C.C. Kicks Butt

by

Aimee
(aimeed@earthlink.net)

C.C. Babcock was horrified. This couldn't be happening to her. "Maxwell!" she protested.

"Please, C.C. It's only a movie. I promised them before I remembered that Fran was going to need me at the doctor's."

The last thing C.C. wanted to do with a Saturday afternoon was take the Sheffield rugrats to a movie. She'd rather read plays, spar with Niles, chew people out over the phone! Anyway, her whole body ached from her Ju Jitsu class the day before. She didn't want to move.

Still, he'd made a good point. If his wife had an obstetrician's appointment, it was only right that Max be with her. C.C. was pleasantly surprised at how little pain she felt at the thought of Max and Fran making babies together. She suspected her feelings for him were by now less love and more wounded pride, but she wasn't quite ready to admit it.

"If it really means that much to you, I'll do it," she sighed. "I don't see why, though. Life is full of disappointments. Why shouldn't they start getting used to it?"

Max remained silent, but he gave her a quick hug for being a good sport. "Here's plenty of money. Let them have whatever they want to eat."

There was enough money there for three movies, but C.C. hoped to God it didn't come to that. She didn't think she was a bad person, just not maternal. She firmly squashed down a feeling of self-pity for her own neglected childhood.

"Now, I want you all to be nice to C.C. Don't give her any trouble, and try to make her feel like part of the team. I know she's hard to warm up to, but I really want you to try."

"Too bad Niles can't come," said Brighton. "Those two generate enough heat to set the theater on fire."

"You know they don't really hate each other that much. In fact, I think – well, never mind, but it's important we include her. That's why I didn't ask Niles to skip Butler Bowling and take you out." Niles hated Butler Bowling and begged for chances to skip it, but Max wouldn't let him because he always came home with such great gossip.

Maggie just folded her arms and sulked. Grace was optimistic, though. She felt that C.C. was a great candidate to be her first real psychotherapy patient. Whoever said a twelve-year-old shouldn't have career goals?

Godzilla wouldn't have been C.C.'s choice of film. She suspected it was Brighton's way of making a subtle "Blondie Godzilla" joke at her expense. To her surprise, she found herself getting into it. "It's gonna have a baby?" she demanded of Brighton.

"Scary thought, isn't it?" Brighton asked, trying to sneak a look down her blouse.

Grace whispered, "This is so symbolic! Godzilla having a baby is a typical symbol for the male fear of—"

"Shut up, Gracie!" hissed Maggie. "You're embarrassing me!"

"'Scuse me for having a brain," retorted Grace. C.C. grinned. She liked the feisty little one. Well, okay, maybe not liked, but super-intelligent, temperamental Grace was the only Sheffield offspring she had anything in common with.

"This is so cool," remarked Maggie. "The Gap advertises on the popcorn bags."

"I've got Ralph Lauren." C.C. displayed her bag.

"Booooring! Does he even make anything fun?"

"No, that's what we've got Versace and Vera Wang for."

"Shut up!" someone behind them snapped.

"Shut up yourself, pimpleface!" Maggie tossed popcorn at the interloper, then turned to finish the movie.

"Good one!" C.C. whispered. Maggie looked startled, then gave her a shy smile.

"Oy vey, I need something sweet!" exclaimed Grace, looking pointedly at C.C..

C.C. grinned. "Lunch at Ghiradelli, anyone?"

Brighton's jaw dropped. Had Lady Prim and Proper really just suggested ice cream for lunch? That was so – Fran!

An hour later, he reflected that maybe she wasn't so bad. She even held Grace's hair back and steadied her with a hand when Grace ran into an alley to throw her ice cream right back up. And not a word of complaint. He had to give her one thing. She was tough.

He was about to find out how tough. As the four turned to leave the alley where Grace had left her lunch, the way was blocked by three tall, dark, and not-handsome figures with big knives. One even had a gun.

C.C. froze. Her mind screamed for help, but her mouth refused to do a thing.

"Hand over your money and jewels and nobody gets hurt," one said. It was just like in a movie, but bad. C.C. removed her pearls with trembling fingers and began to riffle through her purse. Maggie had already turned over her purse and gold earrings, and Brighton his watch and wallet. Grace shrank behind C.C. with her hand to her throat.

