All Aboard Andi's Dream Ch. 01

© 2024 Duleigh Lawrence-Townshend. All rights reserved. The author asserts the right to be identified as the author of this story for all portions. All characters are original, any resemblance to anyone living or dead is purely coincidental. This story or any part thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the expressed written permission of the author except for the use of brief quotations in a review or commentary.

All Aboard Andi's Dream is the story of Andi and Paul Jarecki's Honeymoon Cruise aboard the yacht Andi's Dream. The story picks up the next day after the events of Andi's Dream - Joy To The World

All Aboard Andi's Dream

Chapter 1

The Family Honeymoon Begins

Introduction

In early December Dr. Adrianna "Andi" Roberts and her twin daughters Sandi and Madeline traveled from Denver to Western New York to visit Andi's friend Dr. Lucy Kocis then go up to Toronto for Christmas. Unfortunately, Andi got stuck in a Western New York lake effect blizzard and drove into a ditch on a country road. The only person who could help her was Paul Jarecki who owned a cabin near where she went into the ditch. Paul came with a tractor and took a suspicious Andi and her daughters back to his cabin where they waited out the storm.

They were stuck in the cabin for almost a week and suspicion became friendship, and as they learned about each other, friendship became love. They emerged from their snowy confines engaged with plans to marry on Christmas Eve. When they get to Paul's house, everything in Andi's life changed, and she realized that she and her daughters no longer have to scrimp and save because Paul is fairly well off, and he even gave Andi a yacht for Christmas.

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It's All About the People You Love

Dr. Andi Roberts, now Mrs. Andi Jarecki, stood marveling at her kitchen. When her brand-new husband, Paul Jarecki, built what he thought was a gourmet kitchen, he went all out. From the huge eight burner double oven gas stove to the 48" wide refrigerator, this kitchen was incredible, and Andi felt daunted by it. The kitchen was enormous, and Andi was not. Andi was a short, curvy, busty bundle of joy with a license to practice medicine. She has a beautiful face, not fashion model beautiful, but 'down to earth my god who is that angel' beautiful. Norwegian farm girl beautiful. Laughing mom helping her children color pictures beautiful. Concerned almost tearful doctor who is trying to give her patient bad news beautiful.

And she's short, not Peter Dinklage short. She was four and a half inches taller than him. She had a marvelous sense of humor about it, because being buried in a mountain of student loans, being left by your husband while eight months pregnant, and being the single mom of twin preemie girls for five years you must have a good sense of humor. That and a strong will, bear trap memory, and incredible friends.

It was barely a month previous since she was traveling from Denver to meet up with her closest friend, Lucy Kocsis (pronounced "coaches") when she got lost in a Western New York blizzard and ended up in a ditch. She and her girls were rescued by Dr. Paul Jarecki, a bit of a recluse with seventy-five acres and a cabin, and a house in town. And a house in Florida... actually, two houses in Florida, and ten Ford dealerships. She didn't find out about all that until after they were married in a candlelight ceremony on Christmas Eve.

For Christmas she gave her new husband a watch and a wallet, and a coffee mug that said, "We love you poppa!" featuring a picture of the twins. To Paul, these were the most wonderful gifts he could imagine. He used his coffee mug every day and gently washed it when he was done. Andi purchased them with the money she had available and was completely unaware of Paul's monetary worth, so these little gifts came from her heart and emptied her purse.

In return Paul gave her his Victorian Mansion, a new car, a seventy-two-foot sports motor yacht, two houses in Florida (co-owned with her brother and sister-in-law), a cabin in 75 acres of forest, a dozen chickens, then gave her a full accounting of their money. None of that moved Andi as much as when he gave the twins a plaque to hang in their room that announced to the world that he was adopting them.

The morning after Christmas, Andi was waiting for the restaurant model Bunn coffee maker to finish a fresh pot and for her dear friend Lucy to arrive. They had plans for a Boxing Day (whatever that is) breakfast, followed by an activity that Paul didn't describe to her other than to say it's traditional.

"Good morning, Mrs. Jarecki!" startled Andi out of her thoughtful funk. It was her husband's brother John and his wife Macy. John is a shorter, younger version of Andi's husband Paul, and Macy is a tall, slim, gorgeous black girl that was born and raised in a fishing village in Quebec which gave her the most delightful French accent. When it comes to looks, Macy and Andi are complete opposites. Macy is tall, slim and her skin is deep black. Andi is short, curvy, and very pale, but the moment they met, they fell in love. Neither woman had a sister and now they're drawing as close as Andi's twins are.

