Chapter 32
Friday September 16th
Lennon's POV
"So Theo, we have a guest coming for dinner today"
He looked at me.
I wanted to warn Theo about Harry's visit before he just showed up here. I can't believe this day is actually happening if I'm being honest. I've been stressing about it all morning long, to the point where I had myself so nervous I threw up a couple hours ago. I'm a mess, and Theo doesn't even know it.
"His name is Harry. He's a friend of mommy's, and he's going to come eat with us, and maybe you can play some of toys with him" I suggested gently, careful of my words. "Does that sound like a cool idea?"
"No"
I bit my lip. Well that went great.
"Okay..." I blew out air between my lips. "Well he's very nice, and he's excited to meet you. So do you think we could at least give a nice hello?"
Theo shrugged his shoulders.
"And maybe if you think he's cool, you can show him some of your train tracks. I hear he's very good at building bridges" I talked Harry up even if on the inside it was hurting me just the slightest.
"I don't think I wanna"
I just know this is going to be a very hard evening to get through. I obviously want Theo to be comfortable, and I wouldn't want to force him into it, but on the other hand I know that Theo's lack of hospitality is going to break Harry down.
I'm worried if Harry gets discouraged, he'll walk away, and this will all be for nothing.
"Okay, we'll see what happens when he shows up" I left the conversation open.
"When he comin?" Theo tilted his head to look up at me. He was currently rolling play doh between his palms and making non edible hot dogs.
"In about 10 minutes"
"Otay"
I walked away from my first born and instead went to the babies. At the very least, Harry can hold either of the twins if he wants to. I know they aren't his, but hopefully it lessens his disappointment slightly. I needed to get them dressed in better outfits though because they're honestly still in pajamas.
I got them dressed into more presentable clothes, but still comfy. Atticus wore some shorts and a t-shirt with buzz lightyear on it. I didn't realize until after I put it on him that it was a hand me down of Theo's that Harry had bought for him so many years ago. I made the decision to change his shirt into another character, I had faith that Harry would remember the shirt and I didn't want it to hurt his feelings or something.
Lia wore a pair of pink cotton overalls and socks, so it was still cute and comfy. And now Harry can tell them apart if he felt so inclined to do so. Lastly, Theo was still in his clothes from school so I knew they were okay.
Once the babies were taken care of, I set them down on their play mats with some toys. I looked around the house and figured this was as good as it was going to get. Harry's going to be here any minute, and I have a whirlwind of emotions cursing through my body right now.
"Ah!" I shrieked, and then instantly regretting it and hope Harry couldn't hear it.
I took a deep breath and opened up the front door.
And there was Harry.
He looked slightly more dressed up than normal, with his trench coat and yellow cardigan. His hair loosely framed his face, and those rings continued to cover his fingers. 2 boxes were held in his hands.
"Hi Harry"
"Uhm. Hi" He said nervously, and I chuckled quietly.
"It'll be fine" I assured the both of us.
"What if he hates me?" Harry whispered.
"He doesn't even know what hate is" I whispered back and let him inside.
We made our way to the kitchen and set dinner on the counter. I had already gotten out enough plates and Theo's drink cup so we didn't have to worry about that. But here is the moment that I've been anxiously anticipating all day long.
Theo "meeting" Harry.
I walked Harry over to the table where Theo was playing with his play doh and it was like time stopped. Theo's back was still to us, clearly interested in his crafts more than anything else, but for Harry it was completely different.
His hand quickly covered his mouth.
He rested one hand on the island and leaned all his weight into it as he took in the sight of his child in front of him. It looked like for a second he almost stopped breathing.
The tears started streaming down his face.
I could see the genuine happiness behind his eyes right now. This is all that he wanted...
I handed Harry a napkin to wipe his eyes, but he was frozen in shock he couldn't even move, so I used the napkin to wipe his face before Theo turned around and wondered why he was crying. We stood there for a good minute before I was wondering if I should slap Harry to bring him back to life.
Harry's an world renowned actor, I need him to pull it together and act like he doesn't know who Theo is. Respectfully.
Just as Harry unfroze, Theo had noticed we were there and turned around in his chair. Theo's green eyes looked Harry over up and down, trying to figure him out.
"Theo, this is my friend Harry. Can you say hi?" I spoke up, going over and picking Theo up and holding him on my hip. I walked him over to Harry so they were only about a foot apart.
This is crazy to me.
Theo rested his head on my shoulder, and I could feel him gripping my arm with one hand. The other hand raised slowly and did a small little wave.
To surprise, Theo also whispered "Hi"
"Hi Theo" Harry's voice cracked. I just knew this was a surreal moment for him. None of us thought this day would happen, and although he's a lot happier about it than I am, it's still crazy. "What are you doing?"