One of the men approached C.C. and tried to grab Grace. Instinctively, C.C. hit his arm away. "She's wearing a necklace," he said. "Give it to me." Grace opened her hand to reveal a tiny pink pearl on a gold chain nestling in the hollow of her throat.

"That was a birthday gift from her father! What right do you have?" C.C. demanded. He grabbed her from behind and held his knife to her throat. "Give him the necklace and get out of the way, Gracie," she commanded.

Gracie obliged, silent tears running down her face. She gave C.C. and her captor a look of hate. It was then that C.C. decided she was sick of playing it safe.

She grabbed the arm that held the knife. She stomped on his foot and snapped her head back, breaking his nose.

Brighton acted fast. He punched the second guy and yelled, "Maggie, Grace, run!" Brighton continued struggling with his opponent.

C.C. saw the third man raise his gun and point it at Brighton. She pivoted swiftly, breaking the arm of her adversary, and thrust her hips back into his. She hoisted him over her shoulder and sent him crashing into the gunman. She then leapt into the fray, randomly kicking and stomping on the fallen men. She knew ground fighting techniques, but never saw the point in giving up the advantage that they were horizontal and she was vertical.

Brighton was no mean fighter himself. Soon, his opponent was down.

Two policemen came flying into the alley, followed closely by Maggie and Grace. Before long, two squad cars pulled up and the three men were divested of their stolen goods and bundled, two conscious and one unconscious, into one squad car.

C.C. and the children all had to crowd into the other car to go to the police station and file a report. It was a tight fit, but to C.C.'s surprise, Grace climbed eagerly onto her lap and hugged her tight. "Miss Babcock, I'm so afraid."

"I know, honey," C.C. whispered. "So am I."

On her right, Maggie leaned her head on C.C.'s shoulder.

On her left, Brighton did the same, but C.C. was no fool. "Knock it off, you little pervert, I know what you're up to," she told him.

One of the officers interrupted this tender scene. "Miss, I think you'd better get a hold of their parents. Here, use my cell phone."

"Never mind," said C.C. "I've got them on speed dial."

C.C. had never been so miserable in her life. Max had been furious on the phone, and Fran was shrieking in the background. Niles wasn't home yet to lend a note of sanity to the proceedings (oh, ironic thought!), and she was going to get it good for letting the kids get into trouble.

She was sitting with little Grace, holding her hand while the child gave a statement, when Maxwell tore his butt in and started ripping hers open. "C.C., how dare you put my children at risk? I ask you to take them to a movie, and this is what happens!"

"Daddy, no!" shrieked Grace, as Fran had to be restrained from beating C.C. about the head and neck with a purse.

"I'm sorry, Maxwell," C.C. said in a low, tired voice. However old she actually was, she looked at least ten years older.

Brighton yelled to get through to his father. "Dad, it wasn't like that! C.C. was great!"

Maggie jumped in. "Dad, Fran, we know you're worried, but C.C. saved us. She beat up two of them herself. Brighton helped her, while Grace and I ran for help. If not for her, they'd have taken everything, and we'd be wandering around New York trying to find a cab driver who takes good intentions! They might even have hurt us, but C.C. wasn't afraid. She and Brighton were heroes."

C.C. looked up at her. "You and Grace were, too. You handled yourselves wonderfully. You were calm, you followed directions, and you got help quickly. Most importantly, you got yourselves out."

C.C. then reached out to Brighton. "I know maybe we aren't close enough for me to have the right to say this to you, but I'm really proud of you, Brighton. You could have left me alone with those men, but you stayed. I don't know if I could have taken three!" At this point, C.C. broke down. Her head dropped into her hands, and she took several deep breaths to try and battle back tears of exhaustion, fear, guilt, and frustration.

Fran and Max were silent. Then, Max made one last point. "C.C., why didn't you just let them have what they wanted? Are jewels that important to you?"

"Daddy, that's not fair. C.C. gave them hers. She just got mad at them when they tried to take mine. You gave it to me," Grace said, and started to cry. But when Fran and Max reached for her, it was to C.C. that she ran.

"No, Grace," they heard C.C. say gently. "Your parents are right. I was very foolish."

"That's enough!" Fran cried. "My babies were in danger and Miss Babcock saved them!" She conveniently forgot she'd been trying to kill C.C. with a handbag thirty seconds ago as she turned to Max. "You're lashing out at her because you're worried, but you should be showering her with thanks and anything else she wants, for saving your children."

