by Cee, DW
“In short, she wants to be a housewife? She’ll give up med school for a chance to be barefoot and pregnant?” I blurted out those words and immediately regretted it. That’s exactly what every married woman in this backyard was or had been at one point in their lives. Uh-oh...!
Emily wasn’t even fazed at what I’d just said. “I think our Laney has a way of looking further into the future than most of us. She doesn’t want to start something now, or maybe not start something now, that she will regret later in life. She believes whatever she chooses to do, she’d like to do her absolute best and not have any regrets.”
“Then why film school?” I had to know.
“She also likes writing and she wants to try her hand at script writing. She figures she could do this at home while she’s ‘barefoot and pregnant.’” Emily mimicked me and caused a riot among all the Reids under thrity-five. “If you get to know her, Laney is insightful and deep. Very few things are left to chance with her, and whatever she does or feels, her whole heart goes into that very action. Why, you only need to see her with my kids to know that some man out there will be loved profoundly.”
With that sycophantic speech, Emily went back to caring for her kids, the mood got a lot livelier, but I didn’t understand my cousin any better. If I were her, I’d stay here, enroll in the best med school, become a doctor as quickly as possible, and work under her dad. How much easier could life get if your dad is the Chief at a major hospital? There’d be plenty of time to get married and have kids in her thirties. Not everyone was an Emily, who got married practically straight out of college, and popped out three kids in under two years. I shook my head in disapproval. No wonder we never got along. She so did not understand life!
June 3, 2013 Playing House
We started furniture gathering for our new home! Though the Davis boys weren’t closing on this property for another few weeks, we decided to make a checklist of what we already had, what we needed to purchase, and what we needed to fleece from Emily’s basement.
If you’ll all remember, Jake and Emily moved into my grandparents’ (that’s Jerry and Estelle Reid, not Roland and Estelle Ascot) home. This massive home came with tons of furniture. Our money-conscious Emily recycled a lot of furniture, but there are still a large number of pieces sitting in the gigantic basement. We decided to make an afternoon of rummaging through all this furniture, rather than spending unnecessary money.
“How you feeling, Emily?” Max went and gave her a generous hug and kiss on the cheek.
“Too close to her lips, Davis. Stick to the head, or hand,” Jake warned while carrying a sleeping Ellie.
Just to annoy him, Max gave Emily a quick peck on her lips, which surprised us all. Emily giggled, Max gave a rascally chuckle, but Jake and I didn’t know how to react to this school-boy prank.
“If scowls could talk,” Max said while pulling my hand in his. “You’ve got a sleeping baby in your arms. You don’t want to wake her with your scowl.”
Jake’s scowl became even more pronounced. I think I followed suit as Max laughed and took me downstairs.
“What was that?” I know I mentioned earlier that I didn’t have bouts of petty jealousy anymore but kissing another woman on the lips??? Nuh-uh! Stuff like that is not all right in my book.
“GEM...” he crooned and started making out with me in the corner of the basement. “You can’t possibly be upset with that millisecond of a kiss to a mother of three. Why it’s no different than me kissing your Gram on the lips. Consider it familial,” he chuckled again, and proceeded to feel me up under my dress.
I considered arguing with him. I considered telling him that he did NOT date my grandmother for four years. I considered telling him he may not kiss any female Reids on the lips, ever! But once his finger started gliding in places it shouldn’t be gliding in and out of, when my brother could walk in on us at any moment, all considerations were forgotten. The rhythm of his thumb brushing over, in combination with his middle finger gliding in and out of, and his mouth grazing me up and down my neck, I literally bit my lips to keep from moaning the house down.
“Shh,” he whispered, “you’ll wake the baby.”
“Damn you,” I uttered somehow. “Why here? Why now?”
“You still upset about that little kiss? You want me to stop so we can talk about it?” The jerk did stop and briefly shot a deadpan look, then smiled wickedly. “I didn’t think so,” he added and continued his torment.
The nearing sounds of Emily and Jake, and the fear of being caught forced the both of us into a frenzy and I dug my nails into the antique chair as he dug his middle AND his index fingers inside...and out. It was so close...I was so close...I moaned into his mouth and literally saw shooting stars, a full moon, an entire freakin’ galaxy when my eyeballs rolled over. There was a point where I’d thought I’d stopped breathing.
“HUH!” I let out a loud breath.
“Enough? Or shall I continue?” He asked in an almost lazy drawl.
I realized our position had not changed and his fingers stayed right where they were five seconds ago, only it was gentler.
“I think that’s enough for now. We can continue later, in the privacy of a bedroom....unless you need finishing up?”
“Let’s do what we came here to do, then retire for the night.”
“Mmmm...let’s...” I was still basking in the afterglow.
Furniture “shopping” was successful but took longer to finish than expected. We picked out all the pieces we liked and needed, measured some of the questionably big pieces to check against the rooms in the house, and wrote up the pieces we still needed to purchase.
