Cross reference to chapter 6 of Caught in the Whirlwind
32
Piper takes note as her daughter fills up one of Jamie's old backpacks with miscellaneous nonsense from around their apartment. The handle of the bag is adorned with different colored ribbons to establish it's now her backpack. She puts her backpack next to Jamie's by the front door, Piper's used to her routine and delays the meltdown for as long as she can. Her daughter comes out of their room "dressed" for school; she's relatively well matched, for a three year old she figures, the only thing that looks completely awry is her hair. She goes through this with her several mornings every month as her daughter desperately wants to start school but is just shy of pre-school eligibility. She attends nursery school three times a week, but during Piper's days home with her, she tries to take advantage of her daughter's ache for knowledge and reviews whatever she's interested in, all after the almost-weekly calamities.
"Harper, not today," she tries to break the news five minutes before Jamie needs to leave for school.
She watches her daughter over-dramatically melt onto the floor and cry like she does every time she realizes today is not the day for "big kid" school. His teachers have met her as she drops him off and picks him up with Piper or Alex many mornings and informs them all regularly that she'll be going there too.
Piper picks her up off the ground and asks her if she wants to drop him off today or if Alex should take him.
She wipes her tears with her fist and nods. "Yes, what?"
"I wanna go with Jamie."
Alex takes that as her cue, she yells "bye" out loud to Jamie, and walks down to their elevator with Harper at her heels. She waits for the elevator with Alex and as the ding sounds, gives her a hug and a kiss and runs back down the hall back to their apartment.
"Are you crying again?," he asks his sister as he gets his second shoe on, "I wish I could stay home."
"It's almost the summer babe, then camp, baseball... few more days," Piper reminds him as she combs Harper's hair back into a high ponytail, she struggles arranging her daughter's curls into any other type of style. "Go try to put your shoes on," she tells her as she collects the bag Harper packed and dumps the contents onto their mail table. She packs it with easy to grab snacks and a few things for the day.
After dropping off Jamie, they head into the nearby park and relax in the shade. Piper sits cross legged and leans up against the trunk of a tree while Harper goes through her bag in search of something to play with. After coloring, running around and going through a book of letters, Harper asks,
"what does elemeno look like?" "What does what look like?" "The elemeno."
Piper looks at her curiously, "I don't know what that is baby."
Harper exhales, "the elemeno." She proceeds to recite the alphabet, "H-I-J-K-elemeno-P." Piper eases up on her laughter but points out that it's four different letters in her book. "Oh, well if it was one, I could find it better.
They return home after they run around the city getting Jamie's things arranged for the summer, and Harper asks to put on the Wizard of Oz; Piper puts it on for her and smirks at the obsession that both of her children have over this movie. It's a reliable way to make the peace in their home when the youngest members of their family wish diarrhea upon each other. With her elbow against her side and her wrist relaxed, Harper points to their TV, "I want that."
Piper looks up at the girls from the Lullaby League, "you want the dress or you want to do the dance?"
"Dance in the dress."
"Alright," she says as the free spirited, energetic, now aspiring ballerina dances around the living room. She sends Alex a text after looking up a few studios who have summer sessions and ask if they have a thousand extra dollars lying around incase she wants to continue in the Fall; she also informs her that their daughter decided the alphabet was outdated and needed some flair.
Alex returns home with Jamie who pants "finally!," as they walk in having been tortured while Alex bought a few light pink and black leotard dresses for Harper.
"How stinkin cute are these?! Harper!," she shouts as she rummages through the bag and shows Piper the mini spandex outfits. Piper forcibly pulls Jamie close to her as she brushes the sweat from his forehead into his hair and looks at her hand somewhat disgustingly. He doesn't notice,
"did you have a good day overall?," she asks him knowing he was dragged along with Alex the whole afternoon.
"Yeah, I'm starving, is dinner ready?"
"Yeah mom, my day was great. Thanks so much for sending me to a great school and getting all my crap ready for the summer. How was your day? Oh my day was fine, thanks for asking."
He laughs, "sorry."
"Dinner will be ready soon, go wash your face, you're gross."
Harper comes in and Alex beckons her close, Piper holds different leotards up to her body to see if any are too obviously big or small.
"For me?," she clarifies with gleeful eyes.
