Hello, it is Wednesday and I am back with a new chapter! I said it over on Letters That Changed Everything but it really feels like the longest month of not uploading. But I did what I set out to do plus some more so I'm pleased about that! I'll be honest with you, my new character of Sammy's brother and old Team Rocket friend Jorginho is really at the forefront of my mind and will be using him as a vessel to create what I want to create and say what I want to say :D So be prepared for lots of chapters focusing on him this year, getting to know him and his story and how he interacts with everyone! Of course, I'll accompany all of the uploads with tales of various characters too. This one, however, is a Jorginho one and is the second half of my other chapter called The One With The Display Of Love. I hope you enjoy! Like the first, it's nice and straight forward :)
In life there are no clear cuts. Sometimes there are no distinguishable endings, and it certainly takes quite the in-touch individual to feel the breeze of a new beginning in the air. This, however, is the next instalment of a story with which we are familiar. I suppose, the next part of the adventure was going to reveal itself eventually, wasn't it?
Like the fall making its way to us by a nip in the air after a satisfying summer, this little continuation deserves its own day in the sun. Because, after all, nothing shines as brightly as newfound love. And it deserves to be known by all. And shared.
Rather than anything else Jorginho had the desire to do on one particular day, he did the sensible thing by hopping back into his car and taking off before doing the not so sensible thing of speeding down the city roads towards another, rural area of Kanto and to where one of his friend's lived. He just couldn't help himself!
He possessed all the unbridled energy in the world. And that disposition of his still hadn't faltered after the drive. So, after he parked his car on the driveway and with a sassy click, locked the doors behind him and the keys disappeared into his pocket, he decided to allow that energy to buzz through him and to be shown on the outside.
His body surged him forward with joy as he reached for another pair of keys, unlocking the front door to a home that wasn't his, but one he was very much welcome to stop by at any time. His boots already making clacking noises on the wooden floor, he slammed the front door behind him, skipping along the hallway and calling out for someone, not just anyone, so they could share his joy with him.
Jorginho's beam glittered far more than any of the mirrors or light fixtures that hung off the walls and ceilings of the Morgan Household, heart pumping in his chest and causing his legs to take him round corners he barely had ever known existed.
"James? James, where are you? I have something I need to tell you!" he called out to every chamber of the Morgan Household and waited for someone to appear. For anyone to appear. For some reason it slipped him that barely approaching ten in the morning was still early for the creative types and maybe not everyone had arisen from their slumber. "Something amazing happened!" Or with quite so much vigour!
Jorginho continued to call out despite no clear response to him. He, however, registered that there were noises. Chatter. He heard various sounds from different parts of the house. But nobody started to respond to him and only him at first. So, he continued his way.
He sprinted down more of the halls. He passed Justin and Katie sitting cross legged in the living room and with a pile of flowers to be pressed spread between them, both then glancing at one and other thanks to the sudden presence of a booming man that was not Katie's grandfather.
He became a gust of wind through the kitchen, for once not stopping at the smell of Meowth standing over a boiling pot and with Jorgie and Johnny lounging appreciatively near him.
Jorginho prepared to make another circuit of the house, starting to feel his eyebrows knotting together at the lack of response and indeed, the lack of response from James who didn't seem to even be there.
"Can there at least be someone who-"
He wasn't given the opportunity to finish that sentence. Jorginho could not make it known that he wished for someone to at least pretend to care about him and whatever it was that filled him with merriment on that morning.
As he darted back into the main hallway all over again and by the front door, Jessie was just making her way back into the house, so she was able to stop Jorginho in his tracks, a confused hand cupping around the ball of his strong shoulder.
"Jeez, why did you burst in here and what's got you so frantic?" she wondered, not exactly a sense of annoyance in her own voice but complete and utter dismay at the disturbance. It was amazing that someone had stopped the movement of his feet! But then again, it was her husband in which he wished to speak with. "James is in the pool. He's over there with-"
Jorginho wouldn't find out who James was with until he found out for himself. Annoyance rummaging through his own organs became outdated and now that he had a solid person to celebrate with, he did not let that opportunity slip by.
Before Jessie knew it, she was stopped mid-sentence by not only Jorginho grabbing hold of her hips but by lifting her up around the waist, spinning her and celebrating with her. She was soon told what needed celebrating.
