“jory, baby, i’m sorry but i need you to come home. i know you’re at practice but fuck, they just won’t stop crying!!” dalton was clearly distressed, his voice cracking from the stress as he fought to be heard over the twins screaming in the background. “i’ve fed them, changed them, burped them, played with them and nothing is working !! they won’t stop and my dad he can’t come and i can’t get hold of your mom i can’t– fuck, baby, i can’t do this i can’t handle them on my own not yet please. please jory, come home. i need help, and they respond to you better. i don’t think i can be left with them alone just yet i don’t think i’m ready i’m really not i can’t do it i can’t. one i could handle on my own, but not two, not yet.” he wanted so badly to be able to handle his children, he wanted so badly to not think of his mother and not to be able to understand where she was coming from but now, when there were two screaming babies and only one dalton, he could understand only slightly. but she gave up with just one, she didn’t care enough to try - to stay. dalton did. he’d get used to it, he would be able to handle them both, in time. but now just wasn’t that time.
jory felt a part of himself come back when he got back to dancing. jory spun around and felt great again. he had to work his body back into shape so his muscles didn’t go soft. dance felt right, it was the thing he was best at, and he got to do it again. he could make this work, family and work. that was until a call interrupted his practice. jory took the call opening his mouth to respond only to be met with more of dalton’s panic. before the birth it had been jory who was afraid of being able to handle a baby much less two. dalton had been sure, dalton went back to the club relatively early. so jory had been alone with them both. he was used to holding the twins in his arms and looking down into their faces. he knew exactly how they liked their bottle and how to get them to sleep by singing to them softly. and playing the ballet music they had heard so much while inside him. he knew that he just needed to keep talking calmly throughout their cries and eventually they’d stop. he talked about his family and about dalton and eventually they’d quiet and stare up at him, not understanding but just listening to the tone of his voice. jory knew that they liked to be held on their belly at times or turned upright to calm down. sometimes his mother helped, but often he could handle them alone. colton in particular was a rather easy baby, quiet and easily hushed. julia was loud, screaming at the top of her lungs and complaining at every turn. his mother compared them to her siblings, the first set of twins. “carrie was a loud-mouth just like julia, cory was always sweet and quiet. you were the same way, you looked like your father, and i always planned to name you after him. but you were so quiet and sweet, and unlike your father, you were like cory, so i combined the two, and you were jory,” she tells him.
he hears the continued panic in his husbands voice and interrupts, “dalton, dalton please, calm down, calm down, take a deep breath. i’ll come home, i will. i’m going to come home now. you just need to calm down. they’re not going to be calm if you’re not. they can tell you’re stressed so they’re too. just sit down and hold them and talk to them. try and tune out the crying and just keep talking and remain calm,” jory begs. “can you do that? i promise i’ll be home soon baby,” jory says looking over at madame zolta and melodie sadly. they had been so happy that jory was coming back and now that was dashed.
