A/N: Thank you all so much for your lovely reviews! I hope you enjoy this next chapter.
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Chapter 7: Hannah
While Ana had initially felt embarrassed her father insisted upon bringing Ted to the construction site on Saturday, she couldn't help but feel warmed by how sweetly Christian had acted toward her son. She hadn't been sure how he felt toward kids in general, but thankfully he hadn't made her feel ashamed for bringing her family - on the contrary, he led them all on a small tour around the construction site, making sure to point out the bigger pieces of machinery for Ted's benefit. Ted was so excited to be seeing all the cool trucks that he even asked Christian for a better look, and Christian asked Ana if it was okay if he picked him up in his arms so that he could have a higher viewpoint. Ana said it was perfectly fine, and for the rest of their walk Christian carried Ted in his arms, the little boy appearing delighted upon having such a high spot to see everything on the jobsite. Ana and Ray couldn't help but exchange smiles as they watched Ted having such a great time.
While most of the people here in Easton knew who she and Ted were and treated them kindly, Ana couldn't help but feel touched by the fact that Christian was getting along so well with her son. It warmed her heart for some reason, though she couldn't quite figure out why.
Once Andy the foreman and a few of the other construction guys arrived to the jobsite with some of the new equipment, Ana ushered Ray and Ted back to the truck to take them home, and Christian said that they could come back anytime.
Ana spent the rest of Saturday helping her father at the carpentry shop, and by the time the day was over and she had tucked Ted into bed, she was completely exhausted. She hadn't realized how much hard work she had been doing the past few days at the construction site, and in addition to her usual carpentry work and being a mom to Ted, she felt practically dead on her feet at this point. Once she had changed in her pajamas, she lay down on top of her comforter and fell into a deep and dreamless sleep, not waking up until late Sunday morning.
Yawning widely, Ana pulled herself out of bed and saw a note from her father on her bedside table. Apparently, he had taken Ted to church that morning and afterward they were going out to lunch, giving Ana the morning free. She smiled at her father's kind gesture, and felt inexplicably grateful for it as she dragged herself to her bathroom to shower and dress.
It was ten o'clock by the time Ana went into the kitchen to make a pot of coffee. It was a beautiful summer day out today, and Lake Easton shimmered underneath the blue cloudless sky outside. Ana took her mug of coffee and walked over to her patio door, gazing out into the woods and taking in the peaceful nature surrounding her home.
Ana glanced over toward the vacation rental house next door, the one that Christian said he was staying in, and she actually saw the man himself sitting on his outdoor balcony overlooking the lake. He was sitting in an adirondack chair in front of a patio table, with his laptop and a travel mug of coffee, and he typed away busily on his computer without noticing he was being watched. Ana observed him for a minute or two, unsure if she should approach him, but finally decided the neighborly thing to do would be to go over and say hello. She stepped out of the house, mug in hand, and walked across her yard and toward where Christian sat.
When she was about ten feet away, Christian finally looked up from his laptop and spotted her. He smiled brightly. "Hey there, neighbor."
"Hi," Ana couldn't help but smile. "Sorry, I'm not disturbing you, am I?"
"No, not at all," Christian said politely, and he closed his laptop before pushing it away from him. "I was just checking in on my company in Seattle - my CFO Ros is going to be attending a meeting for me today. Would you like to sit down?"
"Sure."
Christian scooted his chair over to show that there was another adirondack chair right beside him, and Ana tentatively walked up the steps to the raised balcony before moving to sit beside him.
"This house is beautiful," she complimented, setting her mug of coffee down on the patio table and glancing around. "You have a better view of the lake than we have."
"I get what I pay for," Christian chuckled, gazing out over the lake as well. "So how are Ray and Ted doing?"
"They're good. My dad actually took Ted to church this morning so I could sleep in a little, which was nice of him," Ana giggled. "It's rare when I actually get a day to myself like this."
"I can imagine," Christian said sympathetically. "You do seem to take on a lot, what with working at the carpentry shop as well as the construction site. So is it just you, your father, and your son living at the house then?"
"Yup," Ana nodded. She could tell Christian was trying to dig for information, and he smiled at her.
"I'm sorry if I sound intrusive," he said apologetically. "It's just that I really liked getting to know your family yesterday and I want to know more about you guys, that's all."
"It's okay," Ana said understandingly. "You want to know about Ted's father, right?"
