March 10th 2025

Chapter 238
For Family, Forever

Their friends would tease them, saying how their kids were so dialed into "school brain," with their mother the teacher in the house, and on a day like this one, they had to say that they could see why. It was the morning before the first day back to school, and to look at all of them, one might have assumed the return was happening on that day and not the next. There had already been one round of school bag checks, and Ava was late to join the rest of the family at breakfast, on account of her having suddenly decided that her outfit was all wrong. The whole scene had been much too comical for her parents. It wasn't as though she never usually cared for clothing, but to hear her now, she had absolutely nothing to wear that was going to be good enough for her to be seen in public.

"Sweetpea, I know it's your first day of middle school, and that's a big deal," Maya told her daughter, pulling her into her arms. Ava didn't seem to agree, still sort of quaking with sartorial panic and resisting the affection for it. This had to be resolved immediately. "How about we check things out, you and me?" she told her, then off the eager nod she got back, "After breakfast. Your plate is going to be cold. And your brothers will eat everything in sight if we leave them alone too long."

"Fine," Ava sighed, even as she looked like she knew that her mother was probably right about the boys. "Did you guys make potatoes?"

"Your dad did, yeah," Maya confirmed once they started up the stairs, and the way Ava bolted up the rest of the way with haste, she must have had the same thought. The boys might go through their plates in the blink of an eye, but once that was over, any unattended breakfasts might be in trouble, the potatoes most likely to keep Elliott's attention until he couldn't help but reach over and swipe one chunk… and a second… and all of them if they didn't get there soon.

All plates were still good and hot and untouched when they walked into the kitchen, but then that wasn't so much due to any restraint as it was to the fact that no one sat around the table.

"Where'd they go?" Ava asked her mother.

"Good question. Guys?" No answer came, not from within, but after a moment, they heard voices, and barking, from out beyond the house, and they moved to the back door just as they could spy Lucas and the boys coming back. Jamie had what first looked like a bundle in his small arms and was recognized as a puppy, the closer they came.

"What just happened?" Maya asked as they all came through the door, talking over one another.

"I saw her, Mommy," Jamie looked up to her, then down to the puppy. It was small enough, frail-looking enough, to suggest it was all of days old, if they hadn't come upon the animal on the day one. "Back there, I saw her," he looked toward the door. He had likely been at his post, as usual, waiting for his great grandparents to come over from the small house.

"Is she okay?" Ava asked, kneeling before her brother to meet the tiny thing as her brothers and father had done outside.

"We might need to give her a bit of care to help her settle into things, but she should have a shot. What I'd like to know is how she ended up out there in the first place," Lucas frowned. He was doing his best to keep the mood light, but Maya was looking at him and she could see him with a shield at the ready for the newborn pup.

Seeing him with animals, whether they were theirs or not, there would still be this spirit present in him, the one that would have made him such a wonderful veterinarian if he had followed that path. Now with this tiny thing left in distress, that spirit was going to stick to him, making it impossible for him to leave this story alone until he knew that it would all be alright. Then again, going off the look he gave her, he was thinking as she was that there was little to no chance that this pup wouldn't come to call this place her home, not when all the kids were crowded around her as they were. And with Jamie holding her as he did, could they really split her from their Tadpole, days from his fourth birthday? They might have had the thinnest of chances if not for what he said next.

"It's okay, Elfy," he told the puppy, "My daddy is really good at this." Aaaand he named her…

"Elfy?" Lucas asked, getting down to eye level with the tiny blonde. He nodded, sharing a look with his big sister, who was smiling at him. It was the name of his favorite character in a book she'd read for him just a few months ago for the first time and had since been asked to repeat once, and a second time as of just the night before. It was almost as though they had predicted the arrival into their midst.

"She has hair like her," Ava guessed. "That's what made you think of her, isn't it?" That was it, precisely. "It suits her."

Breakfast became all about little Elfy, as Jamie would only let her go if they made her comfortable, and once she was set down, she was surrounded by the other Friar pets even as the children repeatedly turned to look at her, left their seats to go and check on her at the slightest sound she made… If they hadn't all been so sweet and cute about it, they might have been further encouraged to focus on their food while it was still warm. Anyway, it was Sunday, their last free day before the start of school… By the end of the meal, the kids were all sitting on the floor with the animals, Elfy back in Jamie's arms, where she appeared most at ease.

This could have easily become their entire day, just encircling the puppy with quiet love, but they did all have so much they wanted to do, and had to do… When they were reminded of this, they started to split off through the house, but they were never too far from where they could go ahead and check in on their new guest.

