Out of It

After their grandparents had dropped the news that they gave all the grandkids $50,000 and all the great grandkids $25,000 the evening seemed to go down hill. No one knew how to react. John. Well John was royally pissed that his parents sold the land. In not so many words, he pretty much kicked all of us out so that he could talk to his parents in private. The boys, though, didn’t want to leave but yet, somehow they all ended up back at Jordan’s house, seated around his kitchen table staring at the cheques in disbelief.

“Hey,” I tapped Jordan on the shoulder and motioned towards the sleepy Jenna in his arms. “Why don’t you let me put her to bed?”

“Hmm?” He glanced at Jenna for a moment and then sighed. “I guess I should put her down.” Instead of handing her off to me, he scooted his chair back and stood. “Excuse us,” he muttered to his brothers as he grabbed my hand and led me out of the kitchen.

First stop was to the bathroom where he held Jenna while I washed her face and hands. Next stop was in his room where Jenna left her blanket earlier that day when she sat with me while I was getting ready for dinner. Last stop was Jenna’s room where I watched Jordan dress her for bed and give her a kiss before turning to let me give her a kiss.

“Sweet dreams,” I whispered just after I kissed her cheek.

Once Jenna was curled up in her bed, Jordan reached for me. Pulling me into his arms, he lowered his head, resting his forehead against my shoulder. He was acting a little strange; he hadn’t said much since his grandparents shared their news with everyone. At first, I thought it was because he was shocked like the rest of his family but has the night wore on, I began to wonder if there wasn’t something else going on in his head.

“Jordy?” I hugged him tighter. “Are you ok?”

He took a deep breath and nodded. “Yeah Babe, I’m alright.” There was something in his voice that told me he wasn’t as alright as he claimed to be but I let it go, only because I knew him well enough to know that he needed to deal with whatever was going on in his own way first. I knew he would tell me later, he always did.

With another deep breath, he squeezed me so tight, I thought my eyes were going to pop out of my head. Just when I was sure my lungs were going to collapse, he stopped squeezing. Before he pulled away he pressed his lips against my neck. “You’re the best,” he told me as his eyes met mine.

Five minutes later we had rejoined his brothers and their other halves, they had moved from the kitchen into the living room. “How long do you think dad will yell at Nan and Pop before he’s put in his place?” Mike asked as we sat down. “I can’t believe how pissed he was, it’s their land and they should be able to sell it if they want.”

“Control.” Nick replied. “It’s all about his need to control everything.”

As Mike, Nick and Amy discussed their dad’s need to control everything, I sat back and, for once, didn’t voice my opinion on the subject. Instead, I held Jordan’s hand and listened.

It seemed like hours went by before either one of them realized that not only was I not saying anything but neither was Jordan. Giving his twin a questioning glance, Nick asked him what was going on. “Come on Jordan, I know you, of all people, would have something to say.”

With a slight shrug, Jordan told his brother that he really didn’t.

“Yeah, right!” Nick exclaimed. “Anna?” He looked to me for help. “What about you?”

All eyes were on me as I leaned in and rested my free hand on the table in front of me. “I don’t think that it matters much what John feels this time, your grandparents made a decision and they did what they wanted to do. John can yell and scram all he wants but it’s not going to change anything.” With a side glance at Jordan, I continued. “I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m shocked that they sold the land. Never in my life did I imagine….”

I couldn’t continue. It was not only shocking but upsetting that they sold the land. I spent a lot of summers running all over their land with the boys. We hiked, camped, played, swam and in our teen years, we partied. It was difficult to deal with the fact that we would never be able to roam those lands like we were accustom to. I was a little choked up when I spoke again. “It’s like losing part of our childhood.”

Nick ran a hand over his face. “Wow,” he barely whispered. “I never thought about that.”

Beside me, Jordan squeezed my hand really tight. “I always thought it would be there….that I could share it with my kids….that they would know the same carefree summers that I knew.” He turned his head and gazed at me. “I wanted…” He raked his fingers through his hair. “I had plans Anna and now….it’s too late.”

It broke my heart to see him so upset but I couldn’t help but wonder what those plans were. “I don’t want you to feel like this,” he told me. “I just want to make you happy.”

I couldn’t help but smile. “Don’t you know Jordy? I’ve never been happier.”

As Jordan wrapped his arm around my shoulders and kissed me, Mike cleared his throat and asked, “So what are you doing with the money?”

Jordan grinned, “Make new memories.”

****

Sunday night, like every other night of the week, except Fridays and Saturdays, Jordan and I found ourselves side by side in the kitchen, working on lunch for the next day. I was in the middle of plucking tiny seedless green grapes from the vine and rinsing them off before placing them in a small purple lid container when I heard Jordan snicker beside me.

“What’s so funny?” I asked him as I carried on with the plucking process.

Stealing a grape from the container, he popped it in his mouth and grinned. “You know,” He motioned to the mandarin orange already peeled and sectioned, the raspberry jam sandwich without crusts cut into four tiny squares, and the two juice boxes that sat just off to my right as they waited to go into the Dora lunch sac nearby. “My parents do have food at their house.”

