Finding Christian's Birth Mom's Grave

Chapter 4

Detroit! Yes, I am on a plane on my way to Detroit, and I hate Detroit. Maybe after this trip, I will hate Detroit less. I have been having lots of dreams of my time with my birth mom since I decided to go to her grave. But the strange thing about these dreams is exactly that! They are dreams and not nightmares, they are all of the good times, baking cookies, playing at the park, brushing her hair, and one of us sledding down a big hill. These are some of the first dreams I have ever had of my time with her that come from happy times. It seems that Ana is right again. I guess I need to continue listening to her.

Captain Stephen's voice announcing our descent into Detroit draws me from my daydreams. Ana looks at me, her eyes questioning how I am doing. "I am fine, don't look so worried," I tell her.

"I can't help it, I feel responsible for the extremely nervous expression on your face right now. I am the person who pushed you to do this and now you are a nervous wreck. I will look at you with worry and concern because I love you. Just let me be your strength and support for once. You have been there for me so many times in our marriage," she says with determination.

"This is one of the things that I love most about you. You see inside me and know exactly how I feel in any situation. You have been able to do this since we met. It was one of the first feelings I had about you. I felt like you could see into my dark soul. I guess you could and you brought your light into my life," I confess. "I admit I am nervous, but you don't need to worry about me."

"If the roles were reversed, would you be worried about me," she asks.

"That is constant in my life. I have many reasons to worry about you. The first of which is that you have no self-preservation. I will never forget how many times you have risked your life unnecessarily since we met," I tell her.

"Christian you were in danger those times with me. And this situation is not the same as Leila and Jack. This time I set all of this in motion, and if you are upset or hurt by this trip, it is all my fault," she confesses.

"Thank you for your concern for me. But I promise I am not doing this because you wanted me to. When have I have ever done something that I did not want to do? I need control too much to find Ella's grave if I did not want to. Please know I won't be upset with you no matter how this visit turns out," I respond.

"Okay, I'll try not to worry, but I can't promise that I won't still worry a little," she says.

"I love you, Mrs. Grey," I say leaning over to kiss her. Her smile tells me she is relaxing a little about this trip.

We are now all settled into our suite in the Anthem in Detroit. Teddy is having fun exploring his new environment. Ana has relaxed now that we are in our suite and she can focus on Teddy rather than worry about me. We plan to go tomorrow morning to find Ella's grave. Part of me wants to go the section of town where I lived with her and see if I recognize anything, but then another part says that is a terrible idea. I am not sure why I am even curious about this in the most remote way. I have spent most of my life running as fast and far away from that part of my life as I could get and now I am wondering about the place we lived.

Thankfully Ana distracts me by asking, "What do you want to do for dinner tonight? We could order room service or would you rather go out?'

"It would probably be easier to order room service. I am sure Teddy would be more comfortable here. He will be able to play while we wait rather than waiting in a high chair," I say.

Teddy squeals, as if he knows exactly what we are saying. So I pick up the phone and order our dinner. Then Ana and I join Teddy on the floor and the three of us play with puzzles and read stories until our dinner arrives.

My phone rings and Taylor asks, "Sir, what time would you like for me to meet you in the lobby tomorrow morning?"

"Let's wait until about ten, this way we will not have to worry about rush hour traffic," I tell him.

"Sounds like a good plan to me. I will see you out front at ten in the morning," he confirmed our time and hangs up.

"Does that sound like a good plan to you, Ana," I asked after I finished my call with Taylor.

"That should work out wonderfully. Teddy will be ready for his morning nap and should sleep on the drive there. Hopefully, he will be cooperative when we arrive after his nap," she answers me.

"Yes, that is great," I say. Then add, "I think I am going to take a walk to release some tension. I see the look in your eyes, no worrying. I just need to get out and stretch my legs and work off some extra energy."

"I told you I would try not to worry. While you are gone I will bath Teddy and get him ready to go to bed. But he might not want to sleep very early tonight. To him, it is only four in the afternoon, but I will do my best to get him all settled. Then when you get back you can let me in on what you are thinking in that sexy head of yours," Ana says as I am preparing to head out.

"Teddy, Daddy loves you, have a good bath. I will see you in a few minutes. I love you, too," I tell Ana as I walk out of the suite.

