Over the next few weeks Zac and Ginger started to receive various things from Kris. Most of them were Jenny's belongings for her room, but some of it belonged to Ginger. Most of the things for Ginger were things Ginger would have never thought of asking, and every time she opened up a box she thought, "Oh, wow, I forgot about this."
Jenny's room was looking more like a two-year-old's room instead of third spare bedroom Zac had for visitors. He really never got any visitors, although he said Jess once came to spend the summer with him the first year he lived in the house, so he didn't need three extra bedrooms. She started sleeping in her own bed, but most of the time she didn't like it and slept with her parents in their bed. She mainly used her room to play in. She couldn't go up and down the stairs yet, so Ginger invested in plastic gates to keep her away from the stairs. When Jenny was upstairs, Ginger was upstairs, and when Jenny was downstairs Ginger made sure she was down there as well.
Zac's job turned out to be incredibly convenient for Ginger. She had plenty of time to herself as well as with him and he had weekends together so they could be together all weekend, sleeping late (which had a new meaning of nine-thirty) and going down to the beach often.
Zac was at work and Ginger was at home cleaning, which turned out to be a daily habit of hers, when the doorbell rang. Confused (nobody had bothered them in the month and a half that she was there) she walked over to the door and opened it. "Can I help you?" she said to the friendly-looking man on the other side. He was tall with a goatee and was dressed nicely as if he'd just returned from work. He had a dark purple shirt with the sleeves folded up just under his elbows, with black pants and a tie that seemed to go nicely with his outfit. He turned out to be just as confused as she was, and looked at the numbers on the house to make sure he was in the right place.
"Um�does Zac still live here?" he asked. She nodded.
"Yeah," she said. "I'm his girlfriend."
"Zac? Has a girlfriend? That's new." She smiled. This must have been a friend of his. She didn't recognize him, so he must have been a neighbor as well.
"Yeah, well, I'm sort of an old girlfriend and a new girlfriend. I'm Rosemary, nice to meet you."
"Oh, I'm Mark, I live two doors down," he said. She extended a hand and he shook it politely. "Nice to meet you as well. Is Zac home?"
"No," she said, regretfully. "He's at work." She looked at her watch. "He should be home, soon. Do you want to come in?"
"Sure." She stepped aside and he came inside. She closed the door behind him. "It's weird, Zac has never mentioned a Rosemary. Ginger, yes, Rosemary, no."
"Oh, that's me," she said, smiling. "My name is Rosemary but he calls me Ginger. It's my middle name." Mark nodded.
"I see your nameplate," he said, pointing to her neck. She looked down at it. "So, have you been here long?"
"About a month and a half," she said, walking through the house to the kitchen. He followed. "Where have you been?"
"Well I was in Ohio for about a month, and I just came back. I teach at Santa Monica High." Her eyes grew. She'd always admired teachers, well, the ones who knew what they were doing. She could never be a teacher, though; she didn't have the education to be one.
"Really?" she asked. "I always thought that was the best job in the world."
"Yeah, it is," he said. "It's awesome. I love what I do. I get summers off, get two long breaks during the year, and I have a great group of kids. Do you do anything?"
"No," she said. "I don't. I'm supposed to be getting a job because I'm so bored around here but I can't find anything."
"Ever thought about being a teacher?" he asked, unknowingly reading her mind. He was joking but she had actually been contemplating it.
"Actually, yes," she said. "But I didn't go to college so I'm not exactly qualified for it. I'm not qualified for anything, as I've found while trying to look for a job out here. I don't exactly need the money or anything; Zac doesn't want me to get a job, but I just need something to do."
"You could go back to school," he suggested. "That's something to do. Then you could actually become a teacher."
"You're really pushing the teacher thing, aren't you?" she asked, smiling.
"Hey, there's a teacher shortage. We need all the help we can get. Anyone with a high school diploma can be a substitute. There you go." She nodded.
"I'll think about it. So what were you doing in Ohio?"
"Oh, I have family there," he said. "I went to Ohio State, all of my family is there�I go back every summer."
"That's cool."
"Mommy!!"
