Fighting For Family: Summer and Jordan

Dylan I’m exhausted. I’m tired. I want to go home and go to sleep but of course, the freaken superintendent wants to have all the teachers in for a freaking meeting two month before school starts. Things like this can easily be sent in an email but of course, if we mention that, we are in the wrong, old school jackass. I walked into the room with my wife, Reagan, by my side, looking down at my watch. I think this thing is broken. I swear, we’ve been here for hours but it still says the same time. “We just got here…you can’t possibly be looking at the time already.” She rolled her eyes and laced my fingers with hers. We’ve been married for six months and it’s been an amazing six months. Our wedding was planned by her best friend, Summer, who just happens to be an event planner. Who knew? I sure as f**k didn’t and how did I not know? My family could have been using her for all our business events and with the amount they throw, she could start her own company. Note to self, talk to Summer about that. Our beautiful twins, Eliana and Trey, are the light of our lives, all our lives, including Jordan and Summer who are their godparents. They are well loved by everyone in our family and our family was huge. My mom and dad, Hannah and Austin, spoil them both rotten. Their story is a bit complicated involving marriage contracts, an asshole "father" and reuniting years later. Ray’s parents, Eli and Bella, seem like they are trying to outdo my parents with the spoilage. They met through my parents, being their best friends and all. Tristian and Riley, our parents’ best friends, have been keeping to themselves again. Tristian actually ended up being Eli's twin brother. They were seperated when they went into the foster system. I am so not looking forward to when the twins get older. Finn, Ray’s twin brother, just likes to laugh at our expense. I remind him that this could be him in the future but he swears he will never fall for someone again, whatever that means. He won’t say much about his past. Ray and Finn have a younger brother, Brayden, but he opted to go to boarding school out in North Carolina, where Archer, my younger brother, was and he is taking the summer out there to play soccer. Taylor is also in boarding school in California so we don’t see much of her. She used to be close to Jo, but after the whole shooting thing happened last year, she stays away from everyone and opted to try the boarding school life for herself. The twins are currently with Archer and Jo, his girlfriend. They’ve been dating for ten months and what’s funny is that two of those months no one even knew. Jo has been through hell and back. Her mom up and left her and sent a letter to her basically telling her goodbye and that she deserves a better life. Was she right to let her go? Yes, but there are other ways to do that. Any who, our lives has been a hell of a rollercoaster ride. Moving from New York to Texas, getting the job as an elementary school gym teacher and high school varsity football coach, finding Ray, and everything in between, including the drama with our ex’s, yeah, it’s been fun. Not. “I’m checking my watch to see if it’s working. I think it’s broken. We’ve been here for like two hours but according to this piece of junk, time hasn’t changed.” I sighed as we sat down in our chairs in the auditorium. I leaned my head back and closed my eyes and groaned, “I just want to go home, cuddle with the twins and take a damn nap. Is that so much to ask?” “One, it’s not junk, it’s from your grandfather so shush. And two, we just got here so stop being over dramatic or I’m going to call you Summer. And three, I want a nap too, but this is our job and apparently, something important is going to happen otherwise they wouldn’t have every teacher here. And speaking of every teacher, did Jordan get the message?” Ray asked. She took out her phone and checked the email that was sent out and Jordan was attached, so where the f**k was he? I’m so not sitting in this torture chamber without him. “He got the message. He said he had prior commitments that he could not reschedule and I told him to keep his d**k in his pants and get his ass down here. You know how he is.” I sighed and ran my fingers through my hair. Jordan proposed to Summer at our wedding with our help and ever since then, they have not been able to keep their hands off each other. “Him and Summer are too much sometimes." She laughed, “They haven’t kept their hands off each other since the wedding, kind of disgusting but kind of adorable.” “What’s so adorable about the two of them getting it on in your old house?” I shudder at the though. I have seen more than enough of Jordan to know how he is. Gross. “We will talk when we get home.” She smiled up. The door opened and in walked in the Superintendent of the school district. He has been with the school system for three years and has made many changes to help better us and keep us in budget. There were rumors going around that cuts were going to be made and once a decision has been made, they were going to go to the town to vote on the new budget. I don’t know what’s going on, but we were all scared. “Welcome everyone. I am sorry to bring you in but we need to talk about the upcoming school year and some potential changes that will be happening with the school system.” He stood at the podium on the stage speak to every teacher is here in attendance, minus Jordan. I looked around and we all were sitting up, waiting for what he was going to say. “As we all know, we have a little