AN: So, here I am, back from my unannounced and unplanned sabbatical. I hope some of the people who were reading this are still slightly interested in what happens in the rest of the story. So, without further ado, here's Chapter Twelve.

Chapter Twelve: The Birthday

It was around six o'clock at night. It was still bright outside, due to the long days caused by summer, and the sky was a harshly bright blue color. Jill was in the Pole's kitchen, helping her mother put the final touches on Lily's birthday dinner. The dinner was simple, but it comprised of Lily's favorites foods: mashed potatoes, pork chops, green beans, and a chocolate birthday cake. (Actually Green beans were not one of Lily's favorite foods, but Mrs. Pole had felt the need to incorporate vegetables into the menu, as almost any parent would.) Jill was helping Mrs. Pole with the last chore of the night, which was frosting the birthday cake. She had to admit to herself that they had done an exceptional job with the cake. It had taken a lot of work, but the end result looked like something that could be bought in any bakery. They had covered the top with vanilla frosting, and then wrote: "Happy Birthday Lily" in the very middle of the cake in bright pink frosting. They had then started to draw flowers on the surface of the cake in blue and yellow colored frosting.

Jill had been able to maintain a seemingly calm appearance all day, but on the inside she was panicking. The moment she had woken up that morning she had began to think that inviting her father to the dinner without her mother's knowing had been the most idiotic thing that she had ever done in her life. She tried to justify her actions by reminding herself of the time her mother had invited that Scott man to dinner without her knowing, but deep down she had a feeling that her mother would not see it as the same thing. It seemed that whenever a child did something that was considered wrong it was a big deal, but if a parent were to do the exact same thing it wasn't so wrong. That was the double standard that every teenager in the world was aware of and forced to live with. But Jill knew she didn't have the right to hide behind the excuse of that double standard in that instance. That Scott man who had come before had just been someone her mother worked with, who Jill had not even known, and this was her father. It seemed odd when Jill thought about it, before she would have never had thought that there would be a time when inviting her father into a house that had once been his own would be such a big deal.

"Jill, are you alright?" Mrs. Pole asked looking at her daughter as she slowly and carefully drew a blue frosting flower on the chocolate birthday cake. "You're being so quiet tonight." She observed.

"Oh, yes." Jill said snapping out of the deep trance of thought which she been in. "I'm alright, Mum, I suppose I'm just a little tired." Jill said quickly.

"Why don't you go sit down for awhile and let me finish this cake." Mrs. Pole suggested kindly.

"Mum, I can't leave you to finish all of it by yourself." Jill protested.

"You've been a great help to me already." Mrs. Pole assured. "Besides if you're tired your work will get sloppy, and we'll have some rather odd looking flowers on this cake." She added teasingly.

Jill laughed. "Alright, Mum." She said, realizing her mother was not going to give up until she gave in. Jill felt her heart sink in. Unfortunately her mother was in a rather benevolent mood that night, and not a peevish one. If she had been in snappy mood Jill would have felt less guilty. She had a feeling that her mother would not be so kind with her when she found out what she had done. Jill walked in the living room where she found Lily sitting on the couch, squirming excitedly.

"So," Jill said sitting down on the sofa next to her sister, attempting to get her mind off of her current dilemma. "How does it feel to be eight-years-old, Lily?" she asked.

"It's amazing." Lily said enthusiastically.

Jill laughed.

"Jill, why do we always have to do dinner before presents?" Lily asked, still not quite able to sit still in her seat. "I don't know if I can wait that long." Jill was accustomed to her little sister's usually hyper demeanor, but it seemed like for a few days of the year, like holidays and birthdays, especially her own birthday, Lily's… hyperness was extremely heightened. She had been bouncing off the walls ever since she had gotten out of the bed that morning.

"Lillian." Jill scolded playfully. "Just sit still and wait."

"Jillian." Lily said doing what Jill hated to admit was a rather good impression of her "I just want to know."

"Well," Jill said. "We have always have dinner before presents because me and Mum love to make you wait for you presents and torture you." She teased.

DING-DONG! The doorbell rang making Jill jump. "Don't worry, I'll get it!" Jill she yelled in the kitchen, standing up from her seat with incredible speed. She ran to the front door. This was it. When she opened the door her father would be standing there to share Lily's birthday dinner with them. The situation could either go extremely well or extremely bad. Jill had a terrible feeling that it would be the latter. Slowly she turned the door knob and pulled open the door…

To Jill's relief and surprise it was not her father standing behind her front door but…Eustace.

"Eustace…Hello." Jill said in surprise.

"Hello." Eustace said. "I hope I'm not interrupting anything" He said very apologetically, looking apprehensive.

"Oh no, you're not interrupting anything." Jill assured him.

Eustace looked more at ease.

"Do you want to come in?" she offered.

