One lazy July morning, Jody sauntered downstairs long after everyone else had already had breakfast, a positive spring in her step. She only had one more week of school to go before the summer holidays commenced, and the latest instalment in the film series she'd done a movie marathon with Tyler for had finally come out. All in all, things were looking up, especially after her recent disheartening realisation that Luke still hadn't plucked up the courage to tell Millie about her.
"Jody!" Mike called, just as she passed the office. She quickly walked backwards, going back into his line of sight.
"Yeah?" she prompted, leaning into the office doorway as he approached her with a brown, bulky envelope.
"This is for you," he said, handing her the envelope. She took it from him, clocking on straight away that there was money inside, specifically coins. What was going on here? Her birthday was still two weeks away, and it wasn't like Mike to give them birthday money in an envelope, especially one with their full names and address on it. "Not from me."
She nodded and muttered a 'thanks', shoving the envelope in the left pocket of her dressing gown. If she were delusional, she would've thought that it was an early birthday present from Kingsley but the handwriting on the envelope definitely wasn't his messy scrawl and he was the one always asking her to help him out financially, not the other way around. For a brief moment, she allowed herself to entertain the idea of Luke having sent the money to make it up to her for taking so long (over a month) to fess up to Millie but she doubted her brother's girlfriend loosened her leash on him enough for him to even go to a postbox on his own.
Walking into the kitchen, she found Tyler hanging around in front of the toaster, seeming like he'd had a lie in as well. She wouldn't know. They didn't come down to breakfast together that often anymore, not even on school mornings; she tended to go downstairs on her own whereas he tagged along with one of the boys he shared a hallway with, usually Alex. It was another sad sign of the distance between them but she'd gradually learnt to accept it, no matter how much it hurt her. Besides, they were still going to that movie together. At least, she hoped they were.
"Morning," she greeted quietly, perching on one of the seats at the breakfast bar.
"Morning," he replied tiredly, yawning. She raised an eyebrow. What had he been doing last night? As if he could read her mind, he explained: "I was up all night with the night care worker, getting my passport renewed."
"Why?" she asked, laughing under her breath. They never went anywhere that required a passport. The council budget did not allow for holidays abroad. She'd never even been to a country that wasn't England.
"ID for the movies," he answered before regarding her strangely. "You are still going with me?"
"Yeah, of course," she responded, relieved that he'd brought it up first. Since he was done with the toaster, she hopped off her stool and took his place. "But you'll have to wait until I turn fifteen. Anyway, I thought we could just use a bus pass or something."
He sat down at the breakfast bar, sniggering. "Yeah, that's what Bill thought as well before they refused to sell him a ticket and chucked him out after he started an argument with them. Let's just say, his date never went out with him again." Oh yeah. She'd heard the playground gossip regarding that 'break-up'.
"I don't even have a passport, though," she said, frowning. She was the one who should've been up all night; she still looked twelve at times whereas he'd always appeared to be older than he actually was. If anyone was going to have to provide ID, it was her. "Mum never took us anywhere." The closest she'd got to a holiday was the blatant lie Denise had told Grant about their cultural trip to Venice.
She needed a passport.
.:. QK .:.
The next day, Jody went straight to the office, determined to get herself a passport. After Tyler had alerted her to the need of one yesterday, she'd asked Mike to apply for one for her and he'd told her to come back today because he needed to make a few phone calls first to obtain her mother's passport number and birth certificate. She hoped Luke wasn't one of the people he'd had to contact because there was a pretty good chance Millie would've answered his phone and found out all about her, maybe ruining her relationship with him forever. Peering through the office door's window, she saw May-Li sitting at her desk, talking on the phone. Mike was nowhere to be seen but May-Li saw her and held up a finger as if to say 'one sec'. Nodding, she sat down on the chair in between the office window and the piano.
"Oh, please Floss!" Candi-Rose begged, following a clearly unamused Floss out of the lounge and into the lobby. "I'd be great! You know I would!"
