On the drive to pick up Abel from school, Wendy did a lot of thinking. She had gone through a lot in the last ten months. Jax taking her to bed the night before he hit a truck, Harlee being born, and now Jax was back in her life. She couldn't believe that he was alive and was trying to wrap her brain around it every single time she saw him. He acted as if nothing had happened and nothing had changed. He was the Jax she had always wanted to be with. She just never imagined that this Jax would be the one coming home to her. He was always this way with Tara but had never really seen Wendy as anything but a junkie. She pulled up to the school. Abel came running to the car and climbed in. She smiled as he buckled himself in before leaning down to kiss his sister.
"How was your day?" she asked.
"Jimmy Jones was mean to me," he told her.
"What did he do?"
"He called me names and pushed me."
"What did you do?"
"I told the teacher and he got in trouble."
"Good boy."
She had been working on him using his words rather than his fists to keep himself out of trouble. He was doing a lot better. He was a good boy, he just had some of his father's violent tendencies. She would never forget the day he picked up the hammer and vowed that no one would ever hurt his baby brother. She knew then that it was going to be a lot of work to get Abel to where he needed to be.
"We go see Mr. Harris tomorrow," she told him.
"He's gonna be proud of me, huh Mom?" Abel asked.
"I be he will be buddy,"
Abel settled back in his seat with a smile on his face. He was proud of himself and that made Wendy even more proud of him.
"The office sent a note home," Abel told her.
"For your medicine?" she asked.
"I think so."
She nodded. She had known that he should be running low on his medication for his heart at school and had stopped to fill the prescription on her way home from seeing Jax. She was itching to tell Abel about his father but remembered her promise. She helped him with his homework as soon as they were home and made them all dinner. She had to give Thomas a bath after he and Abel came in from the sandbox.
"He kept pouring it in his hair, mom," Abel told her.
Wendy just shook her head and put Thomas in the tub. Abel sat on the toilet lid and watched his little brother play in the water.
"Mommy," Abel said.
"What?" Wendy looked up at him.
"Thomas and Harlee won't ever know daddy will they?"
"They will,"
"How?"
Wendy stopped to think for a moment. She didn't want to give away the secret before Jax was able to tell him everything himself.
"You and I can tell them everything we know about your daddy," she said.
"Not the bad parts," Abel said quickly.
"No buddy, not the bad parts. We can tell them about all the good times with daddy,"
Abel nodded. Wendy sighed. She was nervous about the whole conversation. He stared off into space for a few minutes. She glanced over her shoulder at him. He looked lost in thought. She went back to bathing Thomas. He was splashing and have a great time in the tub. She leaned over to let the water out of the tub and pulled him out in a towel.
"Can you go get Thomas a pull up please?" she asked, realizing she hadn't grabbed one from his room.
Abel nodded, and ran down the hall to get one. She looked down at Thomas. He giggled. Abel came back and gave her the pull up. She got Thomas dressed for bed. It wasn't long before he began rubbing his eyes and getting whiny. She put him down for bed. He crashed almost as soon as she laid him down. She was able to get two stories read to Abel that night before he went to bed. Before she went to bed herself, she nursed Harlee and said a silent prayer that everything would work out the way it was supposed to.
The next morning, she got all three kids dressed to leave the house. Abel went to school before Wendy made the drive to the hospital. As she entered the hospital room that was Jax's room, she had Thomas by the hand and Harlee in her infant seat. Jax smiled as they walked in. Thomas pulled back toward the door. Wendy sighed. This was going to be hard.
"Thomas, it's daddy," Jax said.
As soon as Thomas heard his voice, he made a beeline for the bed. Wendy set the infant seat down and lifted Thomas onto the bed. Jax hugged his son, tightly. The little boy clung to his daddy. Wendy had to fight back the tears she had in her eyes. Thomas let go and started babbling on about all kinds of things. A lot of it was baby babble but they were able to make out a few words here and there. Jax was amazed at how much Thomas had grown in the last ten months. Wendy was obviously doing a great job with him. He wanted to see Abel so bad but knew they had to wait until she talked to the therapist about the situation. They didn't want to throw off all the hard work that had been done. He had already come so far. It was not a good idea to mess that up.
