Joanne Street had experienced grief early on in her lifetime. At only thirteen years old, her father collapsed due to an unexpected heart attack at work. After being rushed to the hospital, he died the same night. She got to see him for a few moments to say goodbye, but never quite got a sense of closure. At the time, her grandmother had told her that she experienced one of the worst things that would ever happen to her early on in life. Of course, it was terrible, but God wouldn't give her more than she could handle. At only thirteen years old, her grandmother explained that she must've already carried more strength than most girls her age. Joanne grasped to that notion through the next few months which were the hardest. Many years later, she still missed her father.
At seventeen years old, Joanne watched the same grandmother who helped her find that strength suddenly become quite ill. With a grim prognosis of stage four cancer, her grandmother slipped away just weeks later. Three years afterwards, her grandfather, who never quite recovered from the loss of her grandmother, got sick as well. She had lost one set of grandparents and her father by the age of twenty-one. Through it all, she continued to keep her faith in God never giving one more than they can bear. It seemed to hold true. After all, she met Mitchell in high school before she lost either of her grandparents. Her high school sweetheart stood beside her through it all, including the many nights that she wandered to his house only to soak his t-shirt with tears. He was her strength; by the end, she believed that she could get through anything with him by her side.
She entered a period of peace, euphoria even, after twenty-one. Besides the loss of a great-aunt and a couple of family acquaintances, she finally eluded major deaths. She and Mitchell got married at twenty-two at their beloved Baptist church. It was a beautiful ceremony, full of the traditional songs and everything borrowed to blue. Filling the church, one hundred and ten family members and friends attended. She loved Mitchell Street beyond words. She considered it the type of love you read about in fairytales. After years of dating and envisioning herself as Mrs. Street, her dreams came true that day. Once again, Mitch made everything better for her. He always did.
One year later, she asked him if he felt ready to have a baby. Her dreams had expanded since her wedding day; now, she imagined a whole score of children filling up their new home. She felt eager to start early. As she hoped, he happily agreed. They stayed up late that night talking about what type of parents they would be, and then they began making love over and over again.
It didn't take her long to become pregnant. A little over a month later, she got the anticipated positive result. Knowing Mitch would be working late, she made a huge dinner complete with candles and music. She bought a bib with the phrase "Daddy loves me" and laid it out on the table. It killed her to wait for him to come home without revealing the news. As soon as he opened the door, she nearly pounced on him, dragging him over to the table. She could barely hide her frequent touches to her stomach. It seemed too unreal. He smiled knowingly at her as he entered the kitchen. Once he saw the bib, he exclaimed, "I knew it, Joannie," and pulled her into a wonderful kiss. And then, he leaned down and kissed her belly too.
During the pregnancy, Joanne became obsessed with babies. She read countless baby manuals, eagerly attended Lamaze classes, and practically slobbered over her friends' children. One book instructed mothers to read to their children during the pregnancy. Each night, she began to read a children's book aloud with one hand stroking her stomach. Mitch called her crazy at first, but as the baby started to kick, he started reading sometimes instead. She constantly wondered what her baby would act, look, and sound like both as a newborn and a child. Her mind spun all sorts of futures out for her child, even though she never quite reached past kindergarten or so. It seemed so distant with the baby still so close to her and not yet out in the world. She refused to find out the baby's gender despite Mitch's attempts to persuade her. He painted the room neutral shades of light green and yellow while she adoringly picked out teddy bears, bed spreads, and mobiles for the baby shower registry.
Around the seventh month, she began feeling utterly convinced that the baby was a boy. As much as she tried to avoid specifying the baby as "he" or "him", she constantly slipped. She talked to the baby all the time and often called him "little guy". Mitch teased her about how terrible it would be if she were wrong. Laughing about it, he played devil's advocate about the baby being a girl. When she pressed him, he somewhat admitted that he thought it would be a boy too. One night just weeks before she was due, she found a stuffed football in his nightstand drawer. Across the ball, the dark blue Panthers logo that embodied Dillon High School was embedded in the fabric. During high school, she had been the cheerleader to Mitch's quarterback. Mitch drove the Panthers to state. A knee injury sidelined him part of junior year, and he never quite recovered. Like everyone in their town, he dreamed of his potential son being a Panther someday. Finding the football day confirmed that he thought it was a boy as much as her.
