~Chapter 29~
Danny looked up at his mother with a blank expression. He got the question, but the answer just wouldn't come to him. He honestly didn't know what he wanted to do. The baby was his...for now. Two three-year-olds... It was tough work, and Danny was only home with them after school and on weekends. Sam got the hard stuff. And right now it wasn't just the baby concerning him. Because he couldn't be there all the time, Sam was stuck taking care of them.
Well...not stuck, exactly, that wasn't really the right word. She liked taking care of them.
"Mom..." he said at last, drawing her attention. "Can we go somewhere private?"
His mother looked at him in confusion. "Sweetie, we're in the living room and Jazz isn't-"
"No," he interrupted. "No, I mean just you and me; just the two of us. Not Sam, not Dad, not Jazz...just us."
Her son promptly stood up and walked toward the stairs down to the lab. Maddie followed, still unsure of what exactly her son needed to talk to her about that hadn't already been put out on the table.
Meanwhile, the goth had to face Jack, who was so very eager to know what his wife meant by 'not biologically Danny's'.
"I can explain!" she quickly said, before a third person had time to yell at her.
"I think you should..." Jack muttered. "I mean, my son...! Does he know about this?"
Oh, great... Just great... Here we went with the screeching and the yelling and the shouting...etc... And for at least an hour she would have to listen to false assumptions and what could easily be considered insults. And for an hour, Sam would have to wait...and wait...and wait some more for him to calm down long enough for her to speak. Just one chance, one break was all she needed.
"Sam!" he yelled.
It was only one word in the sentence she had tuned out, but it reached the core of her conscience at ate away at it. Why was it so hard to give someone the benefit of the doubt? She didn't do anything aside from taking a wrong turn! And it wasn't like she knew she was going to be raped! Thankfully he would be the last one she would have to deal with in this family. Except now she was pregnant again, this time with Danny's baby, and her family would have to kn- ...You know what? No. Her family didn't deserve to know. They were worse than Paulina! And she wanted nothing more to do with them, despite the part that had been telling her for years now to explain what actually happened as opposed to what they thought had happened. Even then they might now believe her though. Danny's family didn't even let her explain. She always had to take the chance, the one small opening in the breaks of their ranting to explain herself.
She suddenly noticed the brief silence and- Oh...it was over...
Nevertheless, she said, "I was pounced."
Jack almost seemed to shut down for a moment. His mouth kept going but he didn't seem to actually be focusing on any of the words he was saying. All that came out was a bunch of empty, meaningless, absent sentences. After a few minutes he finally stopped talking and looked at her.
"What?" he said.
Honestly she didn't expect him to hear her, or acknowledge her words if he did hear her.
She repeated, "I was pounced."
Looking away for a moment, he asked, "What do you mean by that?"
She sighed and put a hand over her stomach, knowing there would be a bulge there eventually. "I mean some random man attacked me three years ago when I was walking home. I took a secluded path and, to put it in a nutshell, got pregnant with the twins."
"What do you mean 'attacked'?"
Because obviously that wasn't very clear. "I don't want to spell it out. Sorry if that seems rude but it's not an easy topic for me."
"Did they ever find him?" Jack asked.
This was a little surprising to her. No one else had asked anything about the man, only if she was okay and the crap that everyone asked even though the answer should be so obvious.
"Um...no, I don't think they did," she replied.
"Do you know him?"
She shook her head.
"Do you remember what he looked like?"
Again, she shook her head. "No. Danny found me in a bad storm and brought me here. He said I was unconscious when he found me and later on he told me I lost my memory of what he looked like because the man knocked me out. I don't have a clue."
"Hey, Sam!" Danny called out as he was coming back into the living room. He quick rushed to her side and whispered in her ear, "Don't worry, I'm saving you from my dad." He then chuckled. "I don't know what you guys were talking about, but it looks like he needs to calm down." He grew a little louder, this time audible to his father. "I think we should go out for a bit."
He winked to his girlfriend.