"Yeah, do you like these?," Alex holds them up while she nods, hanging onto Piper's shoulders while Piper helps get her clothes off so she can try everything on.
Piper helps her pull on her white "sticky pants" before slipping on her pink leotard. Alex fixes her hair into a little bun while Piper covers her mouth at the cuteness. Harper does a horrible imitation of the Lullaby League dance causing Alex to release an "oh my God" at the prospect of all the "watch this's" that are to come of this new hobby.
A mirrored "oh my God," echoes shortly after as Jamie comes back into the living room where all of the women are being overtly female and squealing and clapping as Harper sloppily leaps without any hint of grace.
Mid-summer, Piper and Alex sit on either side of Nicky, Harper is bounced around on her lap. Alex wears Jamie's team's hat just off to the side while Piper teaches Harper a cheer with a patterned clap that they've been doing all season. One of Jamie's teammates gets a hit and makes it onto first base. The next player comes up to bat as Jamie gets on deck and starts practicing his swings. The umpire calls strike two and Alex turns to Nicky who doesn't know the first thing about baseball,
"this ump sucks," she waves a rigid hand forward, and leans on her knees.
Harper smiles, "sucks," her tongue goes in her cheek as she looks at Piper who is about to scold her until Nicky turns her lap exaggeratedly away from Piper to shield Harper.
"At least the words didn't come out of my mouth this time," Nicky says to Piper over her shoulder. Harper leans her head back into Nicky, "right kid? And if I do say some grown up word, please for the love of God don't repeat it. You'll get me into trouble." The humidity elevates the volume of Harper's curls, the light breeze causes them to tickle Nicky's cheek, "um, and who do you think you are with this hair? Is this like a challenge or something?" Piper runs her hand over Harper's emerging fro, "my mother's hair is naturally curly, but it's labeled in section 49 of the Country Club handbook that all hair must be properly straightened."
"Ah," Nicky replies and messes up Harper's hair a little more. Jamie's teammate gets to a full count before the ump calls strike three and the kid is out. Jamie steps up to plate and can hear his family on the bleachers, he turns around and tips the brim of his helmet before facing the pitcher.
"Ball one."
The parents and other spectators in support of his team clap. "Ball two."
"Good eye baby!," Piper yells out. He turns around with wide SHUT UP eyes. She tightens her lips as Nicky squeezes her leg with a way to embarrass the kid stare.
"Steeeeeeeerike one," the umpire calls as Jamie throws his body into the swing but misses.
"That's right, you made him want it," another spectator from the other team shouts to the pitcher, earning a watch me punch your teeth in stare from Alex. She holds her tongue but stands up, and slips her thumbs into her pockets to try to control herself.
"Babe what're you doing?," Piper looks up at her knowing the antsy movements of her wife. Before she gets an answer, the pitch comes across the plate below the height of Jamie's knees and the umpire calls out,
"Strike two!"
Jamie's head swings around to stare at the umpire.
"His strike zone is like this big," Alex shouts holding her hands about a foot apart, "what is this golf? How is he supposed to hit that?," she says with her arm gesturing out.
Jamie nods with an arm out to the side in agreement.
Nicky chuckles, "leave it to Vause to defend the minions."
Piper keeps her eyes on Alex, but talks toward Nicky, "did you just call my child a minion?"
"Minion, midget, ankle biter, whatever your preference."
Piper watches Alex place her hands heatedly on her hips, she stands up and pulls on her wrist to sit down, "Alex you can't yell at the umpire, this is little league, you're going to get him thrown out of the game."
"This is ridiculous, the ump has it out for him!"
"He doesn't either."
"Shake it off J," Alex yells out.
The next pitch comes toward the plate and Jamie hits a line drive past second base, it rolls into the outfield. Piper notices the previous annoyance is completely gone from Alex's face as their son is redeemed as he makes it to first base.
They're all walking home after the game, Jamie and Piper are bickering on the sidewalk while Nicky and Alex are swinging Harper who's just happy to be out of there as she finds his games to be too long. They're passing a local market when Piper mentions needing to get a few things. Nicky declares the need to empty her bladder and walks into the store. Beaded bracelets, outside the store adjacent to the market, catch Harper's eye and she asks if they can look at them. Alex offers to stay outside with her, as she catches,
"you can't call me baby in front of everyone! That's so embarrassing!," as Jamie and Piper are walking through the automatic door of the market.