They both only had to wait two weeks and three days longer to find out. After a gruelingly complicated labor that ended with an involuntary C-Section, Joanne Street gave birth to the most beautiful baby boy that she had ever laid eyes on. Mitch broke into tears as soon as he saw him, as both of them fell instantly in love. Throughout her life, Joanne frequently heard the experience of becoming a parent defined as inexplicable. She heard stories of gigantic unending love which she always assumed would feel something like her love for Mitch. In the end, the love differed from anything she had ever felt for anyone. It surpassed her love for Mitch in the way that she felt monumentally protective of her son. She would easily die to save her husband, but she would do absolutely anything to keep her precious son safe. After his first second in the world, she and Mitch already were immersed completely in their child.
She had known that she wanted to name her firstborn son in honor of her father for many years. Originally, she wanted to name him exactly after her dad- Jay. Separately, Mitch liked the name Jason which was growing in popularity around that time. They decided to name their son the variation of her father's name to both honor her father and give him his own identity to establish as well. After arguing about the middle name, she finally convinced Mitch that Jason should carry his name as well. Mitch found it unnecessary as if he were egotistically honoring himself. With a lot of persuasion, Joanne convinced him to name their baby after the two most important men in her life. She could only hope their son would take after both of them. After a few extra days in the hospital due to the complications during her delivery, she finally accompanied Jason Mitchell Street back home to his crib. Inside, a stuffed Panther football awaited the little boy. So it begun.
During the first few years of her son's life, Joanne found grief again. As they tried to have more children, she miscarried three times. The doctor accounted the miscarriages to damage in her uterus caused by the problems during Jason's birth. As devastated as they both were to never fill up their home with kids, Jason constantly lit up their lives. Once again, Joanne found the motto that God never gave one more than they could bear comforting. She pulled through each miscarriage with the perseverance of her wonderful husband and perfect son. Not only was he a perfectly beautiful boy, but he also acted exceedingly mature for his age. He constantly made them laugh with his insightful remarks. At just three years old, his wit could make her and Mitch laugh to the verge of tears. They began to playfully call him "little man" in light of his mature demeanor.
As he grew, he not only fulfilled (and surpassed) each of her dreams for him; he fell into Mitch's biggest dreams too. Mitch had him throwing a football around the backyard by age four. Excitedly, Mitch raved to her about how easily Jason picked up on spiraling even at such an astoundingly young age. At this rate, Mitch promised, he would easily be the Panthers' starting line his freshman year. Joanne rolled her eyes, rationalizing how many years they were away from Jason starting high school. And yet, as he started Pee Wee the following the year, coaches began to tell Joanne about her son's unmatched raw talent. At each step along the Pop Warner path, Jason succeeded above and beyond expectations. He broke records left and right in a West Texas town where football often got compared to religion. While Joanne continued to focus on Jason having the best of manners and a playful childhood, everyone else started discussing how great of a Panther he could potentially be. With her son hardly past fourth grade, he already faced the pressure of a football town that planned for him to be the best quarterback in Panther history.
Most of the time, Jason handled the expectations well. Yet, she clearly remembered one day in seventh grade when Jason came home after school with a terrible expression across his face. Generally the happiest of boys, the look was completely unlike him. Hurriedly, she asked him what had happened. He sighed, answering her in his impossibly sophisticated way, "I was hanging out with Lyla after school when Mr. Garrity came over to pick Lyla up. He asked me if I was getting real ready to be the best quarterback that the Panthers would ever have. I answered him as honestly as possible, you know, telling him I was gonna try my best to not disappoint anyone. He told me I sure better not try because I didn't have any choice but to be the best since a lot of people were counting on me." He paused, sighing a little bit before continuing, "What if I'm not good enough, Ma?"
At that moment, she hated Buddy Garrity more than words. What a nerve to say such a thing to a seventh-grader. Unfortunately, it didn't especially surprise her. Just last summer, the Panthers had hired a quarterback coach to work specifically with Jason. She knew that specifically Buddy saying something was all the worse for Jason though. He had been trying to impress Lyla Garrity, the sweet little daughter of that damned Buddy Garrity, the entire year. It had been the first girl he talked about to her, and although she wasn't quite fond of them as more than friends just yet, she didn't want Buddy Garrity to tarnish it.
