Hello! It is Wednesday and I am back with a new chapter. We are tackling a bit of a new subject matter today, as well as a dynamic that has a huge place in my heart but for one of those oddly common occurences, it has taken me a while to depict! In this chapter, we see Justin going to Misty for some help when his new baby daughter, Layla, won't settle. We learn a lot more of their bond, as well as Justin as a father, rather than a guardian to his foster children. I hope you enjoy :)
Ages:
Misty: 41
Justin: 27
Layla: Newborn
Ash: 41
James K: 15
Disclaimer: I own the story and the OCs mentioned!
Misty did not expect to be interrupted from having her ritualistic herbal tea following a morning swim but that was exactly the situation she found herself in. Furthermore, she could never have predicted the demeanour waiting for her from the person on the other side of the door once it was rattled upon like someone knocking on wood.
Slipper clad feet had carried her to the doorway. Curiosity had laced her eyes and drawn her eyebrows closer together as she wondered who was unexpectedly calling. She would soon find out. She would soon without a doubt promptly find out.
"Will you help me?" Were the words that escaped from Justin as soon as Misty had barely even had the time to properly swing the door open. She found a face very close to hers, barely unable to process his presence, let alone the bundle in his arms. "Please, will you help?"
The lady on the other side of the door had a moment to catch up simply because she seized it. In the second after she registered the presence of Justin as well as the wailing bundle within both of his arms, this paired with his frantic appearance caused her to stick her head even closer to his.
"What's going on? What has happened?" she immediately could not refrain from fearing the worst. There had to be a good reason why his hair looked like he had been dragged through a hedge backwards and his brow was appearing too sweaty even for the warm beginning of September that Kanto was experiencing.
Misty felt her heart running through her chest and seeking refuge in her throat the more that seconds passed and she eyed the crying bundle in the father's arms. Again, she could not help but fearing the worst.
Peculiarly to the person experiencing his actions at that time, Justin took a step back away from the door and had a moment to encourage air back into his lungs. Although in retrospect, it's easy to understand why he needed a moment to compose himself.
Then, when Misty's eyes started to grow equally as bloodshot as his, he responded.
"She won't stop crying. She won't stop crying at all." A brief moment to look down at the bundle in his arms before he quite gingerly peeled back the blanket to look at his daughter's screaming and flushed face occurred. Shaking his head, his eyes fell shut instead of looking at Misty. "Please help."
A porcelain hand scurried through sunset orange locks and out of the sheer relief that there wasn't severely wrong with Justin's baby, Misty had perhaps one of the most out of place responses of all.
Her voice laced with a nervous laugh, for just a moment, she came across as quite unhelpful.
"Well, what do you want me to do about it?" she questioned, hearing her own dismissiveness and it tugging at her heart long before Justin's eyes fluttered open and looked back at her. Hurriedly, she changed her tune, her voice then coming across like the summer breeze. "I think you had better come inside."
Justin felt unusually cautious at first. While understanding breezed through him that Misty hadn't meant to say these words to him because she had so hurriedly changed them, he was also weary enough to wonder whether she actually meant them.
But in the next instance and the more that the little baby continued to draw oxygen further into her chest and cry even more wholeheartedly, he realised that he didn't care if she barely wanted to assist him at all. She was offering him her time. And he needed it more than anything.
A nod of the head and irregularity running through his veins, he jolted into action and twitched into her hallway to join her. He barely heard the door shutting behind them both and not because of the sounds that his daughter was making. Everything was as though he was caught in very thick weather. And he could barely hear himself think.
Fortunately, a wave of familiarity washed over him when he was lead to Misty's kitchen and he saw her morning layout that he knew all too well. Her laptop computer on the island worktop so she could check emails and re-word any lyrics from the night before. Droplets of water decorating midnight marble from her prior swim. Her cup of tea, steaming and still untouched.
Justin swallowed, still clutching his daughter although with the crying that she was doing, he wanted more and more to put her down and cover his ears. Despite the fact that it was his turn to follow the conversation, Misty knew it was her duty to not only console him, but make up for the bewilderment that had caused her to nearly snap at him.
"What's happened? Is she just in a bad mood?" she asked. Her voice and her presence appeared to tug the metaphorical cotton wool out of Justin's brain and allow him to think a lot quicker.
It had the same effect on all of his reactions, too.
"I don't know. She just won't stop!" Exasperation led him to practically have a turn at snapping in return but thankfully, it went unnoticed by Misty who was taking a moment to peel back the blankets to reveal Layla's face herself.
She saw the pink and flushed cheeks paired with the round disc of a sobbing mouth and remembered it all too well but didn't comment on this. Instead, she commented on Justin's despair, realising that her hand would be better off reaching out towards him.
"She'll stop eventually, you know? She can't do much else to tell you what she needs." Misty attempted to console the new father to an infant and she went on to tell him that in time he would learn what each of her cries meant. Maybe this was the wrong idea to hint that he was a novice. "What do you usually do in times like this?"
