Chapter 83
Friar & Sons

When Lucas had found the number for Maya the morning after she'd asked for it, neither of them had expected for there to be an appointment so soon after. But when she'd spoken to the woman, explaining who she was and finding herself recognized as Melinda Friar's daughter-in-law, she'd been told in no time that there was an opening, just two days later. Would that work for her?

She'd asked Lucas. He'd only have finished his last final exam the day before, but more importantly it would be his birthday. Was she really about to go out there on his birthday? If she'd just answered right away, she would probably have pushed it off, even if she might have had to wait a few weeks. But she'd asked, and there really was no choice, of course she had to go sooner than later. She was scared of how it would go, that much was clear, but then so was her commitment to following through.

After having started out not wanting to tell anyone, least of all the grandparents, she had called her mother, told her where she needed to go and asked if she could drive her there. Katy had agreed at once, telling her she would follow her lead, whether she wanted her to stick around or not. And then, she'd called his mother, and told her how she was seeing Dr. Eisley and wanted to know what she was like. Melinda had told her she would get along with her very well, she was sure of it. After she'd hung up, Maya looked borderline terrified of what she'd just done, but Lucas was so proud of her, and he'd held her without a word.

The last few nights had not been a breeze just for the decision. They continued to be much as they'd been, with pockets of sleep and repeatedly waking. One of those nights, when Noah had awakened ahead of his feeding and started to cry, Lucas had woken up to find Maya wasn't there next to him, but then she walked into the room, approaching the crib and picking up the baby before sitting with him on the bed. Lucas went and checked on Elliott, finding he went on sleeping, before returning and sitting at his desk, absently leafing through his notes while Maya finished with Noah. When she'd put him back in his crib, already back to sleep, she'd moved back into the hall.

"Where are you going?" Lucas had asked. When she'd stopped and looked at him, he wondered if she'd been aware of him at all since she'd come into the room. She paused, just realigning herself for a moment.

"I… I couldn't sleep, and I didn't want to wake anyone if I just…" she explained, her voice barely there, pointing back in the hall.

"What were you, just… sitting in the stairs or…" Lucas went up to her, and she nodded. "Hey… come on, come here," he led her back to the bed. She hardly resisted as he got her to lie down again. He held her, rubbing at her back, his lips pressing kisses to her forehead, holding them there. She just lay there, her arms gathered to herself, and she almost felt like a child. When she went to sleep, he figured her body had just relented at last.

Now, this morning, she'd showered and dressed and readied herself to be picked up by her mother. Only when she'd stopped and asked him how she looked did she stop and blink, realizing…

"It's your birthday…" she breathed, her eyes welling in apologies, like she'd forgotten, and he went and kissed her, let her pull back from that feeling and remember she had nothing to apologize for. "Happy birthday," she told him as they looked to one another, giving a weak but very meaningful smile.

"It is that, yes. Thank you," he smiled back. He was twenty-four years old today. He could imagine what guys his age would be doing on their birthdays, and maybe they'd look to his and be glad they didn't have this life, but him… He was right where he belonged, and happily so.

"Maybe I could bring Noah with me… I'm sure she wouldn't mind, and it'd be one less…" Maya wondered aloud as she held him, waiting for her mother to arrive.

"We'll be okay," Lucas promised. "I mean, spending my birthday with these guys?" he looked to Elliott, perched in his arms, and the boy laughed. "See? We're good," he nodded, then, seeing out the window behind her, "Your mom's here."

"Okay… okay…" Maya looked to Noah, his hand laid at her neck as he looked at her, and she just might have brought him along anyway. But, finally, she put him down in the crib, settling him in before turning to Lucas and Elliott.

"Mama!" Elliott reached to her, and Maya picked him up out of his father's arms.

"I'll be back in a bit, okay, Sprout?" she told him, putting on her best smile and maybe hoping he was still too small to see how much of it had to fight to hide how much she didn't want to go and leave him here, him or Noah. She looked back to the baby, and Lucas could practically hear her thinking. No, no, no…

"Maya… Maya, hey," he touched her arm and she looked to him, eyes almost pleading. "Breathe," he nodded, and she did. "Say the word, and we're all going, okay? You, me, your mom, the boys, Pappy Joe… You still want to go, don't you?"

"Yeah…" she replied, voice warbled, then, after another deep breath, "Yes." Elliott was looking at her now, her distress beginning to echo on to him, like he knew something was wrong with his mother but didn't understand why. It brought Maya back around, enabled her to give him a more solid smile than the one before. "And you and your brother get to spend some time with your dad. May boys, sticking together, huh?" she nodded at him, cradling his head and looking upon him for a moment more before returning him to Lucas.