Theo didn't verbally respond, instead he pointed over to his containers of play doh and bucket of shape cutters on the table. So far, we were doing pretty good if I do say so myself.
"That looks super fun" Harry smiled, his voice gentle and soft. The same way he would speak when Theo was a young little baby. Harry was always speaking in the most tender tone, often whispering, and just so filled with excitement to be holding Theo in his arms.
It's insane how a man like that, turned into something else just a mere months later.
Theo nodded along to his words.
"Harry brought over your favorite food" I gasped excitedly, trying to get Theo to be the same, and poked his stomach. "Can you guess?"
At the sound of my voice, Theo lifted his head up and gasped. "Pizza?"
"Pizza" I confirmed. "Can you say thank you to him?"
Theo sighed gently and used his palm to wipe his curls out of his face. Whispering yet again, he said "Thank you"
"You're welcome" Harry smiled.
I put Theo back down on the floor so that I could quickly prepare the baby's bottles so they could eat while we ate, but Theo had latched onto my leg the moment he thought I was leaving him alone.
"Hey, I have to get food for Lia and Atti" I told him, gently trying to pry his toddler strength off of me.
"No" Theo shook his head.
"I'll get our 3 plates ready while you do their bottles" Harry offered, and with a silent nod I gave him the okay. I knew he was just trying to help in anyway that he figured he could.
"Here, you sit down at the table while I do this" I instructed Theo and lifted him back onto the chair. "Clean up your toys so we can eat"
Theo hesitated, but after he looked around the room and realized Harry wasn't in a close enough radius, he nodded and began cleaning up his mess.
I prepared the bottles very quickly, and finished at the same time that Harry did fixing up our plates.
"Need any help?" Harry offered. He was smart enough to try and not go set the plates on the table while Theo was over there alone and content.
"Can you carry those bouncers over to the table? I'll get the twins" I asked, figuring I might as well take him up on his offer rather than taking two trips. He instantly nodded and grabbed the items I pointed at, and I then strapped the babies in.
We then brought all of the food over to the table and took a seat. Of course, I sat directly next to Theo, and then Harry was sat across from me. I noticed Harry tapping his fingers on the table, one of his nervous habits. He didn't know what to say to Theo.
And Theo didn't have an interest in speaking to him.
That left it all up to me. Lovely.
"Theo, want to know something cool about Harry?" I looked down at him. The job of hyping Harry up to a toddler seems like an easy one, but I really didn't know if I could pull it off.
"What?" Theo asked, side eyeing Harry.
"Harry was in a movie, and guess what? He played a superhero!" I said enthusiastically. Theo takes interest in Spiderman, so why not other superheroes? If only Harry did something involving Toy Story, then I could probably break Theo.
"Oh"
"Doesn't that sound cool?" I asked.
Theo shrugged. "Yeah"
"Why don't you tell Harry what your favorite movie is?" I quirked an eyebrow.
Theo shook his head, and ate a bite of his pizza.
"Can I tell him?" I asked.
Theo shook his head again.
Wow.
"You know, Harry also likes pizza. Just like you" I told him.
"Otay"
I looked over at Harry. Harry who was sitting there clueless and not having any idea of what to say. I figured he was upset right now. This is why I wanted to tell him before he came over how Theo was most likely to react. I can't imagine how much worse it would be if Harry was coming in here blind. I know Harry understands why Theo is reserved, but it doesn't soften the blow of experiencing it like this,
I sighed quietly, deciding to give Theo a break. If I continued to push it too much, then I'm afraid it would completely shut Theo down and we wouldn't even get some one word answers. It just takes time. Theo was shy with Lyanna like this when they first met as well, and Theo has grown in talking to her, but he's been around her for a few months now.
To keep the awkward silence away, I knew I had to talk to Harry, so I decided to ask him what he did today.
"I filmed my movie" Harry responded. His tone was completely off, the opposite of how he sounded the other night when he was talking about his project.
"Just act normal" I mouthed to him. If we wanted to get Theo comfortable with him, then the two of us needed to act like we're comfortable. Being tense and shut off is only going to make Theo remain the same.
Harry nodded and shifted in his seat. "How was your day?"
"It was good. I stayed home with the twins today. So we played a lot. I also got to take a nap" I told him minor details.
"That sounds nice. This pizza's really good, yeah? Do you like it?" Harry asked, and bit off another mouthful.
"It's pretty good" I agreed. "What do you think bud?" I looked down at Theo.
Theo nodded and gave a thumbs up.
"Pizza's your favorite, so we had to get it" Harry spoke, now directing it to Theo.
Theo stared at him in lack of response.
This is going to be a long process.
The rest of dinner was spent with Harry and I making the most random conversation. Not surprisingly, Theo didn't join in to any of it. Just ate all of his dinner quietly and asked to get up from the table to play with toys when he was finished.
