Jenny was in daycare now and Ginger was having issues dealing with letting her go, but David was by her side all the way. He was turning out to be something she never thought he would be. He was being a wonderful father to Jenny, who had learned to love him like a father, and although he and Ginger didn't live together they might as well because he was always at her place.
It was Valentine's Day. Jenny was almost a year and a half, and was spending the night at her best friend Angie's house, Janey's daughter from across the hall. Janey and Austin didn't celebrate Valentine's Day as much as before they got married and didn't have a problem watching her for the night if Ginger wanted her and David to be alone. David was making dinner again, something new this time, and Ginger couldn't wait.
"Did I get to tell you how beautiful you look tonight?" David asked, taking a moment to kiss Ginger's neck as she put a salad together. She shied away immediately. She'd always had a thing with her neck; she hated it if anybody ever got near it. It was from her childhood when she would be tickled. She absolutely hated to be tickled and her most vulnerable spot was her neck.
"Davey, stop it�" she said.
"What?" he asked in her ear, his breath warm against her skin.
"You know I don't like that."
"Like what?" he asked. "This?" He kissed her neck again. She moved away from him.
"Davey!"
"I'm sorry, I had to. I know how much you hate it when anyone comes anywhere near your neck," he said. "Keep tossing, beautiful." She rolled her eyes and continued to mix the salad, then put it on the table. A few minutes later David put dinner on the table and Ginger smiled.
"This is so great, David," she said. "I love it when you cook for me. You should be a chef."
"Nah," he said, thinking about it. "No, chefs have to put their own spin on things. I just steal my recipes from other people." She smiled.
"I was thinking," she said.
"Uh-oh."
"Shut up," she snapped, giving him a look. He smiled. "Anyway, I was thinking that maybe next weekend we could go to that little resort all of our friends keep talking about. Go hiking or something. We could bring Jenny or we could leave her here with Kris or something�it's up to you."
David didn't answer. Ginger knew why. The cabin in the woods was the place that most couples ended up realizing that they wanted to get married. All of their friends had the same story; they went up to the cabin, spend the weekend in a remote location with nothing but the two of them and the great outdoors, and within a month they were engaged. It was something about the atmosphere that just made people realize how much they wanted to spend the rest of their lives together. Everybody knew if a couple were going there, pretty soon they'd be married.
The one and only problem Ginger had come across with David was their future. He never spoke of it. They'd always gone along with it. But now that they'd been dating for over a year, Ginger was definitely thinking of the future. She had Jenny and Jenny's future to think of, and if David didn't see them going the same place she did, Ginger felt she was just wasting her time. Jenny needed a father, a real father, and a husband would be nice for Ginger. She had no idea if David had even thought of that, but a year was a long time to not be thinking.
"Or we could go somewhere else," Ginger said, realizing David wasn't going to answer her. She sighed and sat back. "David?"
"I know what you're going to say�"
"Where do you see us going?"
"�And that was it." She waited again and yet again he didn't respond.
"David, this is important." He shook his head. "What? What does that mean? This isn't important?"
"No, I'm not saying that. I don't want to talk about this."
"You never want to talk about it!" she said, her voice rising. "You never think about it! David, I need to talk about this. Jenny is getting older. She needs a father." "She doesn't need a father�" Ginger gave him a stern look.
"Yes, she does," she said. "She needs a real father, not somebody who's just going to duck out on her later on. Now if you don't want to get married�" David sat back and shook his head.
"I cannot believe we're talking about this!"
"David, listen to me!" Ginger yelled. "Our priorities have been different since day one. I was fine with it, but now is where we start growing apart. If you don't want to get married to me, I need to know."
"Why? So we can break up?"
"David, I need someone who's going to stick around. We've been together a year now and if you don't know by now then, yeah, I guess it's so we can break up. I need to get married. I need to make sure Jenny has a father. She's going to get older and she's going to need a lot of stuff that a job like mine cannot provide. I need help. I've never asked for it and I don't want to think that I'm asking for it now, but I still need it. These days you need to be in college to be able to make money but I don't have the time or the money to go. I need somebody with me to help me in this. If you're not going to do that, then I need to know."
