Hello, it is Wednesday and I am back with a new chapter! Slight apologies for the two James and Jorginho stories in a row but I remembered this story and how I always intended it to be one of the first few chapters uploaded of the two of them and to begin portraying the truth to their relationship - that there is a moment in time where they are more than just friends. This chapter definitely shows their closeness! It takes place when Lynne and Jordan go back to heaven and with Jessie away on business as well (she knows and supports the ins and outs too btw), Jorginho moves in to help James take care of his and Lynne's two children and they get even closer. In this chapter, you'll see that James' children really like Jorginho as well, even if they don't know the true nature of their relationship. He's another big kid as well :P I hope you enjoy!
Ages:
James: 48
Jorginho: 48
Jorgie: 9
Johnny: 6
They say you can't choose your family and that is true to some degree. James, on the other hand, had always felt as he had chosen his clan. From recognizing the kinship that he shared with Jessie and Meowth and seeing that they were bound by a force stronger than mere fate. Then, to everyone else that he welcomed into his life with open arms, knowing that the love he had for them all was a choice as well as many other things, and that's what caused paths to never veer too far off the map.
Jorginho felt similarly in many ways. But also in many different ways, he believed that you didn't always have much say in it. In the same way that you never knew when someone was going to stumble into your life, you also didn't know when they were going to take off and leave quite the gap.
Despite the two men's contrary beliefs, on one particular day, they were very much in alignment. They were both surprised, and even humbled at how quickly they had been able to construct a little family of some sorts of their own. It hadn't been ideal when Lynne got taken away from James – not in the slightest – but they had made do.
They had done well. Jorginho had taken to a friendly, paternal role naturally despite his initial stomach pains regarding it all.
But as it often can be, as soon as this thought fluttered into his mind, that notion was put to the test! With James clambering into the driver's seat of the other man's car, it was Jorginho's turn to get the children seated.
It was a simple task on paper. A daily occurrence. But he had grown to realize over the weeks that it was the most basic of tasks that could take the longest. And could take most of his inner strength and patience!
"Alright, you two. Bottoms in seats please." Jorginho addressed both of James' children, one hand hooking over his hip as his other rested itself on the roof of his own car, only needing to offer Jorgie a nod and a smile because she was getting herself seated with no problems. "Johnny, do you need help with your seatbelt?"
From sitting in the driver's seat and adjusting the rear-view mirror so he could see his two children in the back of the car even while driving, James predicted the inevitable. Perhaps Jorginho should have as well. But it had been such a lovely day. A day so enjoyable, in fact, that he had forgotten how difficult it had been to get the six-year-old boy seated for the journey at the start of their day.
Unlike how his sister was not only already poised in her car seat and had just finished clicking the seatbelt into the buckle, Johnny's feet were firmly planted on the floor mat down below his own seat.
He also didn't tone down his attitude because it was his dad's friend giving him instructions instead of his own father. In the same way he would have done regardless of who was trying to get him to sit still, his arms constricted tightly over his own chest and his head shook so vehemently that his curls wobbled from side to side.
Johnny Jinn did not need to stamp his foot to indicate that he was not going to sit down without a fight.
"I don't want to sit in the car for hours again! It will be boring!" he whined, the high pitch of his grumbles contrasting his steely display of his arms hugging his own chest and the frown lines he had practiced to perfection etching between his eyebrows.
Jorgie spoke of a sigh that was silent and merely shown by her slim shoulders briefly rising towards her earlobes. Before she could think about saying any words of her own – not that they would have been helpful at all – her and Johnny's father's voice sounded from in front of her and her brother.
James' voice intercepted any words that could have escaped from Jorginho's mouth as his lips had only just managed to part.
"At this time of day, we are going to be in the car for less than an hour, buddy." James reassured his son with a tone of voice like a breeze gracing a hot day and it made Jorginho for half a second stop looking at the two children and to try and catch his eye instead. "We can take a pause halfway through, no problem."
Instantly, Jorginho's moustache part of his facial hair twitched upwards upon hearing this, and he turned his attention back to Jorgie and Johnny. While the girl of the two nodded compliantly, Johnny's expression screwing up further made it obvious that, as far as he was concerned, it all was a massive problem.
Jorgie watched with her meadow hued eyes in the corners of her white sockets as Johnny Jinn implemented another of his many tactics. He saw his father as the enemy who was making him sit even though Jorginho was right there on the outside of the car, overseeing their actions and safety.
He decided to turn his attention to his father's friend, unable to polite the tone of his voice even though he was then asking a question. Asking a question instead of sitting.
"Can't you come in the middle and sit with us?" Johnny posed, his arms managing to unclench from his own torso even if he still didn't hop into his car seat. "At least that way it will be less boring."
Jorgie's eyes darted to her own lap while Jorginho gave the boy his full attention, his broad shoulders dropping further away from his ears. To tell you the truth, he was flattered that Johnny thought that him being squashed up between the two car seats would make the car journey a lot more stimulating for him. But that just wasn't possible.