A shrug rolled off Justin's shoulders as if he didn't know. Instead of answering right away, he helplessly looked down at Layla but couldn't really look at her in a lingering way for an array of reasons.
Shaking his head, he was then glad to feel a touch roaming from the side of his arm and towards the round of his lean shoulder. This encouraged him to be honest and unafraid to show his naivety.
"We usually can calm her together. Sammy's brilliant when she gets herself in this sort of state. It's not that often." Justin told Misty, meeting her eyes for a brief moment before finding his boots far more interesting shapes to take hold of.
The lack of gaze and tone of voice told her everything, let alone his words. And she understood the position that he was in but she still asked, her touch not leaving his shoulder until it felt ready to part ways.
"And Sammy's out, is he?" Misty wondered, somehow able to think past the small baby that had quite an impressive scream in spite of her size. Then again, was it any wonder with two enthusiastic musicians as fathers? "You can't call upon him?"
While it was true that my best friend's wife had not anticipated the presence of her best friend's eldest son that time of mid-morning but she somehow all the more didn't predict Justin's reaction next.
All the same, she empathised with it.
"No." Hurriedness latched itself onto Justin's words and eyes that Misty knew so well and to be open and adaptable were then rigid. A shake of the head did its best to soften this but it couldn't quite fully do it. "He deserves some time for himself. I guess maybe Layla wonders where he is."
While Misty had since taken a step back from Justin in order to reach for her mug of tea and take one of the first sips of the hot brew, her lips fell together afterwards in reasons other than reacting to the warmth that she was lapping from.
And far more than her expression gesticulating based on his words, she softened with everything that he was. He was an absolute beginner. And he needed to be okay with that and asking for help when he didn't know everything.
In truth, Justin was and he often didn't hesitate to ask for assistance. But when it came to caring for a sweet little bundle, it was a tricky thing. And Misty wondered why she had accidentally snapped at him when then she only felt warmth running through her body which was certainly not down to her herbal tea.
"You'll learn what she's wondering and telling you." She empathized again, taking a second to blow on the contents of her mug although she had already absorbed the first mouthful. "What normally does the trick in soothing her when you work at it together?"
Misty attempted wholeheartedly to come across kindly and tactfully and thankfully she didn't come across as a phony either. In actuality, anything she could go on to say might have sounded this way from Justin if he was feeling like the novice that he believed he was.
The eldest Morgan son's lower lip fell in between his rows of teeth and though he shook his head and shrugged his shoulders like these gestures were a pair that couldn't be separated, he appeared he did know from the answer that he soon gave.
"I think it's just down to luck. We usually just goof around and entertain her until she calms down." Justin answered truthfully but to him, it sounded incredibly lamely. All of a sudden, hurriedness rushed through him again and this was shown by his expression becoming a crumpled piece of paper. "Do you think that you could just hold her? I don't think she wants me."
As Misty's heart privately lurched, there was a quick thought in her mind that told her she shouldn't reach for the baby if she felt that Justin needed reassuring him that Layla wanted him plenty. But the notions that took over bigger space in her mind that was, if Justin asked for something, then it should be delivered because he often was entirely capable of his own accord.
Again in her most tactful display, the orange haired woman merely pressed her lips together and rid herself of the hot mug of tea, her head bobbing and her expression smiling in response. For a rare occasion, Justin didn't reciprocate any of this and he hardly seemed to acknowledge it either.
He handed Layla over to the arms of the woman and then he helped himself to a seat at his bare stool, seeming extremely glad to have a moment to himself even if his presence was lingering.
Again privately, Misty let the air to ooze out of her lungs as she knew that all too well also. It was a great adjustment to go from a free person to have a little being relying on you during all of your waking moments.
She wanted to tell him that like with knowing her cues, he would get used to it in time. But time felt like a huge price to pay when you were exhausted and needed seconds to go by. So instead of comforting her best friend's boy with words or even a touch, she set to consoling Layla.
Misty could not stop her lips from elevating slightly when a gurgle was had for the baby before she revved up her crying all over again, showing that she wanted to cease but wouldn't find it within anyone, only in time and herself.
"Oh, you let rip as much as your daddy on the quiet, don't you?" she humoured the baby, freeing her features from the bundle that she was in and allowing the white patterned blanket to lap at her chin. "I know you're a sunny baby, really. You take after Justin in that too."
Though he had been trying to distance himself for his own sanity, with a hand cupping his own chin, he could not refrain from glancing over and having a fish hook tugging up his brow at everything that was being said.
He just had to be glad that Misty didn't say the baby's current moodiness wasn't a reflection on her father's own personality either, Justin told himself.
The orange haired woman then holding the baby continued more, apparently figuring that small talking in a soothing, baby-friendly voice might offer some comfort to the few week old infant.
"Are you hot, sweet one? Are you not a happy baby?" Misty cooed in a way that was natural based upon her motherly instincts. She jiggled the baby with hair dissimilar to her own father's close to her before she unwrapped Layla from her swaddling cocoon for good.
