Chapter Text
December 2029
It had been six years and four months since Anna and Mike had seen their daughter.
They had meant to come to see her, and she had meant to go back to OBX to see them, but it just never worked out.
Life just became peaceful and fuller, time created to dig into the world. Memories made weren't wasted returning to the OBX, where so much of their youth was spent loathing it there.
During their sixteen years, The Cut was their home, the place that they thought they deserved—a tribe made from the best out of what they had.
Kiara, as much as she would deny it, sometimes missed her family. It's why she would call them every Wednesday night (spaghetti night in the Carrera home) when she knew they were coming home from work. On a few Wednesday nights, she would make spaghetti as they were making it for themselves and chat with them or share sauce recipes.
Kie would share her generous portions with friends they'd make along their travels, signing off with her parents with a chef's kiss or a "miss you."
None of their guests complaining if their pasta was served earlier in the day as they moan in delight. The time difference made it challenging to match dinner times exactly.
Anna and Mike missed their daughter; their understanding of her growth and craving to travel the world had taken time and patience.
When their Wednesday night video chat included JJ and an envelope they'd received from the couple, they never guessed it would be plane tickets to come out to visit.
Not knowing what to pack for, Anna had a suitcase worth of options that her husband joked to their driver on the way to their daughter and son-in-law's house, must weigh the car down, and they would tip extra for gas. The joke fell flat, though, with the driver, Mike instead reached out to still Anna's leg from shaking.
"You've got yourself all jittery."
"I think I'm just nervous and excited. I mean, we finally get to see where our baby girl has been living the past six years. Aren't you the least bit nervous?"
"Nah..." Mike smiles, "Our girls a Pogue, we're going to be wildly impressed."
That earned an eye roll.
Sure they may speak to their daughter regularly, but there was something different about being introduced to a life they don't know her by. A life she'd been living separately for so long.
Already she was impressed with the location of where they resided. The land surrounding them was non-developed but still near civilian life. Locals surrounded them, but yet tourists still stuck out like a sore thumb.
The driveway leading up to their house is guided by a mixture of blue lotus', hibiscus, and so many other color native plants that brightened the way.
Their houses were no different.
John B waved at the parents, smiling as he held his toddler by the chest from behind to keep her from running after the thrown ball at the other end of the yard.
"Oh my goodness." Anna gasped from inside the vehicle hurrying to reach for the handle when the car stopped, "Johnny, look at her; she is just too precious for words."
She holds her mouth, stepping up to them, crouching down to the toddler's level. "And what is your name?"
"Princess."
"She gets that a lot." John B chuckles, "They mean your real name, silly bean."
"Poppy Lena Rootialedge"
"She still gets a little tongue-tied with the last name." He pats her on the back, "Go ahead, baby, you can go grab your ball now."
"She's gorgeous." John B's smile lit up the beach. "You and Sarah should be so proud of the life you've made and created. Your little one is full of life."
"Wow, and what am I, chopped liver?"
Mike whipped around, grinning from ear to ear at the sound of his daughter, who was hanging off the balcony barefoot and swimming in an oversized sweatshirt.
"Never." Mike climbs the stairs immersing his daughter in a hug.
"I missed you too, dad," Kie whispers into her father's neck, the smells of her childhood bringing her back. "I can't believe you guys were able to make it, finally."
Anna reaches around them both, assembling them.
"Well, someone needed to get their butts on a plane if we wanted to see you; we're just happy you finally invited us out here."
"We were starting to think you joined some cult." Kie honestly couldn't tell if her mother was joking; knowing her mother, she probably wasn't.
"No, mom." Kie rolled her eyes, drawing back from the embrace, taking in the two. They have aged since last seeing them, though they probably think the same of her.
Her mom has since embraced her changing hair, letting the silver start to reveal through, and her father's white hairs were more prominent than his dark hairs.
"We can see that now sweetheart, but you can't blame our imaginations for running wild with you all the way here." Anna huffs the bangs out of her eyes, shifting her purse further onto her shoulder.
