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Chapter 13

It felt so good to sleep in. I know we went to bed early last night but it just feels good. I don’t know if it’s that fact I’m in bed with Taylor or it’s our bed and this is home to me, but it feels great. Taylor’s alive because I can hear him snoring a little. I don’t imagine he slept well in the hospital knowing what I know now.

I roll over onto my stomach and a little offside taking the pillow and scrunching it in my arms to push it up enough so I can rest my chin on it as I watch him sleep. I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of looking at him.

I stay there for awhile before he slowly wakes up and gives me the Sleepy kitty look, I’m not aware and awake yet blinks. I smile at him and he rolls over to meet me and kisses me. “Good morning.”

“Mmmn, good morning handsome.”

We kiss some more before he gets up and uses the bathroom then goes to make us coffee in the kitchenette. I wait a few minutes before going and taking my meds and brushing my teeth and using the bathroom myself.

Taylor passes me with a tray of breakfast and coffee and I turn on some music and sort of just sway and lightly sing along to this really good song “All we are, we are.” By Nathan Nathanson, it switches over when it’s done to “Yellow.” By Coldplay and Tay comes up behind me and sweeps me off my feet and carried me to the bathroom. He sings along with the song to me his face all smiles as he does. I feel so light the way that he lifts me up, dainty in his hands and that’s such a wonderful and heady feeling. I wrap my arms around his neck kissing him; I don’t have a choice in the matter. I need to kiss him the exact same way I need water to drink our air to breathe.

Tay and I slowly peel each other out of our clothes and Taylor picks me up and settles into the bubble bath he ran for us. We have a big tub, I love a big tub. He kisses me and it’s one of those kisses when the guys ever so gently holds and cradles your face in his hands and doesn’t just kiss you as much as taste your soul. I fall in love all over again every time he kisses me like this. There is a depth and a strength to Tay’s tenderness that rocks me to my soul every time. I look into those mountain top grey eyes and lose myself in the Images I see there.

We kiss and wash lightly and touch each other just being intimate, not sex just intimate. He reaches over to the tray and he serves me breakfast in bubble bath. Orange segments in granola with a table spoon of ice cream instead of milk or yogurt (Ick.) it’s French vanilla and once you stir it together it just coats the orange bits in the granola and makes both all creamy, It’s just a little dish of it. A few micro-waved crispy slices of bacon and these chocolate filled croissants to go with our coffees. We feed each other as I’m laying and leaning against him. The stereo is playing “If I could change the World.” by Eric Clapton, “Heaven.” by Brain Addams and even “It’s a Wonderful World.” By Louis Armstrong…It’s an incredible song to cuddle up to a loved one to. It’s a prayer to me really sometimes. If I ever had kids as Jaimes even as Jaimes I would have sung that to them as a lullaby. I soak into Taylor like I do the song and the heat of the tub.

We wash each others hair, condition…Taylor makes a face when I put some into his hair but lets me. I straddle him and kiss him and he lets me shave his face clean again. “Patience.” is playing by Guns and Roses as I do. I surprise him by knowing not just all the lines and sing it to him along with the stereo but I can do the whistling part too. Tay returns the favor by letting me lie back and he shaves my legs and serenades me along with the stereo to “Have I told you Lately.” by Rod Stewart.

I know, god it’s OTT but at the same time it’s not. We’re just really singing to each other, often in private and we are both really found of the same music and the same artists and it seems two hopeless romantics that aren’t going to waste a minute of our love. We don’t want to say I wish I did that.

We take out time drying each other off and getting dressed. I’m cooking with Grams today and I’m nervous but excited. It’s going to be a real Sunday dinner with everything that goes with it. The girls are all coming over and it’s going to be amazing! I’m getting to learn to do stuff that I need to know, that my Aunt Katie got to learn from Grams just by being a girl, her daughter and most importantly I get to be part of that. I get to carry on that heritage that’s being a woman. A Powers family woman.