Gently, she had squeezed his cheeks with his hands. She looked directly into his eyes and spoke slowly, "You listen to me, Jason Street. You are always good enough. I don't care if you quit football tomorrow. You are an incredibly special boy, above and beyond most boys out there. You will never disappoint me, so don't you even worry for one second no matter what anyone else says to you, you understand?"
He leaned forward to unexpectedly wrap his arms around her. Whispering, he muttered, "I just don't want to let anyone down."
"You could never let me down, sweetheart," she answered him earnestly.
After that day, she watched her son continuously handle the growing pressure with a maturity well exceeding his age. His skills only continued to improve as he neared high school. He bonded with Lyla, even though his parents made him wait until he entered high school to date her. As it was, Lyla was one year below him and wouldn't yet have entered high school herself. Like always, Jason acted obediently to his parent's wishes and remained Lyla's best friend. On the first day of ninth grade, he asked Lyla Garrity out to the movies. The Garritys called the Streets the next day to confirm the plans. Of course, Buddy fully supported his middle school daughter dating a high-school freshman since he was the ever so holy Jason Street. Pam struggled a bit more with the notion, but Buddy pushed her. And thus, Joanne drove her anxious son to pick up Lyla Garrity for their first date. She greeted the consistently perky girl and then vowed to silence herself for the rest of the ride. But being the gracious son he was, Jason continued to include her in their conversations. At the end, he thanked her for the ride and kissed her on the cheek goodbye before going into the theater. She couldn't think of one other high school boy who would kiss his mother goodbye as she dropped him off for a date, but her son always had been one of a kind.
As he succeeded in his anticipated role as the Panther's starting quarterback, Joanne hardly considered something happening to him. During games, she frequently suppressed the possibility that he could break an arm or leg. Once or twice, she remembered reading about a boy in a horrific sports accident in the newspaper. For a moment or two, she would empathize with the family. Still, she never considered anything comparably horrific happening to Jason. Imagining a broken bone or anything similar that would slightly hurt her perfectly unbroken boy seemed harsh enough to Joanne. She never thought twice about what would happen if he fell completely crumpled onto the field. Her son, who was astoundingly happy during high school despite the growing media attention and endless hours he devoted to football, never could end up like any of those poor kids. She took it all for granted. Even after undergoing so much grief in her youth, she made the mistake of taking her son's state of perfection for granted.
As soon as he got tackled in that monumental game, her heart sank. Immediately, the worst knot developed in her stomach. He looked so twisted, like a doll. She could only hear the silence. More deafening than anything else, the silence killed her. She begged him to get up, to stand shakily. She prayed for a concussion, a broken leg, or anything that the doctors could fix. Despite the growing excitement about Notre Dame and all of his hard work, she would have easily thrown away his football career as the moments unbearably passed in silence. All she wanted was for him to be okay. She barely felt the words leave her lips as she murmured to Mitch that their beautiful son wasn't getting up. With her entire body numb, she somehow grabbed onto Mitch's hand. Once more, he was her strength. But unlike many years ago, she could feel him breaking too. She floated onto the field, her eyes focused on Jason. She willed him to move even just a little as they raced down the bleachers. She needed to be with him.
The first thing she noticed was that he moved his eyes. She felt relief for the very first second. Moving eyes meant that he was alive, which had been her worst fear as she ran over towards him. The relief dissipated in seconds, as she observed the look in his eyes and his contrastingly still body. Later, Mitch told her that she screamed during that moment, begging Jason to get up. She didn't remember screaming, just staring into his eyes. The amount of fear in his eyes alone haunted her. As she hovered over him, just past the approaching paramedics, his scared eyes met her own pair. She could feel him pleading with her to help him, but for the first time ever, she was completely helpless. Mitch saw it too. She felt Mitch finally crumble with tears at that moment. As the paramedics mentioned a spinal cord injury, both of their tears intensified. She knew it before though, as soon as she looked into his eyes. Still, hearing the words made it even more concrete. She held her breath as they asked him to move his hand, only to see his fingers remain perfectly still. As they loaded him onto the stretcher, she heard him thank the paramedics. Somehow, the word jolted her into reality for the moment. This was her incredible son. As they followed the stretcher onto the ambulance, she and Mitch stayed near his head. She promised him with the only words that she could find, "Jason, sweetheart, you're going to be okay. No matter what happens. Daddy and I are right here. We'll never leave you. You're going to be okay." Even as she broke inside, she found her voice for Jason's sake. The entire ride as the paramedics terrifyingly analyzed his situation, she and Mitch kept talking to Jason desperately trying to soothe him in any way that they could.