"You're here now; how about we go on in, and you know..." Kie tucked a hair behind her ear, shuffling over to the front door. She reaches for the door handle from behind her and places her other hand out to stop her parents from moving any further. "Mom, dad...."
"You're making me incredibly nervous right now. Why are you looking at us like that?" Anna comes forward, examining her daughter. "Kiara.... what is wrong?"
"Nothing's wrong, mom; I'm simply taking a moment." Opening the door, Kie steps in, waving at her parents to come in. She glances over her shoulder with her back still leading her in through the doorway. Her finger goes to her lips when her glance goes back into her parent's direction.
She leads them to the family room, where JJ is looking over his shoulder, grinning at them, and uses a hand to wave hello.
Then there it was.
Anna could recognize the noise apart from anything.
"Kiara." She whimpers, stepping forward to grab Kiara's wrist. "Kiara Lennon."
"Mom." Kie places her hand on top of her mom's hand, rubbing it up and down her arm. "Dad... I want you both to meet a little human."
Mike places his hand on his daughter's shoulder to not only hold himself up but to make sure that he's still experiencing real life.
"Is that?" His hand grips were tighter.
'Mike, Anna, this is Slater." JJ beams coming around the couch with the coddled infant in his hands.
"Slater Zayn Maybank." Kie finishes for JJ, pulling her mom in closer to her side. "Your grandson."
The pair were quiet on her sides.
JJ shot her a worried looked.
Maybe this had been a terrible idea, the wrong plan.
Her mom didn't break the silence. Instead, she dropped her arms from her daughter's grasp, then, stepping forward, reached her arms out to gently wrap the infant into her. The exchange was clumsy as JJ was still learning how to smooth transition from one person to another.
Anna cooed, gently reaching out to JJ's arm squeezing it for encouragement.
She bounced the infant boy slightly, unable to take her eyes away from him for even a moment. Kie steps away from her parents as her dad takes a giant step forward, enamored with the sleeping human in his wife's arms.
The silence continued between the pairs, and Anna floats to the sofa laying him on her legs as she runs her fingers as light as a feather over his tiny body swaddled in a soft material covered with sea turtles.
"I don't understand why you chose to hide this from us, Kiara," Anna whispers, her fingers lightly dancing over her grandson, still refusing to keep her eyes away from him.
Kie opens her mouth to respond, her mom's head shook.
"We can speak about this later. I'm a little occupied right now. I have a lot to process and some catching up to do with my grandson."
Her sharp tone didn't go unnoticed.
JJ wanted to bury himself into work, surf, clean out the dishwasher, fold the laundry, anything to avoid the tension. With Kie's death grip on his hand, he wasn't going to get out of it that easily.
They stayed like that until Slater made them aware that it was mealtime with the alarm of his cries. JJ all but ran into the kitchen to start dinner, ducking out the side of the door. A stack of prepared meat from the fridge in one hand and matches to light the grill in another.
To allow herself privacy to feed, not feeling much welcomed to do this in the comfort of her living room Kie excused herself to the bedroom. Deciding she needs some fresh air, Kie unlocks the atrium doors and escapes by relaxing in one of her chairs on the porch.
"Here we go...." Kie soothed her son while he latched on; she cursed under her breath when we started to feed.
"Not something you get used to, huh?" Her mom's voice startled her; she grabs a chair and lightly brings it, so she's in front of her daughter.
"It's the weirdest freaking thing." Kie winces, "My tit legit hurts, and it's sore."
"Well, if you maybe had mentioned I'd be meeting my grandson today, I could have come prepared with things that could have helped with that."
Kiara didn't want to fight with her mom, especially not while she fed her son. Things were already stressful enough, and she was tired; adding to it with her mom's passive aggression wouldn't help the situation.
"Mom... I screwed up, okay. JJ and I had this entire plan to come to the OBX to tell you and dad, and it went to shit when Sarah got sick."
"Kiara, that was four months ago..." Anna begins to argue but tells by her daughter's glare staring in front of her that she needed to calm her tone. "Sweetheart, you had a whole baby without your father and me knowing.
