Living in Surreality - 20. Chapter 20

chapter 20:
: edited by viv :

Viola raised her head, the façade of disgrace over actions in what she considered a previous life, resolving into a look of steely determination. She pushed her self up in the bed she lay in, propping herself up on a pile of supporting pillows while she reached for the remote, switching the television she had been watching off.

"Matthew," she said, relieved that her voice delivered her son's name in a calm tone. The proverbial yang to the yin of anxiety that was coursing through her veins with a tremor which rattled her fingers and charged her heart. "Sit down," she continued, mustering all of her will to keep her voice steady as she patted the bed with a shaky hand.

Matt obliged, claiming the directed seat with no argument, not feeling up to looking at his mother in the face at this moment, or perhaps ever again, with the revelation of her disappointment and hidden disgust. He wanted to yell as he clenched his eyes, striving to fight off any visage of anything that had to do with his mother, the furnishings of her room included. He wanted to scream and berate her every bit as much as he had always heard his father do in this very room, the cheap door the only barrier to his enraged voice. Yes. Matt wanted to do exactly that, he just couldn't, not with the knot clogging his throat and something else restraining him that he couldn't place.

"Matthew," Viola said calmly again, feeling the vibration of the bed and not knowing whether it was from her nerves or Matt's, "look at me."

Matt shook the notion off with a slight, morose shake of his head.

"Please," Viola's voice wavered.

"I can't," Matt answered finding his voice, "not right now."

Viola emitted a shuddering sigh as her shoulders slumped back into the distressing comfort of the pillows behind her. "You're my son, Matt," she said, her eyes fixing on the angle in the space where his thigh intersected his torso. "I just want you to be happy. I may have not been sober in the past, but that doesn't mean I didn't know you were unhappy until you met Jacob," Viola continued, her voice giving into the tremors that were running the length of the rest of her body.

Matt sat with his back to his mother, not responding except for the subtle slump of his shoulders.

"The pills weren't about you and Jacob. Your father," she paused collecting herself, "your father threatened to tell you about a few comments I had made in the past. It scared me, scared me enough to fill that prescription."

"Comments?" Matt's shoulders perked, as he cast his mother a short inquiring look over his shoulder.

Viola gave a slight nod, refusing to look away from her son's quizzical look. "I had made comments in the past about two men, together, in a sexual relationship, being unnatural."

Matt grimaced; the words from his mother's lips piercing him, feeling the simple turn of phrase rip him in two as his back stiffened against their onslaught.

"I'll be out tomorrow," Matt said, his words brash and foolhardy as he stood, just like those of the shadow he was trying to overcome.

"Sit down," Viola commanded, not yet finished explaining herself, and hoping to chase the demons of his father away.

The authoritative voice of his mother quelled Matt's urge to run as fast as he could, her tone reminded him oddly of his father, of Dan, and even to some extent, Clark. Matt had never, in his memory, heard her be so forceful, yet he still found himself surprised as he meekly sunk back into his seat on the mattress beside her.

No longer defeated or leaning into her pillows, Viola reached out and pulled Matt to her in an easy hug. "Don't blame yourself for other people's ignorance Matt, especially mine. I didn't understand then. You and Jacob taught me that some things just don't matter in the long run. As long as there is love, compassion, it can't be wrong in anyone's eyes who takes a moment to open them, and just see." She whispered, before releasing her flesh and blood, "Maybe, you don't understand it now. You'll come to a point where you think nothing will change you, and then one day, an amazing person opens your eyes and you'll see how wrong you've been."

Matt gave a stiff chuckle, "That's already happened," he assured her, as it had in more ways than one. There was Jacob, and the way he had unearthed feelings inside of Matt, which Matt had never acknowledged were even possible. Then there was always his father, looming off to the edge in a world where everything had to be perfect, when the man himself was far from piety.

"You're growing up too fast," Viola observed, somewhat forlorn that she had wasted so much of his childhood too impaired to fully experience it.

"You're okay with Jacob?" Matt asked again, allowing the hug Viola had pulled him into, even finding relief with the action as he returned it.

"You're happy, that makes me happy," Viola answered as she released her son.

"That's not really an answer Mom," Matt frowned.

Viola thought for a moment before smiling softly, "It just may not be, but it's the truth."