With one final light kiss on the head by both her and Mitch, they transferred Jason into the ER for emergency surgery. She broke into the greatest sobs of her life the moment that they parted. Nothing compared to the grief she felt now. As much as she tried to convince herself that it could be temporary, she knew that the chances of a complete recovery were slim. Emergency spinal surgery scared her equally. As terrifying as permanent paralysis sounded, she needed her boy to live in any condition. As she half fell into the waiting room chair, Mitch collapsed into the one next to her. She buried her head into Mitch's chest, as they both cried freely. "He has to be okay," she desperately pleaded, with Mitch, with the universe, with God. Scaring her even more, Mitch didn't respond.
After the surgery, she sat in Jason's room for hours. She left for a total of seven minutes, all for bathroom breaks, as she waited for him to wake up. Pacing back and forth, Mitch kept clinging to the doctor's words that they couldn't be certain about the permanence of Jason's condition until they completed some tests. Saying the words to visitors might have given them some optimism, but Mitch's desperate hope didn't help her. Knowing her husband almost as well as herself, she could read the terror in his eyes. He wanted to convince himself that Jason could recover, but they both knew differently. If they hadn't been convinced from his condition on the field, the scene in the hospital room foreshadowed an equally bleak outcome. Joanne couldn't process the fact that her son would most likely never walk again. Instead, she kept thinking back to the harrowing fear that had filled his eyes when he realized that he couldn't move. She knew that as soon as he woke up from the anesthesia, he'd realize it all over again. She couldn't do very much for her son but be there for him. If the paralysis was as permanent as he feared, the extent of it could improve based on rehab. As devoted as her son acted, he would need to rely on his parents more than ever to recover as best as he could. She didn't even think twice about being there to help him through in whatever way; there was no other option.
As she feared, he opened his eyes with a heartbreaking glimmer of dread. Immediately, she went to grab his hand, only to realize that he might not be able to feel the sensation. She moved her hand to his shoulder instead. She could see the tears forming in his eyes. As she watched him understand, she wasn't sure what to say. She wiped his tears from his eyes for him. "Ask me anything you want, and I'll do my best to answer, okay sweetheart?" she gently offered.
He swallowed with his voice breaking as he tried to speak. Tears kept falling, and subsequently she kept wiping them away as he formed his words. "I'm never going to play football again, am I?"
Unlike most children, Jason always had been trained to think about football first. Unable to tear his dreams away completely, she answered him as the doctor had answered their own questions, "Well, Doctor Kroll said that he needs to do some tests before he can tell us whether it's permanent or not." She wanted to stop right there, to preserve some hope for him. Yet, as he looked at her, she knew she had to answer as honestly as possible, "Honey, it's unlikely that you'll play football. But they did say that almost all patients with a spinal cord injury like yours recover most use of their arms and hands."
He didn't look as afraid anymore, but almost terrifyingly calm instead. He closed his eyes for a moment before asking her the unanswered question, "But not my legs?"
She looked at him silently, rubbing his shoulder. Somehow, with the use of all her restraint, she held back her tears. She spoke as solidly as possible, "Well you're going to go through all the physical therapy and we'll pray…" She trailed off as she tried to make the answer enough.
He took a deep breath. "Okay," he said matter-of-factly, trying to process the information like the rest of them.
Mitch approached the front of the bed. She'd asked him to let her explain to Jason first. Unable to find any words of his own, he agreed. He patted Jason's head just a little, and then let his hand slide to Jason's shoulder. "I have never met a boy more determined than you. You're going to get through this, son. Just take it one step at a time, okay?" his voice cracked as he nodded at Jason.
"I'm sorry, Dad." Jason whispered, always worried about everyone else.
Mitch shook his head, tears forming in the corners of his eyes. "You have nothing to be sorry about, you got it?" He leaned over and kissed their son's head.
"Okay," Jason repeated after a moment. "Well at least my face didn't get messed up. That's good, right Ma? You're always saying that I have a face of an angel. I'd really hate to have killed that too."
"Jason. Sweetheart," she pleaded softly. She tried to smile a little bit, knowing he was only trying to help her too. Maybe they both needed to do something to make an impossibly wrong situation just a little more right.
