Daddy Brought Home the Stepdaughter

Chapter 2

(I got asked who I would choose to be the face claim for Massey, I chose her.)

The next day, Brad sat at work, counting down the minutes before he had to go and pick up Dusty and Massey.

As he sat, he wondered about Massey. Another daughter. A teenager. He had never thought of that. When he thought of having a daughter, he thought of a sweet little girl like Megan, who likes princesses and ponies and pink. But a big teenage girl was different. They were big and unpredictable. You didn't know when they were going to be sweet and have you wrapped around their finger or mean and scare you into submission. They could love pink and beg you for a pretty new car to go and give their new boyfriends a ride, or dress in all leather with loud music, screaming about how you don't understand them when really, you don't, even if you think you do!

And Brad was scared.  Very, very scared.

"Check. Check, check. Chinese Checkers, Czech, Czech Republic, pop, sibilance, sibilance, pop, one, two, six, seven, check, check, check, check." Brad's thoughts were interrupted by the man in the sound booth. He had been working to find someone who could sing the company jingle over the radio just right for their station, The Panda. It was a jazz station, and not many people listened to it, but they still worked hard to make it the best jazz station it could be!

"What do you got for me, Brad?" Leonard Holt, Brad's boss, had entered the room, and Brad took a deep breath before standing up and shaking his hand formally.

"Oh, Mr. Holt, hello." He greeted. "Well, hopefully the new voice of The Panda." They both sat back down, and Brad remembered he had to let Holt know he was leaving. "Oh, listen. I gotta leave early today. I gotta go pick up my wife's ex and my oldest stepdaughter at the airport." Holt looked to him like was crazy.

"Jesus, kid, how'd you draw that shit detail? Another kid and the dad? How old's the kid?" Brad shrugged, really not needing one of Holt's "pep talks" that he sometimes gave his employees who were having some trouble at home.

"Ah, she's seventeen, but its okay. I want to get to know her, and I have to let their father come in." Holt gave him a look.

"Brad, why do you want this deadbeat in your home? Its one thing to let the kid in, but now you're letting in the guy who left the kids." Brad sighed, thinking that Holt didn't really understand what was really going.

"Well, it's not that I want him in my home, it's just that the better stepparenting books say that the worst thing you can do for the kids is to push out the biological. And Massey didn't do anything wrong, she doesn't deserve to be pushed away like that." Holt shook his head, knowing that this was a bad idea.

"You're in the danger zone with the dad here, Brad, and let me tell you why. Kids that grow up without their dads always end up obsessing over them. Most of the hook-ups that I've had in my adult life have been with women that had daddy issues." Brad shook his head, suddenly wanting to end the conversation and focus on the work.

"I don't know if this is an appropriate story." But Holt kept going.

"Look, my wife would kill me if she knew I was telling you this."

"Well, then you shouldn't tell me this." Brad insisted, but Holt wasn't stopping for nothing.

"When I met her in Denver..."

"You're going to tell the story, aren't you?" Brad sighed.

"...she was a topless maid. - Ninety-nine bucks an hour." Brad nodded, wishing he could drop dead now rather than listen to this story.  "Never met her father. But who did she meet? Me. And who did treat her like shit? Me. I eventually loved her, but every time she got out of line, I'd just pull the Humvee over and ask her to get out politely. And then I'd drive away. Guess what? She showed up at home every time." Brad furrowed his eyebrows, completely confused by the story.

"This story has no relevance to my situation." Holt shrugged, having forgotten why he had started telling the story in the first place.

"Oh, it doesn't at all. It's just a good story." Then he looked to the guy working the booth, who was sitting by patiently. "So, Pete, are we going to hear this guy, or what?" The sound guy, Pete, nodded, and turned up the volume so that they could hear the guy in the booth.

"One-oh! three-point! siiiiiiixxxxx~! The Panda!" Holt looked to Brad. He clearly wasn't a fan of the guy's voice.

"I'm sorry." Brad sighed, Holt standing and walking out of the room.

"Keep it up, Brad. You and I will fight in the parking lot." He promised, and Brad sighed again, rubbing his temples.

DVD

"...So today is the day I'm finally meeting the father of my children and my new stepdaughter. Am I nervous? You're darn right I am. But who wouldn't be?" Brad let out a deep sigh. He was at the airport, speaking to a Spanish speaking chauffeur about his woes and his concerns as they both held up signs for the people they were picking up to bring attention for them to go to them. "And here's the thing. I mean, Pepe, you know, kids... ...they see through things and, at the end of the day, they know who's been around..." he suddenly gasped. "Holy balls!" Coming towards Brad were two of the scariest looking people he had ever seen, which wasn't saying a lot, but it said something.

They both had small, dark brown eyes that almost looked black. Each wore a leather jacket, hers more form fitting than his. His black hair was slicked back and shiny with gel, while hers was a dark red and curly, flowing freely under a black beanie. He wore a black shirt with black pants and big black riding boots. She wore a low cut black tank top with silver lettering that read "I'm the Motherfuckin Princess" across it with leather, black skinny jeans that chains hanging from it. Her boots were big like his and scared Brad out of his wits. He could almost hear them thump towards him as he stared at her makeup. Black winged eyeliner that was sharp like a pencil point and black eyeshadow to match. Her skinned tanned with nothing on her cheeks, but blood red lipstick. They both looked like they were going to beat him up, take what he had, and leave him in an alley for dead.

"I hope that's not them." He gulped, and Pepe grinned, not feeling at all sorry for the annoying, curly haired American man who wouldn't shut up.

"no hay duda de que ese hombre es mejor que usted en todos los sentidos y que la niña tiene bolas más grandes de las que jamás podría soñar tener." He spoke in Spanish words that Brad thought were encouraging, but actually basically told him that he had no balls compared to those two.

"Well, you're kind to say that. Thank you." He told Pepe, taking a deep breath. "Yeah, I feel pretty good." He then walked over to them, hoping he wasn't red or visibly shaking. "Hey, you Dusty and Massey?" He asked them.

"Nope." The man said, and the girl shoved him aside as they walked right past him, him completely confused.

"What?"