Chapter Ten

Everything

He simply held her and let her cry.

“I don't want to go,” she choked out in between sobs. “I've got too much to stay away from back there!”

“And you've got too much here to leave,” William replied.

“He's lying,” Mairi said, referring to her father. “Mom wouldn't want me to leave. She and Dad had to deal with an overbearing father, and they didn't let that ruin things for them. And I mean, I don't know if we have what they did, but I don't know if we don't... And I don't want to give that up either. Mom would want me to stay and... and find out...”

“I'm sure she would, Mairi. I want you to stay, too. I would love nothing more. Your father is just worried, what with what happened with Drew. He doesn't think you're protected here.”

“You'll protect me,” she sniffled, “Right?”

“Of course. Maybe he just doesn't believe I can. He doesn't know me.”

“William,” came Lukas's voice from the slightly open door, “I wanna talk to you, boy.”

“Sir, I'm a little busy--”

“A little busy with my only daughter,” he growled. “Get out here.”

“Yes, sir,” he sighed, trying not to figuratively step on Lukas's toes. Showing him respect could help him see that it would be alright to leave Mairi here. He gave her a quick peck on the forehead and followed Lukas out to the hallway and shut the door behind him.

“What, exactly, are you up to? What're you trying to get outta my girl?”

“Nothing, sir.” William said, trying to make reassuring eye contact, “I'm not trying to get -”

“Everyone's trying to get something, boy. Don't think I don't know what you're after. You kids are all the same, just looking for a way to get into each other's jeans.”

“That's not true!”

“You calling me a liar, boy?”

“No, sir. But you don't know me, and I'm not -”

“No, I don't know you. Thats why you're not getting a chance with my daughter.”

Lukas's stomach tightened when he remembered that he'd had a nearly identical conversation with Camille's father many years ago. He'd been told the same things he was now telling William.

But this was an entirely different situation.

Wasn't it?

It had to be.

“Whatever you want,” Lukas growled, “You're going to have to get somewhere else. No one is going to hurt my girl anymore, least of all some pretty boy from Scotland.”

“With all due respect, sir, you have no right to say any of that.”

“Oh, don't I?”

“No. My origin means little, and I don't use my looks just to get a girl. All I want is a chance to make Mairi happy and safe, with her permission. Which she has given me. I don't know exactly how she feels about me, but I know how I feel about her. Sir.”

“And how do you feel about her, boy?”

“I'm... I'm in love. With her. I don't know why, or what is is that draws me to her,” William stammered, “but I do know that she makes me want to amount to something worthwhile. I want to be the shoulder she comes to first to cry on. I want to be the man she dreams about, the man she spends her life with.”

“Those are strong words for a little twenty-year-old. You've only been 'official' for what, a week?”

“Strong words correspond to strong feelings. I know you've felt this way, too, especially if Mairi's mother was half as wonderful as her daughter.”

Lukas could not think of a response. There was no witty remark, no sarcastic retort or statement of condemnation. How could this boy, less than half his age, know so much about love and how it felt? How could he recognize it with such clarity? And how on Earth could he have fallen in love so quickly and apparently so completely? He saw so much of himself in this kid, right down to the determination with which he spoke and the way he knew what he wanted. But he couldn't give Mairi up so easily. He'd only agreed to let her come to NYC because she had completed high school, and had an aunt who could take care of Mairi in his stead. A boy was never part of the agreement.

“Is there nothing I can say,” William asked, interrupting Lukas's reflections, “to persuade you to allow your daughter to stay here?”

Funny. Lukas had said the exact same thing to Camile's father when they went to America to get married. They'd been caught a couple days before they planned to tie the knot, without consent from Camille's parents. He'd asked her father what he had to do to get him to let his daughter make her own choices, to let her go off with him. He remembered how it felt to be so certain of himself and his emotions that he was willing to say or do anything.

Was there nothing William could say to change his mind?

“Daddy,” came Mairi's voice from William's room. She had wiped her eyes dry, though they were still a little red. Mairi was never one to cry so much, and she regretted how dramatic the whole thing could have come across. “Daddy, I'm sorry.”

“What're you sorry for, sweetheart? It's not your fault,” Lukas conceeded.

“I'm making you upset. Look,” she said as she slowly emerged, “Your face is all red. I've made you angry.”

“It's alright. Listen, I--”

“Daddy, I am sorry for how I've been reacting, okay? I just... I just want to stay. I know you don't really have any reason to let me stay. I know I haven't proved that I can take care of myself.”

“Mairi, I --”

“And I'm sorry for stressing you out, and making you worry. But I'm asking you to give me another chance. I have someone to rely on now,” Mairi said, gesturing to William, “Someone to watch out for me. I really will be okay, Daddy.”

