I'm back! Sorry for the sudden and unexpected break last week but there was just too much going on between work and personal life.
Make sure you visit the DeGrassi Saviors site and my page for the daily clue and the full writing schedule. June and July calendars are up and August will go up after One Shot Week in July.
The calendar will be changing a little in August, things are so busy now that posting every day is just too much and it's leading to a lot of skipped chapters. So I will no longer be posting weekly one shots, I will be doing one shot weeks every two months instead of three and a one shot month. All together it will be roughly the same amount, if not more, of one shots posted while still giving me a day without posting. One Shot Month is Monday, September 5th – Sunday, October 2nd this year.
*ART stand for antiretroviral
Ch. 33 It Ain't a Question of 'If', Just a Matter of Time
(SPINNER)
"Bye see you Monday," Clare calls as she comes out of her room and I come running out of my bedroom to see her in the hallway, she's holding Fitz's hand and a bag in her other hand.
"Hold it, where are you going for the next two days?" I inquire. As usual we have people at the house, Adam and Maya are in his room. Drew's at work but Bianca is in their room. Owen and Johnny are here, watching TV in the living room but they wouldn't stop her from going anywhere anyway, well not when she's with Fitz. Paige is here too, in the kitchen starting on dinner.
"Staying at Fitz's place for the weekend, there are less people there. Actually since Emma and Sean are staying at Jay's tonight there's no one there," Clare replies.
"Be safe," I tell them.
"I'll take care of her," Fitz assures me.
"Yeah I know you will. You'll be back Monday after school?"
"Yes big brother," she replies with a slightly annoyed tone to her voice.
"I'll see you Monday," I relent.
Clare smiles and kisses my cheek, then she and Fitz leave. I follow them to the living room, Owen and Johnny simply wave as my sister leaves with Fitz. I go into the kitchen and find Paige stirring a sauce, I walk over putting my arms around her from behind and kissing her neck.
"Hi," she giggles.
"I think we should go out to dinner," I tell her.
"What about everyone else?" Paige questions.
"I'm pretty sure they can figure out how to feed themselves," I reply taking the spoon from her hand and turning off the burner.
Paige turns around and gives me a tender kiss, "Give me a few minutes to change."
I move my arm so she can get to the bedroom. I turn off the other burner and then leave the kitchen.
"I'm taking Paige to dinner you all can figure out dinner for yourselves," I announce to the house.
"HAVE FUN," they all reply almost synchronized.
Paige and I change into some clothes nicer than jeans and t-shirts and then we leave for dinner. I had no plans and made no reservations but it's the middle of November and it's been snowing so I'm not too worried. I take us to one of our favorite restaurants and we only have to wait ten minutes for a table.
"Have I told you," I comment reaching across the table and taking her hand, "that you look exceptionally beautiful tonight?"
"Thank you," she smiles, "but I'm just wearing a sweater and black jeans."
"And you look amazing, although with your beauty you could wear anything and still look incredible," I reply and she giggles as the waiter comes over.
We order and eat while talking mostly about our jobs. After dinner we get in my car and I drive us to an overlook with a view of the city lights and the snowfall. I'd get out of the car but it's freezing outside so I take her hand and look into the eyes of the woman I love.
"Do you know how much I love you, how very deeply I fall in love with you each and every day. How much I admire you. You've grown from a headstrong confident girl to a strong, independent, mature woman. You can not only handle me but my siblings and you've always been great with them and they all look up to you. You are the only woman I have ever been in love with and I know I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Paige will you marry me?"
"Yes," she grins wide and captures my lips. Her hand grips the back of my neck and we stay locked in the kiss for several minutes before I break it. I only pull away a couple of inches to lock eyes with her again.
"I don't want to take anything from Emma and Sean but I want to get married now, not tonight but soon. Maybe next month around Christmas? At the house in front of our friends and family, because all our friends are family. I lost my mom when I was young and my father a year and a half ago. We lost Zig and I've thought I was going to lose Clare more than once in the last few months. Now Jay's faced with this life altering disease. Life is too short to wait for anything and I know we already live together but I want you to be my wife."
"And I would be honored to be your wife. A small wedding at the house with our family and friends sounds perfect," she smiles and our lips join again.
