December 16th 2022

Chapter 188
One of Ours

The end of their work and school days went in reverse to how they began. No matter who was watching him that day, Jamie would be brought out to office in late afternoon. He and Lucas would then go on and make the pickup rounds. Middle school, here was Maya. Elementary school, they got Ava and Elliott. And with Noah at the preschool, they had the full set and they could head home.

It had only been a few short days, but it was working well for everyone, no complaints, no pouting bees... Noah liked that he was one of the older kids now, him and his cousin out there, and like it had been back when he was home with his mother, his favorite part of the day would be when he got to swap stories with his big brother of how their days had gone. Elliott had plenty to tell him right back, and it was still very early in the year but so far he was loving kindergarten, and the way he talked about it, his little brothers both looked like they were eager to get there, too.

It wouldn't have been until next year before they found themselves seeing any of their kids through homework, but now with Ava among them, Lucas and Maya would jump in when called on by the fifth grader. It wasn't all the time... didn't even actually happen that often. On the whole, she would just sit up at her desk in her room and work through whatever she had to do on that day as soon as they got home, before dinner. If she didn't know something and couldn't find the answer on her own, which she usually could, then she would come and find one of them. When she was all done, she would show them, and her books would be back in her bag , ready for the next day.

From what they had seen and heard, there hadn't been too many problems for her at school itself. Before her family situation had ever changed, she'd been going around and doing her own thing, not caring that the other kids either didn't talk to her or were mean to her if they did. As she'd told Lucas once, she never rose to the challenge, so they'd get bored and leave her alone after a while.

Understandably, she couldn't say for sure how she would deal once they had this ammunition to use. In the past, they only had her lack of friends and her cleverness and maybe her hair to take digs at. What did they have now? Now they might pick on her TV 'job' with the ranch, as though she would have gotten a big head because she was locally recognized. They might have heard about how her mother had left through some parent or another relative, which would be just as much of a sore point to exploit, but then on top of that, her father... Where had he gone all of a sudden that she was living with the guy from the ranch and his family? How many stories they could spin out for that...

She was keeping it together... so far. It was the 'so far' that was the problem. She hadn't needed to use Maya's phone call promise, no, but she'd told her and Lucas both about those brief incidents she'd dealt with. It was new for her, sharing these instead of burying them, but she knew that they would listen, and she appreciated this very much. It made her feel better... but it didn't change the fact that she was struggling with her usual 'don't react' policy, more than ever. If this kept up, she would lose her cool, and they would have her, wouldn't let her go.

She already had so much on her plate, thinking of her father, wherever he was, and they didn't want that for her, but what could they do? They were thinking it over, the night of the 6th of September, after they'd gotten her off to bed, the last one up besides them at this hour. Maya was still putting finishing touches to Jamie's cake, which she had been making at home, not the bakery, because it felt right this being her son.

"Max's sister goes to the same school as he does, yeah?" Lucas thought aloud. Maya turned to him, blinking. "She'd be in the same year as Ava, wouldn't she?"

"She would be, yeah," Maya nodded, though for the rest, she wasn't actually sure. It seemed obvious that she would, but then maybe not, so… "Should I call and ask?" she wondered. They looked at the time. Their kids would be in bed, too. "I'll text Haruna."

When they'd gone up and gotten ready for bed, Maya and Lucas had been visited by a tadpole of a boy who wanted to get up and sleep with them that night. He wasn't having nightmares, no trouble sleeping... he just liked to sleep like that, snug between his mother and father. He wasn't the only one, enough so that it was getting to be a 50/50 shot whether the big bed would have any additional sleepers in it beyond the usual two. It was very much rarer for all three boys to have piled on, but it had definitely happened a few times. This time it was just Jamie though, and with his birthday in the morning, well, it was an easy choice, wasn't it?

"Hello… Hello, little babies... Hello..."

Lucas had been nearly awake before the sound of his son's voice made him crank one eye open. Maya was already awake, though she was doing her very best to not get noticed while Jamie sat there, flexing his big brother muscles, talking at her belly. Lucas' eyes met hers and they smiled to one another before he reached over and pulled the birthday boy into his arms. Jamie squealed with surprise but bounced back quick and turned to hug his father.

"Happy birthday, bud," Lucas told him. Jamie held up two fingers. "That's right, good job," he beamed.

"Daddy, I go?" he asked now, with a little nod of his head they knew to mean 'with you.'

"To the office?" Lucas asked, and Jamie nodded. "You don't want to spend the day with your grandmas?" Oh, that was a tough call, but a day with Dad won out, going by how he put his head down at his father's chest. "Alright, then, it's your birthday, you decide," he told him, looking over when he heard Maya snort. "Unless you want to go to school with your mom…" he asked their son, and she barely had time to make a face at Lucas that Jamie had already looked up and given an energetic response of…

"Yeah!" He was looking at her now, big goofy two-year-old smile on him, and she was just as powerless as Lucas had been.

"I think we could make that work," she told Jamie, and the boy came crawling across until he could be held in her arms now, guaranteeing that she would not seek to get out of bed or go anywhere for the next several minutes, not when she got to have some good tadpole cuddles as she wished her current youngest son a happy birthday. Jamie liked this just as much as she did and ended up falling back asleep.

As was custom, once they all got to gather downstairs for breakfast, it was birthday boy's choice on the menu. It was Thursday, and they would have the big family party over the weekend, and they would of course have a matching dinner that night complete with cake, but it was getting to be something for their family right here that the birthday breakfasts were kind of their favorite part. That morning now, sitting with all of them there, Maya, Lucas, Pappy Joe, Patty, Ava, Elliott, Noah, Jamie… even Simon and Jackson, unborn as they were but making themselves felt… It was the kind of gathering that, normal as it was for them on the day to day but made extraordinary because of the special occasion, just made them reflect on how fortunate they were, having the family they had… Nothing had happened the way they'd imagined it way back when, but it was what they'd wanted, and it was everything to them.