"Bonjour mon cher! The showers in that bedroom are so delightful!" purred Macy as she kissed her husband.

"Wait until you try the tub," said Andi, as she poured John and Macy a cup of coffee. It has been a tradition for John and Macy along with anyone else that wants to spend the holidays at Paul's house, and Andi encouraged that tradition. Currently, the big Victorian is housing Paul and Andi, John and Macy, the twins, Andi's parents, Harold and Heather Driscoll, Lucy Kosis, Gus Didomissio, Katrina Mays (Andi's favorite Nurse Practitioner), and Wonka the chocolate lab. Paul is currently taking Katrina to the airport to return to Denver. She only got to spend a few hours in Buffalo and she and Andi had been up since four AM chatting.

As John and Macy, still in their Christmas pajamas (they had a pajama party on Christmas Eve while Andi and Paul were spending their wedding night in Paul's cabin) sat at the large table in the very large breakfast noon, Lucy returned from work.

Lucy Kosis is a renowned pulmonologist and thoracic surgeon and unfortunately, she spent Christmas night at the County Emergency Medical Center emergency department performing one Christmas Miracle after another. Lucy is tall, athletic, and incredibly plain looking. She is a wonderful woman with a glowing smile, but she feels that she is ugly, so she puts her heart and soul into being good at everything else in life. She's an Olympic caliber cyclist, runner, skier and anything else she can do to avoid men. It didn't work because Gus Didomissio, a local contractor, has fallen head over heels in love with her, but she is trying (unsuccessfully) to keep him at arm's length as a 'buddy.'

Lucy arrived at Andi's house, dragging her exhausted body in from a 16-hour shift at the CEMC 'Knife and Gun Club' and plopped down at the table. Her newlywed friend, Andi Jarecki, looked at her with pity. Not being a surgeon, Andi only has a rough idea of what happens on these arduous nights, but the sorrow on her friend's face and the blood splatters on her scrubs told the entire story. And to top everything off, Lucy just missed her friend Katrina's departure by a half hour.

She sniffed a few times, her eyes bleary from crying all the way from Buffalo to Springville. "I have to get out of there..." she said to Andi, "what kind of woman cuts up her 3-year-old son just because she's mad at his dad?" She lowered her head to the arms she crossed on the table. "Animals," she whispered, and the tears began again. "Animals treat their children better."

Andi put on her reading glasses, became Dr. Andi, and sat down trying to consoled her oldest friend, but it was no use, she couldn't save the chopped-up toddler, but he was just the first in a blood splattered 16 hour long nightmare that was Dr. Lucy Kocis' Christmas evening. John and Macy immediately went to their friend's aid, but Lucy was inconsolable. John was a church pastor and Macy was an ordained minister with a doctorate in theology and psychology, but nothing John and Macy said helped Lucy let go of the dreadfulness of the past 16 hours. She wailed in horror about a pregnant 13-year-old and her 28-year-old 'baby daddy' with a knife, and she put her head down again and shrieked. Her body shuddering from her sobs. She waved away anyone who tried to talk to her about her shift through hell.

Gus, a tall fifty something widower, came down the back staircase and surveyed the situation and shook his head. "This isn't how to do it," he said. "Lucy needs something else." He leaned over and whispered to her, then took her hand and she slowly rose. With Gus leading the way, they headed down the back-basement stairs. The friends all shrugged, expecting maybe Gus would take her down to the couch in the media room for a snuggle, but the sound of a treadmill being used came up the stairs. "I'll go check on her," said Dr. Andi, and she headed down the stairs.

"I can't run with these damn things. They're all floppy." Lucy was standing on a treadmill, holding the legs of her scrubs and flapping them about.

"Then take them off," said Gus. "If it will make you more comfortable, then take them off and run."

She sat down on the bench and yanked her scrubs pants off over her sneakers, then stepped on the treadmill in her panties and started an easy jog. She let down her hair, then tied it up even more severely and began running. Faster and faster she went, sprinting, cursing, crying. She pulled off her scrubs shirt, leaving her in a tank top t-shirt and threw it across the room screaming, "Why do people do this shit...?"