"Want me to send you pictures while you're out there?" he asked, and she nodded.

"Would you?" He kissed her once more, and finally he went along with her down the stairs and remained in the living room as she headed out. He might have gone out on to the porch, but then all that would have gotten him would be Elliott crying, wondering where his mother and grandmother were going without him.

After he'd seen them driving off, Lucas let out his own deep breath. Of course, he had been worried, too, how could he not? But she'd needed help just getting out there, so he'd given her that much.

"Okay," he looked back to Elliott, submitting himself to his son's prodding fingers. It was one of his favorite things to do, any face at all was his to explore, and if they had glasses, oh, look out… "Pappy Joe?" Lucas called out.

"Kitchen," his grandfather's voice reached him, and Lucas followed it.

"What are you doing?" he paused, finding him standing at the counter, loaded with flour, eggs, butter, cocoa and many other items, and reading what appeared to be the instruction manual for Maya's stand mixer.

"Nothing you need to concern yourself about, Birthday Boy," Pappy Joe told him, turning a page and reading on. It wasn't as though he'd never seen him in the kitchen. He could and did cook a lot, but never in all his life had Lucas seen his grandfather bake. "Did Maya get off alright?"

"She just left," Lucas told him. "Can you just take him while I go get…" Pappy Joe looked back now and, catching sight of his great grandson, he smiled and left the manual to go and get Elliott.

"I'm afraid you're still a little too young to be my assistant, but I will accept companionship," he nodded as he held him, turning to his grandson now. "You are not allowed back in here until I say so. Got it?" Lucas held out his hands, smiling and backing away. Leave it to his grandfather to find a way to lighten the mood… With any luck, he wouldn't wreck the place with his experiments.

Lucas went back upstairs to look in on Noah. His young son was lying in his crib as Maya had left him and just about asleep. For a while, Lucas just stood by and watched him. It was one of his favorite things to do. As tired as they'd get in these early days, that was all they needed to do, to look at their boys, and then what did it really matter anymore that they didn't sleep so well right now? It would be a thing of the past eventually, and when their boys weren't so little anymore, they'd look back on this time and miss…

Well, maybe not this part… Not the same as last year…

"Hey… You don't want to sleep anymore?" Lucas spoke quietly as he saw Noah's eyes were properly open now. "How about you sit with me for a while then? I've been banished from my own kitchen," he revealed, lifting the baby into his arms, taking his blanket and moving to the rocking chair. "You and I haven't gotten to do this yet, but you know, I've done this with your brother since he was about as small as you… We haven't really gotten to do it the last few weeks, but we will, again… soon… I hope… But you," he smiled down to his son, "Mr. Noah Patrick Friar… I would like to tell you a story. Go on, pick a leaf from the tree." He waited, watching the baby. Noah blinked his eyes, and Lucas turned his head to take in the tree behind them.

He genuinely tried to leave it up to chance, to let his eyes travel over the leaves until they stopped on the first name he caught. If he'd already done that person recently, he'd try again. Sooner or later he would get back to a person he'd done before, but then the longer he'd known them, the better he knew them… He had plenty of stories to share. Now that he was older, Lucas would hold Elliott in the morning, standing in front of the tree, and he'd let him point his finger and 'choose.' It was not fool proof either, but it was a game, and Elliott loved it.

"Alright, you picked…" His eyes landed on the leaf that read Kermit.

He stared at it for a while. Like all the leaves, it had been made of his handprint, still visible inside the shape of the leaf Maya would have painted around it before tracing his name over it. But unlike the rest of the leaves, this hand's owner was no longer with them. It had never really dawned on them how, in time, there would be others like this one. That was just the way it went, wasn't it? But this one…

"Your grandfather… One of your grandfathers," Lucas looked back down to his baby boy. "He's the one who named you. You never got to meet him, but oh… He wanted to meet you very much."

Where could he even start when it came to Kermit Hart? Fine, it didn't really matter in the end. Noah was still small enough that his age was counted in days. He would not remember any of this. But that was no reason to approach his story without respect.

"You see this tree here?" he pointed over his shoulder. "There's one just like it out there across the hall, where your brother sleeps. Except it's not just the same. Your grandfather, Kermit, he painted it himself. He wanted to leave it for you, for Elliott, for… whoever else might come along after you. And even though he wouldn't be there with you, this way a piece of him is still with us."

Was the sight of that tree, looming across the room… Was it part of what got Maya crying at night? It wasn't her father's tree, but still… It wasn't hard for anyone's thoughts to take leaps and find destinations on the best of days, and he could only wonder the kinds of leaps his wife's mind was able to make, creative as she was.