And besides, his earth toned eyes darting for a split second towards Jorgie, he felt bad for her. He felt bad for her when she had to entertain her brother in the back, and he felt even worse that her efforts were seemingly not good enough to keep him occupied.
However, Jorginho being Jorginho, he tackled everything with a hint of jovialness. James watched him continually lean his palm on the top of his car roof from the outside while peering in closer to both of his children.
He let out a chuckle that was short and sharp, like the bark of a canine.
"Do you really think I'm fitting in here between you guys?" he queried, his hand finally sliding off the red roof of his car as his head drew backwards from the children, both hands rested on his hips and his right knee popped forward above the tarmac.
Despite her earlier quietness, Jorgie couldn't help but smile to herself upon hearing this as she reached for her book from the middle seat even though it became apparent that Jorginho would not be sitting there. James had a similar look as he glanced in the rear-view mirror and didn't even bother to yet put the key in the ignition.
He had the patience of a saint even if he had once been, in my mind, quite the sinner!
All three of them watched as Johnny reacted to the words decorated with sunshine that came from Jorginho. The six-year-old boy, however, was determined to stick to the shade. He might've hopped backwards into his own car seat for something to do but his mouth moved closer to his scrunched-up nose as he thought of his own words to say.
One of the many reasons he had protested getting in the car on the journey down to see Jorginho and Sammy's mother was because they had taken his car instead of his father's family car.
"Yeah, why is it that you have such a silly, girly car?" Johnny grunted, completely unaware of the look that he was receiving from the side of his sister's eyes after he used these playground tactics – as she believed them to be – when it came to Jorginho.
He had swiftly decided that both he and his dad were the enemy!
Jorginho's natural reaction upon hearing this would have been for the sunshine that usually resided in every part of him to concentrate all its energy to his mouth and burst into giggles. But he had learnt over the past few weeks of living with James and his children that sometimes he had to keep his reactions to himself.
Swallowing his amusement, Jorginho titled his head and peered towards James. With a second, the father was stepping in there and addressing his son, not only looking at him in the rear-view mirror but turning over his shoulder to show he was serious.
"Is that a very kind opinion to voice?" Asked James. Jorginho might have been able to suppress his laughter, but he wasn't able to stop his eyes from darting nearer to James, his moustache twitching upwards at the words that the father had chosen to use.
He really admired how James spoke to his children. It shouldn't have been a groundbreaking thing and certainly not worthy of applause, but he always addressed them like they were people. Of course, they were, but some parents didn't have the same opinion. James' own parents being some of them.
James didn't look at them as an extension of him either, or an extension of the woman that he loved. His children were his children. They were their own people. And if they came out with words he disagreed with, he did not punish. An open dialogue could always be had.
Jorginho could not imagine being a father. But if he ever had children, he would want to be the same kind of dad that James was.
Johnny Jinn was the age where James' way was irritating to him regardless. Jorginho supposed that it was proof how safe he felt with James how often it was that he argued back with him.
Johnny's sulky lips parted, and he countered his father's question.
"That doesn't answer my question." He muttered before ignoring him for Jorginho, so eager to take the opportunity to probe him that he did not notice that Jorginho was leaning into the car again and strapping him into his seat. "Why do you have a girly, red car?"
James turned back around in his own seat with a silent sigh as he was glad that Johnny had at least dropped the word silly from his question.
Johnny's seatbelt clicking into the buckle with a snap, Jorginho answered promptly with a voice like a welcomed firework filling the sky.
"Because I am a big girly girl!" he boomed with his eyebrows joining his hairline in a carefree manner, his own lips then pouting together in a different portrayal than the six-year-old boy's, each crater in his cheek appearing as he felt no qualms about sending himself up.
And it worked.
Johnny Jinn's expression had been so vinegary before but now it couldn't help but mirror Jorginho's natural nature, a smirk tugging his mouth closer to just one of his eyes. His blue eyes lighting up as they agreed on something, Johnny muttered to himself, confirming, that Jorginho indeed was a big girly girl.
James shook his head from side to side in the front seat and Jorgie did directly behind him in her own seat, open book resting on her lap. Jorginho was about to shut the door on the children's side with a more even smile on his face that lacked any cockiness at being the one to penetrate Johnny's sulky attitude at least a little bit.
It was lucky that Jorginho did not celebrate. Before he could even think about properly shutting the door with a slam, Johnny looked down and realized that he had been strapped into the car.
His hint of sunshine expression disappeared behind a dark cloud. He did kick his legs this time as he realized that he was getting trapped into the inevitable.
"Oh, I don't want to sit here for hours!" he complained, forgetting the words that James had reassured him with. "Why can't I just borrow your jetpack and hold onto the back of the car and get pulled along with you?"
Jorgie could not stifle her sigh this time and to stop herself from telling her little brother what she honestly thought, she brought her open book closer to her face and intended to get lost in the pages. At the same time, Jorginho could not reign his own disposition in either.
As soon as he heard the child's words – even though Johnny Jinn would now admit to only saying them to get a reaction – he could not stop his face from lighting up as if the nearing winter sun had projected all its energy into his features.
Jorginho did not know how to stop the natural warmth of his voice from causing it to rise in volume.
