Flowering - Part Seventeen
This episode is part of a larger story, Soft Touch. If you haven’t yet, you can go back and read it from the beginning right here.
I wake up to two big, gentle hands sliding beneath my back.
My eyes flutter open and land on my favorite face in the world.
Aiden stops when he sees me awake and looking up at him. He’s bent over me, fingers tucked beneath me, like he was just about to gather me up into his arms. Now he lets me go and gently touches his knuckles to my jaw. I sit up on the couch, blinking the sleep from my eyes.
“Were you about to carry me upstairs?” I mumble drowsily, as Luna hops down from where she was curled up on my feet.
“Mhm. I’m sorry, didn’t mean to wake you up.” Aiden drops to sit down, and I draw my knees up to myself, making room for him. “Why are you sleeping on the couch?”
It was an accident, actually. I had been pacing slowly around downstairs earlier, watching through the windows as the night sky gradually drew closer and closer to dawn. Sipping on a cup of coffee. Stopping every now and then at the French windows beside the front door. Waiting anxiously for the garden gate to open.
“I was trying to wait up for you,” I yawn, knuckling my eyes. “I wanted to be there for you when you got home from talking to-”
I break off abruptly, remembering all at once why I wanted to be up.
My sleepy vision clears right away, and I take a close look at Aiden.
His chestnut hair is windblown beneath his snapback, his cheeks faintly pink from the cold, like he was sitting somewhere outside for a while. The early sunlight spilling into the living room is part golden, part the color of raspberry sherbert. The glow of it softly haloes Aiden’s bronze skin. His stubble has filled in without a shave this morning. Rich, thick scruff on his sharp jawline.
But my eyes go right to his. I look into them deeply, searchingly.
They’re a particular tone and shade of blue. The color of warm, sunlit waters in the shallows of a tropical island.
The color they turn when he’s been crying.
“So I don’t have grouchy early-morning Jamie on my hands?” he asks, playfully poking my chest. “No accent? Half expected you to wake up and call me shitehead.”
He’s trying to sound like he’s joking, but I can hear the thin, fractured texture in the deep bass of his voice. I can see in his eyes and expression - in everything, really - just how raw he is, right now.
“Oh, babe,” I murmur, gently taking his face into my hands.
Aiden lets out a long, shaky breath, puts his forehead to mine. He holds us there for a second, then suddenly tips forward, flattening me down onto the couch. A startled breath is forced out of me, but I wrap my arms around him, my toes curling at the feeling of his nose nuzzling into my neck, the warm weight of his big body.
His snapback was pushed off by his sudden movement, and it starts to tumble to the floor.
I catch it just in time, gently set it on the coffee table, and bury my hands in Aiden’s hair.
His voice sounds rough and husky, but the deep vibration of it rolls through my body like it always does.
“Cool if I just listen, for a minute?”
I nod, then press a kiss onto the top of his head, hold him tightly.
It turns out to be much longer than a minute, but I keep quiet, letting him listen to me in a way that doesn’t require my voice.
I close my eyes and wind two fingers around a strand of chestnut softness. I take deep breaths of him, listening to the soft chirping of the birds out in our garden. I wait until Aiden lifts his head, pushes his nose against mine for a second, and slowly sits back.
I sit up, too, catching his hand in mine. Taking another close look at him.
He looks exhausted, seriously vulnerable and tender. But he doesn’t look upset, or angry. He actually looks like he feels - better. Like someone who cried because they needed to. The aura around him reminds me of the sky after a thunderstorm, when the earth has been shaken up, but the air is pure and swept clean and revived.
“That was really fucking hard,” he rasps, after a moment. “But I’m - I’m glad.”
Warmth and relief rush through me in a huge wave. I had a very strong feeling that Ralph would want to talk to Aiden, too. That he would try. But it feels good to let my breath out knowing that I wasn’t wrong about that.
I can already see that Aiden doesn’t want to talk too much about it, not yet. That doesn’t surprise me. I had a feeling he might want to go for a run or something, take some alone time to process everything before he talks to me about it.
He must be thinking along the same lines. “Is it - would it be okay if-?”
“Mhm,” I cut in, leaning in closer to kiss his cheek. “I understand. Later. When you’re ready.”
Aiden lets out a slow, relieved breath, then gives my fingers a grateful squeeze. I fight with myself for a second, then lose the battle. I don’t need the whole story right away, but I do need something.
“Outcome, though?” I ask hopefully. “Please? Just - in three words or less?”
There’s a short silence. Then Aiden shrugs his shoulders, looking at me in a helpless kind of way.
“I - miss him.”
I tip my head to the side, staring at Aiden with wide eyes.
“I know,” he rumbles softly. “I kinda can’t believe it, either. It’s hard to explain, but - yeah, I really do.”