The blanket fell to the ground like an unwanted spectre and the infant baby's hand was soon wrapped around Misty's finger after she placed it there, intentionally shaking her fist as she jiggled some more.
Good tactics for soothing a baby, to be sure. But still, Layla's own expression was remaining that of a crumpled up piece of paper and she cried so wholeheartedly that actual tears poured out of her eyes.
When Justin noticed Misty's lower lip puckering, feeling slightly sorry for Layla in spite of the fact that she had uttered cheery words to her, he decided that he needed to speak to. He knew that his own voice wouldn't reach out to her in the same way that a mother's would. But he couldn't leave it all up to his father's best friend.
"I don't know what she wants. And I don't think she will be in a hurry to let us know any of her secret languages." Justin spoke with that clenched fist of his then resting against the mismatched parting of his hair rather than underneath his square chin.
Misty observed that he was nearing having a moment to feel his own bottom lip poking outwards too. However, before she could fully focus on this and absentmindedly close the distance between the two of them while she still held his daughter, they were then not alone for the rest of the next while.
You see, Ash had also been using some of the extra facilities of the Ketchum Household and while his wife had been enjoying her morning swim and striving to be even better, he was experiencing the same determination with having a training session with one of his newest Pokémon.
It had gone well and while that little creature was having a hard earned rest in its Pokémon Ball, I was on the shoulder of my best friend while he headed on back upstairs for a shower as if I had been the being that had made him proudest of all.
He longed to crow about everything that he had done when he entered the kitchen and knew where to find his wife! But it was hard for even him to be ignorant of what was going on.
After embracing Misty in a sweaty hug from behind and seeing Layla in her hold as well as Justin's continual (although much quieter this time around) frantic presence, Ash chuckled to himself and breezed past, grabbing hold of a bottle of water along the way as he intended on taking that to the shower rather than me.
"Ahhh, is the little one needing some feminine snuggles?" he asked in a cheery manner and at the same moment that I hopped down onto the kitchen counter top, his lips barely had a second to brush against the neck of the bottle before he spoke to Justin specifically. "Don't worry about it, Katie always preferred comfort from anybody else instead of me for the longest time. But look at us now!"
A nudge from a sweaty, hardworking shoulder from Ash made Justin can't help but look right at the older man and when he headed back on his way after gracing us with his presence, he was unable to refrain from feeling bruised by far more than the physical contact between them both.
Chuckles at the memories of exactly what he was saying followed him along the rest of the house and up the stairs. But these noises were shared by nobody else, not even me who respected my best friend's ability to laugh about it years later and knew all too well about what he was talking about!
Feeling a sinking sensation in her shoulders equally as much as Justin and not down to just understanding, Misty longed to utter the raven haired male's name along with a tutting noise from between the teeth at her husband but she stopped herself.
She discovered her shoulders to experience the bottom of the ocean feeling all the more and yet, peculiarly, shooting up towards the sky when Justin shook his head to rid himself of the hurt and bravely met Misty's intentional gaze with a dimple laced smile and a shrug of the shoulders that spoke of the fact he should embrace the truth.
Misty didn't agree with "the truth" by any means. But she silently applauded his ability to be the novice. She didn't take a seat with him, nor did she touch him but as she leaned against the kitchen island where we both were, I felt a sensation on the top of my head and I knew that her rubs were being sent to James' son.
"You didn't want to go and see Katie for help with this little wailer, then?" she asked, feeling it appropriate to bring up the name of her daughter given of course their closeness, as well as the fact that her husband had brought her up anyway.
In addition to this, she needed some way to subtly prove to Justin that she wasn't ignoring Ash's tactlessness entirely.
Misty watched as Justin's cheeks had a bit of colour added to them and while he shook his head, his focus turned downwards, his finger making swirling patterns in the water droplets from the swimming pool that she had left there.
This time, his bravery had more faults in it and his expression scrunching up went against his intention of being airy, and appeared as an act of concealing.
"Nah." He started with a simple word, taking a peek at his pointer finger as though he had never seen a droplet of water before. "I've asked for her help way too much as of late. She deserves a break."
Justin smiled. There were traces of this action that couldn't be falsified. Nonetheless, he couldn't help but feel a bit of a loser for apparently having a plethora of people ready to help him with something that he was new at. He didn't mind asking for help. But he didn't like having people there waiting for him, expecting him to lay his burdens on them too.
Ironically, Layla took a break from screaming so loudly at that moment but it didn't last all that long for she soon re-started all over again. Misty instinctively jiggled her once more in her arms when the little girl made straight eye contact with her while she wailed, as if to prove some sort of point.
"You didn't want to stop by and see your dad? Surely he has all the information in the world from how many times he has done this?" she attempted to slip in another suggestion and mask it with humour.
While the corners of Justin's rounded nose did crease and he encouraged a smile from himself yet again, he could see through Misty's antics as if every part of her was as transparent as the bottles that Layla had been too upset to accept from him.
