Ian's Heart - 2. Chapter 2 - Ian

Oh, there you are. Since I’m here and telling you my story, it means my bratty son Patrick – whom I adore – has been flapping his gums telling stories. He’s probably told you how he became my son, so we’ll skip that. I’ll tell you about me. I grew up in Florida, I met James in junior high, we were in love the minute we laid eyes on each other. The real kind of love, deep soul kind of love, like Will and Liam. They remind me so much of James and myself, it’s great watching them together, but sometimes it tears my heart out. My life, changed for the worse the day we were told my James was sick. He was my first and only love. It was made even worse the day he passed. I sank into a depression and gave up on everything in life, then my Mom and Dad stepped in as well as my bossy pain in the ass younger sister – Anna. They helped me function again, they cleaned me up, got me back to work.

Once I was back on my feet, my parents up and moved to New England to be closer to my Grandparents as they were getting on in years and it was hard with all the back and forth between the states. So I decided to get out of Florida, maybe at least get closer to where my folks were, try and get a new start somewhere, anywhere but there. I needed to get away from the constant reminders of what I’d lost. I applied for teaching jobs everywhere between Florida and New England. A high school in Lexington, Kentucky offered me a job as the biology teacher, so I took it. I packed myself up, called my folks, said goodbye to my very pregnant, crazy, bitchy sister and drove to my new life here. The move didn’t work because when I moved, I took everything I could that reminded me of James, I didn’t want to lose him or forget anything about him – ironically. It wasn’t so bad though, the first few weeks were same old, same old.

In my third week, that’s when things started changing for the better. A student who hadn’t been at the school for the first few weeks due to death in the family came to class. On his first day back, the poor kid was outed to the entire school, he is gay. I can relate, kids can be cruel and spiteful. One student, and the biggest pain in my ass, Babette, made a big song and dance out of it in the classroom. Making sure anyone who didn’t know yet, was fully informed of Will’s sexuality. Sent her ass to the Principal, then after class had finished I pulled that kid aside to make sure he was alright. That kid was Will, his boyfriend came to find him while we were talking, that’s when I met Liam. I sent them to their next class and went to the principal’s office to deal with the classroom bigot. I really didn’t need to bother.

Don’t get me wrong the Principal was just as bigoted as the girl. Liam barged into the meeting with Will in hand. That didn’t get them anywhere, the Principal just threatened the boys. He would stop them from using the locker rooms, they were no longer allowed to play baseball, and he would make sure no college would accept them. I tried to keep my cool, it lasted just long enough for the Principal to tell me I was fired because faggot predators can’t work in the school system. As I opened my mouth to reply to this small minded piece of shit, excuse my language, a cute little pixie like lady about forty-years-old and a good looking gentleman about the same age, who could only be Will’s father, they were the spitting image of each other, barged into the room. This is was my first glimpse of Kit – Liam’s Mom and John – Will’s Dad.

The Principal tried to threaten Kit and John’s kids again. A mistake of epic proportions. The first to speak was John, suggesting the Principal shut his mouth before he made things worse for himself. Then Kit, well, the mouth certainly didn’t match, this cute petite woman. She scared the shit out of me, she handed both Principal and instigator of the matter, Babette, her lawyers card. Both of them were being sued. She read the riot act to the young girl, and then made some other threats of her own. The girl seemed unfazed crossing her arms defiantly and giving a retort like “I did nothing wrong, it’s the truth, and people should know about it to protect themselves against them.” Another mistake. Some people just need to know when to shut the hell up.

Kit calmed herself quite quickly – scary – gave Babette a sweet smile – even scarier – and said. “I can see your logic in that.” Not the response I was expecting, it took me by surprise, and so did the next thing that come out of her mouth. “And by your logic, I can go ahead and warn everyone about an unwanted pregnancy resulting from a trip to church camp over the summer and how it was dealt with all over social media. Should be the quickest way to get the information out, don’t you think. But, don’t worry, I’ve already told your Dad, he’s on his way down here to deal with the fall out to your good Christian name. He seemed grateful for the information.” Harsh, but effective. Never fuck with a southern Mom. I highly doubt she’d follow through, but fuck me, I didn’t know whether to burst into laughter or shit my pants in fear. Babette let out a sob and ran from the room. One down, one to go.

“As for you,” she turned on the Principal again, “I’ll be calling an emergency meeting of the PTA, and inviting the Superintendent from the board of education to deal with you and your opinions. Take a good look around, you won’t be here much longer.” She turned on her heel, “Come on John, let's get our babies and go home.” The last thing she said was, “My lawyer will be in touch,” and with that said she exited the room. I didn’t know what to do, so I smiled at the Principal. He scowled back, “Things sure don’t work out how you think they will do they? I think I’ll keep my job until the board tells me I have to leave.” I grabbed the stereotypical apple from his desk, and all but skipped from his office, with one hand in my pocket the other to my mouth with the apple for a crunchy bite. I spoke with Will and Liam's parents in reception, asking if I could come by and check on the boys later and help with the PTA and board. Kit invited me to dinner. We all struck up a friendship. That’s how they became my Kentucky family. Will and Liam now call me Uncle Ian outside of school. I love it.

