My Way Home Is Through You

Less than an hour after leaving, Ray pulled back into his own drive, much to Anna's delight.

On the drive over, Ray explained all that had gone on in the past few days. Lou had gotten great amusement from the car seat in the back of Ray's car, and the tale of how difficult it had been to get it there. As they walked through the door of Ray's apartment, they could hear Anna's shrieks of laughter from her bedroom. Mingled with her giggles were beseeching cries from Frank.

"Aw, come on, Anna, please let me go?"

Exchanging a worried glance, the brothers walked back to the girl's bedroom. When they got to the door, they stopped dead in surprise.

All of the toys lay scattered about the room. Only one toy remained in the box: the Frank action figure. It sat forlornly in a corner of the box, with a Transformer robot standing guard just outside.

The real Frank sat beside Anna with a petulant look on his face, staring down at the smaller figure of himself in the box.

"Why do I have to stay in there?" he asked her.

"You dropped Bob!" Anna said, pointing toward the drummer action figure. The little doll was wrapped lovingly in sock, with a folded tissue for a pillow.

"You hurt him," she continued, shaking her finger at Frank. "You have to sit in time out!"

Ray couldn't hold it any longer. With a hearty laugh, he said, "Honey, don't be too hard on him. Frank can't help being clumsy."

"Daddy!" Anna shrieked happily. She hopped to her feet and pelted toward him. He caught her and swung her up into a tight hug.

Kissing her cheek, he murmured gently, "Didn't I tell you I'd be back soon?" She smiled and nodded.

Frank stood from his spot on the floor and grinned at the pair. "Does this mean I can come out of the box now?"

Anna giggled. "Okay, Frankie."

They all made their way to the living room, where they crowded onto the couch. Lou perched on an arm of the small sofa, next to his brother.

"Anna," Ray said, settling her on his lap. "This is my brother. He's your Uncle Louie."

"Hiya, Anna," Lou said with a grin.

Anna blushed and bit her lip. "Hi, Uncle Louie," she murmured.

Lou grinned wider, reaching over and gently tugging one of her curls. "I see you got your dad's hair." She beamed up at him, and with that, her shyness seemed to melt away.

After a little while, Frank excused himself, saying he had some things he needed to get done at home. Giving Anna a hug and a kiss, he bade the Toros goodbye and left.

After a lunch of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (Ray reminded himself that he still needed to get to the store for food), Anna went down for a nap. She fussed at first, wanting to stay up and enjoy more time with her father and uncle, but Ray finally coaxed her to bed.

After tucking her in, he went back to the living room and collapsed beside his brother, tired, but happy.

"Well, what do you think?" he asked after a moment.

"She's a sweetheart," Lou replied with a grin. "And you seem to be doing a great job with her. I'm really impressed, Ray. Not everybody would do so well at being a dad. And her!" He smiled wider. "She loves you to death. I could see that the minute she got up off that floor and ran to you."

Ray smiled with pride and looked toward the door to his daughter's bedroom. He and his brother were silent for a while.

"So," Lou began suddenly, clearing his throat. "I'm guessing you haven't gone public with any of this, considering I haven't heard anything strange about you guys on any of the regular channels - MTV, Fuse, all of those."

Ray shook his head. "No, not yet. I still haven't decided how to do it. I never was good at making announcements." He sighed. "Besides, I'd kind of like to... I don't know, sort of have her to myself for a while. Let her be a normal kid, before she becomes one more faceless name for the more rabid fans to squawk over, you know? I mean, none of us have ever really minded having our pictures taken at any given time, but... Now I understand what Johnny Depp meant when he said he'd beat the shit out of anyone who tried to take pictures of his kids. I feel the same way about Anna." He shook his head. "I just want to protect her."

Lou nodded. "I completely understand that, man. Besides," he shot his brother a grin, "if you break this 'story' and Mom sees it on MTV News before you tell her yourself, she'll go ballistic!"

Ray chuckled. "Mom watches MTV News?"

"For you guys? Hell yeah," Lou replied. "So at the very least, you better wait until she and Dad get back from their vacation to tell them in person. She'll have a fit if you don't." He screwed up his face and said in a high-pitched voice, "'Raymond Manuel! How could you not tell us about this?! How could you let us find out about this on TV?! And turn that amplifier down, that guitar is far too loud!'"

Ray collapsed in a fit of giggles and groaned. "Oh, no, not the full name!"

"So listen, bro," Lou said. "How about you and me hang out until she wakes up. Then afterwards, you drop me back off at home and spend some quality time with your daughter? Just you and her." He paused, glancing around the apartment.

"And for God's sake, go to the grocery store, there isn't a scrap of food in this place!"