A/N: Again, thank you for the reviews. Just to clarify, Jake and Hailey are not an established couple, but they do go out. If that confuses you, wait until the story says something, but I don't want you to thing that these kids are having a total snogfest with each other every afternoon...because they aren't.

Chapter Nine

Gordo kept himself occupied for the rest of the week. When his parents mentioned the McGuire's anniversary, Gordo ultimately decided that he needed to appear mature about this situation. The truth was he couldn't ignore Lizzie's existence. She was still every bit as beautiful as she was they day he'd last seen her. That fact, which he hoped to get over soon, plagued him. Before, Gordo was all but embracing the fact that he'd managed to avoid women for the past several years…but then when he saw her again, that meant nothing. If it weren't for their shady past, he was positive he would have asked her out.

What perplexed him even more was Jake. Jake had a good head on his shoulders and was very trustworthy, and Gordo would have never guessed in a thousand years that he was Lizzie's son. It made sense, though. He had her eyes. In his youth, Gordo had decided that Lizzie McGuire had eyes that could look innocent when desired and yet look every bit as fierce when needed. He didn't notice them on Jake at first, but when he dropped Hailey off on Wednesday, he saw the eyes. As Hailey's guardian, this scared him.

His parents had decided to leave for the barbeque early and Hailey had left earlier that morning to help with decorations. After Gordo dealt with a few business related things that morning, Gordo headed for the party. He was nervous. He didn't know what kind of reaction to expect from Lizzie. He doubted she knew he was going to show up, but then figured that Hailey had probably mentioned something about it.

That was another thing. Gordo hadn't told Hailey about his past with Lizzie. With a combination of stress, nervousness, and lack of finding a good time for this discussion, Gordo avoided this. Since Hailey hadn't asked about it, he figured Lizzie hadn't told Jake about it.

When he arrived, he had to park all the way down the street. The party was so big that Gordo was surprised that they all seemed to fit in the backyard and patio area. He recognized some of the faces, but they all were talking to each other.

Then he spotted her. There she was, carrying a tray of some type of food, smiling and chatting with other people. She looked happy and when it looked like she might have glanced in his direction, he ducked and turned, heading over to the drink table and pouring himself a cup of Coke. He was reaching for a napkin when a voice behind him said, "Davie?"

Gordo turned, facing his niece and Jake, "Hmm?" he asked, taking a sip of his drink.

"Um, is it okay with you if after this is over, I help Mrs. West and Jake's grandparents clean up and then go to the Digital Bean with Jake?"

"Um," Gordo said, slightly distracted in his search for Lizzie, "Sure. Just be home at a reasonable hour and take your cell phone with you."

Hailey shrugged, "Okay, I should be home for dinner." Hailey disappeared and Gordo remained where he was. He didn't feel like socializing, but he felt slightly out of place. Over the past few days, Gordo had concluded that if he had to have a confrontation with Lizzie, he wanted peace. Sure, he wasn't really looking forward to a confrontation…but if their children kept things up, it was inevitable.

In fact, in case Hailey and Jake ever got suspicious, it would probably help if they made their peace sooner than later. But all things considered, Gordo was ultimately perplexed by the situation.

888

Lizzie didn't know that he was going to be there. She completely forgot to worry about that, even though she couldn't stop thinking about Gordo. That alone confused her. Here she was, Lizzie McGuire, all caught up in her feelings about her friend from the past. She never thought she would see him and she hadn't given a significant amount of time prior to their encounter about him, but now it was hard to keep her mind off of him. She felt thirteen again, mostly because she couldn't decide how she felt about him.

What confused her the most about her recent feelings was the fact that Gordo hadn't seemed to change that much. He was always somewhat attractive, charming, and nice. His stardom hadn't made him pigheaded. He was always mature. The only difference was that he was taking care of Hailey. He probably had a girlfriend or maybe he was even married. Hailey had never said much about him and surely it would have been inappropriate to ask.

When she saw him there at the party, though, her first instinct was to hide or go inside. She was stuck handing out food, though, and it wouldn't make sense to hide. So she kept talking with the people and watched him in the corner of her eyes, talking to a few people.

After a few minutes, Lizzie went inside to wash her hands and there, she ran into her brother, Matt, and his youngest child, Davis, who was three years old. "Hey, Lizzie."

"Oh, hey," she said, and she smiled at Davis, "What's up?"

"Well," Matt started and he looked at his son, "it appears that WE had a little accident and we're just now cleaning up."

"I'm a big boy!" Davis exclaimed, in his high, childlike voice as he raised his arms.

"Not today you aren't," Matt said, and then he looked at Lizzie, "If Jenny hadn't insisted on packing another set of clothes, I'm not sure what we would have done."

Lizzie laughed, "Yeah, well, where is Jenny? I was just outside and I didn't see her."

"She's probably still upstairs with one of our other monsters. Jack started pulling Kate's hair earlier and, well, let's just say that as the eldest sibling, Kate did what she had to do."

Lizzie laughed out loud, "Yeah, well, I always told you Kate was going to be one smart cookie. She has two younger brothers. It's good that she's learning so early."

Matt rolled his eyes, but smiled, "Yeah, well, just to clarify, I'm sorry for all the misery I ever put you through. Now I know how mom and dad must have felt when we were younger."

Lizzie raised her eyebrows, "Yeah, well wait until they get a little older. That's when the real fun begins."

Matt shook his head, "If they are anything like you and I were, I can't wait."

"I don't know how I ever handled two boys practically all by myself."

Matt smiled and looked at his sister with sympathy, "They really are great, Liz. You have every right to be proud of yourself."