I actually do believe it. I know my Companion Plant, and I had a feeling. But it’s a whole other thing to hear Aiden admit it, say it out loud.
I spread a hand on Aiden’s chest, then snuggle up closer to him. He puts his chin on the top of my head, toys gently with a strand of my hair.
“Are you going to tell Noah?” I ask, after a moment. “That you and Ralph had this talk?”
“Mmm…” Aiden works through his thoughts for a moment. “I don’t think so, no. Not yet.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t want Noah to patch things up with Ralph for me. Just because he knows that I - that I wish the three of us could be… I just - want Noah to make his choice for the right reasons. It’s about what’s best for him.”
I nod slowly, absorbing that, then lift my head.
“I think that’s the right call, Sugar Maple.” I press a kiss against his stubbled jaw. “I hope they can work it out. I think they’d both feel better.”
“I really hope so, too.” Aiden stares unseeing out through the window, swimming deeply in the currents of his thoughts. “I guess - even if they don’t, I’m happy that everyone from the old crew is finally doing good.”
“Everyone? That leaves out Grant, doesn’t it?”
I pick up the mug on the coffee table, then blink as Aiden absently puts a fingertip beneath it, a flash of ice-blue light moving in his eyes. The coffee gently begins to steam again, the mug warming against my palms.
I lift my surprised eyes to Aiden’s face, but he’s barely noticed that he did anything. He’s still thinking, not even looking at me.
Sometimes I have to stop and appreciate how much control and strength Aiden has gained, when it comes to wielding his magic. That was such a precise amount of heat, it didn’t burn at all - and he wasn’t even paying attention.
“Grant.” Aiden hesitates, then looks at me. “I actually do happen to know that he’s doing good, too. I remembered that he has a cousin who works at City Hall, I asked her. He moved back in with his parents, they’re a couple states away. He’s working for their contracting company.”
I stare at Aiden, taken aback. “I didn’t realize you’d gone looking for information.”
Aiden shrugs, then takes the coffee from me and has a sip.
“I never got super close to Grant. Noah started hanging out with me and Ralph ‘cause he liked us, but Grant did it because we were popular. So I always kinda kept him at arm’s length, I - didn’t trust people like that. But I don’t think he cared, because he was never really, um. Invested in the crew. Not how we were, anyways. We were just at the top of the food chain, and I’m pretty sure that’s what he cared about.”
I think that over for a moment. “He did stick around at Ralph’s for eight years after high school, though. Like Noah.”
“Yeah, but I think for Grant, that might have been…” Aiden pauses for a moment, searching for the right word. “Inertia, more than anything.”
This does make sense to me, the more thought I give it. Grant’s drugs of choice were the kind to make him check out completely for hours and days at a time, sleeping and dissociating. That, combined with the manipulations Ralph used to do to keep Grant and Noah stuck at the house… it would be enough to keep him there.
“I don’t know. Can’t say for sure.” Aiden shrugs his broad shoulders again, runs a hand through his windswept hair. “Ralph and Noah probably got closer to Grant while I was gone. But he was my friend, even if we weren’t as close. It’s not like I don't care about him. I wanted to see if he was doing okay. So I checked, and - he is.”
“Oh.” I blink at Aiden, caught by surprise. “Why didn’t you tell me before now? Or Noah, for that matter?”
“Noah, because I try not to bring up anything about the painful shit from his past. You, because you can’t lie, and if Ralph asked you anything about it, we’d be in trouble. Grant clearly doesn’t want Ralph to know where he is.”
“Oh, yeah. That’s fair.” I tap my fingers against my coffee cup as I take it back from Aiden. “But you just told me, so - you’re not worried about Ralph doing anything with that information, anymore?”
“No,” Aiden says firmly, without any trace of hesitation. “Not anymore.”
And this, somehow, feels like final confirmation. The version of Ralph that I’ve gotten to know recently is not one of his masterwork lies. I already really didn’t think so, but the expression in Aiden’s eyes burns up any remaining shred of doubt that I had.
Silence falls over us. I want to ask Aiden a lot more about his conversation with Ralph, but I know that he’s still processing. He needs time.
He clears his throat, sits up more on the couch, and nods at the small pile of stuff on the coffee table. “What were you doing?”
I can tell he’s in need of distraction, and thankfully I’ve got one for him.
“I was trying to keep myself awake by staying busy. This is the last of the stuff we haven’t dealt with from the move. And this-” I pick it up to show Aiden. “Is, um - I’m guessing some kind of joke from my dad? I found it in the bag with the new locks that he left for us.”
It’s a DVD in a clear plastic case. Scrawled across the front in Sharpie, it says - Jamie and Aiden’s First Meeting.