Over the next year, Joanne cried every single day, usually more than once. At first, tears filled her eyes unexpectedly. As time passed, she learned to hide the tears from Jason. While he stayed at rehab, she withheld her tears until she reached the car in the parking lot. At home, everything triggered her unquenchable tears, from the Panthers winning a football game to Mitch and some construction workers renovating the house to make it accessible for a wheelchair. Once Jason finally arrived home, she watched as he went through his most depressed stage. She would go off to do errands, only to break into sobs alone in her car. Besides the crying, nightmares plagued her. Most nights, she repeatedly saw her son lying disturbingly twisted on the field as obstacles prevented her from reaching him.
As much as she had faced grief in her youth, the loss of the future they envisioned for their son drained her entire soul. She thanked God every day that Jason had survived, but she couldn't stop questioning why. On top of the devastation they faced as a family, the financial costs grew to unbearably high levels. Unable to afford all of Jason's needs, Mitch tried to persuade her to move forward with the lawsuit. She absolutely hated the idea of letting the accident hurt more people, let alone inflicting more pain on Jason. At the time when she needed Mitch most, the fighting pulled them further apart. Left without any other choice, she agreed to the lawsuit. Maybe Coach Taylor should have taught Jason more tackling drills. It seemed just as good as blaming anyone else. As expected, the lawsuit caused backlash towards their family and the once renowned Jason Street. After years of praising Jason in every direction, nearly everyone in Dillon resented him. She hated their hypocrisy, how much it proved how he always had been no more to them than a token in the football sphere. These days, she hated football. Most of all, she felt no relief. For the first time, she questioned her grandmother's advice for them all. She felt astoundingly weak.
In the midst of all of the pain, she watched Jason's closest relationships shatter. During the first few weeks, Lyla Garrity had exceeded any of their expectations. She constantly visited Jason, which became the high point of his day. If Joanne came in after a Lyla visit, he would look visibly happier. After over four years as the highlight of her son's world, she had grown to love Lyla too. She never sweetened up much to the Garrity family, but Lyla distinguished herself as a polite and happy girl. The way Jason loved Lyla reminded her of the start to her relationship with Mitch. As Jason had faced loaded pressure in the limelight, Lyla aided him by making it a joke every day. In a world where Joanne often saw him pressured to be the perfect poster boy, he was himself with Lyla. Somehow, she had convinced herself that Lyla might stay through it all. She realized that Lyla hadn't accepted the severity of the situation, but she figured they all were struggling to find that acceptance. Just as soon as she believed that Lyla might not leave, she watched her son punch Tim Riggins in the face at his rugby scrimmage and everything fall apart. It triggered a newfound anger in Jason, which she once again couldn't solve. Initially, she blamed Lyla and Tim for devastating their already torn closest friend. But, as much as she hated how Jason felt, she realized that they were young too. As badly as they dealt with it all, how could she blame them? When she herself had no answers, how could she blame a barely sixteen year old girl for making a mistake? The whole situation broke her heart some more.
Tim Riggins was another matter. When Jason befriended him many years ago, she immediately had pitied the boy. Jason told her stories of his parents leaving him for weeks at a time, until they finally deserted him with Billy for good. With his scruffy hair and frequently torn clothes, Tim appeared so obviously in need of love. Right away, she couldn't help but brush the hair out of his face. When his clothes looked particularly stained, she prompted Jason to offer him one of his own old shirts to wear. If she offered Tim anything to take home directly, he would decline but always offer her a somewhat startled "thank you". She could tell that nobody gave that boy much. Eventually, she offered him an open invitation to dinner at their house. He told her that he would come Tuesday nights. For the next many years, until the week of Jason's accident, Tim joined their family on nearly every Tuesday night. He was the closest thing she had to a second son. She loved that boy. After the accident, she empathized with his struggle to get to the hospital. She knew how much he cared about Jason and that he felt stuck. Simultaneously, she wanted him to just suck it up and get there. Jason asked about him all the time until he finally started to come. Shortly after, the Lyla situation occurred. She couldn't blame Tim for very long. Over the years, she had witnessed his often confused morals first hand. She just wished he would have kept coming for dinner. She might have been able to help him through it some other way instead of watching him try to solve his problems in typical Riggins fashion. Even if not, she certainly missed seeing Tim Riggins and thought he might just miss them too.
