Chapter 61: Always Remember, I'm By Your Side

*AMY'S POV*

Just as I decide to stop with all the self-pity and start working on a new book, Zoey runs into the house...without Terry.

Without looking up, I ask her, "What's going on?"

She's out of breath, but she speaks through heavy breathing, "I think...I'm going...to have to...divorce Terry."

Say what?

This makes me stop what I'm doing and slowly turn my head, "What?"

"I think I'm going to have to leave him...I...I...I just don't see another way," she stammers.

I push myself away from the chair, "Okay, living room...let's talk about what the hell is going on."

"Okay, now what happened?" I ask as we sit down.

"Terry and I got into an argument...he wants us to move to Butterfly Acres!" she says.

Whoa...that's a shock...but I know that's Terry, Mac, and AJ's hometown.  I guess it's not too surprising that he would want to move back there at some point.

"Why?" I ask.

She tells me about Terry's dream of being a police officer in Butterfly Acres and working with the town to make it great again, restore faith in law enforcement, and all that.  I have to say it's a very admirable thing to want to do.

"That bastard!" I reply sarcastically.

Zoey glares at me, "Now is not the time for sarcasm.  Seriously...I don't want to move from here...and I can't ask him to stay...so I'm going to have to divorce him."

"Z, that's crazy," I tell her, "you love him."

"I know, but I..." she starts.

"Look, ultimately you have to do what makes you happy," I say.

"Staying here would make me happy," she responds.

"Not if Terry's not here," I tell her.

Zoey sits back and sighs, "I can't leave you here."

"We've been over this.  Do not stay here because of me," I tell her, "I'll be fine."

"Really?  Because that little melt down at dinner tonight makes me worry," Zoey tells me.

"Yeah...well, I might go a little nutty every now and then, but as long as you're just a phone call away, I'll be fine." I tell her, "Besides, you never know, maybe moving there will be a good experience."

By the time we finish talking, Terry has made it home, so she goes to talk to him.  I sigh.  Even though I understand that this is just part of life - friends moving away from each other and such - I can't help but feel a bit abandoned.  Oh well, I guess I'm just going to have to deal.

*ZOEY'S POV*

Terry walks through the door and I go to meet him, "Hey," I greet him bashfully.  I guess I didn't really handle the news well...basically I ran away from him.  I'm going to have to do some damage control.

"Hey," he replies.

"I'm sorry," I tell him.

"I'm sorry too," he says as he wraps his arms around me, "I shouldn't have sprung that on you like that."

"No, you needed to," I say, "and you're right.  We need to support each other's dreams.  And if you want to move to Butterfly Acres *gulp* we can talk about it."

As a response, he brings his lips toward mine and gives me a long, slow, passionate kiss.

As he pulls away, he speaks, "Thank you.  That's all I want."

"So...what do we do now?" I ask, "How long do you have to accept the offer?"

"They've given me a couple weeks to accept or reject, then a couple more weeks to get moved there, if that's what I want." he says.

"Hmm...okay..." I don't really know what to say.

"I have an idea," Terry offers, "why don't we go there for a visit, and you can see if it's somewhere you could live before you say yes or no."

"I think that will work," I tell him.

*AMY'S POV*

Zoey tells me they're going to Butterfly Acres for a couple days to check it out.  She isn't super excited about it, but I'm sure she'll be fine.

Before they leave, Terry sits down and talks to me privately.

"Hey...I just...wanted to say thanks," he tells me.

"For what?" I ask.

"You know there was no way she was going to go along with all this if you didn't want her to," he says, "I just wanted to thank you for not..."

"Being a brat and demanding that she stay?" I offer.

"Haha, something like that, yeah," he replies.

"No problem.  You are making her happy, that's all that matters to me," I say.

*ZOEY'S POV*

After a three hour drive, Terry and I make it to his childhood home.  His grandfather greets us.  Terry was raised by his grandfather.  I feel bad that I haven't really met him before now.  He was too sick to make it to the wedding and we just haven't come here until now.

"Hey Pops!" Terry greets him.

"Hello there, son!" Pops responds.

Pops is apparently a hugger.  He gives me a firm hug as well.

"So this is the woman that finally settled my boy down," Pops says.

I can't help but laugh.  I think Terry was born settled down.

Looking at Pops, it's obvious that Terry looks a lot like him.  This makes me chuckle as well because now I know what T is probably going to look like as an old man.

"The last time I talked to this boy, he could not stop telling me how wonderful you are..." Pops goes into the last time he saw Terry and then starts into stories of when he was a little boy.

As much as I want to hear them, T has better ideas.

"Okay, old man, before you start embarrassing me, let me show Zoey my old room." Terry says.

"Oh, oh yeah, it's exactly how you left it," he says, pointing toward the house, which is obviously old and run down, but is obviously a place filled with memories for both of these men.

We head inside and directly up the stairs where Terry shows me to the room we will be staying in while we're here.

"Here it is," he says, "nothing fancy, but..."

"This is great," I assure him.

"Is it weird being home?" I ask.

Terry is smiling, so weird probably isn't the right word to describe it.

"It's refreshing.  I never realized how much I missed the place.  Hey, hurry up and get settled, I want to show you around."

"Oh...okay..."

It doesn't take me too long to just freshen up a bit after the long car ride, so I meet him downstairs within a few minutes.

