Emergency Medical Dad

LXVIII: mid december, present

JESSIE

The middle of December hits Jorgen and I like a train. I think because of the stress we've been under and with the way that my job search and the citizenship applications and moving around has all worked we completely and entirely forgot about Christmas until around the weekend of December fifteenth. Of course, Connor has been mentioning things here and there but I think he can tell, from the way Jay and I have been at our absolute limits, that we weren't really working on it.

I would love to be able to ignore Christmas for another month. Just to let Jay and I settle in with everything and get into a routine and figure each other out in this new scenario but we have an eight year old, which means that Connor is still in the amazing space between too young to understand what christmas really even is, and too old to have stopped believing in Santa.

So Jay and I have to scrape together all that we have to figure out what we're doing. Not really even financially. I think we'll be alright on that front, with me a few days into a new job that so far has been amazing, and with him back in with his team and getting paid on that level, that seems fine. Just mentally, both of us have come to the general conclusion that we're as close to functionally burnt out as we can be. I now get up and go to work, he drops Connor off and heads to the rink, I work, he works, on days that they're not preparing for games or on the road, Jorgen can get Connor right after school because the schedule is actually pretty nice. On days when they're grinding in for a game or he's away, Connor has to stay after school until I'm done at five. I wish he didn't have to but I assume he knows.

I've already had to talk to his teacher about a few things. She said he was acting a little on the mature side for the kids in his class and was definitely more logically based than a normal eight year old. I had to go in and sit down with her while Jorgen was away in Minnesota and explain that he's been through quite a lot more in the last year than a normal eight year old and that it might change things just until everything in our lives settles down.

It was, after all, about this time last year that I realized my mom was more serious about kicking me out than I had previously assumed.

So, despite how little Jorgen and I want to wrestle with Christmas, we come to the conclusion that, for Connor's sake, we really need to work on it. It'll be something usual for Connor, something to get excited about, something that happens normally that will help align him with other kids and reset him into this house and this schedule and this area and everything. It'll be a little weird and Jorgen and I are rough on time, but it's going to work out.

And, with the amount of time I spend downstairs in Jorgen's room, we have a little more time to discuss it.

"Do you think it would be a dick move to not try too hard with our families?" His eyes are shut, arm lazily looped around my back. "To hope that they understand that this is putting us at our absolute wit's end?"

I sigh, "we have to at least give it a shot with them. Maybe something small for everyone and try again next year."

He groans, rolling over to his side and tugging me against his chest, "what are we thinking for our kid?"

"I don't know, legos."

He smiles, still sort of dozing off, "I did have one of the older guys on my team and a staff member I work with recommend me to a little kid's team we could stick him on. They're rough on players and would take him mid-season with little to no skill just to be able to have enough to play games. If we want to get him skates."

"I think that would actually be pretty good," I respond, feeling the sort of lazy way he's circling his fingers around my back.

"And I've got a few people that I know that could help find gear for later on. But skates. We could do skates."

"Skates and legos?" I confirm.

"Mhmm," he's dozing off quite a bit faster than I thought he would, but it's okay. There's no place that's easier to sleep than right next to him. I'm not sure about warmth come summer but then again, I'm living in Canada now, so it really can't be that cold, right?

Having Jorgen gone at least once a week turns out to actually be sort of efficient for Christmas planning. Connor is used to it, he knows that Jorgen comes home sometimes pretty late, goes right to his room, and unpacks. It's a great way to bypass having to hide things we're working on for Christmas.

I'm able to get a Christmas tree rather easily due to Jorgen's truck and the group of people selling them in our neighborhood to support one of the local high school sports teams, and even though it's dropping kind of a lot of leaves and it's rather scraggly due to being one of the last on the lot, it's actually the perfect size for Jay's living room.

Connor and I decorate the inside of Jorgen's house while he's gone and give him a pretty bad jump scare when he gets back, we decorate the tree with him the same day we get it inside, and by the time that Connor is counting down the last days of school before break, we've actually got a pretty decent hold on the whole thing.

It also helps that Jorgen and I have figured out that the best de-stressor in potentially one of the most stressful Christmas seasons of my life, is frequent but all very quick hookups. It's not something I ever thought I'd end up doing as an adult, though I'd never really assumed I'd have someone like Jay in my life, so I really didn't have the situation to allow for my imagination to take me like that, but now that I'm here, it's actually kind of a lot of fun. Even though we really haven't had time to go any further than we did the first night, or screw around with anything else because of Connor and the lack of time of starting a new job, his work schedule, planning, preparing, all that, it's still incredibly satisfying to have something like that with him. Just ten minutes between dropping Connor off for school and heading to work, fifteen minutes in the car when his flight gets in at midnight and I go to grab him from the practice facility. With him in the shower before Connor wakes up, ten minutes when he accidentally shakes me awake rolling over in the middle of the night. It's nice, it's time for just us in days that feel so long but so short at the same time. A relax and reset point, most of the time followed with him kissing me and making me something to eat when we're at home.

It's another random thing about him that I didn't expect, Jay Hadley is a phenomenal cook. Extraordinary, really. He plays it down so much but his wrangle on what he's doing is actually incredible.

And then, just like that, Connor heads off to school for the last day before break and Jay and I find fifteen minutes while I'm home for lunch and then it's go time. Christmas time, really. 

***

this chapter isn't the end! there's one more! give me another half hour and it'll go live <3

-rabid