Eventually, Jason would re-establish ties with both Tim and Lyla. Like the good boy he always had been, he forgave them both for their mistakes. His maturity, like always, made her so immeasurably proud. Despite feeling happy about their reconciliation, she discouraged his engagement to Lyla. She tried to slow him down, but couldn't convince him. Mitch told her to let Jason do what he felt was right. Still, she suspected the engagement originated from Jason's fear that she would leave him again. She wanted more for him than a girl that he now struggled to trust. When the engagement fell apart, she comforted him the best she could, promising that he would find happiness when the time was right. She could tell he didn't quite believe her, but he agreed anyways, just like the good boy he always had been.
Everything hit a plateau when Jason decided to run off to Mexico. Leaving a note on the kitchen table, he left while she wasn't even home. He left her no further clues about where to be found, and her cell phone calls forwarded directly to voicemail. Desperate for answers, she even paid a visit to the Riggins house to try to find some information out from Billy. Of course, he knew nothing. She called Lyla, who claimed she didn't know any details either. Two days later, Pam Garrity informed her that Lyla had taken off for Mexico without any further details. Worried sick, Pam begged Joanne for information on where the three of them were. Joanne helplessly admitted that she lacked any idea where in Mexico they all were staying. As Mitchell rationalized that Jason was a smart boy who would make wise decisions, she worried about all that could go wrong. He had just begun to stop relying so much on their assistance. What if something terrible happened?
Thankfully, he came home in the same state as he left. For the first time, she felt entirely grateful to see him no worse than beforehand except for that tattoo. She hadn't ever considered Jason the tattoo type. He never would have been before either, but she figured if one tattoo could help him heal, then so be it. She felt relieved to see his friendships with Lyla and Tim solidified. And as much as it terrified her when he announced he had to move in with Herc, it granted her a strange sense of relief as well. Jason needed to move out in order to live a normal life. Doing it sooner rather than later only reflected his great progress. She wished he had picked someone other than that sarcastic little Herc but she trusted Jason's judgment of Herc's character. She valued the importance of having friends like Herc who could relate to what he was going through. As much as seeing Jason play rugby made her uneasy, she tried to embrace it for the same reason. She wanted him to feel whole again and made the decision to accept whatever way he went about it. After eighteen years, she let her beloved boy move away from home with an equal mix of sadness and reprieve.
Like all grief, the pain's severity lessened over time. After awhile, she became accustomed to wondering what might have been for all of them had Jason not been injured. When he came over for a visit, she felt less startled by the wheelchair. He had changed after Mexico for the better. He accepted the injury during that trip, which comforted her. If he could accept the permanence, she had to follow suit. Ever since the accident, she and Mitch had tried to treat him the same as before he had been injured. At last, acting the same way required little effort. She consciously prioritized her gratefulness for her son's life over mourning what he had lost.
Jason came over for dinner frequently after he moved out, so she didn't expect jaw dropping news when he showed up her door on a breezy Sunday late afternoon. "Hey Ma," he greeted her with a familiar uncertain expression on his face. It reminded her of the day that he revealed his impromptu plans to propose to Lyla.
She leaned over to kiss him on the cheek, "I was hoping you'd stop by tonight, honey. Daddy's making steak on the grill for dinner." The grilled steak had always been Jason's favorite. She tried not to think about how he would have normally joined Mitch to help man the grill.
He nodded a little. "Good. That's good," he repeated, avoiding her eye contact.
Looking at him skeptically, she waited for a moment to see if he would reveal more to her. Something was obviously up. "Everything okay?" she questioned.
Shyly, he peered up at her. "Dad's not home yet?" he asked in return, avoiding an answer.
"Not yet. What is it, Jason?" She tried to mask the concern in her voice.
"You know, I think we should just wait until Dad gets home." Without pausing, he changed the subject, "Hey, did you hear about Smash Williams? He's going to college. It's great ya know. Coach has been working with-"
She abruptly cut him off, "Jason Mitchell Street, you tell me right now what's going on."
He glanced back up at her sheepishly before giving in, "Okay but Ma, I think you're going to want to be sitting first."
"Dear God, Jason," she muttered. She sat gingerly in the chair, anticipating worst case scenarios. To think, she once had been so optimistic.