Matt took a moment to study his mother, her soft eyes and thin lips, and the badge of time which graced the corners of both. She may not have been as young and vibrant as Jacob's mother, and there may have been more skeletons stacked in her closet than anyone else's, but in spite of her demons, she found happiness. He smiled as he stood; placing a kiss on her cheek before retreating to his room, aware just how much alike they were despite the generations that separated them.

Valerie was all smiles the following Thursday as Matt walked into the front office of King's Auto Body, much as she had been all day. Matt knew the reason for her elation, as evidenced by the bouquets of balloons reading 'Congratulations'. He was, however, surprised to find a copy of the letter on U.C. Berkley letterhead placed neatly underneath the glass countertop next to an advertisement for oil filters.

"Proud?" he asked, looking down at the copy of the letter of acceptance he had read at least twenty times by now.

Valerie beamed in lieu of an actual answer.

"Pre-law," Matt shook his head, still not believing Valerie's choice of a major.

"What?" Valerie scoffed. "Everyone else thought it was a natural choice."

"You like to argue," Matt nodded. "I'll give you that much, and well, you're kind of scary sometimes."

Valerie laughed, enjoying the assessment Matt had given. "So," her face turned serious, "have you heard anything yet?"

The smile withered from Matt's face as he fished an envelope from his back pocket and tossed it on the counter. Valerie instantly recognized the envelope of linen paper and its matching logo, just like her own letter of acceptance. Smiling nervously, she picked Matt's envelope up and slid the folded paper the envelope contained out. Excitement flashed in her eyes as she glanced at Matt while unfolding the familiar feeling stationary. Matt smiled evenly, watching her eyes drift down to the letter, and he continued to watch as her brow creased in displeasure.

"Wait list," Valerie admonished tossing the letter on the countertop. "How in the hell could they wait-list you? I saw your recommendation letters. They were just as good as mine."

Matt smiled at Valerie's indignation. She knew it wasn't his first choice, yet she fumed. More because it upset her plans for the next four years, than it did his. She was still rambling on when he dropped a similar envelope on the counter, this one bearing a Trojan warrior logo in the upper left hand corner. Valerie looked down at the newest arrival.

"Oh Matty," she sighed as she hesitantly reached for the envelope, While she'd be happy if he was accepted, she would still be disappointed. Her fingers traced the embossed logo, not wanting to read the letter of acceptance inside. "Have you heard from the Art Institute yet?" she asked, holding out that bit of hope.

"Nope, I'm still waiting though, if not, I'll take the classes at USC," Matt replied with a small shrug.

"So they did accept you?" she asked, already knowing the answer as her shoulders dropped.

Matt nodded.

"Have you told Jacob yet?" Valerie asked.

"Nope, I just got them out of the box and came over here," he answered, feeling just as beat up over the USC acceptance as she did. It wasn't that he didn't want to go, more that Valerie had been there everyday and without a letter from the Art Institute, that regularity in his life looked to end with the summer. He realized even with being in San Francisco, he may not see her everyday like he did now, but he would still find comfort in her proximity.

Valerie didn't like the thought of USC, and knew Matt well enough to know that she didn't have to voice her objection regarding the school. The look on her face, the way her shoulders dropped without hesitation as she read every progressing sentence in the letter, she knew Matt knew how she felt, and even felt the same mix of joy and disappointment; she liked having that in another person. For everything Matt had ever given her, without realizing he had, she smiled.

"Well, we can't keep all this good news contained for long," Valerie said, reaching for the phone ready to dial the intercom extension to the loudspeaker in the service bays. Picking up the receiver, she dialed a rapid sequence of three keys. Muffled through the walls, a tone could be heard blaring in the bays followed by Valerie's voice beckoning Jacob to the sales office.

Richard sat at his desk, staring at the manila folder that had been taunting him with its presence for the last several days. He didn't want to open it, feeling like he would be crossing an ethical line if he had, but he couldn't bring himself to shred it and its contents either. Catherine had been on him in spare moments, asking if he had read Raul's report yet, and every time, Richard had told her he had been too busy. The woman calmly accepted that excuse twice, since the first two quarries she had been lecturing him on the importance of solving these minor issues before they became small problems, problems which would only be eventually fanned into the flames of controversy.

He knew the woman was right on that front; he had seen petty things build over time until they became moral threats to political careers, destroying in moments what had taken decades to construct He only needed to tune to a cable news channel or glance at the front page of a metropolitan paper to glean that much information. Yet, he still couldn't broach the threshold he felt he would be crossing once he opened the folder.

"Read it," Catherine commanded, having cleared a window in Richard's schedule.

