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gray-autumn-sky · 5 years

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Sleepless in Seattle, Chapter 15

October 9, 1993- Seattle, Washington:

Roland’s eyes widen as he pulls a letter from Connecticut from the mailbox. His smile is immediate and his first impulse is to run inside and make his dad open it--and then, his smile fades. His dad hasn’t even opened that first and perfect letter; he probably wouldn’t open this one.

Forgetting about the rest of the mail, he examines the envelope. It’s not as nice as the first one--the envelope is just plain white--and the handwriting on the front looks very different. He flips it over, again, checking the return address and he notices the same apple stamp as the first--and that detail makes him grin again.

Chewing at his lip, he debates what he should do, and with a groan, he examines it again--and this time, he realizes that the envelope isn’t addressed to Robin Locksley, it’s addressed to him, to Roland Locksley.

A tight but excited grin stretches over his lips as he stares down at it, and he can barely contain himself. It’s rare that he ever gets mail, and even rarer that he gets something this exciting.

He looks at it one last time before he shoves it into his back pocket and reaches for the rest of the mail, knowing that his dad will be suspicious if he comes back empty handed.

“Dad! Dad, I got the--”

He stops, listening as his dad and Belle talk in low, whispery voices.

“No, we’re not going out again,” he says with a little sigh. “It just… didn’t feel right.”

“I’m sure you’ll meet someone soon,” Belle says, her voice calm and soothing as she talks to his dad the way she talks to him whenever he gets a bad grade at school or has a dream that makes him uncomfortable. “There are tons of women out there.”

“Yeah,” he whispers, tip-toeing closer to the living room and peering around the wall. “Like Regina.”

“I know,” Robin says, chuckling softly. “I just forgot how exhausting dating was.”

“You’re tellin’ me.”

Robin’s eyes roll. “You and Ruby have been together for years.”

“That doesn't mean finding her was easy.”

Robin grins. “I seem to remember you coming over from your very first date with her and proclaiming to me and Marian that you’d found the person you were going to spend the rest of your life with.”

“Details,” Belle says, shrugging dismissively. “Still doesn't mean finding her wasn’t rough.”

“I got the mail,” Roland announces a bit too loudly as Robin’s eyes roll. “Nothing exciting,” he says grinning as he drops down the stack. “Just bills and coupons and stuff.”

“Oh--”

“Nothing worth reading.”

Robin’s eyes narrow.

“Well, I’ve got homework to do. So, um… I should, uh… get on that.”

“Yeah, you… should,” Robin calls, watching as he runs off, taking the stairs two at a time.

He gets to his room and shuts the door, pressing his back to it and sliding down, so that if anyone tries to open it, the door will get stuck and he’ll have time to hide the letter.

Grinning, he pulls it out of the envelope. It’s thicker than the last time, he realizes as he tears it open.

And the first thing he notices is that there are three parts. The first--and the one he reads first--has a yellow post it note on it that says “For Sleepless in Seattle.”

Dear Sleepless in Seattle,

My name is Henry. I am Regina’s son.

Roland grins--responding to this letter will be much easier. He won’t need Gus or the thesaurus to look up big, impressive words like he did the last time.

My mom is a journalist and she’s been working on this story for a really long time. It’s on you.

Well, not you exactly, but the radio program you called into on Christmas. She recorded it for the article and she listens to it all of the time. I know that sounds a little creepy, but I swear, it’s not. She just really likes you and really likes your story, and when she listens to it, something happens. I can’t quite tell what it is, but it means a lot to her, and I think she’d like to meet you.

“Of course she does!” Roland says to himself, the excitement in his voice more than evident. “We wanna meet her too… even if my dad doesn’t know it yet.”

My mom’s best friend, Mal, is always talking about signs and fate and people being destined for each other. She’s pretty sappy about stuff like that, but my mom has never bought into it. It’s just not her thing. She’s always been super practical about stuff, even love.

Roland grins at the word love.

“The reason I am writing is because I think my mom really likes you. I like this could love you even.

“I knew it,” Roland whispers to himself. “I knew it.”

He reads a bit more, flipping over to a separate paper that looks like it could be part of a newspaper--and this too is meant for his dad. He doesn't understand most of it, but he gets enough to know that Regina Mills is really into his dad--and given the conversation he overheard between his dad and aunt, his dad is looking for someone really special--someone like Regina.

Then, he gets to the part that has a yellow post-it with his own name written on it.