"It's funny that you should say that because-" Jorginho's finger came alive and waggled as he prepared to respond to the child. But he would not be given the chance.
For a rare occasion, James decided to be the one to raise his voice.
"Jorginho! Bottom in seat please!" James barked, causing Johnny and Jorgie in the back to look at each other as they wondered why their father was talking to his friend like that. After he turned around in his seat to apologize to them for being loud and Jorginho had left the children alone to get himself seated next to James, he whispered an apology to him too. "I'm sorry about that." He said while he leaned across Jorginho to strap him in for more reasons than to conceal his words from the children. "But if he finds out we did that when we were younger, I will never live it down."
Jorginho's brown eyes were naturally wide at the best of times, but they had become discs when James raised his voice towards him for a rare occasion. But once he heard the explanation and the apology, he understood. His expression was quick to soften, and he smiled at his friend.
He had quickly learned that Johnny didn't let go of an idea in his mind all that easily. So, like James had said, if he knew about their antics in their early twenties then he definitely would have been determined to experience the same kinds of things.
Not on James' watch!
He was a different father than he had been when Jorginho witnessed him raising the toddlers that were Jazmyn and Justin. Instead of pondering why, Jorginho just felt deeply lucky to be there for a second round.
"Can I at least drive us all home if you're going to make me stay in my seat?" Johnny wished to sound his own voice all over again to intercept the way that Jorginho and James were sharing a private look like they sometimes did as James finally put the key into the ignition.
Jorginho's mouth portrayed his chuckles even if his throat didn't allow them to sound as he tried to focus on looking out of the window instead of across at James. And James had absorbed some of his demeanor now that their arms were nearly touching each other's.
He decided to humor his son with words book ended by a breezy sigh.
"Oh, go on then." He answered to Jorginho's surprise and Jorgie's too. She rarely could concentrate on a book in the car with everyone else so she certainly couldn't after all of her brother's antics. Her eyes searched for her fathers in the rear-view mirror.
Johnny showed that him being seated was a fickle thing.
His body jerked him forward in his own seat with delight, holding onto the back of Jorginho's chair to steady himself.
"Really?" he beamed, his curls practically taking on a life of their own as, just like his older sister, he was unable to read his father's sarcasm.
Jorginho might have realized a couple of seconds later, but that did not stop him from continually filling his vision with James after he was met with clarity.
James' own moustache part of his beard quirked upwards as the key joined the ignition and he began to roll the vehicle out of the car park.
"Erm, no." he burst his son's bubble in a way that was so well delivered that even Johnny couldn't make himself do anything other than sink back into his seat in disappointment and pucker his lips closer to his scrunched nose all over again. "Let's get out of here before any more bright ideas are had."
James took one more glance in the rear-view mirror to which his son felt his gaze and gave him a single eyebrow twitching up towards his curly locks in response. He had no doubts that he could come up with plenty to keep conversation flowing throughout the journey!
But instead, as his father resumed concentrating on getting them home safely, he decided to copy his sister and occupy himself, reaching for one of his car toys in the compartment next to him.
As for Jorginho, while the car picked up speed and the engine hummed and his arm intermittently brushed against James' as his lounged on the arm rest and the other man drove, he finally looked away from his friend and focused on the road ahead with a smile on his face.
He usually wanted to be anywhere else other than where he currently was. His mind would ponder the next mission. Next experience. The next time he would wake up in a new person's bed.
Not anymore.
Those children and their company were everything to him. Tantrums and all. Impossible questions and beyond. He was glad to be around people that made him feel like he didn't need anything else. And he was even gladder that, thanks to all their patience and their infectious warmth, he was able to express all of this with more than just words.
He made a point to momentarily grab James' arm, turning back to him and intending to lean to whisper something just for him, just like he had done when he had been warned to not say anything in front of the children.
However, while James caught something in the rear-view mirror while driving, he did too. It seemed that guiding young children never had an ending! And it seemed that Johnny was quickly getting bored with doing his own thing, spinning his toy on his finger and doing tricks with it in the back of the car.
He saw the way that Jorgie had finally managed to get lost in her own book and was enjoying every single word and he admired that about her. But he could not express it with words. He could only express it with actions. They were, however, actions that were not welcome.
A paternal instinct lurched in a place inside of Jorginho that he did not know he had when Johnny tried to unclick his own seatbelt and clamber into the middle seat to be closer to his older sister.
Fortunately, Jorgie had a motherly instinct when it came to her little brother even though this had never been asked of her from either of her parents. She stepped in there in quite a way by holding her usually gentle hand out to him, stopping him from moving any further.
"You can't get out of your seat while daddy is driving." She instructed, her usually feather-light touch becoming a bird of its own right, preventing her little brother from doing what he really wanted to do. "And you can't disturb me just because you're bored." Both Jorginho and James' ears pricked up at this! "I'm sure you can entertain yourself."
Johnny had wanted nothing more to clamber close to his sister and lounge against her shoulder while she read, and he spun his toy on his finger. He had been able to make peace with being unable to do that. But as he watched her arm slowly retract itself from being close to him and prepared to resume getting lost in her book, he knew that he could not make peace with that.