Sitting up in his chair, Richard grabbed at the folder Catherine had plucked from the pile and set square in the middle of his desk. Giving her a short look, he pulled the file from beneath her fingers and flipped the cover open.

"It's interesting what people will share with a two-bit private investigator," she said answering the withering look Richard leveled at her. Satisfied that Richard had opened the report, she leaned back in her perch on the corner of his desk, folding her arms in a knot over her breasts.

Her candidate was silent as his eyes poured over the first page, a brief history of Jacob Keats. It mentioned his birth date, the fact that he was an only child of a single mother, raised in a section of Sacramento that had low property values and an abundance of auto repair shops.

"This is supposed to be useful?" Richard questioned, taking a moment to look at Catherine over the top of the document.

"Keep reading," she commented, sounding austere and very pleased with herself.

Richard flipped the page, finding everything, including the high school transcripts overly mundane. Truth told, Richard expected as much, after all there wasn't much dirt a teenager could possibly have lying around in his scant past. He was hoping for a string of felonies, drug related would have been great, but Richard would have settled for a series of petty thefts, but know all he found was a glowing transcript.

"He got an 'A' in freshmen English, and lettered in football... twice," Richard announced, shocked.

"Funny..." Catherine huffed, "Don't you find it interesting that those transcripts end after two years? Or that the following is from a continuation school?" she asked, arousing Richard's curiosity.

Richard inspected the document, finding what Catherine had pointed out. The current transcript indeed ended after sophomore year, flipping the page Richard found one from a continuation school.

"Interesting," Richard commented. "Can't be too good a kid if he got bumped out of school."

"He wasn't expelled, per se," Catherine admitted, edging forward on the desk. "The school board wanted him to receive counseling, his mother objected, and together they decided that the school probably wasn't the best place for him."

Richard gave the dark-haired woman perched on his desk a curious look. "Counseling?" he asked, finding this an interesting turn of events.

"Raul had a problem finding out just why the school board wanted him in therapy, but a few members of the faculty were helpful," she purred with delight, a slow smile spreading across her cranberry colored lips.

Richard closed the file and set it on his desk before reclining in his chair, appraising the woman as he folded his arms across his chest. "Are you going to tell me?"

"It's all there in the report," Catherine countered easily.

"And you know it all by heart..." Richard said, issuing his advisor a playful smile.

"I do," she admitted, pulling back and straightening her spine.

"So?" Richard pushed for the information that he didn't feel like gathering from the report himself, not when he could hear it in Catherine's dulcet, sometimes purring, voice. Some things more than others caused certain regions of Richard anatomy to react. The way Catherine spoke was one of them; the way it raised in progressing octaves with her unfolding excitement, only to turn into a willful scorn on a dime.

"It seems Jacob has a history of wooing the lads," Catherine paused for effect, arching her eyebrows as she did. "He was caught on his knees."

Richard's gut churned with a mix of excitement and repulsion as the words spilled off Catherine's dark lips with an ease that seemed all too practiced to him. They brought back a flood of images into his mind, each worse than its predecessor. Richard shook his head, jarring the memories from his mind as he looked at Catherine.

"Has he..." Richard halted the question he already knew the answer to. He could play the game of ignorance as well as she or anyone else could, but he was trying to determine if she knew what he had seen in his son's bedroom.

Catherine gave Richard a shrug, Raul hadn't been looking in Jacob's present, only into the kid's past, "Only he and your son know that, and Raul hasn't approached either of them, though I can have him talk to Jacob if you want," Catherine offered.

"No," Richard said, shaking his head, not wanting what he considered a 'greasy' private eye anywhere around his family, no matter how broken it may have become. "I'll talk to Matt."

"When?" she pushed, "The sooner this is dealt with the better. Need I remind you that this information has been on your desk for nearly a week?"

"Soon," Richard answered, unwilling to give Catherine anything else.

Catherine gave Richard an unenthusiastic shrug, "As long as your kid keeps his pants on in public," she commented, pushing herself off Richard's desk, taking a moment to smooth her tailored skirt, she continued, "Just make sure it's soon, so we can put this behind us and move onto more important issues."

"I've been trying," he retorted. "But you keep pressing this situation. I just want to forget it ever happened."

"Forget it happened?" Catherine said, scoffing at the notion of forgetting. "I'd love to forget about it, Richard. Do you think the other team will be as forgiving? They won't, with just minor digging it will be done; queer son, addict wife. It will be everywhere, and the people will ask themselves if he could do that to his family what will he do to the district? Then, when it comes to your name or the other guys on that screen, they'll choose the other guy."

