The Chaotic Meeting by Emma H.

Jennifer sighed as she sat down at the kitchen table, sipping her morning coffee. God, Monday mornings could be so chaotic. Elizabeth was always put up a fight to go back to school after having the weekend off for fun and games. But Jennifer had managed to get her onto the bus, and Jim had been able to get off to work on time.

Jennifer settled her hands on her growing stomach, already 6 months pregnant she was really beginning to show. And it was continually getting harder to do things she was used to, and to just move around. She was off of work now for a while, and loved having the mornings to herself.

The phone rang and Jen smiled, it must be Granny of course, that was one of Jen’s favorite moments of the mornings. Granny would call and ask about Elizabeth and Jim, and of course the pregnancy. Thinking about the pregnancy made Jennifer feel as though her life was finally something to be proud about. Six years ago, it had been a different story.

When Jennifer had been pregnant the first time it was when she was 19, she hardly knew the father, though it didn’t matter when that dirt bag left her. She was working a waitress job at the local diner, which was hardly enough to support herself, especially with a baby on the way. Thankfully she befriended a kind old woman, the kindest woman in the world, in Jen’s opinion. That was Granny, her real name was Elizabeth, which Jen named the baby after. Without Granny, Jen would have never been able to survive on her own, Granny provided food, shelter, and especially love. And then of course there was Jim, Jennifer had never loved someone the way she had loved Jim, she remembered the day she met him. It must have been fate.

“Grannnyyyy…” Jennifer called down the hallway, “I’m going to take Elizabeth out for a walk at the commons.”

Granny had just begun to knit a new blanket for Elizabeth at that time, “Alright dear,” she replied. “Just be careful it will be getting dark soon.”

“I will, don’t worry.” Jen smiled, she loved how much Granny cared about her.

Once Elizabeth was strapped safe in her stroller, Jen started walking down the sidewalks leaves underneath her feet crunching as they strolled along. Fall was approaching now and the auburn and burnt orange colors were becoming more frequent. The moon rose, and cast an illuminating shadow down on the sidewalk. The scene took Jen’s breath away, and she noticed, standing under one of the tall oak trees, a man was standing. He had set up a tri-pod and he was taking photos, snapping shots of the foliage. But the calmness was broken when Jen heard Elizabeth squirming, and whining in her stroller.

“Alright, alright,” Jen said to her, “but if I let you out, you have to promise you’ll be a good girl, and stay close to mommy.”

“I promise,” Elizabeth said in that little innocent child voice, which always put a smile on Jen’s face. But as the Elizabeth heard that “click” when her belt was off, she took off running.

“ELIZABETH!” Jen screamed, her complete fear showed on her face, and could be heard in her voice. And then, Jen saw it, Elizabeth was heading straight for the man’s camera, and then…CRASH! She collided with the camera straight on. But before the camera collapsed on to Elizabeth, the man grabbed her, pulling her out of the way.

Jen caught up, out of breath from the chase, and teary eyed from fear.” Thank you so much, it was so kind of you to save her like that,” Jen said hugging her daughter. But she glanced down at the heap of chaos which Elizabeth had created. “Oh my goodness, I’m so sorry about that,” Jen bent down to help while keeping hold of Elizabeth. “I will pay for any damages done.” She told that man.

The man just laughed, “Oh no, don’t worry about any of that, that camera has seen damage than anything else in this world.” He held out his hand, “I’m Jim,” he said.

“Jennifer,” she replied “and this little runaway is Elizabeth.”

He laughed and said, “Well hello there Elizabeth, that wasn’t very nice to run away from your mommy like that was it, you won’t do that again will you?”

“No,” Elizabeth said, sounding tired.

“Well I need to get her home and to bed, maybe I could take you out to coffee in the morning, as a thank you,” Jen suggested.

“That sounds great!” Jim said.

Jen smiled, the rest of the story was history, the two of them just clicked, and two years later they were married. Jen glanced up at the picture on the wall, it was of Jen and Jim, and they were standing in the town commons, under the big oak tree, the place where they met, and the place where they fell in love.