over thirty-five hundred students enrolled in our district with a total of 330 staff members, making us one of the largest districts on this side of the state. Unfortunately, we got word from the state government and it hurts to say, that they have cut the funding to public schools drastically.” “How bad are we affected?” someone yelled from the back. “Pretty damn bad.” He never swore, I mean, that’s not swearing, but to him, it is, so it’s bad, “We need to make up for the difference if we want to keep doing what we’re doing.” He opened a slide show that showed a bunch of numbers. My eyes bugged out. “What the hell…” I whispered and Raegan looked up at me with tears in her eyes. What we read was unbelievable. “Over the next five years, we will be losing a total of twelve million dollars in overall funding from the state. We can make some changes to our routines, but that won’t nearly be enough to cover the deficit.” everyone started to talk under their breath. This was bad. Jordan needed to be here. “We have a couple of ideas. First one, obviously, is to raise school taxes by an additional 2%, which is the max we can raise, per year for the next eight to ten years. Even with that increase, we won’t be able to get new buses and we would need to pause any plans of renovations we had, and that includes the football field remodel that was in the previous budget.” I stood up, “That’s fine. I think I can speak for the entire coaching staff that we can survive without the renovations if that means we can help save whatever needs to be saved. We can upkeep what we have. Do what you gotta do.” And I sat back down with the other members of the high school coaching staff agreeing with me. The only reason why they were renovating the field was because of the incredible improvement from the varsity team and the donations we received. “Thanks Dylan. We do appreciate it. I know you and your team worked hard to get that state championship title. On top of pausing planned renovations, we unfortunately, will need to increase class sizes and lay off some teachers. Class sizes will go from twelve children to twenty per class and that will lay off a minimum of seventy five teachers, staff and teacher assistants, at minimum, possibly more.” And everyone went in an uproar. People have been with this school system for years and now, people are going to lose their jobs. Our district has a total of three hundred plus staff members and logically, you would think that Raegan, Jordan and I would be fine…but that’s not the case. Last one in…first one out. We’re screwed. “We also will be cutting some arts and sports.” My heart stopped. “The art programs will be cut by a third as well as the music department. Can I have all the high school coaches front and center please.” Raegan gripped my hand as I stood up, along with six other teachers and we made our way to the front. Jordan, where the f**k are you… “We, unfortunately, are not able to support the cost of the sports programs this year. The only reason why we are keeping art and music is because they are, unfortunately, cheaper to support.” “But…we just won states…we brought in money to help the school…you can’t do this! All the sports, football, baseball, basketball, soccer, volleyball, track, the kids need this. It keeps them sane. The other sports teams are so close! We had plans to take them to the top!” I started to raise my voice. “How much does it cost to keep the sports program in the school system?” “Dylan…the cost of keeping it is just way too high.” He tried to argue. “What is the cost to keep everything the way it is, to have people keep their jobs, keep the programs and not change a damn thing?” “Dylan…” “Answer him!” Raegan stood up from the back, “Just answer him please? Because all this is affecting not only us, but all the students. We can’t do this to them.” “It’s out of our hands. We don’t have the money.” “How much?” the coach of the baseball team asked, Archer’s coach. He was senior now and he has been cleared to play ball this year and he needs this; all the kids do. “Over the next five years, without the aid from the government and without raising taxes, it would cost about 15 million.” “And the cost of it with the renovations?” I asked, glaring at him. “Thirty two.” Ouch. I felt that familiar ping in my chest hearing that number. I sucked in a breath and turned to look at Ray briefly before looking back at the the superintendent, “Can we pause this? I need to make a call and have a conversation with my wife.” I turned around and walked out of the room with Raegan right behind me. Murmurs and whispers echoed the halls. I opened the door with a bit of force to where the metal can be heard on the other side of the building. “Calm down.” She came up to me and grabbed my hand, “I know what you’re thinking.” “We have more than enough, right? We have the money, right? What’s the point of having all this money and not using it? We don’t do anything anyways. We’re homebodies.” “What about our children Dylan? Don’t you think that we should set some aside for them?” “Of course and don’t forget, we did when they were born and you know our parents already have accounts with their names on them and they have more than we could ever have. What do we have between the both of us?” She sighed and pulled out her phone and logged into our accounts. After some calculating, she shook her head, “We have thirty two million ten thousand dollars in our savings and we have twenty five thousand in our checking. The kids have two and half million in their accounts that we