She sprinted, her legs a blur, on and on until she was exhausted, as tired in body as she was in heart, and trying to push the shrieks of cut up children out of her head she slowed down, cooled down at a walk for a couple of minutes, then stepped off the stopped machine and went over to Gus and began weeping on his shoulder. Gus wasn't sure where to put his hands on the nearly naked surgeon that was leaning on him for support. From across the room, Andi was trying to signal, "Just hold her!" and eventually Gus got the idea and put his arms around Lucy. She pulled him tighter and shuddered, then calmed down. Gus led her to the back of the gym. "Come on, you'll feel better after a hot shower, and maybe a steam."

As he led her through the dressing room door, he called out to Andi, "Could you run up to her room and get her something to wear?"

"No problem."

Andi went up to the room that Lucy was using during the holidays and found underwear, a sweater, and a nice pair of jeans. She brought those back downstairs and left them with Gus, who was waiting outside of the dressing room. "How did you become such a wonderful coach?" Andi asked Gus.

He just grinned. "When you have three daughters who all join the track team, you learn quick."

Andi returned to the kitchen and Macy asked, "How is she?"

"Better. Gus put her on a treadmill and made her run it out. She's showering now."

Back in the kitchen, the talk was about the horrors that Lucy suffered. Even John and Macy, whose Christmas should be jolly and bright as they celebrated the birth of Christ, are all too familiar with the reason for the season: sin. "Every year, and it's getting worse," said John, "People get all boozed up during the holidays and then the fights break out."

"It's bad in Denver too," said Andi. "There's nothing you can do. Denver county just lets them go."

Lucy eventually came upstairs drying her long mouse brown hair with a towel. "How ya doing, babe?" asked Andi.

"I'm done with CEMC. I'll do in-home nursing before I go back to that slaughterhouse." CEMC is in a dangerous neighborhood and sees the worst of the worst with gang violence, domestic violence, and drug violence.

"Glad Gus could get you downstairs and let you burn out some of that anger," said John.

"Yeah, he was the perfect gentleman," she said, then made an angry face and smacked Gus in the gut with the back of her hand.

"What did I do?" asked Gus.

Lucy gave him a dope slap in the back of the head. "Nothing, that's what you did! Attsa matta fo you—eh? You see a chick, obviously emotionally vulnerable, obviously in need a buona cazzo duro, eh?" She made motions with her fist that left no doubt in anyone's mind what buona cazzo duro means, "Ba-boom ba-boom ba-boom, but what... you leave her hanging! Attsa matta Fredo? What kinda buddy are you, eh?"

Gus looked genuinely shocked. "I hope you're kidding me."

She held his face with one hand under the chin and shook his face a bit. "Yeah... mostly." Then she leaned in close and whispered in his ear, "Thank you for not taking advantage," and kissed his cheek.

He placed his hand on her cheek and their eyes studied each other, "Per te qualsiasi cosa," (for you, anything) and they kissed gently. Then she stood next to him, leaning close to bask in his warmth.

"You good, hon?" Andi asked her friend.

"Not yet, but I will be soon." And she wouldn't comment further.

"So... what's a buona cazzo duro?" asked Andi.

Gus blushed and mumbled, but Macy, Andi's elegant, beautiful sister-in-law with beautiful mocha black skin, said as she peered into her coffee, "It's what you were getting at twelve forty-five last night."

"I... we... uh... oh." Sputtered Andi, getting the idea. Twelve forty-five last night is why her pussy aches so much. She looked at Lucy and said, "You must tell me how you knew that."

"Where's the traditional Boxing Day breakfast?" asked Macy before Lucy could answer.

"Some slow poke lost a quick race last night and was supposed to make breakfast," said Andi.

"Did I say make? Or did I say provide?" said Paul as he strolled into the kitchen. "Let's load up folks. Ayato is waiting for us at Worzles."

Grandma and Grandpa Driscoll promised to keep an eye on the twins when they woke up from the most active day in their little lives, so the six piled into their vehicles and drove the few blocks to Worzles and found the 'gin mill' open.

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Boxing Day

They could have walked, but their vehicles were filled with gifts that needed to be transported among the sick, elderly, and needy of Springville and their caregivers. Entering Worzels, they immediately saw a couple of bar flies were already sipping draft beers at the far end of the bar. John went directly to the two usuals, while Paul walked up to the bar while tugging Andi along by the hand. Ayato and Paul looked at each other for a moment. "Colonel," said Paul in a greeting.

