Vibrations

I let my left hand find its way to the side of her face, letting my thumb slide against the smooth skin of her cheek. "Do you think I don't care? That it doesn't matter to me?"

Tears welled up in her eyes... "I know you care. That's what makes this so hard. That I fucking know you care, and yet you just keep bottling it up. And I know. I know that it's going to make you hate me... I just want you to blow up about it. Yell at me. Tell me I'm being a bad mother for yelling at our daughter. Break some shit. Put your hand through a wall, just don't keep pushing it down."

She stopped, and I could see her fighting with her emotions, trying to find the right words to let them out. Finally, she settled with, "Just don't start hating me... I..." she shook her head, "I couldn't take that. Not now. Not after I finally have you in my life just the way I want you..."

I raised her face so I could see her eyes, "You want me to punch you in the face?"

Her shoulders sagged, "Yes. Something... anything..."

I balled up my right fist and very gently set it against her jaw, "Hadouken..."

The tears fell from her eyes... "Please... don't joke about it... don't put it off like it's nothing..."

I pulled her in tight and hugged her, shaking my head... "See, it's a Street Fighter joke..."

She shook her head, "I know goofus... I used to play Street Fighter with you, remember?"

Kissing her neck, I nuzzled her face with my nose. "I'm upset. I want those years back, but I'm not getting them, no matter how angry I get. There's a part of me that does want to yell and scream." I pushed her back and put my hands on either side of her head, making her look at me, "But I want you more. I want Roo. I love you both, and I'm not going to do anything to lose another day with either of you. Do you hear me?"

She nodded, but I could tell I wasn't getting through to her...

I could feel her slipping away from me... I could feel her guilt starting to kill her love for me...

I wanted to cry. I wanted to beg for her to stop...

Instead I gave her head a good hard mini-shake. "Stop it. Snap out of it. You want me to hate you? Keep doing what you're doing. Keep fucking this up. Keep pushing me away from you, because if you do that, I will end up hating you."

Her eyes softened, and filled with tears again.

I shook my head at her, "Just love me, and let me love you... okay? It's not going to be easy, and it's not going to go away tomorrow. We're just going to need to keep working at it. We are all going to have highs, and we're all going to have lows. We just have to figure out how to help each other to figure this all out and how to work through what we're feeling. I'm not pissed right now, but in a week, who knows? At that point, it will be your turn to pick me up, the way I'm picking you up right now."

She nodded weakly, "I love you... I'm so sorry..."

My eyes hardened and I gave her head another little shake, "And stop apologizing. Fucking man up, and get on team let's get this fixed." I let my hands slip down and wrapped my forefingers into the front loops of her jeans, pulling her close. My lips found hers. "The team me and Roo are on now... and put out like there's no tomorrow..."

She giggled and shook her head as she wrapped her arms around me, pulling me into that big hug I knew she needed from earlier and I knew that things were going to get better...

Chapter 26

That night we lay in bed together, tangled in the sheets and each other. She snuggled her face into my chest. I sighed, both in contentment, and as a result of the fact that I couldn't get my brain to shut off...

"What are you thinking about?" She asked me.

I shook my head, "All the shit I need to get done..."

She lifted her head off of my chest and looked at me, "Like what?"

"Like get a job for the summer. Like figure out what the hell is going on with my mom." I trailed off a bit, letting my brain try to catalog the final big thing that needed done... "Like how the fuck I'm going to deal with dropping out of school..."

"What?" She exclaimed, anger filling her voice.

I was surprised by her reaction. It seemed like the obvious thing that needed doing...

She crawled up my body a bit, "You are not quitting school. Don't even say something so stupid, hell, don't even think something so stupid."

I shrugged one shoulder, "Casey... I have a family to support now... I need to get a job."

She ground her teeth, sticking her jaw out at me. I could tell that something about what I had said really pissed her off...

"Roo and I were doing just fine taking care of ourselves a week ago. Don't start pulling that manly bullshit now. You and I are going to work as a team now, you said it yourself. We're team let's get this fixed. I don't plan on becoming Susy Homemaker just because you brought your swinging dick around."

I looked down, "I don't really think it swings... I mean, what would be the opposite of swings? I don't even think it's all that impressive..."

Her face went blank, and I could tell my attempt at humor fell well short of the goal...

"Ha. Ha. My sides are splitting with laughter."

I smiled at her, trying very hard to make her understand. "Look, yes. You're right, and I'm sorry. I didn't mean to imply that you couldn't take care of yourself, or of Roo... It's just... I mean think about it. What, I'm just going to pack up come fall time, wish you and Roo a happy couple of months and take off back to school?"

She looked at me like I had just suddenly turned into a giant iguana. She shook her head at me, "No. When you have to go back to school, we're going to pack up, and all of us are going back with you, as a family."