“Oh, what the fuck?” Aiden laughs, then groans. “Marcus. What could that possibly be?”
“Yeah, I can’t even guess what kind of elaborate dad joke…” I fade off, realizing for the first time that there’s a note attached to the back of the case. “Hang on.”
I unstick the note and unfold it, quickly read it. It’s in my dad’s handwriting.
By the time I look up at Aiden again, my eyes are very, very wide. He blinks when he sees the look on my face, swiftly takes the note from my hand. I watch his eyes fill up with stunned disbelief as he reads what I just read.
Jamie, Aiden - I’ve been transferring all our old Keane-family VHS tapes to my computer, and look what I found! I’d completely forgotten about this, as had your mother, but we thought you’d want to see it. To think you two are moving in together, now! We should have seen it coming.
Love, Dad
“What…?” Aiden lifts his eyes to me, dumbfounded. “There’s no way. There’s no way we - my mom never let me around other kids, never…”
I stare down at the DVD in disbelief. “Oh, my god. Aiden. What do you think it is?”
“I seriously have no idea.”
I have no idea, either, so I just take the DVD over to my Xbox, slide it into the disc slot, and go back to join Aiden on the couch. We cuddle up together as it loads. There’s only one item to play on the menu of the disc, entitled Kid’s Fun Day - Church.
Aiden and I exchange a bewildered glance before I hit play.
You can tell the video came from a VHS tape. It’s a little grainy, obviously shot on a clunky handheld camera. I recognize the place being filmed right away. It’s the gathering room at the church that my parents go to, the room where events are held. It’s done up in decorations and filled with a bunch of kids. Some are babies bundled up in the arms of their parents, and others are old enough to be running around, weaving through the legs of the adults.
But the adults are few and far between. The only ones in the shot are trying to herd the children together into a group.
“Alright, here we are,” comes my dad’s voice, from behind the camera. “It’s Kid’s Fun Day! Services just let out. We’re going to get a group photo of all the kiddies before the activities start-”
“Oh, my god,” I gasp, as a few of the adults clear out of the way.
Aiden’s eyes widen as he recognizes himself on the screen. He’s so small - barely able to toddle around on his wobbly little legs, gripping the folding chairs for support. But I can tell it’s him right away. The bronze of his skin, the messy flop of chestnut hair, the shape of his face. Those soulful, blue, blue eyes.
He looks somehow both timid and eager. He keeps starting after the other kids running around, smiling excitedly, then stopping nervously. One of the other kids makes a face at him, and he looks back with wide, shy eyes.
“Oh, look at you,” I stammer, my heart overwhelmed with love. “Aiden!”
“I - I don’t get this, how was I there with all these kids?” Aiden shakes his head, lost. “My mom would never have let me-”
“Marcus,” cuts in a voice on the video, one coming from somewhere off-screen.
A voice that Aiden and I both instantly recognize as Aunt Sarah, even before my dad says - “Sarah! Why don’t you bring this sweet little man around more often? This is the first time I’ve seen him, I think. That one is yours, isn’t he?”
“Yeah, he’s mine - I mean, no, no, he’s my sister’s. He’s my nephew.”
Something about the way Aunt Sarah says it makes it sound like she’s reminding herself.
“Not talking yet, is he?” my dad observes. “Haven’t heard a word!”
“He - should be, but the doctor said it’s okay that he isn’t yet. All kids are different, he’ll get there. Marcus, look - is this group picture, um - going anywhere? His mom isn’t going to be happy if she hears that I snuck him out, but I thought it would be nice for him to have a little fun, get just a little time around some other-”
“Oh, sorry Sarah, one second,” my dad interrupts cheerfully. “Here are the latecomers!”
The children being arranged for the photo are more or less in place. Someone has scooped up Aiden and set him where he’s supposed to be, and two priests from the church are seated on chairs on either side of the group. But my dad swings the video camera around to aim at the door, where my mom - looking much younger, her bright red hair chopped high around her shoulders - has just stepped inside.
She has me bundled in her arms. My face is smushed against the flat of her chest, just below her neck.
“So sorry we’re late!” She quickly crosses over to the group, pointing at me. “Someone didn’t want to get out of the bath!”
“Typical,” Aiden laughs, giving my shoulders a squeeze.
He laughs again as I smack his chest, my face burning.
My mom sets me down on the left side of the group with all the babies. She sits me upright, then steps back. I look up at her curiously, my red hair at silly angles, my tiny hands pressed to the carpet to hold me upright.
Aiden lets out a sharp breath, pressing his fingers over his mouth.
“Oh,” he says, melting further down onto the couch, his eyes overflowing with love. “Oh, my god.”
“Is he in the right place, Father?” my mom asks brightly, on the TV.
