by Unknown
“Dad, this is Regina Talbot, Regina this is my dad Randy Noonan Senior,” Collin said, as his dad took her hand in his and kept his eyes on her.
“My goodness, I have to say that me son has good taste in women and she’s beautiful to boot. Well me dear, I want to welcome you to our home here and me boys will be on their best behavior while you are here, isn’t that right boys?” he asked, his gaze never leaving hers.
“Yes Dad,” they said as one.
Kendrick nudged Collin. “I think Dad is in love with your girl.”
Collin laughed a bit and whispered, “I think you’re right bro.”
“Steady old man, come with me Regina, I may need your help in the kitchen,” Alannah told her as she took her hand and walked into the back. Regina was a bit relieved to be away from all of those handsome men.
“Can I ask you a question Mrs. Noonan?”
“Call me Alannah, dear.”
“Alannah, are all the Noonan men so suave?” Regina giggled as Alannah laughed out loud.
“There is something you must know about the Noonan men. They’re all smooth talkers…every last one of ‘em. And those eyes of theirs, Lord help us all, those flashing green eyes make a woman weak, a weakness me boys have used to their advantage. I swear when I first met their father, he looked dead at me with those emerald darlings of his and I melted like butter.” Alannah blushed as she took out a roast from the oven.
“I felt the same way with Collin. He makes me feel like I’m somebody when I never thought I was. I have to say I’m very grateful to your son for what he’s done for me,” Regina said as Alannah smiled back at her.
“I’m glad dear, so very glad. Collin has always been one of the good ones and he honestly deserves someone who will treat him just right. Even though we have just met, I know you will do just fine. Now let’s get some of the food out on the table. Boys, we be needing your help with the food, come on!”
And with that command, Bobby and Gerard came into the kitchen. Alannah told them what to bring into the dining room where some of the others were already seated. Regina looked over at Collin and smiled as she set some cabbage on the table between Randy and Kendrick. Collin motioned for her to come over to where he was since he had a seat saved for her. But it seemed his father had other plans.
“Now Regina, I want you to sit right here next to me and Alannah at the head of the table,” Randy Sr. said as he motioned for Randy Jr. to move over a seat.
She looked helplessly at Collin, sitting between the two Randy’s.
After saying a prayer, the boys started to dig into the food. As she reached for the closest spoon, the bowl disappeared before her eyes. Giving up the grab, Regina couldn’t help but laugh at the ten men shoveling food onto their plates. It was like some big free-for-all as they snatched rolls and cut into the platter of beef.
A hard slam shook the table making Regina jump in her chair. Randy Sr. stood up and said, “For shame on you all, we have a guest and all you can do is stuff your own plates. Hell men, she hasn’t even been able to get any of the good food your mother has slaved over for her to try.”
The men looked around at each other as Alannah shook her head at her sons. Regina tried her best not to laugh but soon it erupted. The men looked over at her, and then at each other in amazement as she said, “I’m sorry but I haven’t had this much fun in a very long time, watching all of you going at the food like it was some kind of race to see who could fill their plates up first. Just the sight of you all acting like this as a family, I had to laugh because there is no telling how it was when you were younger.”
“Believe me dear, it was far worse than what you’ve seen,” Alannah said with a snicker.
“We are sorry Regina, we forgot that you were here. Whenever we come and visit, it’s kind of hard not to want to get a hold of Mom’s good food, so it’s every man for himself,” Timothy told her with a handsome smile.
“Now boys, let Regina get her fill and once she’s done, then you can have your fill, all right,” Randy Sr. said as he started to serve her up some of the beef. The men started to hand her bowls of food, telling her that she needed to try this and try that. But there was one thing that Regina didn’t see on the table as she looked around.
“Excuse me Alannah, but I don’t see the colcannon, Collin was telling me so much about it that I hoped to get a taste.”
Alannah snapped her fingers. “Bobby dear, go look on top of the stove and put the colcannon in a bowl and bring it out here, please.”
Regina saw Bobby go into the kitchen only to appear a couple of minutes later with a big bowl of the concoction and set it right in front of her. “Thank you Bobby.”
“You’re very welcome, hope you like it Regina.” Bobby said as she helped herself to a heaping spoonful.
Randy Sr. handed her the butter plate. “You need to make a little well in the middle and put the butter in it like so.” Regina watched as he talked and put a pat of butter into the well, then let it slowly melt. Using her fork, she took a bite while the rest of the men and Alannah looked on.
Regina had never had anything so good in her life as the taste of cabbage, ham, potatoes and butter filled her mouth. She looked over and smiled at Alannah. “Amazing, Collin was right. I know he’s been waiting for this all weekend long, but I think he won’t be seeing this bowl at all.” The entire table erupted with laughter as they all continued eating their dinner that evening.
After all the dishes were put up, she found herself sitting on the front porch. She couldn’t believe she’d eaten so much food at dinner. Leaning back in one of the rockers, she looked around while a cool breeze passed by her. She was honestly happier than she had ever been in her life at that moment.