"I'm sorry!" Kiara exclaimed, startling the child in her arms, so she lowered her voice. "Things were awful here for a few months, mom, and you know that. Sarah almost freaking died from a spider bite, I was getting sick every day, and JJ had to hold it together for all of us. He and I watched Poppy while John B lived at the hospital, I couldn't hold anything down, and the stress made me lose weight when I should have been gaining. It was a literal nightmare."
"Honey..." Anna reached forward, placing a hand on her daughter's knee. "You are my child; no matter how old you are, you will always be our baby. No matter how far you are away from home, we are your parents. We love you."
"I know that." Kie choked, pulling her chin into her shoulder to hide her face. "Mom is was so scary. Everything happened all at once, and there were so many times I wanted to come home, to be home. Between these hospitals with Sarah and the doctors for the baby, it was nothing like being in the states. JJ was so scared, and I was so afraid; John B wasn't even a functioning human being for months. Don't even get me started on poor Poppy; she cried for her momma all the time, every night the first few weeks."
Kie kissed the top of Slater's head to calm herself. "Slater gator came two and a half weeks earlier than he should have and only a few weeks after Sarah came home. Sarah had lost so much weight during her time in the hospital that JJ had to help John B with Poppy and help me at the hospital. We didn't even have time to think about anything else, let alone organize or think to ask for help from anyone. I swear it was just straight-up survival mode. JJ was literally holding us all together."
"Jesus..." Anna gripped her daughter's leg tighter.
"I know we messed up, but it was just one thing after another, but as soon as it all calmed down, we set this all up so you could come to meet him. We do wish it would have been sooner that you found out, but life just slipped away too fast."
"I understand."
And for once, Kiara believed her.
--------------------------------
Her parents ended up staying longer than planned.
Kiara and her mother spent countless hours on and off websites ordering items that Kiara didn't even know she needed until her mom pointed out valuable things.
"Who knew my seven-week-old son needed so many toys." JJ stepped over and danced around all the toys that had magically shown up at his front door throughout the past few days. "My kids got more toys in his first few months of living than I did my whole life..."
"Wait until he starts walking, dude, then you'll have him hot on your ankles chasing after you." JB laughed, grabbing the case of beer from his friend's fridge. "Bro, do you want to start grilling the fish now or wait?"
"Let's just bring it out; if anything, we'll just put it on low or something. I mean, what the fuck is this?" JJ held the item between his fingers, holding it out for John B to inspect
"They look like cupcake holders…." John B pinched the material, rubbing his fingers together to feel it.
"They're so your son does piss everywhere." Kie rolls her eyes, yanking them from her husband and friend's hands. "You stick it on the top of his pee hole, and it helps control the whiz."
"Lil' dude problems." John B shot them a sympathetic look before shooting Kiara a smirk, "How many times has Slater gator whizzed on our boy here?"
"Yeah, babe, how many times?" JJ put his hand on his hip, smirking while he waited for her answer.
"Real cute." Kiara rolled her eyes, grabbing the baby blanket she had come in for, "You know one of these days lil' gators going to get you, and I hope that it's a colossal blowout instead."
"He would never, babe; you see us, men, we tend to stick together…." She flicks them off, going back outside to avoid listening to the rest of what was going to come out of his mouth.
JJ puts six fingers up while holding open the door for JB to follow through.
After setting up the fish on the grill on low, the boys came over to the family circled the bonfire set up on the beach, each settling in a chair next to their respective other. JJ found himself pouting a bit when he noticed Anna had Slater wrapped in a blanket asleep, cuddled to her chest.
Kiara reached over to grab his hand after noticing the slip of his facial features, pulling his hand onto her lap. She drew her attention to her dad again, who's talking to the group about his small kitchen fire that had happened a few weeks ago.
Poppy had her feet bouncing on the chair she was settled in, softly giggling as her father blew off a marshmallow that had a blaze coming from the top.
She huffed and huffed until there was probably more spit than anything on the marshmallow before Sarah blew it out for her.
"Careful baby, it may be hot," Sarah whispers, not to interrupt the story.
"Nucle JJ, you want a mallow?"
