by M. B. Feeney
“Fuck you.” I shoved him with my shoulder, a wide smile on my face.
“I’m kidding. Look, this wedding is gonna happen and you and Charlie are gonna be happy.”
"Dude, I know." I sighed. “It’s just... so much to comprehend.”
"I know how you feel, believe me I do, but you need to remember that not only do you love each other, but your families loves the other too. That's the only blessing you'll ever need in life." He gave me a one armed hug to prevent burning himself on my cigarette.
"Thanks man, I guess we better hit the road." Glancing at my watch made me feel nauseous when I realised there was only an hour left until Charlotte was due to walk down the aisle of the small church. The six of us trailed out of the room and down to the lobby to get the car the short ride to the church my parents had found. I’d wanted to have the ceremony to happen at the church they’d married in, but it had been destroyed by a heavy storm before Charlie and the kids had moved over, so rather than settle for second best, we’d chosen a small church not far from our own house. Plus, L.A. was easier for everyone to fly into from all over the world.
"Remind me son why you or Charlotte didn't stay at the house." Mom piped up as she joined us in the lobby.
"Mom, could you imagine being there while the caterers you hired were running around doing things the way you wouldn’t?" I cocked an eyebrow and grinned at her, knowing she didn’t have a response.
"You have an answer for everything don't you boy?"
"And where do you think I go that from?" I kissed her cheek. "Anyway, it's a nice hotel." She swatted my arm as the car pulled away.
The journey took less than twenty minutes, which didn’t feel like enough time for me to prepare myself. As soon as I got out, I lit another cigarette, trying to mask the shaking in my hands. Mom took my empty hand between her own.
"Honey, I don't know why you are so nervous. That woman worships you. Whenever you start to panic, think of my grandbaby. She'll calm you down." Cassidy, my world.
The day Charlotte found out she was pregnant was well up near the top of the list as one of the best days in my entire life. Yeah, we'd not gone about things the way most of my family, and hers, would have preferred, but it summed up our whole relationship leading up to that point. Even then, she still had reservations about what was between us. I didn't know how much more I could tell her that I loved her. More than anything, I hoped she finally began to believe me, especially now.
Up until that moment, I’d been so worried about her. Wade had text me from the car telling me she’d been sick and slept the entire time. She gave off this air of being strong and together, but imagining her like that made my heart hurt. As soon as I could, I headed up to the hotel room. I looked in on her, fast asleep, looking so small in the huge bed. Lying next to her for a while, I could feel how sick she was, and began to panic. Thankfully, once she woke up and things fell into place, I could relax... Oh crap. I was going to be a father.
Knowing that some people wouldn’t be able to keep their mouths shut about the baby, we decided to tell our families. Well, I called my parents straight away my words jumping out of my mouth in a mixture of nerves and excitement. Mom started crying while my dad couldn’t get his words out straight. I’d given them their first grandchild, and they were both over the moon about it. Charlotte decided not to tell her parents over the phone, but we decided that Sam and Grace needed to know straight away.
Sitting Charlotte’s kids down made me feel even more nervous; looking at their confused faces dried my mouth out and made me stutter. Laughing at me, Charlotte took over and explained what was going on to them. Sam’s face went from expectant to excited in a matter of minutes as the realisation that he was going to be a big brother instead of ‘the baby’.
“Can it be a brother?” He asked, innocence personified.
“Buddy, I really don’t think we can make that promise.” There was no way in hell I was going to explain about babies right there and then, that was a job for his dad.
“Oh... I don’t think I want another sister. Can we send the baby back and get a puppy instead?”
Charlotte busted out laughing, bringing a smile to my face. I watched as she sat down next to her son and explained the basics about why we couldn’t give the baby back and how much, regardless of gender, it would love its big brother. That seemed to please him and he bounced out of the room to play in the other room. Grace, however, didn’t look so enamoured with the whole thing.