This might sound crazy, but my friend Lily is really into this sappy old movies. One of her favorites is An Affair to Remember. It’s pretty boring, but there’s one cool part that I think could work perfectly to get your dad to come and meet my mom. We just gotta work on ‘em and convince them to do it.

“This guy is brilliant,” Roland says, reading over Henry’s plan to have their parents meet on the top of the Empire State Building on Christmas Eve. Henry isn’t sure of the details--and truthfully, neither is he--but Henry is confident they can work something out, and whoever Lily is sounds like she’s going to help them.

Tucking the letter back into the envelope, Roland gets up, opening his door and running down the hall to the phone by his dad’s room. Picking it up, he waits to hear a dial tone, and then punches in Gus’s phone number. He taps his foot as it rings and squirms as Gus’s mom goes to get him, and when he finally hears Gus’s voice on the other end of the line, he grins.

“You gotta come over now.”

“I have math homework. My mom probably won’t let me”

“I don’t care,” Roland says impatiently. “Tell her you’re coming over to do it here. We’re in the same class and all. She’ll buy it.”

“That is true and you are pretty good at subtraction.”

“Yeah, I am, but we are not doing subtraction. We have something way more important to do. We’ve got another letter to write.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Roland tells him, grinning. “I’ll fill you in when you get here.” He glances toward the stairs; his dad and aunt are still talking--and he hopes they’ll be too distracted to talk to Gus’s mom when she walks him over. “And hurry! I wanna put this thing in the mail tomorrow.”

_____

October 11, 1993- - Greenwich, Connecticut:

Henry grins as Lily comes into the living room with an armful of snacks—and his eye catches a big, unopened bag of Doritos.

“Okay, kid, I‘ve got all the stuff our moms would say we shouldn’t have for dinner—popcorn, two kinds of chips, rice crispy treats and—“

“You should get the ice cream to go with that bag of marshmallows.”

A grin pulls onto Lily’s lips. “I like the way you think.”

Henry giggles as she drops the snacks she's already collected down onto the coffee table, and as she runs back to the kitchen, he grabs the bag of Doritos and pulls it open.

He loves when Lily gets to babysit.

It’s a rare occurrence, but when she is allowed to, they always have a blast, filling up on junk food and falling asleep after playing video games until way past his bedtime.

The only time Lily ever gets to babysit on her own is when their moms have girls nights—and while he’s not sure what they do when they go out, he doesn't really care because he and Lily always have so much fun together.

But tonight, they won’t be playing video games or watching movies until they fall asleep—tonight, they have bigger plans.

“Okay, so, your mom had two kinds—chocolate and this cinnamon—“

“They’re sooo good together!”

“yeah?”

He nods as Lily shrugs. “Okay, I’ll give it a try.”

“You won’t regret it,” Henry says. “You scoop both kinds of ice cream into the same bowl then add marshmallow and—-“

“We aren’t using bowls.” Lily grins as Henry’s brow furrows. “I don't want to have to do the dishes so we are going to eat straight out of the carton. Not only do I hate doing dishes, you have no idea the lengths I went to to make my mom need a girls night out on a Monday.”

Henry’s grin brightens as Lily hands him a spoon. “Cheers,” she says, clanking her spoon against his before they open up the ice cream. “Dig in.”

Henry grins and does as he’s told, and for a while, the two of them just sit there, at the coffee table, gorging on snacks.

“You know,” Henry begins as he dips a dorito until his ice cream. “You wouldn't think that nacho cheese chips would be good with chocolate ice cream but, it totally is.”

“Everything is good with chocolate.”

“So true.”

Taking a large scoop of ice cream, Lily shoves her spoon into her mouth. “Okay, we have a lot of work to do.” Henry watches as she reaches for her back back, dragging it to the coffee table. “I got some books on New York from the library at school.”

“Cool.”

“Okay, so, the Empire State Building is open until two in the morning on most days—“

“That's plenty of time!”

“Yeah, but you’re going on Christmas Eve, so the hours are going to be different. Unless—“

“Don’t say we should pick another day!” Henry cuts in. “I already told Roland Christmas Eve, and this is already going to be hard enough.”

“You really think this Roland kid is going to be able to get all the way to New York from Seattle with his dad in tow on a major holiday, like Christmas?”

Henry nods and takes another dorito, dipping it into his ice cream. “Uh huh,” he nods. “He says he can. He’s got some guy named Gus helping him. He sounds like an uncle or something.”

“Okay, good,” Lily says. “At least he has an adult helping him plan this.”

“Yeah.”

“So, can I just assume that Roland and Gus are going to figure out a way to get his dad to New York? I don't have to figure something out for him?”

