Last Chance

Chapter 19:

The next morning, it’s business as usual, take the kids to school, come back and work on the computers, at 1:00 pm, there’s a knock on the door, Joel and I look at each other before I get up to answer it.

There are two police officers and a social worker from the orphanage.

“Hello, officers, how can I help you?” I ask.

“We’ve gotten reports of abuse and unfit to parent from someone, we have to investigate them,” he stated clearly.

“She reported us? This is insane,” I say annoyed.

“What’s going on?” Joel asks approaching the door.

“Your mother reported us for abuse and unfit parenting,” I explain trying to stay calm.

“Where are the children?” the police officer asks.

“At school,” Joel takes an unsteady breath and takes a seat on the bench in the foyer.

“I’ll go check on them,” the social worker replies leaving.

Joel tries to stay calm and not cry.

“What is this about your mother?” one of the officers asks.

“She has been trying to get me to break up with Luka since we met essentially, it’s been eleven years, I have cancer, and she blames that on him, says I need to pray to get better and not go to the drug trials. She’s mad that we took my cousin in after he came out and was kicked out. She thinks we're poisoning him and the kids, I’m just really tired of her antics,” Joel exclaims.

“Have you ever hurt the children?” they asked.

“No, no, we’d never hurt them. They’ve been through enough,” Joel answers honestly.

“Okay, we’ll look into all of this, can we have your parent's phone number and address so we can contact them?” they ask.

“Yeah, yeah,” he replies pulling his phone out of his pocket.

He still has the number because it’s blocked, he shows the contact and address, and the police write it down.

“She was here yesterday, she showed up unannounced when we told her to stay away. When she saw the kids her response was ‘They allowed you to adopt them?’ She always wanted Joel to marry a girl and have biological kids. We have attempted to make peace with them especially when he got sick two years ago, they ignored my letters and blocked my emails and number so we gave up on them and decided to just get on with our lives without them, now they come back, and they’re still the same because the drug trial might be working and they want him to turn his life around,” I exclaim annoyed.

“The social worker will call you if the children seem in good health and their stories match up with yours and the teachers,” the police officer replies trying to be empathetic.

“Okay,” Joel says.

“We’re just going to look around, okay?” one of the officers asks.

“Go ahead,” I reply sitting beside Joel trying to comfort him.

One goes into the living room, through to the kitchen and the other goes upstairs.

They come back after ten, fifteen minutes, “Everything looks fine, it sounds like you really love these children, we hope it all works out for you, okay?”

“Right, thank you, officers,” I reply.

They leave and close the door behind them. I and Joel sit on the bench for a while. We turn our phones up to make sure we don’t miss the social worker’s call. Time passes, the time I would leave to go pick them up, Jamie comes home and sees us.

“What happened?” he asks.

“Joel’s mother reported us for abuse and unfit parenting, we told them what she’s been doing, and they’re looking into it, we’re waiting for the call to see if we’ve been cleared,” I explain quietly.

“You should get a restraining order against her or something,” he replies.

“The children are the priority right now,” I reply quietly. “We have so much going on already, court won’t be good for them and it won’t be good for Joel either.”

“You can’t let her keep doing these things though,” he starts.

“We’ll figure it out, Jamie. Don’t worry about it,” I reply.

I and Joel were used to fighting this battle alone but we weren’t alone or the only ones who could be hurt anymore.

Jamie goes upstairs to do his homework and leaves us in the darkening foyer.

“You hungry?” I ask Joel not because I am, just to make sure.

He shakes his head. 7:00 pm comes and goes until there’s a knock on our door at 7:45 pm. I get up slowly expecting Alexandria or Joel’s mother, maybe she was there to rub it in our faces or something or beg Joel to come back now that his only tie here was me again, but even if it was just me, custody doesn’t get terminated that easily. But it was neither of them.

“Luka,” Aimee shouted and hugged me.

I was surprised. Ash went past me to Joel who was still sitting on the bench. Joel started crying and hugged her tightly.

We both look out at the social worker, wearily.

“Your story checks out and they insisted on coming back,” she replies smiling. “We’ll be talking to your mother about the false-reporting, good night,” she bid.

We hugged the kids for a while and cried before sending them off to the safety of their beds in our house. I and Joel almost didn’t want to sleep, we feared someone would kidnap them in the middle of the night or his mother would come and physically take them away herself.

We ended up sleeping on the couch by the front door as a precaution. We woke up very sore the next morning. But we went about life as normal until a familiar number popped up on Joel’s phone, he hesitated but knew they’d keep calling if he didn’t answer.

“Hello?” he answered his father’s phone call.

“You got your mother arrested?” he shouted.

“She made a false report, it has nothing to do with me,” he explains trying to stay calm.

“They took your mother away in handcuffs! Don’t you care? Do you realize what you’ve done?” he questions.

“We tried everything with you, I’m sorry it had to come to this but it’s not my decision whether or not she gets arrested. She broke the law she pays the price,” he replies in a scarily calm voice this time standing up from where he was sitting on the couch.

