The Good Life

*Alex*

I was flipped through the channels and turned to ESPN so I could watch highlights of last night’s Heat verses Lakers basketball game. Izzy and I watched the game last night while we ate at Chili’s, but it was so good I had to watch replays of it.

Ever since Jack left we’ve eaten nothing but fast food and we’ve gotten along much better, but that’s only because Izzy would stay upstairs while I stayed downstairs until it was time to eat, but she came down early today.

"Daddy I don't feel good." Izzy whined. She sat down next to me on the couch and laid her head on my shoulder.

"What's wrong?" I put the back of my hand to her forehead to see if she had a fever, she felt normal.

"I think I have a stomachache from all the fast food we've been eating. I'm telling Papa!" She complained.

I just felt too lazy to cook Jack had us spoiled because he would have something for us to eat every morning and night. I probably should break us out of this habit since Jack was going to be gone for two more weeks and we couldn't continue to eat like this.

"No! Do you want him to kill me? Cause he'll do it, trust me." I said.

“It’s too late I’m Face Timing him now.” I looked down at her phone and sure enough it was ringing waiting on Jack to answer.

“Give it!” I pulled the phone out of her hand and she started to fight me back for it.

“Hello?” I heard Jack answer in a groggy voice.

"Papa, Daddy’s trying to kill me!" Izzy exaggerated.

"What in the world are you doing?" I heard Jack yawn and ask.

"Hey Jack!" I said happily as I put the camera on my face.

"Do you two have any idea what time it is here?" He yawned again.

"Well it's six here so that makes it . . . two am there." I answered.

"Yeah. Now what's so important? Are you two dying?" He asked.

"No." Izzy and I answered.

"Is anyone hurt?"

"No." We both answered again.

"Are you two in any danger whatsoever?" He sighed.

"No."

"Okay well I'm going to go back to sleep and you two are going to solve whatever problem you're having like normal human beings, got it?"

"Yes sir." We said.

"Good I'll call you two later. I love you. Bye." He said and ended the call. I hated the eight hour time difference we had. We barely had time to talk to each other while he’s gone which I knew he was going to be working really hard. I’m just not use to going more than hours without talking to or seeing him. Plus I was worried about him being so far away, if anything happened I wouldn’t be able to make it there fast enough. Maybe it was just anxiety making me worry so much. I need to get out of the house for a few hours.

"Now what do we do?" Izzy asked.

"Let’s go eat something?" I answered with a question. I think I was using food to cope with Jack being gone for so long.

"Okay, but something light.”

"Let's see if Oli will make us something." I suggested and she nodded.

I used Izzy's phone to call Oli and he answered in the first three rings.

"Hey Izzy!" He answered.

"Try again." I chuckled.

"What do you want, Alexander?"

"I want you to make me and my starving child dinner. We haven't eaten in forty days and forty nights." I joked.

"You literally called me last night from Chili’s to rub it in my face that the Heat beat the Lakers." He laughed. "But what do you two want to eat? I'll make it."

"We'll eat anything homemade."

"How about soup? Hannah makes the best minestrone soup." He said.

"God yes that sounds so good. Text me the ingredients and I'll go pick them up from the store."

"Alright." He said and we hung up.

"So what are we eating?" Izzy asked.

"Hannah's going to make Minestrone soup." I told her.

"Oh good!"

We both went to put on real clothes then made a quick stop at Walmart to buy the ingredients before getting to Oli's house. It was still winter and freezing outside so soup was the perfect dinner.
"Hey!" Hannah said as she opened the door for us.

"Hi Aunt Hannah!" Izzy said and hugged her. I quickly did the same so we could get inside and close the door from the cold.

"Where's your husband?" I asked her.

"He had to take a call from work so he's in our bedroom. He'll be out shortly." Hannah said.

"Oh okay. Do you want us to help you cook?" I asked.

"No no you two sit and relax. It won't take me long to make it."

We followed her to the kitchen and sat down at the table watching as she began to prepare dinner. Oli came in a few minutes later.

"Hi Angel." He greeted Izzy as he kissed her on the forehead. The he went over to the fridge and grabbed two beers and sat next to me.