I knew it was weird for Theo. I think it's safe to say that all three of us don't know what to do right now. I was trying to keep both of them from falling. I didn't want Theo to be upset, and I didn't want Harry to be discouraged. However, this was also a super awkward spot to be in myself, and I'm processing it as I go as well.
"Do you want to hold them?" I asked Harry. We were done with dinner now, and I figured we would give Theo an extra few minutes to play.
"You don't mind?" Harry asked. I saw him side eyeing the twins the entire dinner. I didn't know if it's because he was trying to get used to them being there, or what, but I definitely noticed.
"I don't mind" I reiterated, and squat down to unstrap Delia from her bouncer. I handed her off to Harry.
"Hi pretty girl" Harry cooed at her. He was holding underneath her armpits in front of his face so they were making eye contact.
Delia let out one of her baby smiles at him.
At least one of the kids wasn't giving him a hard time.
"You're so little. How old are they again?" Harry asked, taking his beaming eyes off of Lia and looking at me instead.
"7 and a half months. They were born a little early so she's a little tiny, but it's nothing to be worried about" I explained. The twins were born at 34 weeks, so slightly early, and they spent over a month in the NICU.
"So they were born..." Harry trailed off, doing the math in his head.
"February 1st" I told him.
Harry smirked. The smirk I haven't seen in years.
"Oh shut up it has nothing to do with you!" I laughed.
"I didn't say anything!" Harry defended.
"You had that stupid look on your face. Perfect timing, I know" I rolled my eyes playfully.
"What look on my face?" Harry acted offended.
"Oh you know what I'm talking about"
"It's the universe telling you something"
"Zip it" I scolded, but still messing around with him.
Then suddenly, Delia threw up her milk all over Harry's pants.
I couldn't help myself, I bursted out laughing. "See, she agrees with me!"
"To think we had a connection Delia" Harry shook his head, and gently handed Lia off to me so he could clean his pants and allow me to clean her off.
"I think you deserved it" I shrugged.
"I most certainly did" Harry chuckled, and wiped off the baby spit up from his pants. "I'm scared to hold the other one now. Actually, you've never even told me his name"
"Oh right. His names Atticus" I informed him, and began unstrapping my younger son from his chair. "I think he wants your attention though"
"I think you're lying"
"I'm not a liar" I sucked in a breath and laughed.
Harry acted like he didn't want to, but he bent over and lifted the baby up from his seat and cuddled him in his arms.
"Theodore, Delia, and Atticus" Harry said aloud.
"Those are their names" I nodded.
"Mommy!" Theo called from the living room.
I nodded for Harry to follow me. We both walked over there, Harry and Atticus trailing behind me and baby girl.
"Play wif me?" Theo asked.
"Of course. Harry's going to play too, does that sound good? He's really good at building those train tracks remember?"
Theo hesitated, and thought about his response before he finally opened his mouth. "Fine"
It wasn't an overly happy answer, but it was at least an approval.
I put the babies in a safe spot right next to us, and then the two of us got down on the floor with Theo. Theo had begun to build the track, but honestly it was pretty rough looking.
Harry picked up one of the train track pieces and looked at me, almost like a silent ask of if this is okay or is he going to anger Theo by doing it. I nodded.
Harry began to add pieces to Theo's track, and I watched Theo's reaction.
Theo sat legs criss crossed apple sauce, a blank stare on his face as he intently watched Harry move pieces around and build a track. Every so often I would comment about how cool the track was coming along, and how good Harry was doing to talk him up to Theo.
At last, a track with many twists and turns, bridges, and tunnels was made and it covered almost the entire carpet. Harry didn't see it, but Theo had the smallest smile on his face when Harry announced he was finished.
We ended up playing trains for a little bit, and honestly it felt more like Harry and I were making our trains interact with each other while Theo stared and analyzed Harry's every movement. Eventually, it was getting towards the kid's bedtime and time to start saying goodbye.
"Theo, Harry has to go home now, can you say bye and thank you?"
Theo waved and whispered. "Thank you"
"Bye bud. It was fun playing trains with you" Harry smiled and waved as well.
We got up from the floor, and Harry waved and said bye bye to both of the babies as well, then I walked him to the door.
"Do you think he liked me?" Harry whispered.
"I think it went as good as it was going to get" I whispered back. "We'll keep working on it, okay?"
Harry nodded sadly. "Okay"
"I'll text you tomorrow or something"
"That sounds good"
"Night Harry"
"Goodnight Lennon"
And then he was gone, but officially back in our lives.
Sorry this took so long!! I have had a lot of personal things going on the last two weeks but I hope you enjoyed this chapter.
And Theo and Harry finally met again!!
xoxo