The Night That Changed It All

Good News

I am really, super sorry about the extra long wait for this chapter. I had major research to do for my History project, which is part of the marks for my leaving cert, which, if you're not Irish, basically sets up what I can do with the rest of my life if I want to go to college before I'm twenty three (when you can go back as a mature student).

"Hey little bear. How did your first day go?" Liam asked Lily Ann when we came to collect her from school. It had become a tradition that we'd both come to collect her on her first day so she could tell us all about it.

"Great! Harper and Sinéad are in my class again. Julia's on her own, but she said her neighbour is in her class so she's OK." Lily Ann explained with a smile. Harper, Sinéad and Julia were her best friends and the four of them had been practically inseparable since they met on their first day in first year. 

"That's great, baby. Is your teacher nice?" I asked, rapping my arm around Lily Ann's shoulders to guide her to the car and ignoring the disapproving looks we got from one or two people. The general public attitude towards gays had gotten a lot better in recent years, but there were still a few people who refused to accept that gays were just as human as they were. Thankfully, they were dying out though and it was very rare to find someone who was strongly against homosexuality.

"Yeah, she's great. Her name's Ms. Green. She's really young and she said that she's new to teaching so we have to go easy on her. Someone told us at lunch that she taught their older brother for two weeks last year when she was still in college." Lily Ann explained with a little laugh as she all but skipped to the car. She was still as jumpy as she had been when she was a year old; following Quentin around all day and only falling asleep when he did.

"So you guys are her first proper class then." Liam pointed out, laughing when Lily Ann beamed happily before whispering to me; "That's good. They're always really nice and patient in their first few years; haven't got the years of small children testing their patience making them grumpy."

"Liam!" I exclaimed quietly, giggling slightly and slapping his shoulder playfully. "I'd like to see you deal with a classroom full of small children everyday, knowing you'd be doing it until you could retire, and not get grumpy."

"Alright. I commend them for being able to deal with a classroom full of small children asking weird questions while they're trying to teach them everyday but that doesn't mean I can't complain about them being grumpy towards my daughter. I don't see why you'd become a teacher in the first place if you didn't really, really like working with children." Liam laughed back, glancing over at Lily Ann to make sure she wasn't listening before speaking then rapping his arm around my waist and pulling me closer.

"There's Ms. Green over there." Lily Ann exclaimed suddenly, pulling on my hand to get our attention before waving to her teacher and shouting, only slightly louder; "Hi, Miss."

"Oh. Hello.......Lily Ann, isn't it?" Ms. Green greeted uncertainly, meeting us halfway, so Lily Ann nodded her head reassuringly with a smile. "OK. And you must be Lily Ann's parents?" She still sounded uncertain; probably thinking we couldn't both be her parent, but before we could clear it up for her, as we'd had to do a lot since Lily Ann started school, Lily Ann herself explained.

"Yup! And Daddy's got the scar to prove it." She explained innocently, making me look over at her, shocked. I didn't think she knew about the cesarean I'd had to get when she was born: I certainly hadn't told her anyway.

"How do you know about that?" I asked, completely forgetting about Ms. Green, who was still standing before us, watching this exchange as it happened.

"Daddy told me." Lily Ann explained with a shrug. She clearly didn't think much of it. Looking to Liam, I saw he was smiling sheepishly at me and once I poked his side expectantly, he sighed and explained.