Time To Waste

Chapter 23: Incoming

Their little getaway had really refreshed him, and Chris was feeling himself once again as he went about the droll business of cleaning the apartment up some, organizing items and putting away laundry. He didn't particularly feel inspired to write any lyrics or music today, but maybe later he'd grab his guitar and see if anything flowed. For now, while Jenna was out at a meeting for work, he was enjoying blasting Eighteen Visions' "XVIII" while he did his own version of work.

When the phone rang, it was a welcome distraction from cleaning his own foot-prints off his coffee-table – not a fun task. He tossed himself onto the sofa, and happily accepted the incoming call from his brother. "What's up?"

Nick sounded his usual, laidback self. "Not much, bro. What are you up to?"

Chris explained that he'd been dusting, putting away errant items and laundry, much to the amusement of his younger sibling who said he was "whipped". Laughing, Chris sighed. "Yeah, well, she's pretty amazing."

The other man paused for a moment, cleared his throat and then continued. "I never thought we'd see the day that you'd be having a kid, honestly. You always swore up and down that that was not for you."

"Things change," Chris shrugged. Truthfully, his brother was right and wrong all at once: he had never wanted kids, but now that one was fully in the picture, he was excited. "If you had asked me a year ago, I'd have laughed in your face. But now? We went to the doctor two weeks ago and I saw the baby on the monitor. It was fucking amazing, man. You wouldn't believe how strong that little heart-beat is and how loud!"

His brother laughed. "You sound happy."

"I am," Chris confessed with a smile. "But I've gotta tell you, everything leading up to this was a fucking mess. I haven't seen you without mom around, but fuck, Nick, some serious shit went down." He chewed on his bottom lip and debated if he should even get into the nightmare of that night, but, in his heart, he knew that he had to discuss the situation with someone that wasn't involved in the entire mess and he trusted his brother implicitly.

And Nick knew this: "You need to talk about it?"

Not that his brother could see, but Chris nodded. "Yeah, I do actually. Get yourself something to drink though, because this is a fucking long ordeal."

On the other end, Nick laughed. "Go for it, bro. I've got all the time you need!"

"Alright," Chris went into the kitchen, fished a cold bottle of water from the fridge, then returned to the sofa. "You know that I got a nice hotel suite for my one-month anniversary with Jen, right?"

"Right," his brother agreed. "And you paid an arm and a fucking leg."

"Not really," the older brother snorted. "Whatever. It made her happy."

Nick snorted now. "So, you got laid?"