"I'm in love with Daisy and Daisy is in love with me!" Jorginho was the sun, allowing his truth to be known to everyone and apparently not just Daisy. Indeed, now that these words had been set free once, he had become beautifully addicted to them, and he wanted to shout them to anybody who wanted to hear of them.
Plonking Jessie down back on her trembling feet before he even had a chance to hear what she thought of them, Jorginho skidded off down the correct hallway and where he knew that the pool room was located and where he now knew James to be. He didn't care who joined him. He needed him to know his truth. He needed everybody to know!
Still buzzing like an insect, Jorginho continued his way, darting into the pool room and feeling even more fueled by the muggy air that hit him and the chlorine scent that engulfed his nostrils. He scurried along the tiles in his shoes, not caring about the pictured instructions that hung on the walls and warned against such a thing.
In the end, it was not just the heavy scent of the pool that stopped him in his tracks or the fact that his energy had ended abruptly. Jorginho accidentally collided with the chest of someone as he intended to dart right to where James was in the pool.
Somehow, this was able to cause him to change tracks as well, just like he had not been oblivious to Jessie using her hand to catch around the ball of his shoulder. Jorginho came face to face with Jordan. And the male with chlorine bleached locks instantly sloped his neck towards him, a squint in his right eye as he knew that he had heard some words about someone he very much knew.
"You love my daughter? And my daughter loves you?" Jordan questioned, not exactly harshly but his mouth moved as if he had a loose seed from breakfast in there and it took some effort to get his tongue around it and the words that he decided to speak.
Jorginho let out a torrent of wind from between his parted lips which went up against the humidity of the pool room. He couldn't focus on the sound of splashing and of James from the far end of the pool, not oblivious to the fact that he and Jordan were no longer the only other men in the room.
Not out of the intention to get into any sort of scuffle, Jorginho rid himself of the hot layer of his coat and dropped it down to the ground. He tried to skirt around Jordan but to no avail. In the end he had to look at him in the eye and square up to him.
Either way, for once, he was hesitant to get into any sort of debate with him.
"That's private, dude, and I was wishing to converse with James about it rather than you." He put forth, his mouth pressing into a straight mouthed smile and even did what he perceived to be the decent thing by patting Jordan on his shoulder before trying to move around him for good.
The irony of Jorginho only just crowing these words to anybody who cared enough to listen moments before to then only wanting to say them to James did not go unnoticed by Jordan. Additionally, the fact that James had successfully swum from one end of the pool to the other with a baby on his hip did not go unnoticed by either of them.
James didn't clamber out of the pool when he heard anything that he believed that he heard, nor did he allow his mouth to twitch into a smile. Instead, he felt whatever was brewing between Jorginho and Daisy's father and decided to dissipate it with a noticeably clear gesture towards Jordan when he turned over his shoulder to look at him for backup.
Jordan was encouraged towards the pool side and by James with a remarkably simple waggling motion of the finger, summoning him. Jorginho couldn't help but stand and watch, visibly impressed as one hand of his sought refuge on just the one of his hips and his entire stance tilted to just the one side, putting extra pressure on his leg.
How James got even Jordan to soften just like that was beyond him. He watched the previously looming male crane his spine, listening to what James had to say across the natural echo of the pool.
"Why don't you give us some space, huh, Jors?" James began, already anticipating the betrayed look that would slash across his face and quickly having a response to that. He ran a hand through his wet, flowing locks, other hand and his right hip still taken up by the bonnie baby clinging to his hip. "I'm sure Daisy will share with you anything that she wants to know when she is ready, yeah?"
For a rare occasion, Jordan did not try to function as if James' words were giving him any sort of support. Turning back over his broad shoulder at Jorginho, he showed off an expression of unrelenting doubt. As well as this, his eyes were closely drawn together, and his own hands had started to travel to his own hips.
However, the more that he glanced back at his best friend and the baby that giggled merrily back at him, he knew that he didn't exactly have much choice. It was James' house. It was James' pool. It was James' friend.
He tried to ignore the bitter flavor that encapsulated his tongue that was as lemony as the color of his hair. In the end, he just had to sit in the forced knowing that Daisy would indeed share things with him at some point so he would find out about them eventually.
Jordan straightened his spine and throwing the towel that had been around his hips and concealing his bathing shorts, over his shoulder instead, he pitter pattered on bare feet over to the other area of the pool, towards the changing room instead.
