I swear Jacob spent all of Friday afternoon running around like a headless chicken. He was determined to make sure there wasn't a dirty spot in the house and dinner was ready at six, when Troye and his family were due to arrive.
"Connor, can you clean the rug from the hallway? I forgot to do it earlier." He called from the bathroom and I rolled my eyes, putting down the dust brush I'd been using to clean the top of the bookcase in the study.
"Got it." I called back.
"Papa, where's Buggy?" Penny appeared as I rolled up the rug carefully to take it outside.
"Daddy probably put him in your room. Why don't you go and check?" She nodded and scurried off.
"Connor, they're going to be here soon. What are you doing?" Jacob appeared in the hallway just then, a towel wrapped around his waist and a confused look on his face.
"Cleaning the rug?"
"Why?"
"You just asked me to."
"No I-oh, yeah. Okay, keep going." He hurried off again and I shook my head. Maybe this whole evening was going to be too much.
"Papa, he's not there. Can you help me find him?" Penny appeared again, still looking for her stuffed toy lady-bug.
"Not right now, sweetie. Can you go and get dressed into the dress I put on your bed? I'll come and zip it up in a second."
"Okay."
Ten minutes later, I was in Penny's room with her, zipping up the back of her dress and brushing her golden hair so it was smooth.
"You want a princess hair-band?"
"Yes please." I reached for the shiny silver headband that sat on her dresser with one hand while I used my other hand to pull her hair away from her face. It didn't take me long to situate the headband properly, having learned several quick and easy ways to do Penny's hair from my sister when we adopted Penny. I was just finishing when the doorbell rang. I jumped up and headed for the door, realising I wasn't dressed myself yet.
"Jay, can you get that? I'm just getting dressed." I called as I darted into our room. He yelled something from the kitchen that I assumed was affirmation and quickly changed out of the sweatpants I'd been wearing since I got home from work. I heard the door open and the sound of voices echoed down the hallway.
"Penny? What're you doing?" Jacob's panicked voice reached my ears after a moment and I hurriedly pulled on my shirt before rushing out to the front door where Penny was happily chatting to Troye at the front door.
"Oh." I sighed in relief that it was only Troye but my heart was still beating fast. Jacob and I always told Penny to never open the door without us so it scared us when she did. "Hi Troye."
"Hey." Troye smiled as I pulled the door all the way open with one hand, using my other arm to lift Penny up onto my hip.
"Good to see you made it. And you've met my little monster, here."
"Oh, she's not a monster." Troye laughed, coming inside and shrugging off his jacket. "She was just telling us about her princess hair-band."
"Right. Well, this is Penny. And this is Jacob." Beside me, Jacob reached over to shake his hand, a little more warmly than when they first met.
"Hi Troye, it's nice to finally meet you after only hearing stories for so long."
"Nice to meet you too, Jacob. Um this is my husband; Joey." Joey stepped forward to shake my hand and I vaguely recognised him from the night I met Troye. "And here's Sam and Jess." He gestured to the two kids standing behind him. I immediately recognised Sam and my eyes were drawn to where a bandage was just peeking out under his jacket sleeve. Troye hadn't mentioned anything but from the way the boy kept tugging at his sleeve, I figured it was probably to do with why Troye was away for a few days .