“Yep, right there,” says the priest at the right-hand side of the group. “Is that the last one?”
“Mhm, it’s picture time!” Aunt Sarah says, from off-screen. “Okay, kids, everybody sm- Aiden, honey, where are you going?”
Aiden had been sitting with the slightly older kids, on the right-hand side of the group. But now he’s taking hard-earned, staggering baby steps, slowly and painstakingly making his way towards the other side. He stumbles a bit and goes down onto his knees without anything to hold onto, but doesn’t seem deterred. He’s got a happy, eager smile on his face as he begins to crawl determinedly, all the way -
Right to me. Directly to me.
My baby self gazes at him with obvious fascination as he reaches me. He’s completely out of breath from the effort of getting there, but he lifts himself and sort of falls forward into me, knocking me onto my back on the carpet. His face lands on my chest, and I let out a burst of surprised, happy giggles, grabbing hold of his tiny shirt. He giggles, too, trying to prop himself up on his elbows.
“Oh, Aiden!” Aunt Sarah quickly darts into view of the camera, rushing to pick him up as he puts his hands in my hair. “Careful, sweetie, he’s so much smaller than you!”
She hurries to place Aiden back where he was, letting out a stream of apologies to my mom, who is busy helping me sit up again.
“No harm done, Sarah, Jamie’s alright! Let’s just get the picture, before everyone starts squirming. Okay, everyone say ch-”
She breaks off as Aiden sets off again, this time not bothering to try to walk, crawling directly for me. At the other end of the group, I smile as I see him coming, reaching out my tiny arms for him. He speeds up, his wide, eager eyes fixed on me.
“This is what you all get for trying to keep children organized,” my dad laughs, from behind the camera.
“Oh, Marcus,” my mom says reproachfully. “The kids are always arranged by age for the picture, it’s a church tradition!”
Aiden makes it about halfway to me before one of the parents in the congregation steps in, scoops him up.
“We’re going by age, kiddo!” she tells Aiden, putting him back where he was.
He’s starting to look upset. He makes an unhappy, frustrated face at the parent who moved him, then begins to crawl forward, heading right to me again.
“What’s going on with him, Sarah?” my mom asks, from behind the camera. “He seems awfully set on getting to Jamie.”
“I don’t know, I’ve never seen him like this before. Maybe - maybe he hears something he likes?”
“I doubt it’s that, love, Jamie can’t even talk yet!”
Aiden has almost made his way back to me, and he’s starting to smile again right as Aunt Sarah gently picks him up.
“Okay, how about if we have someone hold you, honey?” She hands him to the priest at the end of the group. “Just for the picture. Do you mind, Father?”
The priest is an older man with kind eyes, deep brown skin, salt and pepper hair. He gives Aiden’s head a reassuring pat as he settles him down on his knees - but Aiden isn’t having it.
He struggles to get free, trying to kick his way loose, one tiny hand reaching out for me. I’m watching him from across the group, wide-eyed, starting to grow troubled as he does.
“Oh, Father, I’m so sorry,” Aunt Sarah says, clearly mortified. “Aiden, please, sweetheart-”
“It’s alright, sister,” the priest laughs, trying to soothe Aiden with a gentle rub on his back. “Come on, little man, we only need a few seconds of cooperation-”
But Aiden goes on staring at me, panting, fighting with all the might of his little body to get free - then seems to realize it’s not going to work. He turns to Aunt Sarah, his blue eyes huge with indignance and despair, a tremendously wounded look on his face. He’s breathing hard, his bottom lip trembling precariously.
“Oh, no,” Aunt Sarah says, and Aiden dissolves into wailing tears.
Pretty much the second that he does, I do, too, my tiny round cheeks instantly turning red with distress. I tip forward and fall onto my stomach to try and crawl to him, even though it’s clear that I only barely know how to do it. My mom hurries forward to stop me.
And then - there’s a sharp cracking sound, like splintering glass. A soft, startled murmur goes up from the gathered congregation.
“What - the window cracked!” someone says. “The - temperature, maybe…? Did get awful cold this morning, and it’s so warm in here. It’s actually kind of hot - did someone just turn up the thermostat?”
“Okay, I - I think I’m just gonna get him home!” Aunt Sarah says suddenly, rushing forward to scoop Aiden up into her arms. “See you later, everyone!”
She strides across the view of the recording camera, Aiden sobbing inconsolably in her arms. He reaches past her towards me with both hands, and I look up at him with tears streaming down my cheeks, clearly about to start wailing, myself.
“Where are you going, now?” my mom asks, as I fall forward like I’m going to try to crawl again. “Honestly! Marcus, come help me.”
“Alright, alright,” my dad laughs. “Happy Fun Day, and all that!”
And the video cuts off.
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