Tough as Nails

Your whole life's gonna change

~Chase~

"Sher, I love you. I really do. You are my favorite sister- Lindz I love you too, but not now" I see her instantly bristle by making favorites but I gotta make a point. "Sher, you are the best big sister we could ask for. Really, I mean it. I would do almost anything for you. But this? This?"

I pace the living room to the dinning table. Looking at Lindz, then Sher with pleading eyes I silently beg for them to come to their senses. God, what kind of horrible things have I done in a past life to earn this punishment?

"Chasen Alexander Coulter! It's not that bad! If you and Jake can... work together..." She smiles hopefully, "you can have it built in one weekend, even finish the paint on the garage. And all your baseball practice will be over Thursday, for a few days at least since it's spring break. And you don't work this weekend."

"I'll make sure I am here to referee, Sher. I'm off Saturday and Sunday morning." Lindz adds like she can do anything when Jake and I are involved. "Your girl Julie is working opposite of me for some odd reason. Think she doesn't like me Chase? Should I push her buttons some more?"

Ignoring Lindz goading about my current girlfriend, I plead, "Seriously Sherry, why the hell do you want to punish me! Jake is a d**k! And he ha-"

"Hey, he's still my husband!" Then Sher sighs, looks down and softens "and yeah, he's kinda a d**k to you."

"To me, Sherry, Jake's been awful to all of us since you got stuck with Lindz and me. He hates us. We've never done anything-"

Sherry interrupts with her her look of I'm not believing your bullshit glare, "Oh so the cinnamon in his shoes for months on end, the Nair in his body wash before our Florida trip, the melatonin infused Gum Drops during the playoffs, faking you lost the rings at our wedding-"

"Okay, Okay, so we had a few jokes at his expense, BUT that's all they were. They weren't that bad" I plead.

Like the i***t I am, I look to Lindz and we can't hold a straight face. My tight lips quiver then I hiccup a laugh. Lindz can't contain it. She starts giggling and rolling to Sher, who now starts laughing, then cackling remembering some of that fat ass's reactions. Sherry belly laughs so hard she wakes up my niece, Bailey.

"Ha, Oh shoot, Chase, get her. Mommy's sorry baby," Sher starts to grab for Bailey from my arms and I turn away to coddle her. I walk away from the laughing twins, trying to contain my laughs, bouncing this happy girl walking to the kitchen and back.

"Well I'm not sorry for the orange soda prank!" Lindz chimes ins.

Sherry takes a deep breath remembering how Jake said his secretly fiber infused orange soda tasted weird for a week and he magically lost 10 pounds by the second week. "Now that was funny! Gosh, do you think we could do that again? Do you think he'd notice the Metamucil this time? Jakie's getting fat again."

"Sher!" I fake a gasp and very Southern lady like cover my mouth, while looking at Bailey. She coos and giggles.

"What! He is! It's like he thought because I gained 80 pounds with Bailey, he could too. Sorry 'bout cha luck boo, I lost 50 of mine 3 months ago with her delivery. What's your excuse, Jakie boo?"

Laughing and playing with Bailey, really makes me miss my Ma. She would have loved to see the three and a 1/4 (yeah Bailey is small so she 1/4) of us laughing and cutting up like we used to before all the bad s**t happened. She'd love to have seen her grand kids. Before Jake came back in the picture. I think back to when Sher and Jake were first together. Yeah, he was an ass, but no worse than my boys Joey or Mike. They are the jocks and popular, so they are just more cocky than the rest of us. Ma would cut up and play just like Sher is right now while Sher would hold Lindz or dance around the room, swinging her.

I don't really remember what happened. I was still too into making my bike do cooler tricks than Joey and Mikey. Guess when I was 9 or 10, I remember Jake and Sher went to all the high school stuff together, all four years for him, three for her. They seemed like they really cared about each other. They kinda stopped but she still hung out with him but in groups.

I remember Sher crying for like days and days. Ma and Dad told her it would all work out and they would take care of everything. She was holed away for like another week, then it all stopped. No moping around, no tears. Jake graduated and went away for at least 3 years. Sher busted her ass at the community college and graduated in 1/2 the time, since she still had a year of high school left when she started. She loaded up on all her classes during the summer too. She was still fun and spent time with us, but no one talked about Jake. I don't think she dated anyone, but I wasn't into girls yet to really pay attention. She was super close with his boy, Joel even when she was with Jake. Even though she moved out, she'd swing by the house with Joel. My 11 year old self thought he was the coolest big brother I wanted.

