August 9th 2022

Chapter 221
Our Magic in Numbers

It was never the same, year to year. Sometimes it would be family on Christmas Eve, friends on Christmas Day, sometimes it'd be the other round, and sometimes it would be a bit of both. This year, as far as the Friars were concerned, it was family on the Eve… and on the Day, at least so far as their immediate families. Today, they also had a few branches of the extended families dropping in, some at lunch, others at dinner… Both Maya and Lucas were finding that they enjoyed being in the role of hosts just a bit more than guests, a fact that sometimes made them laugh as they wondered how they'd ended up there. For Lucas, well, the question generally started and ended with Melinda Friar, but for Maya, maybe it was a matter of contrasting where she'd come from with where she'd ended up. It had little to nothing to do with the complexities of travelling with five small children.

The day had been going great, hectic but not in any way to the point where they couldn't function efficiently. Morning had been all about preparations, and getting everyone dressed, and then there were their first guests coming along, either giving gifts that were openly presented as coming from them or passed on as mysteriously early gifts that Santa had accidentally left at the wrong house… Either way, it led to a storm of torn wrapping paper and ribbons. The bows started to stack up on the triplets' heads, as Marianne had first taken one and placed it on Kacey's headband, and Remy and Lucy had immediately wanted the same done with their bows.

As was to be expected, the new baby coming was a big point of conversation. They knew by now the whole story from the previous year, of how Maya had accidentally found out that they were having a girl and kept it from Lucas until Mackenzie was born, because they'd been trying to be surprised. What was the plan this time around? Truth be told, they hadn't decided yet. Whether they found out the day the baby was born or weeks before, it wouldn't change much of anything, would it? They would be just as happy. But then…

This was the first time Marianne actually realized that they could find out about this before, that it was a choice that they had. And she knew that when her mother would have this baby she wouldn't get to be right there, but… could she be there for the other thing?

"You want to come to my doctor's appointment?" Maya asked, and her daughter nodded. She looked to Lucas, as the notion spawned an idea, the same one, in both their minds. What if they all got to find out together, the two of them and all their girls together? They'd have to try and make it so that Ella was able to come, maybe get her in via video call if she couldn't make it down from Houston, but… They presented this idea to Marianne, and she was instantly giddy. Yes, she wanted that very much. They would have to make sure she wasn't in school at the time, but that could be arranged… Oh, they liked this plan.

The afternoon was a lot of family chatter here and there, and running and playing, assembling a newly received present for the girls… Some guests left, with other houses to visit before the day was through, and new guests arrived after they'd been elsewhere earlier. Dinner was right around the corner, and Maya was on the case for this one. She'd been offered assistance from many a hand both big and small, but she'd graciously thanked them and asked them to leave the kitchen. This was her show today… Well, hers and Mackenzie's. Her little Macaroni was being clingy today and seemed to be satisfied in no other arms than her mother's. Maya couldn't always be holding her, as she was working on dinner, but so long as she was nearby, where the baby could see and hear her, she was satisfied.

"You know, I think we're about done here," Maya breathed when she could finally go and pick her daughter back up into her arms. She laughed at the way the eight-month-old – eight months to the day – wiggled around with excitement as she found herself held by her mother again. "You're such a funny girl, huh? Funny little Macaroni…" she kissed her squishy little cheek, ending with a 'mwah!'

"Wah!" Mackenzie seemed to try and imitate her, which left her mother chuckling even as she felt buzzing in her pocket.

"Hello," Maya quickly pressed the phone between her ear and shoulder, the better to resettle the baby in her arms. There was no response. "Hello?" she tried again. She could just barely hear something… breath up close, maybe voices, too, but very faint and far. She was about to pull the phone back to look at the number when the caller finally spoke.

"Can't… Can't be here…"

She did take the phone back in her hand now, but only out of concern.

"Jenny? Is that you? What's going on?" she asked. Mackenzie in her arms was oblivious to the situation and tried to grab for her phone, which left Maya in the strange position of having to distract her daughter in some manner of cheerfulness while remaining completely on task with her student.

"I did something bad… It's going to be worse now… I'm so stupid…" the girl went on talking, and Maya could hear two things. Jenny was crying, and she was also slurring her words in such a way that her teacher knew… She was drunk.

