Two months passed and as Meredith go more infatuated with roman and found more time to spend with him, I found more time to spend with Regan. We talked about our past, present, and future, it turned out that we were very alike in our opinions. Zac even found time to spend with us.

I was seven and a half months pregnant and extremely large. I loved being pregnant, but I was ready for the baby to come.

For some reason I had become the family baby-sitter. The younger Hanson siblings were enrolled in the public school and the older ones who had children, were busy. So, I started keeping all of the kids.

The guys were in the studio almost every day working with new material so Alyssa and Natalie went with their husbands, so I offered sometimes to keep their kids that way they wouldn’t be running around in the studio.

I was also keeping Jessie’s baby because she was adamant about finishing school. I even kept Zoë sometimes and for some odd reason she seemed to look up to me. In fact on a Sunday afternoon after we had all gone to church, I got a phone call while Zac and I were eating lunch alone, which was unusual.

“Hello?” Zac answered. “Oh hey honey, okay,” he said then handed me the phone.

“Hello?” I asked skeptically wondering who Zac was calling “honey”.

“Dirbee? Hi!” Zoë said in her sweet voice.

“Oh hey Zo, what’s going on?” I said relieved.

“Can you do me a favor?” she asked me, her voice coming over the phone.

“Sure, what do you need?”

”Mommy’s taking me to kindergarten tomorrow and I was wondering if you would come with us?” she asked me. I could picture her holding the phone next to her ear with her blonde locks curling around her ear and the phone.

“Are you sure you don’t want Zac to go with you?” I asked her looking at Zac. He just raised an eyebrow at me.

“No, I want you to come. Please!” She said begging me.

“Okay, I’ll come; can I talk to your mommy?”

”Yes, thank you!” she said giggling.

“You’re welcome. Bye Zoë,” I told her and then I talked to Diana and got it all situated when I would meet them.

The next morning I drove over to the house that my husband had most of his teenage years in when he wasn’t on the road.

When I pulled into the driveway I had a flashback of the first time I had come to the house.

Zac had insisted that I come to meet his family when he picked me up at the airport. I couldn’t get a mental image of his family. Of course, I knew what Isaac and Taylor looked like, but I just couldn’t imagine their personalities and how they interacted with their families.

When we arrived at the house, the driveway had been loaded with cars and you could hear people screaming and laughing in joy in the backyard.

“Welcome to my home. Be careful, it can get crazy,” Zac had warned me.

But, pulling into the driveway today there weren’t any cars due to the fact that Mr. and Mrs. Hanson’s cars were in the garage. There were also no laughing children in the backyard.

The house didn’t seem to shine, it was almost like it was sad that most of its inhabitants had gone and gotten new walls.

Although the gloominess quickly changed when I stepped out of my car and started to walk towards the front door.

Zoë ran out to me and jumped into my arms. I easily picked her up and embraced her and carried her to the front door.

When I walked in the house smelt good. It had that homely smell that you can only get from a real loving home, and plus it reminded me of Zac and that was always pleasant.

“Mom?” I called out. Zac had talked me into calling Diana, “mom” and Walker, “dad”.

“Oh hello dear, how are you today?” Diana asked me sending me a warm smile that seemed to brighten my spirits.

“I’m feeling good today. How are you?” I asked, letting her receive a warm smile in return.

“I can’t complain, I’ll be just a minute. I have to get my paper work together, then we’ll leave,” Diana said as she shuffled around the desk in the study where she had led me when I came in.

“I can wait, it’s not me who’s anxious to get there. Right Zo?” I asked while shifting her in my arms.

“Yeah!” she answered triumphantly like she was proud to be in on our conversation.

In just five minutes we were off in Diana’s vehicle. The van, the family van, which always seemed to bring good memories to mind. It was definitely a good van.

The kindergarten was just twenty minutes from the house, still in Bixby, might I add. When we got there Zoë practically begged me to carry her. So, seeing as she was so light, I agreed without a second thought.

We walked towards the building and Diana pulled open the door with an explosion of noise coming from inside. We walked into a room painted with all kinds of bright colors. There were all kinds of round tables, bookshelves, rocking chairs, stations for crafts, colorful reading carpets, and a great number of kids that were Zoë’s age, running around and playing.

I let Zoë down out of my arms, but she clung tight to my hand. A little girl with dark red hair came up to us and spoke to Zoë.

“Hi, I’m Amber,” she said shyly, ringing her own hands like they were a wet washcloth.

“Hi, I’m Zoë, nice to meet you Amber,” Zoë answered like we had taught her.

“I have something really cool. Can you guess what it is?” Amber asked.

“No! What is it?” Zoë asked sounding very excited.

“My older brother has a car and he drives me places,” Amber said proudly, I hated to tell her, but Zoë had her beat, badly, and Zoë let her know that.

“Yeah? Well, my three older brothers have cars and so do my two older sisters. Plus, my brothers have a band.” She threw in the band card early in the game… Go Zoë!

“That’s not fair, but it’s kind of cool. I – “ but before Amber could finish a tall strict looking woman came over to us.

“Amber, go back to your group,” this woman said sternly, but with a somewhat nice voice.

“Okay, bye Zoë,” Amber said waving.

“Bye,” Zoë waved back.

“Hello, my name is Lennox Crow, founder of this school. You must be Zoë young lady, hello Mrs. Hanson, it’s so nice to finally meet you,” Mrs. Crow said holding her hand out to me.

Diana went to reach for her hand, but Mrs. Crow pushed her own hand closer to me. I took it and didn’t quite know what to say, out of the corner of my eye I say the look on Diana’s face. She was plainly hurt.