“Let’s sneak out before anyone catches us. I believe I need to pay someone back for a good deed performed earlier?”
“How about paying it back right here on this bed?”
“Are you insane? Let’s go before we get caught.”
We were almost to the kitchen door when the entire crew walked in.
“I’m glad you’re still here.”
“What’s up, Garret?”
“Escrow closed early, we got the keys and the go ahead to move in. If you’ve picked out your pieces, we’ll help you move right now.”
“Now?” I asked. But we have things to do!
“Josh is bringing a U-Haul over and Emily said we could use any of the furniture in the basement that we’d like. So, mark your pieces and let me and Josh go through the left-overs.”
Oh, all right! We can have sex later.
Everyone pitched in and we practically cleaned out Emily and Jake’s basement. Emily was salivating at the empty space and dreaming up plans for a craft / gift-wrapping room. What a life. Our entire home could fit into her basement, and she was portioning out a part of the basement for the crap that she keeps all over the house.
Since we hadn’t turned on the electricity, we called it a night after the sun went down, and Max refused our brothers’ invitation to have dinner with them. I saw him texting someone, then calling in for our favorite takeout. We stopped by Emily’s one more time, for reasons unknown to me, picked up dinner and surprisingly went back to the house.
“What are we doing back here?”
“We’re having our first meal and spending our first night here as a couple,” he said with excitement in his voice.
He brought in a huge duffel bag while I brought in the dinner, and we carefully went to our small four person dining table.
“Sit, while I get things together,” he suggested. Once Max got to unpacking, there were more candles than there was space on the table. All were lit throughout the dining room, a bottle of wine was opened, and dinner was out on table. This was insanely romantic! Max, me, candles everywhere, and feelings of contentment and love. It didn’t get much better than this. “To our new home, our new adventures, and our future,” he toasted.
To our future...
June 6, 2013 Life Uninterrupted
Guess whose birthday is coming up? Yours truly, if I may share that personal info. I’ll be turning twenty-eight years old in a few days, and I have to say that for the first time ever, I feel old. I feel like my life’s always been on a straight and narrow course, and I’ve walked that course without any hiccups. Once I got to college, I towed the line, never veering far from success. Good grades, law school, passed the bar on the first try, clerked for a big time judge, become a young partner in a big law firm...I wasn’t too far from my end goal.
Feeling older and a bit introspective today, I thought about what I wanted in life on a personal level. I’d achieved or was on my way to achieving my work goals, and personally, I guess I was quite successful relationship-wise as well. My parents and I were close, I adored my brothers, sister, niece and nephew—and of course they adored me back, and I had a phenomenal boyfriend. We were days away from completely setting up house and I couldn’t be happier with the way we were communicating.
In fact, life was so good with Max, I didn’t freak out when he told me that Hannah was also going on this “mission” to Mexico. I figured it was her right to do whatever she wanted to do. It was her life, her money...whatever! Of course it helped that she was going with the June group and not the July one that Max was going on. He he he! You knew there had to be a catch, didn’t you? I’m not that understanding. It’s not that I don’t trust Max; I just don’t want him spending any unnecessary amount of time with her. After that apartment hunting stunt she pulled on me, I have every reason to use caution.
“Jane, can I throw you a party for your birthday?” Even eight months pregnant, my dear sister cared enough to offer.
“Absolutely not!” Jake answered for me. “You are about to burst. You have active one-year-olds. You are giving birth in four weeks! You do not need to be throwing any more parties.”
“Oh Jake.” she poo poo’ed his edict. “I’m not an invalid. I can throw a small—or big—dinner party if Jane wants one. I think it’d be fun. We can invite...”
“No!” Like father like daughter, my brother sounded just like Ellie. “Mom can throw Jane a party if she wants one.”
“Um, hello??? Do I have a say here?”
“No!” was his retort.
No different than usual, I ignored my brother. “Thank you, Emily, but I don’t want a party. We might actually start living in the house on my birthday and celebrate it there.”
“How about a little dinner?” Emily then quickly added, “I’ll get everything catered and hire help to set up and clean up,” to appease her husband. “Once the baby comes, I won’t be able to do anything for months. All I’ll do is nurse and change three diapers,” she walked over to my brother and put her arms around him. This was the first time I’d seen Emily in action and she was quite the charmer. “Please, Honey? I love you and the kids and the home we’ve created, and I love sharing it with our friends and family. I hate the thought of not having friends and family over after the baby arrives.. Please, Jake? I’ll be really careful and get lots of help.” She had both arms around his waist and she formed her body into his, the best she could with that mountain of a belly. Of course my brother was a goner from the moment she touched him and asked to throw “a little dinner.”
“You promise to get help?” He asked so sweetly and so full of love.
