Thank you all for the kind thoughts! Only thing left is an annoying cough! Ya''ll da best :))
Zayn's POV
"Zee!"
"Mmph," I grunt, rinsing the soap off of my body. I open my eyes and peek to the left, seeing a shadow of Charlie's figure.
"Soo...Marley's school just called. Apparently something happened." She slides open the shower door, clearly giving zero fucks that I'm naked. "And they want one of us to come down there."
"What happened?" I ask, adding shampoo to my hair. If somebody fucked with my kid...
"They wouldn't say, but...I dunno, I guess it has to be pretty serious if they're getting the parents involved."
"Aaand...I'm guessing that parent would be me." I grin, closing my eyes and leaning my head back so that the stream of water runs over it.
"Probably against my better judgment," she laughs, "But yes, that parent would be you. I'm about to head out to work and I don't have the time to swing by there first, really, since I'm starting a bit later today. I've got a presentation and whatnot."
I give my scalp a good scrub and rinse before shutting the water off. I really don't want to bring the kids out, since we're not completely over the flu, but if it's for Mar, then I will. "Most definitely against your better judgment," I agree. "You know you're the more level-headed parent of the two of us." I watch her eyes rake over my torso as I begin to dry off and tie the towel around my waist. She has absolutely no shame.
I quickly cover my chest, giving her a horrified look. "Can you stop staring at my boobies please! You're making me uncomfortable." She glares before closing the shower door on me. I watch her retreating figure, and it almost looks like she's shaking her head.
"Feeling alright?" I shout out, just after she rounds the corner. She knows what I mean; I like to check up on my whale wife. I think she's gonna ignore me, so I open the door and step out of the shower- proceeding to go about my business. But she peeks her head around the corner moments later and gives me a thumbs up with a small smile on her lips.
Charlie's POV
"Soo..."
"So..."
I take a much needed deep breath- not to mention, I've nearly finished my hot chocolate. And we only arrived here ten minutes ago. Great...this is going swimmingly.
"This is pretty weird," I finally muster up the courage to say. My dad and I met for coffee during my lunch slash dinner break. Another one of my tricks so that if this meetup went to shit, I could just pretend that I was running late and beat it back to work.
"It's not weird, it's just....well, I didn't exactly expect us to just fall into easy conversation," he says, ripping off a piece of his banana nut muffin, toasted with butter. I won't comment on the fact that that just so happens to be my go-to muffin as well.
"Well maybe we can start by you explaining to me what happened twenty-two years ago...all of it. I want to know everything."
He leans back in his chair. "Fair enough." He studies my face for a second. "You look so much like your mom. The both of you do, really."
I cringe. As I mentioned before, I still have some work to do with coming to terms with myself and Genevieve being sisters. I think it's fair that I'm not exactly welcoming the idea with open arms.
"Anyway," he continues when I don't say anything. "Your mom and I were in college, you know that part. She couldn't raise the both of you on her own. And I-I wasn't ready for a child, but...I...I had to. And I certainly was in no position to take on two twin girls. So the most logical thing at the time was to split the both of you up."