"Your grandfather, he left us, about a month ago now," Lucas told Noah. "And your mother is very sad because of that. I know it's upsetting when you hear her crying, and you're too little to understand what it's all about, but… if you're going to remember one thing, you have to remember that it's not about you. You're a… bright spot, so, so bright, you and your brother both. She loves you so much, and right now she needs our help. But she'll get better, I know she will…" Please, let me be right…

He couldn't help her with this one. It was something he'd had to make himself admit. Oh, he could support her, and he always did, as he always had. But they were caught in this… vortex of sleeplessness and chaos, which made it difficult enough to make sense of a lot of things. Even if it wasn't for the exhaustion, and the tests, and the boys, this was just something Maya had to handle by herself. She had to find her own way, and he could only just… try and hold up the walls around her as she went.

"How's it going in there?" Lucas spoke into the kitchen after heading downstairs with Noah a few minutes later. Nothing he heard sounded troubling, and he smelled chocolate, so it had to be good news?

"Very well, nothing to complain about," Pappy Joe reported, in a voice Lucas knew very well. He had been told to stay out, and he had better be doing that and not even think about coming in… as though he didn't know what his grandfather was up to. It made him chuckle, but at the same time, he had to wonder. Maybe he wasn't just doing it for him but for her, too.

"That's good to hear," Lucas replied. Thank you. "Still need your companion?"

"I guess I can release him over to you. Do me a favor, stand there and hold your arms out… Wait, do you have the baby?"

"I do."

"Put the baby in the bassinet, come back, arms out."

"Alright," Lucas smiled, bringing Noah over to the small bed by the couch and returning to stand outside the kitchen. "Eyes are closed, arms are out," he told his grandfather.

"Careful now," Pappy Joe told him… or Elliott, as Lucas could hear his son squealing. Two seconds later, he could feel him in the space between his hands and carefully took hold of him. "There you go, now, off you go."

"Did you give him chocolate?"

"No, but he might have some stains on him, I'm realizing now…"

Once he could open his eyes ("Dada!"), he found no stains, so he carried Elliott over to the couch. He planted him on his knee before pulling the bassinet closer, careful as ever.

"Do you know who that it?" Lucas asked, reaching in to hold the baby's hand. "That's your little brother, that's Noah… You want to say hello to Noah?" They tried to say his name around Elliott as much as possible, hoping he'd pick it up.

"Da!"

"Alright, so we're still working on it, that's alright," Lucas sighed, kissing his son's head. "So, how do you feel about a nap right now?"

He had barely moved to lie down on the couch, bringing Elliott along with him, when the doorbell rang, and he closed his eyes. It was time for their visit from the Future Babysitters' Guild. When he went and opened the door, he was presented with three young Harts, who all wished him a happy birthday. Two of them did this out loud, of course, while the third merely threw her hands out like her sister did and gave a big smile to match.

"Hey, guys, thank you," Lucas smiled, stepping aside to let them in.

"Is that Cara?" Pappy Joe called from the kitchen. "Send her in here, will you?"

"Looks like you've got kitchen privileges today," Lucas looked to the twelve-year-old. "How do you get those, mine were revoked."

"You can't come in," Cara laughed before running to the kitchen.

Lucas put Elliott down on his feet, and soon he was being walked about by his Aunt Eliza. He had always loved her, but since the day Noah was born, Elliott had taken that much more of a shine to his mother's sister, and Eliza was more than happy to return the sentiment.

"Is Maya sleeping?" Sam asked as he shut the door.

"Uh, no, actually, she's not here, she went out," Lucas told him. They should have discussed this, and now he wished they had. It wasn't like they didn't know to expect her siblings, but now… what was he going to say? Did Maya want them to know or not?

"She did?" Sam asked, clearly surprised by this. "Where'd she go?"

"It's a long story," Lucas ended up telling him. "She'll tell you when she gets back."

"Is she okay?" Sam looked to the side, spotted Noah in the bassinet, which told him this wasn't about his godson. Lucas didn't know how to answer that one with truthful misdirection like before. No matter what he said, it would either be something he wasn't at liberty to say, or something which would leave Sam to fill in the blanks and risk spreading.

"As okay as any of you," he finally said, looking to Sam, to Eliza… This much at least Sam would understand. When it came to those other layers, the ones that came with Maya's whole current situation, and everything that came before, well… If Sam could leave it at this for now, then the rest would be up to his sister to decide how she wanted to approach it.TO BE CONTINUED

See you next week! - mooners