I nodded. “I know but…” I glanced at him and gave a helpless shrug. “Jenna likes carrying her lunch sac and this way, your mom doesn’t have to worry about what to give her for snacks and stuff.” Turning back to the grapes, I hesitated, thinking I was doing something wrong. “Jordy, has your mom complained?”

“Not that I know of. I just think it’s cute.” He gently hip bumped me. “Little Mama.”

****

“What do you mean, you can’t watch Jenna?” A little later that night, just as Jordan and I finished cleaning up before heading into the living room to watch a little TV, his mom called. “Well what am I supposed to do?”

I tried to busy myself so it didn’t seem like I was trying to listen in so I wandered down the hall to his room. I had changed and was in the middle of pulling the bed covers down for later when he came into the room and plopped down on the bed. “Mom and dad aren’t going to be able to watch Jenna for a couple days,” he told me. “It seems that Dad thinks he needs to have a family meeting with Uncle Brian and Aunt Meredith – he summoned the both of them to my grandparents place.”

“Wow,” I sat down next to him. “What are you going to do about Jenna?”

“Call around, hope someone can babysit. If not, I’ll take a couple days off work.”

“Who are you going to call?”

He shrugged. “I could call Nick but I don’t know if Amy would want Jenna as well as Bradley. Mike…well maybe not.”

“We could call my brothers; see if Susan or Mary can help us out.”

“I don’t know,” he rubbed his face. “Susan would be best, since she’s in town but she’s in the same boat as Amy, would she want another kid around with a newborn? I mean, Jenna’s a great kid but will Susan be too tired from dealing with Courtney? She’s only two months old.”

“I can’t say until we call them Jordy.”

“I know,” he rolled over and grabbed the phone from the bedside stand. “I’ll try Nick first,” he told me as he scrolled through the phone’s directory.
Twenty minutes later we learnt that Amy and Nick had appointments the next morning, so they weren’t able to help. Susan was extremely apologetic but she didn’t think that it would be a good idea for Jenna to stay with her because Conner was sick. Zach told me that Mary would love to spend time with Jenna but she happened to be visiting her parents for a few days. “She is extremely emotional,” he told me. “She was crying the other night and told me that she missed her mom, so I told her to go see her.” He mentioned something about not being sorry when this baby was born. “I’d help but I’m working. Sorry sis.”

I guess I didn’t look too happy when I hung up from talking to Zach because Jordan sighed deeply. “I suppose,” he hesitated. “I could call Heather’s parents; she did tell me they missed Jenna when I was talking to her earlier.”

“You could,” I rubbed my hand over his back. “But do you want to?”

“No.” He stated as he took the phone from me. “I don’t really want to but they are her grandparents and…” He shrugged. “Maybe they won’t be available.” He sounded so hopeful, I really believe that he was actually wishing they weren’t and he could take time off work to spend with her.

I watched him as he dialled their number and took a deep breath. There was no secret that Heather’s parents weren’t Jordan’s biggest fans, despite Hank’s assumptions that they wanted Heather and Jordan together when they first came back to town. Sure, they were nice when he ran into them on the street and yes, Heather’s father did take his car to Jordan when there was something wrong but they didn’t like him when he was dating Heather and they didn’t go out of their way to be super friendly now that Jenna was around.

Jordan stumbled over his words as he told Heather’s father the situation. “It’s only for a couple days,” he insisted. “From 7 until 3:30 when Anna gets off work.” He listened for a few minutes and shook his head. “No, no, Anna will pick Jenna up – I don’t get off work until 6-6:30.” Deep frown lines appeared in his forehead as he went quiet again. “What do you mean you don’t want Anna to pick her up? You don’t get to say who can and can’t pick her up!” He paused and then his head started to shake once again. “Forget about it!” He snapped. “I’m not going to drop Jenna off, you don’t get to dictate to me who I can and can’t have around my daughter. Anna never did anything wrong and Heather is a million times happier with Hank than she was with me.” With another, ‘forget about it, I’ll figure something out’, Jordan hung up the phone.

Ten minutes later, the phone rang, Heather’s parents’ number showed up on the caller ID. “I’m not answering it,” Jordan stated as he left the bedroom to shower before bed.

The phone stopped but soon it rang again. I answered it.

“Put Jordan on,” Heather’s dad demanded.

“He’s in the shower,” I informed him. “I’d tell him to call you back but he probably won’t.”

“I want to see my granddaughter.”

I nodded. “I understand but it’s up to Jordan, not me.”

“Tell him to call me, or I’ll just keep calling back.”

Smiling, I told him I would. I was about to hang up when I heard him call my name. “Yes?”

“Tell Jordan that Jenna will be ready to go when you come to pick her up.” Before I could respond, he hung up.

When Jordan got out of the shower, I told him what Heather’s father said but he was a little worried about bringing her over there. “What if he doesn’t give her back?”

“He can’t keep her,” I told him. “If he tries, we’ll just call Zach.”