Harper informs her that she can't see all of the bracelets on the table so Alex lifts her up. She picks up one bracelet at a time so Harper can inspect them when the woman who works in the shop comes outside to offer assistance.
"Alex," the auburn haired woman recognizes her immediately.
Alex looks up curiously for a moment, she curses internally, "Sylvia?"
"Oh sorry, if you can't quite remember. I'm sure there were plenty!" Alex tightens her lips at the commentary, reflecting back to her younger, less considerate self. Sylvia stands with her arms crossed, appearing somewhat defensive, and looks at the little girl nestled on her ex-girlfriend's hip. She tilts her head slightly to look at her face, she looks nothing like her, but still the way she's holding her. She looks Alex up and down and knows she wouldn't have had kids and shakes the thought away.
"So, how are you?," Alex says fondling a bracelet in her hand.
"I survive. These," she purposely brushes along the skin of the brunette's palm and lifts the bracelet, "always sell well."
Alex bends her fingers to scratch the skin of her own palm, "the shop is yours?"
"Yeah, do you want to come in?," she raises a brow.
Her lips part, her expression isn't clear whether she is about to decline nor accept the offer when a tallish boy with ruffled brown hair comes running up to the table,
"Mom wants to know if we need toilet paper in the house."
She turns her head toward Jamie, her mouth still hangs open slightly, "yeah... yeah we do."
He looks at Alex weirdly and runs back into the store while Sylvia looks at Alex and snorts derisively.
Alex widens her eyes as both of her eyebrows raise above her glasses.
"She's yours too?," she asks with a slight frown, nudging her chin out toward Harper, remembering the exact color of Piper's hair.
Alex plants a kiss on the top of Harper's head. "How many do you have?"
"Just the two, feels like more sometimes," she bites the corner of her mouth awkwardly. "Sylvie look...I'm really sorry how everything ended between us. I was really selfish back then..."
Nicky walks out, mid-panty adjustment and lights a cigarette, "it's like a zoo in there," she says to Alex while keeping her distance away from Harper.
Sylvia's demeanor softens slightly as the similarity of the blonde women's hair sets in.
"I don't know, just weird, her...," Jamie says pointing at Sylvia while Piper comes out of the store with two bags of groceries in one hand and pack of toilet paper in the other.
She looks up at Sylvia who sees Jamie pointing at her and Piper walks in a big U and goes right back into the store. "Shit..., shit, shit, shit." She puts the groceries down, her hand comes up to her cheek, she feels the sting from the punch of that woman's fist.
"Mom!," he says in response to her repeated profanity.
"Sorry."
"Do you know her?," Jamie asks picking up one of the bags of groceries.
She takes a breath and decides she needs to put on a brave face. She hadn't been in the wrong anyway, this should be on Alex, she told her heated cheek. "Yeah, she's one of mom's old friends, c'mon." She lifts the toilet paper and the grocery bag and heads back outside toward Alex.
"Ready?," she asks Alex.
"What, no hello?," Sylvia asks with a little too much nerve.
"Hello," she says reluctantly, "Alex?," she wills her wife with her eyes.
"Can I have that back?," she asks Piper pointing to the bracelet that's still in Harper's grasp, "or are you still taking things that belong to other people?"
"Are you still misdirecting your anger? I didn't do anything to you."
Alex takes the bracelet Harper's still holding and gives it back to her ex, she turns to leave, "c'mon Pipes."
"You slept in my bed!"
"Holy shit," Nicky mutters while she blows smoke out the side of her mouth pulling Jamie back.
"You put a bag of dog shit on my porch and lit it on fire!," she seethes over the table, she mutters under her breath, "crazy bitch."
"Pipes!," Alex says knowing the depth of Piper's temper, "Sylvia, good luck with the store."
"It wasn't dog shit!," she shouts, getting in her last licks.
"Who was that?," Nicky asks, Jamie's ears perk up.
"She was your friend?," he asks her.
Alex lowers an eyebrow, "no, she wasn't my friend."
He looks at Piper confused, "not a good one," Piper says trying to save face.
"Was that...," Nicky starts.
"Nick..., no," Alex cuts her off.
"Was that who? How do you know her?," Jamie presses.