We continue kissing for a long time, so long the windows have fogged up. We finally break from the kiss for need of air. We're both smiling and I roll the windows down a little to let some air into the car.
"Should we go share the news? Sean and Emma are at Jay's place right now and I think Jay could use some good news after yesterday," I comment.
"Yeah he could, I think most of us could. Let's go see Emma, Jay and Sean and then we'll go to the house and tell everyone there. If we're really doing this next month, even keeping it small we have some planning to do," Paige remarks as I start driving to Jay's place. I park out front, get out putting my arm around Paige and we knock on the door.
"Hey guys," Sean smiles as he steps aside to let us in.
"I'm still alive and I'm doing fine you two didn't have to come check up on me," Jay comments.
"We didn't come to check up on you, we know Sean and Emma are taking care of you. We came to give you some good news, we're getting married," Paige grins.
"Next month at the house, life is too short to wait," I inform them.
"Emma will you be my maid of honor?"
"Of course," Emma smiles hugging Paige.
"I was going to have my brothers be my best men," I comment.
"I'm sure Clare will be happy to be a maid of honor as well," Paige smiles.
"That's great news congratulations you two," Jay smiles hugging us both.
Sean says congrats and we stay a few minutes talking with them before we leave. We go home to find everyone still there and now Drew is home.
"How was dinner?" Adam questions. It looks like they finished the pasta Paige was making and ordered pizza.
"It was great and we're getting married," I reply.
"It's about damn time you two got engaged," Owen replies.
"Yeah we've been expecting this for months," Adam comments.
"I want you two to be my best men," I tell my brothers.
"Well duh," Drew replies.
"Good 'cause we're getting married next month, around Christmas."
"We'll do it here at the house, a small ceremony with everyone but there's still a lot to plan," Paige says.
"I can help plan, I love weddings," Maya grins.
"Yeah me too and I'm sure Clare and Emma will help, probably Jenna too," Bianca remarks.
"We'll probably need everyone's help. Right now we're going to go celebrate," I grin licentiously and pick Paige up into my arms taking her back to our room.
(JAY)
"I don't see how this is going to help," I grumble as Sean and I get out of his car and walk toward the church. We're not here for church we're here for an AIDS/HIV support group. Yesterday morning Sean and Emma came with me to the doctor, a specialist in the field, so that we know what my options are and everything I need to be doing. We were there for two hours and there was a lot of information. I've already begun taking ART drugs, they gave me a combo that's in one pill so I don't have to take a dozen pills a day. The doctor also said I'd probably start feeling side effects in the next couple of days. We also called Tony yesterday, we told him about my diagnosis and I'm on medical leave until after Christmas. It will give me time to adjust to this new way of life, to adjust to the medicines and any of the side effects from them, or new ones if the medications need to be changed.
"We're here because no one else can even begin to guess what you're going through but everyone here is in some stage of the disease. They are the only ones that will understand what you're feeling and thinking. They've been through what you're going through, they can tell you what worked for them and what didn't. You know we're all here for you but we can't even begin to imagine what you're going through or feeling but they will."
"If I just feel more depressed because I'm in a room of dying people I'm never coming back," I tell him as we walk into the church. It's Sunday afternoon and you can see that the service ended not too long ago.
"Fair enough," Sean nods. We find the sign for the support group which is held in a back room of the church.
"Welcome I'm Dennis," a man says when we enter the room, "please have a seat in the circle."
"Oh I'm just here for support," Sean tells him.
"Good we welcome friends and family, you can join us in the circle or sit to the side if you prefer," Dennis replies.
I look at Sean silently telling him that he'd better sit with me. We sit down in the circle of chairs, there's about twenty chairs and they all fill up, they even move in more chairs when more people come. I'm not sure if it's comforting to me or incredibly frightening that there are so many people here that either have HIV or AIDS or are here to support someone with it.
"Welcome everyone, we have a new face here tonight, actually two of them," Dennis comments looking at us when everyone is seated.
"Uh I'm Jason but everyone calls me Jay. This is my best friend Sean he's here for support. I was just diagnosed a few days ago."
"I bet you felt like you'd walked into a brick wall and the floor suddenly fell out from under you, while at the same time someone had reached into your chest and stopped your heart," comments one guy.
"Yeah that's exactly how I felt," I nod.