“Mairi. It's alright. Relax.”

A confused look fell on the teenager's face, but it quickly changed to worry when her father shook his head slowly, the same way he had done last night. She started to think of what else could be said, but Lukas began speaking first.

“I don't like this. I don't like it one bit. You're my little girl, Mairi, and you always will be, so I don't think I'll ever really be able to let you go completely. Maybe no father can... So, you have to promise me a few things, okay?”

“Anything,” Mairi eagerly accepted hoping to get permission to stay.

“You have to promise to let me worry about you. You have to promise to come visit every once in a while. You have to promise to be more careful so that my worries are completely useless. And you have to promise to call me, and let me know that I'm worrying pointlessly.”

“I promise, Dad. I promise, I promise. Cross my heart.”

Mairi made the corresponding motion for a bit of emphasis.

Lukas sighed and ran his strong, calloused farmer's hand through his graying hair. “Okay. But the moment you break one of those promises, you're coming home, got it?”

“Oh, Daddy!” Mairi threw her arms around her father and hugged him as tightly as she could. He stummbled backward a few paces at the unexpected impact, but returned the embrace.

“You're so much like your mother,” Lukas mused as he stroked his daughter's hair.

“I don't want to jinx anything,” Mairi said, “But what changed your mind?”

“You're so much like your mother,” Lukas mused as he stroked his daughter's hair. “If you really believe there's a shot at having something with this kid like what Camille and I had... Well... I need to step back and let you have a go.”

“Thank you, Daddy. You don't know how much that means to me.”

Actually, sweetheart, Lukas thought, remembering his wife's smile and cheerful laugh, I think I do know. I really think I do.

Mairi accompanied her family members to the airport and saw her father off first. He was still reluctant, and a very large and demanding part of him wanted to tell his daughter to get on the plane with him. But, he had already told her she could stay, and he had to deal with that.

“Don't do anything I wouldn't do, alright? And get some pepper spray.”

Lukas got a good little laugh out of his daughter with that last remark. He was half-serious, but knew she wouldn't really use it on that William boy. Maybe she wouldn't need to, but it was better to be safe than stuck in a position worse than shoveling manure.

“You treat my girl right, kid,” Lukas warned William. “Y'hear?”

“I wouldn't dream of anything else, sir.”

An hour later, the flight to the Dallas/Fort-Worth airport boarded and Mairi gave her nieces a hug, and told them to mind their parents. Michelle wished her a speedy recovery and invited her to call if she needed anything, and Edward winked after throwing a glance at William.

As he gave his sister a hug, he told her, “No matter what Dad says, he seems like a good guy. Don't be afraid to give me a call once in a blue moon, sis.”

“I'll try to keep my schedule clear for that.”

Edward extended his hand to William and gave him a firm handshake, a rare thing for him. He didn't like physical contact with people he hardly knew, but it meant a lot for Mairi to see her brother being friendly toward her boyfriend.

Her boyfriend...

“Nice to meet you. Take care of my sister.”

“Of course. It was wonderful to meet you and your family, as well. Have a safe trip.”

Mairi and Gigi went back to their apartment that night, and William had to go back to work at the restaurant, and the theatre was going back to business on Friday night. Work was out of the question for Mairi, though. She didn't intend to go back to the Majestic anytime soon, and decided to look into playing in different shows. While she had miraculously been able to put Drew out of her mind, to forget what had happened, she just didn't feel like the theatre felt the same.

Besides, Gigi was talking to her various connections at other theatres to see if there were any available positions for her temporarily handicapped niece to fill. Two weeks before William's birthday, Mairi went to a few interviews, and she was particularly excited about one as a personal assistant for Magdalena Kayne. Ms. Kayne was the leading (and almost only) lady in Spamalot, playing as Guinevere, the Lady of the Lake. Rumor had it that Kayne was humble and kind, and Mairi wanted to land that particular job most of all.

“Maybe you'll find out about the job just in time for my birthday,” William grinned, wrapping an arm around her as they walked through Times Square, doing some relatively early Christmas shopping before he had to go into work. There were already two rather large bags with assorted items for Elleanor, Cecilia, and Anna.

“Your birthday is supposed to be about you, not me. Speaking of which, what do you want me to get you for the big two-one?”

“Booze,” William joked. He would never actually drink, of course. “In all seriousness, I don't know. I've already got the best girlfriend in the world -”

“Really? Who?” Mairi teased.

“-And I don't know what more I could want.”

“Awww, how sweet. I guess I'll just have to figure something out.”

“Guess so.”

She had no idea what to get him. His father was rich, and he could get whatever he wanted that way. Plus, William had such marvelous work ethic that he could earn anything he wasn't willing to just get from Gerard. Their relationship was great, completely relaxed and just so perfect, so there wasn't much to improve on there. What do you get for the man who has everything?

