Hello, it is Wednesday and I am back with a new chapter! I really can't believe that I wrote this one at the beginning of this year, it feels like it was much more recent than that. I remember writing it so vividly. This chapter happened in a rare moment where I got an idea and needed to write it straight away. It's a little shorter than usual, but it also covers a lot of ground. It's no secret that James and Jorginho share a lot of trust and emotional intimacy during Team Rocket, but that reforms in a whole new way when they rekindle their friendship after nearly twenty five years of not being in each other's lives. You can very much see their bond in this chapter, and it takes place when they are much older and Jorginho is dealing with trying to accept Jennifer into his life, who is his little brother's mother, and his mother, but he once had to pretend was his aunt. I hope you enjoy :)
Ages:
James: 48
Jorginho: 48
Disclaimer: I own the story and the OCs mentioned!
James didn't mean to frighten Jorginho but that is exactly what he did as he sat in the dull burning light of the bedroom, waiting for him to reappear from being in the bathroom. His dripping chest and shoulders flinched, speaking of his surprise before his mouth even had the chance to.
"Jesus, James!" he yelped, hand automatically resting in the middle of his own bare chest before realizing he had to act differently, holding onto the towel that was folded around his waist. He took a gasping breath before finding more words to say. "I thought I dropped you off home."
James' own palm rose to his forehead as he understood that he hadn't done a particularly good job at not frightening Jorginho even though he had put his bedside lamp on while he waited for him. He hadn't wanted to wait downstairs because that would have made him seem like more of an intruder!
Perhaps he already was. Ther was no escaping this fact.
He rose from sitting on the edge of the double bed, hand swooshing from his pulsing forehead to his own locks to soothe himself while Jorginho too tried to recover from the fright.
"I couldn't stop thinking." James blurted out, approaching the other man who was then confident enough in the security of his towel around his waist to raise both arms to try and tousle his own hair out of his eyes. "Thinking about…" James rethought which word to use. "Thinking about Jennifer, and-"
Although James had thoughtfully avoided saying the word mom, this wasn't the only thing that went unusually unnoticed by Jorginho. He was beginning to shake his damp head from side to side while excess air puffed out of his lips.
"Jesus, James." James heard those words again and they caused his hands to tumble down by his sides, beginning to spy the fellow man from an angle. It was Jorginho's turn to press a consoling hand against his own forehead. "I told you how it was going to be." He knew that his tone escaped harsher than he intended so he corrected his mistake as a thorny flush crept up from the base of his neck. "I couldn't handle anything else making the day more complicated."
He said complicated rather than awkward. In hindsight, I wonder if that was better for them both or worse.
Jorginho might have missed some queues from James, but James was as attentive as always, understanding what he was getting at in the little words that he did say. He addressed this straight away rather than being bitter and proving a point.
Since they were no longer in their twenties, nothing was ever a competition between the two of them.
"I know, and that's why I was overthinking the other thing. Not that thing." James sunk back towards the end of the bed, making it clear to Jorginho that he was staying. Jorginho didn't grunt or sigh or react in any way. He just had to listen. "I could tell you were upset when you dropped me home. I had to make sure that you were okay."
Jorginho's thumbs hooking back into the white material of his damp towel even though it was perfectly secure around him, he hesitantly looked over at James.
Oh, you have no idea, he thought about saying. But what was the use in that, really? As much as he applauded displays of emotion in others, he found it far more difficult to embrace within himself.
Certainly, regarding his past.
But for some reason, as if he was the shower head that had just been attempting to wash away his worries, the truth came flooding out of him. Well, a hint of the truth in a very Jorginho way.
"Can I at least get dressed first?" his body language and his voice sprang alive as if often did. As much as worry did drag him down from time to time, he was mostly a very vibrant fellow. His hands were on his hips as a display of humor then rather than insecurity.
Jorginho didn't specify what was to come next, but James had an idea. He knew that he could still change his mind. After all, he had always known that Jorginho preferred to listen to other people's woes rather than paint the picture of his own.