"Abel asked me a question last night and I didn't know how to answer it," she said.
"What?" Jax asked.
"He asked me if Thomas and Harlee would ever know you."
"What did you tell him?"
"That we were able to tell them stories about you so they would know you. We could show them pictures."
Jax nodded. He knew this was hard on Wendy. He felt bad. He knew he was going to have to come clean about how the whole thing was set up in the first place. Him actually hitting the truck had been an accident. He wasn't supposed to hit it. His bike was supposed to go under it but he was supposed to be out of the way. He had people on standby with an ambulance if he needed anything. He was supposed to have been able to walk away clean and start a new life with Wendy and the boys. It wasn't supposed to turn into what it was now. The original plan was he fake his death by having his bike hit the truck, while he only really ended up with road rash. He was actually hit hard and the ambulance that arrived on scene took him to the hospital after declaring him dead on the scene. The two driving the ambulance took him to the hospital that was originally part of the plan but he was life flighted to the hospital he was at now and no one there knew of the plan. None of them thought he would make it so they told everyone that he was dead. They figured it was only a matter of time before he really was dead because of the damage he had done to himself.
Wendy was going to be angry with him about it. He just hoped she saw through it and realized why he had done it. The guys all thought he was dead now which gave him a completely clean break. He had toyed with the idea of telling his guys that he was alive but he wasn't sure how dangerous that really was and didn't know who had control anymore. He thought about asking Wendy but decided against it.
At 2:00pm, Wendy left to go pick up Abel from school for his appointment. She took Thomas and Harlee with her. It was killing her not to be able to tell Abel that his father was alive and that he didn't have to worry about telling Thomas or Harlee about him. Abel climbed into the car and buckled himself in. She drove to the center where he received his counselling. She had called the counselor on the way to the school to tell him about Jax being alive and giving him time to think about how to handle it. She told him that Abel had no idea but the other two had seen Jax.
"Ready?" she asked.
Abel nodded. They walked into the office. Abel had his hour long session with the therapist before they called Wendy in with the other two kids. The therapist nodded to Wendy.
"I think he's ready to hear it," Mr. Harris told her.
She was shocked.
"Hear what?" Abel asked.
"Abel, do you remember that phone call I got the other day?" she asked him.
"The one from Tig's accident?"
"Honey that wasn't about Tig, that was about your dad."
"My dad is dead."
"No sweetheart, your dad is alive. He was hurt very badly but he made it. He will be coming home to us in a few months."
Abel stared at her, trying to decide if she was lying or not.
"I want to see him." Abel told her matter of factly.
She nodded.
"We can go after we leave here," she said.
He nodded, looking at the therapist.
"Abel, are you ok?" Mr. Harris asked.
Abel nodded. It was a lot for the little boy to take in. He wanted to see for himself if it was true or not. Wendy drove them all up to the hospital after the appointment. Jax was not expecting them but she hoped that it was going to be all right.
"Who are you here to see?" the nurse asked.
"Jackson Teller," Wendy said.
"He is in his room,"
She nodded, leading the way to the room. Abel squeezed her hand the closer they got to the door. She glanced at him before opening the door. Jax looked over when he saw her.
"Wendy, I wasn't expecting you back," he said.
"I have a little boy who wants to see for himself that his daddy is alive." she told him.
Abel stared at him, not saying a word.
"Hi Abel," Jax said.
Thomas was trying to get on the bed. Abel shrank back next to the infant seat that Wendy had set down to be able to help Thomas get on the bed. Jax watched his oldest son trying to read what he was thinking. Abel looked down at his sister before looking back up at his dad.
"I'm glad you're alive," he said finally.
"Me too buddy, I've missed you." Jax smiled.
Abel took a deep breath before moving closer to the bed to hug his father. The same tears from that morning were in Wendy's eyes again. Jax hugged his son, not ever wanting to let go.