“How are you doing baby?” Looking over her shoulder, she smiled seeing Collin grabbing a chair to sit down right next to her. “So how do you like my family so far?”
He gave her a kiss on the cheek as she sighed softly while nudging him. “Your family is so much fun, so loving and caring and they just accepted me like I was part of it. It’s been a long time since I’ve felt like part of a family,” Regina told him as he took her hand and kissed it.
“My dad is totally in love with you. I honestly haven’t seen him lit up like that since Mackenzie brought in his wife, who was his fiancé at the time, to introduce her to everybody. I know my brothers adore you as well as my mom. I think she’s writing down her colcannon recipe for you right now.” Collin chuckled as Regina laughed as well.
“Thank you for bringing me here Collin and thank you for the most wonderful weekend I’ve ever had.” Giving him a hug, she felt someone staring and looked over his shoulder. Some of the brothers were peeking from the front door. Regina smiled and whispered, “Go away.”
“Are my brothers at the door?” Collin asked as Regina couldn’t help but laugh at their antics.
“Do you guys constantly do this to each other when you bring girls over?”
They all started coming out of the house and sitting on the porch or getting some of the chairs.
“Yes,” they all answered and Regina still couldn’t help but laugh while Collin rolled his eyes.
“So are you going to question me because it feels like you’re going to interrogate me or something?”
The brothers looked at each other as Collin got up from his chair and smiled. “Good luck sweetie.” He walked off the porch and back inside as Randall took his spot.
“Don’t worry Gina, we don’t plan on biting your head off or anything like that, it’s just a bit of a tradition us brothers have. Whenever one of us brings over a girl, we like to get to know more about her for ourselves. So who wants to go first?” asked Gerard.
“Me first, where did you meet our brother?” asked Bobby.
“At work, I work in the mailroom. I was picking up mail on his floor and was headed back but the elevator broke. I was going to carry all the packages down the stairwell by myself but he offered to help me. After that he
invited me to lunch and it’s been fun ever since then.”
“Yeah that’s our brother, always helping a damsel in distress.” Kendrick chuckled as did the rest. “All right my turn, do you like our brother and if so why?”
Regina was taken aback by his question but of course she understood that these were his brothers and they were only looking out for him. “Actually when your brother started giving me attention, I was shocked because I honestly never had a man like him give me the second look he did. I’ve always been the shy girl who kept to herself and didn’t talk with guys like you, who were handsome and sweet and had all the girls falling over them. So when your brother began talking to me, I froze up so bad I was shaking. But then I decided to give it a try and as we talked, I slowly started to like him and now I have to say I love your brother very much. I’ve never met anyone like him and I honestly hope not too because I know he’s the one for me.” Tearing up, she wiped her eyes and was surprised when five handkerchiefs appeared in front of her. She took the one from Jordan. “Thank you.”
“All right another question, what’s your favorite ice cream?” Jordan said lightening the mood.
Regina cackled at his question and tried to keep from crying even more.
“Oh my, I like Ben and Jerry’s Butter Pecan and Baskin-Robbins Pralines and Cream.”
“I’m going to have to try those.” Jordan smiled as some of the others agreed.
“What do you think of us, his brothers, and our parents?” asked Randall.
“I think you’re a bunch of wonderful guys, like the brothers I never had and your parents are amazing people. They’ve treated me with such love and kindness. I’ve wanted that for a very long time…since my parents passed away.”
“Your parents have passed away?” Mackenzie asked.
Nodding, Regina gave him a small smile as some of them coughed a bit. “If you don’t mind me asking but which one of you guys live in Ireland now?”
“That be me and Bobby,” Mackenzie chimed in with a smile. She had noticed both brothers had a bit of an accent like their parents.
“How long have you guys lived there?”
“I was the first to move there, I wanted to go back to where our parents were born and raised. The rest of these guys thought I was nuts to want to. But when we were kids we would go visit our family and I fell in love with the town, which is called Fethard-on Sea, because it was right by the sea. The town was very nice and we would have lots of fun there. So I told our parents that when I graduated from high school, I wanted to move back to Ireland. We had some very long talks the couple of months before I graduated. They warned me I would have some hardships, which I did. After I moved back, I stayed with our cousins and I got a job. It all took time, but I never looked back. Now I run a resort that a lot of people come to visit to go fishing. I have a wife named Moira and three kids, let me show you.” Going into his pocket, he pulled out his wallet and flipped through some of the pictures he had before handing it to her. “Those are my kids, Connor, Hugh and Meara and of course Moira.” The kids, who were actually teenagers, all wore smiles like their mother but looked more like Mackenzie and the rest of the Noonan clan.
“You have a beautiful family Mack.” Regina smiled as Mackenzie’s grin grew even broader with pride. “And what about you Bobby, why did you decide to move back?”