“What’s up sweetie?” I asked, sitting next to her as Charlotte moved across the room to sit with Sam. It was obvious she was taking a step back to allow me the opportunity to engage with Grace in a way I hadn’t before.
“The baby won’t have the same dad as me and Sam will it?” Her voice was quiet as she spoke, almost as if she didn’t want Charlotte to hear her.
“No honey. I’ll be the baby’s daddy. Is that a problem?” More than anything, I wanted to run outside and light a cigarette, but I couldn’t do that. Grace’s gorgeous little face was turned away from me, like she was hiding.
“I don’t know. Me and Sam are the same, apart from him being a boy, but the baby will be different... what if Mummy likes it more than us because she loves you more than Daddy?”
Her words put a lump in my throat that took me a while to shift. When I managed to find my voice again, I took her hands into my own and began to speak softly.
“Honey, your mom could never love anything more than she loves you and Sam. You’re both her entire world right now, and just ‘cause she and your dad aren’t in love with each other anymore, they still care about each other, and more than anything, they both love you and Sam.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Charlotte leaning against the door frame, watching us.
“Just because your Mom’s having another baby, with me as its daddy, doesn’t mean for one second that she’ll stop loving you.” Making a show of dipping my head, and dropping my voice to a whisper. “Wanna know a secret about Moms?”
“Yeah.” Grace whispered and moved closer to hear my words.
“Moms are superheroes.” I withheld my laughter at her big, blue eyes widening at my words. “I’m serious. Wanna know what their super powers are?”
“Yeah...”
“No matter how many kids they have or how big their family gets, they love everyone the same. Mom’s hearts grow with each person that joins their family, and they don’t burst.”
“Wow. I didn’t know that.”
“No, they keep it a secret, but it was okay I told you ‘cause no one wants you to worry. You’ve already been a great big sister to Sam, now you can be an amazing big sister to the baby.”
“I’m glad Mummy met you Gage.”
“I’m kinda glad she met me too sweetheart. You all okay now?” I pressed a kiss to her forehead after she nodded. Charlotte joined me as Grace skipped off to play with her brother and I let out a huge sigh of relief.
The fans at the Vegas show got a double whammy of shock and gossip that night. Not only did Matt get very publicly engaged, I announced I was going to become a daddy. While I had the nod from Charlotte, but I hadn't wanted to tell my friends that way, especially not in front of a club full of fans. No doubt, people were posting about it online as soon as it was out of my mouth. Later that night after I’d had a couple of drinks, I blamed Callaghan and his big mouth for making me blurt it out in front of so many fans with camera phones. He never had been able to keep his mouth shut; he had an ingrained and innate talent to weasel information out of people, without even trying.
Once the wedding of the year was out of the way— the very next day, Charlotte and I went back to her place in the UK while Matt and Karina went on their honeymoon. We had no shows for a couple of weeks, and there were things we needed to talk about, even more so now that she was carrying my baby. I couldn’t stop worrying about her, despite the fact she’d done the pregnancy thing twice before; the distance between us killed me
at the best of times, but it was going to be worse.
When we began discussing the options, I was expecting a bit of a fight about her considering moving to the States, but she surprised me buy readily agreeing with moving across the pond. I knew it wasn’t an easy choice for her to make— leaving family and friends, as well as uprooting the kids, but my girl was all for it since Dermot had moved to South Africa and wouldn’t be involved on a personal level with the day to day upbringing of the kids.
As much as L.A. had never appealed to her, she understood that it was, for now at least, somewhere I needed to be career wise. The knowledge that she'd be able to find work easily enough was a big relief; after all, what town didn't need teachers? Naturally, she had her own conditions. She didn't want to live in L.A., but outside the city itself, in the ‘burbs. That was fine by me, there was nowhere I couldn't drive or fly to for work. She also wanted a house rather than an apartment, and she insisted on contributing to everything, monetary-wise. This was something I couldn't understand; I was now earning more money than I was able to spend, so I could make sure all of us were well provided for, but Charlotte argued that she didn't want to feel like a 'kept woman'; and was stubborn as hell about it.