Richard smiled as she pattered on in her display of indignation, more at the way the tempo of her voice rose with every syllable. His smile eroded as quickly as it formed, her actual words sinking into his brain.

"Is there anything else of note I should know about in this?" Richard asked, his voice resolute as he nodded his head indicating the folder he had just closed.

"Nothing as salacious..." Catherine purred.

Richard's jaw muscles tensed and relaxed as he weighed his options. "Finish it," he answered, his fingers landing harshly on the document, sliding it forward on his desk towards Catherine who was now standing, "and shred that," he finished as he removed his fingertips from the offending folder.

"Finish it how?" Catherine asked, plucking the folder from the desktop as Richard began reading another document while his hands supported his head.

Richard spared her a glance from the draft legislation he was reading, "I want Jacob Keats out of my son's life."

"Glad to see we are finally on the same page," Catherine cooed with delight before turning on her heel and retreating from his office.

Richard didn't respond to her statement, preferring instead to watch as the globes of her rear jostled with her walk out of his office. Left with the dissipating fragrance of her perfume, and the fading visage of her hind end, Richard pushed himself back into his leather desk chair and wondered just when, if ever, he would talk to Matt.

Closing the door to Richard's small office, Catherine crossed the rows of desks where campaign workers would be assembling buttons, photocopying flyers, typing emails, and manning phone banks. Ignoring the sound of the staffers making fundraising calls, she proceeded directly to her office. No sooner had she closed the door, than her cell phone was out and ringing Raul.

Raul had barely managed to get in the door of the dingy little motel room he was staying in before his phone started a piercing chirp from its place on his hip. Dumping the grease stained paper bag on the small table, he grabbed the phone, taking a glance at the caller ID display before flipping the clamshell open.

"How did he respond?" Catherine asked, not wasting time on useless greetings.

"He was amiable," Raul answered, digging his double cheeseburger and fries out of the bag he set on the table.

"Amiable is not agreeable," Catherine said, her lips thinning as she spoke in a terse tone.

"He wasn't," Raul stated, sounding unfazed by her tone. "He thought about it for a minute, and then said he couldn't do it. It appears your little problem down there was more than a warm and willing body after all."

"I'm not happy," Catherine said, to which Raul shook his head on the other side of the connection, wondering to himself where this woman got off. "Did you deliver the contingency plan?" she asked, commited to causing as much trauma as it took to get her way.

"Fed-Ex'd it yesterday," Raul answered, "just in case he wasn't as open to the idea as we thought. His girlfriend should have received it this afternoon."

"Good, Richard is complacent with the plan, he wants this minor problem out of his son's life. Call me when you have any developments," Catherine stated simply before cutting the call.

Raul tossed the phone aside, ignoring how it slid across the white Fed-Ex envelope he should have mailed that instead lay abandoned on the single king-sized bed. He issued the package a withering glance. This whole 'other' plan didn't sit well with Raul for some reason he couldn't pin down. It was too malicious for his taste; too much of a twisted web Catherine was weaving as she boldly used one person to get to another and another. That, and he was being practical, having serious doubts about destroying Cody's current relationship with his girlfriend. Raul figured such a bold move would hardly be conducive to garnering the kid's cooperation

He continued to stare at the package as he tore into his double cheese-burger, taking a large bite, chewing methodically as he exhaled through his nose. In the end, he knew he'd bend to Catherine's will and deliver the envelope and the information it contained. Deciding on a different approach, he wiped his mouth with a napkin and tossed it aside.

Tomorrow, Raul decided, as he settled back into the well worn arm chair the motel room provided, he'd give Cody the envelope tomorrow, and tell him a second copy was ready to be mailed to his girlfriend if he failed to comply. Its not like he was asking the kid to shoot anyone, Raul just wanted him to make a phone call, and try to rekindle what they'd once had. The money was out now, save for a scant five grand. Cody had pushed Raul into a corner, with his refusal; he would learn that there were some things he couldn't dismiss. After issuing the ultimatum, Raul would fly back to Los Angeles, and hopefully be done with this mess.

Jacob smiled pulling Matt into a strong hug. He kissed the nape of Matt's neck, not giving a shit who might have wandered into the shops front office and saw it. Sill he smiled, pushing Matt away and congratulating him while looking him the eye, and the whole while he was dying inside. It was a stupid reaction, and Jacob knew it. He would go to USC in a heartbeat, but he knew Matt was holding out hope for the Art Institute.

