with."

"Well, yeah. There is that, I guess," he said.

"You guess? It isn't like the stork is going to drop a baby down your chimney, Man. You will be alone in that duplex for nine months. I think you're going to be fine."

"And what about Jessie?"

"Robert's working on something. I'm not sure what, but he's on it. We'll just have to wait and see what he has in mind."

Jessie sat down in the comfortable cahirs and sighed " god these are comfy" he said smiling " oh I do the edges too and work my way inward" he said to Brian as he then lent forward and began placing several peiced with straight sizes upward to he could se the face of them two fit perefectly and he smiled looking for the third one.

It took him an hour but he managed to get teh whole bottom of the puzzle done " okay how are you doing?" he asked seeing he wa well ahead of him and he chuckled " okay I got a lot to learn." he said trying to find peices faster but made himself slow down knowing it was not a race but a freindly game. " have to admit , its good to do something not alone for once, I mean other than missions or patrols." he admited. Jack isn't a games guy" he said and Kaden well he is but we do other things together, and I mean walks , stopping to try new tea flavors and talk, a lot of talking." he said with a chuckle.

"Khaat and I went through that phase that you and Kaden are doing, with doing the things that we initially found we enjoyed, but then, as the weather got colder and we needed to stay home a little more, we started branching into other things. And besides that, we did have a newborn, too. That took an immense amount of time. The older she gets, the easier it is for us to take her with us, and she likes going with us too. In the meantime, though, we've gotten good at chess and backgammon and puzzles and all sorts of things.

"Abbey's got a few months yet before we really do need to start her in school. She'll be four in April, so next fall, she'll be in nursery school. I think I've managed to finally twist Khaat's arm that its time to do that. Khaat wanted to do home schooling and keep Abbey at home. I guess that would still be an option, but I'd rather see her have some socialization with some other kids her age. And besides, there is always the chance that, during the day, we might be able to sneak off and go out for breakfast or lunch if she's in school. I'm trying to tempt Khaat into thinking about some grown up things we can start to do again. And she wants another baby. Women," he sighed, laughing.

Jessie sat and listened to Brian talk about how he and Khaat first did things in there relashanship then he spoke of Abby and how she will start preschool soon " I heard there are some great preschools for magic kids" he said then he chuckled again as Brain said they could have adult time and that she wanted another baby " so Abby could have a litel brother or sister?" he said smiling " is that what you want?" he asked " oviously Kaden and I don't realy have that problem but , i guess we could adopt should we feel were ready, but that's way down the line right now." he fixed another peice in place and looked for another.

"If Khaat has her way, Abbey will have several siblings. Khaat has it in her head she wants ten kids. I don't know why she wants ten. She doesn't know why its ten, but its ten. It's always been ten. Maybe its from being an only child. I don't know. I wouldn't mind having another, if they're as well behaved as Abbey, but it would be my luck that we would have octuplets or something, and they would all be demon spawn. I don't think I would luck out and, all our children would be angels. My biggest fear is that she would end up with complications like she had with Abbey. She damn near died having Abbey, and I really don't want to risk her again. Robert really doesn't think that would happen again, but it's something to be aware of. If she could be sure of having healthy pregnancies, I wouldn't mind if we had a hundred. But she comes first--always."

"You know, this is a lot more difficult because Angus put the pieces in a plastic bag and we don't have a ruddy picture to look at. I have no idea what the heck this is going to be. Too early to tell. Unless you have an idea?"

"You certainly could adopt, but you could also decide to find a surrogate mother, and then the child would be biologically related to at least one of you," Brian said