Christian didn't say anything, though the expression on his face confirmed Ana's belief. She smiled reassuringly at him.
"It's fine, Christian. I'm actually kind of used to some of the looks people give us. When Ted and I visit places outside of Easton, I sometimes get the 'where's his father?' question from people. I understand why you'd want to know, but it's actually more complicated than most people understand."
"What do you mean?" Christian asked, frowning curiously at her. Ana hesitated a moment or two before picking up her mug of coffee and staring down at it, not taking a drink.
"I don't really know how to explain it," she said slowly after a moment. "Everybody in Easton already knows everything that happened, though, so it's not a secret…" She finally looked back up at Christian, who was still gazing at her. "I think you should know that I'm not Ted's biological mother."
Christian didn't say anything for a moment, though the expression on his face was completely gobsmacked. He stared at her. "Wait - what? You're not?"
Ana shook her head. "His real mother was a girl named Hannah, and she was my best friend growing up. She died when Ted was just a baby, and I'm not sure who the father is. I never bothered to find out."
Christian still looked utterly shocked by this revelation - Ana knew this was sort of a difficult topic to discuss, which was why she rarely told this story to other people. Christian finally seemed to pull himself together a little more after a moment or two, and he shook his head, blinking.
"Wow. Ana, that's…" he stammered, confounded. "I-I'm so sorry you lost your friend at such a young age. That must have been really tough."
Ana nodded, grimacing sadly as she remembered everything that had happened only four short years ago. "Yeah, it was," she said quietly. She pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and unlocked the screen, holding it out for Christian to see. "That was me and Hannah when we were eighteen," she explained as Christian looked at her wallpaper. "We had gone to the Washington State Fair that year - it was the first time for both of us, and we had so much fun."
Christian smiled lightly, "You guys look really happy."
Ana brought her phone back and smiled at the familiar picture of her and Hannah sitting at a picnic table, wearing sunglasses and tank tops as they smiled brightly at the camera. Hannah's blonde shoulder-length hair glinted in the bright sunshine.
"This was taken a few months before Hannah found out she was pregnant with Ted," Ana said, still staring down at the picture. Her smile faded. "Hannah's home life was kind of a mess… her dad had run off when she was just a little girl, and her mom would constantly drink herself into oblivion. Hannah ended up staying at my house most nights since she couldn't handle being around her mom too much. I could kind of understand, since my own mother had left me and my dad when I was little. However, after awhile, Hannah, Ray, and I kind of became our own little family."
Ana set her phone down on the table and gazed out toward the lake. Christian didn't say anything, though Ana could tell he was listening intently. She went on:
"Once we were in high school, Hannah kind of let herself go a bit. She started drinking and partying every night, not to mention she would sleep with any and every guy who paid attention to her. She was very rebellious, and a lot of it came from deep-set insecurities, I think. Even though my dad and I tried our hardest to get her to stop messing around, she wouldn't… not until our senior year of high school, when she found out she was pregnant."
Ana paused for a moment, setting her mug of coffee back down on the table. "Learning about the baby had completely changed Hannah's life. She did a complete one-eighty from the life she had been living - she immediately stopped drinking and partying, and she started to put all her focus into creating a better life for herself and her unborn child. She graduated high school with decent enough grades, and quickly got a waitressing job at the local diner. Once she had some money saved up, she finally moved out of her mother's house and came to stay with me and my dad until she could afford her own place. Ray and I helped her pick out everything she needed for when the baby came, and after nine months she gave birth to a beautiful baby boy."
Ana couldn't help but smile at the memory of Ted's birth. "I'd never seen Hannah so happy as when she first held baby Ted in her arms. It was so beautiful, and she promised him right then and there that she would do everything in her power to create a happy life for the two of them. And in the months that followed, she kept that promise.
"In addition to taking care of Ted and waitressing part-time, Hannah started applying for jobs in Seattle. There were obviously a lot more job opportunities in the city, but I think Hannah felt that if she could snag a decent-paying job there, everything would be okay for her and Ted. My dad and I did everything we could to help her out financially, but I think she felt like she and Ted were a burden to us, and she wanted a new job so she could start supporting her son without our assistance. It was pretty tough for her though, since she never went to college and had virtually no work experience."