"I don't know, Rosie," David said. "I don't know." He sighed. "I don't think I can do that. I'm twenty-one years old, Rosemary, and so are you. It's too early�"
"I have a seventeen-month-old baby. It's almost too late."
"Then I can't do it." Ginger paused. She wasn't exactly expecting that. She was expecting him to at least try. After a moment, she nodded.
"Well," she said. "I guess this is it then."
"Just like that?" David asked. "You're walking out on me?" Ginger closed her eyes and put her hand against her head.
"It's not like that."
"It seems like it to me."
"David, if you just understood what life is really like," she said, opening her eyes but not looking at him. "Sometimes you're so young."
"And so are you."
"No," she said, dropping her hand and looking at him. She had tears in her eyes. "No, I'm not. Not anymore."
"You are and you don't even know you are. You're not even twenty-two yet. Just because you have a child you act as though you're years older. You're not. You're the age you are and nothing's going to change that. You may seem older, you may seem younger, but you will always be the age you are."
"David, you don't understand," she said. "You won't understand until you grow up, meet the perfect girl, and you get married. You'll have children and your life will change, then you'll come back here to me and tell me I was right."
"I already met my perfect girl," he said, looking directly at her.
"Well this perfect girl is walking out on you," she said. She stood. "You should go."
Within two days anything that belonged to David in Ginger's home was returned to him. Kris was around a lot more now that David wasn't dominating the area, and Lily had moved on to another family once Ginger put Jenny into daycare. Sitting in the living room, looking around at the place, Ginger found herself right back where she started. In the same dump with the same sister, complaining about the same things.
"I need to get out of this place," Ginger said. "You and me should got up to the cabin this weekend. Leave Jenny with your mom and just hike all weekend."
"I don't know," Kris said. "I'm not marrying you." Ginger smiled. "I didn't know you like to hike."
"I've actually never done it before," Ginger said. "I've always, always wanted to do it, though. It's, like, number two on my list of things to do before I die."
"Really? What's number one?"
"Have sex with a rock star," Ginger said. "And I already did that." Kris nodded. "Me too."
Kris and Taylor hadn't spoken to each other in a long time. Apparently he was very busy and their relationship was kind of dying out. Kris was thinking about ending it the next time they spoke, but she was wondering if that time would ever come. It was almost a given that they were over by now anyway. Neither of them knew where exactly it went awry but it did and suddenly it just wasn't that important anymore. Kris had school, Taylor had work, and Kris was spending so much time helping Ginger take care of Jenny that she missed his calls anyway.
"We should do that, then," Kris said, looking over at her sister. "We should go hiking."
"Great."
It never happened. Someone from day care infested the entire group with chicken pox, and Jenny, at one and a half, wasn't exactly having a good time with it. Instead Kris and Ginger spent the weekend, and most of the next week, rubbing ointment on the irritable child and giving her oatmeal baths so she wouldn't itch so much. Jenny was feeling terrible and she cried nearly all week, which was very rare for her. She'd cried before, numerous times, but they were all because she fell and hit her head, fell and hurt her arm, ran into something�there was always a reason for it. Now she was just cranky and irritable and she itched like crazy so she cried all the time.
"Oh, honey," Ginger said, bouncing Jenny around the open area between the living room and the kitchen with Kris getting another bath ready for her. "I know. I know it itches and I know you're miserable. I'm sorry. It's better that you go through this now." Jenny was crying her eyes out and Ginger felt terrible. "Kris! How is that bath coming?"
"Almost ready, sis! Give me another minute."
"Knock, knock," Janey said, popping in the front door. "I heard Jenny crying, what's going on?"
"Oh," Ginger said, shaking her head. "She's got the chicken pox. A little snot-nosed idiot brought it to her daycare and she's dying because of it."