transferred when they were born. Dylan, if we do this, we will eventually be back at square one.” “Raegan, we were lucky enough to grow up with parents that are…well off…and they were able to give us more than we could ever need. The money we have now, we got from our trust funds when we turned twenty and neither of us have touched it except the money I used to build the house…if we do this, it would be for all the kids. It would be for Jo and Archer who are seniors and are banking on this year to get noticed by scouts and get into good schools to keep playing. It’s for the twins, when they get older, they will have the same opportunities that we had and it’s for all the kids in between…” “Dylan, think about this…” the superintendent interrupted us, “I don’t know if you know this, but if you do what I think you’re doing, it becomes a conflict of interest to have you both working with the school district.” “So, what are you saying?” I glared, “If I do this, I can’t work for the school?” “You or anyone related.” He looked right at Raegan and her face fell, “And that also includes Jordan.” “Why him? He’s not related!” “But you got him the job. You could influence his teaching and coaching. If you three end up staying with the school and do this huge donation to save everything, that gives you the opportunity, all of you, to try and change things in the school that don’t need to be changed or try to influence others because of the money you gave. If it were my choice, I would be okay with it, because I know you three and you would never do that, but the board says otherwise. So, think about it please. You and Jordan brought our football team back to its glory, back on the same level we were at when you were a senior, do you want to give that up?” I looked right at Ray and her watery eyes. I would be ruining things for all of us, but I would also be helping everyone else. Was I willing to make that sacrifice? I took out my phone and tried to call Jordan but he didn’t pick up. Of course he wouldn’t. “It’s done. I’ll have it wired to the school as soon as possible.” Raegan didn’t look surprised. She had the same thought. Yes, our careers ended tonight and so did Jordan’s but we both know he would understand, at least I hope he would. “Thank you. And just so you guys know…we could always use volunteers.” He winked. I tried to get what he was saying, but I couldn’t understand. I just spend thirty two million to keep the schools alive basically and we only have so much money to live off of. I mean, I know we have more than enough for a bit, but eventually, I will need to get back to work. That was a phone call I didn’t want to make, but I didn’t really have a choice, but for right now, I want to avoid that call and get the hell home. The super went back into the auditorium and left us in the hallways. We were no longer teachers so we were not supposed to go back in. I held my hand out to Raegan and we started to make our way back to the car. “What you did…” she started. “I know, we should have talked and Jordan is going to kill me.” “What I was going to say…” She pulled me to hurt and wrapped her arms around me while I held the small of her back, “Was amazing. You just gave everyone their futures back. We can always get more money later. I can work with Summer.” She shrugged, like it wasn’t a big deal and it’s an everyday thing to spend thirty two freaken million. Damn, what was I thinking? “I’m gonna have to call Eli, you know this right?” I sighed and leaned my head against hers. “You don’t have to.” “I do, it’s the only other thing I know. I minored in business, so what else am I supposed to do?” I groaned, “And I need to get Jordan a job too because fuck.” “Let’s just…go home and relax with our babies, okay? We can tell Jordan tomorrow, together and make those calls.” We headed home and I looked at my watch and it was almost six. Damn, that was way too long. We drove in silence until we got home. I just wanted to crawl into bed and relax and figure all this out tomorrow. “What’s that?” Ray asked, pointing to the porch. We got out of the car and rushed over. “A car seat. What the hell?” There was a blanket draped over the top and we pulled it off and there sat a little girl, a mini toddler, maybe one and half, two max. Brown hair, blue eyes. “Who would leave a baby here?” Ray picked her up as she started to cry and held her to her chest. From the blanket, a letter fell out. “Let’s go inside.” I ushered them both in, bending down and getting the letter and car seat. As Ray went to the living room with the child, I went downstairs to get Archer. “Archer. Jo.” “Living room.” Archer called out. Him and Jo were sitting on the floor trying to get the twins to crawl race. “What’s up. How was the meeting?” “Not important right now, we need you upstairs. Now.” They gave me this look and gathered the twins as I called Finn. “Hey man.” Finn answered. “Sorry I couldn’t watch the kids. I needed to get these reports done before Monday.” “I need you to come over now.” “Dude, what’s wrong. You sound like you’re about to lose your shit.” “With the night I’ve been having…I just might.” “Okay, I’ll be there in ten.” “Are you home or at the office?” “Office, why?” “s**t. I need Jordan here too. Gotta go. I’m gonna call him.” And I did just that, over and over but he didn’t pick up. I went upstairs and when Finn arrived, I had them all call Jordan and blow his phone up because from the looks of all of this and according to the letter that fell out of her carseat, one of the four us just became a father, or in my case, again.