"Just a minute," she said, holding up a finger, then ran out of the room. She found Jenny in the living room. Mark stepped out of the kitchen and looked, curious. "What do you want, Jenny?"
"I'm hungry!" Ginger groaned.
"I know you are, honey. Daddy's going to be home any minute now and we'll get dinner started. Isn't there one of those PBS kids shows on that you love so much?" Ginger turned on the television and found PBS. They were still playing kids shows at six o'clock in the evening. "There, it's Caillou. Watch him for a little while." Jenny sat down in front of the television and Ginger headed back to the kitchen where Mark was. "Sorry about that."
"It's quite all right," he said. "You have a daughter?" She nodded. "And I'm guessing she belongs to Zac."
"Yeah," Ginger said, smiling. "It's kind of complicated, but then again it's kind of not. It's just a rather long story."
"I think it's cool," he said, backing off the topic like Ginger hoped he would. The garage door opened and a minute later Zac appeared.
"Hey! Mark! Haven't seen you all summer!" Zac gave the guy a manly hug and then kissed Ginger. "So I guess you met Ginger, huh? I wanted to tell you about her but I didn't even know you were back in town."
"I just got back. School year started yesterday."
"Really? I had no idea. Did you meet Jenny?"
"Not necessarily," Ginger said. "He kind of just saw her."
"Well come and meet her. One of these days you might be teaching her, if all goes well and we stay in town." Zac brought Mark into the living room where Jenny was watching TV. She got up and ran over to him as soon as she saw him in the room, throwing her arms around his leg. He picked her up and introduced her to Mark.
Apparently the reason he came over in the first place was to introduce Zac to a new band he'd heard at a concert in Ohio that he thought Zac would like. Zac explained to Ginger that Mark and he did a lot of this sort of thing together. Once Mark introduced Zac to an unsigned band that he liked so much, he gave their demo to the head of the label Zac did a lot of work for and actually produced their record.
"Ginger has zero taste in music," Zac explained to Mark, who Zac had invited to stay for dinner. Ginger gave Zac a look.
"I liked your band sorry ass band, didn't I?" she asked.
"Like I said, no taste in music," Zac repeated. "When she does listen to music, she listens to alternative rock, and not even the good kind, the crappy kind. The wannabe bands that nobody likes."
"People like the bands I listen to!"
"No, they don't," Zac teased. She rolled her eyes.
"Your food sucks tonight," she said, just to try to get back at him.
"No, it doesn't," Zac said. "You're just trying to get back at me for saying your taste in music is terrible."
"I'm not the only one who thinks that," she said. "Doesn't Daddy's food suck tonight, Jenny?" Jenny nodded and then shoved another spoonful in her mouth. "See?"
"She doesn't know what she's talking about. She's just agreeing with you because you're her mother," Zac said. "You're using her to poke fun at me." Ginger shrugged.
"Oh well."
"Anyway," Zac said, "back to the original topic, have you heard the new Ataris CD?"
"No I haven't," Mark said. "How good is it?"
"Oh my God it is wonderful," Zac said. "They continue to reinvent themselves with every album. They just get better and better. I think they're going to be in town soon. We need to go. I'm sure I can get us tickets."
"Zac, you can always get us tickets," Mark said. "You're the person to go to if someone needs tickets to anything or anywhere. You've got the connections."
"Hey, it's what I do best," Zac said, shrugging.
"I want to go," Ginger said. Both Mark and Zac looked at her, shaking their heads. "What? I can go! I can be hip and rock with the best of them." Zac put his head in his hands, in completely disbelief. "What?! You know, I used to be cool!"
"The key word there, Ginger, is 'used.' You used to be cool," Zac said, looking at her. "You're not any longer. You had a baby and you just lost all of your cool." She looked down at her plate in a way that reminded Zac of Kris, and he smiled. "I'm sorry."
"Whatever," she said, putting up her chin in defiance. "I don't know how good these tattoos and this tongue ring is if I can't even go to a concert and be a punk with the best of them."
"You have a tongue ring? I didn't even notice," Mark said. Ginger stuck out her tongue and her golden heart she'd had since she was twelve was still in her tongue. "Wow. I had no idea."