That was probably why he had so many friends, folk desperate to air their gripes!
James, however, for a rare occasion was quieted rather than warmed by the other man's louder display. He merely nodded his head and turned his body around on the bed to give Jorginho privacy and this left him cocking his eyebrow up towards his damp hairline at his choice.
But even so, he didn't want to make things weird by pointing out that if James was going to get all prudish on him then he should just leave the room. And he also wasn't sure how it would go down if he told James that he didn't need to turn away at all!
They both knew all that they had been through and the longevity of their bond. They both knew how to act adoringly. Even if lines did blur more than occasionally.
The next thing that James knew was that the mattress was shifting next to him and that he could turn his body back around again, no longer needing to send his gaze up towards the ceiling and twirl his hair around his finger for something to do.
He tried not to take his own turn to flinch as Jorginho was far too restless to get fully dressed after his shower, sitting back next to James in his pajama bottoms and nothing covering his torso. He hadn't even bothered to comb his hair.
He would regret that in the morning, James noticed to himself as he chewed upon his own bottom lip, knowing what happened to his growing hair length if he didn't try and tame his wavy curls. James, however, didn't say such a thing. And he didn't reach his hand out to remind him wordlessly either.
Some things were more important than others. More urgent.
Jorginho had urgency in those soft brown eyes of his as his palm found his way to his forehead a second occasion, admitting to the other man.
"My head is full of chaos right now." He began. This made James immediately recover from noticing his unwillingness to get fully changed and tilt his head on one side, listening earnestly. Jorginho looked down at his own lap. "I'm not sure it's worth you listening. I'm not sure I know how to say what I'm feeling."
James was the kind of person to be unable to relate to this. Sure, he had had several occasions in his life where things were too big, and things were changing too fast for him to be able to pin them down to a single conclusion.
But he had always been wonderful with expressing his feelings. Through talking. Through music. Through writing. Even through gesture.
He showed Jorginho of his prowess there and then with how he went ahead but he certainly did not brag. He knew everybody was different.
"Take your time." James told him, not knowing whether he should place his hand on his bare shoulder, so he instead placed his hand down on his arm right before it met his wrist. It was damp. But it was warm. And this gesture comforted Jorginho more than he could express. "Perhaps we can figure it out together."
Jorginho's pursed mouth slammed shut and for half a second, James worried whether it was what he had done or what he had chosen to say. But this wasn't the case. The truth was, he really doubted whether he could piece enough to together to say anything at all.
But then, he figured, this was the place to start. He just needed to open his mouth and tell James where he was at. Tell him anything. Even to admit that he felt nothing.
"Everything feels so overwhelming. There's too much and I don't know where to start." James' own mouth pursed with empathy as he heard this, his thumb beginning to occupy its sense with rolling around the bone in Jorginho's wrist as if it were the button to an arcade game. Jorginho was somehow undeterred. "I thought I wanted to fix things with… her." James had been right not to say the word mom. "But today made me realize how challenging that is going to be."
James weaned himself away from playing with the bone in Jorginho's wrists and bought his hands back towards himself at this admission. He had not been put off by what he was saying. He was not offended. He just knew how much this took for Jorginho to confess and wanted to give him space.
His right hand roaming to the back of his own neck where he could feel long locks of his own tumbling down, hiding all the tattoos and all the rings, James nodded his head slowly.
That day had been a lot, even for him. It was the first time that Jorginho had met up with his birth mother, Jennifer, and her husband, Peter, without his little brother, Sammy around for comfort. He had needed someone else to step in. That was why he asked James.
Truthfully, there was no one else he trusted more, and he could at least rely on James and Jennifer getting along well to have something else other than the sickness in his gut to focus on. But even that hadn't been enough to ignore how alienated he felt.
It's true, he did want to fix things with her. He did wish to get to know her again. But there was something stopping him.