“I promise!” She answered back in the same manner. “I love you,” she whispered and kissed him on the lips. When he tried to return her kiss, he was a step too late as she was already over by me demanding a guest list.
Jake only shook his head and said, “I’ll get the door,” when it was obvious that both Emily and I were oblivious to the fact that anyone had even rung the front door.
“Josh, what brings you by today?”
“Hi Emily,” he sounded a bit down. “I came to ask you for some advice.”
A downcast Josh was a really cute Josh. “No hello for me?”
“Hey Sis. What’s up?”
LOVED that moniker! “Emily and I are planning my birthday dinner. You wanna come?”
“Will Laney be there?”
“Um...no...she’s in London. I highly doubt that she’s going to make the ten-hour flight back just for my birthday. Maybe for Emily’s birthday, but not for mine.”
“I’ll consider it...” he moaned. He was in such the dumps that I didn’t even bother feeling offended by his “I’ll consider it.”
The kitchen door opened and in walked Donovan with two big bags again.
“Ellie! James!” Emily called. “Uncle Donovan is here. Time to go.”
“Where, might I ask, is Uncle Donovan taking the twins?” I could not believe Donovan was spending quality time with the twins.
“Since James likes Toy Story so much, I got the firm seats to the Arena for the Toy Story on Ice show.” James ran into the kitchen with his dad and my gorgeous nephew came dressed as Sheriff Woody with the yellow shirt, blue pants, cow-print vest, red neckerchief and all. Donovan pulled out of his bag, a cowboy hat, a brown plastic belt and holster, matching brown cowboy boots, and a sheriff’s badge.
“No g-u-n?” I spelled out.
“Negative, ma’am” Donovan answered in his lame wanna-be Buzz accent. “Where’s my Ellie?”
It was actually cute the way he was “fathering” these kids.
“Meeee!” Our adorable life-size Jessie came running into the kitchen in her Jessie replica button-down shirt, denim and “cow” pants and a brown belt with a huge plastic buckle. Emily had even tied back Ellie’s hair in a thin braid and held it together with a yellow tie, just like Jessie in the movie. Uncle Donovan completed this outfit with a red hat and brown boots. My niece made the most beautiful Jessie! I took lots of pictures of our life-sized toy story doll and sent them over to Max who was at the hospital.
“You’re taking these kids on your own?” I asked surprised.
“You want to come? We have two extra seats.” Donovan offered. “Ellie, James?” He called out to them and they looked over. “Should we take Auntie Jane to go see Woody and Buzz?”
James incessantly shook his head no and went from elation to fright and Ellie just yelled, “NO!” Damn these kids had a long memory. I thought kids forgot everything.
Donovan and Jake laughed. “I guess they don’t want you.” Donovan said and Jake agreed.
“Can Uncle Josh come with you?” Josh was brave to ask. This was a tough audience.
Both kids ignored Josh as though he didn’t exist and Ellie kept yelling, “Yund...yund...yund...,” while James kept point his finger up in the air.
“What the hell are they doing?” I quietly asked Emily.
“That’s Elizabeth’s way of mimicking Buzz when he says, ‘To infinity and beyond,’ and James is mimicking Buzz’s hand motion.”
What a crack-up. Watching kids all day wasn’t as boring as I thought.
“You going, too?”
“As a matter of fact, I’m not. You and Josh want to stay for dinner? Donovan and Jake are taking the kids.”
“Perfect. They’ll make a good-looking gay couple with two beautiful children.” I busted up as soon as I saw Donovan and Jake make that connection. “You know that’s what everyone will think. I suppose they’ll know that it was Jake’s sperm that created the babies. Then, does that make you the effeminate one, Mr. Pink Penguin polo-shirt man?”
Donovan looked at his pink metro shirt, casual white Tommy Bahama pants, and brown suede slip-on loafers and looked horrified. “Oh, hell no. Jane, you want to trade places with Jake?”
“Nope. I’m taking my sister and little Joshie here to dinner.”
Emily giggled. “You two will look adorable with my kids. Please take good care of them and bring them home at a decent hour.”
“Will do, my beloved.” He kissed his wife goodbye.
Josh lamented, “I need to learn to talk and act like your brother, Jane. Then maybe Laney will return my calls.”
“S
he hasn’t called you back at all?” I was surprised since I thought those two were getting along well.
“She called once when I wasn’t able to pick up and left me a brief, ‘all is good’ kind of message. I need some advice, Emily.”
“How can I help?”
“What can I do to catch Laney’s interest?”
“I don’t know, Josh. I think you might be better off letting Laney go,” she said in between nuzzling her kids and giving them their goodbyes.
“Why?” Josh asked, disgruntled.
“I talked to her this morning and it sounded like she was seeing someone.”
“What?” Donovan said loudly enough to make Ellie jump in his arms. “Sorry, Sweetie. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