"No." This single worded response from Justin took Misty by surprise. She knew she could not hear his reply as rude or even curt because his tone didn't come out as that way in any way, shape or form.
It was what it was. And after she swallowed the surprise, again, she understood more of what Justin didn't say than what he said. And it was indeed this that caused her to stop trying to send touches to him through my skull and for another time reached out to him directly.
As well as feeling the massaging feeling of his own knuckles against his scalp as Layla could not be soothed even in the arms of a mother, he felt fingers curling around the lean ball of his shoulder before it was patted.
"Why don't you make yourself a cuppa, Justin?" Misty suggested and catching me off guard that time, I watched with eyes as round as Layla's mouth as Justin's bottom leapt off the bar stool, not hesitating to go and make himself a different kind of tea compared to what the Williams' family often drank.
Misty didn't have the heart to smile at the fact that her suggestion had gone down seemingly well, let alone feel the invisible desire of it tugging at the edge of her mouth. Wordlessly and to herself while she merely resumed walking around with Layla and jiggling her, she knew why Justin was hesitant to ask help from James far more than Katie.
She knew that she was to keep it just for herself. So that was what she intended to do while she put that heart-breaking yet heart-fixing fondness for Justin into soothing his daughter to serenity.
Layla was drawn even closer to her chest that once comforted her own babies and she ran a hand through her sparse locks, already feeling overwhelmed by the fraction of joy that she felt for her father being replicated when it came to the closeness with his daughter.
What a beautiful thing both Justin and Sammy had done to want to give their all to a third child, Misty thought to herself. She thought a variety of things while the kettle bubbled and boiled and Justin in between waiting for that task to come to an end as well as his daughter's crying went to the fridge for a carton of milk.
Predominantly, she couldn't help but look down at the little girl and see her for everything that she was even when she was the opposite of her usually calm and sunny self. It was true that she had pointed out how much Layla was like Justin but when she took a moment to gaze down at her and be uninflected by feelings of extra closeness with one of her dad's she couldn't refrain from seeing the multiple layers of her.
She somehow saw both traits of both father's within her, the warmer skin tone of Sammy and the snub nose of Justin mixed with ingredient upon ingredient from generations and generations passed through DNA, adding to the mixture that was the soup of one perfect human being.
She would be even more wonderful if she gave the crying a bit of a break, Misty smirked to herself. And, funnily enough, it was when after the kettle had clicked to a shut and Justin had poured himself a milky brew and sat back down with it that it occurred to Misty.
It occurred to her that the sound of the kettle had caused the baby's crying to dull down and not because it roared over even her own noises. Again, she could not refrain from pointing out the similarities between one father and daughter, humouring them both.
"Oh, so like her daddy, indeed. Calms down when a cup of tea is on the cards, eh?" A smile stretched apart Misty's lips while Layla's arms fell behind her head, stretching upwards and still containing her, albeit indeed quieter, wailing.
It was funny how when you got so used to something that you ceased to realise when circumstances changed! This was indeed the case who initially caught onto the playfulness from Misty more than anything and didn't realise why she had said these words until a moment or two afterwards.
And even then, he didn't dare do anything other than show some form of relief with his expressions, his eyebrows pointing to the sky on his face and taking a wordless sip from his cup of tea. Like a shadow not revealing its true form in the dead of the night when you looked upon it, Justin didn't dare speak of the fact that Layla had actually given their ears the slightest of breaks.
After an exhale against his cup of tea caused the steam to blow against and cling in microscopic droplets against Justin's prominent philtrum, despite the idea that Misty had previously had to not bring up her secret musings, the chance to speak another time made her go against her initial intention.
Relief running through her veins that the little girl was much calmer even though she was still wailing and mewling in her arms, she used this sensation as adrenaline as well as her heart starting to pump quicker from the way that she might be overstepping her mark.
"You know…" she started, causing more than just my head to turn as she came out with these two words first of all. Inwardly, I was glad that Justin was done with swallowing and momentarily rid himself of his own mug. "You mustn't compare yourself to your dad. First of all, I don't think you'll be crazy enough to have so many children."
Again, Misty paired her very real words with a bout of humour as if her real intention could not be left on its own. I had a feeling that was proven incorrect when I assumed that Justin wouldn't know where her words were coming from, wondering why she suddenly brought that up to him and was speaking those words to him.
But even, although he had hardly had the time to register them within his own being, he knew they were there and wasn't surprised that Misty had suspected them, let alone was speaking about them.
A reaching for towards his mug and a second sip of the brew was necessary before he found his own voice. He didn't feel compelled to look over the fellow adult that he was sharing company with, instead his eyes wandering to all sorts of places.
Nonetheless, he didn't try to deny anything for a second.
"I don't try to compare myself to my dad at all. It's everybody else who does it." he responded levelly, his eyes not settling on one particular spot and figuring that he didn't feel ready for the sensations of if he was speaking directly into the eyes of Misty. "I know they don't mean it… They just see wonderfully fatherly traits in him and they automatically look to me to see them in me too."