“Oh, I’m Mrs. Hanson, but I’m not Zoë’s mother,” I said hoping to clear up this mess. “This is Zoë’s mother,” I said putting my hand lightly on Diana’s back.

“Oh sorry, I am so very sorry, I saw that you were pregnant and I just figured,” Mrs. Crow said, her strict look turned into an embarrassed flush.

“It’s okay, Dirbee here is married to one of my sons,” Diana said happily, but the hurt look still remained in her eyes.

“Yeah, Dirbee is married to Zac, my biggest brother!” Zoë said obviously proud that she could once again by apart of an adult conversation.

“Oh, so you’re married to her oldest brother,” Mrs. Crow said turning to me.

“No, I’m married to her biggest brother, like she said. Zac is bigger than Isaac and Taylor. And of course Mack, but that’s a given,” I said just talking until Zoë interrupted me.

“This is Jordi,” she said as she put a hand on my stomach. “Say hi, the baby would like that,” Zoë said to Mrs. Crow. She reminded me so much of Taylor in moments like this, she was letting her happiness blind her.

“Oh… okay. Is it a boy or a girl?” Mrs. Crow asked.

“We’re not telling,” I said smiling. I missed Zac.

“Ahh… Hello, Jordi,” Mrs. Crow said to my stomach which made Zoë jump around chanting:

”Jordi says hi… Jordi says hi,” she didn’t stop either until Diana took her hand and the three of them, Diana, Zoë, and Mrs. Crow, walked over to the desk, leaving me to stand there to just watch all the little children play. I loved Jordi so much already.

Half an hour later we were back in the van. Diana’s eyes still hadn’t lost that look of pure doubt.

“Mom, what is it?” I asked not sure if I wanted the answer or not.

“She thought you were her mother, I’m too old to have a baby,” her eyes filled with tears as she said that.

“I’m not a baby!” Zoë said from the back seat while she sucked on her thumb.

“She’s right mom, she’s not a baby and you’re not old, you were never old and you’re not old now. You’re never going to be old, at least I don’t want to think about that,” I said truly not able to imagine another one of my moms dying.

“It’s just that Ezra is only four years younger than her, it doesn’t seem right,” Diana said while brushing away a tear.

“You know what I think is horrible about this whole thing?” I asked getting ready to try and brighten her spirits.

“What dear?” she asked me, the sound of worry still in her voice.

“It saddens me that there are so many teen pregnancies today that she had to assume that I was her mother. I think you’re the perfect age to have a baby, I am way too you,” I said trying to play her pain onto me.

“Dirbee… I think you’re right. You are too young, I shouldn’t be supportive of you and Zac at all,” she laughed.

“No mom, you shouldn’t be,” I laughed with her.

“But I really am proud of you and Zac. I mean with you two, everything has been planned, nothing has been a mistake and of tat I am truly prod,” she said taking my hand and gently squeezing it. When she touched me, I felt Jordi move; she was definitely going to love her grandma.

“Thanks mom. It means a lot to hear you say that.”

“Why?” Diana asked.

“Well, because I know that comes from a mother’s point of view and I just hope that’s how my mom would have felt,” I said pulling my hand away from hers and I placed it, instead, on my stomach as if making a silent promise to Jordi that I would always be proud of her, no matter what.

“Oh honey, I didn’t know your mother, but I know that she was a wonderful woman by the way you miss her. I am absolutely sure that she would be incredibly proud of you and Zac.”

”And she would love Zac, she hated all of my other boyfriends because they weren’t musically and she knew I wanted music in my relationship. She would adore Zac,” I said laughing at the memory of Zac meeting my dad.

I was so happy that I had spent the day with the actual Zac Hanson that when he took me home, I didn’t want the day to end, so, I invited him in and insisted he meet my dad.

“Meet your dad,” he stuttered. “I’m not good with meeting parents.”

”Don’t worry, it’s not like we’re a couple or anything and he’s almost as big of a fan of you as I am, I’m sure he’d love to meet you.”

”Your dad is a fan of us?” Zac asked in awe.

”Well, he’s more of an Isaac fan, but he’s learned to like you for my sake,” I laughed.

“Oh, I see,” he said, somewhat offended.

“No, don’t worry. Come and meet him,” but at that moment Zac didn’t have to come in, because my dad came out.

“Dirbee, where have you been? Your work called and said you didn’t show up and you were supposed to be home two hours ago. Have you been running around with this guy all day?”

”Dad, I’d like you to meet my new friend. Dad, this is Zac Hanson,” I said smiling.

“Yeah right Dirb… No, wait a minute…” he stopped and ran inside when he came back out he had the This Time Around CD case in his hand. Zac looked almost the same as he did on the cover because he hadn’t yet cut his hair. He looked from the case to Zac a couple of times before he held out his hand to Zac.

“Wow, it’s nice to meet you,” my dad said.

“Uhh… yeah. It’s… uh… nice to meet you too, Mr. Baxter,” Zac stammered.

“You two are just weird,” I said; my dad was acting like a teeny bopper and Zac was acting like a shy seven year old.

“Mommy, Dirbee,” Zoë said from the backseat, awakening me from my daydream.

“Yes baby,” Diana asked back.

“I think everyone should go get ice cream,” she said not stopping to even take her thumb out of her mouth.

“Who’s everyone?” I asked.

”Everybody!” she exclaimed loudly.

“You know what Zo,” Diana asked. “I think that’s an excellent idea.”

This was going to be a fun day.

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