February 10th 2022
Chapter 41
Our Sparks For Family
Had she been holding to at least some suspicion that they'd be getting visitors from Katy's side of the family? Yes, naturally. They weren't getting the Hart-Lanes, but that was because James' grandmother lived in Portland, and they'd gone out to see her and others of his family out there. The Austin contingent of the family had decided in the end to spend their Christmas where they were, rather than to travel out, for any number of reasons, so now here they were. But then the Clutterbucket side, Katy's side, Maya's… The Olsens had been the ones she'd expected, as Charlie would of course want to see her parents and her big sister and her nieces and nephew… Maya and Lucas weren't going out there to Arkansas this year, didn't feel up to traveling with the triplets just yet, so the senior Clutterbuckets had chosen to stay, too. And that was how, unbeknownst to them, the various branches of the tree had rallied and made their way over, from as far off as Australia and a handful of cities and states, to land on this doorstep on Christmas day.
There were several minutes of what they had to call 'the good chaos.' More hugs exchanged than they could count, between the arrivals and those of their family already in the house, coats and hats and boots slowly but surely collected and stowed away… There were great new heaps of presents brought under the tree, long-traveled additions to the food spread out on the kitchen table and counters, in the refrigerator, freezer, or oven… Friar sisters tall and small were caught up in a great whirlwind of holds, and kisses, and pinched cheeks… To no surprise, Lucy was the first to tap out and have her fill, and Maya soon retrieved her and went to sit in a quiet corner with her for a while. Even Marianne, after a while, needed a minute, and she ended up playing 'super cape' with her uncle Sam, which slowly but surely refilled her energy stocks.
"When our boys were this little, you can't imagine how scared Sasha and I were that we'd get them mixed up," Betsy Young chuckled, looking from her cousin Katy's girl down to the two babies cradled in her arms. Her boys, Dax and Miles, would be turning seventeen in just a couple of months, identical twins themselves. "Didn't look like they had anything to tell them apart, not one little thing, and we looked, we did," Betsy laughed, and Maya joined her, recalling how she and Lucas – and a good part of their families – had been doing the same with Kacey and Remy for a while after they were born. "We left their hospital bracelets on about as long as we reasonably could."
Once she'd bounced back thanks to her uncle, Marianne spent a good part of the afternoon with her great grandfather's sister. Georgia Clutterbucket, good Aunt Georgie out of Australia, hardly ever got to see everyone out here, as she only traveled out maybe once every other year. As far as the Friars were concerned, they'd seen her three times before today, and two of those times had been out in Australia, once when they'd gone out there on vacation for nearly a week, in the summer before Marianne turned two, and the other time when Marianne was still in Maya's belly, the summer of the tour with Ree. Oh, but Georgie and her husband Toph were no strangers to the now four-year-old, oh, no. She talked to them on video calls on a relatively regular basis. The old couple would take great pleasure in bringing the small girl along on various outings around their city, showing it to her. Lucas would joke that the two of them should have their own educational/travel show, and Maya would reply that she wouldn't put it past them to try.
"Nana!"
"Tori!" Maya replied to the call, emulating her granddaughter's tone. The two-year-old giggled. "You got up here all by yourself, huh?" Maya asked, and the girl nodded.
She'd been away from the gathering for a little while, the better to check on the triplets' diapers, and feed them, and settle them down for a good nap away from… most of the noise. There was just a constant rumble of voices and music from below, enough that she was considering setting the girls up on the second floor for their nap. They were all about set to go now, actually, as she'd finished with Lucy and was now simply holding her, seeing no reason to put her down, or to leave Kacey or Remy for that matter.
"Do you want to lie down a while, too?" Maya quietly asked her granddaughter, brushing a fringe of raven hair from her face. "Might be a good idea." Tori shook her head, though she did come up closer, gripping on to the rocking chair's arm and resting her head against her grandmother's hand. She whispered Lucy's name, again and again, and Maya smiled. "You sure?" she asked, adjusting her hold on her daughter so she might reach out one arm and stroke the toddler's back.
"Want Papa," Tori declared, and Maya blinked.
"You want your papa?" she asked.
"Auntie Nika," Tori added. She moved over to get a look at Kacey and Remy, asleep in the former's crib. Maya considered her options before finally letting out a breath. She stood and settled Lucy down with her sisters before taking hold of her granddaughter and bringing her to sit in her lap. She absently started rocking her along as she held her, and whether Tori believed she needed a nap or not, she hit peak sleepy-cuddle mode very quick.
