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***
"More pancakes?" Sydney asked.
"Man...I'm waffling here, Sydney, I really
am." She giggled, as planned. "But you're feeding me too well these days. If I'm
not careful, I'll gain back all the weight I just lost, and--"
"I know, I
know, dieting makes you cranky." She made a show of taking my plate away. "And
we don't want a cranky Weiss, do we?"
"I'm personally opposed to
it."
She grinned and took another bite of her own pancakes.
These
pre-work banquets became a habit shortly after Sydney moved in. I'm not sure
when she stopped inviting me the night before and when I just started showing
up. She told me once that she got bored eating alone and that if I wasn't there,
she'd start talking to the Mrs. Butterworth bottle. I'm not sure she was
kidding. So she'd cook, we'd eat, and then I'd give her a ride to work. Do you
know how hard it is to get your driver's license back when the DMV thinks you're
dead?
While I did the dishes (Mama Weiss raised a boy with manners, thank
you), Sydney wandered into the living room. I looked over and saw her holding
the CD Marshall had made for her. "Have you listened to that yet?"
"I
haven't had the nerve. Does he really think boybands will bring my memory
back?"
"This is Marshall. He could be in a boyband and it wouldn't
surprise me."
She looked over at me.
"Okay, it would. But you know
what I mean. Here, let me see it." I took the CD case carefully between two
soapy fingers. "Oh, here, play track 15."
"John Mayer? He sounds
familiar."
"Yeah, he's from before." I tuned in to the song enough to
catch the lyrics and winced. I lose my worried mind? Marshall, what were
you thinking? You couldn't have picked a slightly less appropriate song? "He's
really big now."
"Cool." She tapped her fingers on the stereo. "It's got
a good beat, and you can dance to it. I give it a 78."
I burst out
laughing, moved to cover my mouth, and inhaled some bubbles. "Stop snickering
and give me a towel, Bristow," I said between coughs.
Just then, the
doorbell rang. I waved Syd toward it and groped for a towel
myself.
"Dad!"
"Good morning, Sydney. I thought you might want a
ride to work." He caught sight of me as he stepped inside. "Weiss."
"Hey,
Mr. Bristow." I went back to coughing.
"Is he all right?" Jack asked
Sydney.
"He just got a little enthusiastic about this song, that's
all."
If it had been anyone but Jack Bristow, I would have sworn a smile
was tugging at his lips. "Well, it is a nice song, I suppose."
"You can
dance to it, too," I said. Yay, breathing was beginning to function
again.
"Is that so?" And to my jaw-dropping, eye-popping shock--and from
the look on her face, Sydney's as well--Jack took his daughter's hand and swung
her into a perfect waltz.
Okay, I probably should have looked away. But
damned if I was going to.
As I watched, Sydney sent her father a look
that absolutely radiated with happiness, and then tucked her head under his
chin. He smiled--no really--and kept dancing.
I remembered suddenly a
conversation I'd had with Lauren back when she started dating Mike. Just like
Sydney asked me about Lauren when she first came back, Lauren had come to me and
asked about Sydney. Well, who else could she talk to?
"We used to joke
that except for the bad guys, her life was Everybody Loves Sydney," I'd said.
"Okay, bad guys and authority figures. She had issues with Kendall."
"So
I gathered," Lauren said in that faux-reserved way she has. "Did that extend to
her father, too? I can't quite get a handle on Mr. Bristow." This was before he
got himself tossed in solitary-for-life, of course.
"No, Jack loved her.
Probably more than anyone. He just has the social skills of a grizzly bear. A
really cranky grizzly bear."
"Perfect Sydney," Lauren said, and I
completely understood the bitterness in her tone.
"No, not perfect.
Just...just Sydney. When I first met her, it was kind of off-putting. At the
time, she had this tragic, almost mythic air about her. The love of her life was
dead. She'd been duped by the bad guys. And she was a scarily good spy. She was
larger than life, you know? And that was uncomfortable. But she was also really
goofy and really nice and she loved her life outside the CIA. She was a good
friend, Lauren. She was--"
"--just Sydney," Lauren finished, and I had to
smile.
Exactly.
The song ended, but the Bristows stayed where they
were. I left them talking to each other and slipped out of the house.
It
would be good for them to spend some time together. Maybe Jack could give her a
ride to work more often; she'd like that. She could feed him breakfast,
too.
I should cut back on the pancakes anyway. The lurch in my stomach
was obviously from too much buttermilk, not from the way Sydney had looked when
her father danced with her for possibly the first time ever.
I wasn't
signing up for another season of Everybody Loves Sydney. I wasn't.
I
turned on the radio. Guess who was playing?
"This is all your fault,
John," I said out loud. "I'm obviously the one losing my worried mind now.
Thanks so much."
--the end--