Fifty Reasons to Stay (Book Three)

Chapter One- Perfect..?

Stereotypical trilogies always start the third book or movie shortly after the second one left off, or when something major happens that "changes everything." Sometimes there's a "previously on *insert title here* that tells you what you may have missed.

I don't think anyone's missed anything.

Leo and I have been married for seven years. We still live in the outskirts of Portland, Oregon, in a tiny neighborhood with large houses and blah blah blah.
Our street is called "Grey Circle" even though there's only three houses in this circle and it really should be a triangle.
The other two houses in the "circle" are occupied by 1) a rich old couple, Rose and Frank Carr- I think they never had any kids. Either that or their children never visit. But they're very friendly and good babysitters if needed, and 2) the other family are called the Penn's. Don't laugh. They have four kids, twin boys that are Andrew's age, a daughter who is about fourteen, and a baby. They are just a tad homophobic,  the parents anyway. Kyle and Sonia. They've never set foot in our house, neither have their kids. But Andrew goes over there to play a lot and sometimes plays with the twins in the backyard.

When I see Mr. and Mrs. Penn out working on the lawn I make sure to kiss Leo right in the front window just so they know I honestly don't care what they think and sometimes I consider painting our house the colors of the LGBT flag thingy complete with outdoor lighting that illuminates those colors at night. But I'm not that mean.
I'm almost always happy and kind.
Well, stressed-happy.
It's not that hard keeping Andrew and our little Teresa happy, it's just Leo that needs the extra care. He needs to be cuddled and fed and told he's loved at least twice a day. I'm cool with that. It's what I signed up for. Whenever he's in a bad mood or we've just fought I go back and read the little email letters he used to send me after we first got married. It cheers me up. I'm pretty clingy and refuse to acknowledge my mistakes.
He should probably just leave me.
Anyway.
In case you didn't read Leo's fascinating narration in the previous book, I'll give you a little summary of the house.
Six bedrooms; three are used, one is an office, and the other two are in the basement as empty guest rooms should my brothers ever come over.
We have a view of the mountains out the kitchen window.
My favorite bathroom is the one connected to me and Leo's bedroom. It has a really huge shower, and a rather large tub. So either way, we can join each other when it comes to bathing.
I decorated every room in the house and I think it looks great. Unfortunately, I don't really have any friends to show it to and spend most of the time watching daytime television and folding laundry. Sigh. Hey! It's not that I don't like watching Dr. Phil every day after lunch while Teresa naps. I love my life and my family.
Could I use some me time? Yes, but I wouldn't complain about it. Have I fallen terribly behind on all my work this year? You bet!
But my goal is to keep them happy. I'm not as important in that case.
To be honest I don't really know why I wrote this. It's stupid, me asking for attention most likely. But I'm okay. We're okay. Everything's okay! Perfect, great, wonderful, magnificent- I hope nothing ever changes!
I just need to focus on-
excuse me, the dryer is done.
~~
Summer vacation was about to begin, which meant Leo got a few weeks off before summer classes would start again. Fortunately, he was only teaching twice a week during this mini semester.
I was looking forward to the time we'd hopefully get to spend together, fantasizing about the vacation we were about to go on somewhere in the Caribbean...
In fact I really should've been catching up on my editing instead of that.
But yeah, he said he was excited too. This would be a good summer, I could sense it. Well, I could sense change on the horizon but that meant good change right? Right.

And that's it. Everything is perfect, we're happy, nothing has changed, nothing will.

The end!

Wait, no. Things were about to go to hell.