"I'll see what I can do, okay?" Maya asked her, and Tori nodded. Not a minute went by before she was sound asleep. Maya pressed a light but sustained kiss to her forehead.
Sweet baby girl… She'd been in their lives for most of her own, they'd watched her grow, and even if Maya could not have foreseen herself becoming her grandmother in the end, there had never been any part of her that felt like 'I'm barely in my thirties, how can I possibly?' No. Ella was her daughter, and Tori was her daughter, and so she was her granddaughter. And she would always want to do what was best for her. Ultimately, it would have to be Ella's choice, but she couldn't pretend as though she hadn't heard. Here they all were, downstairs, her family and Lucas' family, from near and far, brought together on this merry day. And Tori may have been small, but she was big enough to look around and contemplate the fact that there were people missing, people she was getting to care about a whole lot.
After managing to pull her phone from her pocket, Maya sent out a text to Ella, summoning her up the stairs. When she arrived and spotted her daughter, it was clear that she'd been looking for her. Maya relayed how she'd come along and found her here. And she told her about what she'd said, what she'd expressed to her grandmother. Ella looked down to her sleeping daughter, looked so deeply as though she was resisting the urge to cry.
"Hey… hey, hey, come here," Maya reached out her hand, and Ella came up to her, crouched and knelt by the rocking chair, almost in the same spot where her daughter had stood not long ago, which afforded her the same comforting arm brought around her shoulders. "I know you're scared," Maya quietly told her. "But this is a good thing, isn't it? It's what you hoped for. You wanted Tori to have her father in her life if she could. She's got enough love for the both of you in her heart, letting Theo in won't… push you out."
"I-I know," Ella sniffed, brushing tears from her eyes. "It's just… It's a lot…" she admitted. "And the Munroes just got here, and…" she drifted off again, and Maya found her hand to squeeze. Ella lifted her head again, her eyes so like the sea on any day now even more so for the tears. Talk to me, Maya's own eyes begged, and Ella stared to the side for a moment. "It's so stupid, things have just… They've been weird, lately, I don't know. Ever since school started this year, and I've been trying to figure things out, with Theo, with Nika and her whole… It's complicated, yeah, but what choice do I have, I can't just ignore it, so it takes up time, and then… Whenever I bring them up, things get all…"
"Awkward?" Maya asked, after silence threatened to drift in. Did she need to point out that Taylor Munroe had been falling in love with her for over two years and that she could see just why Theo's reappearance would throw his brain in disarray no matter how good of a friend he'd been to her all along? Probably not. Still… "Tell me something," she started after a beat. "I know you've said that what you feel for Theo now has nothing to do with romance, that you just want to be friends again," she stated, and uneasy as she was, here was a certainty she could hold on to, so Ella nodded. "What about him? Where does he stand, do you know?"
"He's in the same place," Ella replied, with a confident nod. What she and Theo had, it was in the past, for both of them.
"Maybe it would help if you introduced him to your friends," Maya suggested, rather than to suggest outright that Taylor might come around if he saw for himself that Ella and Theo were nothing more than friends who shared a child anymore.
When Tori woke from her brief nap, she was carried back down the stairs by her grandmother, not aware in the slightest of the conversation or its result. Her timing did however line up with the arrival of two new and unplanned guests. It was easy to see that neither of them had anything that could qualify as their 'holiday best,' but they'd gone as close as they could. Their clothes played no part in the uncertain looks on their faces, but then those disappeared as soon as they were spotted by the one who'd wanted them. Tori was set on her feet only once she could be allowed to zoom off toward them without colliding into anyone, but oh, was she ever giddy to find her papa had appeared. He picked her up and she wished him a merry Christmas. To look at him and his sister, Maya would guess this might have been the merriest Christmas either one of them had had in a couple of years. It made her as sad not to have invited them outright as she was glad that they'd come along.
Tori had been very keen on imitating her Auntie Annie for a while, and here she took a page out of her book by moving right along, after having found her father and his sister. She took the siblings by the hand, one on either side, and took them out to meet people. The very first people she brought them to, because they mattered so very much to her, were her mother's best friends. If the goal was to put Theo and Taylor face to face, they got there so fast as to leave both boys just on this side of whiplash. But here were all these people that she loved dearly, people she wasn't shy around, and having them all in the same place made her smile so much…
From a distance, where they both stood in the living room, Maya and Lucas witnessed the scene, their daughter's friends shaking hands with the infamous Theo Petrelis. There was no telling yet what would come of the meeting, but if they had their Christmas miracle, it would be this: peace among Ella's circle.
TO BE CONTINUED
See you tomorrow! - mooners