I get dressed with lotioning with my Nivea and blow dry out and brush my hair. I powder myself and spray on some deodorant before sliding into a really nice set of bra and panties done in a dusty rose nylon and lace. It makes me feel really feminine and pretty and good about myself. It really helps that Taylor is staring at me with wonder mixed with very obvious lust. It really makes something in me shine, I’m not complete and the way he looks at me I feel like I’m the most beautiful girl in the world. It makes the fact I’m not complete yet not matter as much as it does most days. After such a romantic morning and the way he looks at me I take my lipstick and a tissue and I slink over to him and kiss him and gently push him against our bookshelf. I back off just enough to put on my satin pink lipstick slowly then kiss him again. Then kiss my way down leaving a trail of lipstick kiss prints over his muscled naked torso before taking him…making him mine, making him this big strong powerful and virile man cry out my name, whine in pleasure and grip the bookcase as I take him there. There’s eye contact this time, I look up his body and make sure he see’s me close my eyes in pleasure, like he’s…Yes it’s me being a bit slutty, it’s me doing something many women won’t do, get grossed out and freaked out by it. It’s pretty much just skin really, it’s Taylor and the feeling I get from doing this to/for him give me a high that outweighs any Ick factor. I even have this thought of Taylor caviar that kind of helps everything go down. Instead of it being a dirty porn thing I strive for the idea of making love to him that way.

Even after he still watches me brushing my teeth. “I’m not going to kiss my grandparents or my dad with you on my breath or lips honey.” I smile at him. It gets him chuckling and kisses me toothpaste and all. “I love you Jen, I’m going to bring in the rest of the laundry hon.” He kisses me again and leaves taking the clothes basket with him.

I finish getting dressed with a light spritz of peach scent and a nice dress a satiny blended fabric with white blossoms on it and it’s this dusky yellow color with a fitted waist and elbow long sleeves and a scoop neckline that hides my bra straps but shows off my breasts just right with a occasional hint of the lacy cups. I even like the length just above my knees and I slip into a pair of strappy sandals and head downstairs.

It’s about forty minutes later when Grams and Gramps and dad come in and carrying a whole bunch of bags of stuff with them. I took that time in between to put on several pots of tea and coffee and do some extra cleaning. I hug and kiss them good morning and if they had breakfast yet. They have so we head into the kitchen to get started just as Tim and Holly arrive with the kids and Davey brought Njinda and her mother, Nin introduces her to my dad and I can still see her scars, the permanent limp but I see the love and gratitude for him there.

War sucks, but I’m starting to really think If you’ve never been there either as a soldier or as a survivor you can’t know, we can’t know…If you’ve never been a kid crying because their homes blasted or burning and you’ve got nothing or worse or had to walk through those places…we shouldn’t talk about these things like we know we’re entitled to it. We’re not.

Sorry, it’s just seeing her with dad and the expressions on their faces and in their hearts took me there. Dad leads her over to one of the booths and gets them both a tea and they sit quietly talking together in Somali.

I’m so proud of him. I’m proud to be his daughter. Holly hugs an arm around my shoulders and leads me into the kitchen.

The turkey is the first thing we do because it takes the longest. The first surprise is Grams showing us how to use a basting needle to inject flavor into the meat. Then she takes a can of apple juice and mixes in a half cup of salt and a few drips of liquid smoke and heats it in a sauce pan then mixing in melted butter. She shows us how to inject the bird then she stuffs it with quarters of apples and pears tossed in summer savory. There’s salt and pepper put on top of it. We drop it into the biggest roasted we have that has the bottom covered with a bit of water and chunk chopped celery, carrots, onions with the skins on…Grams says that it adds a toasty flavor and color to the gravy. She says the veggies will help make and awesome gravy and finishes it off with a scattered handful of raisins and pecans.

We start prepping the other foods and I’m learning all sorts of family secrets and tricks like biscuits that you use  ½ mix of cake flour instead of bread flour, how you grate frozen butter into them instead of just mixing in so they are tender and raise up so fluffy.