"Where are we going first?" I ask.

"Just down the road," Terry replies.

"Hmm, okay.  Lead the way." I say.

We walk down the road and stop at an empty lot.

"Here we are," Terry says proudly.

I raise my eyebrows and look around at the vast nothing in front of me, "What are we looking at?"

"This, my love, is where our house will be if we move here," Terry says.

My mouth falls agape, "We're not just going to look at houses here?"

"Hell no," he says, "not for my Vi.  Between your savings and mine, I think we can build a nice little house."

I can't help but get excited.  I have dreamt of building my dream house for...forever.

I guess Terry gets nervous when several moments go by and I don't say anything, so he interrupts my silent glee, "What do you think?"

"It's perfect," I tell him.

He claps his hands together, "I'm glad you think so...okay, now...off to some town highlights."

Our first stop is a pond.

"What is this?" I ask.

"This is my favorite place to fish," he says.

"Oh," I try to act excited, but as I have mentioned before, nature and I do not get along.

"Don't worry, we don't have to stay, I just wanted to show you.  Besides, we have much more to see."

"Here's the movie theater" Terry points out at the next stop, "It's only got four screening rooms, but it's plenty for us."

"Huh," is my response.  Okay, so a pond and a movie theater.  I'm kind of worried about the amount of things to do here.

"Do you all even have a Wal-Mart?" I ask.

"Haha, no, but we have a corner store where we do our grocery shopping..." he tells me, "...don't worry, the finale of the tour is yet to come."

"But what could be better than a field, a pond, and a theater?" I ask jokingly.

There's a sparkle in his eye, so I know whatever it is he's excited about it.  That pretty much means that whatever I think about it I'm going to have to muster up some excitement.

"Okay," I ask, "where to?"

We have to take a taxi cab to wherever it is we're going, and the drive seems to last forever.  

"Where are we going?" I ask him after the fifth or sixth sharp curve.

"We're almost there," he says.

"Okay, but if I hear banjos, I'm offering you up first." I tell him.

This just makes him laugh out loud.  I'm glad he thinks it's funny now.

As the cab rounds another corner, Terry gets excited, "Here!  Here we are!"

"Okay, once again, I see nothing," I tell him.

(AUTHOR'S GEEKOUT MOMENT:  THE RIGHT SIDE OF THIS PICTURE SHOWS THE "FUTURE" LOCATION OF HADLEY'S HOUSE)

"Just look at this," Terry says, obviously in awe.

"More land?  Is this the future site of the Wal-Mart?" I ask only half kidding.  What kind of town doesn't have a Wal-Mart?

"No, Vi...this...all of this...will be ours one day," He says.

"I hope you like lawn mowing," I tell him, "what are we going to do with all this land?"

"Build on it...our house, Amy's house, your mom's, Pops, our children's..."

"Child's," I correct him.  He needs to remember that I only want one.

"Child's...whatever...anyway, our child's house...our grandchildren's houses...we'll have our own little compound here one day, I know it."

To get a better idea of what we are looking at, this is the land he's talking about.

I have to say I'm amazed.

I can't help it.  I start running.

Terry is running behind me, trying to keep up.

"Where are you going?" He shouts to me.

I stop when I get to the river.  

This really is beautiful.

"Why did you take off like that?" Terry asks me.

"I wanted to see this...it's gorgeous," I tell him.

He smiles, "I thought so too."

"How long have you been thinking about this?" I ask him.

"Since you told me it was your dream," he replies simply, "Vi, more than anything else, I want to make you happy.  We can live in Harmony for the rest of our lives, that's fine, but we are never going to be able to find something like this there."

I have to admit he is right.  Harmony is a great city, but it's just that - a city.  There's no land like this there.

"You mean you found all this for me?" I ask him.

"Of course," he says, "I'm not going to move you here with nothing to do.  You're going to be busy designing houses for whoever you want to come live here."

I laugh.

"What's funny?" He asks.

"Just...you keep amazing me..." I say.

He looks confused, "What do you mean?" 

"I still can't believe how well you know me," I tell him.

"So you like it?" He asks.

I laugh.  "Of course!  Hell, enticing me with land is the perfect plan.  How can I say no?"

"Woo-hoo!" He yells and grabs me, spinning me around until I think I might throw up.

"Whoa!  Calm down!" I tell him laughing, "if you're going to be doing that, we need to build a bathroom here first."

"Oh, sorry," he says letting me down, "Hey, the football stadium isn't far from here, do you want to catch a game?"

"Sure," I tell him.

We get to the modest stadium just in time for the game to start.

"Is the team any good?" I ask.

"Nah, not really, but they try hard," he says, "I keep thinking they'll get someone that can pull them out of this slump one day."

(HEHEHE, I COULDN'T RESIST)

After the game we head back to Pops' house.  Thankfully, he has dinner fixed for us.  It's just sandwiches, but they are delicious.

After dinner, we settle in the worn in living room in front of the little half-broken TV Pops has.

"So, do you think you can live here?" Terry asks me.

I take a deep breath.  I know it's not going to be an easy transition, but I know it will make him the happiest and if we really can build all our dream houses here, that would make me happy, so I reply, "You know, I actually do."

So I guess that's it.  Within the month, we are going to be residents of Butterfly Acres.