"I didn't want to live anymore. I didn't want to get sick and frail," remarks a woman in her twenties.
"I felt that too, after the anger that's all I could think. I would take control and take my own life, I bought the gun and was about to pull the trigger when Sean and my other best friend Spinner found me and stopped me."
"I took pills, an entire bottle. I wasn't only HIV positive I was pregnant," a woman speaks up. She looks like she's in her late thirties, she seems sad when she talks about it but she was smiling when we came in here. "My parents found me and called 911, I lost the baby which was probably for the best, but I lived. I found hope, I met a wonderful man and fell in love. We've been together fifteen years now, we got married and we've adopted two children. He's known since our first date and he fell in love with me anyway. We learned all we could about safe sex and not spreading the disease to him or our children. I have a life now, a good one. As hopeless as I know you feel right now you can find hope again."
"It doesn't feel like it, all I know is I have these pills to take and I have to change my life," I comment sinking down in my chair.
"I was diagnosed three months ago and I still feel like it's hopeless. One of the worst things has been side effects from the medications. I've changed the medication grouping twice now," a woman says.
The support group continues for over an hour, most of the people that were more recently diagnosed talk about how hopeless or terrible they feel, which is what I feel. Most of the people that have been living with the disease for a long time talk about how they have a life now and there is hope.
"So do you feel better or worse?" Sean asks me when we're back in the car.
"I'm not really sure actually. It was kind of nice to hear that people have been living with this for a long time and they have a life, fallen in love, gotten married and all that. But most of them took several years to get to that place. It was also helpful yet depressing to hear from the people in roughly the same stage I am. I know they went through what I am but all the side effects from the drugs and the depression and hopeless feelings stick around for a while. So I don't know it was helpful yet depressing but I guess I'll go back next week."
"Good," Sean smiles, "you want to go to the Mason's?"
"Yeah sure, it's Sunday so I'm sure anyone not working is there and that will probably cheer me up, being with people I love."
(CLARE)
"You think Spin and Paige will really be able to pull off a wedding in a month?" Fitz asks.
"I think," I reply flipping him to his back, "that you shouldn't talk about my brother when we're making love."
"Sorry," Fitz laughs.
"If you're not in the mood I can do someone else," I comment.
Fitz growls and reaches up flipping us so that he's on top once more. He lightly pins my wrists above my head and gently kisses my neck. He thrusts slowly and rhythmically at first, it's almost teasing the way he does it and all the while he kisses my neck and jaw. When my hips begin bucking and grinding he picks up his pace. With every thrust he goes a little faster and a little harder until we both explode in rapturous orgasm. He slows down, thrusting a few more times before pulling out and taking off the condom before he lies next to me. I turn on my side and put my head on his chest, Fitz puts his arm around me while I begin slowly dragging my finger over his chest.
"I think we should make this official," Fitz says almost in a whisper after a moment.
"Making love or lying naked together?"
"No," Fitz replies tickling my side and forcing a shriek from my lips, "I meant us. We should be official. Girlfriend and boyfriend, we should be official."
"What exactly would that change? We're already making love and you've been sleeping at my house and in my bed for a long time. And I've been sleeping in yours since your mom left. We already go on dates and all that stuff so other than labeling you as my boyfriend what would it change?"
"You would officially be my girlfriend so you wouldn't be dating anyone else."
"You're not asking me to be your girlfriend just so I can't go out with Jeff are you?"
"Do you want to go out with Jeff?"
"That wasn't an answer that was another question, which usually means you're trying to hide something."
"I'm asking you because I want you to be my girlfriend, I don't want you to be Jeff's girlfriend but not in a possessive way. If you want to date Jeff I wouldn't stop you, I'd even be happy for you if that's what you wanted but I think you know how I feel, how I've felt for a long time and I'd like us to be official."
"Other than the fact that I shouldn't date or have sex with anyone else I'm still not sure what it would change."
"Well that's kind of the point, it wouldn't change all that much because it's already like we're dating we just aren't official. No one is going to be surprised by it, not even Jeff. And I'm not asking you to choose either, you can still talk to Jeff even see him when he's here. But you'd be my girlfriend so no kissing or having sex with Jeff, if you want to be with him then tell me."