He nods, patting his stomach.
"Otay." She starts mumbling to herself, fumbling while she fixes up her next marshmallow.
John B throws over a beer and lifts one of them to each person quietly and throwing them to who nods.
"Is that a tattoo?" Anna points with her free hand to Kiara's side; her shirt must have shifted up when leaning over earlier to grab JJ's hand. "When did you get that, and oh my god, what is that?"
Sarah snorted.
"Mom, come on, it's not that big of a deal."
"Permanent ink isn't that big of a deal? Let me have a better look."
"It's not even that big of a deal." Kie took her free hand, lifting her sweater all the way, revealing the small tattoo of an outline of the sun and wave.
"I'm not stupid. Lift your shirt; there's more." Kie rolled her eyes, lifting her sweatshirt to reveal two small tattoos of two zodiac symbols, Gemini and a Leo. "Kiara, those are permanent. Those are on your beautiful skin forever."
"Oh, don't let your mother fool you," Mike speaks up, and if Anna didn't have her grandson in her hand, she would have flown a hand onto his mouth. He rolls his eyes at his wife's dramatic gasp," She's got three tattoos, to of which you do not want to see proof of."
"Which is why!" Anna tried talking over her husband towards the end of his sentence. She glared at him at the end of his, and Kiara raised her eyebrows, waiting for her to continue; her head bobbed, giving her the go-ahead to explain. "Which is why I am disappointed that you would cover your beautiful skin in ink."
“Mm, yeah, makes a lot of sense.” Kie rolls her eyes
“What are the tattoos?” Sarah shrugs
“Trust me; you don’t want to see them.” Mike laughs into his beer can, again avoiding his wife's glare from beside him. “Anna had a bit of a wild phase during her rebel teenage years.”
“Is that so?” Kie leaned her head onto her hand, “Please tell me more, dad.”
“This is ridiculous.” Anna huffed, playing with the ends of her Slater’s blankets to avoid eye contact with the rest. “There’s no reason to have brought any of this up.”
“You were just giving me shit about having tattoos; of course, there’s a reason why this is relevant. Please, carry on, dad.”
“John B.” Anna shakes her head, “Honey, I might take one of those now if you wouldn’t mind opening it and bringing it to me, please.”
Poppy takes the opportunity to bring over the marshmallow that was on fire for JJ to take. Her hands are sticky from eating her own when she taps him on the arm to get his attention.
“Oh my.” He laughs when her hand is glued to his arm when tapping him. “Little sticky there, aren’t ya?”
“Here you go!” She shoves the marshmallow still on fire, with the stick in his face.
“Wow, thank you!” JJ masks excitement over the now charcoal marshmallow, throwing it over his shoulder when she skips back to her parents to grab another one.
He leans back into the conversation, hoping he didn’t miss much.
“I did not, no, I did not do that, Michael, and you know that.” Anna shakes her head, drinking her beer. “You know what... whatever you tell it how you think it went.”
“I will because I was the only one sober enough to remember.” Mike ops for another can from JB. “As I was saying, Anna had a little adventure with the Pogues that lead to one or two or three tattoos.”
Mike pops open his beer, pointing at Sarah, John B, and JJ.
“All three of your parents were there.” Mike nods, remembering, “Sarah, it was your mom, both your parents JJ and John B your dad was there.”
“You knew my parents?” Sarah drew in closer to the fire see through it to Kiara’s parents. JJ’s hand reached out again to Kie’s. While her parents were distracted, she questioned quietly with her lips whether he was okay with this or wanted to stop.
He squeezed her hand while kissing the back of it to let her know he was okay with it.
“Avery, Anna, and Lena.” Mike smiles over to his wife at the memories it brings by just saying their names, “You couldn’t separate the three through high school. John B, your mom was a latecomer; she didn’t quite make it into their lady group that easily.”
“She didn’t want to either.” Anna commented, “She wasn’t much of the groupie type.”
“Avery, Lena, and Anna went everywhere together. It reminded me very much of your boy’s dynamic growing up.” Referring to JJ, Pope, and John B. “I was the Kiara of the times, sometimes falling to the side because I was the only guy. Of course, I had Big John as my best friend, but Anna was my girl, so I was around the ladies often.”
