BABY TRACKER 👶
19 months old 🗓️
September
I run back to the salon at the end of my break, I'm late. The shop took ages to sort my balloons out after taking my order down wrong.
I burst into the shop looking like some kind of clown, to find Danielle waving madly at me "ah thanks for getting my balloons Chels, you're a life saver!" She trills.
What??
"Your bloody balloons? What are you going on about?!"
She looks at me wide eyed doing a weird sideways head nod towards the back.
"The balloons for my dad's 52nd birthday!" She says pointedly.
Jack appears through the curtain at the rear of the salon and it clicks, I shove the giant 2 and 5 balloons at her.
"Ah ya goin' out for his birthday?" Jack asks her, as he kisses me on the cheek.
"Yeah, just the pub near their house"
"Ah nice, it's my birthday soon too"
"Oh is it Jack" Danielle exchanges a sly grin with me, "I had no idea...."
"Anyway you...." I turn to Jack leading him away from where Danielle is mixing some custom colours up "what have I done for you to turn up at my work?"
"Thought I'd come pick Mia up with ya, me cars gonna be at the garage till tomorrow, so I got Stonsey to drop me here....."
"You alright walking through town with me? You know I leave my car near nursery.......and Mia will still want to go to the park"
"It'll be fine"
Jack transferred to Manchester City in August.
To say he's struggling is an understatement.
Everything at the club is the total opposite of what he's used to.
On top of that his transfer fee was obscene, Jack became the most expensive player in English football history.
That combined with the Euros, well, now he's famous. Like proper famous.
Even people who don't really follow football know who Jack Grealish is.
He can't go anywhere without being recognised.
The first few days after his signing were a whirlwind and while I stayed out of official photos released to the press, photos of us leaving Peps restaurant were leaked.
A few days after that a photographer followed Jack from the Etihad back to my house.
Once the photo was released it didn't take local people long to know the location of my house, especially being on a new development where the houses are all of the same super modern design.
Within days we were getting people turning up outside......with what happened with Mia this was a massive security concern to us both and caused a lot of stress and tension for both myself and Jack, it culminated in the football club sending one of their security staff to sit outside the house overnight, but that didn't ease the paranoia for either of us, so we took Mia in the middle of the night and checked into a hotel.
We were then moved into a property owned by the club, in a building where a few other players live. It's nice, and its safe and gives us breathing space to decide what to do next but Mia is missing having a garden, so we've got into the routine of stopping at the park every afternoon.
Mia is overjoyed at seeing Jack picking her up.
I can see the girls at nursery are nervous of him, the nursery hasn't been able to apologise enough to for what happened and as a result they've removed the finger print system and implemented extra security measures.
Jack wanted to take her out of the nursery, but I refused, she loves it there, and I have to take responsibility, I should have made them aware Craig was no longer part of Mia's life. I should have known to have his details removed from their system. I shouldn't have even trusted him to even let him pick her up from nursery, regardless of how desperate I got for help - it's on me, not Jack.
"Ya wanna go to the park princess?" Jack asks as he scoops her up.
The park is quiet, just a few mums and toddlers playing and a small group of boys, probably around 11 or 12 are kicking a ball around.
Jack runs off with Mia to the little obstacle course, she's shrieking with laughter as he lifts her across the monkey bars.
I sit on a bench and watch them.
I can't help but overhear the two young mums sitting on the next benck along.
"Don't look now, but Jack Grealish is over there"
"Jack Grealush you mean......fucking hell, how is he even real?"
"Right? My boyfriend can't believe I'm suddenly so into football.......and now he's joined city I get to openly perv him every week"
"Urgh, we're bloody United in my house, can't wait for the derby"
"The arse on him"
"Literally I would lick that arse....."
"I just want to sit on his face....."
I freeze, pretending to scroll my phone, my back to them slightly.
"The fact he's good with his kid somehow makes him even sexier"
"Right?! Honestly my ovaries explode everytime I look at him, I don't want more kids, but fuck I'd have his babies!"
I can't believe people actually talk like this.....
"Gotta feel sorry for his girlfriend though"
"Why, can't feel sorry for anyone that gets to handle that cock daily!"
"Haha, no I mean he's a bit of slag.......villa fans all saying he was always fucking around......."
