October 2021
We make it to Olivia around lunchtime, letting Owen out of the car she runs to Olivia who was waiting outside for us.
"Stop!" I shout at Owen and she does thank god. "You never ever run in parking lots you know that." I remind her as I grab her hand. I make an apologetic face to a nearby driver. We put Jack on the leash and look around the campus building where Olivia told us to meet at.
"Teetee!" Owen chirps when we finally make it to the door.
Olivia gathers her up and hugs her. "You need to stop growing! Would you like me to stunt her growth a bit?" She jokes with us
"Never," I say shaking my head.
"So miss ballerina how does it feel?" Olivia asks for the third or fourth time but the first time in person.
"Surreal," I answer her. "How is your school year going so far?"
"It's good," Olivia says and bends to scratch Jack on the head.
"It's okay that he's here?"
"Oh yeah, people have dogs all the time here," Olivia tells us as she leads us to a small area with tables next to a coffee shop and we sit down. We all get coffee while I break out some snacks for Owen to have.
Eating on the road wasn't easy for us when it came to her, so we tried to stock up before leaving for her to eat.
"I want to say it will be weird not having you around, but the past two years have sorta prepared us for this," Olivia says.
"So it has, and you know you're always welcome to visit, I know it's pretty far but it's a nice enough city," I tell her. "Of course, I'll probably end up visiting home as well so it's not like we'll never see each other."
"We'll just have to continue watching Buffy together via messenger and I'll get you to proofread my stories or help me out with research while trying to shock you," Olivia grins.
"God no, also you will never shock me. I have a baby I am not naive or shocked by much."
"Do I want to know?" Ken asks curiously.
"No, you do not," I tell him shaking my head. "Not when it comes to what she wrote anyway."
"Literary Corn?" Ken asks using the code word that some social media uses not to get taken down.
"You wish," Olivia laughs loudly.
"Wait, research. No," Ken says as it dawns on him. "That one night?" He asks and I look sheepishly at my coffee. "Oh, I see you just use me for entertainment and research for your friend?"
"Oh lighten up you had fun," I say shaking my head. "and it was once and I essentially told her wasn't exactly possible unless you are a circus contortionist."
"Mommy, can we have a baby?" Owen asks up and we all pause to look at her. "Where do you get babies like Theo?"
I look at Ken is partially stunned and Olivia who is trying not to laugh.
"I think Mommy and Daddy have their hands full with you right now," I tell her hoping it would pacify her. "Babies are a lot of work and take a lot of time."
"Not to mention mommies have to make them in the belly," Ken says trying to be helpful.
"How do they get in there?" She asks next and he realizes his mistake.
"Uhh, well," he says looking at me in a panic and I giggle. "We can talk about that later in the car?" He tells her.
"Cookie then," she looks at him and Olivia lets out a laugh.
Lunch is over all too quickly and hug Olivia tightly. We had to get back on the road if we wanted to get to the hotel early enough for dinnertime.
"You'll knock them dead, just don't kill yourself in the process," Olivia whispers as she hugs me back. We both step away and she crouches down to Owen, who hugs her without prompting. "I'll miss you kiddo, but don't worry I won't forget your birthday and I'll always talk to you when I call." She tells my daughter.
We spend another five hours on the road, stopping only twice for bathroom and coffee breaks. We check into the hotel, exhausted we order some dinner from a nearby place. I get Owen to eat before we let her go run some laps in the kiddie swimming pool despite the late hour until she is worn out and tucked into one of the beds without a fault.
I fall on the bed, as Ken eats another piece of pizza, checking his phone as he does. Jack is situated with his bed and water and food bowl.
"Do you want the last piece?" He asks me as I watch him.
"I'm good," I say shaking my head as I pull the blankets over me. I close my eyes to rest them, thinking I would get up to brush my teeth in a moment.
The alarm is blaring as I open my eyes. I'm still in yesterday's clothes and Ken's side of the bed while mused, he is not there. I roll over to find him with Ken still asleep. I shut off the alarm, grab my things and make my way to the bathroom. I brush my teeth and do all the other normal morning things before showering quickly.
They are still sleeping when I come out, I grab my phone and snap a photo of the two of them sleeping cuddled together. I bend down and kiss his forehead gently, shaking him awake gently before telling him I was going to investigate the continental breakfast.
I come back with a mini feast, after inspecting all that I could for Owen, luckily it was still early and barely anyone was up just yet.
We check out and hit the road, hoping to get to Toronto by at least 5 pm. It was an eight-hour drive, but between food and bathroom breaks for all of us including Jack, it would add on time.
When we make it to Toronto we're tired of the car. The first few hours of driving were fine, but as boredom set in both Owen and Jack got restless, and we found ourselves stopping more.