"I agree," said a deep voice from the door. A tall black man in a uniform came in. He dismissed the officer who'd been taking Grace's statement and had watched the quarrel in silence. "Thanks, Patty, you can go. I'm Sergeant Lane. Mr. and Mrs. Sheffield, your family was lucky they only ran into robbers, nothing worse. If they had, you would be able to credit Miss Babcock with saving their lives."

Fran hugged the children tight while Max pulled C.C. to her feet and hugged her. Then, they switched places as Max choked out, "I'm so sorry, C.C. Fran is right. I was worried sick about you all, so I blamed you when I should be thanking you. What do you want? Name anything?"

"You can owe me real big," C.C. replied with a spark of her old self. Which did she want more as a reward, help landing Niles or help putting a good one over on him? This was going to take some serious thinking.

Fran was still hugging the stuffing out of C.C. C.C. pushed her gently away and reach

"We have the youngest Miss Sheffield's statement and Brighton's as well," said the sergeant who'd defended C.C. to her business partner. "We just need to get Miss Maggie Sheffield's and Miss Babcock's and then you can go."

Fran led Maggie away to give her statement, and the sergeant sat down at the desk in front of C.C. "Now, Miss Babcock, can you tell us in your own words exactly what happened?"

"What's to say?" C.C. shrugged. "I kicked their butts." Brighton snickered. Grace clung to Max and giggled.

After almost an hour of going over the same damn nit-picky details over and over, C was released. Maggie and Fran were waiting for them in the lobby, and they were all released. Before they went, Maxwell asked, "So you're certain, sergeant, that no charges will be brought against Miss Babcock?"

The sergeant rolled his eyes. "Under no circumstances! Miss Babcock is a wonder! Say, is she dating anyone?"

Max thought of C.C., who wasn't dating anyone, as usual, and opened his mouth the invite the sergeant to dinner with them. Then, he thought of Niles, who hated her and loved her and couldn't get up the guts to tell her. "Yes, sergeant," he replied. "I'm sorry, she is." C.C. would thank him someday for that lie.

Grace and Maggie were still too shaken to eat, but Fran, Brighton, and C.C. more than made up for it. Max couldn't believe the way that one teenage boy and two women in their thirties could inhale mediocre Chinese food.

The bill came and C.C. wasn't finished yet. "I want some Mexican Fried Ice Cream," she demanded. Fran nodded enthusiastically, shoveling down the last bite of Moo Goo Gai Pan.

"We aren't at a Mexican restaurant!" snapped Max.

"There's one around the corner," volunteered Brighton.

"Thanks," Maxwell said sourly. He paid the bill and they walked to the nearest Chi-Chi's. Brighton regaled them by telling them what it really meant in Spanish. C.C. actually blushed.

In no time, C.C. was carrying a bag with enough fried ice cream for an army, or just enough for her and Fran. They were going to stop by her apartment and get Chester and an overnight bag for her, and she was going to spend a couple of nights at the Sheffield house until her nerves had settled. Grace, who hadn't let C.C. out of her sight since the attack, was standing right there while C.C. loaded clothes into an overnight bag when the phone rang.

"Well, Butler-shaped-like-a-punching-bag," C.C. greeted him. "Fat lot of help you were to me this afternoon when I was risking my life out there."

"Just get my family back to me, now, and you'd better be coming with them so I can check you all over myself!" Niles roared in her ear.

C.C. felt warm all over. "Will do, Captain Cleanliness. We'll be there in twenty minutes."

Grace took Chester in one arm and C.C.'s hand with the other as C.C. turned out the nights and locked the door.

C.C. told them about Niles' call, and Max grinned and headed them home. Fran had taken Gracie into the front seat with her and C.C., Brighton, and Maggie were in the back.

"So,' said Brighton, knocking his knee against C.C.'s. "This was fun. Want to do it again next week?"

C.C. wasn't sure whether to cry or laugh.

Despite the terror she felt even hours later, C.C. felt warm and comforted by her greeting from Niles. First, he hit her upside the back of the head. "That's for endangering my family, you psychotic witch," he told her. Then he grabbed her hard and hugged her fiercely. "That's for bringing them back to me safely."