"No, you don't look old enough," Floss replied stubbornly before she did a double-take at Jody, her eyes lighting up in what appeared to be approval. "Jody!" she exclaimed, walking up to her with an unnaturally wide smile on her face. A deflated Candi-Rose trailed along like a kicked puppy. "Will you be my bride?"
Jody blinked rapidly, thoroughly taken aback by the weird request. "Umm, sorry, Floss," she said, grimacing. "I don't swing that way... and I'm pretty sure it'd be incest." Floss was, after all, kind of an annoying, bratty little sister.
"I wasn't proposing to you!" Floss retorted, crossing her arms. "I need someone to pose as a bride for my art project."
She exhaled shortly through her nose, amused. "Not this again. You made Carmen stand in the same spot for ages the last time."
"Come on, give me a chance, Floss!" Candi-Rose pleaded, "I've always wanted to dress up as a bride!"
"That was before I had a phone," Floss responded, totally ignoring Candi-Rose. "I'll just take a couple of photos and then you can be on your way. It's called painting by reference."
"Yeah, well, I'm busy," Jody said truthfully, though she wouldn't do it even if she wasn't. She leaned over to look through the office window, discovering that May-Li was still in the middle of her important phone call.
"Busy sitting down?" Floss asked dryly. "Well, I'll guess I can give you a few more minutes. I'll need to go and find Tyler anyway, cos you need a bridegroom."
Jody rolled her eyes, having expected something like this. Floss never missed an opportunity to push the Jyler agenda. "And now I'm definitely not doing it."
"Brandon's her boyfriend!" Candi-Rose pointed out, and Jody just pinched the bridge of her nose, waiting for the screeching to begin. This was only going to the beginning of the fifth shipping battle this week of a very long war.
Surprisingly, Floss didn't rise to the bait. "Don't be bitter," she told Candi-Rose. "You can do her hair and make-up." Candi-Rose proceeded to squeal, her desire to be the bride seemingly forgotten, and Jody's eyes darted between the two girls and the office. She was trapped, and her pink-loving housemate looked just about ready to drag her to her room for a full makeover.
"Why can't Charlie and Alex do it?" she questioned genuinely. She was sure that Alex would be more than happy to pose as Charlie's bridegroom. "They're the oldest."
"They're both out mowing random people's lawns," Candi-Rose answered, turning to Floss in excitement. "We should get Brandon over here to pose with her. A real couple would be way better than a pretend one!"
Before Jody could object to her boyfriend being exploited for a Year Six art project, May-Li yanked open the office door and popped her head out of the room. "Jody? You here about yesterday?"
"Yeah," Jody instantly replied, grateful for the interruption. As May-Li went back into the office, Jody stood up and gave Floss an apologetic smile. "You're going to have to let Candi be the bride after all."
Floss groaned and Candi-Rose grinned before Jody went into the office and shut the door on the both of them. May-Li looked up at her from her chair, shuffling a few papers about her desk. Apparently, because she was on the smaller side, her baby bump was more prominent than it would be on other women in the same stage of pregnancy. "Okay, so, Mike filled out the online application yesterday and all I've got to do now is get your documents together and send them to the passport office." Her surprise must've shown on her face because May-Li suddenly chuckled. "What's got you so shocked?"
Jody laughed, shaking her head. "Nothing, only I didn't expect you guys to get it done so quickly. I thought it'd take ages."
"Oh, thanks for that(!)" May-Li responded as she got up and opened the top drawer of the filing cabinet. Jody hadn't meant to imply that the care workers were slow at their work, even though they actually were at times. Things used to run much faster back at Elm Tree House when they'd had three care workers (or rather two care workers and one care work assistant). It was a shame that Melanie, Tracy's replacement, hadn't lasted long. For some reason, Mike and Gina never replaced her. "The actual passport will take a few weeks to get here," May-Li continued, taking out a file Jody had never seen before and putting it on the desk. "It's a little more complicated than your usual application because you're in care."