Well, until Jake came back muscled up and different. He wasn't the cool ass cocky jock that everyone loved. He was this monster we have today. And my stupid- God I love her but want to shake the hell out of her- sister took him back! A couple months later, Joel showed up at the house, then Jake. Then Joel and him wrestled around in the back yard like some crazies beating the s**t outta each other. Joel Said some stuff to Sher and left. She cried. Jake said some stuff to Sher and stayed. She cried harder. Then Jake left after he said some more stuff to Ma and Dad.

The very next day, Sher showed up after school with Jake instead of Joel. There was more yelling. Then... Then... the police officers came and I held Lindz for hours while she screamed for Ma to come home. I held Sher's hand when she told us she was gonna move back to the house and be like Ma since Ma and Dad couldn't come back.

I felt the tears threatening to flow, the soured lump in my throat milliseconds from busting out those damn feeling. I'm past this s**t, but it still hurts. Just when I think I'm losing my s**t, Bailey- gosh she's talking with angels, I know she is- smacks the hell out of my nose. I'm talking face meet palm, grab some cheek and eye balls slap for real.

"Aww Fuc-

"Chase, Don't you dare finish that!" Sher jumps up grabbing Bailey, who's giggling like that s**t was the funniest thing she's ever seen, as I fold over silently thanking that baby.

"Okay... I'll put the damn shed up, Sher" I concede rubbing my cheek, nose and eyes checking I'm not bleeding.

Sher, uses her free hand to check my wounds, swatting my hand so she can play big sister nurse. "Move your hand. And paint the garage?"

Signing, Lindz and I groan, "and paint the garage."

"Thank you baby brother," she swat/pats my cheek that her spawn just smacked. "Thank you baby sister". I try not to grumble I only have 5 days to mentally prepare for this s**t.

                                                                                         ~/~

~Travis~

It's never good when you actually get that call back a few days after having a test. All those words about, "just a precaution, test all possible issues" never meant anything to me. It never happens, until now.

I set an appointment to get something for these damn headaches, because pride be damned Blake was right. I can't even be around my family it's so bad sometimes. I wouldn't call it a migraine, but a screaming pain. I've had a few migraines but it's not that pain- similar with loud noises and stress. Not ideal with 6 and 7 year girls. I couldn't concentrate most of the time. I thought it was stress at first. Stress that was causing my neck and shoulder to ache so bad that my damn left hand would go numb and fingers wouldn't work.

The doctor walks in, professional as ever in his white coat and stethoscope. He shakes my hand like I've known him my whole like, not just a week. "Mr. Montgomery, Good to see you again. Although I wish it was under better circumstances.

"Yeah... Look Dr. DaVaux, can we just get to it? I know there must be something, if I was called back like this.

"You're right son, but we need to run a few more tests so we can look at options. The CT scan was just a precautionary test given your symptoms.

I roll my hand, beckoning him to explain, "Options for...

"Mr. Mon-" I stop him, "Travis. Mr. Montgomery was my grandfather."

"Travis, your CT result show a rather large growth pressing on the frontal lobe of your brain. I am not versed in that field, so I've had the front office set up a appointment for a very well respected neurologist. He will want to run additional tests to determine if the growth is malignant and your treatment options. With treatment..." I zone out.

My brain- that now has a "growth" on it decides to stop working. I can't focus on anything but how bad this must be to make me need to puke every few hours from the pain. How horrible will the treatment be to get this things out of my skull? Fuck.... Blake and the girls. I'm a proud bastard, but thinking about my family... even if I 'm not the best husband and could be a better dad, I love them. Blake and I coexist for those two babies we created... Oh god, I hope this is not something they can get...

"Travis?"

"...Is it bad?

"Like I said, this is not my field of expertise. A neurologist is better suited to diagn-"

My blood boiled. I want to shake this rich bastard. I jolt forward and slam my hands on top of his pristine cherry desk. I lean in close enough, his face gets spittle as I bellow. "It might not be your expertise Doc, but you read whatever that test was and saw something. Now, tell me what the hell is going on!"

"Travis, I understand this is not something you wanted to hear. No one would...