The words "and they will never find it" were heard by Misty despite them not being uttered, let alone most likely not even thought by Justin either.
Moreover, a crack in the heart right from the end of each chamber was felt by the orange haired woman as if Justin had really looked into her eyes and put forth this notion.
I for one felt like what he had said anyway was equally as compelling so I didn't need to make anything else up. Comparison was always the thief of all joy. And while it was sometimes an honour to be compared to a parental figure, it also could bring the greatest heaviness to ones left.
I believed it silly to try and replicate the legacy of one human being. But lots of people did it, and tried to search for it within others. I suspected it was because familiarity was something so many people needed. They needed to see something they knew within someone else to feel more secure in their own lives.
"You don't need to be a dad like your dad for anyone. You only need to be a dad for yourself." Misty insisted although, like Justin had said, he wasn't the one doing all the comparing.
I watched and took a step back as this time; I heard extra words ringing out like bells belonging to a church after sentences had been fully formed. While scratching right at the surface of my heart, I knew that I was suspecting words from Misty that were being thought about, rather than actually put out towards the ether and for many to properly here.
She knew that Justin being the dad that he needed to be was more than enough. In hindsight, she tells me that she regrets not telling him this. Truthfully, Misty regrets not telling Justin more of the fond words that she often concocted in her mind for him.
While the comparing thing was something that Justin tried not to do, as he found himself occupied with playing with the little paper tag that hung out and over the edge of the mug of Misty's own tea, words tumbled out of him as he was focused more on his own absentmindedness.
"I'd want to be a dad like Sammy if I could become one like anyone. There wasn't another before him and I know there will be none after him." A wan smile laced across Justin's lips and Misty found herself growing studious towards this particular action. "He's just got it."
The orange haired woman's fixed gaze saw lips forming these words and so she witnessed them at first more than she heard them. But when she looked more at the bigger picture again, taking a figurative step backwards as I often did, for another time, she heard more of what Justin didn't say than he did say.
He was aware that his style of affection towards any relationship that he found himself building wasn't always so heavily built around touch and squeezes and kisses upon cheeks. He didn't ever want anybody that he came into contact with to think that this made him love them any less. And he especially didn't want his children to think that of him.
Misty knew that his love language was expressed in so many other ways. From a beautiful smile that couldn't be faked and with eyes that shone with pride at even the smallest of achievements. From enthusiastic, well thought out sentences of praise. To song lyrics that were filled out with sensations of love like the loving stuffing that was added to a teddy bear.
Justin had more love to give than almost anyone that she knew and it was the kind of thing that spilled over, over and over again once its full potential had been locked. She knew his children would never go without.
Instead of speaking all of this with words, it was conveyed through a hand joining his in playing with the same exact paper tab from her tea bag and by joining in a conversation that showed she was truly engaging.
"I suppose there can be some challenges with there between two dads around, among all of the wonderful things too." she began, her thumb meeting Justin's before they went their separate ways and she fiddled with the string while his thumb and forefinger gripped the tab like it was a plectrum. "Subconscious competition, maybe?"
Justin and Misty both shared a skill at being able to deliver home truths in a digestible manner. Needless to say, they could both get it across like a slap in the face too! But when it came to each other, more often than not it was something that was able to be swallowed, even if you nearly choked on it on its way down.
Still with his attention on the tab and his actions rather than anything else, his mind was able to roam and so, his words were able to float out inhabited.
"Subconscious, perhaps. Certainly never acted upon or encouraged." He replied and immediately, with a baby close to her being, somehow Misty felt compelled to smile at his words more. "Sammy is utterly brilliant, though. I wouldn't dream of one-upping him as far as the children are concerned. Only levelling myself up to match him."
It fascinated Misty how someone with such a sunny face with features so easy to gaze upon could turn to having structure of austere steel in a moment's notice.
This couldn't be truer there and then when to prove that he was so very serious about his words, his gaze locked onto Misty and his expression became rigid, not out of anger but out of the certainty of it all.
To combat this, Misty continued to having a soft curving of the mouth. And this encouraged Justin's expression to mellow out as quickly as it had previously formed. She knew that he was already a loyal and worthy father and that would only continue to grow in time. He just needed to look at the challenging times as something to be overcome and with all the excitement in the world, rather than weariness and fear.
If he looked at it in the same way he did with most things then not only would be blossom, but he would fly. And he would be a father to contend with. Not that this was to be encouraged, though. And not that he wanted to be in competition with anyone other than ghostly silhouettes of old versions of himself.
"You're probably regretful that Layla is no longer screaming so utterly loudly that you are able to hear me droning on as well." Justin at last took his turn from all the times that Misty had purposefully attempted to humour him.
He let go of the tab of her tea bag for good as if he no longer needed her so strongly but of course, the case of this was the opposite. He had sunshine brewing back in his eyes when he looked at her, Misty only just able to see his smile before his mouth was occupied with taking more sips from his drink.
