A/N: I still don't own Miracle. Thanks to everyone who reviewed!
Darkdestiny2000: Yeah, I feel sorry for them too. I'm glad you loved that chapter; it took me forever to write.
CapriceAnn Hedican-Kocur: Yeah, I know exactly what and when the perfect moment will be and I'm not telling anyone what's going to happen. But you guys can guess…
Icesk8er: You'll see what's coming when I post this. It's getting interesting, if I do say so myself. (I love your story.)
Meadow567: Hey, take your time with the site. I'm patient. I'm glad you liked the chapter.
Prettypinkcheer5: I'm so glad you liked it. I'll try to update more frequently now that I'm out of school.
Jack's POVThe Thursday after New Year's, 1980, I walked into Ellie's apartment. Heidi had been running a temperature for the past few days, so Ellie hadn't been at practice that day. I found Ellie sitting on the couch reading a book. "How was practice?" she asked without looking up.
"How'd you know it was me?" I asked.
"Natalie and Jennie are in the kitchen doing their homework and you're the only other person who has a key to the apartment," she said. "Well, actually, it's Rob's key but you borrow it all the time."
I sat down next to her and kissed her cheek. "I love you."
"I love you, too," she replied. "Now back to my original question, how was practice?"
"Not so good," I said slowly, thinking of how to tell her what had happened. "Coach has his final twenty now."
"Whom did he cut?" she asked. I think she knew already because I'm pretty sure Herb tells her things like this ahead of time, but she wanted me to tell her. That girl has taken way too many psychology classes.
"Coxie," I told her. "I'm glad it's not Rizzo, but I still wish that Herb didn't have to cut anyone."
"And I'm sure Herb wishes the same thing," she said softly. "Cutting Coxie couldn't have been easy for you. But I'm just glad he didn't cut you."
I hugged her and ran my fingers through her dark brown hair. "So am I. This whole experience has been a dream come true for me. I'm going to represent my country in the Olympics and I met the girl of my dreams."
"When's dinner?" one of Ellie's sisters yelled from the kitchen. "We're hungry."
"We should feed them," Ellie said. "But I don't want to move."
"I could order pizza," I suggested.
"That'd be great. Go ask the girls what they want and the phone is in the kitchen." She smiled at me. "Thanks honey."
I went into the kitchen where Jennie and Natalie were doing homework. "Jack, did you ever take algebra?" Natalie asked.
"Yeah, why?"
"Do you know how to do this problem?" she asked, shoving her book at me. "It's number seventeen."
I looked at the book. "Yeah, just a minute, I need to order pizza and then I'll help you."
"What kind of pizza are you getting?" Jennie asked.
"What do you want?"
"Pepperoni," Natalie said.
"I want cheese," Jennie said.
"I'll order one pepperoni and two cheese," I told them. After I ordered the pizza, I went back to Natalie's math book. "Did you do anything like this in class?" I asked her.
She shrugged. "I don't know. I wasn't paying attention today."
"Okay, you're supposed to factor the equation and solve for x," I told her.
"But how?" she asked.
"Watch and learn," I told her and began writing.
2x²-6x+60
"First you have to set the equation equal to zero."
She nodded. "Then what do you do?"
"Then you factor it," I said.
"But how?"
"Watch me," I told her.
(2x-3)(x-2)0
"Then you set both parts of the equation equal to zero."
(2x-3)0 and (x-2)0
3 3 +2 +2
2x3 and x2
"So x equals two and 2x equals three?" she asked.
"Divide both sides of two x equals three by two," I told her.
"So, x equals two or two-thirds?"
I nodded. "Exactly."
"Where'd you learn to do that?" Natalie asked.
"If I weren't playing hockey, I'd be a stock broker," I told her. "So I studied a lot of math in college."
"Do you know how to do derivatives?" Jennie asked.
"Yep, are you studying those?"
"Nope, but some of my friends are and they were talking about them today when I was by Charlie's locker."
"So when do we get to meet Charlie?" I asked her.