She couldn't quite understand what he said at first. He kind of mumbled the words while looking down. What she thought she heard couldn't possibly be correct. "You what?" she asked, incredulous that she had heard him right.
He looked up at her, suddenly appearing more confident. Speaking much more clearly, he reaffirmed the impossibility, "I- uh- I'm going to be a dad."
Of course, Joanne Street had imagined her grandchildren. As her son grew into the perfect teenager, she imagined like anyone else that he would end up with Lyla Garrity. The thought of their children in the far distant future had crossed her mind. And of course, in the aftermath of the accident, she had considered it once again. She had somewhat given up on the prospect of grandchildren. While she hoped for him to find a wife someday, she knew that would be more difficult than before the accident. She knew the odds of him having a child had lowered drastically too. It seemed to be out of the cards at least in the foreseeable future. Now, at nineteen years old, she couldn't quite process her son's words. "You're going to be a dad?" she echoed as her voice lurched a little at the end.
Nodding, he continued nervously, "I know it's going to be really hard. I don't know how good I'll be or anything, but I just need to have this baby. Erin wanted to- to get rid of our baby. I just knew it was wrong, so I followed my gut just like you always tell me to do. And it worked. I convinced her to have the baby." He looked at his mother, seeking approval.
She managed to squeak out one word, "Erin?" For some reason, she had assumed the mother must have been Lyla even after everything. How could she not have realized he was seeing someone else? He used to confide in her about practically everything.
Looking embarrassed, his cheeks reddened a little. "Um- I kind of- it was an accident, that night before I moved out," he choppily answered. His voice chirped up a little, "She's a real nice girl though, Ma. I think you'll like her."
"So you're not even together with this girl?" she confirmed uneasily, avoiding the idea of her Jason, her impeccably well behaved son, had knocked a girl up. Hesitantly, she asked the lingering question in her mind, "You're certain that this baby- that it's yours?" She needed to make sure he was certain before she could let herself feel all the emotion, before she could imagine his child.
His smile alone would have eased her fear. "Yeah, yeah. I'm sure. She's a good girl. I trust her. If it makes you feel better, she told me that she'd do tests if I wanted down the line. But the baby's definitely mine."
It was her turn to take a deep breath. A little laugh escaped her throat as tears crowded her eyes. "Oh wow."
"I know," he agreed, with a tiny laugh. "So what do you think? Gram, Grandma, Granmaster J?"
She laughed fully, ruffling his hair a little. "Definitely Granmaster J," she teased.
"Yeah. I knew it," he smiled. Then, his tone became more serious. "I'm going to do my best, Ma. All I want is to be as good as you and Dad. I just- I hope it's enough," he said the last part barely audibly.
She embraced him readily, trying to make him feel just how perfect he always would be in her eyes. "Maybe most boys your age would struggle with this type of thing but you are one of a kind. Just seeing the way you face every challenge in your life gives me all the confidence in the world that you'll be an incredible father."
And similarly to so many years before, he whispered to her, "I just don't want to let the baby or Erin down, you know?"
"That little baby is going to be damned lucky to have you as a father, Jason. I'm certain you won't let either of them down. Sweetheart, you haven't let me down yet," she promised him, positive about her words.
Eight months later, Joanne would first get to hold Noah Mitchell Street. At 8 pounds 2 ounces, the little baby had ten perfect fingers and toes. He looked eerily like Jason but with a reddish tint to his hair. Instantly, she loved her grandson.
"Isn't he the greatest?" Jason asked her and Mitch excitedly, just a boy himself but so aged beyond his years.
"He's perfect, sweetheart." Joanne answered honestly, letting Noah lightly grip her pinky finger. Knowingly, she smiled at Mitch. Once again, tears had filled both of their eyes. But unlike so many times in the recent past, these tears had solely sprung from happiness. It reminded her of the day another little boy had been born. Her grandmother's words floated back into her mind. God never gives you more than you have the strength to bear. They seemed fruitless the last couple of years as her family faced their largest challenge. Now, Noah reaffirmed them once more. This precious boy was enough to indicate that they had made it through, for the better. Jason had told her that morning that he finally had found the good in his accident. As soon as he laid eyes on his little boy, he knew that he was right where he was supposed to be. She could see the look of pure love in his eyes when he looked at both Erin and his son. Joanne understood. For the first time in years, she understood that everything really was going to be okay.