That was like a stab in the heart! He wanted her attention even more than he wanted to get moving.
Out of the frustration of it all, his head pointed towards the ceiling of the car like he was about to start yelling and his feet twitched in his trainers, obviously preparing to kick and make his feelings known.
James had to keep his eyes on the road. Fortunately, his right-hand man was right there.
Jorginho turned around in his seat and tried to placate Johnny Jinn before things escalated further.
"What do you say we play a game of good old fashioned I-spy?" Jorginho suggested with enough self-awareness to make his fingers click as he knew it was a bit of a basic suggestion, but he figured it was a good enough tactic to at least distract Johnny. The boy let out a grunt. Jorginho started anyway. "I spy with my little eye, something beginning with…" he paused to focus himself and turn back around in his seat. "T."
Johnny Jinn blew out of his lips as if he was close to braying while his hair that was like a Bouffalant jiggled from side to side. He was about to open those pouty lips of his and tell Jorginho that he was being silly – as silly as his silly, little, red car - but he caught the man's gaze in the rear-view mirror, and he sent his own eyebrow quirking up towards his hairline.
Johnny mirrored this again in return.
Oh, it was on.
If he resisted, Jorginho could think that he wasn't smart enough to play. If Johnny Jinn played his cards right, he could end up showing them all!
It was, however, James who guessed first, drawing a breath into his lungs with relief that Jorginho had distracted his son enough not to leave muddy footprints at the back of his seat.
"Is it… trees?" James wondered, one hand wandering off the steering wheel to point to the glass of Jorginho's sunroof and where the car was getting one last look at all the images above before the sky darkened too much and everything became a blur.
Jorginho swung his head from side to side and told him nope. But he smiled at James once again, before he silently glanced over at him, confident that they would all take quite some time to get it.
For a rare occasion, Johnny Jinn swung his legs in his seat due to concentration and he took quite some time gathering an answer for Jorginho.
"Is it… toilets?" he asked. His expression pouched up all over again when the rest of the people in the car giggled because they thought that it was because he was trying to be funny. It turned out that Johnny had spotted something that even Jorginho had not and with his finger pointed out a mobile toilet strapped to the back of a van.
After apologies were uttered for brushing the six-year-old boy the wrong way, more guesses followed, both James and Johnny batting them out between them both as if they were caught in a tennis match.
Tyres? No. Trunks? No. Traffic? No.
It was quite a quiet time of the day to drive.
They had to switch to things inside of the car instead.
Trainers? No. Toys? No. Treats? No.
If they had any snacks, then Jorginho would be tucking in!
Jorginho, rather than getting impatient, was filled with glee the more that time passed, and no one could guess what his I-spy was. He folded his arms over his broad chest and uttered a low, close-mouthed chuckle, and he waited for either Johnny or James to get it or for them both to give up.
While Jorgie felt like she was welcome to play the game if she wanted to, at first, she had felt much more inclined to get a few chapters ahead in her book, so she had something extra to talk to her dad about at bedtime.
However, the longer that they got into their game, and no one could guess, she couldn't stop herself from not putting her book away entirely but from placing her book in her lap, beginning to trace over one of the illustrations in her story.
It didn't suddenly become clear to her because she had guessed Jorginho's I-spy from the get-go. She did not wish to be rude and interject. But she could see her father silently pondering and she could feel her brother's feet shaking next to her, telling her that he was about to get restless indeed.
Jorgie quietly leaned forward and stuck her head between the two seats in the front of the car.
And she made her guess.
"T for tattoos." She spoke. She and Jorginho ended up doing a private dance with each other as she leaned back in her chair while he turned around in his seat in the front of the car.
James' eyebrow quirked to his own darkening hairline and listened, peeping in the rear-view mirror while driving to see how his daughter was going to react if she was right.
She was right.
Jorginho made this perfectly obvious by the breath that tumbled out of his lips, his neck threatening to incline on the side.
"Yes." Jorginho whispered, for half a second his deep tone of voice snatched away by the awe that he felt towards the nine-year-old. Then his neck straightened and so did his spine, his mouth quirking wide at just one side and his eyes blinking behind his glasses. "How did you know?"
Johnny's mouth pressing into a firm line, he told himself that it was because he and their father had made so many guesses that she was aided by the process of elimination. Jorgie, continually tracing the story book on her lap, filled Jorginho in with the truth.
Her shoulders brushed the tips of her earlobes only once and for half a second.
"I saw your eyes drop to daddy's hand in the second before you said it began with T." Jorgie answered with one more shrug for good measure before not feeling the need to meet Jorginho's gaze any longer and so looked down at what she was doing with her finger.
Johnny somehow managed to swallow his grunt. He told himself that he would get it next time.
James, meanwhile, moving into another lane of the road couldn't help but press his own lips together in a different way to his son as his mind was filled with the image that Jorgie painted for the rest of the car.
Jorginho adjusted his thick black rimmed glasses on his face. He spoke words for Jorgie and Jorgie alone before turning back around in his seat ahead of getting too dizzy at facing backwards. Or dizzy at the child's observations!