"Alright, come on, come on, down you go," Maya told Ava as they headed down the stairs toward her room. Both of them were bringing one of the twins along with them, as they had both trailed after them as soon as they'd started to walk away. Maya had been sure they would want to stay with the puppy, but with the way they sped up as soon as they were noticed, holding out their arms to be picked up, it was much easier to simply bring them along.

"There's nothing, Mom," Ava insisted, even as she went with an expert hold on baby brother Jack, who might have distracted her with the way he played and pulled at her ginger curls. "None of it feels right for this, I swear."

"We just went and got new clothes for school last week, so I find that hard to believe," Maya snorted. The noise pulled a tiny giggle out of Simon, and she kissed his little nose. That made him wriggle, but he stuck his face toward her again, so she'd do it all over again. Who was she to refuse him?

"I know," Ava quietly replied after placing Jack on his feet, his twin brother soon by his side, as he would want to be. Ava looked just on the edge of ashamed for her sudden frustration. Even after all this time, there could still be times where she fully remembered that they had taken her in and adopted her, fully continued to carry this concern that there could exist something in the world, big or miniscule, that could make them reconsider that choice.

"Hey…" Maya moved up to embrace her at this, and feeling her girl relax in her arms at this, she only wanted to keep on holding her. She kissed the top of her head before inciting her to look up and meet her eye. "What started all this?" Maya asked, and Ava frowned to herself.

"Kelsey and I were talking about how we were going to start in a brand new school, and we would get to start and end it, together…" The flash of a smile across her face transformed the word and, at the same time, presented the entire problem with Ava's recently augmented wardrobe. She wanted to make sure that she and her girlfriend had the perfect start to that important year.

"I told you how your Dad and I met out there?" Maya asked, brushing hair from her daughter's face. Ava nodded. She knew, and she loved the story. "It was my first day of school in Texas, and I was so not into it at first. I never wanted to leave New York, my friends… But I was still in a new school, and it was a fresh start, so I really didn't want to go in there and be seen the same way I'd been back in New York. I think I thought about what I would wear that first day about a thousand times on the drive out to Austin, and the days until I stepped in there for the first time." Ava nodded, recognizing that feeling very well. After a moment of silence, the whole thing cycling through her mind, she frowned and looked back to her mother.

"What does that have to do with Dad?" she asked. Maya smirked.

"Oh, day two? Going back there after I had met him? Even harder to decide," she confessed in a whisper. Ava looked both amazed and surprised. Had it really been that quick? "Hey, I didn't realize it until… months and months later, but it definitely happened."

"So, what does that mean?" Ava asked.

"It means… If you want us to go to the mall today, we will find your perfect look," Maya explained, then off her merry look, "One outfit, and once we walk back out of there with a bag, that's it. Deal?"

"Deal," Ava nodded, then, "Can Kelsey come?" Maya chuckled.

"Does she know what she's wearing?"

x

"Hey there, Chewie," Lucas gave a slightly exaggerated jolt at his son's appearance, the bounce of his curls as he moved into view prompting the nickname. "You alright?" he asked, noting the look in Noah's eyes, like something had spooked him out of nowhere. He hesitated to speak, pressing his lips together so tightly that they started to turn white. "Breathe," Lucas laughed and waved for him to come to his side of the table. Noah did as told on both counts, and Lucas put his arm around him. "Speak?"

"Dad, what if I can't do it?" he whispered.

"Do what?" Lucas asked.

"First grade," Noah revealed, and Lucas took a moment to bow his head so not to look as though he'd laugh.

"What makes you think that, huh?"

"I-I don't know. But it would be bad, yeah?"

"Noah," he sighed.

He wasn't going to dismiss his worries. Just because he knew that first grade wouldn't be so bad, and that he would have so much help on hand if he really thought it was all a lot, it wouldn't look that way to him, would it? He was just a little boy, and this was all new to him, and he was just glad to know that he felt at ease sharing things with him. He wanted to encourage that much in him, as in his siblings both younger and older.

"Tomorrow, you're going to have your first day, yeah?" he started, keeping the six-year-old close. "Over here, you have me and Mom, and Ava and the boys, and your great grandparents back there," he nodded toward the little house. "When you're at school, you're going to have your teacher, and your classmates. Now, they might not be as… fun as the rest of us," he tipped his head in confidence with his son, "But they'll be there with you every day when you're at school. If something starts to feel difficult, you've got us here, but you'll have them, too. It'll be kind of like last year, just with more listening… and learning… Some of it will probably be boring," he admitted, with a scrunch of his face that made Noah giggle. "But I'm sure you'll find something that will make you look forward to going every day."

