by Sammie
Disclaimer and rating in part 1.
SUMMARY: String meets Caitlin's oh-so-approving parents - crack!fic from a cracked mind. :-D Comes from a part in "Love Unsought". ("He thought, as he stood there at the altar, that Cait's parents would most likely slap or punch him into next week. If he had a little girl and she and some guy did what he and Cait were doing, he'd punch that 'some guy', too.")
She knew this was going to be a disaster.
"Kinda quiet, isn't he?" Mrs. O'Shannessy whispered to her. "What do you two talk about?"
"Ma," Caitlin sighed.
"But he is quite good-looking." The woman grinned. "Oh, I remember when I fell in love with a pilot. All muscles and toughness, and that uniform - !"
Cait sighed again and tuned her out.
It graduated to national catastrophe at dinner.
"So where are you staying?" At her sister's voice, Cait rolled her eyes at her plate. She took a deep breath to try to answer Caroline in a calm voice and suddenly felt a touch on her hand as String's closed over hers under the table.
"Oh, they're staying here," Mrs. O'Shannessey interjected. "Stringfellow will be up in your old room, and Cait in hers."
"Why are they staying apart?" Her sister-in-law asked, and no amount of head-shaking and 'stop' warning glares Caitlin and her brother sent could get her brother's loveable flake of a wife to be quiet. "She's already pregnant."
Cait closed her eyes as gasps went around the room. Her sister clapped her hands over their children's ears - as many as she could with just two hands.
Her sister-in-law winced as she looked around and realized nobody else knew. She then mouthed to Caitlin, "I'm sorry."
"What?" Her mother looked at her, dumbfounded.
"Caitlin?" Her father broke his silence. "Is this true?"
There was a long silence.
"Two months," Cait murmured.
The room erupted.
The older Mrs. O'Shannessy wailed.
The younger Mrs. O'Shannessy tried to get a word in.
The former Miss O'Shannessy looked smugly over at her "disgraced" sister.
The younger Mr. O'Shannessy considered killing his wife for blurting out his sister's secret.
And the older Mr. O'Shannessy...
"Daddy!" Cait shouted as the back of Hawke's chair hit the ground with a loud thud, and he tumbled across the room. "Daddy, how could you!"
"You get back here, you stinkin' sack of slime! You yella-bellied, two-fanged son of a - "
"OK, Dad." Cait's brother tried to pull him back and get the older man to drop his fist. "Dad, Dad. We don't need to do this. No punching guests, remember?"
"String? String," Caitlin murmured, as she hovered by him, slumped against the wall, one hand over the bleeding cut on his face as she helped him up. "Are you all right? I am so sorry."
"Caitlin, how could you!" Mrs. O'Shannessy burst into her tears. "Why couldn't you be more like Caroline?"
Caroline Simon, nee O'Shannessy, looked smug.
"Wait!" Caitlin's sister-in-law exclaimed. "I mean, what's the big deal? They're already married!"
"Oh, crap," Caitlin's brother muttered and buried his face in his hands.
"What?" his wife protested. "I mean, that's good! They've been married almost half a year already!"
Silence descended over the room once again as everything stopped and everybody turned to stare at the couple, still sitting at the other end of the room.
Caitlin winced and closed her eyes, praying for a moment of patience.
"You're already married? That long?" Mrs. O'Shannessy asked in disbelief.
Caitlin winced, then looked around before saying weakly, "Yes to both?"
The room erupted.
The older Mr. O'Shannessy looked relieved.
The younger Mr. O'Shannessy looked angrily at his wife.
The former Miss O'Shannessy looked shocked.
The younger Mrs. O'Shannessy winced; she hadn't meant to give away all her sister-in-law's secrets at once.
And the older Mrs. O'Shannessy...
"You got married without your own mother there?" Mrs. O'Shaughnessy exclaimed at Caitlin, then promptly slapped her son-in-law, who got a dumbfounded look on his face (after recovering from the blow).
"Ma!" Caitlin cried indignantly.
"I can't slap you, you're carrying my grandbaby!"
He sat on the edge of the bed, waiting patiently, a rather amused look on his face.
She applied some antiseptic to the cut with a small gauze. He sucked in his breath at one point. "Sorry," she said softly. "String, I'm so sorry. I really didn't think they would react like that. Well, I know they wouldn't take it well, which is why I wanted to give it to them slowly, but I didn't - "
"Cait." He put a hand on her arm, smiling up at her. "It's OK."
"Oh, everything's just peachy!" she exclaimed sarcastically, dropping her ministrations to pace. "My dad punched you, my mom slapped you, and we've only been here an hour! I swear, I'm going to kill Bobby. He knew he wasn't supposed to tell Jen, because as much as I love Jen, the poor dear couldn't keep a secret to - " She stopped when she felt his hand on her arm again. He held up the gauze. "Oh, right."
She went back to her nursing. "I don't know how you can be so calm about this."
"Well." He tilted his head slightly. "I did elope with and knock up their daughter."
"Thanks," Cait grumbled sarcastically.
"If it were my daughter, I'd have thrown the man out of the house already."
"Glad you see the good in all this," Cait muttered. She carefully attached the gauze and tape over the long cut, then handed him an ice pack for the bruised skin. He leaned back on the pillows in the bed and held the ice pack to his face.
"Well," he said dryly, "at least your parents will let us stay together now."
END