"Yeah," Ginger said, looking down again. "I lost my punk image once Jenny came along. I am no longer cool. Zac�Zac he can have twenty children and still be cool. I don't know how he does it."
"It's all in the speech, Ging," he said. "All in the way you talk."
"Whatever."
After dinner Ginger had somehow convinced the both of them to let her go to the concert. Zac didn't seem too happy about it, but he was just teasing. He was actually happy she was showing an interest in music again when she hadn't even listened to it in such a long time. The only problem they had was Jenny. The concert was definitely not a place for a nearly three-year-old child to be, and neither of them had any friends that could watch her. Ginger didn't know anybody in town and Zac's only friend was Mark, and he was going to the concert with them.
"Well," Zac said, "There's a sixteen-year-old girl who lives next door. I don't know if she'll be able to do it or if she'll want to do it. It'll be all afternoon and almost all night on a Saturday and teenagers have lives."
"You could always ask," Ginger said. "It's still two weeks away, I'm sure teenagers don't plan their weekends two weeks in advance. I know I didn't."
"Yeah, we could ask her. What if she can't? Or won't?"
"We'll find someone, Zac," Ginger said, waving it off. "Don't worry about it." Zac shrugged, sitting back on the couch. Jenny had just fallen asleep and they were alone until they decided to go to bed. "How old is Mark?"
"Um�thirty-seven, I think."
"Thirty-seven?" she asked, her voice rising. "Oh my God! He so does not look thirty-seven!"
"I know, and he doesn't act like it either," Zac said. "He's actually kind of a dork, but then again so am I so I don't really notice it. He's a really cool guy. He works down at the high school."
"Yeah, he was telling me about that," she said.
"He teaches Anatomy."
"Anatomy?" she asked. "Wow, smart guy."
"He is the smartest man I know," Zac said. "I don't know how I ended up being friends with him. I was outside some day, I don't remember what I was doing, but he came up to me and we started talking. Somehow I mentioned a band I was producing and he was like 'Oh yeah, I heard of them, they're really awesome.' I had never met a person before who knew who that band was, so me and him just clicked instantly."
"It's good you have somebody to talk about music with," Ginger said, "since I have no taste in music whatsoever."
"You have a very different taste in music than I do," Zac explained. "It's not like it's bad, but it's just different. That's why I tease you about it so much."
"Can I wear my old makeup and show off my tattoos at this concert, or will they look at me like I'm crazy?" Ginger asked, leaning up against Zac, who in turn put his arm around her.
"No, you can do it if you'd like. I think Jenny would freak out if she saw you, though."
"Jenny won't freak out. She's almost three. She knows who her Mommy is."
"Her birthday's coming up."
"Yes it is."
"What are we going to do?" Zac asked. "She doesn't have any friends here." Ginger didn't know.
"Jenny's never really had a birthday party or anything. She was too little for that," Ginger explained. "And she didn't have that many friends. There was Angie, the little girl across the hall, and a kid or two from day care, but besides that it was always just me and her. We can do the cake and take pictures, but that's all I really want to do."
"Okay," Zac said. "Have you found a daycare?"
"Nope."
"Have you even looked at daycares?"
"Yeah, I have," she said, looking up at him. "I'm not a bum and sit on my ass all day. I do check around. I haven't found anything I really like yet. Every place I've been to stuck up their noses at me like I was stupid just for asking. You picked the best neighborhood, Zac, everyone's rich snobs."
"Do you want me to go around with you? People know me, they won't be all snobby towards you if I'm around."
"Nah, I don't want my daughter going to a daycare where the kids are like that anyway."
"She could just stay home with you, you know. That'll give you something to do all day." Ginger shrugged. "I haven't really seen any kids around the neighborhood. Everyone around here doesn't believe in children, or their children are all a lot older than Jenny."
"She can manage without friends until she goes to school. That's how I did it."
"And look how lovely you turned out," he said.
"Hey!" She hit him.
"I meant that seriously, Ginger! Gosh, stop being so abusive!" She gave him a look and hit him again. "Anyway�I'm tired."
"All right. Let's go to bed." They got up and went up the stairs, where Jenny was asleep in their bed. In a few minutes they both got in and fell asleep as a family.