"Really?" Janey asked. "Let me get my kids. They haven't had it yet."
"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Ginger asked.
"Yes! I want them to get it! It's better now than later! I'll be right back." Kris came out of the bathroom.
"What was that about?" she asked.
"Janey is getting her kids so they can catch it as well. We'll be one big spotty family." Kris smiled and Janey walked in with both of her kids. Jenny stopped crying at the sight of her best friend Angie. Ginger put Jenny down and she ran over to Angie.
"Go on, Angie, give her a hug. You too, Dylan." Ginger smiled as Dylan looked up at his mother. He didn't want to have to hug Jenny. He didn't like girls.
"Mommy, she's a girl," he said.
"Do it anyway."
By the next day both of Janey's kids had been tricked into getting the chicken pox and they all stayed over at Ginger's place, whining and complaining. Janey was with them, applying ointment and the three of them took baths together in the big bathtub (one of the only good things about the apartment, the bath tub was huge).
"So you and David broke up?" Janey asked. "That's too bad."
"Yeah," Ginger said, sighing. "Once Jenny realizes he won't be coming around any longer she'll be crushed. She loved him so much. It was just I wanted to get married and he didn't, and I didn't want to be in a relationship when I felt I was just wasting my time. He was pretty upset."
"Well, honey, you need a good man. You need a man who'll be willing to go all of that way. Jenny needs a father."
"Yeah, she does," Ginger said. "I just hope I find him before it's too late."
"Rosemary Stevens, get your ass in here and help with these kids!! I don't even have a child and yet I'm stuck giving all three of them bath!" Kris yelled from the bathroom. Dylan giggled in the bathtub and put another handful of oatmeal on his sister's head.
"It's good practice for when you do, Kris," Ginger called back.
"Get in here!"
"I'm coming, I'm coming," Ginger said, shaking her head. "I swear, if she didn't complain she wouldn't talk at all." Ginger walked over to the bathroom and Jenny was playing around in her oatmeal bath. This was definitely her favorite part of having the chicken pox. She got to play around in gooey chunky oatmeal and get nice and dirty, and she wasn't itchy at all. "What do you need help with?"
"They're ready to get out and they're all full of oatmeal. I could use your help getting them out." Ginger smiled, shaking her head. "What?"
"Who would have thought I'd be getting my daughter out of a tub full of oatmeal?" Ginger asked, laughing. "It's so funny when you step back and think about it." Jenny looked up and saw her mommy. Giggling, she threw some oatmeal at her. It landed directly on her face and Ginger was appalled. "Oh my God! Jenny, that wasn't very nice!" However, the other two kids found this very amusing and started throwing oatmeal. Kris and Ginger were screaming, trying to dodge flying oatmeal, but before long everything was covered in the substance and Ginger had given up on trying to stay clean. Jenny threw another tiny handful of oatmeal at her mother, and this time Ginger threw it back, carefully avoiding the little girl's face.
"This is so disgusting," Kris said, putting her hair back. "I have oatmeal all over me." Kris turned away and Ginger grabbed two handfuls of oatmeal, silently walking over to Kris. "Oh, and Rose�" Kris didn't have time to react. As soon as she'd turned around Ginger had smeared oatmeal all over her face. Ginger giggled with the kids as Kris wiped her eyes, then looked straight at Ginger. "This is war."
With that, Kris and Ginger started pelting each other with oatmeal. The kids started laughing. "Your mommy's funny," Dylan said to Jenny. Jenny giggled and looked at her mother.
"Mommy," she said. Ginger stopped immediately, her hand down the back of Kris's shirt, and looked at Jenny.
"What did you say?" she asked.
"Mommy!" Jenny said again. Ginger ran over to her baby and picked her up out of the tub and held her close against her body.
"Oh my God, Jenny, you said Mommy! You said your first word!" Ginger hugged her baby, full of oatmeal and other messes, and began to cry.