I'm silent for a moment as I slowly drag my finger over his chest in little swirls, "I honestly have no idea what I want. But I know I like being with you and you always make me feel good. So yes I'll be girlfriend."
I smile and look up at Fitz and our lips join together in a kiss. We stay locked in the kiss for several minutes before pulling apart to sleep. I fall asleep in my boyfriend's arms and on his chest. We wake up to the alarms on our phones Monday morning and get ready for school. Fitz drives us to school but first we stop at The Dot for breakfast and to see my brother.
"I'm hungry, also Fitz and I are dating," I inform Spin when we enter the café.
"I thought you were already dating," Spin comments while he starts making us coffee.
"Now she's officially my girlfriend, we made it official last night," Fitz explains.
"Okay, so what are you eating?" Spin questions.
Fitz and I order and he pays, of course Spin puts in his discount, and we sit down. Spin brings us the food and we eat before going to school.
"You know I'm going to call Jeff this afternoon to tell him we're official," I comment when we're walking into school.
"I figured you would tell him and I expect that you'll still talk to him," Fitz replies.
"Hey how was your weekend alone in the love shack?" Owen teases putting his arms around our shoulders.
"Our weekend was great and we're official now," Fitz replies.
"Official what?" Owen questions taking his arms from our shoulders and walking next to us.
"Boyfriend and girlfriend," I reply.
"Oh cool, so did you pin her or something?"
"Dude shut up," Fitz responds.
We're at their lockers so we stop and they open their lockers. We tell everyone else that we're official and everyone as about the same reaction. No one is surprised and almost everyone thought we were already official. Everyone but Drew who tells Fitz he better keep me safe and out of trouble. Nothing much happens at school, since football season is over Drew, Owen and K.C. all come home after school. The guys start looking for snacks and the girls get comfortable in the living room. I go into my room to call Jeff and tell him about me and Fitz.
"Hey."
"Hi, how have you been?" I ask him.
"I've been good. How are you?" He questions.
"I'm good, Spinner and Paige are getting married which is good news but Jay is sick which is not good news."
"Sorry to hear that is he okay?"
"No he's not but that's not why I called. Fitz asked me to be his girlfriend last night and I said yes so we're official now."
"Yeah I kind of a had a feeling that was coming," Jeff replies with a tone I can't quite place.
"Are you upset?"
"Well I'm not thrilled but I knew you and Fitz were a thing and he's been out of juvie a while now. So does this mean we can't talk anymore?"
"We can talk of course and hang out but no more of the other stuff."
"Yeah of course. Well I probably won't be back in Toronto until Christmas anyway, busy training for hockey season."
"Yeah Owen's been doing that too. Well I should go, I have homework and everyone will be here for dinner. We're all eating here to have dinner with Jay."
"Sounds like it's serious with Jay. So I'll talk to you soon?"
"Yeah call you soon," I reply and hang up. I set down the phone and go out to the living room to see what there is to eat.
"So how'd he take it?" Fitz asks.
"He took it fine, not sure he was happy but he said he knew it was coming and he'd be out at Christmas," I reply just as Spinner gets home.
"Don't ruin your appetites we're having a big dinner tonight and I need to get started," Spin warns us.
"Spin there's no way I can ruin my appetite," Drew replies with a mouth full of sandwich.
Spin shakes his head and goes into the kitchen and Paige gets home a short time later and she helps Spin make dinner. The rest of us do homework until Spin asks the boys to get out the folding table and chairs from the garage and set them up for dinner. I haven't seen Jay since his diagnosis expect for going to his house to yell at him for trying to commit suicide. I know he had a support group yesterday, went to the doctor with Sean and Emma on Saturday and today Lucas was with him all day.
(LUCAS)
"Mmmm that was my alarm I have to get up and get to school," Mia groans when her alarm goes off Monday morning.
"I'd keep you in bed and tell you to ditch if I weren't spending the day with Jay," I reply caressing her arm. Since we started dating a month ago she's been sleeping at my place the last couple of weekends.
"No I need to go to school and you definitely need to be with Jay. I hope he's okay, I can't imagine what he's feeling or going through," Mia says before kissing my chest and getting out of bed and my arms.
"Yeah me either it's pretty devastating. You're still coming to the dinner tonight right?" I question getting out of bed.
"Yes I'll be there; it was really nice of Spinner to invite me. Your friends have been really welcoming."
