Busy Days

March 2029 - San Myshuno, New York
Chase family - Edwin is 39, Darcy is 36, Jackson is 11, Ava is 7

Working in law enforcement in San Myshuno keeps Edwin busy at times.

These are some of those busy days right now. He solved a case and now has the suspect in custody. Even after being taken into the jail, Edwin is still finding strange things in the suspect’s pockets.

 

The best part of Edwin’s day is getting through all that work and getting back home to his family. Ava is always waiting for a hug from her daddy.

Ava loves hugging everyone. Even her big brother Jackson still lets her hug him.

Edwin greets Darcy with a kiss. Even after all these years, he’s still deeply in love with her. He agreed to move to San Myshuno with her without question. It is a way of moving forward in her career, going after the dream she has of reaching high seats in politics by winning over a large crowd of supporters.

“How was your day?” he asks her.

Darcy sighs. “Busy. How was yours?”

“Busy too,” he says. “We stay a lot busier here than we did in Arcadia, huh?”

“Never a dull moment,” she agrees with a wide smile.

Edwin gets up early for a jog when he can before the rest of his family wakes up. He already moves a lot at work, but he enjoys an early morning jog when he can.

San Myshuno is a lot bigger and busier than Arcadia and Pine Hollow. Even in the earliest of mornings there are lights on everywhere and people already getting started in their days.

Even with movement around him, the jog lets Edwin clear his head before the rest of his day at the police station gets started.

He actually loves San Myshuno as much as Darcy does and can’t picture them living in a small town again. This city is full of life that he hopes his kids get to explore and learn from as they grow up here.

When she gets home from work, Darcy helps the kids with their homework.

Jackson is in his last year of elementary school and his assignments are getting harder in his opinion. Ava doesn’t have any problems with her work and usually finishes before her brother does.

“Come on, Jack, you know the answer to this one,” Darcy says.

Jackson lets out a small growl. “I don’t know! Tell me what it is.”

“Read that page again,” she encourages him. “You’ll get it.”

Jackson scowls, but he looks at his book again. It’s going to be a long session, Darcy knows.

The neighbor across the hall plays loud music late in the night and Ava can’t go to sleep.

She explains that she has to go to school in the morning and needs to sleep.

But the neighbor is not happy and snaps back at Ava that she can play her music as loud as she wants it. Ava isn’t brave enough to fight back. So she goes home and covers her head with a pillow to try to get some sleep.

Darcy tries to encourage Jackson in his homework, but he’s reached a level of frustration that he just can’t hold back.

He yells out all the things he can think of. “I’m not smart, I’m stupid! I don’t know anything my teacher is trying to teach me!”

Darcy lets Jackson yell out all of his frustration, but then she sits him down for a talk.

“Jackson,” she says, “you’re not stupid. Okay? Don’t let anyone tell you that and don’t tell yourself that.”

“I hate school,” Jackson tells her. “I’m too stupid for it.”

“It takes some time to learn things,” she says. “But you are smart enough to learn it all.”

Ava walks by and says, “Not as smart as me.”

Darcy shakes her head. “Ava, that is not nice. And Jackson is just as smart as you are.”

“Are you sure?” Jackson asks. “I have a hard time learning stuff.”

Darcy pulls him toward her for a hug. “We all do. You are smart and I know you’ll do great things in life.”

Jackson squeezed her back just as tightly. “I’ll try,” he promises.

On the weekends, Darcy likes taking the kids out on the town. She takes them to a local museum one Saturday while Edwin is working.

The museum offers art classes and so the three of them join in for a little fun.

Ava goes over to the room for making clay sculptures and has fun squeezing it between her fingers.

A boy she knows from school comes over to her and waves. “Hey, Ava,” Kenny says. “What are you doing?” 

“Making a sculpture,” she tells him.

“It doesn’t look like a sculpture,” Kenny says.

“It’s a sculpture of a ball,” Ava says. “Can’t you tell?”

Kenny shakes his head. “It looks like a clay rock.”

Ava shoots him a scowl. Kenny is the most annoying boy in her class and she’s not going to believe anything he says. She doesn’t have to impress him anyway.

Jackson tries to work on some drawings, but he’s just not interested. He never has done much drawing or coloring in his childhood.

But outside behind the art gallery is a pond. There is a sign saying fishing is allowed, and he finds an old fishing pole left near some rocks and so he casts out a line.

It isn’t long before Jackson catches a fish. It may be small, but he’s happy he was successful. This is much more fun than sitting in the museum!

Ava gets bored with the clay sculpting so she goes outside. She stole some little jars of paint on her way out and begins to decorate the rocky path toward the museum.

But when Darcy finds her, Ava is in big trouble.

“You’re going to apologize to the museum owners and then clean all of this up,” she tells her daughter.

Ava makes a face. “Oookaaay,” she says in a long drawn out tone of exasperation.

And so she follows her mom’s instructions. Cleaning up the paint is not a fun way to end the trip out on town!

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Jackson does have the loves outdoors trait, so he was much happier outside fishing than making art inside!