Loving Family

Evalynn: A new year

We spent New Year with Mick's family and got our Christmas presents from them while we were there. Mamma let me stay up with the adults to watch the fireworks in London on TV, although told me I wasn't old enough to drink with the adults just yet. That being said she still let me try a little sip of prosecco, and it seemed to taste good (better than coffee anyway). But the main focus for Ben and I had been around the gifts and watching the fireworks on the telly. Expensive fancy physical gifts don't tend to excite me all that much, I tend to prefer the fact that someone thought of me and wanted to give me something in the first place over the item, but I was so in love with a few of the things I'd been given. One of the presents I'd got on New Years Eve was a very gorgeous book called Wolf Princess. I'd also been brought a few small little things like posters and more picture frames to decorate my room by Mick's family, while mamma's side of the family had been more focused on giving me arty things like a watercolour paint set, craft kits and cross stitch packs. The more I'd thought over mamma and Mick's very different interests the more the gifts their families had given me made sense.
Mamma and Mick, who clearly knew me best, had brought me my favourite things though. I'd had a few new outfits for Josie and Faye Bear which had made me smile a lot, though I'd hardly wanted to explain the significance of that to Aunty Clare when she'd asked, worried she'd tease me for almost being a teenager who loved teddies. And tickets to go with either Mick or Cece (the choice was apparently mine) see mamma in a musical she was going to do called Singin' in the Rain - it was pointed out to me that I was going to end up seeing it anyway because Mick would inevitably take me and maybe even Ben a few times at points he figured we'd want to see mamma because it'd would be too long since we last had. But the other present, the more important one, was the present I'd got when we got home from nanna's but before we saw Mick's family. I was finally in possession of a better phone - admittedly it wasn't the newest model, but it was the same as mamma's and not too old or a hand-me-down like my last one - and a very pretty case to keep it safe. Mamma and Mick had already put their phone numbers in it along with a few family members' numbers, but because it had a different number there was no way of moving my contacts from my old phone to the new one besides me doing it manually, which I was fine with. Mamma and I made an agreement afterwards; it was my phone I was able to message any of my friends and have privacy over what we talked about, and put games on it so long as I was honest about what I was using it for, her obviously not wanting me to just snoop to dark corners of the internet or be being horrible online (or I supposed having anyone be horrible to me). I reckoned as a pre-teen with her first smart phone that was a pretty fair deal.

The other thing that had been celebrated (if that was the right term) in between Christmas and New Year was my homecoming day. Because of it being caught up with Christmas not much of a fuss was made about it, given how we normally celebrated was time together and we were already doing that anyway. Mick was off work because he always was for his work's Christmas shutdown and mamma was at home too. Ben gave me a very pretty sparkly card he'd made, clearly with some help from mamma or Mick, and mamma had given me a massive hug to celebrate (Mick had given me a shorter, but still very affectionate, hug) but that was as far as the celebration had gone off the path of any other day in Christmas week. We'd concluded our main celebrations of mamma being mamma to me were probably best off happening in the summer on the date I'd found out - after all from that day on all my worries tended to get texted to her and she started working on getting her maternal rights back not long afterwards. That was really the day that she became my mamma, not the day I'd moved home. We'd elected to call the date in July 'Reunion Day'. It meant no celebration of me and mamma's relationship got completely lost, as things were she planned to avoid doing too much theatre in our summer breaks, and we only had one special day to remember.

It was a few days after New Year as I ran round the house finding everything for my first day of term that I first realised I could take the Gameboy to school. It'd have to stay hidden in my blazer pocket during class and be played on quiet mode if I was in the library but that didn't matter. I could take it! Only I couldn't remember where I'd put it when I'd last played it and didn't have the energy to go looking for it. I'd do so after school tomorrow. I was jealous of Ben because he had tomorrow off with mamma while I went back to school, I liked school but I'd still rather be at home and able to play childish games with mamma and Ben. It seemed most of our school holidays didn't quite perfectly line up, me having done more days at school before Christmas too, though I did get the longer February break out of the two of us, which would be nice. Mamma and I already had a couple of plans for what we might do, one involving a theatre trip in London, the other involving seeing her family. I wasn't sure I minded which one we picked, just so long as we managed to have a little time just us like we both still so wanted. I had nothing against Ben, I still found him adorable, but I also liked mamma and Evalynn time because we'd never really been able to have it before.
Done with packing my bag, I fell down on the sofa, leaning up against mamma. She slipped her arms around me. "It's been over a year." Mamma said to me. "You've done a year at this school."
I smiled, shuffling against her to get more comfortable. "I know. It hardly seems real."
She kissed my head. "And yet it is. A year of you being home my beautiful little girl."
"I love you." I whispered.
"I love you too Evvy." She replied.