"It's none of your business," Alex looks at him seriously.
He looks annoyed, the older he gets, he learns that his mothers are crazier than he once believed; they have a life of secrets, some of which he's been told throughout the years and some that they say they'll tell him when he's older. But with the seriousness of the look his mother just gave hum, this doesn't seem like something he'll ever know more about.
Alex walks ahead a few steps with Nicky, "you guys need some...time? When's the last time...? Alex looks sharply at her, "don't worry about me, I should be asking you."
"I have plenty of time, okay? Just say when, I'm overdue to teach new antics anyways." -
They've mastered the art of shutting out the background noise of their children's screeches as they taunt and chase each other wildly throughout the apartment. As the temperature starts to drop, the cabin fever gets old pretty quickly, though they try to still spend 30 minutes or so running around outside to let the kids take in some of the crisp evening air. The vibrations from their stomping are sent through the floor, causing either Piper or Alex to look up every now and then refocus their attention on the present conversation. The last series of stomps is halted with a thud as Harper collides with their three shelved bookshelf, as her coordination is not as refined as her brothers. As if time slows, various photographs slip from their upright positions and fall face down; she sees the vase that Piper painted for her years ago, teeter back and forth on their bookshelf before it falls and breaks on the hardwood floor by their daughter's feet. Alex bolts to pick her up out of the way of the broken shards of pottery while Piper moves Jamie back who immediately apologizes knowing the history of the piece. Harper violently cries,
"are you hurt?," she asks tilting her baby style.
"No," she breathes hard through her cries. Alex notes a superficial cut to Harper's foot and tries not to worry her since she doesn't know its there.
"Okay, stop crying then," she clutches her and carefully steps over the pieces that Piper says she'll take care of. Alex walks her into the bathroom and sits her on the vanity of the sink while she opens the medicine cabinet and the door underneath the sink to clean and dress the cut.
"I broked it...," she continues through her cries.
"It's okay Harps... stop," she sets the peroxide and q-tip that are in her hands down and tries to calm her daughter. She places her little hands on her thighs and squeezes them in her own, "look at me... count..."
This innate guilt when they've done something that displeases either herself or Piper is something that, no matter how many times they've tried to dissolve the situation, their kids have difficulty controlling.
She ignores Alex's request to count, "mommy made it for you," she sucks the air in sharply, "I broked it on accident."
"I know, it was just an accident, I'm not mad, at all, okay?," she lifts Harper's chin and presses her forehead against hers, "count."
She keeps her head still against Harper's as she counts to five before she starts to clean her foot, "we'll try to fix it with glue, alright?"
Harper nods, "can I have a Barbie one?," she says looking at the boxes of bandages in the medicine cabinet.
"Absolutely," she says lifting her foot close to her eye to inspect it for any fragments that may have gone deeper. She sniffs Harper's little toes and pulls her face back as if it reeks causing her daughter to giggle and push her toes once more toward her mother's face.
That smile, she's a mini Piper through and through. She sets her on the ground and she scampers off to find Jamie, "look, it's pink!," she lifts her foot to show him her bandage.
"Amazing," he says sarcastically until Alex steps back in and shoots him a glare, "it's pretty Harper," he says quickly before he gets a lecture on how Harper's a baby princess. He lets her tag him and gives her a ten second head start before they continue with their earlier shenanigans.
The brunette notes the floor appears as though nothing has happened, she finds Piper in the kitchen, using the hood light from the stove so she can adhere the pieces of cheap pottery back together.
"Hey," Alex stands beside her and strokes her pointer along a larger piece with irregular borders, "you think you can put it back together?," she asks poignantly.
Piper looks up at her sensing her tone, "yeah, I think so. I think I got everything off the floor." She sees the subtle nod, the strands of dark hair cover her eyes so she can't quite see her face, but she knows what she's feeling. "And hey, if I can't I'll make you a new one," she checks her with her hip, trying to downplay what this piece of material means to her wife. She pinches the ends of a larger piece and sets it along the glue line of another, "see?" She pecks the brunette's shoulder.
Alex brushes a hand on the blonde's forearm that's fanning the air around the glued clay helping it dry, "thanks."
An hour later Piper presents her with the vase, visibly cracked but made whole once again, "good as new."
Alex receives it and tilts it back and forth in her hands, "s'better than before."