For someone who was not actually born in Galar despite having the accent, he sure had the self-deprecating tendencies that they did! With a shake of the head and light in her own eyes, Misty disagreed with him.
But she then looked down at his daughter, getting an idea from the glitter of his smile, feeling encouraged to switch her positions and allow her to see more of the world that was invisible to her while she screamed so hard, from a different angle.
"She just needs time, as we all do sometimes." A shrug rolled off Misty's own shoulders for one of the first times and she rubbed the infant baby's back and made sure that her head was tilted while secure as she lounged against her arm front wise, a reminiscent of a wild cat in a tree. "Remember Johnny Jinn used to love this? He used to nearly break your back from it at barely even two months old."
It was a sensation similar than stepping out into the garden on a warm morning and finding yourself basking in the sun to be in the company of two people that shared so much. There was always so much to say. There were rarely moments of silence. And when there were, it was because they were nothing but comfortable and enjoyed not saying anything together as much as they enjoyed chattering away together.
My eyes went back and forth, looking like I was observing a tennis match as my gaze went from Misty to Justin, absorbing everything that they had to say for themselves.
A chuckle from Justin wasn't hard to muster but his curved back of his hand fell over his mouth like he was trying to conceal the raw wholeheartedness of his reaction. Of course, he could not conceal the grin that was in his eyes which bloomed like a flower in the warmth.
"I think it's for the best that Dad stopped there. Otherwise they could just keep getting taller and taller and he would be eaten out of house and home!" Justin responded.
Brightness in her own eyes, it was soon enough Misty's first and foremost idea to think of the fact that he had already been eating out of house and home by that growing lad when he had been a teenager!
And then it occurred to her that he probably hadn't even had a chance to eat from the way that Layla had taken up so much of his time. It had seemed that he had only just had enough moments to grab a quick shower. Either that or he had arrived at hers drenched in sweat from the stress of it all.
"Why don't you go and make yourself a sandwich? I think this girl will let you eat in more of a quiet state." She suggested, stopping from leaning against the kitchen island as she had done for quite some time and returning to wandering around the room with the little baby.
That time, I watched as Justin's bottom wasn't quite so eager to leave his seat to go and make food and it wasn't because he was full from his cup of tea. And it wasn't because he felt shy about helping himself in the home of the Ketchum's for he often made himself home by making sandwiches in the middle of the night while at a sleepover there!
Yes, while Misty's attention was taken up by Layla and the girl then grizzling and groaning rather than sobbing and screaming, Justin had an expression that was just for Misty and just for a secret. His eyes flickered back and forth, filled with gratitude at the way that she had helped him.
Indeed, something that he would go on to regret not expressing in word form, and only being shared by a secret twinkle in the eyes and a twitching of the lips.
In between helping himself and making his sandwich once his bottom had finally left the bar stool a second time, he couldn't help but give Misty more looks to which the meaning was entirely private. When she did happen to glance up, her heart thudded in her own chest, mistaking it for a father's love brewing stronger yet again.
It didn't exactly go away during moments of weariness and frustration but it certainly wasn't so easily expressed! However, in that moment, Misty felt that his adoration was back in full force. Which it was. She just didn't realise it was shared between more than the one being.
That time with Justin occupied and with his back towards any onlookers as he buttered bread and set himself to making food because he had indeed skipped his ritualistic bowl of cereal, Misty found it to be her brain ticking and again with words that she had tried to refrain.
It was notions that she hadn't even realised to be there but once she acknowledged them, they prickled at her neck and demanded to be spoken. She really tried not to because it seemed too pathetic.
But then, they lurched out of her before they could be swallowed down to the depths of her stomach and where unspoken words lingered.
"I hate to sound so teenager-y and desperate about all of this…" she began and it goes without saying that immediately, Justin's tall and lanky frame craning over what he was doing turned around, an edge of curiousness decorating his eyes. "But why me?"
Misty had to go on to clarify that she meant that she was wondering why Justin had decided to drop everything and get a bus over to see her for advice over the multitude of candidates that he could have picked. And it made her loathe herself and how she was sounding more!
Straight away, Justin's expression became as rigid as his knife as he completed this and he dropped anything else that he was doing with his hands and his hips felt the curling of his fingers.
The orange haired woman's cheeks felt aflame and she prayed that it could not be seen from the outside while she didn't let Layla go. Thankfully for her, Justin's prior countenance melted away like butter on a hot day and he even took a step closer to the two of them, not hesitating to reply with equal truth.
He figured that she deserved it after being so forward with him too, even if she was being desperate and teenager-y, in her words.
"Because…" Justin began, his tall stature somehow making even Misty appear small as not only did he look down at her but he reached for the then placid arm of his daughter, his loving touch being for her and her alone as well as for the woman who had led her to that peaceful state. "I knew that even if you weren't able to help us out then I would leave yours feeling a whole lot better anyway." He spoke. Like a switch in a lightbulb, he suddenly smiled wholeheartedly. "And I was right."