She quickly nodded. "Yeah, I think we should." Anything to save her from this horrible conversation. She'd already explained it to two members of Danny's family, she most certainly didn't need a third. Although she knew Jack would ask her when they got back from who-knows-where. Usually they went for a walk or spent time together in the park. They did something of that sort-
She was jerked from her thoughts by Danny's hand pulling her forward and out the door.
He finally seemed to get more serious than he had in the house. "Hey, are you okay? And you told my mom? Does she know...you know...about everything? And what about my dad, were you just talking about it with him? Does he know? Oh, and my sister... Do they all know?"
She nodded. "Yes, they all know. Your dad was actually the last one to find out."
"How did they all react?"
He gently held her hand as they began to walk toward the park.
She sighed. "In short, I was called a slut about a billion-"
He stopped and grabbed her shoulders. "THEY WHAT?!"
She took his hands off her. His eyes were furious; they weren't the normal baby blue. Now they were an electric girly green...without the 'girly' part.
"Calm down," she said. "What did you expect them to think? It's not like anyone will just guess everything on the spot and be right about it."
"But they-!"
"Had a normal reaction," she interrupted. "They cut me off as soon as I told them they weren't born to you and started ranting on about how I slept with someone else and was using you. I managed to find breaks, though, and took that as a chance to explain myself. After that everyone stopped assuming I was some trashy girl who would sleep around with any boy who came my way."
"Well..." He kissed her forehead, his eyes returning to their original color. "I don't know why they would think that about you. You're too adorable to be anything like that."
"Says Baby Blue." She sighed heavily. "Danny, I'm not cute. My entire upper torso is covered in scars. I mean, you saw them, you know what I look like."
He smiled. "So you haven't seen your face yet? Funny, I thought you would've by now. Sam, I told you before, I don't care about your scars. So what if you have them? That was three years ago. Look at you now, you're all better and you're so much happier than you used to be. You're fun to be around, yes you're cute as a button, and I love every part of you."
She stayed silent the rest of the walk to the park.
"And you know that, right?" Danny asked once they were there. "That I love you?"
She used a nearby swing as her seat and rattled the swing beside her, beckoning him to sit down with her.
"Of course I do," she answered.
He eased into it and slowly rocked himself. "And I would never hurt you."
"I know."
He fiddled with his thumbs for awhile before saying, "I made you something. I sort of...well, didn't do a very good job... I think you might like it though. Hopefully you will; I did my best."
He dug into his pocket and fished out a folded up piece of paper. Opening it, he scanned through it a couple of times and nodded to himself. He then folded it back up and handed it to her. "Yeah, definitely not good, but not bad either. Read all of it, okay? It has as much depth as I can possibly write down."
She took it and unfolded it. Amazingly, it was a poem...her favorite form of writing. And it was long, which was saying something since that meant it wasn't the typical Valentine's Day poem, that whole 'roses are red' thing. The most important thing was that Danny wrote it, and that meant more than the length of a poem.
It was cheesy, corny, sappy...but completely original.
I want you to know,
There's a girl that I love,
Who always wears black,
But I call her my dove.
My dove is wonderful,
She is truly outstanding,
And I really want to be,
What she should be demanding.
She's told me I'm shy,
And that's probably true,
But nevertheless,
Our love really grew.
She calls me clueless,
There's a reason for that,
Since I couldn't tell,
She was all I looked at.
Once I learned,
She's all I can see,
I couldn't stop staring.
She's the only one for me.
It's her that I love,
It's her I adore,
She is the one,
That my heart beats for.
And I love her all the more,
Through every trouble we face,
And through every problem,
Since this is the case.
She's been by my side,
Along for the ride,
And on the tour of life,
She's been my guide.
It's me and her,
From here on in,
And she'll be with me,
Through thick and through thin.
And through it all,
She's made me believe,
In what she's sure,
That I can achieve.
She's the only one,
Who will love each half,
And will praise each part,
And smile and laugh,
As she bares her heart,
To my open soul,
And makes me complete.