Grams greens are a mixture of Swiss chard and beet greens along with turnip greens which are the tops of the actual turnips and more oddly green beans cut into long slivers they’re steamed and then cooked in just a bit of butter and diced bacon that you cook first until it’s crispy and just a pinch of onion flakes and…the really odd thing a bit of heavy cream and a shake of nutmeg. It’s kind of involved but as you cook the liquid out of them more and more the more the flavors blend together. I can’t help but put a tablespoon of it on a hot biscuit with butter. I swear I melt as much as the butter does. I’d have said you were nuts if you told me I’d like vegetables this much.

She makes a puree of boiled parsnips that she folds into this white cream gravy with ground sausage bits in it like for biscuits and gravy but it all goes over steamed cauliflower and baked with bread crumbs on top. I don’t like “Fake Broccoli.” but I like this, it’s the weird sweet of the parsnip mixing with the sausage and it sinks into all the crevices I can taste this with turkey it’s be good.

There’s peeled and boiled beets that get tossed in butter and a mixture of the spices you’d use to pickle them but done in a spice grinder and just a bit of them. Or the way she cooks up sweet potatoes chunked up with parsnips and carrots and squash chunks steamed then tossed in bacon drippings and chopped up crispy bacon plus a touch of nutmeg and cumin and for Nin and her mom we add a few allspice berries and plantains and this gravy of orange juice and tapioca flour it’s put in a dish and into the over until both kind of broil from the bacon fats and butter.

There’s more, like potato dressing. It’s really important because it’s both Dad’s and grampus’s favorite. It’s mashed potatoes with softly and lightly browned onions lot of them too, finely diced green onion tops and a lot of Summer Savory. Grams secret ingredient for it? Fresh ground black pepper and celery salt instead of normal salt in it. She mashes this up with chicken broth instead of milk or butter or cream. She tells me this over anything else is the foundation dish in our family. It’s in cold sandwiches with the turkey, the base for any turkey soup or chicken soup we make from left overs and even reground with a raw egg and flour and fried into like crispy dumplings served with soups or gravy or by themselves. I thought the batch was huge until dad and gramps came and begged a bowlful of it and sat at the counter just eating it with bread and tea.

Okay learning this after seeing the looks on their faces. That pure pleasure smiles of a favorite food. Taylor tries it and has a similar look. It makes me teary that this is mine now. I can make this for them anytime they want me to and I can do this for them. I feel so in synch right now

Out of the main dishes is the potatoes and we steam them then cool them and cut them into quarters. We toss them in the rendered fat from the turkey and then shake and bake before putting them in the oven to get crispy and roasted. The turkey is basted and basted and taken out to cool while we make the gravy. All the liquid from the bird and the stuff in the roaster is poured into a blender and it’s buzzed up looking like a real mess then we pour it through a strainer and stir it until the solids are off. That’s when we chill it to separate the fats for the potatoes. Once it’s done we add the heart and giblets. Gran does these in a pressure cooker with white wine, mushrooms and a herb bundle. It cooks for like an hour and she adds another potful of just water to it until the bits are smooshy tender. We buzz up the stuff and mix it with the other liquid and she thickens it as it is boiling in the pot with toasted flour and poultry seasonings. I try it once it’s done…

OMG, Grams’s gravy is a whole food group all on its own. It sounds like a lot of work but it’s just stuff from two pots buzzed up and strained and thickened into the best thing I’ve ever eaten.

Desserts are pies things that Grams wants me to learn because they’re a family favorite and secrets sometimes. The girls are allowed to learn because this is a secret for just the women of the family…I’ in tears and actually so honored when Grams said to us as we were getting started.

“The guys all have their things, building things and hunting or fishing and their own rituals and they bring the other men and the boys into the family with these things and that’s fine, better than fine because young men need direction nowadays. But in the Powers family and in the Swifts (Grams’s maiden name is Swift.) we keep our own secrets, things to cook, patterns for knitting and embroidery, remedies and what not all of it in the family journal.”

She had taken out of a book bag this old thick and heavy clothbound ledger binder that was really thick and filled full of these laminated pages. Some were really old, most were handwritten. There was recipes and all sorts of things in here even letters from these women to friends, family, sisters, mothers pictures too going from as far back as the first hand written recipe for lobster and scalloped potatoes dating back from 1852….we get to see stuff from all these periods of my family history.