There and then, Misty received a smile from Justin that if she had really been a teenage girl, then it would've caused her to melt! It did anyway. Justin didn't chose to, nor did he feel compelled to add the soppy words that she was always there for him.
Instead, this was spoken with a squeeze of the shoulder from his other hand that wasn't stroking the arm of his daughter so very tenderly. I watched as with the three of them having some sort of hold on each other, they were like an electrical current passing nothing but wordless fondness from person to person.
I had never felt gladder to not be a part of something. It was so very electrifying to simply watch!
I continued to watch as after just a second or two, that current was broken by Justin moving away and returning to what she was doing. Misty followed suit although, of course, her actions had an extra quality of lightness running through them at the reassurance that she had asked for and didn't feel foolish – only delighted – to have received.
From Togepi to her own children to everyone in between that she had doted upon, she never took the time to really reflect on her gratitude towards her own self but if she had then I hoped she would be pleased at her natural mothering ability.
It allowed her to feel things much more deeply. For people that belonged to everybody, not just her. While she didn't express this with blatant words, it was plainly obvious that Justin belonged to her in some way. In many ways, he was a man after her own heart. And she felt a lot better about the world going to sleep at night with someone like him in it.
This would only be proven the more and more that time went on, on that day. For you see, just as Justin had turned around from having his back to everybody else and leaned his bottom against the counter while taking his first few mouthfuls of sandwich, we stopped being alone in our little group yet again.
It seemed that someone had the opposite need of Justin desperate for advice from Misty. Someone wanted the absolute opposite of this. And this was proven from the way that he bustled in through the front door and attempted with all of his might to go through the kitchen to reach the living room where he could sulk in private.
It seemed that James Ketchum had returned home instead of being at school during his mid-morning break and while concern laced Misty's heart without a moment of hesitation at the weight that he was carrying on his shoulders and she could tolerate him not speaking to her, she could not abide by him not showing manners.
I watched with widened eyes of my own, equally as concerned as Misty and somehow more ready to take action and step in.
"James." Misty began by saying her youngest son's name, Layla still in the same position in her arms and hiccupping when she sensed more of a firm motherly display brewing. "Something has happened, yes? But we still greet people, don't we?"
She would get to the bottom of what was troubling her son eventually. But there was always time to be polite to people, regardless of what was going on.
From simply knowing him like the back of my own hand and watching him since birth, I could tell that his eyes rolled in his head as he had his back to us and tried to breeze past us all, almost making his way to the doors that lead to the living room aka his respite time.
Then, he cringed. If he went against his mother's wishes for him after they were clearly put forth then it would seem like he really was petulant. And having teenage troubles or not, that was the last thing that he wanted.
Cheeks even more flushed than usual, his head bobbed just the once and he couldn't exactly look at Justin giving his mother company in the kitchen, let alone mutter the single syllable of a greeting.
Fortunately, the two of them had a bond that tied the two of them like an invisible string too. And no doubt did Justin see so much of himself in the red cheeked teenage boy.
For once, a sandwich made in the household of the Ketchum's was the least of his priorities.
"Everything okay with you?" his voice came across as easy-going as could be and it wasn't because he hardly tried at all. And Misty was left with feeling everything other than envious when, although for a couple of seconds her son still couldn't look at any of them, he could not act like everything was fine either.
Of course he could not. He had come home for his mid-morning break rather than staying on and he loved school so very much. Clearly something had happened.
The redness that swanned over his cheeks in the further seconds passed proved this and the three of us watched as his skin near enough matched the tone of his hair. We could see his shoulders wriggling and grooving as if he didn't want to relive what had happened by speaking of it.
But connecting him and Justin, James too longed for help in his own way. And his eyes then managing to travel to the man that he looked up to both literally and figuratively, he confessed with hands seeking refuge in his school trouser pockets.
"I completely acted like a fool in front of this new boy that I kind of really like. Ergo, I will be never going back." After acting beyond his years in confessing what he been troubling him, he did the classic thing of a boy his age by blowing it out of proportion.
But that was to be expected! While Misty's eyes couldn't stop themselves from swivelling with concern as she took this seriously, knowing more than anyone how much her son loved school, Justin continually saw himself in the pale fifteen year old's self.
It was his natural instinct to smile at how much he had been there once! But he controlled himself. And instead his eyebrows drew together and lifted slightly, his arm reaching out as more of a symbolism than actual gesture to try and embrace the boy.
"Oooh, well I understand why you feel a little red in the face but believe me, if this guy is nice enough to have caught your attention then I don't believe he would ever think less of you." Justin reasoned and while his arm went back to his side, his reason for leaving Misty with his daughter for the time being wasn't because he was heading over to James to embrace him.
He knew well enough that times such as those meant gestures of contact were more suffocating than normal. And examples of relation were touch and go. He would have to tread carefully. And first and foremost, he would have to be sincere.
For a rare occasion, James blew the air out of his lungs and it caused his locks to blow at the force of it all. For once, he felt like Justin did not understand him at all and it caused his broadening fifteen year old shoulders to move down towards the floor where his eyes longed to be as well.