Henry nods. “He says they’ve got it covered.”

“Good.”

Henry nods, looking out at the stacks of books on the coffee table. Planning their part alone is overwhelming, so he can’t imagine having to plan Roland’s part, too. “Hey, Lily,” he murmurs, looking up. “Can I ask you something?”

“Shoot.”

“What do they do when they go out, anyway?” Lily looks up. “I mean, are you sure we have enough time? What if they come home and--”

Lily shrugs. “Right now, they’re getting drunk off their asses, then they’re going to eat a bunch of bad, greasy food and drink a lot of crappy diner coffee to try and sober up before they come home to us. We have the whole night. You don’t have to worry about it.”

Henry blinks, frowning as he considers it--usually his mom eats so healthily and likes to be in bed by ten, especially when she has to go to work in the morning, and her outing with Mal wasn’t exactly something she planned for. “Oh. I hope they’re okay.”

Lily grins. “It’s good. They’re having fun. Promise.”

“Guess that explains why she’s so grumpy the day after they go out,” Henry sighs, shrugging as he takes another bite of his ice cream. “She gets bad indigestion from greasy food.”

A tight grin pulls onto Lily’s lip and her eyes roll. “Yeah. That's it. Indigestion, not a hangover.”

“What’s that?”

“A hangover?” Henry nods and Lily laughs. “It’s like a bad headache after you drink too much.”

“Have you ever had one?”

Lily blinks and for a moment she just stares at him. “This isn’t about me. It’s about your mother and how we’re going to get her on top of the Empire State Building on Christmas Eve.”

Henry nods. “We could ask to go,” he suggests. “I bet you can see the Christmas Tree in Rockefeller Center from the top. That would be really cool to see!”

“Yeah, it would be,” Lily agrees. “But what if she says no. New York isn't exactly around the block.”

“Yeah,” Henry says, growing. “That's a good point.”

“Luckily, you have me.” Henry grins and nods. “So, I think we should start planting seeds now, and make your mom thing going to New York for Christmas is her idea.”

Henry blinks. “Have you ever met my mom? There’s no way—“

“What if my mom thought it was a good idea.”

Henry’s brow furrows. “This is going to be complicated, isn’t it?”

Lily grins and shrugs—and then, for the next several hours, they hatch out a plan.

Lily starts by calling around to some of the the theatres on Broadway, asking about what shows they have playing on Christmas. She and Henry settle on a performance of The Nutcracker, and to Henry’s surprise, Lily pulls out one of Mal’s credit cards and purchases four tickets on the spot. His eyes widen and he asks why she has one of Mal’s credit cards, Lily shrugs and tells him it’s not her fault that Mal forgot to ask to have it back after allowing her to take it to the mall to get a new pair of winter boots.

Henry’s eyes narrow, not quite believable, he also doesn't care.

After they secure the tickets to the show, they plan out the rest of the day, culminating with ice-skating at Rockefeller Center.

“Now, here is where it’s going to get tough,” Lily says, biting down on her lip. “You’re going to have to do something kind of extreme.”

“I expected that,” he says, looking down at a map of New York City. “And I completely expect that if this doesn’t work out, my Mom is going to murder me.”

“No, she won’t,” Lily insists. “But… my mom might murder me for helping you runaway in New York City.”

Henry grins and shrugs. “Unless, she’s so happy for my mom, all is forgiven.”

For a moment, Lily considers then scrunches her nose. “I don’t know. I’m literally sending you off into one of the most dangerous cities in the country, to meet some strange guy so you can score your mom a date she doesn't want.”

Henry frowns. “I don’t care what she says. She wants to do this. She just doesn't know it.”

“Or maybe she does and she’s just scared to admit it.” Lily beams, reaching over and nudging him. “Hey, I’m really proud of you, kid. This is really sweet of you, you know that?”

Henry shrugs, focusing at a subway map in one of the guidebooks, trying to figure out the best way to get from Rockefeller Center to the Empire State Building.

“Seriously,” Lily says, nudging him again. “ Even if it doesn’t work out—“

“It will,” Henry interjects, still not looking up from the confusing map. “It has to.”

“But even if it doesn’t, it’ll be worth getting grounded until the end of the century for.”

Looking up, Henry giggles, grabbing another chip from the bag and popping it into his mouth, feeling quite satisfied with himself. “And lucky for us, that’s only six years.”

Lily’s eyes roll as she grabs one of the hide books and he giggles again, crossing his fingers as he again tries to figure out the subway map.

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