For Forever...

Daddy's Girl

May 2014
 
 
Jensen P.O.V.
 
Jared and I were finishing up on set for the morning when my phone started ringing like crazy. I mean it would stop, then start all over again consistently for the past 15 minutes straight. We were filming and I didn't have it on me. So the race to get to it was real.
 
"Hey Mom, everything good?"
 
"No honey, we need you to come home."
 
"Why what happened? Is Kayle-"
 
"Honey, Kayle is as fine as she can be. It's Wayne, he had another heart attack. This time while he was in the field. He didn't make it. The funeral is in two days, you need to come home. I know it's late but you have to be here."
 
"I'll be there. I'm checking flights now, I'll call you back."
 
My heart dropped, I know this man and I didn't get along for quite some time, but without all of that I wouldn't be the man I am today. He helped to raise me just about as much as my own parents.

I ran to find Bob or anyone of the guys. Thankfully running into Bob quickly.
 
"Hey, I need to get on a flight home like now."
 
"What's going on? We're only like halfway through the episode."
 
"I just need a few days, a family member passed."
 
"Yea man, please go. Do you want someone to go with you or are you good?"
 
"I'm good, I just, I need to be there."
 
"Of course, you know us, family first." I just nodded my head and took off to my trailer. I explained what happened to Jared and Clif before getting a flight for that night. It was a stupid connecting flight, but it was all they had especially this late.
 
After a six-hour layover in LA, I made it back to Austin. I said hi to my parents and went straight to bed. Tomorrow was the funeral, tomorrow I was hopefully going to hold Kayle one more time as we laid her dad to rest. It was a shitty moment of selfishness, but it was the truth. She's got to be there, it’s her own father.
 
**********************
 
Well, jokes on me, here we are at the funeral and she is nowhere in sight. Her mom asked me to watch the little girl that she usually is babysitting every time I see her, while she dealt with the hello's and goodbyes to everyone that showed up. Of course, I agreed, this little girl was awesome, and I haven't seen her in like two months. It was amazing she wasn't walking or saying any words the last time I saw her, and now here she was running around with me on her tail, and talking up a storm, most of which I couldn't understand besides easy words like Dada, Mama, cup, and a bunch of animal sounds.
 
I caught myself in a small daze watching her, realizing that this, this is the life I could have had with Kayle. The life I still want with Kayle, but there was no way she would take me back. Hell, she didn't even show up to her own father’s funeral. Her mom just said it was because she couldn't afford a flight back home but wouldn't tell me where she was when I offered to pay for it. Keryn came over next to me and sat on the floor, we both watched his daughter and the little girl playing.
 
"So, found out mom's losing the house. Dad didn't have shit for life insurance, and she's never worked so…childhood home gone."
 
"Doesn't it make enough money to basically self-sustain?"
 
"When dad was running it yea, but mom can't afford to make sure everyone is paid. Plus, she's getting old too, she runs around with these two little ones daily. Trying to tack on farm hands, she won't be able to handle it."
 
"But, say someone were to get the place, would it be able to be ran by like a hired guy?"
 
"Probably, but mom can't afford that." I just shook my head letting it all sink in.
 
After everyone left I drove Kayles mom back to their house getting the little girl, JJ, out of the car. She was sleeping so I brought her straight upstairs, carefully changed her diaper and clothes, then put her into her crib. Somehow, she managed to stay asleep the whole time. I walked back downstairs to Kayle's mom silently crying at the kitchen table. I walked over and sat down next to her, pulling her in for a much-needed hug.
 
"You want me to stay here?" She just nodded her head yes. "Okay done. Keryn said this place is going to be going to the bank?" She backed away and looked at me with her tear-filled red eyes.
 
"He worked so hard his entire life, and in just a few short painful days all of it is going to shit." I shook my head no.
 
"I won't let it."
 
"Jensen, honey, there isn't anything anyone can do about it unless I hit the lottery." She partially laughed.
 
"You are aware I'm a fairly decent actor that has like 10 seasons of a show or so under his belt, right?" She laughed again this time louder. "I'm serious, let me do this, I'll buy the house, I'll pay off all the cars, I'll make sure the hands get paid, and make sure that you have one single guy that can-do everything Dad did. Please." She covered her mouth with her hands.
 
"Jensen, I cannot ask that of you."
 
"You aren't, I'm offering. I'd do the same for my family. You don't have the means right now, but I do, and I will for a very long time. I mean, I don't spend it anyway." I smiled, and she pulled me back in for a hug.
 