"Oh no, thank you." Eustace said. "I just wanted to drop this off." He said.

It was not until that moment that Jill noticed that he had been holding something at his side the whole time. It seemed to be a piece of paper, folded in half, but she couldn't see what was written on it. Eustace handed it to her.

"Yesterday I made Lily this card for her birthday." Eustace explained. "I wanted to come by and drop if off earlier today, but I couldn't get out of the house 'till now. Alberta decided to rearrange the house today," he told her sounding exasperated and worn out. "She's been making Harold and I move all of the furniture in our house to new spots. It's quite the pain."

Jill took the card from his hand. "That does sound awful." She said sympathizing for him. She looked down at the card in her hand and took a good look at it. On the front of the card the words "Happy Birthday!" were written very neatly in green, blue, and red colored pencils. She opened the card and read it: "Dear Lily" it said at the top of the card. "I that hope you have an absolutely wonderful 8th birthday" the middle read. "Your Friend Eustace" it ended.

Jill smiled. The card was so simple, yet so considerate and…sweet. "You made this?" she asked. "All by yourself?" she teased, although she was still surprised and touched by the gesture of him making the card for Lily. "With colored pencils?"

Eustace didn't respond, but his cheeks were turning an interesting shade of red, luckily Jill was to busy looking at the card to notice. She looked up at him. "It's rather thoughtful of you." She told Eustace sincerely, smiling at him. "This will make Lily so happy. She really likes you, you know."

"Well," Eustace said looking embarrassed. "It isn't that big of deal, it wasn't a lot of trouble." He told her, making sure he sounded as casual as possible.

"Still…" Jill said looking down at the card again.

"Well, I better be back on my way." Eustace said looking at his wristwatch. "Alberta will probably need me to move around more furniture soon." He said with a grimace.

"Alright," Jill said. "Bye." She said. She stood and watched him walk down her driveway. She then closed the door and walked into the kitchen.

"Who was it?" Mrs. Pole asked.

"Eustace." Jill told her. "Look what he made for Lily." She said showing her mother the card.

"That Eustace is such a nice boy." Mrs. Pole said. "It seems the two of you have become such good friends lately." She mused as she looked at the card. "You know," she said thoughtfully, looking up at Jill. "We ought to invite him and his parents over here for dinner sometime."

Jill suddenly pictured her and her family and Eustace and his parents seated around the Pole's dining room table with a terribly awkward silence hanging over all of them. "I suppose we could maybe do that…" Jill said tensely. She prayed that her mother did not remember the idea later on. "I'm going to put this card with Lily's other presents." She said abruptly, hoping she had done a good job changing the subject, and gotten the idea out of her mother's head.

She walked out of the kitchen and to the closet next to the front door. She opened it and put the card on the top shelf along with two objects wrapped up in bright wrapping paper. The smaller parcel, Jill knew, was the journal that she had bought for her sister the day before. The other parcel was from Mrs. Pole; it was square shaped and about twice as big as Jill's present, but Mrs. Pole had not told Jill what it was. She knew Jill and Lily were close, and she had not trusted Jill not to accidentally tell her younger sister what the present was. Personally Jill thought that her mum was underestimating her maturity on that account. She assumed Mrs. Pole thought this way was because she had never completely gotten over the incident that had occurred two years ago, when Jill had told Lily that there actually wasn't a Saint Nicholas. Lily had been crushed, and Mrs. Pole had been livid.

Jill closed the closet door and walked back into the kitchen.

"Jill, would you go and call your sister to dinner whiles I set the table?" Mrs. Pole requested as she began putting the casseroles onto the kitchen table.

"Already?" Jill asked. She didn't think it would be a good idea to start before Mr. Pole had arrived. She didn't want him that they hadn't been considerate enough to wait for him, even if two thirds of them weren't even aware of the fact that he would be joining them that afternoon. "I mean, don't you think we should wait just a little while longer?" Jill suggested to her mother, trying to sound nonchalant.

"Why?" Mrs. Pole asked, looking at her daughter curiously. "Is there something you want to do?" she asked.

"No." I just thought maybe we should wait a bit longer." Jill said lamely, not being able to think of a good enough reason to actually wait any longer.

"Well it's already six thirty." Mrs. Pole said looking at the clock that hung on the wall across from the kitchen table. "Besides, you know your little sister; she probably wouldn't be able to wait any longer."

"Alright, then" Jill said, giving in. She walked out of the kitchen into the living room where Lily was still sitting on the couch. She was sprawled out on the living room, and was busying herself with one of her coloring books.

Lily sat up when she saw Jill. "Do you like my giraffe?" Lily asked showing Jill the page in her coloring book with a black outline of a giraffe. Lily had colored the giraffe purple and given it green and pink spots.

"That is an interesting looking giraffe." Jill said looking at the picture. "Mum said it's time for dinner." She told Lily.

"Really?" Lily asked excitedly. She jumped up. "Let's go." She said grabbing Jill's hand and dragging her into the kitchen.

"There's the birthday girl." Mrs. Pole said with a smile as the girls entered the kitchen and sat down at their seats. Jill glanced at the fourth seat, at head of the small kitchen table. It was the one that her father had sat in at meals, before he left. That spot hadn't been set in a while.

"Alright." Mrs. Pole said seating the last casserole on the table and taking her seat.

The dinner began and went on as all birthday dinners at the Pole residence did. The dinner seemed to drag on for Jill. She kept on expecting to hear the doorbell ring or a knock on the door, indicating that her father had finally arrived, but it never happened. Lily, on the other hand was talking excitedly, as she usually did, and she didn't notice her sister's distance in mind.

Soon the dinner was over, and still there was no Mr. Pole.

'Maybe he'll get here while Lily is opening her presents.' Jill thought hopefully. 'That would be nice. Like a surprise for her.'

"Jill will you go get Lily's presents?" Mrs. Pole asked as she began to clear the dishes off of the table.

"Sure Mum." Jill said.

"Yes, finally!' Lily exclaimed excitedly.

"Now you wait in the living room." Mrs. Pole told the overexcited eight-year-old.

"Okay." Lily said dragging herself into the living room, like a scolded puppy.

She went to the closet and got Lily's presents and the card from Eustace from the top shelf. Instead of going back to the living room she went to the window by the front door first and looked out of it. There was no approaching car, or figure on foot. She sighed and returned to the living room where she found Lily and Mrs. Pole sitting on the sofa.

"Here," Jill said smiling for her sister, despite her growing disappointment. "Open mine first." She said handing the wrapped up present to Lily.

"Thanks Jill!" Lily said excitedly.

She began to slowly and carefully take the colorful paper off of the present. That was the thing about Lily. Although she was always in such a big rush to get her presents, whenever she finally did get her presents, she always took the longest time unwrapping them because she hated to ruin the colorful, pretty wrapping paper that the presents came in.

Finally, after Lily had successfully unwrapped the present without a single rip in the rapping paper, she had gotten to the actual present.

"Wow!" Lily said excitedly picking up the journal that Jill had bought. "Thanks Jill."

"You're welcome Lily." Jill said, happy to see that her sister had liked the gift that she had picked out. She remembered the card.

"Oh, and this is from Eustace." She said handing the brightly colored card to Lily.

"He made this for me?" Lily asked in awe, as she opened the card. "Wow." She said.

Jill looked up at the clock as her sister studied the card Eustace had made her.

Five minutes has passed. There was still time for him to come.

"Alright Lily," Jill vaguely heard her mother say. "Here's my present."

Jill could here the sound of her sister peeling the wrapping paper from the box of the present, as she remained staring at the clock. She wondered why her father would choose to arrive so late. Surely, in a situation like this, one would arrive as early asa possible.

"Jill." A voice said, followed by some more words that Jill didn't hear.

'He's not coming.' Jill realized at that second. 'He never even planned on coming.'

"Jill." Mrs. Pole said with more emphasis.

"Oh, sorry," Jill said snapping back to reality. "What did you say?"

"Isn't your sister's new sweater nice?" Mrs. Pole repeated.

"Oh, yes," Jill said realizing that Lily was now wearing a bright, pink and white stripped, sweater. It must have been Mrs. Pole's gift.

"Yes," Jill said forcing some enthusiasm into her voice. "It looks splendid on you Lils." She commented. "Turn around." told her sister.

With a big, delighted smile, Lily held up her arms high and straight and slowly turned around in a circle.

Jill nodded. "It suits you." She told Lily.

"Really?" Lily asked excitedly.

Jill nodded.

Mrs. Pole looked up at the clock. "Oh look," she said. "It's getting close to your bedtime."

"Oh, mum!" Lily exclaimed. "It's my birthday."

"She has a point, mum." Jill said.

"Oh, alright," Mrs. Pole said with a smile.

"Can we have some tea?" Lily asked happily.

"Alright," Mrs. Pole said. "Let's go to the kitchen and I'll fix a pot." She said.

Mrs. Pole and Lily stood up to go into the kitchen.

"Actually, I'm feeling kind of tired." Jill said. She stood up and walked to the staircase. "I think I'm going to go to bed." she added a bit gloomily.

"Are you sure?" Mrs. Pole asked, looking at Jill with concern.

"Yes, I'm sure." Jill told her. "I'll see you both in the morning." She said. "Goodnight."

Jill climbed the stairs slowly and walked into the room. She closed the door behind her, changed into her nightgown, turned off her lamp, and climbed into her bed. She pulled the covers up to chin and rested their quietly. She had prepared herself for everything that might happen when he showed up, but she had never thought that he would not show up at all.