James didn't address that elephant in the room straight away. He made another suggestion instead, inclining his neck over at Jorginho and fiddling with his fingers the lengthening strand of lavender that appeared in front of his face.
Jorginho wished he could find solace in doing that, but he felt far too nauseous with emotions at that point.
"Maybe you need to be honest with her and tell her that you found it hard." James suggested, immediately recognizing with meadow eyes that Jorginho's earth toned ones were darkening with disagreement. "You took a big step today. There's no shame in finding it challenging."
As James tried to comfort Jorginho with his words, it dawned on Jorginho that he didn't feel shame throughout the lunch that they had all taken together. Sure, he could feel that Peter was trying to manipulate that feeling within him from the passing comments that he made but he had imagined that he had been wearing his polished armor, so it didn't get through to him one bit.
Jorginho was not experiencing shame. His next words put a label on one of the things that was circling through his mind.
"I could not hurt her like that." He firmly stated, leaving James' eyes revealing whites like that of an egg around his irises at how his accent altered to more of his native tongue as he worked through his feelings. "I know she regrets the choices that she made." James fought hard to listen to the words rather than be fascinated by the other things that he was told. "I will not hurt her."
Those last words were the thing that got James' priorities straight. His eyes fluttered down to his own lap upon the realization that Jorginho was a deeply loyal son even if he had never really been allowed to be one.
That caused a twinge within his own heart. But this was an occasion to hide it. He could not make things about him. Even if he truly felt pain for all that he had been through – all that they all had been through.
James' suggestions did not quieten even if his voice sounded through thoughtful lips like he was trying to blow a sphere of dandelion fluff into the rest of the field.
"I think she would feel closer to you rather than mere pain." James said, already privy to the shake in Jorginho's eyes that would soon ricochet off his head. He would go on to continue all the same. "Sometimes, Jorginho, healing together is the way to truly heal."
James knew what he was talking about. Upon future reflection and when I was clued into this story, one thing that I do know is that I do know is that if anybody had the right to say these words then it was him.
He had had to heal many relationships in his life. Some that his own actions had severed into pieces. And others that he hadn't deserved to have to fix but had embarked on the journey of trying anyway. He had learned that healing together was the way to go. That hiding your pain from a person that you did want in your life was completely detrimental.
Jorginho would have to learn this on his own. If, of course, this was even a lesson for him to learn.
In that moment, it seemed, that James' words weren't cutting through to him in the right way. At least Jorginho felt able to be truthful about that.
His head finally begun to shake like a swaying branch in the wind.
"I am sorry, James." He began, and he started by speaking the other man's name back to him but hit him with words that probably would not feel as reassuring as James had been trying to do for him. "But in this instance, I don't think you know what you are talking about." James' head twitched. Fortunately, Jorginho's eyes spoke of no harm. In fact, they spoke in a way that made it a possibility that he had the right to speak to James in this way. "I mean, your mother…"
Jorginho trailed off. He may have had the nerve to speak that maternal name allowed when it came to one of James' parents, but he still didn't finish that sentence.
James, however, finished it for him. His head was nodding now that Jorginho's was no longer moving from side to side.
"Yours is nothing like mine. I understand." He put forth and Jorginho's head copied his motions, bobbing up and down while his hair slowly began to dry on its own into tamed curls. "But I still found it hard to bury the knowledge that I deserved to have a mother that was right for me and accept that it didn't have to get to me anymore because I had countless other people in my life who were right for me."
Jorginho's eyes had been so certain that James could not relate to him. And they hadn't forced themselves to be this way to prove any sort of point or keep them on the opposite side of the road to one and other.
Yet in that moment, they melted like chocolate on a summer's day.
Jorginho knew that there were so many things that he missed when he decided to turn his back on Jessie, James and Meowth when they quit Team Rocket. And among all the memories he wished he had been a part of and all the heartaches he wished he could have supported them all through, James finding peace with his parents was one he wished he had been around for.
He would have very much liked to have held his hand and embarked on that journey with him.