"I will never be able to repay you."
 
"I don't want to see a dime of it. I'll call a lawyer tomorrow and get everything taken care of before I have to go back to Vancouver." She just nodded her head and mouthed thank you. I kissed her cheek. "Go try to get some sleep, I've got that little princess. When is her mom supposed to be here?"
 
"She's out of state for her schooling so, I just have her until the weekend."
 
"Well I'll handle her in the morning. She eat eggs?" She just smiled and nodded. "Bottles?"
 
"No bottles, all sippy cups, she'll eat pretty much anything as long as it is cut up small. Drinking as long as she gets a cup of whole milk a day, everything else is half and half juice and water."
 
"Got it, go try to sleep." She nodded again before getting up and heading to her room. I walked up a little bit later going into Kayle's room. Nothing has changed at all, even the pictures of us were still on her dresser. I climbed into the bed and let sleep claim me.
 
I woke up to little fingers poking me in the eye and couldn't help but laugh.
 
"Well good morning little lady." She giggled in response. "Are you hungry?"
 
"Num nuhs!"
 
"Alright, diaper first though." I got up picking her up with me and walked into her room to change her diaper before heading downstairs to make some breakfast. Carol came down a few hours later to the two of us playing on the floor with some toys.
 
"There is still time you know." I just looked at her confused. "For you and Kayle, there is still time. Don't lose hope."
 
"It's hard not to when she didn't even come home for this, where is she? She should be here."
 
"She's in New York, for school, and doing really well. She needed to become independent and she did just that and so much more. I know you haven't seen her in almost two years but dear she has grown up so much. Just don't lose hope please. I know my girl, she is still deeply in love with you."
 
"Same, going through the everyday motions just isn't the same without her. I even have a girlfriend, and she just, she's just there to pass the time. I don't want to be with her, but I also don't want to be alone."
 
"How long have the two of you been together?"
 
"Pft, like a year."
 
"And do you love her?"
 
"Not even a little bit."
 
"Does she know that?"
 
"She knows that I've never told her that I love her, and when she says it I just change the subject. It pisses her off, but she thinks I just have a commitment issue. Little does she know I'm still a married man." I laughed so did she and smacked my arm.
 
"Boy, you're momma."
 
"Already wants to kill me for it. I know, this is just something I have to do to see if I can even get over Kayls…but it’s not working. And since neither of us filed for divorce we are technically still married which works out."
 
"She'll be done school in about a year."
 
"Then what?"
 
"Then she will get a job in production somewhere I assume." She shrugged her shoulders like telling me for the first time what Kayle was going to school for was just no big deal. I smiled, I was happy for her she was chasing her dreams. She always wanted to be in production with the hopes that one day we would be on set together, both working. God I could only hope. "Anyway…are you hungry?"
 
"No, there is extra breakfast and coffee though, and my lawyer should be here in about twenty minutes to get everything transferred. Kayle's SUV is still half in my name, so I called and paid it off. She needs a new one though, so do me a favor please, next time she's home make her go get a new one. Have the dealership call me and I'll send them the money."
 
"You take care of us so well, you know you don't have to."
 
"She's my wife. Y'all are family. Family takes care of one another." She just smiled and walked away.
 
After signing all the paperwork needed to transfer the other two vehicles in my name and the house, the lawyer said it would take a few days for everything to be finalized but I left him with a check to cover everything and another to cover his time. I had to get back to work, no matter how much I didn't want to leave any of them.


Kayle P.O.V.

I couldn't believe my dad was gone. I couldn't risk going home and seeing Jensen face to face. I knew he was going to be there. Call me a coward but I wasn't ready to tell him that the little girl he plays with every time he's back in Texas just so happens to be his flesh and blood. I wasn't talking to anyone, I just went back into my shell. I didn't want to talk, I didn't want to say goodbye. My daddy was gone and I wasn't ready to say goodbye to anything or anyone.

I didn't go back home for obvious selfish reasons, but my mom came back up to New York a few days after the funeral so that Justice could be with me while in between classes, she also somehow managed to talk me into getting a new vehicle. Said something about it'll be cheaper and less maintenance and that my dad's insurance covered it all. I wasn't going to argue with her, she was grieving and the best thing that I could do was just be there. Be present, even when I didn't want to be.

Where did I want to be?

In his arms, for forever.