"Like what?" Noah asked, intrigued.

"Well, knowing you, aside from reading…"

"I can do that," Noah sat up, suddenly emboldened, and Lucas smiled. He'd started there in hopes of making him feel better.

"Yeah, getting better and better," he nodded. "And you'll get to draw, and paint…" That was good, too. "And, well, there's gym class, and… music class?"

"Oh, yeah…" Noah blinked. He'd forgotten all about that, in all his worrying, but now he remembered, and above all the other things his father had told him, this would easily be the thing he hung onto the most.

Lucas had been seeing it in him over the last few months, the way music had become important to him, more than ever. Apart from his sister, none of the other children had shown this much of an interest the way he did, and it was one of his and Maya's most important rules that they should encourage their children's interests. When they reached all-consuming levels, there was nothing better to see than those happy faces bursting with excitement.

Once Noah had found his peace again and run off to play with the twins, outside with the rest of the boys and Pappy Joe and Patty, Lucas went and called Elliott into the house, so they might have a quick talk. He couldn't really blame him for what had come to pile up in his little brother's head, knowing he had done nothing more than share his own experience. He'd just finished his own run through the first grade and come out on the other side having loved his experience.

He was looking forward to the second grade, so he would have talked about the year before with excitement, yes, but detail most of all, the whole of it probably coming on like an overwhelming wave for Noah without Elliott's realizing. All he could do here was check in with him and discreetly lead his sprout of a firstborn to take extra good care of his younger brother the next day. He was always going to be there for Noah, as he had been from the moment they had presented the then eleven-month-old with his newborn brother.

"Could I do first grade again, Dad?" Elliott replied, and Lucas was at a loss for words there. That was not what he'd hoped to hear there.

"Again?" he asked, and Elliott nodded.

"I can be with Noah that time," he explained, such a proud smile on the seven-year-old's face that Lucas might have just hugged him for it.

"What about your friends? Max… and Max…" he nodded at one name and the other. "Wouldn't you want to stay with them? You guys were all so excited to go into second grade the other day, remember?" He might have forgotten that… just a little… And now that he remembered, he was brought to a very unfortunate fork in the road. "I happen to know that your old teacher is going to be Noah's teacher this year, and I know she can't have forgotten you," Lucas tapped his shoulder, and Elliott smiled. "She should know all about Noah already, and she'll be glad to have him now. Sometimes, you might even get to visit him."

There would probably still be this draw in him to want to stay with his little brother, even if it meant leaving his friends and doing first grade all over again, but luckily they wouldn't have to tell him they wouldn't have done it anyway, as he would stick to the second grade. As he would reason, they had already bought all his things, and got his books…

x

Thanks to the fine intervention of Kelsey Farrell, Ava had locked in her outfit for the next day's entrance into middle school, and it had been found right there in the Friars' basement instead of the mall. When she'd been called with the invitation to go shopping, she'd been driven over to the house by her mother. She was helped down into the basement, and about an hour later, Ava had called up the stairs, saying they were all good. She and Kelsey would hang out right where they were, now that she was there and all. Anyway, this would be their last opportunity to just do whatever they wanted before classes started.

While all this was happening, Maya had set herself to making cookies, the better to have enough for all the kids to bring with their lunches throughout the week. Had she purposefully allowed the sent to waft out and find Jamie so he'd come back inside and assist her? She would never confess or deny, but here he was, adjusting his apron after she'd put it on him. He had no sleeves that day, but he still had the reflex to reach up to check that there was nothing in the way.

She knew that they were far from being done with the whole preschool thing, with the twins still a couple of years from starting there, but something about having her third boy returning for his second year there was making her want to bake, to keep her hands busy. She could have picked up a sketchbook, a guitar, but in times like these, it was always the kitchen that called her, sugar and spices and chocolate… As her aunt Charlie would say, at the end, she got a treat.

"That's a huge cookie!" Jamie gasped when the baking sheet was pulled from the oven and he spotted the one that had been made of the last of the dough. His eyes were so big and eager, and Maya laughed. "It's big like my head, Mommy!"

"Are you sure?" she asked, miming like she was taking measures of his head and then the cookie. "Too big for you to eat?" she wondered. He shook his head. He was up to the task, he was confident. "Could split it with someone," she leaned against the counter to get closer to his eye level. "I might have a suggestion," she innocently shrugged. Jamie leaned in, ready to hear what she had in mind. "One piece for everyone. A family cookie," she whispered. He liked that idea. Maybe they'd make a fall tradition of it…

TO BE CONTINUED

See you next week! - mooners