"Wow." He showed his admiration in this simple way before he couldn't stop his hand from reaching out to where his eyes had accidentally dropped at the beginning of the game, his finger inadvertently copying the same motions as Jorgie and reaching out to touch the winged etching on James' hand that was for both his children in the back of the car. "Oh, she is good." Jorginho whispered under his breath for only him and James to hear.
James warmed from the inside out far more than if he was being complimented. Jorginho was right. Jorgie was good. And because she had succeeded in her guess, it was her turn to spy something and she swiftly decided on something that began with L.
The whole game started again. This time it was James, Jorginho and Johnny guessing, though he had lost a chunk of his motivation since his sister had won the approval of Jorginho instead of him. They started inside the car instead of outside this time.
Legs? No. Lenses? No. Luggage? No.
They couldn't see it. It had been thrown in the boot.
Jorginho suggested that it was time to take their guesses to outside of the car.
Leaves? No. Lights? No. Lake?
No, that had been a pond that Johnny Jinn had spotted.
Two minutes passed. Then five. Then ten movements of the clock hand in the car twitched the big hand forward. Somehow, they were all even more stumped than when Jorginho started the game!
None of them wanted to and Johnny Jinn really didn't want to, but in the end, they all gave up. Of course, it was Johnny who protested the most when Jorgie clued them all in.
He practically tumbled out of his own seat when he heard what his sister said. He thought it was nonsense!
"Love? Love?! You can't see love, Jorgie!" his bottom suddenly had a life of its own as he buzzed around in his seat, taken aback by his sister's suggestion even though perhaps he should not have been. "That is the silliest thing I've ever heard!"
Peering in the rear-view mirror, James was quick to see the heat that usually gave his daughter her lovely orange hair had melted into her cheeks and offered her quite the mottled hue. Nevertheless, before he could open his mouth to encourage his son to speak kindlier to her, she defended her stance with that heat making its way to her throat.
She used her embarrassment to fuel herself.
"Yes, you can." She insisted, not needing to raise her voice in the way that her brother had been doing to get her point across. Her feet twiddled in her own trainers. "You can feel it. And you can see it everywhere. That's why I chose it."
Johnny scoffed so vehemently that he started coughing like he had swallowed a fly! While Jorgie gulped her own blush back after feeling glad that she had at least defended herself, Jorginho made up for the actions that James wished that he could do while he had to keep his eyes on the road.
After turning around in his seat and giving Johnny his own water bottle to help him catch his breath, he offered Jorgie a nod of the head but not a smile because he did not wish to warm her cheeks further. He did not wish to single her out, nor did he wish to make her feel foolish with his flattery.
But he had to tell her the truth.
"I liked your suggestion, Jorgie. I never would have guessed it." He told her, James unable to resist taking his eyes off the road for a split second to glance to his side at the way that Jorginho sounded closer to his native tongue as he addressed his daughter. "You're a very smart kid."
Jorgie did not muster up a smile seeing as Jorginho's mouth had not twinkled one towards her, only his eyes had done that. Be that as it may, she copied his nod and settled herself more securely back into her sit and picked up her book once again.
She intended not to get distracted again for the rest of the car journey.
As well as quenching Johnny's tickly cough, Jorginho's water had seemed to cool his attitude and he did not mock his older sister further now that he could speak once more. Barging forward in his chair all over again, however, he wished to make a suggestion.
He did not suggest another letter to spy on. He had another idea. Another game in mind. This one was quite infamous out of the mouth of Johnny Jinn, and Jorginho had gotten to know it very well!
"Who do you think would win in a fight between me and Jorginho?" he asked the car, his voice rising with child-like innocence to contrast the question that he was asking. James peeked at his son in the rear-view mirror and cleared his throat like he was the one with the sudden tickle.
Jorginho, unfazed by the sudden question, burst into giggles. He might have since turned back around in his seat, but he peeked at the six-year-old boy in James' mirror and shook his head, the slight pink hue of his cheeks speaking of how tickled he was that he liked to ask that sort of thing.
He didn't know how James had produced a child so unlike himself!
"I wouldn't get into a fight with you, you're a little boy." Jorginho answered through amusement, his brown eyes reflecting the last of the daylight but not just because of the laughter that longed to continue to escape from him. "I don't like to fight anybody. Not really." Jorginho fought through the urge that erupted through him and caused his arms to stretch behind his head.
Now that the car had reached some red lights, James was able to be a bit more mobile than he had been while driving and he certainly had more of his attention span to offer. Turning to his side and watching the way that Jorginho was stretching and speaking words through a yawn, he couldn't help but address him as if he was one of the children.
James' finger shot out and momentarily brushed under Jorginho's chin.
"Are you tired over there?" he asked, his voice rising a few notches in pitch above his usual uninflected tone, turning back with a smirk to check the lights hadn't changed color while Jorginho sheepishly dropped his arms back down but snuggled his back against the seat of the car.
He had always been used to doing a lot of his own driving. It was nice that he and James took turns now that they were living together.
Jorginho made sure to speak back to James before Johnny inevitably piped up with another question.