“Probably because I wanted change too, some kind of excitement or something that you can’t get here. So after I graduated from college, I headed back to Ireland too. I think I was like Mack. We always had fun there when we were kids so I wanted to go and relive all of that nostalgia. I stayed with Mack for a couple of months, but then I decided to move to Dublin, where it was a bit more my pace. I ended up getting a little apartment for a couple of months while I was trying to find another job, a lot of jobs mind you, until I met up with some friends who were in the music business. After a couple of years of figuring things out and making a few records for some local bands, I’ve become pretty successful.” As he smiled a big grin, the rest of the brothers nodded in agreement.
Regina sat back impressed by the two. “And the rest of you, what do you do?”
“Lawyer,” said Randall
“Ad executive,” said Randy Jr.
“Artist,” said Timothy
“Police officer,” said Kendrick
“Police officer,” Kenny said with a smile
“Chef and I own my own restaurant,” said Jordan
“Owner of my own courier business,” said Gerard
“Well, now you know a little bit about me and I know all of you, I do have just one…more…question to ask. Do you guys do this to every girlfriend Collin brings home?”
The expressions on the brothers’ faces made her wonder if she should have asked that question or not. They all looked at each other so puzzled and perplexed.
Randy Jr. finally told her, “My dear, you’re the first one he’s brought over for us to see. Honestly, Collin has never ever brought a girlfriend home. Most of the time, if he got involved with a girl, it was, well for, I don’t want to say really but you get the picture.”
“Yeah, I pretty much get what you’re saying. Wow, I can’t believe he never brought a girl to meet you, except for me though. That is amazing to hear,” Regina said with a smile and the rest of the men smiled too.
“He must really care about you to bring you over to visit us and our parents.” Bobby told her. The thought made her blush a bit.
“Well, we better let him come back out here, Collin come on back out man!” Tim shouted. The men got up as he came out to the porch.
Regina had never seen Collin as white as he stared at her. She took pity on him, giving him a smile as the brothers give him slugs on the shoulder and winks as they left the porch. Eventually he sat down, took a deep breath and smiled,
“I see you made it through the Irish firing squad.”
“Yup, I sure did. Now, before we got interrupted, what were we doing?” Regina questioned him.
He looked like he trying to remember but then that sparkle in his eyes looked over her as he slowly leaned in to kiss her lips. He pulled her to his lap and held her close as they enjoyed on his parent’s porch.
Chapter Seven
“Now make sure you give me a call whenever you like. It’s so boring here sometimes and even though my sons are supposed to call their mother, they normally don’t. Besides, it would be nice if you did give me a call once in a while,” Alannah said, as Regina gave her a hug the following day before she and Collin headed back to go to work.
“I promise and thank you for the colcannon recipe,” Regina said with a smile. She went over and gave Randy Sr. a hug as well but being that he was such a big man, his hug was almost as powerfully as he was. Regina almost lost her breath as he told her, “You take care dearie and come visit us whenever you like.”
Nodding her head, she walked over to the brothers who all looked at her with smiles on their faces. “All right now, group hug. Come on, might as well get this over with all at once.”
As the brothers looked at each other, Bobby stepped right up and gave her a hug. Soon the rest of the guys joined in and hugged as well. Regina thought it was funny how they all ended up until Collin shouted, “Hey guys, we got to go and Bobby, I hope you weren’t copping a feel over there while you’re hugging up on my girl.”
Groaning, they all let go of Regina but as she found herself still in Bobby’s arms, she started laughing.
“Bobby, let her go now.” Timothy laughed as he did.
Regina got into the car as Collin started the engine up. They all waved as she did and soon she and Collin were on their way back home.
“I think it would be best instead of us going back to our homes to drop our stuff off that we just leave it in my car and then I’ll take you home after work.” Collin said, as she looked out the window at the traffic whizzing by them while they went into the express lane.
“Your family…” Regina laughed for a mo
ment before smiling at him. “I swear, your family is amazing Collin. Thank you for this weekend.”
Collin grabbed her hand and kissed it while he continued driving.
Back in town, Collin drove up the office’s upper level parking garage. Knowing the daily grind waited for no person, Regina got out and stretched for a bit getting herself together. Collin surprised her coming up behind and taking her in his arms.
“I’ll call you for lunch all right?”
Nodding, she turned around and rested her arms around his neck while running her fingers through the back of his hair. Softly he kissed her.
Pulling away, he told her, “Have a good day baby.”
“You too Collin, I’ll see you for lunch.” Regina kissed him on the cheek before they walked over to the stairs and onto work.
As Regina entered the mailroom, she didn’t see Linda. When she asked Patrick where Linda was, he said, “She called in sick today, said that she would probably be out for the rest of the week. So we’ll have more to do this week.” Regina started to get to work.
And busy it was as it seemed like the entire morning was nonstop. Toward lunchtime, Regina looked at the clock and then at the phone, waiting to hear from Collin but his call never came. Luckily five seconds later the phone rang and Patrick picked it up. “It’s for you Gina.”
“Hello?”
“Hi baby. Listen, I’m not going to be able to have lunch with you, I’ve got a meeting that will last for a couple of hours. Do you mind going out with your friends today instead of me? I promise to make it up to you”
“Sure, I’ll meet you after work, can’t wait to see you then.”
She called Maxine’s phone praying the entire time that she would pick up.