She shrugged. "I told you on Christmas. I'm worried that you and Rob might scare him."
"Why would we scare him? We told you we'd behave ourselves."
"I know, but he's kind of nervous about meeting you because you're a hockey player. Plus, Ellie has such a good relationship with you that I'm afraid you two might intimidate him."
I laughed. "If you bring him over here sometime, Ellie and I will behave ourselves. We won't be scary or anything."
"Can I invite him over for pizza now?"
"Go ask your sister; she's in charge." I loved doing that, forcing Ellie to make all the important decisions. After all, it was her apartment and they were her sisters. If we were married and had children of our own, I would have to help make decisions, but for now, I could shove the decision-making off on Ellie.
Jennie came back into the room a few minutes later. "Ellie wants to know what time the pizza will be here," she said.
"In about twenty or thirty minutes," I told her.
"Okay," she said. Then she turned around and ran out of the room again.
She came back again a few minutes later. "Ellie says I can invite Charlie over for dinner as long as I introduce him to Rob and Emily sometime very soon."
"The phone's by the refrigerator," was my reply.
"Okay," she bubbled.
Ellie's POVCharlie and the pizza arrived at about the same time. Charlie was short, about my height, with curly brown hair, blue eyes, and thick glasses. The pizza came in cardboard boxes, was nice and warm, and smelled delicious. Based on first impressions, I liked the pizza better, but then I was hungry and I already had a boyfriend.
"Jennie, Charlie's here!" I yelled after I let him in.
She ran in squealing, "Charlie!"
He smiled and hugged her. "Jennie, how are you?"
"I'm good," she said. "How are you?"
"I'm okay," he told her. "Homework's been keeping me pretty busy though."
"I'm sorry," she replied.
I smiled and shook my head as Jack came in. He shrugged and wrapped his arm around me. I cleared my throat and my sister jumped.
"Oh, Charlie, this is my sister, Ellie; Ellie, this is Charlie," Jennie said quickly.
I shook his hand. "It's nice to meet you, Charlie. We've heard a lot about you."
Jennie blushed as Charlie said, "It's nice to meet you, too, Miss McClanahan."
Miss McClanahan, that was one I rarely heard. Even when I was teaching ballet, ice skating, or piano most of my students called me Ellie. "Call me Ellie; Miss McClanahan makes me feel old."
"Umm, okay, Miss McClanahan," he said. This boy was not going to get it.
"Charlie, this is Ellie's boyfriend, Jack O'Callahan. Jack, this is Charlie Fabian," Jennie said.
Charlie shook Jack's hand tentatively; he seemed a little scared of Jack, who was at least six or seven inches taller than him. "It's nice to meet you, Charlie," Jack said.
"Nice to meet you too, sir," Charlie said in a shaky voice.
Just then, Heidi started crying. "I'll get her," Jack said.
I looked up at him. "Really?"
"It's time I took some responsibility for her," he said. "I am the closest thing she has to a father after all." Then he went to bedroom to get the baby.
"That's the first time he's ever done that," I said softly, more to myself than anything. Jennie and Charlie didn't seem to notice that I'd said anything and I took the pizza into the kitchen.
I was setting the table when Jack walked into the kitchen carrying Heidi on his hip. "Heidi, tell Mommy what I did. Tell her how I changed your diaper and you were good," he said. "Tell Mommy what a good job Daddy did taking care of you."
Daddy, the word rang in my ears. He was calling himself her daddy. I smiled and kissed his cheek. "Thank you so much for everything, Heidi, the pizza, helping the girls, just everything," I choked out. I was going to cry over something as simple as Jack calling himself Heidi's daddy.
He gave me a one-armed hug. "I love you and Heidi. We're a family; that's what families do. They take care of each other."
"I know, but you're being so good to Heidi and me."
"I love you," he said. "That's why I do this."
"I love you too," I told him.
Dinner was an interesting meal. Charlie wolfed down three pieces of pizza all while watching Jack out of the corner of his eye. "So, Charlie, how long have you known Jennie?" I asked.