"Daddy!" Davis exclaimed restlessly, "I want to go outside! I want to play with Andrew and Jake."

"You do?" Matt asked his son, "What are they playing?"

Davis shrugged, "I want to be with the big kids."

Lizzie and Matt exchanged a look, both of them knowing that the big kids probably wouldn't like this, "I'll play with you," Lizzie finally offered.

Davis got excited, "Really?"

"Lizzie, you don't have to do that," Matt said, "I'll take him outside."

"No, it's okay," Lizzie said, smiling at Davis, "I hardly ever see these guys and I want them to remember their Aunt Lizzie."

Matt shrugged, "Okay, well, I guess I'll be upstairs, then. I'll be outside in a few minutes."

"Okay," Lizzie said and then she turned her attention to her nephew, "So, what would you like to play?" she asked, tugging a piece of hair behind her ear, "or do you want to go outside and see what's going on out there?"

Davis nodded, "Outside!"

Lizzie led Davis outside and Davis started toward the sandbox. Her parents had put it there when grandchildren came to visit. Lizzie sat on the edge of the sandbox and watched as Davis played with a plastic dump truck and chattered about random things. Ten minutes later, when someone announced that they were about to serve cake, Davis jumped up excitedly and headed for the cake. Lizzie went after him, but couldn't stop him before she heard an "Uff!" and saw that Davis had bumped into someone's leg. When she saw who the leg belonged to, she wanted to hide.

None other than David Gordon was standing there. He looked down to see what hit him and then looked up and their eyes connected. After standing there for a few seconds, Lizzie finally said, "Oh, I'm so sorry. Honey, are you all right?"

Lizzie was about to reach down and pick up her nephew, but Gordo beat her to it. Gordo picked Davis McGuire up, inspected him for scratches, and then looked at his face for a few seconds. Lizzie wondered what he was thinking about. She was about to take Davis away from Gordo when Gordo said, still holding Davis, "He looks okay to me," he said and then he looked at Lizzie, who looked nervous, "Where is Matt, anyway?"

Lizzie weakly smiled, "He's inside dealing with Jack and Kate."

"Ahh," Gordo said, nodding his head, "You know, I always wondered how he ended up naming his daughter 'Kate.'"

"Well," Lizzie sighed, "Her full name is 'Kate Elizabeth,' and she was named after her two aunts."

Gordo looked down at the child that he was still holding who just observed the adults, "This is Davis, right?"

Lizzie squinted, "How did you know?"

Gordo shrugged, "I see them every once in a while."

"They don't even live here, though."

"They moved away two years ago," he said, and then he put Davis down. Davis stayed where he was, near Gordo.

There was an awkward pause…surely one of many to come if they kept this up. Lizzie suddenly looked at Davis, "Honey, did you say you wanted some cake?"

Davis nodded excitedly.

"Let's go then!" Lizzie said, but Davis didn't move. Lizzie saw this and asked, "Don't you want cake?"

Davis looked at Gordo and then at Lizzie and then back at Gordo, "I want to stay here."

"You can't stay there, Davis. If you want cake, you have to come with me. We have to congratulate Grandma and Granddaddy."

Just then, Gordo cleared his throat; "I can stay with him if he wants."

Lizzie knew that's why Davis wasn't moving, but she wasn't sure how she felt about leaving Davis with Gordo. It just felt weird. Lizzie finally decided to give up, "Okay, I'll bring you and…Uncle Gordo a piece of cake and I'll be right back."

Lizzie left to get some cake. Five minutes later, she found Gordo and Davis hanging out near the porch, seemingly in an engrossing conversation, "Okay," she said, and she handed them each a slice and then she turned to Gordo, "I'm sure that you would rather hang out with some people your own age," Lizzie said and then she sat down beside Davis.

"Actually, Lizzie," Gordo started, and Lizzie turned to listen, "I don't mind Davis at all. He's actually the most interesting person I've talked to all day. He was just telling me how he wants to be a cowboy when he grows up."

Lizzie glared at Gordo. She was sort of sick of putting up this friendly front with her and apparently, he wasn't just doing this to be nice to her. She then looked at Davis, "A cowboy, huh?"

Davis nodded, "Uh-huh," he said, "cowboys are cool!"

Lizzie looked at Gordo again, hoping that he would get the message that she didn't really want to deal with him right now, but he didn't move, "I think that would be really cool."

After another fifteen minutes or so of sitting there, Davis talked about how he was going to preschool next week and some of his friends, and all this other stuff. Matt came outside and announced that it was time for them to leave, Lizzie got up to say goodbye to Matt's family, and Gordo stayed where he was and didn't even try to act like he was intruding. This drove Lizzie out of her mind.

Instead of saying something about it, though, Lizzie mumbled something about finding her son and disappeared. The party was dying out and people were leaving. Gordo didn't move at all. A few people walked over and spoke to him, but he showed no sign of leaving the party.

After Lizzie checked on her sons to make sure they were okay, Lizzie hid inside the house for a few minutes. When she came back outside, Gordo was up and it looked like he was finally leaving. He didn't even bother to say goodbye to Lizzie personally when he left. After everyone had left and everyone was cleaning up, Jake told Lizzie that he was going to run over to the Digital Bean and then drop Hailey off.

When Lizzie was finally alone, she thought about the events of the day. Gordo was definitely sending her mixed signals and this irked Lizzie, even though Lizzie couldn't figure out why she was so upset about the fact that he hadn't even bothered to say goodbye.

By bedtime, Lizzie had concluded that if she and Gordo ever had a confrontation after this, she would…she would…well, she hadn't decided what she would do. Today with Davis hadn't been completely uncomfortable, but why did he choose her?