That took me by surprise...

I shook my head at her...

She suddenly bit her lip and looked down at my chest, "I mean, if you want me and Roo to come back with you... I guess I should have asked that before I just assumed..."

I put my hand against her face in sudden panic, raising her head up to look at me. "Of course, I would want you and Roo to come back with me! I just thought..."

My thoughts trailed off. What had I thought?

"I mean, I can't just make the two of you uproot and come charging off after me. That's completely selfish..." I tried to connect all my thoughts together, and found them to be a mishmash in my head. "I can't ask you to just give up your lives here..."

She put her hand against my face. Her skin was smooth, and cool against my skin. I could see frustration in her face.

Her eyes met mine, "I'm going to say something, and I want you to try not to take it personally, okay?"

I nodded, "Okay..."

She took a deep breath and let it out quick, "Baby, Roo and I don't have much of a life here without you..."

That slammed into me hard. I suddenly felt like a complete failure. Like I had failed to provide for my family...

She poked me hard in the chest, "You promised!"

"Ow!" I exclaimed, "What?"

"You weren't going to take that personally!" I saw the guilt slam into her again, and wished very much that I had controlled my reaction better... "I'm going to try it your way, okay?"

I raised an eyebrow at her, "My way?"

She put her hand against my chest, "Yes. I'm going to try to focus on what needs to be done. I'm going to try to put the past behind me. Roo's life, and my life were okay without you, but I realize now, it's so much better with you in it. That being said, I realize now, I'm just in a holding pattern. Like I was waiting for you to come in and be a part of my life again, and without that, I just chose not to live. I realize now, everything I was doing was literally hand to mouth. I wasn't trying to build a life for me and Roo. I was feeling sorry for myself, and that's not on you. You tried. You tried to get me to come up and live with you, you tried to get me to go to school, and I was so busy feeling sorry for myself and letting guilt run my life I refused.

"I'm not doing that any more. We don't have much here, and that's the point. We're not making a huge sacrifice in giving up what we have here." I could see her words catching up to her, "All we're really doing is riding the coattails of your life..."

I pulled her in closer and kissed her forehead, "No, you're not. We're going to build a life together. I'm sorry that I said anything different than that. I realize now, how much better my life is with you and Roo in it."

It was then I realized what was making me hesitate. What was giving me doubts, "I think I realize now why I was willing to give it up..."

It made me feel really guilty...

"I wasn't really all that happy in school. I just felt like I was going through the motions. I had no real end goal..." I looked at her, and school just felt a lot more important... "now... now I really want to get school done. I want to finish law school. Not just for myself, but for you and Roo too. I want to provide for you both. I want you to both have the best things in life. I want Roo to go to the best schools, and have the best things, to have all of the things she needs."

She tilted her head, "Don't be silly, and don't be one of those asshats that starts talking about how much money makes your life better."

I shook my head and smiled at her, "And don't you be naïve. You and I have both been poor. We understand, money doesn't make you happy all of a sudden, but it certainly helps to keep a lot of misery away. I'm not talking about stuff for the sake of stuff, I'm talking about making sure I can take care of us. Making sure we have opportunities."

She smiled and snuck me a kiss, "Better."

A thought occurred to me then... "So how do you want to do this?"

She tilted her head, "Do what?"

"Moving back."

She took a deep breath... "That depends. Do you want to stay here for a while?"

I nodded my head, afraid to give it breath, "At least until I know what's going on with my mom..."

She nodded, "I was thinking the same thing."

I shrugged, "Dad said I could get a summer job with him. I'm thinking that might be a good idea. It would get us through the summer, and then at the end of the summer, we could move back... my old apartment would work for us I think. It has two bedrooms. One is an office right now, but I could clear all of my books out of it, set up someplace else, and there'd be a bedroom for us, and one for Roo."

She smiled, "And I could get a job." She play punched at me, "And I'd be a little worker bee while you went to school."

I grimaced... she wasn't going to like this... "Kiddo... I think you might be forgetting a few things."

"Like what?"

This was going to be hard to put in a way that wasn't going to hurt her feelings... "How much do you pay for childcare right now?"

"Well, your family helps me most of the time..." She admitted.

"When we go back, we're going to be looking at probably a thousand dollars a month for that alone..."

I could see her face drop. "And if I'm checking groceries..." I could see some life jump back in her eyes, "I still make more than a thousand dollars a month!"

I smiled at her, "I know, but is it worth it to lose all that time with Roo for a couple of hundred dollars a month?"

She moved closer to me and I could feel a fierceness enter her body, "Yes. I'm going to help us. I'm going to help our little home."

I felt a fierce sense of pride in her. "Maybe you should come to school with me?"

She shook her head, "No. If I did that, I would just need to pay for childcare and I wouldn't be bringing in money."