"Well, we've gone to school together forever, but we just started dating about a month ago," Charlie answered nervously.
"What's your family like?" Jack asked.
Charlie almost jumped at the sound of Jack's voice. Then he said, "I live with my parents and my older brothers are in college. Geoff is eighteen and Jonathan is twenty. Am I going to have to meet Jennie's older brother someday?"
"Yeah, Rob really wants to meet you," Natalie said. "He likes to meet all our boyfriends. Well, he met Jack before Ellie did and he met Jannie before she did. She had to introduce him to Todd and I can't remember which one of them met Peter first."
"Ellie dated someone named Jannie?" Charlie asked.
"Steven Janaszak," I said. "He was the goalie for U of M and now he's the backup goalie for the Olympic team."
"Oh, okay." Then he went back to shoving pizza down his throat. For a short, skinny kid, he sure ate a lot. He must have a fast metabolism or something.
After dinner, Charlie took Jennie and Natalie home. Normally, Dad picked them up, but Charlie called him to tell him that he wanted to take the girls home. Dad agreed only because he wanted to meet Charlie.
Jack, Heidi, and I had the apartment to ourselves. "What do you want to do now?" Jack asked me after the kids left.
"I don't know. I was thinking we could wash the dishes," I told him.
"You're no fun," he whined.
"All right, I'll wash the dishes and you can play with Heidi."
"I guess I can do that," he consented.
Jack was sitting on the floor playing with Heidi while I washed the dishes. "I have a question I've been wanting to ask you."
"What's up?"
"When you were younger did anyone ever call you anything besides Ellie?"
"Umm, my parents called me Elizabeth when I was born."
"Did they ever call you anything other else? Anything like Liz or Beth?"
"Not really, Rob started calling me Ellie when we were like two and it just stuck," I said. "I tried being Beth for a while in sixth grade, but I'd been Ellie for so long that nothing else really worked for me."
"Nothing else really seems to fit you," he said. "You're just Ellie."
"Thank you, I think," I replied.
"It's a compliment," he told me.
"Then thank you."
He smiled. "You're very welcome."
Later that evening, we were sitting on the couch when Jack asked me another question. "Do you want to have children?"
"I have Heidi already," I said.
"Besides Heidi though, do you want any more children?"
"Yeah."
"How many more?"
"Probably like three or four more, how many do you want?"
He shrugged. "I always thought like four kids, maybe five."
"Does that include Heidi?" I asked.
Jack smiled and nodded. I kissed him; I couldn't resist that.
Jack's POVAs January progressed, practices became more and more intense. Ellie and Doc constantly had their hands full with sore players. I was always exhausted, so Ellie and I spent most of our time together watching movies or just talking. Some days I barely had the strength to hold Heidi I was so sore.
I kept asking Ellie questions about marriage and family; I was looking for information. I was planning to ask her to marry me sometime in the next few weeks, probably during the Olympics.
One night, about a week before we were to play the Soviets at Madison Square Gardens, I was laying the couch watching Heidi sleep on my chest when I asked Ellie what I considered to be a very important question. "If you could have named Heidi, what would you have named her?"
"You mean instead of Heidi Louise?" she asked me.
"Yep."
She shrugged. "I've never thought about that."
"Okay, what do you want to name your next daughter?"
"Not after my mother," she replied hesitantly.
"Okay, so Miranda is out, but what's in?"
She limply shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know. I have this theory that when I see my babies, I'll know what to name them."
I smiled at her. "I hope so. Otherwise, you're going to have some nameless kids."
"I'll think of something to name them," she told me.
"Heidi, where are you going?" Ellie asked our sixteen-year-old daughter as she headed out the door.
"I'm just going to the mall with Cora and Becky," she said. "And don't worry, Dad, we didn't invite any boys."
"What time will you be home?" I asked. Ellie and I were in the kitchen of our suburban Chicago home.
"By midnight," Heidi said.