Niles insisted on hearing the entire story, and when Gracie, who insisted on telling it, got to the part where C.C. took on half a dozen attackers single-handedly just to save the pink pearl necklace, there was a look in his eyes that frightened C.C. to death. Not because he looked angry, far from it. He clung to the children and gave her a look full of something she couldn't quite interpret, but that made her feel strange and weak. On this of all days, it was too much. Niles tried to ply them with food, drink, anything to keep them up so he could reassure himself they were safe, but they were all exhausted.

The children had never been put to bed quite so thoroughly before. Fran, Max, Niles, and C.C. all vied to tuck each one in, turn the light out, fetch drinks of water, and bestow a good night kiss. Brighton refused everything but the kiss, which he begged C.C. for. She declined, offering him a slap upside the head instead. The other adults laughed.

Then, C.C. was escorted to her room. Fran sat with her until she was ready for bed and turned out her light. Max had excused himself to check on his girls one more time, and Niles brought C.C. water. He even offered to brush her teeth for her. C.C. punched his arm and told him to get out of her bedroom.

C.C. fell asleep quickly due to sheer exhaustion, but soon the dreams started. She was sobbing hysterically as huge dark men came at her and tore her jewelry from her ears, throat, fingers, and wrists. She saw her purse fall to the ground as though in slow motion, as jewels spilled out of it, too. The children were screaming, but she was too paralyzed to fight. Why did no one save her? She couldn't do it herself. All she could do was scream, and scream, and scream.

"Miss Babcock!" She found herself able to fight, and she fought furiously. "Miss Babcock, wake up! You're only dreaming. Please, Miss Babcock, you'll wake the children!" Soon the deep British voice penetrated her consciousness and she ceased to struggle, but she couldn't breathe. It was several seconds before she realized why. She was clutched against someone's chest. "Oxygen!" she squawked. "Niles, let go of me!"

Niles released her enough for her to breathe, but held her hand, and when she had caught her breath, gathered her back into his arms. She lay there with her eyes closed for a few moments, just drinking in his warmth and masculine scent and letting it all drive the demons away. She didn't try to resist his touch at all. She didn't have the strength.

After a few minutes, he whispered, "Babcock?"

"Mmm?"

"Want to tell me about it?"

"It was horrible. I was being attacked by butlers."

"Oh, you know it's your fantasy."

She went tense. Neither knew what to say. Niles was emboldened enough to run his hands up and down her arms. "Did these bruises happen today?" he asked, noticing a ring of blue marks around her arm. "Yeah. It really sucked. Finally a guy was holding me like he'd never let me go, and all I could think was, 'They didn't teach me anything for this position in Ju Jitsu."

Niles laughed. "Got any other boo-boos I should know about?"

"Lots. Of course, you put them there. You're always beating up on poor, helpless little me."

Niles snorted derisively. "Don't make me laugh, Babcock. You could take me any time you wanted."

C.C. smiled up at him. "I know. It's your fantasy."

"You wish, trollop."

"I know you, menial."

"Poster-girl for peroxide."

"Spic 'N' span."

"Queen of lost virtue."

"King of virgins."

"You want to eat those words with Hollandaise or garlic butter?"

C.C. laughed. "Is the nightmare gone?" he asked her.

She thumped his chest. "No, feels pretty solid."

"Baby, you don't know the half of it."

It was a blatant invitation, but C.C. didn't have the guts to go there. Beat up a couple of bad guys, no prob. Sleep with the butler? She'd have to be drunker than she'd ever been before to risk that kind of pain.

"Niles?"

"Babcock?"

"I know what you're trying to say, and not tonight. Not out of pity and fear."

He sighed. "You can't hold me off forever, Babcock. I'll get what I want eventually, and you're going to love it." His voice was mocking.

C.C. thought a moment. "I've been through a terrible trauma, Niles." She fluttered her eyelashes at him. "I'd settle for some cheesecake."

"I just happen to have a new recipe for peanut-butter cheesecake."

"Ooooooh, Niles, just the thought of it makes me feel all funny inside."

"That better not be the fried ice cream backing up on you, Babcock. I'm not holding your head over the toilet all night."

"Shut up, Niles. It'll give you something to clean."

They couldn't help the broad smiles that covered their faces. It was a relief to have things back to normal.

Well, better than normal. Niles never touched her except to hold her, but he stayed all night and held her, and she had no more bad dreams.

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