Who Wouldn't Want To Be Me

Jordan's P.O.V.

How could I be so stupid? If there was one thing I knew about Cam, it was that while she wanted a family she didn’t want one anytime soon, and that it would probably be easy to scare her out of a relationship. Sure, she loved kids – as I’d seen with my nephews – but unlike me if she wanted a family she had to stop playing hockey. When I explained to her what I meant I almost let it slip about having kids in the house, that I wanted it to be our kids. I let out a sigh, staring up at the roof while rubbing her back as she slept; her head on my chest and a smile on her lips. I had to get my act together, otherwise I’d slip in front of somebody or manage to scare her off. And by this point I was too scared to lose her; I was in love with her, something that should have scared me off the moment I realized it.

I didn’t really do the whole ‘in love’ and ‘long-term’ kind of thing. I’d had my heart broken once as a teenager and that was all the incentive I needed to stay away from the whole thing. The year and a half with Tori had been the closest thing I’d had to a real relationship since I was sixteen, and I was starting to realize now that while I’d loved her, I hadn’t been in love with her. At the time I hadn’t known the difference, but I was starting to realize it now; with Cam my whole world seemed to shift to revolve around her. She was always on my mind, and when we weren’t together all I could seem to do was wonder what she was doing, or if she was thinking about me too, all the typical, cliché romance novel shit that I wasn’t a fan of was now becoming my life. Worse than that I couldn’t even tell anyone about it.

That’s what killed me. The fact that I’d finally fallen in love and I couldn’t even tell my brothers, or my sisters-in-law, or my parents, or even my best friends. I knew and understood why, and I felt awful and guilty every time I thought about it and it upset me. I knew how hard it was on Cam, and I knew why she was doing it, so why I was still so caught up on it and upset about it I wasn’t sure. Well I was, but it wasn’t making dealing with it any easier.

My mom wanted so badly to meet my girlfriend, the one who’d ‘turned my life around’ and her and dad were so excited for me, I hated hearing the disappointment in their voices when I’d called and said that she wouldn’t be at the All Star Weekend. Marc and Eric were much the same; while they both teased me about being ‘whipped’ and everything else, they constantly bugged me about when they could meet her. More than once I’d almost slipped and blurted out that they already had, but I’d managed to check myself in time.

I dozed on and off until I heard soft knocking at the door. I untangled myself from Cam and opened it to see Jared there, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

“Parker started tossing and turning and he’s up now; I just got him some milk,” he said, and I nodded, going to the kitchen to see him while Jared went to wake up Cam.

“Hey there sleepy,” I grinned, ruffling his hair as I walked over to the cupboard to get myself a glass.

“Hi Unca Jordy. Where Unca Cam?” he asked, still yawning as I poured myself some juice and sat down beside him.

“He must still be sleeping; he had a nap too,” Parker smiled brightly at me before sipping on his milk again.

“Was tired. Pwanes make me sweepy,” he told me, and I nodded. I understood; they did the same thing to me. We sat there for a minute until Jared and Cam came into the kitchen. Cam was yawning and rubbing the sleep out of her eyes while Jared looked no more awake than he had when he woke me up.

“Hey there sleepy; did you have a good nap?” Cam asked, and Parker nodded. As soon as Cam sat down Parker moved to sit on her lap, and Parker leaned back against her, looking like he could go right back to sleep. I looked out the window, wanting to get my head on straight for a moment. Every time Cam and Parker had a moment and I watched them together all I could think about was how I wanted that to be her with our little blonde toddler. This strange ache hits my chest and I wanted to run outside and announce to the world that I was in love with her so that we could just be together and our relationship could progress normally.
“So, do you want to go to the zoo today?” she asked, and while Parker looked excited he looked more tired than anything.

“I wike the zoo,” he managed, before letting out a huge yawn. Cam chuckled, softly running her hands through his hair as he rubbed his eyes again.

“Or should we just make something to eat and watch a movie, then go to the zoo tomorrow?” she suggested, and after a few moments to think it over Parker nodded.

“Yeah, that sounds betta,” he agreed, and both Jared and I thought the same. Everybody was just a little too tired for a full afternoon like the zoo, and we wanted Parker to have fun, rather than be cranky and being drug around to see his favorite animals when he wasn’t in the mood for it.

“Okay, well, why don’t you, Uncle Jay and Uncle Jordy pick out a movie and I’ll make a snack?” she suggested, and Parker stuck his arms out towards me to be picked up. I gladly obliged and followed my little brother into the living room to start going through the extensive movie collection Cam and Becka had.

“Oh my God! Cam you have Space Jam?” Jared gasped, coming across the VHS. I had to chuckle; I remembered Jared begging mom and dad to buy it so he could watch it, and I’m pretty sure he all but wore out the tape. I’d been just old enough to think I was too big for cartoons, but I had watched it at least once with him and enjoyed it more than I would have admitted.

“Yeah, is that what we’re watching?” she asked, and Parker nodded, seeing as his uncle was so excited about it. Jared set up the VCR – where they’d found a VCR I didn’t know – and had the blue screen waiting on Cam.

“Here we go – some popcorn, and I tried to defrost the cookies but I don’t know how well I managed to do that,” she said, putting a huge bowl of popcorn on the coffee table as well as a platter filled with homemade cookies.

“I’m sure they’ll still be delicious,” Jared assured her, taking one and carefully biting into it. The look on his face said it all; that Cam had baked them herself and that they were up to par with the rest of her baking. I reached for one as well, and when Parker reached out gave it to him and got myself another one. Sure enough, I all but began to drool when I took a bite; she’d warmed them up enough that the chocolate was a little runny, and melted in my mouth.

“Wow, these are amazing,” I told her, not even caring that my mouth was still full. Parker nodded his agreement, and Jared did the same as he pressed play on the VCR and made himself comfortable on the floor, leaning against Cam’s legs. I wrapped my arm around her shoulders, and knew that as soon as Parker fell asleep she’d lean against me. Just after they went to Looney Toon Land I heard Parker start to snore, and then pulled Cam into my side, where her head immediately rested against my chest and turned her torso slightly towards me. Parker was asleep on my lap, his head leaning against the arm of the couch, and Cam pulled the blanket off the other armrest so I could cover him up. I slid my hand under the material of her T-shirt, and felt Cam tense up. A grin teased at my mouth as I kept my eyes trained on the TV; all I wanted was for my hand to be on her skin, I had no intentions of misbehaving with my little brother and nephew here. After a moment she relaxed, and when I chuckled she lightly smacked my knee – she knew it didn’t hurt but it got her point across.

A few minutes later there was a knock at the door, and while Jared moved to pause the movie Becka came out of her room and announced that she had it, and that she’d see us later. We said goodbye, and she let herself out, without us seeing who was on the other side of the door. It didn’t need to be said that it was Sid, and I was glad Cam didn’t have to move away from my side.