*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#

The following morning I was up and nearly ready for school. The bright red blazer and checked skirt were back, although I quickly realised that the weather forecast for today suggested trousers may be a better choice and had to go change. My bag packed properly with all the books I needed, my bus pass was found (that had proven challenging, though we'd eventually found it on the kitchen table with a bunch of other random things people had clearly left in the pockets of clothes), my water bottle was filled for once and I was in the process of tidying my breakfast stuff away when Ben came downstairs. He was already dressed even though he didn't have to be up yet, and he seemed keen to get my attention. So I distracted myself for a moment to give him what he wanted, taking him into a good morning hug. Which also served the purpose of keeping him out of Mick's way should he decide to come downstairs now and join in the chaos.
"Can I walk you to the bus?" Ben asked me when we let each other go.
I bit my lip the road at the end of the driveway wasn't the best place for a child to be wandering around alone, as I was sure mamma would agree. "How about you walk me up the drive? Then mamma can watch from the door and make sure you're okay." I compromised.
He thought about that idea for a moment. "Yeah okay." He said.
I smiled. It'd be up to me to tell mamma no doubt, but I'm sure she'd be fine with sitting in the doorway to watch Ben and make sure no harm came to him. "Alright. Make sure you have shoes on though!" I said.
He nodded and I rubbed his hair before running upstairs to brush my teeth.

"Where you going Ben?" Mamma asked five minutes later, watching him trying to velcro his own shoes.
"I'm going to walk Evvy." He replied.
"Really! Where to?" Mamma asked.
I smiled as I listened to the conversation, tying my shoelaces as I did. "He's going to walk with me up the drive." I told her. "He wanted to walk me to the bus stop but I didn't think that was safe. Would you sit in the doorway and watch him back just so we know he's alright?"
"Of course I can, though I'm sure you're safe enough on the driveway Ben." Mamma said.
Both Ben and I smiled. "You ready B?" He nodded at me. "Alright then." I offered him my hand, which he gently closed his little fingers round, and we walked up the driveway towards the road. I glanced back after a few steps and saw mamma stood in the doorway watching us, the love she was feeling in that moment so obvious to me though I knew Ben would be totally oblivious to it. I'd known that half the reason she'd be fine to watch Ben back from the doorway would be because she'd enjoy the moments of watching us walk together like she always did. When we made to the point Ben and I had to part I let go of his hand and took him into a hug.
"I love you. Have a super day with mamma!" I said.
"I loves you! Enjoy school!" He replied.
I smiled. "I'll try my best. Be a good boy and head straight back to mamma now okay?"
He nodded and, when we let each other go, he turned round heading back towards mamma, still in the doorway though I was too far now to tell her feelings. I headed on to the bus stop.

On the bus I sat next to Molly as I always did, we talked about our Christmases and what different things we'd been given and done. It was nice how even now she was too busy for us to see each other that much she would still make time for me and talk to me on the bus and if she saw me in the hallways. At school I found Kathryn and spent much of my free time with her, again talking about Christmas and our presents and what exciting things we'd each done since we last spoke. Angela seemed to have moved on from antagonising me which was a relief. Although she'd never done or said anything directly I still had a distinct feeling she was going to start bullying me any minute, the longer I could dodge that for the better - she'd probably move on to someone else if I could just avoid her another few weeks. I'd done all my homework that was due on the first day back and my English teacher was overjoyed by the amount I'd read and was willing to talk about after class. Mr Parker set us homework as he always did, but he usually set quite easy homework so it was nothing out of the ordinary to have a map to colour in or a weather pattern to write a paragraph about. Things felt very good and very normal.

*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#*#

As I headed back up the drive after school I was surprised to see Ben run up to me. He for once wasn't dressed as a pirate, instead just wearing a normal top and trousers.
"Is everything okay?" I asked, looking down the driveway and seeing to my relief mamma sat in the doorway. He clearly wanted to walk me home too.
"I'm just excited to see you!" Ben replied, offering me his hand.
I took hold and he ran back down the driveway. He tugged my hand a few times as I walked behind him and gave me a look so I "ran" (it was more of a fast walk so I didn't overpower him) back to the house, us both giggling most of the way. He was just so overjoyed to be with me, just like I still often felt about being his sister. He was going to be a very nice gentleman when he grew up, mamma kept saying it, though he still liked to pretend to be a pirate at the minute.