He shook his head, longing to find something along the lines of bravery and integrity in the lining of his pockets.
"I don't expect you to understand. Like you've ever embarrassed yourself in front of someone you liked." James pointed out, a streak of teenager-y defiance making an appearance to combat the neediness of his digits hiding away.
Somehow, Misty and I refrained from looking at one and other! Justin would have to indulge James in the truth on another day.
For the time being, he uttered just one single word in response to that part of the younger male's words.
"Okay." He decided to say, allowing James to think what he thought. Justin knew what he himself thought and a (hopefully) good way to boost his confidence and reassure him too. "I embarrass myself a lot. I had to come here because I couldn't stop my own daughter from crying." He didn't try to but his slightest elevation in tone brought humour and grace to the conversation. "Please, remind me of another moment that I made a fool of myself."
Contrasting the wide, concerned eyes that Misty had once had when she wondered what was going on with her middle child; they then fell a lot thinner as she didn't have a clue of what Justin was going with. She hoped that like he took to most things, it would work out in the end!
James felt similarly in his bewilderment at what was going on. Was it some sort of game? Was it some sort of trick question?
At least his cheeks didn't feel so hot. Instead, his brow felt the pressure of knotting together as he didn't understand what was going on.
"You never make a fool of yourself." He insisted in a doubtful sort of way, because he was clueless as to the reason of this question rather than being less than confident about his answer.
To stand taller if he was having a trick question laid about him, his hands slid out of his pockets and they hugged around his chest. Justin was equally as quick to respond as before and this time, he offered an extra word.
"Thank you." He started, his tone of course and expression not indicating whether he actually felt flattered or not. Time would go on to prove his meaning. Apparently he was one of the people who too needed time. "I embarrass myself plenty but you can't think of anything because you wouldn't dream of thinking that about someone else, do you get me? So it's the same for you too. Yeah?"
More often than not, especially when he was younger, James was so enamoured by anything that Justin had to say that he would've agreed with his advice straight off the bat. He had grown since then and though he still idolised him, it was the sort of idolisation that longed to go deeper rather than blindly following.
Misty saw this growth in the moment that her son shrugged and uttered his next response.
"I guess…" he started and all of us knew that Justin needed to try harder. It was lucky he rarely ran empty when it came to effort.
That time, Justin's arm did loosely wrap around the shoulders of the younger boy as he engaged with him and he hopped that their relationship would allow him to shrug him off if he became too suffocating.
"Trust me." He started again and the orange haired woman for once garnered this to be the turning point while she rubbed Layla's back and felt that she was in a turning point too, drifting off to sleep at long last. "You don't need to worry about what other people think because most of them, even the nicest of them, are too focused on themselves and what they've done to embarrass themselves to care about what you've done." Justin winked. James' cheeks were aflame for a new reason. "You just focus on being entirely you. That's all that your thoughts need to be focused on today."
And with that, once James had recovered from receiving a wink that was friendly enough but paired with a smile that apparently melted the hearts of whomever you were, he felt able to nod his head for real and actually listen to the advice that had been bestowed upon him.
And not only that, but absorb it too. What a rare thing! What a rare thing for a teenager to heed to the words of somebody else. But then again, it helped that it wasn't coming from a parent. And looking over at Misty, I knew that she was sharing the same things as me as Justin and James shared a moment, both of their arms wrapped around each other's shoulders at that point.
You would think that parents give the biggest advice, moulding their children into the people that they become but in truth, we are all a perfect concoction of everybody who has uttered words to us and pointed us in the right direction.
And though Misty wondered this as she watched on the scene, she thought about something else as she held Layla close and looked at Justin holding her son close, helping guiding him through life too as much as she did, and in his own unique way.
How ironic that they had both settled each other's children on that day! But she wouldn't change it for the world. While he didn't utter these words, I knew that they were true and they were more than true for the both of them.
They were always there for each other. And that was the type of quality that friendships were made of. They didn't necessarily need length of time and daily chats and ticking off activities. Were they there for you when you truly needed it?
Justin and Misty could always find each other. In troubling times. In moments of their own lyrics. And even embarrassing times too! They were birds of a feather in more ways than one. And destined to oversee each other's growth.
It was the kind of bond that was spoken with action rather than too many words. Yet thankfully, their wordlessness fuels a great many tales. That grows more and more in the spaces of my heart as time continues. Just as Justin and Misty do for me. And each other, too.
The End.
There you go! Thanks so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed :) I certainly loved getting to depict these two characters who individually and together are very close to my heart! I really do think they are very similar and they have a level of wordless understanding with each other where they don't need to crow about it all the time. Justin views Misty as a mentor and not that he knows it, but she feels the same way in return. It was interesting to tackle Justin's worries as a new father. Certainly very normal, and in time, thanks to people like Misty, he will understand the value of what he has to give :) Thanks again for reading and I will be back next Wednesday so see you then!
Amy signing out :P