May 23rd 2022

Chapter 143
Our Joy For Bonds

In a lot of ways, Maya was glad for this turn. It felt strange to think about it that way, especially with how the previous day's incident had left everyone around her behaving as though something terrible had happened and would happen again, something much worse than what had actually happened… Oh, it wasn't that she didn't worry about herself, or the baby… She did that a lot, more than she'd care to admit. But despite how her afternoon had turned out the day before, she woke up that morning and… she felt good. After Lucas got up to go and check on the girls, she lay there for a moment and contemplated…

She looked forward to today. That made it sound like she didn't look forward to going to work every day, which couldn't be further from the truth, but today… Today she'd get to stay here, get to spend time with Kacey, and Remy, and Lucy… Some days it felt like this part of their lives, which just flew right by if they didn't stop to take notice, was escaping her. Five days out of seven, she saw them when they woke up, and then again in late afternoon through evening, which by that point was mostly all about dinner, and bath and bedtime. Now the thought of getting to be with them in all that time in between… It was a gift.

That didn't mean she would forget about the day before, and no doubt no one around her would even let her forget it. For her part, she quickly recalled every part of it as she was about to climb down the stairs. It was no more of a trouble today than it had been before, at this point in her pregnancies, certainly had been harder by the end of the last one, but it was as though every step she went down, she worried that she might go and get dizzy or feel faint again, lose her step… She tried not to think about it, but it remained, until she finally reached the bottom and could walk into the kitchen to see what her younger sisters had been cooking up.

Once they'd eaten and everyone else was going to be leaving soon, Maya wished she could have had the day, just her and the triplets. She wished she could have just basked in their sweet silliness, in observing them as they went about their morning the way they would on those days when she'd be off to school. It wasn't exactly feasible at this point though, was it? Reasonably, looking after a trio of eighteen-month-olds came with enough potential frenzy even without being seven months pregnant and having to take things easy. But she knew her mother and mother-in-law were on their way and for all the love she had for each of them, she didn't look forward to what this could mean for her first day of leave. Still… she would need them.

They arrived together, and Maya could just imagine that they'd had a talk, the two of them on the ride over, and the conversation had boiled down to 'let's not overreact.' They came, and naturally they asked how she was doing, but they also kept a relatively calm tone. Did that mean she couldn't see right through to the concern rumbling underneath? Not at all. For that at least, she decided that the best way she could guarantee they would all get through this day without any issues would be for her to show them how little they had to worry about. Hopefully, that would work.

As morning advanced, Maya was left to see and think about how much the triplets were used to this, to daytime with their grandparents. Nana Katy had her series, so she'd be working a lot of the time, but then she'd also have days like this, where she could step away from her career and exist fully as the loving grandmother she was. To see her with them, Maya couldn't help but smile. It brought back memories, from when she was very little, maybe not as young as those three girls, but still… Granny Mel, on the other hand, who had no such obligations with her time, was maybe the one who spent the most days looking after her granddaughters, and it showed. She had just come alive in a whole other way from the moment Marianne had come into the world, and while the two of them were definitely still very soulmate like with one another, it did not diminish the love she had for the triplets, or the love they had for her in return.

They went and played outside with the dogs for a bit. Maya did not have to be convinced to sit and simply watch, so she was made comfortable and from there she could look on at the mess of little giggling girls, running around, intermingled with the small pack of dogs, running, and hopping around as though fed by their energy, even as the pair of grandmothers would be out there, making sure no one went and wandered off where they shouldn't go. Maya had brought along her sketchbook and pencils, knowing full well the potential of playing spectator to all this madness, so it didn't take long for her to start and sketch the scene, though she did also spend plenty of that time simply watching all of them and not the page before her eyes.

It didn't exactly slip her mind that, if not for what had happened yesterday, she would have been in school, but it did take until lunch before she realized that this all went two ways. The juniors would already have had their last period art class looked after by someone else, though she doubted they would have been told why. But then what about today? How long would it take before word started to spread, as students would be left to wonder where Mrs. Friar was? As it turned out, it didn't take very long. It might have been that they would be left to ponder all of this, all on their own, but then there were some among the student body who both knew where she lived and how to reach her by phone. The lunch period couldn't have started more than three minutes prior by the time she got the call.

"Good morning, Miss Brett," Maya smiled as she answered.