Ana stared out toward the lake, feeling her heart ache in her chest as she thought about her friend. "One day, Hannah got an interview for an administrative assistant job at some Seattle investment firm, and she was so excited about it. She felt that this job was her ticket to a better life, and she had worked so hard for it. However, at this point she had become completely burnt out - she had spent months and months searching for a new job, working at the diner, and taking care of her baby. She hardly slept at all, and since her interview was in Seattle, my dad and I tried to encourage her to stay the night at a hotel after her interview to rest up before coming home to Easton the next morning."
Ana swallowed, feeling herself tear up slightly. "She didn't take our advice. She felt confident that she could just drive to Seattle in the afternoon, do the interview, and make the trip back to Easton at nightfall. She got to Seattle and did the interview, but on the drive back…" Ana hesitated, feeling a lone tear slip down her cheek as she fought back her emotions. "… on the drive back, she was so exhausted that she fell asleep at the wheel. Her car veered of the highway and crashed into a tree, killing her instantly. No one found her until the next day, when my dad and I called the police after she didn't come home."
Ana sniffled again, hoping she wouldn't break down crying. Christian silently reached over and took Ana's hand in his own, comforting her, and Ana felt grateful for his presence as she gently squeezed his hand back.
"Ana, I don't know what to say," he said quietly after a few silent minutes. "That's terrible… I'm so sorry."
"She had been on a path of destruction for so long," Ana went on, emotion clouding her voice. "But after she had Ted, she was finally starting to turn her life around… and then this happened. It wasn't fair."
Ana sniffled again, and she blinked away a few more tears from her eyes, trying to calm herself down. Christian said nothing, though he continued to hold Ana's hand in his silent comforting gesture.
"The news of what happened immediately spread all over town," Ana went on after a few moments, when she had a grasp on her emotions. "It was all anyone could talk about for months - since Easton is such a small town, everyone knew who Hannah was and that she had left behind a newborn son with no one to take care of him. Hannah's own mother had actually left town at this point, not wanting anything to do with her daughter or grandson. I don't think she even went to Hannah's funeral and vigil, which everybody else in town had turned up for.
"With no father in the picture, a lot of offers came in from people in town to adopt Ted," Ana went on, smiling tremulously. "But since I was Ted's godmother, Hannah wanted me to be his legal guardian if something ever happened to her. After she died, I agreed to take up the responsibility of raising Ted, and I adopted him when he was only seven months old. I was twenty at the time."
There was a short silence after she finished. "Wow," Christian said quietly, and he shook his head. "That's an incredible thing you did for your friend, Ana. Does Ted know about any of this?"
"Sort of," Ana said. "He doesn't know the details of how his mom died, but he knows that he was adopted. My dad explained to him that his first mommy had to go to heaven, which was why God sent me to him as his new mommy. Ted's happy with that explanation, though I know when he gets older I'll probably have to tell him the whole story of what really happened."
"Well, I'm sure he would be very proud to learn what his mother did for him," Christian said sincerely. "And I know he would be extremely grateful for everything you and Ray have done for him over the years too."
Ana couldn't help but smile. "I hope Ted will understand that adopting him wasn't an obligation on my part - I love him as much as I would if he were my own child. Raising him has changed me in so many ways, and I know that, as a mother, I will do everything in my power to honor Hannah's wishes by giving Ted the happy life she wanted for him. It's the least I can do."
There was another short silence between them, and Ana let her thoughts drift as she gazed out toward the lake. Christian still held her hand in his own, and after a few moments he slowly released her fingers and brought his hand back to his lap.
"I was adopted too, you know," he said after a moment, and Ana looked over at him in surprise. "All my siblings and I were adopted by the Grey's. The woman who gave birth to me…" Christian paused. "Well, let's just say she was ill-suited to be a parent, and she died when I was only four years old. That's when Grace and Carrick Grey adopted me into the family, and I can say with absolute confidence that I would not be the person I am today if not for them."
Christian looked over at Ana, and she looked back at him. She saw the sincerity in his gray eyes as he smiled at her. "What you're doing for Ted is extremely admirable, and I know that he will appreciate you just as much as I appreciate my own parents."
Ana smiled slightly, feeling oddly touched that Christian chose to share that part of his life with her. "Thank you, Christian."
Hearing him talk about his own experiences made Ana feel better about sharing her own, and it was with a profound feeling of peace as she turned her gaze out toward Lake Easton, absorbing the beauty of the nature around her.
A/N: So were any of you expecting that? Be honest lol
Hope you all enjoyed that! Next chapter, Christian gets an interesting phone call from Seattle.
Please review and let me know what you think :)