"Colonel," replied Ayato, then his inscrutable Japanese features broke into a smile as they shook hands, "great spread yesterday." Ayato and his wife were guests at last night's Christmas feast at Paul's house.

"I'm hoping to see an equivalent feast this morning."

Ayato thought for a moment, snapped his fingers, and said, "I'll open an extra can of fruit salad." They both chuckled and Ayato continued, "the table is already set up in the back."

John appeared and, pointing to the two early morning drinkers, said, "can you get those two some breakfast to sop up that beer? Put it on my brother's tab."

"Will do Padre."

Ayato's wife Julissa, a tough chick if there ever was one, brought out bowls of scrambled eggs, plates of bacon, stacks of biscuits with sausage gravy on the side. She saw Paul and greeted him with, "Mornin' Colonel."

"Morning to you too, sergeant. Care to join us today?"

"For breakfast or the distribution?"

"Both, if possible."

The hard-bitten NCO screwed up her face and thought, "I better hang around here, except for the Sisters of Mercy home. I have friends there." The Sisters of Mercy is a nursing home that was one of their usual Boxing Day stops.

"I'll make sure whoever draws the Sisters picks you up."

Once everyone was seated at the table, John said grace and they dug in and explained to Lucy and Andi that Boxing Day is an old British holiday where "postmen, errand boys, and servants of various kinds" expected to get a Christmas gratuity. It's not a holiday in the US but in Canada le Lendemain de Noel. The day after Christmas is a national holiday, and since Western New York is close to Canada, it's not unusual to see Boxing Day celebrated in the area.

Boxing Day is celebrated in different ways throughout the world but is always centered on giving to the less fortunate. John's Springville Congregational Church and other churches in the village team up to hand out gifts to the elderly and forgotten of Springville. As they ate, groups from the other churches showed up and sat at the tables and the booths and had breakfast as well.

Once breakfast was done, Father Juan from St. Aloysius held up a clipboard and whistled for attention. Father Juan was a short, wrinkled gray-haired Hispanic with an infectious grin and a gift for organizing. He read off the instructions for the Boxing Day distribution, a task that would be boring, but Father Juan could draw out laughs from the entire crowd as he went through the myriad of dos and don'ts. When he was done, he called for the teams to get their gifts and head out.

Teams were set up in twos and fours and as they headed out to the parking lot, their list of locations was handed to them. Gift boxes were in Paul's truck, John's car, Father Juan's jeep, and the trunk of Pastor Vincent from Trinity Lutheran church's car. Folks checked their list, picked up as many gift boxes as they would need, and off they went to distribute the gifts.

The weather was typical Buffalo weather for Boxing Day; it was frigid when they went into the bar, warm and sunny with snow melting rapidly when they headed out to hand out the gifts, and cold and rainy when the gift distribution was over.

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"So, this is the one, eh?" asked Father Juan after the distribution was over and teams returned to Worzils to hand in their completed lists.

"Yes Padre, this is the woman who has held my heart captive for five years," said Paul, putting an arm around Andi.

"He did the same to me," said Andi while shaking Father Juan's hand, "and neither one of us knew it."

"This must be an interesting tale," said Father Juan, holding Andi's tiny hands in his.

"Paul is going to have to tell it, Father. Macy, Lucy and I have shopping to do before we set off on our Honeymoon cruise," said Andi, antsy to get going.

"You go shop then and stop by St. Aloysius when you get back. I'll light a candle for you." As the girls exited the building and hopped in Paul's truck and headed for Orchard Park, Father Juan signaled Pastor Vincent over to their table, then caught Ayato's attention and held up one finger. "So, what is this I hear about? She held your heart captive for five years?"

Ayato showed up with a pitcher of beer and several glasses and, knowing his clientele, he brought a pitcher of Coke, then stayed close. He wanted to hear, too. "It's probably nothing at all, but we like to think it was something. Five years ago, I went to a medical conference in Minneapolis. I think it was in November or something like that. All I remember is that it was frigid, thirty below. When I was there, I met Andi. She was pregnant and had that radiant smile that women who are happy to be carrying have." He paused for a long sip of beer.