After the contentious custody battle, Frank & Mary go on with their lives as usual. But it isn't until an eventful night at Ferg's that Frank starts to wonder if maybe his life might be missing something. Now that his niece has a normal life, maybe...
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The sun had just officially set as Joey sat out on her mother's porch reading one of her many parenting books by the soft glow of the porch light.
The day after she and Sam had arrived in town, Joey had headed to the local library and had essentially pulled every book off the shelf in their small parenting section and had ignored the puzzled looks she'd gotten from the librarian as she struggled to carry them all to her car.
When it came to raising Sam properly, she had no idea where to start and wanted to cover all her bases. In school, research had been something she remembered being pretty good at and figured it was time to stretch out those old scholarly muscles.
Since putting Sam to bed, she had skimmed through five books already and was slowly catching on to the fact that there was no real consensus on parenting techniques. But she figured if she went through different theories, she could cherry pick the ones that seemed to fit the existing dynamics between her and Sam and toss out the ones that seemed ridiculous or outlandish.
Not messing Sam up was so important to her that anything was worth a shot, but it was comforting to know that no one really had all of the answers. The more she read, the more themes of loving and listening to your child became pretty repetitive. Apparently, being patient with your child was a big deal, also.
Obviously. Joey scoffed to herself. She already had those bases covered. It's not like she enjoyed watching the same cartoon 50 times in a row, or digging for worms with Sam. She patiently did those things because she loved him and had listened to him enough to know that those things were important to him.
The lack of proper light had her wearing her hated black rimmed reading glasses and her tea had long since gone cold. But the night was cool and peaceful and Gus, who had managed to wedge himself onto to the other end of her mother's little wicker loveseat, was sleeping on top of her feet and was doing a good job of keeping her feet warm.
She discarded another useless book and picked up another one. This one was about gentle disciple and it held her attention for a lot longer than the rest of them had. She understood the importance of discipling children, but had been dreading the idea of being the bad guy in Sam's eyes and this book was helpful. Maybe her embarrassing trip to the library hadn't been in vain, afterall.
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Frank stuffed his hands in his pockets as he walked across the street towards Jessie's house. Joey was still reading out on the porch and hadn't looked up from her book so he leaned against the house and observed her.
Frank wondered to himself if he was being a creep, but he couldn't help but love seeing Joey in her natural state when she thought that she was alone.
He watched her read and was amused with the little expressions that crossed her face when she appeared to like what she was reading and the sour frowns she made when she found something outrageous. She was so expressive, it was almost impossible not to find her adorable.