He didn't exactly collide his shoulder with Jorginho's as he left them to it, but he might as well have! Even so, he uttered these words, and they had a purpose:
"Be good." He calmly warned Jorginho, speaking the words that Jorginho often spoke to everyone by his way of a farewell but of course, given the context, they came out mightily differently.
You could've cut the sudden atmosphere with a knife. It was the kind of energy that caused even Layla on James' hip to die down her babbling and for James himself to raise his eyebrows towards his hairline. But then, his gaze travelled over towards Jorginho, filled with intrigue.
Then and there, a smile was already tugging at his lips. His meadow hued orbs glinted in a particular fashion. The atmosphere stopped being so able to be sliced. Jorginho remembered exactly how he had been feeling before and the absolute need to share anything and everything with somehow.
When James gave him a silent look, wordlessly telling him to share whatever it was that he wanted to share without making any of his own guesses, Jorginho didn't hesitate to bundle into that same energy all over again.
Somehow, he caught James and Layla off guard with the way that he made a sudden leap towards the pool.
"I told Daisy that I love her. I'm in love with Daisy!" he managed to whoop before his fully clothed body hit the pool, giving James only a couple of seconds to scramble for cover with Layla ahead of the two of them ending up too drenched.
A lot of splash-back occurred even so! Layla giggled as she waited for her uncle to reveal himself back to the world. He did so a couple of seconds later with a dripping face and locks in his eyes, needing to flip them back like a shaggy dog.
A grin soon enough appeared from Jorginho, undeterred by the pool water. His nose scrunched with celebration. And James acted like he was hearing things for the first time rather than his acute ears catching onto them before, hearing them from the moment that Jorginho had uttered them to his wife.
"Well, that is absolutely beautiful news." James congratulated and when Layla started to clamor to be in the presence of the broader male, Jorginho didn't hesitate to accept her and bob in and out of the water with her even though he was hardly dressed for that kind of occasion at all. "What prompted such an outpouring of love?"
Jorginho, despite what Daisy had been known to call him, was not foolish and certainly was not to the fact that James probably already knew, whether it was from hearing the words echoing around the house by his own vocal cords or it had been hearsay.
After all, Daisy was too in tune with her own feelings for her to only realize how she felt about Jorginho when he uttered these words to her first.
Nevertheless, he did not accuse his friend and he just listened to the congratulatory words escape from him, feeling the arm that tried to wrap around his broad shoulders as he continued holding Layla out in front of him, as mesmerized by the little girl that belonged to his brother as much as he was by the turn of events.
Because of this, he didn't hesitate to set the scene, telling James all about their morning together and the way that they had talked and talked and been so close to one and other and shared breakfast and wonderful conversation on the way to dropping her off at her office.
It was only when he had got through all of this and he had spoken from his heart in a different degree that he realized what James had been insinuating with these words, through a smile that had painted on his face with such gentle and natural care, subtle care.
"Oh, you remembered yesterday evening was date number three. That is the reason for the slight movement of your eyebrows." Jorginho observed, no longer holding Layla around the stomach in both hands and holding her against his hip while she kicked her little legs in the water, pretending to make a motion towards James and those eyebrows of his. He openly chuckled. "Well, a gentleman does not reveal anything." he began again, repeating words that he often heard from James and had done back in their Team Rocket days together. "Apart from that wonderful times were had, and I went to bed and woke up a very happy man."
James prepared to chuckle some more but funnily enough, any noises that he could've fully uttered were stifled by Layla reading the room well enough to let out her own giggles! Jorginho pulled her ever closer to her hip and planted a loving kiss right on her cheek.
One person, however, who would not join in on merry twinkles of the eyes and laughter erupting from throats was Jordan who had not entirely disappeared after all. And his presence was noticed by James again immediately at once when he heard his voice, realizing that he had just been standing behind the door.
Jorginho rolled his eyes upon seeing his wet feet revealed from the door that had good few inches cut off at the bottom to lead to the changing rooms, showing off this gesture rather than fear over anything that Jordan could do.
"I'm right here!" He exclaimed even though he had been asked to leave them to it. And showing no qualms over it, he revealed himself from behind the door all over again and padded back towards the pool side, standing there.
Somehow, he managed to keep all composure and not have a menacing smirk tugging up the corner of his mouth when Layla clamoured for him as soon as he stood there.
The child liked a change!
James resisted shaking his head at Jordan getting his own way and instead swum closer to Jorginho when he loitered against the side of the pool with Layla, flicking his hair out of his eyes and looking at him seriously.