"I am, actually." He confessed, resting his elbow this time against the arm rest between the two front seats and cupping his own chin with his fingers now that James' hand had joined the other one on the steering wheel. The light of the sunset flashed across his eyes in this moment. "But happy tired. It was a lovely day."
Jorgie, who felt a great deal of fondness and kinship for Jorginho though her brother's energy took up most of the interactions of the day, couldn't stop herself from speaking words in agreement even if she had been following different words on a page with her finger.
"It was a lovely day." She agreed before resuming what she had been doing, not looking up once.
The car rumbled all around them again as the light switched from red to amber and James anticipated it inevitably switching to green. In the meantime, Jorginho found his voice all over again even though he was suppressing another yawn.
"Mhmm." He mumbled before feeling his head lulling and knowing that he had to do something about it. A sleepy squint taking over his gaze, he turned around in his seat one last time to address his children. His face grew rosy with more than just the sunset which had streaked across his vision. "I'm just going to rest my head on your dad's shoulder, okay guys?" he checked in with the two children. "I need to shut my eyes for five minutes."
He didn't check whether James was welcoming of it or not. It seemed that the green light that also winked into the car gave the permission. In return, Johnny Jinn looked over at his sister, but she didn't look over at him. She was already absorbed in the world tucked between all those pages.
Instead of being miffed at the lack of response, Johnny continued with his face portraying exactly what it wished to portray.
For half a second, he stared at Jorginho like he had two heads!
"Why are you checking that it's okay with us?" he wondered, not bothering to say the words that Jorginho should check with their father instead because they were not the kind of words that he wished to say.
Johnny Jinn's lips pouched together out of habit as he tried to figure things out for himself. It was to no avail. It was lucky Jorginho had an answer for him.
He looked across at James just once before his shoulders shrugged closer to his ears and he mumbled in return.
"I don't know." He began. But it seemed that he did know. "I didn't want you guys thinking I was sad or something." He explained. And with that, he guessed that neither of the children had a problem with it – their father even less – so he settled back the right way in his seat with his cheek nestling against the shoulder of the other man.
His eyes did not yet flutter shut. And he was glad that this was the case when, after he felt Johnny Jinn's feet lightly kicking the back of his seat for a moment or two, he heard the words that he had chosen to mutter.
For a rare occasion, Johnny didn't have any arguing to do.
"You couldn't be sad." He muttered, lifting his own hand in the air and beginning to swirl a sprig of his curly hair with his finger. "You're with us."
And with that, Jorginho let out the softest of chuckles that also set free some weight in his shoulders that he did not know that he had been carrying with him. He felt James' shoulder dipping in response but still welcoming him all the same.
It was as Jorginho's eyelids relinquished into some shut eye that he found his words as well.
He agreed with the six-year-old boy.
"Well, that's true." He concurred before nuzzling against the shoulder of James a little more.
How opposite of somber he felt. How content he was. He did not need to keep his eyes on the road any longer. They were going home and that was the most important part. And James was taking the lead and that was the best part of it all.
He would probably go anywhere that he asked him to and with his children in tow. What Jorginho did not realize is that before the time came to go home, came the time to answer more questions.
Oh, how Johnny Jinn was full of them!
Jorginho's brow as his cheek formed a union with James' shoulder was only just beginning to soften as Johnny leaned forward in his seat all over again. In not much time at all, his child-like voice filled the car once more.
"Who would win in a fight," he commenced with an emotion tugging his mouth closer to his earlobe as he felt everyone's attention falling on him. Even Jorginho who had his eyes shut but the crow's feet near his eyes suggesting amusement that would later fully form like a flower budding. "Between Jorginho and Jessie?"
While Jorgie's feet pointed closer together as she remembered Jorginho saying that he didn't like to fight anyone, she waited for their father to remind her brother of exactly that. She was, however, left feeling the same way as when something went over her head between the pages of her story.
James instead couldn't stop his chest from letting out a breeze of dismay – lighthearted dismay – and took the time to look in the rear-view mirror at his son as he found himself lagging behind a particular slow car.
Jorginho's chuckles began to blossom even if his eyes still did not flutter open to witness the world around him.
"They've had many, many fights over the years and Jess won every single time." James told the children, feeling Johnny's body crane closer to the seat in front of him while Jorgie's continually pointed like a ballet dancer. "She could kick his ass anytime." He looked at the children rather than over at Jorginho because the apology was for their benefit. "Sorry."
Jorgie couldn't help but feel her feet relaxing at her father apologizing without hesitation and at the same time, Johnny drew backwards in his seat. As he made this motion as he settled, he seemed to deflate all the air out of his lungs like a balloon and James could tell that he was impressed.
Jorginho, on the other hand, could have been less than impressed! But he didn't react all that much apart from his initial chuckles and appeared to quieten down, his large head growing heavier on James' shoulder. His breathing beginning to draw out and deepen told him that tiredness really was getting the best of him.
But then he tried to one last time flutter his thick eyelashes open and he addressed Johnny Jinn before he felt asleep for good.