After breakfast, birthday or not, it was time to hit the road. Noah was dropped off at preschool and then it was on to the elementary school for two drop-offs, yes, but something else, too… they hoped.

Elliott and his two best friends had moved right along from the preschool to kindergarten together. It was still early to project the three of them going through the grades together, from this school on to the next one and the one after that, but right now for sure, if the choice were given to them, they would choose one another, forever.

So far, since the start of the year, the three families had not run into one another in the parking lot, mostly because their arrivals were usually staggered by anything from distance to departure times, but this morning at least two of them would be arriving at the same time. The Friars arrived first, and they waited at the minivan until the Farrells would come along.

They didn't have to wait too long. Elliott was helped from his seat, then Jamie, Ava hopping out after them, swinging her bag on to her back. And right before either Maya or Lucas had to decide if they were going to come up with some excuse to keep them all right here a few minutes longer or just tell the whole truth, Elliott pointed. He'd just spotted the Farrells' van. Ava knew Max by now – the boy and the girl, too – but she had never known of his sister… sort of. Once she saw them help her and her wheelchair out, she got a look to suggest she may never have spoken to this girl or known her as Elliott's friend's sister, but she had seen her before. They were both in the same grade, yes, but not once had they been in the same class. She's always been 'the girl in the wheelchair.'

She told Lucas and Maya all this quietly when they asked her. She was curious, couldn't help it now that there was this connection that turned her from some random fellow fifth grader to boy Max's sister. While Elliott dashed off to join his friend, Mr. and Mrs. Farrell approached the Friars along with their daughter.

"Hi, you must be Ava," the woman smiled, holding out her hand. "I'm Haruna Farrell."

"Hi," Ava replied, nodding as she shook her hand.

"You've met our son, and I think you've seen my husband before," Haruna pointed to the man. She had. Brian Farrell had previously come to drop off and pick up his son when Max had been at the house to play with the Friar boys while Ava was staying with them. "This is our daughter, Kelsey," Haruna indicated the girl who'd been following this exchange with curious eyes of her own and polite patience. Now that she'd been mentioned, she met her schoolmate's gaze and smiled. Ava smiled back and they first waved at each other before taking their cue from Mrs. Farrell and reaching to shake hands.

"Hi," they spoke and just as soon laughed for the synchronicity.

"We were just thinking last night how the two of you were at the same school, same grade," Maya started to explain and the girls both looked at her. "And Elliott and Max are already friends, and hanging out with each other, here, at our home and their home," she pointed to herself and Lucas and then to the Farrells. "So, we thought it might be a good idea to introduce the two of you."

"We're not in the same class," Ava reminded her.

"That can be changed though," Lucas told her, and her eyes said it all. It can? "Yeah, we checked," he nodded. "Only if you wanted to, of course." Ava looked at him, considering this, then turned to Kelsey like she wanted to make sure she was okay with this, too.

Right when the idea had come to them, both Maya and Lucas had been of a mind that Kelsey would react just as she did now. She was such a friendly and open young girl. They were sure that if they'd been in the same class at some point before now, this situation with the mean kids keeping others from befriending Ava would not have deterred Kelsey for a minute. This class swap didn't even feel like a gamble; it just made sense, and to see the way they talked to one another as they made their way toward the school, maybe they already thought the same thing, too.

Kelsey had seen the ranch segments, all of them but especially the ones from the past summer, where Ava had joined Lucas, not just seen but been interested and invested in them. She found them so informative, and she called up her favorite ones, which in turn got Ava to share other facts they hadn't included… When it came up in their conversation that Kelsey had been born and raised in Japan for the first six years of her life, it had turned the tables so that now Ava was the one listening intently. She was eager to hear any and all things she could want to share about this, and Kelsey happily obliged.

"Hey, we're here," Maya spoke up and the girls paused, like they'd forgotten they were at school. This was partly on the Friars and Farrells as well; none of them had been willing to interrupt the exchange, seeing how animated the eleven-year-olds were.

The boys were dropped off with the other kindergarteners, and then they took a trip to the office for Ava's class switch. It was already in progress from the calls Maya had made last night and this morning, so all they'd needed was Ava's word. They had that now, and they were happy to learn that she could officially count herself transferred to Kelsey's class, which sent two girls off with a renewed anticipation for the day's lessons. When they were left off and their parents headed out of the school, Kelsey was telling Ava about their teacher, who was supposed to be really nice and have these 'super nice glasses that look like turtle shells.'

Brian and Haruna thanked Maya and Lucas for the connection. Kelsey was in a somewhat similar situation, where even though she personally didn't seem to mind it, the other kids hadn't been too friendly with her, so she'd tend to go and do her own thing. Now, the two girls had each other, and if what they'd seen back there was any indication, they could have tended to not just one girl's underserved loneliness but two. They believed the same thing as the Friars had done, that there was strength in numbers. The mean kids would still be there, but with a friend by their side, Ava and Kelsey just might find the road ahead easier to navigate.

"Alright, listen up, Mr. Friar," Maya started as they split off from the Farrells. "Not you, him," she told Lucas with a grin as she poked their birthday tadpole's cheek, making him wriggle in his father's arms. "Are you going to be the Jamie who sits when he's supposed to or the one that runs around and pulls everything off the shelves today when we're in class? Huh? Birthday boy? What's it going to be?" she asked, laughing at the puzzled look he gave her. "You know what I'm talking about, don't you?" He smiled. "That's what I thought."

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners