Loving Family

Evalynn: Mother's day

"It's not a hard question really is it? What to get her for mother's day?" Mick asked me. We were sat on my bed, him taking mamma's usual job of tucking me in as she was feeling poorly and had gone to bed a bit earlier than me for a change. He'd used the opportunity to ask me about mother's day because we were safe from her overhearing for once.
I took a deep breath and repeated the point I'd told him so many times before. "I don't know because I've only known mamma for..." I paused to count on my fingers "...8 months, so I really don't know what I should get her."
"Well what do you want to get her?" He asked, softly drawing circles on my arm with his finger like he did to mamma and Ben (when Ben'd sit still long enough anyway) where his arm was round me.
Thinking for a moment I tried to limit my thoughts to what it was I thought she wanted. I was finding it hard to narrow my options because I didn't feel like I quite knew mamma well enough yet to make an educated choice. "Something meaningful not flowers that'll just die in a couple of weeks. Something that she'll love I just don't know what."
Mick nodded. "Do you have any ideas yet? What about jewellery?"
"No too fancy. We have our bracelets and lockets anyway. I was thinking maybe like a fuzzy teddy bear or something like a mug." I replied.
He smiled. "Now we're getting somewhere. I think she'd love a fuzzy teddy Ev. How about I pick you up after school tomorrow and we can go shopping to see what we can find."
I smiled and nodded. "Well only if mamma's feeling better to look after Ben."
"We could take him along as well, give her some peace and quiet?" Mick suggested. "But we'll see how everyone feels tomorrow how's that?"
"Yeah. I love you Mick."
"I love you too Ev. Sleep well and I'll see you in the morning." He replied before softly kissing my cheek and letting me go. As he backed out the room a little awkwardly I snuggled up in bed, blowing him a little kiss before he turned the light off like I'd do to mamma. He shrugged and blew one back to me then closed the door. Would she really want a fuzzy teddy? I couldn't be sure but it felt like my safest option. And anyway, even if she didn't want to snuggle a teddy bear she could always sit it on guard near her bed like I did with Faye Bear or take it with her when she went away. It was the best idea I had so it wasn't like there were many other choices.

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The following morning mamma still wasn't feeling too great so it was Mick that dealt with getting me off to my bus stop in time and getting Ben ready for nursery. And he managed to do both, which was no surprise to me, but was seemingly a surprise to mamma from what Mick told me when he arrived at school to pick me up, Ben in tow.
"Yeah she genuinely refused to believe that you were both out the house and had everything you needed for the day this morning when I woke her with a cup of tea." He said.
"Surely she knows you can handle the both of us though? It's not like either of us are particularly difficult." I replied.
Mick shrugged slightly as he stopped at the traffic lights for the old canal bridge. "She does yeah. Well... no I'm sure she must know. So I don't know maybe it was the fevery-headachy-ness talking rather than her as such."
I nodded, even though I knew he wouldn't see. "Is she better today than last night?"
"No. I think she's got worse. She certainly looks worse and she says she's got an incredible headache. I poked her earlier to wake her up so she ate something and she was really hot too, so not great. You two had better be nice to her when we get home." He said.
"I will daddy." Ben replied. I smiled at how cute he was before adding my own reply along the same line.
"Good on ya. Right Ev. Are we still going with the teddy idea?" He asked. "Ooh finally thank you lights." He mumbled as the lights finally changed colour. As we crossed the canal I looked down to see if I could see a moving boat, but to no avail. Supposedly, according to Charlotte, if you cross the canal at the same as a boat is under a bridge it meant good luck - I wasn't sure I believed it but I loved looking down at the boats on the canal below anyway.
"Urhm yes. Teddy. You can never have too many fuzzy teddies can you Ben?" I asked him, noticing he had one with him now. A minty green and pale blue cat today, one I hadn't seen him with much. It mostly seemed to live on the bookshelf in the living room so I thought it maybe wasn't his.
He grinned and nodded.
"Who's your friend?" I asked him.
"Westie! Mamma named him. She got him last summer." He explained.
"It's sorta mamma's teddy so don't tell her! And why's he green and blue do you remember?" Mick probed. I assumed then that there was a specific reason behind it, I just didn't know what. Was green Mick's favourite colour? I knew it wasn't mamma's, that was yellow. Ben clearly liked blue so green could be Mick's.
"Urhm... erhm... because Evvy?" Ben asked.
"Sort of yeah. It's because it's the colours associated with Gloucestershire where Evvy was before she moved here." Mick reminded him.
I frowned as I thought it through. "Oh yeah that's the colours of the county flag. See that's like what I wanna get her. Something like that that'll mean something to her because she'll love that."
"You're adorable." Mick said.