I’d never heard him talk like that before and I thought he’d reached his breaking point before, but apparently not. I thought he might throw his phone.

“Drop the charges,” his father states.

“There are no charges. We aren’t taking her to court. CPS and the police are for false reporting and wasting of law enforcement’s time,” Joel explains. “We could probably press charges though if we wanted to consider what she’s done.”

“This isn’t my son, what have you done with my son? Where is my boy?” he questions.

“I’m not your boy. I’m a fully-grown adult with his own life that if you’re going to act this way you have no business being a part of. This person you created in your head never existed, I was never going to play football or become a lawyer or marry a woman, that’s what you saw because you wanted it. It was never my dream, it was your expectation. And you couldn’t accept that I’m not you and I’m never going to be, therefore I will never live up to your expectations,” he finishes, hangs up and turns the phone off.

He sits back down beside me and leans against me. I can feel his heartbeat calming.

“I’m officially done with them, I’m never picking up their calls again,” he says quietly.

I thread my fingers through his and kiss his forehead. He moves his head to kiss me on the lips.

“I love you, forever and always,” he murmurs.

“Me, too,” I reply quietly. “Me, too.”

It takes a lot to cut complete contact with your family, if Joel and I had any other choice we would have avoided it, but I think it was safe to say we did more than try with his parents and family. We didn’t want to suffer the abuse they threw at us anymore, they were the only ones who were going to suffer going forward, without their son, without getting to know the person he loved and without knowing their grandchildren.

I don’t know if they even just tried to get the children taken away because of me or because they were his biological children, no one else had ever been adopted in his family so we didn’t really know what their response would have been if I wasn’t involved. It was terrible that they were willing to disrupt a child’s home all to get back at someone, it was petty.

Joel sent invitations to the wedding out later that week, they were not among the guests, Jamie’s mother must have seen the invitation we sent to my father because the blocked phone calls started up again. Joel barely looked at the phone when it was them.

We started to pick out suits and contrasting colours for the bridesmaid's and groomsmen's outfits. Sean and my father had been selected by me to be groomsmen, well Joel had invited Mark, his teacher friend from school and Jamie to be his. Alice, Alyssa, and my mother were our bridesmaids.

The treatments continued and school got better for Ash. Joel was scheduled for surgery in May to remove half of the current tumour residing before his four final drug trial treatments and another surgery at the beginning of June. But that was months and months away and we still had to get there first.

Sophie’s fight was harder because the cancer was in her blood. She was hanging on but her results looked less promising. We watched Maria pray over her and beg God to let her live. At this point, her life expectancy hadn’t changed so she now had about three months left to live. The doctors had started asking Maria if she wanted to continue the drug trial or if she wanted her daughter to pass at home with her family in peace. But she told them to press on.

Our lawyer started calling us the following Monday, Charlotte had apparently given Joel’s parents his phone number as a way to get in contact with us. He was asking how much he should tell them about Joel’s estate and will since we’d be changing his will and I’d be getting everything in the event of his death.

We told him he could tell them about the changes to the will and if they choose to contest it I would be taking them to court. I would not allow them to take the house I and Joel lived in and we and our children would continue to live in it after the event of his death. We were going to record the signing of the will when it was changed and have witnessed in case of this. We were going to fight this battle until we were certain Joel was healthy and it was no longer relevant or until it was settled in court in front of a judge. The wedding plans went on, Joel had a ring picked out but said it was a surprise for the wedding day and Alice was keeping it until then.

We outfitted Aimee in a flower girl’s dress and asked Ash whether she’d like one similar or to be the ring bearer. She liked the idea of being the ring bearer and took it in stride and we got her a smaller tux similar to the groomsmen. That was an event in itself. The tailors looked at us oddly whenever we addressed Ash as “she” or “her” but they just went about their jobs without too many questions.

She was happy when she looked in the mirror and adjusted the royal blue silk tie around her neck.

“Do you like it?” I ask.

She smiled brightly at it but soon it melted away.

“Is this okay?” she asked suddenly.

“What? Dressing like this?” I respond.

“Dressing like a boy,” she clarifies.

“As long as you’re happy and comfortable in the clothing it’s fine, yeah. You could still change your mind and wear a dress if you wanted. Do you want to?” I reply.

She shakes her head and says, “Hector said boys can only be ring bearers.”

Hector had been the origin of the hair and clothes comments and despite his parents, the teachers and the assistant principal talking to him, he continued to berate Ash.

“What did we say?” I ask.

“To ignore him and do what you feel is right and comfortable for yourself,” she replies.

“So, do you want to wear a suit and be the ring bearer?” I ask.

“Yeah,” she replies quietly.

“Then don’t worry about him, okay?” I reply.

“Okay,” she answers.

I was glad it hadn’t escalated to physical violence, but that might have only been because biologically Ash was a girl and his parents may have at least taught the decency of not hitting a woman or girl or knew that if it escalated physically that people were more likely to take the side of girl rather than a boy. This was problematic in itself because violence should never be the answer against anyone in any situation unless you are threatened first.