Anchor ⚓︎ Jake 'Hangman' Seresin

⚓︎ chapter nineteen ⚓︎

After Jake had left for his training, Eleanor got up a few hours later and decided to take a walk on the town with the dogs to get a feel of their home for the next few weeks. She spent the day going in and out of shops around the town and noted a couple she wanted to visit later on when she had time.

She made it home around lunchtime and quickly realized they had little to no food in their house.  However, she also didn't have the car, so she had to wait until Jake got home for them to go and get groceries.

The rest of the day was spent looking up wedding decor that she could DIY to save money, bridesmaid dress designs, color palettes, and different cake flavors.  However, in the back of her mind, the thought of the mission kept poking its way through, which in turn caused her stomach to twist and turn the whole day with anxiety.  It was making her physically sick.

She didn't want to worry because she knew that the people she cared about were damn good pilots, even to the point where they were cocky.  But she also knew that even if she couldn't know the specifics of the mission, it was extremely dangerous or they wouldn't have called back the best of the best.

Trying to ease her mind, she began to flip through wedding magazines to get inspiration and to distract her mind.  It worked because a few hours had passed and she heard Jake's truck pull up to the house, causing a smile to rise on her face.

A minute later, the front door opened and she heard him setting his stuff down before making his way back to the bedroom where she was sitting on the bed.

"There's my queen," he spoke, walking over and sitting in front of her.

She greeted him with a kiss before scrunching her nose.  "My dear king, you are in need of a shower because you stink," she laughed, causing Jake to laugh as well.

"I thought I didn't smell that bad," he defended, lifting his arm to sniff, "but I can shower if you will rub my shoulders a little before I hop in."

Eleanor laughed but agreed, positioning herself behind him to rub the tense muscles in his shoulders. "I didn't know the training would be this harsh on you," she gushed as she worked her fingers into his back.

"Oh, this wasn't just from the training," he told her, "our instructor wanted to work on dogfighting today and if you got shot down, you had to do two hundred push-ups."

"And the great Jake 'Hangman' Seresin got shot down?" She gasped sarcastically.  "I need to alert the media!"

Jake rolled his eyes. "Ha-ha," he fake laughed, "this guy's good. Seems to have your older brother rattle because he got shot down twice by him."

Eleanor's brow furrowed at his words. "Who did you say your instructor was?"

"Captain Pete Mitchell," he responded, "his callsign is Maverick if that sounds familiar."

Upon hearing the name, Eleanor felt her blood run cold. She hadn't heard that name in years it felt like.  Hell, she hadn't thought about Maverick in years it felt like.  Her fingers stopped rubbing and just rested on his back as she thought back to the last time she saw him and to be honest, the very harsh words she had said to him.

"You okay?" Jake asked, turning his head to look at her and seeing the far off look in her eyes.  "Is there history there that I need to know about?"

Eleanor blinked before looking at him and smiled.  "No," she told him, "just someone from the past, that's all."

"He was in the same Top Gun class with your dad, right?" Jake asked.  "I saw their class photo today."

She nodded.  "Yeah, and I will tell you that story one day, I promise," she told him, kissing him gently on the lips.  "Now, go shower because I wanted to go get groceries but I didn't have a car so I decided to wait for you."