"You're crazy," Jacob said, his smile as big as when Matt first handed him the letter. "You might walk away from USC, but I'd give my left nut to go there."

"It's my Dad's school," Matt reasoned as he took a seat in one of the cheap chairs that, along with an old TV, made up a small customer waiting area.

"Kid, it's a university," Jacob exclaimed as he jumped into the seat next to Matt, "side's their mascot is a Trojan."

"Greek warrior, not a condom," Matt observed, smiling.

Jacob chuckled at Matt's observation, "It'll be the whole college experience, not some watered down version that you'd get at the school in San Francisco," he said, trying to sway Matt into going to USC and giving up on the California Institute of Art.

Matt shrugged, still undecided, and not liking that USC was the school his father had pressured him to apply to. "I still haven't heard from the Institute of Art," he said with a shrug of his shoulders.

"Go with USC," Jacob said, his smile withering, concerned he wasn't swaying Matt's judgment.

"With Berkley pretty much out, Val says I should hold out for the Institute," Matt observed. "Though if she had her way I'd wait out the wait list and go to Berkley."

Jacob frowned and decided to change the subject, "You off tonight?"

It was Matt's turn to frown. "Nope, I have to be there in twenty minutes."

"Have you thought anymore about accepting Dan's offer?" Jacob inquired, curious if Matt had given any thought to working at the garage with Valerie and himself.

Matt nodded, the corner of his mouth curling slightly, "I'm going to give my notice next Friday. I talked to Dan about it some more, and he said whenever I'm ready to start just show up, he'll find something for me to do."

"Awesome..." Jacob grinned, nodding his head slowly.

"I better get going," Matt said, noticing the time.

"Give me a call when you get home," Jacob said standing up, "or just come over, and we can..."

"I'll see you tonight," Matt decided with a devious smile, grabbing hold of Jacob's offered hand.

"It's a date, Kid," Jacob said with a wink as he pulled Matt to his feet. He wanted to kiss Matt goodbye, but settled on rubbing his thumb over Matt's knuckles, accentuating the action with a slight smile.

The final three hours of Jacob's shift seemed to stretch out into an infinite eternity. The oil changes had dried up with Matt's departure and he could only sweep the shop floor so many times without looking like he was wasting the pennies that passed with each click of the hands on the time clock. Then there was Valerie, and her optimistic droning about Matt being accepted to the art school. Jacob played nice, and smiled enthusiastically as she went on about living up north for four years. He had almost had enough by the time she dropped him off in his driveway.

Jacob didn't even offer her a 'goodnight' he was so angry at her plans for Matt's future. It may have been selfish, and even brazen to an extent, but Jacob felt he had more rights to Matt's future than Valerie did. He was Matt's future after all, where Valerie wasn't, not really. Not in the way that involved a pair of rocking chairs on a porch in the distant future.

The warm smell of garlic and roasting beef didn't even faze him as he entered his house, being far too concerned and hopeful to spare any thought for appetizing smells or the rumbling in the pit of his stomach. Without so much as a 'hello' to his mother, who stood at the kitchen counter cutting into a small chunk of roast beef, Jacob dropped into a seat at the kitchen table ignoring the brochure that sat in front of the seat his mother usually sat at.

"Rough day at the garage?" Joanne asked, setting the plate she had prepared for herself in front of Jacob before wandering back to start dishing up another.

Jacob looked down at the plate piled with slices of roast beef, mashed garlic potatoes, and carrots. "No," he answered, feeling hungry enough to clean the plate twice, but not willing to eat just yet.

"It doesn't look that way," Joanne said, setting her plate on the table after pushing the brochure out of the way and taking a seat herself.

"Valerie got accepted to Berkley," Jacob said sounding bothered by her fortune.

"I know... that's great news!" Joanne smiled.

"It is," Jacob agreed with a half-hearted smile.

"So why the general blah you have going on?" his mother questioned, positioning her fork and knife strategically in her piece of roast beef.

"Matt didn't," Jacob answered, grabbing for the flatware beside his plate and using it to push a carrot around his plate instead of using the fork for its intended purpose.

"Awww," Joanne sighed. "Did he have any backup schools?"

"He applied at USC and at California Institute of Art," Jacob said, nodding. "He got an acceptance letter from USC today."