Men were so hard to shop for.

They stopped for some hot chocolate near the theatre district before heading off to Mars 2112. Some gal was having a sweet sixteen at the restaurant, and had especially requested the presence of a certain alien captain in a certain spandex outfit. William asked if it made her uncomfortable, but Mairi assured him that it was okay for him to parade around like that for someone's birthday. As long as things don't go too far, she thought about adding, but decided not to say it. Will wasn't likely to let that happen.

But it was the girl that Mairi was worried about. William's job was basically to make children laugh and give the older generation something to swoon over, something to return for in the hopes of seeing again. Mairi had returned to the restaurant several times since going steady with William, mainly just to meet up with him after work let out. It was a good thing he had to wear a big foam mask, because it would be all too easy for gorgeous little things to go after her man.

“It's clearly bothering you,” William commented three blocks from Mars. “I can quit the job, if you want me to. Goodness knows that suit rides up places I didn't know clothing could go...”

Mairi burst into a fit of giggles, though he was partially serious. About both quitting and the way the suit wore him. She didn't want him to quit just because she had a case of one-month jealousy. Every girl freaks out that her boyfriend is going to run off with someone younger, hotter, and just plain better. There were plenty of women in the world, and a fairly large group of them lived in New York. William could have his choice of any girl.

Which brought her back to the question that bothered her to no end: Why me?

No, not, “Oh, this is terrible. Why does everything bad always happen to me?” sort of 'Why me?'. But more of a, “Wow, I'm so lucky. Why would he choose me over every hottie in the city?” Some nights she couldn't sleep because the question just kept begging to be asked, and in turn, begged to be answered. Mairi, however, couldn't answer that. As hard as she tried to think of a reason why she'd stood out to him, she simply could not do it. Any response that came up just didn't sound right. One day, she'd ask William and find out for sure what exactly had drawn them together.

Hopefully it wasn't just being in the right place at the right time. Meeting your boyfriend at a restaurant for your seventeenth birthday, while he's working the tables wearing spandex, didn't exactly seem like something she'd hope to be the standard way of getting a relationship.

“Mairi?”

“Oh,” she jumped, “Sorry. Guess I was just thinking.”

“I really don't mind quitting. I'll put in my two weeks notice as soon as we get there, if you like.”

“No, no, you don't have to do that. I know you love that restaurant.”

“Not as much as some other things,” he said, barely audibly. The crowd around them drowned out the sound, but he continued, “I may love working there, but I don't want you to worry about me.”

“I don't worry about you. I worry about the teenage girls who come in and say it's their birthday in hopes of getting a little present from you.”

Now it was William's turn to laugh, something which still gave Mairi chills. Happy chills. Chills that felt right, chills that belonged. Every sound he made was music to her ears.

“Just the way you did?” William teased.

“No, no. That wasn't me who went there. That was Gigi. My diabolical, plotting, and very sneaky aunt, who has known you long enough to think you might do her a favor and me a good time, set that whole entire thing up. I know she called you and asked you to kiss me before I ever got here, and so I was completely innocent. My part in that birthday dinner was completely out of the loop. I'd never even heard of Mars 2112 until she brought me there that night. Didn't know anything about it.”

“Mairi,” William said, taking her hand as they descended the stairs to the main courtyard of the underground building that housed the infamous Mars, “I should just like to correct you on one detail. When I kissed you, that was of my own free will. Gigi did call me, yes, but she only told me that she was bringing you in about an hour before you two actually showed up. She dropped a few hints that she wanted to make a big deal of your birthday, but never really told me what to do. Except for the bit where asked me to carry you or hug you a lot. But I kissed you of my own accord.”

Well... Mairi certainly couldn't deny that that made her beam.

Outside, they passed the familiar statue of a spaceship before entering the main doors of the lobby. Newspaper articles about the restaurant and its strange employees hung on the walls, and one of Captain Orion hung smack dab in the middle. The pride and joy of Mars 2112, Mairi thought. She knew no one could play the character so well as William could. It was just acting. Just acting.

Mairi squeezed his hand three times, a way of saying “I love you” without actually saying it. Those were strong words to mess with, and she'd known too many gals who'd lost a guy for saying it first, too soon, or too often.

Mairi was definitely not about to loose William.

A/N

HAHAHA! Yall thought I was going to separate the two so soon, hahaha. Well you were WRONG! We just got one of three necessary tragedies done with the whole Drew incident, and it's so not time for the next one just yet. We've got a couple timeline months before the next one. I win. I'm so evil. And remember: The more reviews I get (that don't involve my stupid typos!), the sooner you get more William and Mairi. By the way, sorry if Mairi seemed a little wishy-washy this chapter... But she IS !