"Ya Think? I'm 32 years old! I have a wife who already picks up my slack because my head is pounding all the damn time! Not to mention I really hate the world all the time for no f*****g reason! How do you expect...."

I loose my fight and fall back into the chair. "I have two little girls... Am I going to be around to see them grow up? Are they going to bury me before they get to middle school? Doc...."

"It's against my better judgement as a medical professional to tell you if this is terminal without additional testing, some invasive, I just cannot do that... But I will tell you to prepare for the next few months. You need to see Dr. Messer. "

And I did three days later. Dr. Messer was smart- like brilliant. I overheard him speaking to another surgeon. I couldn't understand a damn thing he said, but I knew he was brilliant. You can't fake that type of intelligence.

With that same confidence he scheduled a spinal tap and biopsy for the following week. It sucked. So bad.

It was scheduled for the week before we were moving across town, into the this big blue house. Blake had a thing for the sloped arch over the front doors of a 1920s Tudor. When she saw it, she had to have it. It even had a huge deck and yard for Dax.

Not that it would matter much to me after too long. It was time I start thinking ahead. I called Meyers, my attorney in Atlanta. Without question, he moved everything around so even if I was not there... even if I was awful to her now, I could do this one thing for her.

God I missed how we were when we were young.

In just a few short days after we moved in to my wife's dream home and started unpacking our life, I found out just how bad things were going to be. Another killer headache had started when Blake saw me lying on the floor in front of the couch. She wasn't alarmed. I have done this since Gracie was a baby. The cold on my neck would help the pounding in my eye balls and keep the room from spinning off its axis.

She speaks so softly worrying about me, "Trav, do you want me to get you water and something for the pain? I sent the girls outside for a a little bit with Dax to play on their play-set."

She sat down running her fingers against my neck. I wanted to tell her what I found out earlier today. I just didn't know how. Her trying to ease my pain just made everything hurt more.

Researching the unfortunate symptoms thoroughly with Dr. Messer and discussing my results, I could point to the exact moment this alien took over my body. Again Blake was right. I hated when she was right.

It was only going to get worse. Worse for her... worse for my children. I would rather die miserable than see hurt like this. One day....

My chest aches.... Oh god I can't do this. I'm going to have a heart attack before this alien takes me...

I have to push and push hard.

"Stop. You're making it worse."

She stills and whispers. "I'm sorry. I didn't-

"Just go on. I'll be able to tolerate you in a minute. Then I've got to go."

She looks down and nods. "Okay. Feel better."

She stool stiffly and walked to the yard with the rest of my family.

                                                                                        ~/~

~Jake~

"Pleasure as always Mr. Greene." I nod to the nerd with the expensive ass camera looks at the photos, twisting and turning them like he can see inside the photos, before he hands the to me. "C'mon, they are just as good as the last ones ya did right? I ain't got all day, whacha you find?"

He looks up, forgetting he was working for me. "Oh sorry, Jake. She works as an office manger for Clarence White's marketing and project management firm. She has an impressive resume all in Atlanta."

I sneer at my personal investigator- part time photographer/ sports & entertainment reporter for some insignificant magazine now one looks at, oh an all round computer geek. "What in the hell are they doin all the way in Lashbrooke?"

It'd be funny if this kid got off on all these adventures I sent him on. Too bad he's just repaying a debt to our boss.

"Her father stayed here after he divorced her mother Elaine Conners. She moved to the east coast then southeast right out of high school. Married Travis Montgomery a little over 7 years ago. Travis inherited several bars from his grandfather. Travis, Blake and their two daughters moved from Atlanta right after he liquidated quite a bit of assets. "

Man's good, he has done better before. "And now he's runnin' the old dive off the square... Conners... Now, why does that sound familiar?"

"Her father is Victor Morrison and her mother was Theresa Conners. They are from Dallas. Elaine is known for her family's influence. Or ability to influence. Elaine seems to not want anything to do with her daughter. She only contacts her every 5 years."

"I'll be damned, you did good." I toss several hundred in front of him and lean further back so my stomach isn't crushed. f**k! I gotta quit smokin' then eating, maybe hit the gym.

"I'll double that if you catch him doin somethin to show his ass at the bar. Seems convenient enough. haha"

The nerd leaves. I lean back in my chair her at the office. It creaks again. I stand and slam my and on the stack of sales contracts on my desk. "Damn it!"

Did Victor send his granddaughter here?