"How are two holding up without Jack?" He asked as he handed me a beer.

"It's harder than I thought it would be. I feel like he's gone forever. Like hearing his voice on the phone or Face Timing him isn't good enough." I sighed.

"I bet he hates being away more than you do." Hannah said.

"I'm sure he does. He hates when I have to leave him for work every morning so this is killing him."

"Well he only has what?-two more weeks?" Oli asked.

"Yeah but it might as well be three years." I sighed.

"Awwww you're so heartbroken!" Hannah said as she walked over to pinch my cheeks.

"I know, it sucks."

"What have you been up to?" Oli asked Izzy.

"Well I waaaaas grounded for-" I tuned her out so I wouldn't listen to her try and get sympathy from Oli.

"Guess who contacted me two days ago?" Hannah asked.

"Who?"

". . . Lisa. She called me and wanted us to have lunch together so we can talk."

"What'd you say?" I asked.

"I told her I'd have to check my schedule to see when I would be busy but I was just bull-shitting her. I don't know if I want to meet up with her or not."

"What happened between you two?"

"We got into an argument because she said I was trying to rub dating Oli in her face while she was single. At first I was tried explaining that I wasn't but she wouldn't listen to reasoning so I just stopped talking to her all together." She told me.

"Leave it to her to get jealous over nothing." I chuckled.

"Yeah really." Hannah laughed with me.

I was about to ask her more about her conversation with Lisa, but I saw Oli pulling out his wallet and handing a few twenty dollar bills to Izzy. She wanted this two-hundred dollar sweater from Barney’s online store and surprising she hadn’t asked us to buy it for her because of our talk we had last week. Of course Oli was going to get it for her though.

"Why are you giving her money?" I asked him.

"I work hard for my money and I can do whatever I want with it." He said trying to imitate my voice.

"Shut up." I rolled my eyes at him. He was part of the problem too. I turned back to Hannah and asked, "What else did Lisa say?"

"She brought you up if that's what you're really asking. She asked if I could believe that you and Jack were still together now and that you two had a daughter."

"Is she stocking us?" I joked.

I think she stocks you're Facebook page." Hannah said seriously.

"Do you think she follows us? When I went to Wendy's with my friends a few weeks ago there was a car parked in front of the building and the person inside it was wearing a ski mask and looking at us as we walked. It freaked us all out." Izzy said.

"No I don't think she's that messed up." Hannah said.

"Maybe it wasn't someone watching you maybe it was just a random person and you guys were all paranoid." I told her.

"Well they gave us a creepy vibe whoever it was. Like I understand it's cold outside, but who actually wears a ski mask?" She complained.

"As long as the person didn't actually touch you I'm fine." Oli said.

"No they just stared at us."

"Lisa also told me she was dating some guy and something about hoping he would propose soon. I don't know the whole conversation was short an awkward. I just wanted to hurry up and get her off the phone." Hannah said.

"You're so mean." Oli told her.

"That's not mean. Mean would have been me not answering the phone at all." Hannah said.

"Yeah what she did was civilized." I added. "It's like how before Jack left Alan called him. They talked and it was kind of weird, but he just did it for the hell of it."

"Have you seen Alan lately?" Oli asked.

"No why?" I said.

"I ran into him like last weekend when I went out with some buddies from work and he's like an alcoholic or something now. He was at the bar pounding back drinks left to right. I had to buy him a cab to get him home safely." Oli said.

"Yeah I don't think he's been paying attention to the Taylor or Ian because on Taylor's Snapchat stories she's always out with like random older guys at all hours of night." Izzy said.

"Shit that's not good." Hannah said. "I think we should tell Austin because Alan isn't really stable enough to look after them right now."

"Should we get involved?" Oli asked.

"Yeah I think we should. If something happens to Taylor we would feel guilty knowing that if we would have told Austin about it we could have prevented whatever happened." Hannah said.

"I'm not doing it." I said as I raised my finger up to my nose to initiate nose-goes. Oli and Izzy both raised their fingers to their nose and Hannah was the last one to do it which meant she had to call him.

"Fine I'll do it later." She grumbled.

Notes

I know this chapter is kind of short, but it holds so much information that's important for the next few chapters.