They might have been against crude man talk but they liked to be honest with each other.
"You two make a very lovely couple." James complimented against what ran through his mind, and Jordan watched the way that his smile spread across his face immediately, very wide but not at all out of place. His shoulder practically nudged against his friends with his bare, tattoo etched one before he continued. "This is the first time you've felt like this, isn't it?"
Jordan and Jorginho might have loathed this being the case, but they were united in possessing stilted breath there and then. Feeling the sweet child still dangling around his hip, Jorginho knew that he needed to be honest and there was no reason not to be.
Even so, for a good couple of moments, his mind flashed through different scenes of his life as if he was selecting reels of an old film and James joined him, being around for enough of the beginning parts and the more recent to have mental images of his own filling his mind.
Even back when he was a younger in Team Rocket, it was undeniable the way that young women and men alike swooned towards him, happily falling victim to his happy go lucky charms and feeling utterly ecstatic and not to mention lucky when he showed them any attention in return.
He had never used any of them, that had never been his style. James knew of the sheer volume of people that he had been involved with, not naïve to the way that they darted out his dormitory door if James knocked on it in the morning. He would watch them go, flush faced and dazed but contented.
That hadn't exactly changed as he got older either, James didn't have to cast his mind all that far back to remember what he still sometimes found when he knocked on his door.
It was never right to settle down. Not with his work. Jorginho knew – as he said – fuck all about what it meant to be a real family. A real lover.
But then came Daisy. Then came Daisy. James knew how much things could change overnight. They had done for himself. And they had done for Jorginho.
This was evident from the way that he almost became the sheepish boy that he had never been, cherry red against the pool water that lapped against his chin while he paternally held Layla out of the way of getting it too near to her chubby little features.
Jorginho's eyelids sought each other's company. But he could not deny anything. In the end, he shook his head, breathing love out of his nostrils.
"I never thought I could feel this way about anybody. I've never let myself." He answered James honestly, showing no qualms about looking right into his eyes as he told him the truth. James simply couldn't help but become as puddly as some of those love interests of Jorginho's in return. He had been so lucky with his own love stories but still melted at anyone else's tales, the opposite of desensitized, and full of the joy of it all. "I should thank you. There would be no Daisy without you."
Drawn into the tale being told James was, it's true. However, no matter how involved he felt, he could not stop his head from twitching like a leaf in the fall waiting to fall from a tree and both of his eyes blinked together when he heard this as well as noticed the way Jorginho was looking back at him.
His eyebrows elevated and his one hand flattening over the entirety of his beard, his expression showed how new of a notion this was shared between them both but also, he meant each and every word.
Despite wanting to continually look over at his good friend to search for any joking or teasing that might've come after a brief moment of heart, James could feel Jordan's eyes blazing on him as well and for that, something was in him which made him take a bit of a risk, not just by bringing him into the conversation.
"I think you're thanking the wrong person." James said. If he had been wearing his own glasses like Jorginho had been while in the car with Daisy, then he surely would've taken a moment to adjust them on his face. And not because he was also then running the risk of making Jorginho think he was being shut down. "It's this one who helped make Daisy into the woman we all know and love."
Rather than feeling the slightest bit humbled at being engaged into the conversation after barging his way into the interaction moments before, Jordan focused heavily on seeing James' eyes unable to do anything other than continually shine even without his glasses.
Be that as it may, he was soon forced to look back again at the reason for the gentle warmth that had taken over James' cheeks as well as the smoothing gesture towards his own beard and the same person who was surely a reason for Daisy's own glow when that person spoke.
Jorginho didn't often hold his tongue. If he had words to say then he was going to say them, direct or otherwise.
Thankfully in this moment, he was direct in his softness.
"Daisy is a wonderful woman, and she has captured my heart." He turned his whole head over his shoulder to look at Jordan rather than just adjusting his eyes, his hand absentmindedly reaching to stroke Layla's cheek as if wondering what his partner was like at that same age. "You did a wonderful job raising her."
It was James' turn to feel his chin dipping into the lapping motions of the pool water but for a different reason. He could have done, but he didn't like to look between the two other guys there and then. It seemed too… not tense. It just seemed too raw. That was meant just for them.
But James felt Jordan looking over at him again. Once more he knew why. He realized he often relied on him for consolation and now that that subject was out in the open, he needed it more than anything. Of course, Jorginho knew the truth. And he also knew why it wasn't the obvious thing that someone should say to Jordan.