She makes two halves whole.
She pulls me up,
When life takes its toll,
And helps me to reach,
My ultimate goal.
And I'll help her up,
Every time that she falls,
And when she needs me,
I'll answer her calls.
There's a girl that I love,
And her name is Sam,
But she won't admit,
That she's my little lamb.
I want her to know,
That I'll treat her well,
That I'll do anything,
To make her heart swell.
I want to be someone,
That she should deserve,
But it took me three years,
Just to work up the nerve.
I may be half dead,
But she is my life,
So I hope I can ask her,
If she'll be my wife.
Sam clapped a hand over her mouth and stared at the last line for the longest of times, rereading it over and over to make sure she'd read it right.
It was impossible, right? Was this the wrong poem? She highly doubted it...he'd looked it over before giving it to her. Was he actually proposing? That couldn't be right, this was Danny! It would've taken him a hundred years to do this! And the wedding... Was he ready for one? Was...was this even real? No, couldn't be. Felt like it. Looked like it. It was real...but how? No way, this had to be some sort of trick or...or a dream! Or something! It wasn't like she was Cinderella being asked to the royal ball without the use of her fairy godmother. Sure, she had her prince, but you'd think it was too soon for him.
Key phrase...'for him'. For her, even last year would've been good. But she knew for a fact that if this was the truth of reality and he was proposing right here, right now, he would wait like ten years before being prepared for a wedding. For a brief moment she asked herself if Danny even knew that marriage came after engagement. The answer was obvious but this was Danny. A proposal at eighteen didn't seem like something he would do.
Yet here he was.
She finally stopped staring at the last line and moved her eyes from the paper to look at the swing beside her. It was empty. Her eyes automatically lowered.
And there was Danny.
He was down on one knee looking as absolutely nervous and scared as one could get. One of his hands held a small black box with a velvet covering. The other held onto the lid. She couldn't help but notice how visibly he was shaking. Inside the little box was a band of silver with a diamond in the center. Sam knew the rest of the ring was hidden beneath the padding that thickly lined the bottom of the box.
"Sam, will you marry me?"
Tears formed on the rims of her eyes and she smiled. It was real...! He was proposing...! Now the question was, was he delirious on flower pollen again or was he sane? Well, actually, a side effect of the pollen poisoning was a chameleon-eyed look, where both his eyes would point in opposite directions. He was looking straight at her, waiting for an answer. His eyes were normal.
Her smile widened and she slid out of the swing seat to put her arms around him.
He let out a small breath but then paused.
"Um... I-I need a solid yes or no..." he mumbled.
She laughed and kissed his cheek. "Yes."
The rest of that breath came out as a sigh of relief. And not the little kind of 'whew!' relief; no, it was the big kind of 'OH THANK GOD!' relief.
She said yes, because she loved him and knew he would be the perfect husband for her. He was already a perfect-and overprotective-father for the twins.
He stood up and offered her his hand. She took it, pulled herself up, and watched as he slid the ring on her left ring finger.
Now it was official.
A/N
*squeals like a crazy obsessed phangirl* YAY! It's not the longest chapter, nor is it the most detailed chapter, but... Yeah...okay...I apologize for how long it took, it's just...I really, REALLY suck at poetry, okay? This was extremely hard to do even with four other authors and my Fundamentals of Literature teacher helping me (I hope you now realize that I used the last A/N's request for a "poem assignment" to throw you off).
We all need to give a special hand to the following people:
Alisi Thorndyke
Sandrastar
ChristinCC
sammansonrepilica
Mrs. J (my Fundamentals of Literature teacher)
So thanks, you guys. I bet you found your contributions in there. :P And I did hold to my promise about getting it all in order.
Everyone, I'm sorry but I can't do review replies, review quota, or even 3,000 words for this chapter. See, I have seizures. Right now I have a HORRIBLE headache and I think I might've had another one. :( I'm sorry, you guys...