"Try again, young lady," I told her. "You might want to shoot for ten-thirty, eleven at the latest."
"But Daddy, it's a Friday night," she protested.
"And you're sixteen," Ellie replied. "We're your parents and we've decided that your curfew is eleven."
"Mom, I can drive now!"
"You drive a car that your father and I bought for you. We gave it to you, we pay the insurance, we can take it away from you when we see fit. Heidi, I don't want to get all totalitarian dictator with you, but if we have to, we will."
"You two are so retarded!" Heidi yelled. "Cora's dad is letting her stay out until midnight!"
"We're not Cora's parents; we're your parents," I replied.
"Actually, you're not," she retorted. "You two just adopted me and raised me because my biological parents were losers. How do you know they aren't normal people now? They might have changed. You two sure haven't; you seem to think this is still the fifties."
Ellie sighed and I knew she was going to tell Heidi about Ron and Julie. "Heidi, I have to tell you something you're not going to like. Ron died in a car accident about five years ago."
"Well, there's still Julie," Heidi retorted.
"No, she's been in and out of prison for drug use, child abuse, and theft for the past sixteen years," Ellie said. "You have three half-siblings all of whom have been in foster care for years. The option of living with Julie is simply not available."
"She was sentenced to twenty years in prison about a year ago," I told my daughter.
Heidi's eyes went from my face to my wife's face and back again. "Are you two being honest?"
We both nodded. "Fine," she moaned. "I'll be home by eleven."
"You'd better be," Ellie said as Heidi headed for the door. "The mall closes at nine."
"Oh Mom," Heidi sighed and Ellie laughed.
Later that evening, Ellie and I had to get our younger children to bed. Thirteen-year-old Stephen was good about helping get the younger three to bed. Our youngest, seven-year-old Anna, always put up a fight. "I'm not going to bed" was her rallying cry.
Nine-year-old Mary was good about going to bed unless Heidi wasn't home. Then she put up a fight for hours.
Eleven-year-old David conflicted with us on bedtimes but usually, he gave up the fight pretty quickly.
Ellie was pregnant again; that was definitely a surprise. It was like we woke up one morning and boom, she was pregnant. She had wondered how that could happen when it had been seven years since Anna was born. I reminded her that she was only thirty-eight and still capable of getting pregnant for another ten years or so. She was due in February and things in the O'Callahan house were getting pretty miserable, especially when Heidi wasn't home. When Heidi was home, Mary and Anna went to bed much more easily. I don't know why. Maybe it's because they knew she wouldn't be waking them up at some ungodly hour when she got home from wherever she had gone.
Ellie had already gone upstairs when Heidi got home. "Where's Mom?" she asked the minute she came in the door.
"She's due in six weeks. Where do you think she is?" I said without looking up from the paper.
"In bed, sound asleep like she's been since she put the little girls to bed," Heidi said with a smile.
I nodded. "She's been like that with every pregnancy. It was the worst with David and Stephen."
"I remember," she said, sitting down next to me. "When she was pregnant with David, all she did was sleep."
And eat, I thought, and complain about how fat she was. I loved her though. I didn't know what I was supposed to say to Heidi's comment so I just kept reading the paper.
"I'm sorry for what I said to you and Mom earlier," Heidi said. "I never really ever wanted to go live with Ron or Julie. I just said that because I was mad at you and Mom. You're the only parents I've ever wanted."
I nodded. "I forgive you."
"Thanks," she said, hugging me.
"But you're really going to have to talk to your mother," I told her. "And apologize to her. She isn't someone to be toyed with like that. You have to realize how badly Julie hurt her when she left you with her and ran off to get high."
"All right, I'll talk to her in the morning," Heidi said reluctantly. "Dad, did you ever meet Ron or Julie?"
"I met Ron once about ten years ago. He was in Chicago for a business meeting and he stopped by for dinner to meet you."
"How come I don't remember this?"
"Your Aunt Emily had just had Katrina and so you were with your mom in St. Paul visiting the baby."
