Our Time Will Come - An After Story

106

*Last Christmas Chapter before an interesting storyline*

Hardin

"What's with you?!" I ask my soon to be son in law as he storms towards me. He completely ignores me, brushing past my shoulder on the way past. That little shit. He's holding some kind of ticket in his hand, probably the Season one that Emery bought him for Christmas.. so why does he have a face like thunder? Did she get the wrong team? Or is he just being an ungrateful little shitbag? I watch as he makes his way over to my little sister. My little sister who I love dearly, but can hardly trust due to the fact that she's the female equivalent of myself.

I glance around in search for Emery and she is nowhere to be found in the main room. I instead peak my head into the kitchen, where I find her holding my new great niece, while Addy seems to be filling her in on all the gory details of her arrival. Hopefully it puts her off having babies for a while, I mean her getting engaged was too much for my heart to handle. I don't think I can take much more.

I listen in for a moment until I hear the word 'contraction' and with that, I'm out of there. I do not want to relive that. I rejoin the family in the main room who are having a sing along. "Come on Hardin, sing!" My father begs. "No!" I huff, my face like thunder. I don't sing. Tessa gives the puppy dog eyes and I instantly find myself miming the words to Silent bloody Night. I'm not whipped, I'm not whipped.

I place a kiss onto Millers head as the family, who evidently sound like dying cats, belt out the hymn. "You don't how loved you are, blue eyed boy" I whisper to him as I rock him. I'll tell you what this song is missing..  A bit of electric guitar and drum and bass, though, I don't think that would go down well at the church. It wouldn't be a very silent night.

I receive deep glares from the dying cats, when my phone starts to ring obnoxiously loud. I retreat to my fathers room, taking Miller with me to answer it. The name flashes on my screen and for once, I'm looking forward to answering this particular person. My mother.

"Hardin!" She chimes as I pick up the phone. "Merry Christmas, mum" I tell her. "And a merry Christmas to you yanks" she chimes, as loud as ever. "Yanks? Don't make me laugh. I'm a Brit, loud and proud" I scold her. I get a kick out the way she cackles down the phone. "I've got little Miller here with me" I tell her and she kicks up a fuss at how grown up the twins are looking as of late. Of course, she hasn't seen them since they were born but Tessa bombards her with weekly photos of them. "You have no idea how much your gift means to me, Hardin" her voice wobbles and I smirk at how easily she becomes emotional.

For Christmas, I bought my mom and Mike plane tickets to JFK Airport. They arrive on January first and will reside with Tessa, the kids and I for five days. In normal circumstances, Never in a million years would I even consider spending more than a few days at a time with my mother, I love her to pieces but fuck, she's annoying. However.... As of late, I have realised that you only get one mother and it's about time that I started treating mine better. Plus, I want an excuse to boast about my newest achievements. I know that sounds massively arrogant, but I think I have the right to be a little cocky about what I have achieved. When I was a teen, my mum didn't think I'd make it past twenty without getting myself jailed or killed. I can't blame her. I was a total shit.

"Oh how I can't wait to pinch the cheeks of those little twinnies. How I can't wait to meet this Charlie that Emery speaks so fond of" she chimes. Oh fuck... about that. My mother is yet to know that Tessa and I have guardianship of Charlie. She met him briefly, months ago but there was so much happening at the time, you know.. with her and Vance, that she barely got to say Hello. I decide to leave it until she gets here to tell her about the whole Charlie thing. I don't want her flipping out on Christmas Day.