Like Real People Do

Aqua Swimming Pool

The one with the doubts. 

//

I was distracted. Which wasn't a good thing under any circumstances, but considering I was supposed to be working, it was especially bad.

But I couldn't help it. It had been hours since Jaxon had left to talk to Lauren and we were currently sitting at the airport gate, waiting for the announcement that boarding had begun and Jaxon still hadn't showed up. Which meant that they were having one hell of a conversation.

And that in turn meant that instead of performing my nanny duties, I had left the twins in the care of their ever attentive uncles and was staring blankly out onto the tarmac, watching as suitcases got loaded onto the plane as I mentally worked out every possible way their conversation could go.

"Penny for your thoughts?"

I started at the sound of a soft voice, looking to the side to see Trey slipping into the uncomfortable plastic seat beside me. "Oh, hey."

"I would ask how you are, but I have a feeling I already know the answer," he said pointedly.

I scrunched up my nose apologetically, knowing that I'd been in kind of a mood for the past couple hours. "Am I that transparent?"

"It's understandable," he shrugged. "I mean, who wouldn't be worried about their significant other's ex was back in town?"

He hadn't actually seen Lauren, but I'm sure the news of her reappearance had spread like wildfire as soon as Benji left the room.

"But that's just it," I sighed. "She's not just some high school sweetheart that he's going to reminisce with and then they're going to part ways on good terms. She's the mother of his children. That means something."

"I don't think he sees it that way," Trey pointed out.

I know he didn't. Jaxon didn't really consider Lauren to be Finn and Audra's mother. In his mind, she was practically erased from existence the day she walked out on them. And although I could understand that point of view, because he was being a fiercely protective father, Jaxon disregarding Lauren as a parent didn't change the fact that she was the one who gave birth to those twins.

I explained my logic to Trey. "I know. But it doesn't matter how much he wants to convince himself that she's not a factor. At the end of the day, she's still Finn and Audra's mother. If she wants to be in their lives, she has a right to be, no matter how Jaxon feels."

"That's a very mature perspective," he replied, looking somewhat impressed. "You don't feel threatened?"

"Of course I do," I said quietly. "But the truth is that I don't really know that much about their relationship. All I know is what Jaxon told me about the day she left. But I figure if they planned on being a family forever, they must have really loved each other."

There was a pause and I could tell Trey was debating whether or not he should fill me in on the inner workings of Jaxon and Lauren's relationship, but he eventually gave in, exhaling slowly before beginning. "They did. Jaxon once told me that a week after he met her, he knew she was the one. At the time, I thought that was so ridiculous, but the more I saw them together, the more I was convinced. People always scoff at young love, as though the fact that you're a teenager somehow makes your feelings irrelevant, but I honestly think that if they hadn't gotten pregnant, they would have made it."

That made sense. Getting pregnant so young was bound to cause tension in even the best of relationships. "You don't think they were ready to be parents?"

"Is anyone ever really ready to be a parent when they're nineteen?" he shot back.

I shrugged. "Jaxon seems to make it work."