"Do you know what though, I think I'd forgive him anything, that grin of his, the eyes......literally he could shag my mum, my sister and my nan and I'd still forgive him and eat my breakfast off of him...."
I've had enough.
I abruptly stand up, shoving my phone into my pocket and purposefully stop a few feet in front of the women.
Jack sees me. I hear the two women gasp as he looks towards our direction.
"Oi c'mon beautiful, Mia wants you to do the monkey bars!" He calls.
I stride towards him without looking back.
Their silence speaking volumes.
"Mummy do!" Mia points to the monkey bars.
"Mummy can't do that!" I tell her, "daddy do it!"
"Daddy's already done it!" Jack grins "mommy's turn"
"Jack, I've never been able to do them"
"C'mon I'll help ya" and suddenly he's picked me up at my hips, against his chest, supporting me as I move along the bars.
I feel uncharacteristically smug when I see the women staring open mouthed at us.
As we walk back towards my car Jack slows to watch the boys with the football. They've managed to get the ball stuck high in a tree and they are desperately trying to kick another ball high enough to hit it and knock it out.
They are yelling frantically at each other, with one boy shouting louder than the others that his mum is going to kill him.
"Should I help them?" Jack's asks me.
"Can you do it?" I tease. He stares at me open mouthed.
"Nah, I'm not even rising to that Chels"
He wanders over to the group.
"Need a hand"
At the sound of his brummie accent and sight of him, despite the cap which isn't doing anything to disguise him, they all start grabbing each other and excitedly pointing.
"Er yeah, please Jack....."
"Gimme ya ball then"
A boy throws the ball to Jack who laughs as soon as it lands in his hands "are ya joking?? This is well flat! Obviously ya not getting any height on it! Got anotha one?"
"Noooo, but you can do it can't you Grealo?"
Jack notices several of the boys are now filming him.
"I'll try, but as long as ya don't post anything online if I miss" he jokingly replies.
I watch as Jack starts doing some keepy uppies, trying to get some height on the ball. As the ball reaches higher into the air I watch as Jack swings his leg back, fully extended.
As the ball falls back towards him he whacks it hard up towards the tree. The sound of his trainer hitting the ball echoes around the park, shortly followed by the squeals of the boys following as both balls fall to the ground.
The boys surround Jack, high fiving him and thanking him. He spends a few minutes posing for photos with them before saying goodbye.
The boys watch us in awe, but Jack just continues on, like that was an everyday occurance, just doing something as normal as kicking a ball about in the park.
***
It's jack's birthday.
I wake up early and sneak into Mia's room to get her.
I gather up the balloons I'd hidden in the wardrobe of the spare room and arrange the giant 2 and 5 that hes already seen in the lounge.
Mia clings onto the 'happy birthday daddy' balloon while I grab his presents.
I send Mia back into my bedroom first and she walks to towards the bed yelling "happa birthday time daddy!!!!"
He stretches in the bed with a huge smile on his face. He sits up and opens his arms, inviting Mia to join him on the bed.
I pass him a huge pile of cards "happy birthday baby"
He grins "I really thought I had no cards! Did ya hide them all?"
"Yes, silly, and I got the concierge to keep back anything that looked like a birthday card" there were some very unconventional perks of living in an apartment block that was basically a glorified hotel.
He opens the handmade card from Mia first, followed by the picture she'd made using her handprints and lots of glitter.
"Ah that's goin' up ova there that this princess" he said pointing to the wall opposite our bed "then it'll be the first thing I see every morning" he grins "well second, afta I see your face" I ruffle his hair and pass him an envelope.
He opens it gently. "Ah bab, come 'ere"
"I never know what to buy you!"
"This is brilliant! Really brilliant!" He is genuinely beaming. Knowing how much he wants a dog, but also knowing how impractical that is right now, I'd sponsored an older dog at the dogs trust which had so many problems the poor thing would never be rehomed, but would be looked after at the dogs trust. I had 'adopted' it for Jack, it couldn't live with us, but Jack could visit it and take it for walks.
"Right! Come on, nursery, work and training won't all just wait for us!" I say clapping my hands. Then turning to Jack, "I know we're celebrating properly at the weekend, but I've got your favourite for tea, and Mia might have made a cake....." I tease.
"Me favourite?" He wriggles his eyebrows.
"Yes"
I smile as I walk out to prepare breakfast with Mia, I hear him say to himself "steak, blow job and you...."