"Yeah they're like family. I'll pick you up just at five, dinner isn't until six but we should get there a little early," I tell her before stealing her lips for a kiss.
I go into the washroom to get ready and when I come out Mia goes into the washroom. I drop her at school and remind her that I'll text her when I'm on the way to pick her up. She kisses me goodbye before getting out of the car and I drive to Jay's, parking and knocking the front door.
"You know it's not necessary for one of you to be on Jay watch all the time," Jay comments as he opens the door.
"Dude you tried to kill yourself yes it is," I comment as I go in. Since Spin and Sean stopped him on Friday Sean and Emma were at Jay's place all weekend. Sean had to go back to work today but I'm off tonight and I said I'd stay with him.
"I know but it was a snap decision and I promised to tell someone if I was feeling that way again."
"Yeah and if you try to kill yourself again Clare will kill you," I remind him.
"And I never want to be on that girl's bad side, I think she's scarier than her brothers when she's angry."
"Yeah no kidding. So how was your support group?" I ask following him into the kitchen where he's making breakfast.
"It was okay I guess, it was sort of depressing and uplifting at the same time. I don't know if it helped or made things worse to hear about what I'll be going through. But it was good to hear from the people that had been living with it a long time and were living a decently normal life, married with kids and everything. At the same time it took a lot of years for them to get to that place and basically what I heard was the next few years are going to suck. Enough about me how are things with Mia?" Jay inquires.
"Amazing, awesomely amazing, wonderfully amazing."
"So terribly then," Jay jokes.
"I've never felt this way about anyone, Mia is incredible. I'm already in love and I'm going to marry that girl. When I'm with her I'm extremely happy and when I'm not with her I'm thinking about her."
"You've got it bad," Jay laughs.
I help him finish making breakfast and we eat. We spend all day in his apartment, mostly watching movies and talking but I also help him look into some alternate treatments his doctor recommended. I make sure he eats, takes his pills and stays in good spirits. We leave before five and stop to pick up Mia before heading to the Mason's house.
"Hey how you feeling?" Owen asks Jay when we walk in. They have the tables set up and are putting out the chairs.
"Not really sure but I'm not going to kill myself," Jay replies. A few more people ask how he's feeling and everyone hugs him.
"Fitz and Clare became official today," Adam says when we sit down to eat.
"Last night actually," Fitz corrects him.
"So what were you two before?" Jay inquires.
"Unofficial I guess," Clare shrugs.
"I think it's sweet, you two are cute together," Mia grins.
"I'm just happy she's dating one guy and it's someone we know well," Spinner replies and Clare shoots him a look.
"So how are the wedding plans coming?" Mia asks Paige.
"It's amazing how much there is to plan even with having the wedding at the house. We started making a list. We need to get food and a cake, I need a dress. Spin and the guys will rent tux's and I'm not getting an expensive wedding dress but I'd still like a wedding dress plus I'd like to have Emma and Clare in semi-matching bridesmaid's dresses. We need to get an officiator and file for a marriage license, make sure we have enough chairs and figure out how to get married at the house in December with the snow but have enough room to eat and dance and have the ceremony."
"Hey we're all here to help," I remind them.
"Yeah and we're going to need it. We also need rings, flowers and decorations so it looks better than our living room," Spinner comments.
"You should break the list into sections and give everyone a duty. You can have final say but then you won't be stressing about everything," Mia suggests.
"That's a terrific idea," Paige grins.
We eat and hang out at the Mason's for a couple of hours before everyone goes home. I'm sleeping at Jay's tonight and Spinner is going to stay with Jay tomorrow. We say goodnight to everyone and go out to my car and I take Mia home first. I park and tell Jay I'm going to walk Mia to her door.
"Tonight was fun, I really like being with you and your friends," Mia smiles.
"And they all like being with you, but no one likes spending time with you as much as I do. I'll call you tomorrow, you could come over after class and hang out."
"Goodnight Lucas," she smiles putting her hand on my shoulder and our lips collide in a passionate kiss.
Mia breaks from the kiss and I have a huge grin on my lips. I get back in my car and look at Jay as I start the car.
"I'm going to marry that girl."
The update next Saturday will probably jump ahead to Paige and Spinner's wedding and Christmas.