A month or so later a friend of the family – Bill, came to check on me at my parent's request. The boys were having a cookout that weekend for Kit and had invited me. When I declined because he was visiting, they said to bring him along. Turns out Bill was John’s long lost love from his teenage years. Their families had torn them apart and hadn’t seen or spoken since. They are now together, Bill quit his job and moved to Kentucky for John. I’ve never seen Bill so happy, it pleased the heck out of my Mom too. They’d been work friends for a long time, she said Bill always had a sadness about him. Well, now we know why.

Will was so sweet when this all came about. He came to me fretting because he thought I was interested in his Dad. I assured him that I wasn’t and I was happy for them. Besides my heart belong to James. That sweet, sweet boy told me, “James will send someone he picked for you, that person will be holding your heart. Life isn’t so cruel it would have you alone.” So I’m hanging on to that. But can you imagine that coming from a seventeen-year-old? His boyfriend Liam is the same, he’s the quiet achiever of the two. Until it comes to Will. If you mess with Will, you can kiss your ass goodbye. Liam will kill, I’m sure of it.

Who’s next, oh my parents. They’re good, loving folks, I’m one of the lucky ones. My parents have been married for forty years. I don’t ever remember them even having a heated word between them, let alone fighting. That’s how I want any relationship of mine to be. I’m not so naïve to believe it’s been all sunshine and roses, especially with my sister and me to contend with. But they’ve made it look easy, and they are still very much in love.

My sister, I don’t even know where to begin. We’ve never been close, but have always been in each other’s lives. I think that’s more for Mom’s benefit than anything. If Anna and I weren’t related, I’d have nothing to do with her. I know two marriage’s she’s destroyed, neither were hers. She latched on to a cop – Adam something or other – fell pregnant and manipulated him into marrying her. I’ve only met him a couple of times, I feel sorry for the guy, for some reason he seems happy. The burning itch to let him know exactly who she is has come to me more than a couple of times. She’s selfish and all about herself. I can guarantee, Anna doesn’t even want the baby, but she’ll use it to manipulate the poor soul into getting what she wants. I hope I’m wrong, but I doubt it.

<>-<>-<>

“Hey, Paddy?” I called out to him from our kitchen.

“Coming Dad,” he yelled back, I could hear him walk down the hallway, he stuck his head around the corner, “Hey, what’s up?”

“Have you finished your homework?” I asked.

Paddy rolled his eyes at me, I love it, “I’m not sure you're aware of this, but my Dad’s a teacher at my school. I can’t get away with anything so… of course my homework’s done,”

“Ooh! Snarky!” I chuckled, earning myself another eye roll, “I’m bored out of my skull, do you want to go to the movies?” I asked him.

“Um… it’s already eight-thirty,” He said pointing his digit at the clock in the kitchen.

“Are you scared something bad happens outside after nine pm? Did you want to report me to the police? Seriously I’m bored, and I’m wide awake,” I paused letting him mull it over, “I’ll let you sleep through class tomorrow, tell them all to leave you alone because you were up all night sick, but I made you come to school anyway. It will make me seem like a mean asshole, it’ll give me a bit of street cred, and you’ll get all that sweet love from Sasha, I’ll even give you the notes from class when we get home tomorrow.” I snickered.

Paddy laughed out loud, “The only street cred, you’ll ever have is as an easy mark. And as far as you being anything close to an asshole would be that you own underwear to cover yours.”

I slumped back in my chair, “I hate teenagers.”

“Oh Daddikens, don’t be all mopey, I’ll come with you. But no damn chick flicks, something with guns, blood, car chases and gory stuff. And you're buying me an ice-cream.” Paddy came into the room and threw his arms around me giving me a bear hug.

“You have to stop hanging out with Will and Liam, you’re getting a mouth. And these muscles you're building, it’s getting to a stage where every time you hug me I have to go to the chiropractor.”

“Who’s the snarky one now?” Pat said.

“See mouth,” I gave him a light “Gibbs” to the back of the head. He laughed the little shit, “Get changed, I’m not going anywhere with you in your pajama’s,”

He marched down the hall, calling back, “Pajama’s or not old man, I look good.”

See Mouth!!

We got out of the car at the Cinema Complex, and as soon as my foot hit the tarmac, my stomach did a flip flop, hmm, that was weird. I opened the Cineplex door for Pat, and he went in, my stomach did it again. Geez, I hope I’m not getting sick. I tried to ignore it, we got our tickets and some pop corn, his ice-cream and headed for our theater. Pat and I were chatting and laughing at the posters on the wall as we walked, all of a sudden my heart fluttered and my stomach flip flopped. It was enough to make me stop and grab my chest.

“You okay Dad?” Pat asked grabbing my arm, worried and panicked. I looked around to see who was around us, but there were bodies everywhere. Movies had just let out, and others going in. I didn’t recognize anyone I knew, and there didn’t seem to be any trouble anywhere around us.

“Um… Yeah, I guess, I had a weird feeling that’s all. It’s past now, I didn’t mean to scare you, sorry son.” I said frowning still holding my chest. Maybe I should go to the doctors. I’ll make an appointment tomorrow.

“Okay, are you sure? We can go home if you want,” He looked scared.

“No sweetheart, I’m fine, I promise.” I smiled. I looked around while we made our way to the theater, I couldn’t see anything that would have caused it. We both had the same thing for dinner so it can’t be that. I shrugged it off.