My hands shake touching these pages. I even see a few recipes from my Aunt Katie in there. Not one of us, me or holly or Nin had ever seen such a thing and as much as there’s a lot of feminism and equal rights for women and a lot of girls turning their noses up at such things. It’s a wonder to us. Holly’s mom was and is a drunk and she grew up hard. Something like this wasn’t a part of her world, or Njinda’s she’s fascinated by the history of it. Me it’s the fact like holly this is a huge chunk of my history of myself that I never new existed. Natalie made sure I never really knew my dad or his family. Getting this back is a huge thing to me and the fact of being accepted as a real woman and as a daughter and granddaughter of this family brings me this indescribable feeling of joy.

Grams hugs me close and whispers in my ear. “This gets passed onto you next baby girl.”

“WwwWhat..?!”

“Unless your dad has another daughter this’ll be yours.”

“But…but..”

“You’re my granddaughter it goes to you.”

I turn around and hug her and cry. Good tears, better than good tears.

Custards…I know there’s tons of people out there going yeach! But as it turns out a good custard recipe is the basis of a huge amount of deserts. Ice cream is derived from it, Lemon pies, Key lime pies, Rice pudding...I’m told another favorite of the Powers men and a real money stretcher, bread puddings and the list goes on. She teaches us and it’s really essentially pudding you cook in a pot on the stove and it’s really easy to make. I’m going to tell you now. It’s mostly eggs, milk and sugar and it is just as easy to screw up.

Airy pies…Grams shows us how to melt gelatin then combine it with egg-whites and then beat them into stiff peaks. I mix...sorry, fold mine into a orange sherbet pie that’s a vanilla custard with concentrated frozen orange juiced added to it and the zest and juice of half a lemon and the zest of a medium sized orange it’s folded together and then baked like a soufflé of sorts then cooled in the fridge to set up. It’s so good! Like an orange sherbet pie all creamy and stuff but like as light as…as a container of thawed out cool whip.

I make that and top it with whipped cream and we make Lemon with real zest and real lemons in it. There’s also a layer of really thin slices of lemon with the peeling that we candied and put into the pie in layers of the pie filling.

But honestly my favorite is making a chocolate cake with boiled frosting? I love boiled frosting…I’ve never had it before today and I’ve never cleaned out a bowl with my fingers or licked the beaters the thing is neither has any of the girls or Taylor for that matter. That being said we make at Grams bidding one cake each to take home and so we can all share.

I share my beaters and bowl with Tay as we share a liter of milk and sit at the counter kissing and laughing and getting messy because we can only eat the icing off the other persons beater, so we’re feeding each other and kissing away the mistakes that we made of the other. Holly and Tim are doing the same thing. It’s a lot of fun but wow Holly’s kids get really messy and then there’s all that sugar running through their systems. Grams actually volunteers to clean them up.

Billy shows on his motorcycle with a date in tow and Angie shows up with Hunter all around suppertime. We don’t really have a dining room but we are a diner so we used the tables and the booths to eat at and we serve up everything on the counter. Oh my god the guys are like locusts. I’m a good eater, I’ll never be one of those eats daintily girls and I have a big nearly heaping plateful but the guys tear into everything eating with these blissful looks. I say my own blessing over my food quietly, not everyone is really comfortable with god in our little group. Njinda and her mother do likewise but it’s in Somali so I’m not sure what was said but they had bowed their heads. I never got that, even in church, I’ve always lifted mine up. That got me in trouble a few times in the past. Natalie said I was disrespecting god. I don’t get that either.

Anyway, every thing went over really well and we had a great time eating together and talking and laughing at just stuff really. I love this, the way it feels gathered together. I love how much this is appreciated by everyone here pretty much. There’s a lot of us never had the big family dinners and the ones that did like dad and my grandparents hadn’t done it in a long time. Hunter got weepy and upset because she used to do this with her dad’s family but since she’s transitioned none of them really want anything to do with her or Angie. We hug her and console her and Tay smiles at everyone as he hugs her too. “Why don’t we make this a full time thing? All of us get together here every Sunday and have a family dinner.”
I so love him right now. “I think that’s an awesome idea honey.”