"Hi!" Stevie replied, and her voice grew quieter in the next moment, as though she'd pulled her phone from her ear to talk to one or more others standing near her. "We heard… well, we're not sure what we heard, everyone sort of has a different story about why you're not here. Some of them are kind of ridiculous."

"Well now I'm intrigued…" she laughed. "For the record, I'm alright, I just started my maternity leave a bit earlier than I'd intended to."

"I know, I ran into Gracie, she told me what happened. She's been trying to set the record straight around here."

"What about Nellie?" Maya had to ask, knowing her other sister's tendencies.

"She's… definitely getting a kick out of messing with the weirder ones."

"There it is," Maya chuckled.

"So, you are okay then," Stevie had to ask.

"Yes, I am," she reassured her. "I'm still having to figure a few things out on my end, with how fast it all happened, but I will get a message out to everyone soon."

She had a couple more calls like this, from the likes of Nika Petrelis, and Olivia Zhu… After texting her sisters about what Stevie had told her, she received a running list of 'the theories,' and they gave her a good laugh, especially as they shared some of Nellie's 'counter theories.' Beyond her catching her students up on her situation, she also got to hear of one from their side, mainly that the Olivia/Kelsey musical situation had been resolved.

From the start, they had set things out so that Olivia was holding Kelsey's spot for her while she was dealing with her mother's illness, all with the understanding that she might end up playing the role all the way to the end, depending on how things advanced. Once Mrs. Farrell had fully recovered, there had still been the question of what would happen now. Kelsey loved doing the musicals, and she would have done this one, too, but now here they were, not so far off from the end of the year, and she sort of felt bad about stepping in just like that, even as Olivia was showing that a part of her felt bad, too, about not seeing the project to the end after all she'd done.

But now they had their solution: they would both do it. There would be several performances, so they would alternate.

"I think this is going to be my favorite part," Maya whispered, as her mother and mother-in-law helped her little daughters on to the bed, there to join her for an afternoon nap. There was a bit of a pile-up to see who would get to lie down closest to her, but once they were all lying down and they saw that her arm was more than capable of wrapping over all three of them, peace soon reigned. Lucy was closest to her, nearly plastered to her, with Remy right next to her, and Kacey on the outer end… right up until Jax hopped up and lay down next to her, like a barrier in case she rolled off.

"You stay here as long as you like then," Melinda whispered back with a smile. It was easy to recognize the underlying suggestion, telling her to remain resting like this, but she didn't feel the need to point it out, so she left it alone. "I can't get over how much the twins remind me of Lucas at that age…" Melinda went on, and here Maya could easily smile and agree. They had seen those traits in Kacey and Remy for a long while already, but the more they grew, it only became more defined. They had his very eyes, and sometimes to see those staring back at her in their little faces… Meanwhile, her little bun bun girl may not have had a twin, but to observe her features, she might have been hers with how she looked.

Staring at all three of them there, drifting off to sleep under the spell of their mother's lullaby, Maya had that same thought as she'd had upon waking. She was glad to be here, glad that her leave had started, and that she would get to be at home with them for the next several months. She would get to see them through the second half of their second year, and that was pretty good. Everyone kept looking at her like they wouldn't be opposed to her spending the next two months doing as little as possible, but the way she saw it, the best 'treatment' to get her and this baby through to the end of this pregnancy was a solid dose of Kacey Angela, Remy Susannah, and Lucy Elizabeth Friar, all day, every day.

"I'm going to tell you a secret, okay?" she whispered, when the grandmothers had left the room and gone back down the stairs. "I know you're all sleeping, and you won't hear this or remember it, but I'm going to tell you anyway, okay?"

She hadn't told anyone, not even Lucas. All this time, they'd been set on not finding out what they were having this time, not until the birth, and that was still the plan… Except that when she'd been at the hospital, when they'd checked her and the baby out, they had inadvertently told her, assuming that she already knew. She'd played it off as best she could, not wanting them to feel bad about it. But now she knew, and she couldn't tell, but she wanted to, so… what better solution than these big sisters in the making? So, she told them.

"And that's not even the best part," she went on. They'd still been stuck on names, down to two options on either side. But the one who'd told her… She could see their name on their ID card… If that wasn't a sign… Now she knew just what their Tiny would be called, and it was their secret to keep.

TO BE CONTINUED


See you tomorrow! - mooners