"That's great!" Joanne exclaimed.

"I know, but he's holding out for the art school, and I don't understand it." Jacob responded before nibbling at a carrot he had skewered with his fork.

"Oh," Joanne said, figuring Jacob felt left out of the whole college hoopla. She knew USC had been a dream of his back when he was playing football. He wanted a scholarship to either that school, or to Penn State. "Upset he's willing to walk away from something you wanted?" Joanne asked.

"It's not just that," Jacob said with an unperceivable nod. "I just got here it seems and they both want to run away and go where we came from."

Joanne found the answer too simple, maybe because her vision wasn't blinded by the problem like she imagined her son's to be. "So go up there with him if that's what he chooses."

"I can't," Jacob mumbled. "I signed up for that fire protection coarse I was telling you about."

Joanne chuckled, "I'm sure the community colleges up there offer the same thing," she rebuffed.

"Taught by the California Department of Forestry?" Jacob fought.

"It's still California, and they have more forests up north than they do down here," Joanne said cutting at her meat again.

"My job?" he pushed, not wanting to give the real reason for his reluctance to fold to her suggestion.

"You'll find another one," she replied giving him a confidant smile.

Jacob stared at his mother, trying to figure out how she had a rational response for every obstacle he had encountered in his life. That was his biggest reason for not wanting to leave, he didn't want to leave her, she didn't need to be alone and he wanted her close if he ever needed her, closer than a phone, and closer than a five hour drive.

"I can't leave you here alone," he blurted.

"Jacob Keats!" Joanne blurted, swatting his wrist that lay on the table. She would have given serious thought to moving back up north, but this was her home now. Here she had a good job, a house that was hers, and not an apartment in a shabby building that smelled like burning acetone every other week. "I'll be fine here, I'm a grown woman."

"No you won't," Jacob observed, his tone saying that he would argue until dawn if she wanted but his stance wasn't going to change.

Joanne smiled at the sentiment, her heart swelling at how much of her obstinate father was in him, "You sound like Jacob," she observed in reference to her father, opting not to fight his stubbornness.

"So do you, when you feel like it," Jacob said with a sly smile.

"This fire protection course is Monday through Thursday right?" she asked an idea taking shape in her mind.

"Yeah," Jacob admitted to one of the bonuses of the program, Monday through Thursday, nine a.m. to three p.m.

"You could just drive up after class lets out on Thursday," Joanne smiled proud of her simple logic.

"Ten hours in a car every week?" Jacob asked, liking the idea but not totally sold on it.

"Or," Joanne said, setting her cutlery down, "There is this..." she finished sliding the brochure she had moved earlier across the table.

Jacob's eyes glistened and a smile spread across his face as he looked down at a brochure for a Yamaha YZF-R6S. He flipped the book open taking a moment to study the picture of a bike speeding around a corner on a mountain road flanked with luscious green pines.

"Nice bike," he commented trying to contain his excitement.

"Expensive graduation gift," Joanne commented, her own smile widening as Jacob looked up at her thrilled and surprised all in one. Gone was his earlier glum attitude, replaced by what Joanne could only describe as giddy excitement that had him vibrating where he sat.

"How did you know?" Jacob asked, wondering how she had figured out he wanted to buy one.

"Well let's see, there were the cycle trader magazines, the computer desktop picture changed to one that had that bike, I've seen you looking at the site on more than one occasion..." Joanne rattled off all of the things that clued her into to Jacob wanting the bike.

"Are you serious?" he asked sobering to the reality that he was getting the bike for graduation.

"We'll see," she said smiling in her way that said he'd have to wait and find out. Jacob however knew from past experience, that it was as good as in their driveway.

Without thinking, he bounced from the chair and threw his arms around her neck, eliciting an excited, surprised laugh from Joanne.

"Well..." she said still clasped in his arms. "There goes that surprise."

Jacob gave her a squeeze for good measure, releasing it just as the phone rang. Bouncing away from her, he practically hopped across the small distance between the kitchen table and the phone, flashing his wide smile at her every chance he could. On the verge of giggling with excitement he yanked the receiver off the cradle.

"Hello!" he answered the excitement evident in his voice.

"Hello?" a familiar voice sounded from the other end that threatened to fracture Jacob's wide smile. "Jacob?" the voice asked, as Jacob's brow furrowed with the sound of his name in a voice he never thought he'd hear again.

"Cody?" Jacob responded, his voice nearly catching in his throat as the excitement bled out from him.