"Oh you made it," Leslie says pulling me into a hug. "A little travel weary, but that is understandable."
"Grammy!" Owen says rushing towards her grandmother for a hug and Leslie catches her and hugs her tightly as I continue to talk.
"I don't know how we will manage the next days," I say sighing. Even if Ken and I switch back and forth between driving to give each other breaks. It's still just a long day in a car.
"But you will," Leslie laughs. "Come in, come in, bags in your old room Ken, Elowen is in Persis's old room. We can have a quick dinner and then let the munchkin run about to wear off some of her energy before bed?"
"Sounds perfect," I tell her.
"Tomorrow there is a small lunch with some other family, a late thanksgiving lunch, so to speak," Leslie explains.
"Of course," I say nodding my head.
"Owen is at work, but he'll be home in an hour or so," Leslie further explains. It takes me a moment to realize that she means Ken's father. That she also calls Owen—Elowen most of the time. I suppose for the two days we are here I will get into that habit as well.
We were all busy chatting when the door opens and Elowen jumps up.
"Grandpa Gandalf!" She shrieks. "I missed you this much!" She says holding her hands out widely.
"My goodness, you have grown," Ken's Father says swinging her up into his arms. "
"I count to ten," She says proudly. "I help make charcuterie board too!"
"I think you can say that word better than your grandmother," He teases Leslie who scoffs with a shake of her head, though with a smile of course.
"She ate more cheese than placing it on the board," I tell him. "Her talking is almost triple— twofold almost overnight. It's like she decided to wake up talking in full sentences almost."
"How it usually goes," He says, eyes twinkling. "How was the drive?"
"Oh I don't think we'll be doing any more road trips for a while once we are settled," I chuckle shaking my head.
We settle down for dinner, it's simple considering tomorrow was supposed to be more elaborate. Chicken, salad, steamed vegetables and to ensure an easy dinner time I make up Owen's plate for her and we keep the salad dressing out of her hands so she can't douse on everything.
We take an evening walk around the neighbourhood and we end up in the same old ravine we had our fight in years ago, oddly enough almost to the day. This time Owen is running about us, and Jack is looking for squirrels.
It smells the same, and the memories are foggy now, they blur together and while I can pull pieces of that fight, I can still argue back to some of them. Some of them I can't anymore. We were young, and we were idiots about everything. This time his arms wrap around me and he kisses the top of my head.
"What are you doing?" Ken asks as we are cuddled in his childhood bed as I toss and turn.
"Trying to get comfortable?" I say simply before rolling over to him. "Have you ever had girls in this bed before?"
"Seriously Rilla?" Ken looks at him.
"It's just a question?" I say shrugging. "I mean it's not like I can get mad at you after having a few boys grace my bed over the years?"
"We just drove seventeen hours in two days, with a toddler Rilla." Ken gives me a look. "I know you when you're jealous, and we are not doing that tonight. These walls aren't as soundproof as one might think."
"I can be quiet." I pout a little.
"Now that is the silliest lie I have heard all day," Ken says shaking his head, but his lips are upturned.
"I'll do all the work?" I whisper teasingly.
"Rilla," he warns me slightly.
"From now on, we're gonna have a little less ritual and a little more fun around here," I say smirking
"Rilla, I love you but honestly—" he stops short. "Did you just quote Buffy?" He asks me, flipping me onto my back. I can't tell if he's impressed or disturbed.
"Actually I quoted Spike," I grin at him. "I thought you were tired?" I say raising my hips to meet the obviously growing bulge.
"I am, but clearly you know the exact buttons to push," Ken says kissing my ear and I squeak at his cold hands. "Quiet now," he reminds me of his parents down the hallway.
"The condoms," I say groaning. They are packed away somewhere I don't know if they are even with us.
"Yep," Ken says sighing after a short kiss. He rolls away from me onto his back I sigh sitting up in the bed for a moment, before rifling through his old bedside table. "You won't find them in there." He tells me.
"You sure about that?" I hold one up. "I mean it can't be that old can it?"
Ken reaches for his phone and turns on the light.
"2016," He says. "Yeah they are older than the child we already have, and I am sure that if we even attempted Karma would not be kind," Ken says throwing it back in the drawer.
"Of course," I say sighing. "Well, night then," I tell him and kiss his cheek and I flop down sighing.
"Oh of course," Ken says quietly. "stir up the temptation and then abandon it." He whispers into my ear.
"Then you best get a towel now," I say saucily and in the dark, I can hear him ponder for a moment. He gets up for a moment and rummages through a bag or two, before going to the bathroom where our toiletries were stored.