"How about we play our own, new little game, buddy?" he began in a lower tone than normal that still was able to be noted above the hum of the engine as James drove past the car that had previously been slowing them down. "Let's see who can keep their eyes closed the longest."
Jorgie's toes twitched in her trainers, but she held her book closer to her to not give anything away. James had to muffle his smirk but that was always difficult around Jorginho. Johnny Jinn's bottom twitched against his own seat.
Before long he was edging his face between the front two seats all over again. He might have been a curious chatter box, but he was not a naïve little boy.
That was probably why he asked so many questions.
"I'm not stupid. You're trying to get me to be quiet and go to sleep." He initially argued, catching a glimpse of Jorginho in his father's mirror and seeing the way that he didn't bother to deny this, instead showing a split second of his dimple before it concealed itself back against James' shoulder. Perhaps this made Johnny relinquish into his seat. "I can still beat you though."
And with that, Johnny leaned his curls against the headrest of his car seat and his eyelids shut, his spiky black eyelashes fanning out and twitching before they too relaxed along with the rest of his body.
He was sure determined to beat Jorginho!
James couldn't help but think that, although he was certain to give a good go at it, he would get bored soon enough and want to lean forward to look out of the windscreen or suggest some other kind of driving game.
But for the time being, he did not wish to hurry things along. In that moment, everything was okay. More than okay. Jorginho's weight was fully sinking into his shoulder as his breathing became even more spaced out and his expression grew far more hardened than it usually did while it was awake.
Perhaps he couldn't run away from his secret burdens when his eyes were closing.
But for the time being, that didn't matter either. James had Jorginho against him and the children in the back of the car and everything was okay. He knew exactly what he was doing and where he was going. Tomorrow didn't matter. It didn't exist. Worries did not need to present themselves.
For the time being, everything was wonderful.
He showed his contentment to be in the present moment when he smiled as he caught Jorgie's eye in the back seat as he pulled up behind a line of about twelve cars or so. Everything was quiet and so was his mind.
His heart, however, was loud. Loud for the people he loved, and he showed that by addressing his youngest daughter and not just because she was the only other person with her eyes open.
"Did you have a nice day today, my cherub?" James asked his daughter, taking a momentary glance to look at the wing etching on his hand before fixing his full attention on her behind his seat. "It seemed that you did."
During those times in all their lives, seeming to be okay didn't mean anything.
Jorgie had always been a child who felt things with the full depth of her soul and James had never scolded her for this, only reassured her that this was her strength. She had changed a lot since she was a little girl. She stopped asking so many questions like her brother continued to do.
Like their father, she was content in her own world and exploring things through play and poetry and books. She had quieted down as she got older and certainly since her mother had gone away. But that did not mean that she did not like to chat.
Jorgie's meadow green eyes lit up like the glitter font on the front page of her book as her father addressed her, not hesitating to nod her head and draw him into her world.
"It was a very nice day, Daddy." She told him before no longer needing to hold her book in her clasp anymore. Her book discarded on her lap; she couldn't help but reach to tuck a particularly curly strand of Johnny Jinn's hair away from his nose as his own breathing filled the silence. "I liked seeing Jorginho with his mother."
Seeing as his daughter had taken the time to be attentive and affectionate towards her little brother as well as being stuck in traffic, James didn't hold himself back from performing a similar gesture on Jorginho.
He brushed a lonesome strand of hair away from his own brow before lightly trailing his thumb down his broad nose.
It was along with his action that he found his answer.
"It was lovely, wasn't it?" James replied in a tone of voice quieter than usual, not bothering to correct his daughter's words and hoping that he did not do Jorginho a disservice because of it.
He was told that he had not because, although Jorginho responded to his touch with the corner of his mouth twitching a couple of times and the lightest scratch of his dimple appearing, it became obvious that he hadn't heard anything at all.
This was the kind of smile that he did in his sleep when he felt a fond touch, the rest of the world lost on him but the affection of someone clear as day no matter where his mind wandered.
James' thumb finally edged itself off the end of the round point of Jorginho's nose. And it was as his hand reluctantly moved back to the steering wheel that Jorgie had her own question for her father this time.
"Daddy?" she asked, getting done with fussing her brother long ago and now facing forward in her seat, her feet listless as they didn't bother to swing a few inches from the ground.
James' pulse slowly moved to his throat as it dawned on him how drawn out his focus had been on Jorginho. It was, however, easily moved back to his daughter and he searched for her gaze in the mirror again.
The traffic had not yet moved.
"Yes, my love?" he spoke, his left hand idle on the steering wheel while his right elbow was propped up against the edge of his window, that hand on the same side beginning to tousle through the hair that hung past his ears and towards his chin.
He was always glad whenever he decided to let his hair grow. It was not only a place for his loved ones to show their affection, but he had something to shield him, and something to fiddle with during times of discomfort.
This could have been one of them.
Jorgie could always pick up on the smallest of things.
"I like Jorginho." She announced, her two small hands resting on her knees rather than needing to find comfort on top of her then closed book.
James' eyebrows twitched just once closer to his hairline. He could feel his meadow eyes that he had bestowed upon his daughter absorbing the quality of a lake rather than rolling fields as he heard these words.