"Typical," Jody commented, inching closer to the desk as May-Li looked inside the file.
The file was full of thin, pink pieces of paper with official, important-looking emblems on them. May-Li took one of the sheets out and placed it on her desk before closing the file and putting it away. Leaning over the desk, Jody studied the piece of paper she now realised was her birth certificate, skimming over her date and place of birth, full name and sex but stopping short when her gaze fell upon the next section. Her mind drew a blank, and her mouth became dry. This couldn't be right.
The section entitled 'FATHER' was blank.
.:. QK .:.
Her head was still spinning when she got back from the nearest postbox; May-Li had asked her to post the envelope full of documents required for her to obtain her passport. Feeling utterly numb, she dragged herself to the lounge only to find Floss taking photos of Tyler and Candi-Rose dressed up as a bridegroom and bride. Normally, she wouldn't have batted an eyelid at the spectacle but seeing Tyler with another girl today, even if it was just Candi-Rose, made her see red. In a fit of jealousy, she stomped towards Floss and snatched her phone.
"Oi!" Floss exclaimed, lunging at Jody. "What did you do that for?!"
Jody licked her lips, searching for something to say as she reluctantly returned Floss's phone to her. She couldn't outright say that she was in a horrible mood because of what she'd just discovered but she couldn't remain silent either. They'd think she was mad! "Don't you think Candi-Rose would look better with Ryan?" she asked weakly, only realising afterwards how disastrous that sounded. "Or Bird?"
"Not really," Floss answered, flicking through her photo gallery. "Bird looks too young, and Ryan would make it look like he's divorcing her, not marrying her." She suddenly stopped what she was doing and looked up from her phone, her eyes flitting towards Candi-Rose. "You still look too young here."
"It'll be fine, just put some wrinkles on her when you get round to painting us," Tyler piped up. Despite her anger, Jody had to refrain from smiling at his unhelpful comment as Candi-Rose let out a loud 'eww'.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Floss glare at Tyler. "I want to leave school as the best artist of my year, not some amateur!" She turned to Jody. "Either I wait for Charlie and Alex to come back or you take Candi-Rose's place."
Surprising even herself, Jody agreed, and within ten minutes, she was wearing one of Candi-Rose's dresses, a veil, and makeup. It was a little awkward posing as Tyler's bride given the state of their friendship as of late, and she was sure she looked downright ridiculous all dolled up and hanging off his arm, but the whole thing was a good distraction from thoughts of her family, at least for a while. Even the dress wasn't as horrendous as she thought it'd be; it was pretty tame for Candi-Rose. Unfortunately, the photoshoot was over far too soon and Jody 'Gray' was forced to face the troubling questions regarding her paternity again.
Back when she'd first seen her birth certificate, she'd thought the worst: that Gray's details weren't on it because she simply wasn't his daughter, and that she'd been living a lie her entire life. However, that theory just didn't hold any stock; if Gray had thought she wasn't his daughter right from the beginning, he wouldn't have stuck around for that first year and a half. Besides, paternity tests had definitely existed back in 2003. The alternative, that Gray was her father but opted not to be named her father, made even less sense. Everyone else on the planet was either given their mother's last name regardless of whether their father was listed on the birth certificate or not, or their father's last name as well as having his details on their birth certificate. By all logical reasoning, it would've made more sense for her to have been Jody Jackson right from the start.
Was Gray even on her brothers' birth certificates? Was he not on hers so that he wouldn't have to be legally responsible for her? Or because he'd never been married to her mother? Was he just the type of guy who wasn't on any of his kids' birth certificates, even those of Benji and his sister? How was she even supposed to determine that?
It just didn't make sense.
.:. QK .:.
"You know Floss only asked you to be the bride because of...?"
She tiredly peered up at him from her phone, letting out a quiet laugh. She supposed he was right. It wasn't like she looked significantly older than Candi-Rose; her youthful appearance was the reason she desperately needed ID in the first place. Besides, how old had Floss seriously expected a couple of care kids to look?
"Yeah, I guess," she muttered, pressing the power button on her phone and watching the screen go black. She leaned back against the sofa as he sat down next to her, leaving that Taz sized gap she'd now grown accustomed to between them.
"Penny for your thoughts?" he asked curiously. "You seemed a little angry when you took Floss' phone and then you practically ran off after she was done taking photos."
"I saw my birth certificate today, for the first time," she admitted, certain that everyone else was either outside or upstairs. "My dad wasn't on it."
He raised an eyebrow. "Really? How did you know his name then?" She blinked rapidly, startled by his words. "I thought your mum never said it be—"
"Because she hated him," she finished, realising he was right. She'd asked for her 'daddy's' name a couple of times as a child but Denise had always snapped at her in response, and, of course, she'd never dared to ask again after Kingsley's feral outburst over her naive girlhood drawing. "So did Kingsley..."
How did she know? She couldn't remember being told by anyone, not even by Luke who'd hated Gray the least and had always just referred to him as 'Dad'.
"Did you know that it was his name for sure or...?"
She glared at him. What was he implying? That she'd invented her father's name during a bout of madness... or sadness? "Someone must've told me; I couldn't have just guessed it. I already knew before the woman at the supermarket called out his name."
He just looked confused. "What woman and what supermarket?"
Oh no. She bit her lip, remembering that she'd never told him about the supermarket run-in with Gray. How could she forget? After all, it was one of the many reasons there was an emotional distance between them now. "Err, I saw him at the local supermarket when I went shopping with Charlie... and I knocked his son over. The boy's mum called him over because the security guard wouldn't kick me out."
To his credit, he didn't look angry upon hearing what she'd hidden from him for months. Instead, he simply asked, "His son?"
"He's got a daughter as well," she said sadly, wrinkling her nose. "Another one, I mean. With that woman he left us for."
"You should've told me."
Looking down at her hands, she sighed. What difference would it have made? Gray still would've been off enjoying his life with his replacement family and she still would've been a grisly, emotionally damaged care kid. She swallowed deeply, making eye contact with him once more. "It doesn't matter anyway. He was never really my dad, not in the way he was Luke's and Kingsley's. And if he really wanted to find me, he would've called social services by now." She inhaled deeply, trying to quell the sinking feeling in her chest. "My only blood family is Luke."
Empty words. She'd already given up on Gray twice before but he'd managed to worm his way back into her mind without even trying each time and she was sure he would again, whether she liked it or not. As for Luke, at the rate things were currently progressing, he'd have married Millie and had five kids with her before telling her that he had a little sister. The money she'd briefly hoped was from him had turned out to be the ticket fare she'd asked Ella to pass onto Thomas; Thomas had sent it back to her as a gift because, in his own words, he had 'made more than enough' off Ella.
Her family were such let-downs.
A/N: Jody seeing her birth certificate for the first time at nearly fifteen years old might seem contrived but I legit saw mine for the first time (that I can remember) at nineteen years of age! I'd simply never needed it before that.
Thanks to CharlieSMarts12 and yourfire for the reviews. I loved reading both of your thoughts on Jody/Brandon's relationship and I agree with you both to some extent.
CharlieSMarts12 - I do wonder if Brandon picked up on Jody's feelings for Tyler during the relationship. The way he asked her to Florida would suggest not but you never know.
yourfire - out of curiosity, where did you get the idea that Bird is the same age as Ryan? I made him a year younger than Jyler (and thus Ryan) here but I never thought he was older than them. The only thing I know for certain regarding his age is that he's two years older than Jay. I actually quite like that Brandon was portrayed as a nice guy. I've seen too many shows where the 'other man/woman' is evil or something which makes it so that the protagonist only gets with the other half of the endgame couple because it's more convenient. Like they should make the decision to break up because the other person is wrong for them, not because they turned out to be a monster. And thanks for your kind words about my writing. It really makes me happy.