Eventually, we came to the arrangement that I would buy us a house but she would deal with the majority of the bills as she and the kids would be there more than I would. I still wanted to ensure my family was secure so, after a conversation with Charlie and Dermot, I set up college trust funds for their two kids, and planned to set one up for our baby as soon as he or she made their appearance. What was the point of me having money if I couldn't use it for our future? We’d both agreed that the kids wouldn’t be spoiled, and would understand the value of a dollar, but we also didn’t want everything to be a struggle for them.
After spending a few months in rented accommodation, we finally moved into the perfect house an hour out of L.A. I'd nearly had a fit when I'd arrived back from a meeting with my agent to find Charlotte up a ladder painting the ceiling. No matter how much she tried to tell me she was fine, I put my foot down and hired some guys in to do it all. I made her sit on the couch and 'supervise'. There was no way that my seven month pregnant... girlfriend I guess, was going to put herself and my baby at risk over the perfect color combination. She’d ranted at me for a full hour about it, but I inherited my stubbornness from my mom, and I stood my ground and she eventually gave up and did as I’d asked.
The elder kids had gone down to Texas to spend some time with my parents during their vacation time when Charlotte woke me up at three a.m. to tell me that her waters had broken. Cue a Weston panic of epic proportions; after what felt like a lifetime, I managed to get her into the car and to the hospital. In just over three hours, I was holding my daughter, sobbing.
I stood in front of the altar with Callaghan at my side as the traditional wedding march began. My heart jumped into my mouth as I looked at the pastor, smiling weakly. I turned to see my baby girl walking down the aisle with her brother and sister, sprinkling yellow rose petals onto the ground as she walked. Tears began to roll down my cheeks as Cass grinned my own smile at me. I made a mental note to check I had enough ammo in the gun cabinet down in the basement; I was going to need it as she got older. At just under four years of age, she was already a stunning child, and that wasn’t me being biased.
"You okay bro?" The seriousness in Callaghan's voice shocked me, I nodded and looked past him as Charlotte began to float towards me, my eyes getting more and more misty, the closer she got.
"Perfect."
Two Years Later…
Living just outside L.A. had its benefits, even if it did mean having to deal with abysmal traffic on a regular basis whenever we needed to head into the city itself. These excursions had to be timed perfectly.
“Darlin’, if we don’t leave now, we’re gonna be late.” I hollered up the stairs.
“We’ll be right there.” Yeah, sure. I’d heard that one before.
I stood at the bottom of the stairs, checking my tie was straight for the hundredth time, just for something to do. Smoothing down my jacket, I checked for dog hairs. Buster, as if summoned via osmosis, ambled passed me from the kitchen, his white hair taunting me.
“I’m watching you buddy.” I mumbled at the white shepherd the kids had picked out a few months previous. Buster, on the other hand, completely ignored me as he jumped onto the couch and began to lick his balls. “Show off.”
“Daddy!” Cassidy came flying down the stairs, jumping off the bottom step into my arms.
“Hey my mini darlin’. Don’t you look pretty as a picture?” Gently, I placed her onto the floor and knelt down to look into her eyes that were the mirror image of my own.
“Mommy looks prettier.” There was no way I was going to disagree with her as I looked up. Charlotte walked down to us, her glorious legs on show from under her short black dress.
“Damn darlin’.” Keeping hold of Cass’s hand, I stood to kiss my wife. “You look amazing.”
“You look pretty nifty yourself there cowboy.”
“Ready to go? Hey, kids. Come on.” Grace and Sam came in from the den, just as suited and booted as the rest of us. I led the way out of the house, and down to the limo that had been sent to pick us up.
“Wow, this is sick.” Sam’s eyes near popped out of his head as we travelled through the streets, people stopping to stare as we glided past them.
