Regrets

Always Something There To Remind Me

1976.

The next morning, the three all woke up around the same time. They walked out to the main area of the living quarters. Both of the two men and their guest were dressed and ready for the day, but still groggy and tired from the late times that they all decided to go to sleep the night before. As they all entered the main room of the apartment, they all were yawning and shuffling their feet.

"Morning, house guests," Tool greeted the woman staying in his place, as well as his best friend.

"Good morning," Alexandra yawned and sat down at the small kitchen table, leaning her chin on her fist and her elbow on the table.

"What time is your brother's flight coming in?" Barney asked as he stretched.

Alexandra looked at the clock on the wall. "At about 4:45 this afternoon. So we've got 'bout eight and half hours till he comes in."

Tool nodded. "What should we do till then?"

Before anyone could answer, there was a knock on the door of the living quarters. The three all shared strange looks before Tool left the room and went toward the direction of the door. Just as he approached the door, another three knocks were head from the opposite side of the door. He waited about a minute before opening the door, just to make the person sweat a bit, then opened the door. Once the door was open, Beatrice 'Bea' Ross Presto was revealed, standing on the porch, her baby daughter held tightly against her shoulder, both wide awake.

"Mornin', Bea," Tool greeted tiredly, "And hey, little Adriana."

The baby smiled and giggle at him, recognizing the man with long hair and tattoos. "Hey, Tool," Beatrice smiled in greeting.

"Wanna come in?"

"Yeah, sure."

Beatrice followed Tool into the house, holding on tightly to her five month old daughter. He closed the door gently behind her and led her to the kitchen, where his two guests were waiting to see who was at the door. The two guests looked back up at their host and his newest guest- more like his two new guests- both with different looks on their faces. Alexandra gave a polite smile at the woman and her baby girl, while Barney gave a look of question at his sister and his niece. The older Ross sibling had a look of both confusion and relief on her face as she saw the two guests.

"Hi there," Beatrice greeted the strange woman a bit awkwardly.

"Hi," Alexandra greeted, just as awkward.

"Bea?" Barney questioned, ignoring the two girls greeting, "What're you doin' here?"

Beatrice looked at her brother. "Well, Mom wanted me to see if you were here since she tried to call you at your apartment to see how you were doing, but you didn't answer." She then looked to the stranger. "I'm sorry. Hi, I'm Bea, Barney's older sister."

Alexandra gave a tired smile. "I'm Alley-Kat, but you can just call me Ally. Is she your daughter?"

Beatrice smiled proudly at the baby in her arms. "Yeah, her name is Adriana. She was just born in March. You wanna hold her?"

Alexandra gave a strange look. "You're ok with someone you just met holding your baby?"

"You're obviously stayin' here with Tool, and as far as I know, he always has a reason for letting someone stay in his house. Besides, he's held her before, so why not you?"

"Gee, thanks," Tool teased back.

"Alright then," Alexandra chuckled, "Sure, I guess."

As Beatrice handed Alexandra the baby girl, she felt nostalgic. It wasn't exactly a good sense of nostalgia, but rather a sad feeling. She couldn't help but think back to when she'd found out she was pregnant with her and Frank's baby. She thought back to when she had the miscarriage and when she'd found out she could never be able to have any children of her own after the miscarriage. She then began to wonder about the little girl who would've been five years old at this point.