His eyes smiled more than his mouth did because the pointer finger of his right hand was then roaming over his mouth.
"I like him too, baby." James didn't stop himself from answering the truth. He did stop himself from saying several other things and because he did that, a silence ensued between the two people awake in the car.
James couldn't use his shoulder to turn himself closer to Jorginho even if had liked to. For a moment or two, he was stuck in one position, and he was stuck in his thoughts, feeling gladness for his daughter's words penetrating all the worries that were often simmering in his mind.
Of course, there had been a part of him that wanted his children to like Jorginho seeing as he had moved in with him to take care of them with him while Lynne and Jordan were far away, and Jessie was away – closer away but still away – to promote their shared business.
Be that as it may, he had never tried to set anything up. Jorginho had just been around to help James around the house so he could in turn focus more on his two little ones while they had only one parent for the time being.
Jorginho was hard to dislike, though, and James knew this more than anyone. He was so appreciative that both Jorgie and Johnny felt safe around him. To tell you the truth, he had felt this new feeling of protection ever since he had decided to support him through a challenging time.
James finally fought with Jorginho's weight to turn to look at his face for one second before his attention was captured by Jorgie once more.
"I feel like he hasn't filled the hole where Mommy used to be." Jorgie started again and she took James' breath along with his attention. He tried to straighten in his seat. But he could not do that and not just because of Jorginho. The lake in his eyes got the better of there as well as his throat. "But I think he's shone a light in the gap."
Oh, Jorgie. Oh, Jorgie.
How on earth had she known that he had been thinking of all their loss? And how did she draw out and spell out the words that he had been meaning to tell to Jorginho himself for the past couple of weeks?
Jorgie's toes in her trainers tapped together as, for all her contentedness that she had done the right thing by speaking her own mind, part of her feared that she should have kept quiet from the way that her father didn't answer her straight away.
He filled his vision with his lap, his finger roaming even faster over his mouth as if this would encourage words with the same gravity to appear on the tip of his tongue. He could never do that. And he could never hurry himself
Words would appear when they would appear.
And eventually, they did, and they formulated while Jorginho gently raised his own hand behind his head once more, this time not to stretch but to roam his fingers through the comfort of James' hair while he slept.
This touch binding them, made James realize that he had no profound words to say. But the truth had to be good enough.
"I think that too, baby." James told his daughter with his eyes rising back to look at her once more, his lower lip trembling now that he did not have his finger brushing right there as well as how truly he meant these words. "I think that too."
And with that, Jorgie drew a breath out of her that was only for her to hear, her ankles relaxing her feet downwards and her spine bedding into the car seat behind her. She looked away and so her father did too.
Because the traffic had begun to move, all James could do was look away from his daughter and veer away from their moment and continue driving them all home safe and sound. But with his two children behind him and Jorginho's cheek closer to his neck than his shoulder, of course his mind kept revisiting all that had been spoken instead of just driving towards their destination.
He kept revisiting a lot of other things too. And one of the main points was how devastated he was going to be when they all stopped being the little family they then were.
James knows better than anybody that nothing lasts forever. And he is a certified professional of letting things go when it is time to bid farewell to certain things in your life. To certain people.
He knew there would be a time when he had to set Jorginho free as well. They all would. Oh, how he would miss the weight of Jorginho pressing him down. No doubt would the weight of his absence choke him far more than the joy of watching him be loved by his children.
But for the time being, everything was as it should be. Everything was perfect in its imperfection. He was part of a family again. He was protected.
Jorginho often wore an armor so reflective and so heavy that it stopped allowing anybody to get too close. Now that armor was off, and he was reveling in true affection and that armor had been moved along to James.
However, instead of shrinking him, instead of closing him off, it was giving him everything that he needed to feel safe. To love without fear of getting hurt. To adore with the absence of a shadow of someone else's judgement.
I have no doubt that this is the reason that when James returned the encasement to him, it was changed for Jorginho too. Changed in the same way that Jorginho was changed by the love of having a family that he did not run away from.
It's true what they say, isn't it? To be loved is to be changed. Oh, how all three of them loved Jorginho.
The proof of that is the man that emerged on the other side of this moment in time.
The proof of that is within all the stories that are yet to come.
The End.
There you go, thanks so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed! :) I know I say this every week but I really did love reading through this one. I think it's often because there is such a gap between writing and actually uploading chapters (this one is nearly a year old!), they feel new to me and I can't remember all that happens so I feel like a reader of these stories myself in some ways. I think I was rewatching the BBC sitcom Outnumbered with my dad at the time of writing this and the younger two children of that show have always inspired Jorgie and Johnny - and the character of Ben definitely inspires Johnny's antics here :P Another inspiration of this chapter was I was in the back of the car with my mum and her partner in the front while we all drove back home from visiting my Nan. I just got to daydreaming much of this story and she could tell that's what I was doing and I'll just always remember how that car journey lead to this story :) Thanks again for reading and I'll be back again on Wednesday with more of this so see you then perhaps!
Amy signing out :3