He just had to make peace with the fact that he could learn as much as he could in hindsight.
"How did you find the strength to be able to do that?" he asked. It was his turn to look down at James' wrist as it laid upon his own leg, and he thought about reaching for it in the way that he had done to him once before but then he decided against it.
He figured that James needed the space to think of this answer. If he even wanted to think of the answer. It surely still felt prickly for him, even if years had passed. Just like how he imagined it would always be for himself and Jennifer.
James' lips moved around on his mouth as he considered and then his left hand lifted, nudging near his eye as if he had glasses to adjust on his face. But he did not. It was nighttime. And he had left them behind at home in a hurry to make sure Jorginho was okay.
In the second before James found his voice, he let out a loud puff of air from his lips like he was a big bad creature wreaking havoc on unsuspecting swine's.
But he needed to do this to make room inside of his lungs for the truth.
"I just knew that if she was going to accept me for me in the way that I had been begging for her to do for years then I needed to lead by example and accept her for her. Faults and everything." James told Jorginho, looking over at him and concentrating on the way that his eyes reacted to what he was saying. They didn't leave his. "So, I told her exactly that."
Jorginho's eyes were snatched away then! But it was only because the more animated side of his personality took hold of him once again for a split second as if it were a puppeteer and he were the marionette doll.
He looked all around the room with eyes whiter than the paint of the skirting boards in his bedroom before back at James.
He was stifling a grin. An impressed grin. He knew what Johanna was like.
"And how did she take that?" he inquired, his eyes being unable to stop themselves from darting around the room all over again as he couldn't shake all the images that he had of James' mother, many through tales and just the once in person.
This was the woman who had put James down all his life. He was not stoic enough. He was too high pitched. He was too girly. Then he was a delinquent. A thief. A criminal. A man marrying below his status. Producing bastards. A cheat. A home wrecker. A lost cause.
At least he had the world's longest resume, James used to bravely joke!
This was the woman who pretended that she was deceased alongside her husband. This was the woman who used an open hand to shame her son well into his adulthood. This was the woman who turned a blind eye and tried to marry him off to a woman who felt no true love in her heart.
This was the woman who turned James into everything that he was, for good and for bad.
And he had stood up to her in such a way?
Yes, Jorginho really wished he had been around to see that.
James shrugged, trying to mimic some sort of grin but it resulted in quite the sheepish one, his own gaze darting around but because he still couldn't quite believe his cowardly self, had been courageous in any way.
"She took it." He sandwiched his words between two shrugs and then his hand roamed back through his hair for comfort, Jorginho's eyes back on him again and watching the way he sorted his parting out, so it settled a lot more evenly. "She bothers me a lot less these days."
James' eyes twitched just a small fraction up towards his hairline. I still wonder if he meant that she tried to get under his skin less or he had stopped allowing her to do so. Jorginho was clearly thinking of other things and, unlike how he couldn't muster up his own feelings at times, he knew what he wished to say about another person's situation.
His bare shoulder jerked closer to James' clothed one as he inclined his neck, telling the other man something.
"You don't see her." Jorginho added. He was trying to enhance the picture that James was already painting. But it also sounded like a statement.
It also seemed to back up his point from before that, despite that James had his own struggles with parental relations, he still did not have all the answers when it came to Jorginho and Jennifer.
Of course, he didn't. He never would. But that didn't stop him from seeing the wispiest of threads connecting his path to the man sat down with him.
James' gaze flickered from the drying shoulder that was near enough touching him to the face of the person next to him. He did not feel offended by the words. So, he did not act as such.
"I don't." he agreed, his voice as flat as the roads in which those two men would traipse together in their younger years but his eyes not dulling for a second even if they did look away. They looked towards the ceiling looking down on them both to gather his thoughts. "But I forgave her for the ways she screwed up my life and let her know the lessons I did take with me." He pushed a lose strand of hair out of his eyes before they settled on Jorginho again. "And I know you think I don't understand. But I really do think you should consider doing that too."