"Didn't he ever try to meet me again?" Heidi asked. "I am his daughter, after all."
"I told him that you were in St. Paul with your mother and your brothers, but you'd be back on Friday, or whatever day you were coming home. He said okay and I never heard from him again."
She nodded. "Do you think he really cared about me?"
"I hope so," I told her. "But I don't know."
Heidi kissed my cheek. "You're the best dad a girl could wish for."
I woke up just then because Rizzo was shaking me. "Come on, Jack, we're leaving for New York in six hours."
"But I don't want to get up," I moaned.
"You can sit next to Ellie for the whole plane ride," Rizzo offered.
"Fine, just let me sleep. Go bother Gabby or something."
"Get out of bed and then I'll go see Gabby." Rizzo had been dating Gabby Pierce for almost five months now and he had fallen head over heels for her. She wasn't coming to the game at Madison Square Garden because she couldn't get the time off from work.
I climbed out of bed. "Now will you leave me alone?"
"Sure," my insane roommate replied and left the room.
A few minutes later, Bah walked into the room. "Can I hide in here?"
"Why?" I asked him.
"Nina's in my room saying good-bye to Johnson and it's getting a little uncomfortable."
"Make yourself at home," I told him. Whenever Johnson was with his girlfriend, Nina Marshall, things got a little iffy. "Is Nessa coming to see you off?"
"Yeah, probably." Vanessa Taylor and Bah were perfectly suited to each other. She was everything he wasn't, talkative, rambunctious, and not monosyllabic.
"Why wouldn't she come to see you off?" I asked him.
He shrugged. "No clue. She loves me."
I smiled. "Did she tell you that?"
"Last night when I took her out to dinner."
"Well then, congratulations," I said, clapping him on the back. "That's great."
"Thanks. When are you going to ask Ellie to marry you?" he asked me. "You've had the ring for ages now."
"Bah, I just bought the ring last weekend," I said. "I asked her father's permission but I think I'm going to ask Mac too."
"You're going to ask Mac and Ellie to marry you? Is that legal?"
I was starting to understand why they called this guy "Bah"; he's about as stupid as a sheep. "No, Bah, I'm not going to ask Mac and Ellie to marry me, and doing that would be illegal. I'm going to ask both Mr. McClanahan and Mac to give me their permission and blessing to ask Ellie to marry me."
"Are you serious? You're really serious about this girl," Bah exclaimed.
"Yes, I'm serious about her. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to take a shower and get dressed."
"Hey, don't let me stand in your way."
"Thanks."
After I was all "cleaned up" as Ellie would say, I went to Mac's room and knocked on his door. "Who is it?" he yelled.
"OC," I replied.
"Come in," he replied.
"Hey," I said walking into the room. Mac was the only one there; he was packing his stuff. We wouldn't be coming back to St. Paul after MSG. We were going straight to the Games. Whoa, we were leaving St. Paul for good today; well, this was the last time I'd live here, most likely.
"What's up?" he asked.
"I need to ask you something."
"Sure, go ahead."
"I'm planning on asking Ellie to marry me after the Games are over," I said slowly. "And I wanted your permission before I did it. I met your dad for dinner on Sunday night and he gave me his blessing, but I want your blessing too. You're her twin brother and you two are closer to each other than any siblings I've ever met before."
"You're going to ask my twin to marry you?" Mac asked me. "And you want my permission?"
I nodded. "If you'll give it."
"Will I give you my permission?" he asked exuberantly. "Not only that, I'll give you my blessing. Congratulations, man; welcome to the family."
"You're serious?"
"Dude, my sister is in love with you. If you want to ask her to marry you, God bless you both and give you two a long, happy marriage together. And may God help you and protect you from my sister's wrath."
"Thank you so much."
Mac shrugged. "Hey, my twin sister is in love with you. What else could I do? Welcome to the family. And get my sister the heck away from my mother."
All I could do was smile.
A/N: Okay, so that was a long one. Please review! He's not going to propose to her for a while.