“This is so crazy.” Sarah was completely in awe that Anna and Mike knew her mom.
“Lena got pregnant with Rafe senior year of high school; when he met your father when he came home from his sophomore year of college.” Anna chimed in, “God, she was smitten with him.”
“Well anyway, one night all of us were hanging out at Rixon’s, and it was Luke’s brilliant idea to go out just before this storm was coming in....”
“Of course, Avery felt the need to egg the situation on because she wanted to prove that she was just as nucking futs as Luke... sorry, JJ.” Anna apologizes
He shook his head; it was so odd to hear stories of his parents together during a time before he was even a thought.
“Storm clouds are roaring in, the waves are just ridiculous at this point, and I mean the sky and water just look like a nasty bitch.” Mike moves his arms to demonstrate the water's movement. “We were high as shit, drunker than skunks, and shouldn’t have been in that water.”
“But Luke and Avery sure did know how to convince you to do stupid things willingly.” Anna chuckled
“We lived to tell the tale, but when we swam up to shore...”
“More like washed up.”
“Oh yeah, we did lose Lena in the waves that night... that was right before she found out she was pregnant with Rafe. Of course, the waters were dark, but Lena decided to drift away from us that night. She’s lucky the waves brought her to shore before she drowned.”
“We had never been more scared than when we were screaming for her.” Anna shivered, remembering how relieved they were to find her coughing up water into the sand.
“So that night we piled into the Twinkie and with the high from riding in the storm, and you know the actual weed, it led us to your Uncle Teddy’s house, John B.”
“You guys drove the Twinkie?” John B was shook; who knew the Twinkie had so much history.
“Of course.” Mike said while Anna laughed out, “Where do you think your parents conceived you, John B?”
“Gross.” JJ grimaced, looking over at his best friend, “Dude, the Twinkies ruined now.”
“Could have gone a million years without knowing that.” JB winced
“As I’m holding the offspring of your shenanigans.” Anna rolled her eyes, “Get over it.”
“Okay, moving on...” Kie whispered awkwardly.
“Your Uncle Teddy was a tattoo artist back in the day, or at least he liked to think of himself as one. We were sitting there shooting the shit, drinking and smoking some more, and the next thing you know, Anna’s got herself laid out on the kitchen table with her shirt off.”
“Shut up. Mom, so you just decided that John B’s uncle would tat you up in his kitchen. Who are you?”
“Next thing I know, Avery and Lena are begging Teddy to do them next. They all wanted matching tattoos that said ‘P4L’ above their asses.”
“Shut up.” Sarah snorted, holding her mouth
“You’re lying.” Kie didn’t believe it.
“I hate you, Mike.”
“I swear to god; they all have ‘P4L’ above their asses. When they got that done, they continued to beg Teddy for another matching tattoo under their boobs, ‘The Cut’, but to make it cool, they asked to have it written like it was rough around the edges, so it’s written like someone who has tremors.”
“This just keeps getting better.” JJ was in awe
“The drowning, the smoking, the drinking, the tattoos... it’s starting to all make sense of why Rafe is the way that he is.” Sarah connected the pieces aloud before slowly starting to laugh.
The others were quiet, pondering the thought themselves before joining in on Sarah’s uncontrollable laugh because, honestly, it just makes the most sense.
“Oh my god, you’re right!” Anna howled out, startling her grandson, but with her being on her third beer now, she offered to hand the baby off just in case.
JJ sprung up to grab him, taking the chance to take him for a little bit before his next feed.
“Your moms have been hogging him.” JJ side-eyed Kie when she gave him a pout.
Anna started on another beer and a story of their younger years without the baby in her arms. Sarah asked questions about her mom, and JJ kept quiet from asking, only listening to what Anna and Mike offered to tell them about Luke and Avery.
Who knows, maybe eventually down the road, he’d want to learn a little more about his father's young life, but right now, he was content thinking about his own with those surrounding him (plus Pope)