With a sharp intake of breath, Jorginho looked down at this lap and straightened his posture, so he wasn't leaning towards James for comfort quite so much. After the initial headrush of fear that he misspoke, James allowed logic to melt into him and he knew that Jorginho was just doing what he suggested.
He was considering.
Whether he went through with it or not was another matter.
James would also learn that the breeze of breath from the other man was for a different reason as well. Another bout of truth shot towards the forefront of Jorginho's mind.
James' patience modelled so gently had encouraged him to be able to speak it freely.
"But I have forgiven her." He said, and as these words formed, James couldn't help but see a flash of the little brown eyed boy that Jennifer had somehow placed into the care of others. That part of him would always be alive. A part of him would always feel rejected. "I know that she was only doing what she felt was right at the time. And she's a brilliant mother, she is to sweet Samuelito."
James held back the words of, and she could be a brilliant mother to you again if you let her. He didn't even know whether Jennifer wanted this second chance, let alone Jorginho. He instead chose other words carefully. He surprised himself at how promptly they were on the tip of his tongue but, then again, they weren't the longest of utterings.
"Then…?" James softly encouraged, meeting Jorginho's eyes and wondering that if he was so devoted to Jennifer in a weird way that he didn't want her to feel hurt and that he had forgiven her for their past then what was stopping him from moving things forward for them both.
He would be left knowing before Jorginho even found the words as his actions did the talking, suddenly leaning forward on the bed and his head in his hands. James knew that he wasn't crying. He didn't really do that when he was sad. When he was frustrated.
Crow's feet etched lines by his eyes with turmoil as he found as many words as he could, softly banging a feeble closed fist against his own forehead as if this could pluck more out of the depths of his heart.
"I think it's a bigger problem than just with me and my mother." He admitted, a haggard sigh escaping from him before that closed fists of his banged lightly against the center of his own bare chest as if that could soothe the melancholy beats of his heart. "I don't want to be like you are with Johanna… I want to get close to her but there's something…" Jorginho trailed off. His neck was flushing bright enough to see in the dull light, and he knew it and James knew it. But he couldn't swallow the heat back. "I just can't."
James knew what that was like. Once upon a time he had been stupidly in love with Jessie and wondered how on earth he would tell her – if he could tell her – if he should tell her or if their friendship would be shattered forever.
He had once wanted something so badly but just didn't know how to get it. He still didn't know how he had succeeded. Deep down, he knew that finding intimacy in his friendship with Jorginho back in Team Rocket had been vastly helpful, and then the closeness of a relationship wasn't too much of a leap.
It suddenly was slapping James in the face that for all his confidence and sturdy air about him, there was a huge part of Jorginho that was the same.
He wanted closeness with his blood family so badly but just didn't know where to begin. James wasn't self-centered enough to believe that he could help him like Jorginho had done for him.
Bit of a shame, really. I would be curious to know how things might have turned out if he took that uncharacteristic leap.
"Maybe you feel like you can't right now because everything is so new." James suggested, that hand of his finally breaking the distance with Jorginho again and finding it easier to rest his palm against the skin of his shoulder while he was leaning forward. Leaning away from him.
They both knew that James hadn't hit the nail on the head. Jorginho had confessed something a lot bigger than just his relationship with his mother. But then again, that relationship with the umbrella of everything else.
Not that either of them knew how to express it, but it was highly likely that if that bond at the top got patched up then all the other kinds of bonds that Jorginho longed to experience would fall into place.
Even though the elephant in the room was as clear as a nose on a face, Jorginho nodded his head. He sniffed violently and managed to sit further up.
"It feels like everything is coming at me at once and I just don't know which option to take." He agreed, sniffing again, and managing to look back over at James. He noticed that his eyelashes were blacker and spikier than usual but because no droplets of water clung to his eyelids, he didn't say anything. "I do want her in my life. More than anything."
It took courage to admit that. For a man who had once been a baby given up by his teenaged, widowed mother at the age of two years old, it was extremely complicated for him to admit that throughout all the hurt that he felt, he still wanted to try. For Jennifer. For Sammy. For himself.
If he really was honest, the biggest thing that he hankered after in life was the love of a mother. The maternal instincts and motherly touch had always been a great absence in his life. He could still have that. He could potentially still have that. It was just whether he was bold enough to take that risk and get to know a woman that deep down he wondered if was always meant to be out of his reach.
James felt deep tenderness in his heart for Jorginho because he could somehow fathom all this out from just one look at him. That emotion caused him to reach a hand out and brush out of his eyes an annoying curl that had formed into a loose ringlet.
And it was when that touch between the two men occurred, something hit him, and he knew he had to share.
"You can take it very slowly, you do realize that don't you?" he said, causing Jorginho's eyes to flutter over to him as his hands remained in his hair, longer than they needed to and with no more haywire strands that needed taming. "You don't have to leap into being mother and son straight away if that feels too much." That felt beside the point, Jorginho thought! But he held his tongue this time. Maybe it was the comforting hands. "Just see if you even like each other. See if you can get along as companions."
Jorginho was glad that he hadn't jumped the gun and told James exactly what he felt. Watching his hands fall out of his locks to give him space, Jorginho's masculine brow portrayed quite the frown as he considered, thinking it through and pondering in a far healthier way.
To tell you the truth, he hadn't considered that at all. He thought that because of the truth – that he and Jorginho were mother and son – and because they had decades of making up to do – that they had to dive into the truth straight away. That they had to be everything that they missed.
But James was making sense.
Jorginho might have thrown himself into the deep end straight away when he made eyes at somebody across the bar, but this was different than his emotionless flings. This was a relationship that he did want to build. One of the first that he had ever wanted to construct.
He wanted to get it right in the end, even if he didn't get it right in the beginning.
So, he was willing to try anything.
"Do you really think that would work?" Jorginho asked, those youthful eyes of his locking back onto him for reassurance now that he felt that he did have good advice to offer after all. He didn't realize it until he got what he wanted but his head had also begun to lean towards the other man.
He wanted comfort in that way once again.
Soon enough James hands were not only tracing through the drying strands of Jorginho's hair, but he was nodding his head and discovering words to say back to him.
"I think that anything that takes the pressure off you so that you feel comfortable enough to show Jennifer the wonderful person that is a part of her is worth doing." James told him. His eyes smiled before his mouth did but that was soon to come as well. "And I think that the both of you deserve to make peace with the past."
James hurriedly added in case the first part was too much for Jorginho. It was not. It was hard for anything to be too much for him, especially when it came from the right person.
As overwhelmed as he felt with the new situation that he was navigating, the hardships that he faced surrounding his relationship with his birth mother would never truly be too much for him. Sometimes Jorginho forgot that he didn't have to face anything alone. He had a number of people he could unload his problems onto.
It goes without saying that James was one of them. And it goes without saying too that Jorginho knew this from the question that he suddenly asked.
That was usually his way of dealing with things rather than talking!
"Do you think that I could have a hug?" he asked, his body not twitching in case it wasn't what James wanted but surely his insides wished to do exactly this.
Pushing his hair out of his eyes not that he needed to, James was on the brink of uttering the single word that he usually used when asked this question. But on that day – in that moment – the word sure felt indifferent.
There were better words to describe his compliance. After all, there wasn't really anything that he wouldn't do for him. And how brilliant that felt after the fight that had caused them not to speak to each other for more than twenty years.
James really did know what he was talking about, didn't he? He had not only managed to fix a friendship with Jorginho but nurture something even better.
They were the same side on the same coin rather than opposite sides on opposite coins.
"Of course." James answered him and at once, his arm was wrapping around the wide breath of his bare shoulders after taking the briefest of detours where Jorginho felt fingers skimming across the back of his neck.
James intended to pull him into the side of him and he did exactly that for the first couple of seconds, but Jorginho felt that he wanted more. Needed more. He had received the shock of his life when James had been waiting in his bedroom for him after his shower and for a split second, he wondered whether he even wanted him to be there or not, let alone how he felt about talking about his feelings.
Now, he didn't quite feel rejuvenated because the heart to heart had been a little draining. But there was some sort of feeling rushing through him that made him want to seize whatever flashed through his mind.
Jorginho didn't need space anymore and didn't want just a sideways hug. He showed that to James in not so many words by the way in which he nudged him with a solid bare shoulder and James in turn knew to follow suit and open his torso up for more of him.
Both of their arms were then wrapping around each other as Jorginho's leg in his towel was planted next to James' and he was buried against him, his strong arms holding him with such fervor that James had to put quite the effort in to match his strength!
But it was worth it. Jorginho loved a bear hug. And whatever made him feel not alone and consoled was worth it to him.
James' eyes fluttered shut and his chin was resting in the top of Jorginho's wavy curls, taking a sigh in through his nostrils as Jorginho's beard brushed against the skin of his neck. It made friction and then a bit of a mark when he decided to open his mouth to talk while so close to him.
"Thank you for being such a good listener." He told him. He didn't say any names. No nicknames or words from his native tongue floated out of him. But it was clear who he was talking to. It was clear who he meant. And it was clear how he felt.
James' arms gripped around his back tighter before one of his ring clad hands gently patted him in the middle of his shoulder blades. For some reason, he couldn't find the words to thank him in return. But fortunately, as he often did, he knew how he felt, and he also knew how to articulate it.
Jorginho felt his sentiment vibrating through his chin to his skull as he was spoken to in return.
"You're a pleasure to listen to. Always." He told him and then the chin moved away from the top of Jorginho's head. Another sigh was drawn in through James' nostrils and then a kiss was planted to the center of his hair, where he had tried to wash away all his worries with water but in the end, it was his oldest companion that had done that the most.
Jorginho relaxed into him more if that was at all possible. And he knew that this was one of the bonds in his life that he had to see through, had to see what it could be and couldn't allow the wounds of the past to sully.
Not again. He had done that once before. He was not going to make the same mistake twice. He wasn't going to let James go again. He should never have done the first time around, he felt.
Mirroring this intention, I'm not sure how long Jorginho's wrapped around James and I'm not sure how long they stayed like that. But what I do know and what I can report is that things between Jorginho and his mother didn't stay in the same way forever.
Following James' advice, Jorginho got to know Jennifer slowly first and then all at once. His bravery and his commitment to keeping hold of what he genuinely wanted in his life encouraged Jennifer to do the same no matter the cost. But that's another story.
These days, she does not fear the past. She does not fear judgement. She doesn't listen to what her husband says, and she listens even less to what he doesn't say! Jennifer sees Jorginho for who he was when she left him all those years ago. Jennifer sees Jorginho for all he always has been and who he always will be.
Her most precious gift.
There's something wonderful about a heart so hesitant. They are often filled with the truest version of love you could know. And I love these stories about the man known as Jorginho that I have had the privilege to know. Like everything he does, all his tales are touched with magic. They are touched with love.
And I cannot wait to touch on all of them.
The End.
There you go, thanks so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed! :) One thing that I absolutely cannot wait to do over the coming months is explore Jorginho's relationship with Jennifer even further. It's just so complicated and I love getting into that sort of thing! I've said before that Jorginho is a character very much a part of my heart and this chapter reminded me why that is very much the case. I just love delving into a character that on the surface is so merry and fun to be around actually has suffered quite a lot - and has a lot of depth to him. I think James is the perfect person to deal with that - to deal with Jorginho. He is no stranger to difficult times! This is the first chapter I've written where they are not in their twenties and it shows the full intimacy of their bond. But I have to tell you, it goes even deeper than this! And that's another thing I cannot wait to show you :D Thanks again for reading and I will be back again on Wednesday so see you then :)
Amy signing out!