I tilted my head at her, "You don't want to go to school?"

I could see a sadness come into her face, "I do... I just... I want to provide for us too..."

Smiling at her, I asked, "If you went to school, what would you want to do?"

She pushed her hair back behind her ears, "I want to be a teacher..."

I smiled at her. She had always wanted to be a teacher... "Then you need to go to school. You won't ever be a teacher unless you go to school."

That fierceness entered her gaze again, and I knew, the argument was over. I had lost. "You want to give me and Roo the finest things?"

I nodded, "Absolutely."

"Then finish school. When you get a job, then I'll go back to school. In the meantime, I'll find something to take care of us. I'll help to put you through school, and then you help me. Deal?"

I shook my head at her, "Deal."

Chapter 27

We all sat in the doctor's office. Me. Casey. Roo. Dad. Deb and Adrianna.

We all had that hangman at the gallows look on our face. We were all waiting for the shoe to drop.

The doctor looked at us, smiling. It was hard to tell what kind of smile it was. Was it one of those, 'everything is going to be okay' smiles, or was it one of those, 'I really need to seem like I care because I'm about to give you some really bad news' smiles...

He opened a little folder and looked over my mom's information, studying it. When he looked up, his smile got a little wider.

"Well, we got the results back from the pathology lab..."

He let the information sit in the air so long you could feel the tension in the room grow.

It was dad that finally had enough, "Well, spit it out doc. What's the news?"

The doc nodded, smiling wider, "No cancer."

I let out a sigh, releasing the tension I hadn't known had even built up.

Deb was still recovering from the surgery, and she still had the staples in her neck from the work they had done to seal her back up. Her voice was still a little on the gravely side, mostly from the damage that had been done to her neck. She tired easily...

"So what was it?" she asked.

He shrugged, "Don't know."

All of us kind of looked at him in dumb shock. How could they not know? How could there be thousands of dollars in medical bills. Hundreds of hours of work by trained professionals and nobody know?

He smiled again, this time wider, "These things happen. You'd be surprised how common they are. Sometimes our bodies just do weird things. Grow off weird little tendrils of stuff. Most of the time, we never notice. Deb, you just had one of the ones that causes problems, and that made us notice."

"What happens now?" Dad asked.

The doctor nodded, "Well, nothing really. We get Deb all healed up. We keep an eye on the area going forward. Maybe do some ultrasounds every year or so to make sure nothing is going to grow back."

Deb's face was filled with so much relief my heart wanted to sing for her...

Chapter 28

Casey lay beside me, breathing hard from the effort of our lovemaking.

I held her close, my right arm circled around her, my left hand playing with the hair on her head, brushing at her bangs. I was fighting off that feeling of sleepiness...

That beautiful feeling of absolute bliss that comes after connecting intimately with someone we love...

I felt her stir a bit against me, sensing her looking at me and her desire for me to look back at her. Looking at her, all I could do was smile. She made me so fucking happy...

She nibbled at her lip, looking at me like she was nervous...

"Can you stay there, right there for just a second?" Her voice was quiet, full of doubt...

I smiled at her and nodded, afraid that if I spoke I would shatter her into a million pieces.

She crawled out of the bed and went over to her dresser. She opened the top drawer and took something out. When she came back, she had my ring.

She held the box out to me and I felt my heart drop into my stomach...

She was giving my ring back to me...

She smiled at me, "If you give it to me now... I'll take it..."

I felt my eyebrows crawl up my forehead like they were trying to escape my face.

She smiled again as I looked at her.

I opened the ring box up and looked at it, "Well... I don't know..."

She slapped my arm.

"Will you marry me?"

She smiled, nodding her head as she took the ring. My heart sang as she took it out of the box and put it on her finger.

I smiled at her, "It looks good on you."

She nodded, cradling the ring to her chest, holding it close.

I shook my head, trying to understand, "Why now?"

She lay down against me, pushing her body against mine once again, "I was sitting there in the doctor's office today and the thought hit me... what if it was me they were talking about. What if I was sitting there with you, and we were wondering if I was really sick? What if we were sitting there and it was you. What if I had to sit there and wonder if it was you that was sick and maybe dying?"

She shook her head, "I'm done wasting my life. I fucked up, and if you were mad at me, I'd have to eat that and learn to live with it. You say you want to be with me. Maybe I need to trust that. In the end, I need to just do what I can and help us both to move on with our lives. Maybe you're angry with me. Maybe this won't work out, but one thing I know for certain... I know how badly I want you, and I know how badly I fucked up trying to keep that from you. I'm done with that and I want to spend the rest of my life making my mistakes up to you..."

I grabbed her hand and pulled her close, kissing her, knowing that she was right. In the end, all we were going to have was each other.

We would find a way to make that enough...