I know she is worried, but I am not sure how to even explain all the emotions that are warring around in my mind right now. I have held onto all of the horrible parts of my time with Ella and here I am to say goodbye to her. How do I say goodbye to someone that allowed such terrible things happen to me? But how can I not say goodbye to the person that gave me life? I am thankful that I have been having some good dreams about her for the last couple of weeks. But I have had years of nightmares about my life with her, compared to a couple of weeks that doesn't to seem like many good memories. As I continue to walk another memory comes to my mind.

"Mommy, are we going to the park," I ask and Mommy shakes her head. "Where are we going if we aren't going to the park?"

"My sweet boy, I told you it is a surprise," she reminds me.

"I forget," I say to her, but I am so excited about this surprise. Mommy holds my hand as we walk up the sidewalk. I like it when Mommy holds my hand. I like it when it is just me and Mommy. We get on a bus and Mommy holds me on her lap. When we finally get off the bus, we walk some more. But when we get to the surprise, I am happy.

"Happy Birthday, Christian! Your first trip to the zoo," says Mommy with a big smile.

"Yes! I want to go see the tigers! Do they have tigers here Mommy? I hope they have tigers and lions," I tell Mommy as we walk into the zoo.

I am so glad that Mommy is happy on my birthday. The zoo is the bestest place in the whole world.

"I want to live at the zoo, Mommy. Can people live at the zoo? If people can live at the zoo, I want to live here when I grow up, okay, Mommy," I ask as we leave at the end of the day.

"You can be a zookeeper when you are big. Then you can be at the zoo whenever you want. You are my smart boy, you can be anything you want when you grow up," Mommy tells me. I jump up and down with happiness because when I grow up I am going to live at the zoo.

"This has been the bestest day ever. Thank you for taking me to the zoo for my birthday," I tell Mommy as we sit on the bus.

"You're welcome and I love you," Mommy says.

" I love you too," I say as I kiss Mommy on the cheek.

The good happy feeling lasts all the way home. But then he is there when we get home. He is mad at Mommy and is yelling at her. Mommy starts crying and yelling at him. He hits Mommy and stomps out the door.

I go to help Mommy.

I literally stop in the middle of the sidewalk and shake my head to chase away the memory. I want to focus on the positive moments of the memory. There were tigers and lions at the zoo that day. I think that was the last birthday that I spent with her. She did love me and I loved her. I need to head back to the hotel and to my family. Maybe we can take Teddy to the zoo before we leave. He is probably too young to remember it, but I will have the memory. What is it my dad said about making memories? He said to make memories with Ana and Teddy. Yes, taking Teddy to the Detroit Zoo, where my mom took me, is a good memory that I want to have alongside the memory of being there with her.

Ana's POV

Christian has been gone for a long time. I hope he is ok, why do I push him into doing these things? My Subconscious adds You can never leave well enough alone! I tell her to be quiet and try to stop worrying because that's what I told Christian. But he has been gone long enough that Teddy is asleep. He actually fell asleep easier than I thought he would. The airplane ride must have taken a lot out of him.

I run a bath in the large corner tub in our bathroom. I slide in the bubbles and hot water, ready to relax since I am alone. This doesn't happen too often, I need to take advantage of it. As I sit in the water, I think about Christian's behavior over the last couple of weeks. He seems to be on a roller coaster of emotions. But to my relief, he has not had any nightmares from his early years. He actually has had some good dreams about living with Ella. It seems that my idea of finding her has been mostly good for him. Let's just hope that tomorrow it doesn't backfire in my face. The water is not very warm now, I should get out and check on Teddy. I haven't heard anything from the monitor I brought from home. But I want to see him for myself, he isn't in his normal environment.

After looking in on Teddy, I pick up a manuscript I brought to look at for work. I will distract myself with this novel. Just as I need to take a break from work, I hear the door to our suite open.

"Perfect timing, I just finished working and need to take a break," I say with no worry in my voice, I hope.

Christian walks over to me, lifting my legs he sits on the couch with me. "You smell wonderful. Did you have a bath while I was gone," he asks while he rubs my leg.

"Yes, and it was very relaxing," I say.

"Did Teddy have any trouble falling asleep," Christian asks.

"No, I was really surprised at how quickly he went down," I confess. "The trip here must have worn him out."

"I am going to go shower and then we can talk in bed," he says as he gets up and heads to the bathroom. Then he looks back at me and says, "Unless you have a more strenuous activity you would prefer."

That man, he really has one thing on his mind when we are alone. But I need to hear from him all the things he needed to take a walk to think over in his mind. My inner goddess is very disappointed with this train of thought. I stand and head into the bedroom to hear the inner thoughts of Christian Grey.u