Cheers Darlin'

Chapter Ten

Chapter Ten

“We wish you’d told us before, Jen.” It was dad who spoke first. Mum was just sitting there. I could tell that she was torn between feeling anger towards Jenna for not telling them sooner and relief that Riley shared DNA with Charlie and not just some random.

I’m not exactly sure how dad expected Jenna to answer him. She was crying so much that she’d barely been able to choke out that Charlie was Riley’s biological dad.

I was sitting on the arm of the chair that Jenna was sitting on, rubbing her back soothingly. She covered her face with her hands and let out a heart wrenching wail. I held back my own tears.

I couldn’t see my sister like that.

As if Charlie not remembering their night together wasn’t bad enough, she had had Riley to remind her of that every day and now that the cat was out of the bag, the truth was staring her right in the face, unforgivingly.

“I’m sorry,” she finally whispered. The hand covering her face muffled the sound but it was unmistakeably heard, her apology.

I heard dad let out a long sigh.

“What happened, sweetie? Why did you feel like you couldn’t tell us about this?” mum finally spoke up.

I looked up at her and saw that her eyes were glistening with unshed tears. Mum prided herself with the relationship she had with Jenna and I. It was true, that we barely kept anything from her. She was understanding and accepting and everything you hoped your mum would be. But there were just some things you didn’t tell you parents; period.

Like my friendship with Finn for instance, it was a complete blank spot to my parents until he’d come to pick me up.

“I’m sorry, mum. I’m so sorry,” Jenna cried, removing her hands from her face now but her tears continued to stream down her face.

She had pulled all her hair up into a high pony tail, keeping them out of the way. Her face wasn’t hidden and the grief she felt was clearly plastered on it.

“Honey, did you think we wouldn’t be okay with that? Did you think that we wouldn’t have preferred to know?” Mum approached Jenna now. She pushed Jenna’s hair back and tilted her head upwards, wiping the tears off of her face.

It was apparent that I wasn’t the only one drying Jenna’s eyes as often as needed. Jenna had all of us to back her up no matter what and it was time she realized that.

“I couldn’t,” was all Jenna said.

I understood immediately but I was the only other person in the room who knew what really happened, though not from Jenna herself. Mom and dad didn’t have any idea what was really going on and Jenna was going to have to give them more than that, as hard as it was to repeat.

“You couldn’t believe that we would understand? Why, Jenna is it so hard to believe that we do love you unconditionally no matter how badly you mess up?” Mum’s voice was rising in anger, clearly misinterpreting what Jenna meant to say.

I could see why she’d be angry. After all, hadn’t they supported Jenna when they found out that she was pregnant? Hadn’t they been there through the pregnancy? Mum was even in the delivery room with Jenna and I. Too bad that she had no reason to be angry because that wasn’t what Jenna meant.

“Mum, it’s not like that. It’s more complicated than you think. You don’t know the whole story yet. Just let her finish,” I said, standing up and stepping in front of mum, blocking her from Jenna.

Mum wasn’t going to hit her, she had never raised a hand on either of us and she wasn’t going to. I stepped in front of her because I needed her to know that I knew the story and I was backing Jenna up, regardless.