“Dude, that word... really?” I would never understand the way kids spoke; it made me feel old and out of the loop.
“What? All the kids at school say it.”
“I know buddy, I know.” Charlotte and I sighed. This boy was growing up way too fast and there was nothing we could do about it. School had let out for the summer, and soon all three would be heading over to Cape Town to spend a month with Dermot, Alice, and the new baby; our family was growing. When they got back, Sam would be heading into sixth grade, and Grace was starting High School. Within a year she’d have her learner’s permit and be taking driving lessons. Charlie had regular private breakdowns over her kids and the way they were fast becoming young adults.
It got worse a couple months ago when Cass was accepted into the local Elementary school; she broke down for a full ten minutes. It scared the hell out of me too, but I wasn’t at home as much as she was. Luckily, she’d been offered a job at the same school, so knowing she’d see Cass everyday calmed her down.
“What happened to the dress shoes I bought you?” Charlotte’s voice, her British accent still strong unlike the kids, cut into my thoughts. Smiling at her, I looked down at my feet which were clad in my fifteen year old boots.
“They pinched my toes, so I went and got these resoled.”
“But they’re brown... and your suit’s black.” She rolled her eyes. “What am I going to do with you?”
“I can think of a few things, I’ll fill you in later.”
“Ewww, Gage. That’s gross.” Grace screwed up her pretty face, making both Charlie and me laugh. The car began to slow down.
“Oh, we’re about to arrive; everyone ready?” I shifted across the seat to position myself by the door. Within seconds of us coming to a stop, the driver had made his way around the car and opened the door, blasting us all in the face with a barrage of flashing from the cameras in the press pit.
Climbing out of the car, I plastered on a wide smile as I held out a hand to help Charlie get out. Once the kids were out, I lifted Cass up into my arms and took hold of my wife’s hand— linking our fingers, so we could start walking along the dark, denim carpet that led to the entrance of the TLC Chinese Theater.
“Gage, this way!”
“Gage, give your wife a kiss for the camera.”
“Gage, Gage...”
I was being assaulted by voices from all sides. Cass snuggled her face in against my neck to hide from the flashing lights. Gripping her tightly, I smiled at everyone as I continued to walk towards the door.
Once we were in
side, I put Cassidy on the floor and held her hand as we walked over to the bar where my agent, Nina, was waiting to take the kids for some food while Charlotte and I sat and watched the film. I had a couple of interviews to do after the screening, so we couldn’t duck out early.
“Go with Nina honey. Mommy and Daddy will see you soon.” I knelt down to give Cass a kiss on her cheek. “Save me a dance for the party?” With a serious face, she nodded before skipping off with Nina to eat.
“That was... intense.” Charlie took my hand as we made our way to take our seats.
“I’ll never get used to it, that’s for sure.”
I thought back over the last eighteen months, when I was offered the part of Johnny in ‘The Devil’s Track’, which was a movie adaptation of the Charlie Daniels’ Band song, The Devil Went Down to Georgia. Nina had received a call from the casting director who had seen a video online of a Pocket’s gig, and wondered if I’d be interested in playing the lead.
Once the contract was signed, I was asked if the band would be interested in appearing on the score. I didn’t have to ask them twice; as huge fans of the song, we all jumped at the chance. Since then, we’d had a lot more attention thrust upon us and our gigs were packed out every time.
“I’d worry if you did. Don’t ever become complacent Gage, it’s not you.” She kissed my cheek as we settled down to watch the movie.
:: ::
“So, now that the movie’s been wrapped up, what’s next on the cards for Gage Weston?” The female interviewer had been flirting with me throughout the entire recording, and it was driving me insane. I wanted to get the whole thing wrapped up so I could get back to my family.
“I’ve been in the studio with my band, Pocket Full of Lyrics, as we’re fixin’ to release a new album within the next few months, but for now, I’m concentrating on spending time with my family.”