"Everything all right?" I hear someone ask Ken out from the hallway.
"Yes, just was looking for some hand cream for Rilla?" He says trying to cover apparently. Because what am I fifty? Hand cream?
"Oh I have some," I hear next.
"It's fine I got it," he says quickly and the next thing I know he's quickly shutting the door of the bedroom once and I giggle.
"Hand cream?"
"Oh yes because lubricated condoms are so much better of an answer," Ken shakes his head.
"Let's just go to bed," I tell him. "We can figure out how to defile your childhood bed another time."
"I didn't say I didn't get them," Ken says holding them up and grinning and we both laugh and giggle, maybe a bit too loudly.
"Come down to the office with me this morning," I hear Owen's deep voice as me early in the morning. Ken was upstairs with Elowen still asleep as she called out for us at god knows what hour of the night.
"But lunch?"
"We'll be back before then," He tells me simply. "But come, there are a few things I wish to show you."
"Okay?" I say still confused. "Should I dress up?" I ask him, knowing I have a work dress packed away just encase I needed something to wear.
"Whatever you planned on wearing to luncheon will be fine, we'll live at 8 and walk down to the subway," Owen tells me before leaving the kitchen once more.
I shake my head still confused, but look down at my pyjamas and gulp some coffee. I guess I needed to look presentable!
The building is familiar to me, he signs me in and leads me down to the elevators, but we don't get off on his office floor, but more of one of the cubical areas. We walk down winding hallways until we reach a door which he knocks at and goes into and I am left sitting for a moment waiting for him.
"It's you," someone says which surprises me. The other looks at me, and suddenly you can hear my voice from that day being brought up. I flinch at the sound of it.
"Why don't we, not scare her with her own videos," Owen says chuckling as he comes out of the office. "But I see you met my daughter-in-law?"
"Daughter-in-law?" Another asks.
"Rilla is dating my son, though what she has done for the Charlottetown has been by herself. You know me if I play favourites I at least want a doughnut out of it," Owen jokes. "She actually just got a spot in a ballet company out west, so they are visiting before the move."
"Ballet company have media positions?" One asks confused.
"Actually it's not for this sort of thing at all? My main dream has always been to dance in a ballet company and I somehow I did it. So I'm going to do that until someone tells me I can't anymore," I tell them blushing.
"That's amazing though! I covered the ballet here and there and I couldn't imagine doing things like that do?" I find myself blushing once more.
"Well I'm just an apprentice so I'll see how it pans out for me, but I didn't know my video got played out here?"
"Well, mostly it was after well the court one," Another one says quickly. "But the video of you being attacked by those puppies up for adoption was also epic." Another one tells me.
"Thank you?" I say looking over at Owen who was smiling but seemed to understand.
"Well, we must finish our morning," he says and I say goodbye to them and follow him up to his office, a few floors above.
"No Royce lingering around?" I find myself asking when he unlocks the door and lets me go in first. Still confused why he wanted to me here anyway.
"Lord no," Owen almost barks out a laugh. "Not before 2 pm anyway."
I watch him grow through his desk for a moment and I look over at a family photo.
"You know when Kenneth told us about you moving and dancing I had hoped it be here In Toronto," 0wen tells me.
"I'm sorry that it's not, it feels like I just take him and Owen away from you," I say frowning.
"It's not that, but it would have given us a chance to help you more," he tells me shaking his head.
"If it had been here, I have a feeling things would have been much worse with my parents." I remind him. "I'm not sure how much Ken has told you but I wasn't exactly pretty?"
"I gathered that from bits and pieces," he says nodding. "They got used to the idea though?"
"I suppose so? I mean distance helps them think about things more." I tell him. "It's been more about learning to let me make my own choices than my actual choices."
"You know I probably wouldn't admit this to many, but I will miss these sorts of places. I live and breathe to dance, but this has grown on me and I would have been happy and comfortable in this sort of career," I tell him honestly.
"You don't have to give it up," Owen tells me.
"Dance is full-time and a lot of work," I tell him. "It may not pay the greatest but it's worth it to me at least?"
"I wasn't suggesting anything of the sort, I just mean we have an online junior writer department who sort of pick and choose things off a list. You could write as much or as little as you want. If you wanted to make a few extra dollars or keep a small wedge in the door here? I can always talk to the person running that department?"
"Isn't that nepotism at its finest?"
"Possibly, but you know well enough that it's who you know and nothing more than that," Owen tells me. "Plus, I wouldn't suggest or offer you something that you were qualified for." He reminds me.
"No, you just let my daughter watch movies and documentaries about war," I tease him.
"Shucks, I guess Macbeth is off the table tonight," Owen grins knowingly.