Hunter sniffles. “But me and Mum aren’t your real family.”

I look at her then reach over and pull her over into my arms. “Hunter, I’ve got real family that were awful people just like your dad’s has been to you guys. Your mum stood up for me when she didn’t even know me. She’s definitely family to my heart.”

“But you barely know us.”

“I feel it honey, sometimes you just know. See my heart’s what tells me you and your mum are really nice and are really great people. I can tell you guys are right full of love. With everything I’ve been through I need all the extra love I can get. So I guess I kind of need you two in my family. I know I sound greedy but do you think you’d want to be part of my family? I’m looking at Angie as I’m asking and she’s crying but smiling really big. I can see this has been a rough road for her, supporting Hunter and losing family and being a single mum. I see her nodding through her tears. Hunter’s looking at me, then her mom, then to me again. “Really?”

Angie smiles and wipes tears away, we’re all wiping tears away even the guys. “Yes Hunter I think in a way we found our way home.” Hunter hugs me tightly around the waist. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” She’s sobbing into my dress but they’re happy sobs and I can’t help but feel this energy, this indelible force in me that says…girl, woman, mother…love then, nurture them…It’s a maternal feeling and I’m not sure if it’s just an instinct but part of the light in my soul. You know when you do something and it just feels so right. I’m floating in it right now.

I hear her ask still kind of muffled by my torso. “Can I have a grand-mum too…I…I lost mine…” I’m about to answer and part of me feels stabbed from the hurt and betrayal in her voice. Grams slides out from the booth she was in and sinks to her knees and turns Hunter around to face her. Poor Hunter’s got the reddest eyes right now and tears streaming down her cheeks and her chins doing that shaky tremble… “Absolutely honey, absolutely….” Hunter latches on to Grams and starts to bawl like something painful just got healed. I’m crying and Taylor hugs me tightly and whispers in my ear. “Jen…you are the most amazing…wonderful girl in the world.” I love that feeling, I love him feeling he can be proud of me. Grams looks up at me crying too. “I’m so proud of you honey, god…(Grams actually looked up at the ceiling.)…Katie, do you see her? Thank you…(She looks back to me.) Jenna, you are so, so much like her you know that? She touched everyone’s lives around her and made them better.”

Now everyone is crying.

Dad gets up from his seat and kisses my cheek. “You did real good baby girl, I’m proud of you.” He goes and takes Angie to a seat and gives her his handkerchief and get’s her settled. The look of pride shining out of my Gramps is…It’s not like dads, getting that really beaming proud look of approval from your grandfather it’s different, it’s so special in it’s own way. He’s been through so much in his life and has so much life experience that when he looks at you like that…It actually feels like…like I made the world a better place. He hugs me and kisses me on the cheek as he walks to the kitchen carrying some dishes.

“C’mon fellas, family tradition the ladies cooked us a great supper and we’re going to do the dishes. Hun, why don’t you girls head up to the living room and watch those DVD things you rented.”

It takes a few minutes to get us all organized but about twenty minutes later we’re up in my…(I love saying that.) living room on the chairs and the couches with another cake and coffee and milk and stuff on the coffee table and my comforters and quilts and all my pillows as the whole bunch of us women nest and cuddle up to each other and watch The Notebook, then Titanic and we cry, and eat and swoon and bond.

During a movie pause and pee break I lean on Grams. “Do you got a picture of Aunt Katie?” She nods. “Yes, uhm here.” and she takes out a nice candid headshot of her.

“Can I borrow it?”

“Sure.”

I take it and run downstairs and put it in the scanner hooked to Taylor’s new office computer and take the photo-printer out of it’s box and hook it up. I print off a enlarged 8X12 copy and one of the empty frames I bought when we bought the photo stuff. I go back upstairs and set the picture against a pillow in front of the coffee table so she’s right there with us.

Grams is crying again and so is some of the other girls and I settle in and hug my Grams and put my head on her shoulder.

“That’s better, it’s only right she’s here too huh Grams?”