The Imperfect Truth of Diamond Hearts {Kellin Quinn Sequel}

9 - All About Us

    Do you remember?  Do you remember Hannah?  When I came home after that first tour and all the ones after?  Can you see it?  Can you see where I took you so that we could be together?  I can feel you here and I can feel you there.  Please don’t leave me.  We have to make it back to that place so that we can grow old together.  Do you remember?

    I wasn’t sure why I had written that down in my notebook, but it was there, scrawled out in my messy hand writing on an otherwise blank sheet of paper.  I read the lines over and over again, trying to figure out what they meant but I guess it didn’t matter.  Breathing deeply, I took in the hearty scent now flowing through my body.  Relaxation took over tense muscles while peace embedded itself in my heart.  Black circles were starting to turn back to healthy flesh tones and the exhaustion in my limbs was beginning to return strength.  Who knew that getting out of the house could create such wonders for the body?  Two screaming babies managed to drain every ounce of energy I had had before Kellin left and now that he was home, the both of us were so tired we could barely function.

   And then he had brought me out here.

    It didn’t matter at this point if he really thought it was paradise out here the way that I did; the two of us felt the magic of this wooded area more then ever because we could finally breathe.  Catching air and a moment alone was more precious than we could ever have imagined before the twins.  Now that we were out in the woods, spending a week in the cabin my parents owned up in the mountains with no television and very little cell phone reception, it was like drinking a renewal potion.  My skin had turned from sallow to healthy pink within a day while my brain morphed from mush to substance in two.  Body rejuvenated and heart content, it was hard to imagine a world outside of this one where the screams of tiny children kept you up all night.

    After five days of this haven, I had started to miss home but only so much.  I loved Hunter and Keira, but another week of this and I might be ready to brave them again.  Two more days with Kellin alone in the middle of nowhere wasn’t enough for me.  I was pretty sure my husband was getting cabin fever though.  He had come home three afternoons before our departure to heaven and was still recuperating from evenings spent up all night with four children.  I had two babies to clean and feed and love, but Kellin had had his own problems.  Justin and Jack drank a lot and had way too much fun on this tour while Jesse and Gabe seemed to get high before every set.  The problems he’d dealt with were just as extensive as mine.

    Keeping juveniles out of trouble is just as heavy a task as cleaning up the monsters in cribs at home.  By the black beneath his eyes, I could tell he had been just as exhausted as me, every bit as deserving as I of this trip.  However, the lack of outside communication was driving him nuts.  Granted, it was a pain in the ass to go and call my mother to see how the twins were, but I didn’t truly mind.  Mom was ready for us to come home because she told me that being a grandmother entitled her to full visiting rights, not keep them all night rights. 

    I had laughed at her because I wasn’t ready to come home.  Like I had said, I needed more days filled with just this.  I needed a vacation from being a mom.  Nonetheless, I think Kellin really missed being a dad.  He was gone this entire time taking care of children that weren’t his and now he wanted to hold the babies he had helped to make.  I couldn’t say I blamed him, but neither could I deny the fact that he was crazy.  This could very well be the last holiday we had alone together.  I wasn’t sure if Mom wanted to babysit ever again for this length of time.

    Still, he was restless.  I sat on the porch watching him as he swung absentmindedly in the hammock beneath a pair of oak by the river.  His leg dangled and wound clockwise to the tempo of his swing while cool ocean blue eyes studied the pale azure sky.  Lips were slightly parted, hands folded on his chest.  The grey and white plaid button up that covered his torso was a bit disheveled and a few buttons had popped open.  Dark locks were in disarray as though he had been messing with it to much, but the overall mien of my husband was not only worry, but anxiety.  I wanted to comfort him, but wasn’t sure that me being around him would help.