But he said it anyway. Why? As I look back in retrospect, even I don't know. I suppose, it was hard to believe that someone who kept so many people a part of her own being would ever disrespect her father like that by saying he had done nothing to craft her.
Besides, that would have been a lie.
James at last looked back over to Jordan from the second that he heard his voice rumbling, beginning to finally break into an answer of his own.
"I can take no credit for such a thing. Like all my daughters, Daisy does as Daisy pleases." He started, earning a fond, albeit approving nod from James who took Layla back off Jorginho when she reached out to him this time, coming full circle. No longer in charge of anybody else, Jorginho felt both his eyes and his ears listening to Jordan "She lets her heart wander to places she feels drawn to and I suppose I must approve." Jorginho couldn't focus on his heart missing a step at this possibility. Instead, he allowed it to hammer for a different reason. "You feel like racing?"
It was true to Jordan for him to change the subject as soon as matters of the heart got too vulnerable. That was him. But you couldn't expect him to get too deep with Jorginho too quickly, could you? James may have been there but there could be only one Williams to open themselves up to Jorginho at a time.
Jorginho's head recoiled backwards as he needed a minute to take this next bit in. James couldn't help but press a kiss to Layla's cheek just like her uncle had done and then he moved out of the way, already anticipating the response that was surely going to come.
Jorginho barely fully clambered out of the pool, and he was already nodding, wet hair of his sending droplets cascading everywhere.
"Of course, I do." He complied with ease, standing up on the pool side with Jordan and stripping down to his bare necessities before he realised that he must've misplaced something especially important to him during it all. His two fingers pressed against the bridge of his nose, feeling far more exposed with them not being there than anything else. "But wait. Do you see my glasses? They must've tumbled off the last time I dove in here."
And Jordan paused. His head slanted to the one side. For a rare occasion, he studied Jorginho's face with something other than entire distrust. It didn't occur to him that he had not been wearing them in the Morgan Household to begin with. It didn't occur to James either. Layla couldn't say anything even if she had realised the truth!
Jordan hesitated. And then, suddenly, with the reflexes of a land animal rather than one drawn to the heart of the sea, his hand shot against Jorginho's chest. Before Jorginho could steady himself or even gasp, he was plunged back into the water.
James' eyes widened with dismay while Jordan merely shrugged.
"Guess our race is who can find the glasses at the bottom of the pool first!" Jordan's shoulders extended up and down. And then leaving Layla cackling with laughter, he did the dive of a competitive swimmer, cutting into the water with far more grace than poor Jorginho had managed!
And with that, those two guys got down into business with their race so really, as you surely know, there was little point to it at all. Like the love confessions that had been put forth by both Daisy and Jorginho, his glasses had found a home against one of the seats of his car and they relinquished against the plush there, in the same manner that these two people were beginning to lean into love.
I might not have been a part of this story of theirs, but I would become a lot more involved as time went on. In the same way that when Daisy looked out of the window as they drove along and saw the invisible strings that connected her to her newfound love, my own life was intertwined with theirs.
It couldn't help but be. It was a love story that I would be overjoyed to be caught up in. It was one that bought lessons and trickiness and delving into layers of yourself that had never been known to be there and of course – joy. The kind of joy that made you shout from rooftops, just like Jorginho did.
In the end, isn't that what everybody wants? No matter what your age, you want the kind of companions surrounding your life that make you feel not only ageless but invincible. All these stories keep my heart pumping youthfully. Yes, despite all their twists! They never aged a hair upon my head. Only instead filling me with warmth that helped me fall asleep at night.
Jorginho finally found the person to not only help him sleep at night but to put a stop to those sudden starts in the morning that he had been experiencing for years. Jorginho found love after he found family. And in Daisy, he found it all.
Two happily ever afters for two very worthwhile people. I'm here to tell you that they happen not just in fairy tales. They just happen when you least expect it.
The End.
There you go! Thanks so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed :) I wrote this half and the first half all together and it was only when I was done that I decided to split it into two. I'm glad I did! Here you get a little taste of not only Jorginho's blossoming love for his future wife, Daisy, but also the role that both James and Jordan play in all of that. And certainly, the role that Jordan plays in Jorginho's life. More of that to come this month! Thanks again for reading and I will be back next Wednesday with another chapter so see you then :) Amy signing out!