"Jenny, how much did you…"

"You should hear the things they were saying to me, the things… the things they were telling my mom and dad, like I wasn't right there hearing them…" Jenny went on, oblivious. "I couldn't… I wanted to just… I don't know… B-but now we're going to eat, I… I have to go up there again, and they're gonna know, Mrs. Friar… They're gonna know a-and they're going to be all over us again…" Her crying seemed at once to get louder and quieter, which Maya guessed to mean that she'd tried to muffle it. "I don't know what to do…" she mumbled now.

Maya took a breath, closed her eyes… She wished that she could pass some sort of support directly across the line, but it was impossible, so she was going to have to come up with an alternative.

"Jenny, listen to me. Are you listening?"

"Uh huh," the girl replied. This was not the jolly drunk she'd encountered at Halloween a little over a year ago. This one was in crisis. Whether this second incident counted as a pattern or not, of her student and alcohol consumption, it was not important at this instant.

"Just hold on for a couple of minutes, okay? If it all works out, you'll hear a doorbell soon…"

Knowing how they would sometimes be out of Texas over the holidays, Maya was immensely relieved to know that, at this moment, a few doors away from the Marshalls' house, the Zhu family was gathered and about to have Christmas Eve dinner, just as their neighbors were, just as the Friars were, and among their guests was Nadine. Maya called her old friend, teammate, and bandmate, and she explained the situation as succinctly as she could before asking for her assistance. She barely had to say anything, and Nadine was on board. Even as they were talking, she knew the great Dr. Zhu was getting her jacket on and heading out of her parents' home, marching up the street toward the Marshalls' door, and ringing their bell. When Mr. Marshall would come to find her there, she would play what boiled down to the 'can I borrow a cup of sugar' maneuver, the better to get a moment with the man and talk to him in earnest without drawing his guests' attention.

Maya was still on the line with both calls, Jenny on her cell and Nadine on the home phone now that she'd set Mackenzie down. She could hear the one vaguely reacting to the new presence she had heard arrive upstairs, while the other was having a hushed conversation with her mailman. It was just as well that Jenny couldn't hear what was going on outside the basement, or she might have panicked at the idea that Olivia's older sister was telling her father that she was hiding in the basement and drunk. To Maya though, knowing the man enough by now to understand where his head and his heart would be, she knew it would be the right call, the thing to lead him into action… and did it ever.

In what would easily be a dynamics altering move in the Marshalls' extended family, first Andrew, and then Laura Marshall with him, laid into those of their guests who had been verbally attacking their daughter. They had tried to keep the peace before, to ask them kindly to be better with her, but after everything they had watched Jenny go through in the months preceding and following her transition, this incident had finally made them realize that this was not a peace worth keeping if it was going to hurt their child. They did not give those guests the chance to storm out indignantly: they told them to leave, that they were no longer welcome until they apologized to Jenny, and even then, only if she agreed to forgive them.

When this was over, as Nadine would later recount, there were only Mrs. Marshall's brother and sister-in-law and their two kids left around a table set for fourteen people. Half their dinner party had left in a huff, while Mrs. Marshall hurried down the basement stairs to go find Jenny. Maya heard the woman arrive, on her cell, Jenny's worried voice stalled by her mother's reassuring one as she apologized for her ending up down there like this. She told her that it was safe to come up again, that she wasn't in any trouble, and they were going to have a far better Christmas Eve now that the others had gone. Maya felt like she really would, and she breathed out in relief.

Jenny's mother took the phone so she could speak to her daughter's teacher a moment, thanking her for the assist. They wished one another a Merry Christmas and hung up. This was followed up with getting back to Nadine as she was now returning to her parents' for her own dinner. They would see each other the next day. Maya thanked her for her part in this intervention, and Nadine insisted she'd been happy to do it. She knew how family could cut deep like no one else when it came to who you were.

With both calls now ended, Maya breathed deep, let it out, both hands finding their way to her growing belly, for a double dose of centering, of comfort.

"Hey…" Lucas came into the kitchen, his neck and shoulders overrun with small girls as he held all three of the triplets, all of them noticing precious little else other than the fact that they were all up there and it was fun. Their father, on the other hand, could see the aftermath of… whatever had been happening, there on his wife's face. "Everything okay?"

"Might be, now," Maya nodded before giving him a vague hand signal she hoped he would understand to mean 'I'll explain later, nothing to worry about at the moment.' "I wish I could still do that," she stated as a smile returned to her face, approaching him, and looking to the girls as they twisted about to see her and reach for her. There were three small hands tapping at her face and head, and she welcomed each one. "Are you hungry?" she asked them, and they heartily nodded. "Good. Dinner is ready."

TO BE CONTINUED


See you tomorrow! - mooners