"Oh yes and if goes well we can move on to Hamlet," I say shaking my head and playing along.
When we get back to the house there are a few new cars.
"Also, my family is a little opinionated, if anyone gives you trouble…" Owen says almost protectively.
"I'll be okay, try having my mother for a mother," I laugh.
Owen wasn't joking though as the longer the afternoon went on the more this whole thing felt like a battlefield.
"You must be Ken's girl," I hear behind me. I turn around to see one of Ken's great aunts, or was it his grandmother? I met so many of his extended family this afternoon. I was still wearing my green dress with pink flowers on it, and Owen was running around in her own sparkly concoction that Leslie had bought for her.
"I didn't think you would be this skinny, unlike my daughter you probably could fit into my wedding dress. She grew out of it when she was twelve, even Persis couldn't ever zip it up."
"Uhh, well I dance?" I say rather shocked at the comment. Once upon a time, I would have preened at such a comment, but coming from this person it almost felt offensive. Also, Persis wasn't fat, she was sturdy, but she had no issues buying clothing in Japan, so I am rather confused by the comment as well
"I am Rilla if that is what you are asking," I say, as much as I enjoy being with Ken it seems off-putting to be referred to as his girl.
"About time he did right by you. All the nonsense of not the right time, it's all in timing, I don't feel comfortable. Who cares about comfort, If you get a girl pregnant you do right by her. Glad to see he finally got some sense in himself.
"Pardon?" I find myself saying, as I don't know what to say when her voice is laced with judgment.
"You know what I mean, it's horrible how long he took. We kept telling him to marry you or something and not that friend nonsense. You don't raise children as friends," She tells me next and my eyes widen.
"If waiting for the right time is waiting so I can I grow up, then I love him more for him. I needed those years, I needed to gain some actual good coping mechanisms and deal with everything that was haunting me. I needed not to be some scared, messed teenager who hurt herself every chance she got. He did something very right by me, and not allowing himself to be pushed by some old age standards that you think are right. I was 16, I was young and scared and we both had to make choices neither of us liked or wanted but we need to, but we had to, not just for us, but for her. Because it would have never been fair to her, nor would we have lasted." I tell her, my tone biting and she stares at me before she turns on her heel with a huff as Leslie calls for lunch to begin.
I am in such a mood I mostly push and pick at the food on my plate.
Skinny. The word still has the ability to send me spiralling in many ways. Even if I had been doing so well for so long.
I sigh and take a long drink of wine.
"Don't drink it all at once," Ken whispers beside me jokingly and I smile weakly at him. I try to eat more, but every time I look down at the plate, my brain just screams at me.
"Excuse me," I say quietly as I leave the table.
I grip the counter of the bathroom, trying not to cry or overreact.
"Hey what's wrong?" Ken comes to find me a few minutes later.
"I had a run-in with Great Aunt Gladys," I tell him.
"What did she say?" Ken frowns.
"This, that…" I say quietly waving a hand and he gives me a look.
"She commented on my body, which I am sure she thought was very complimentary until she essentially called your sister and her daughter fat for not fitting into her wedding dress. Skinny, god I used to preen and kill for those comments, and now every time I look at the plate of food I just hear her, feel her watch me eat." I tell him.
"Okay," Ken says calmly. "We'll get you a new plate, or I'll say that you aren't feeling well and went to lie down for a few minutes."
"No, no I can't because then every one of those opinionated old ladies will think I'm pregnant and she already thinks you should have married me when I was sixteen. Let's not let her think that we're just two idiots who can't figure out birth control as well as being heathens for not getting married when I was pregnant like how it was the proper thing to do," I tell him rather angrily.
"Pardon?" He asks confused at the change of topic.
"She told me it was about time you did right by me, and that you should have married me when I was sixteen because it was the thing to do. Of course told her politely to essentially fuck off, that you gave me the time to heal, grow up, and for us to both figures out life. God, it would have been a tragedy, a nightmare, we would have grown to probably hate and hurt each other. But I wonder…thinking about back then, how we were when I was pregnant…if you considered it at one point?"
I watch him sigh and think for a moment, before pulling me towards himself.
"I had a lot of people from all corners telling me what to do, and what not to do. There was definitely some of the family who thought I should marry you and just be done with it. Because that is what you did in their time. For me, I just wanted to do what was right and I didn't even know what was right until it was almost too late. " He tells me, resting his chin on the top of my head, letting his body curl around mine.
"We still found our way though, with us, with what we wanted our futures to look like. It all worked out in ways we never would have expected. You are going to be dancing, and I got an email today from a museum about an interview…so I think we're going to do and be just fine."
"It is pretty surreal at times," I say quietly letting myself settle into his warmth.