This Is Us - Chapter 2: Chapter 2

I angrily toss the bowl of dough down on the hard surface and start mixing it together with my fingers as the front door to the farmhouse opens.
"Dear god, what did the sugar cookies ever do to you?" Wesley asked as he walked into the kitchen and walked over to the fridge, grabbing a small bottle of water.
"Well, our wonderful daughter decided to tell me that she has to bring in cookies tomorrow as part of a project. Of course, she waits until I put her to bed to tell me so because she doesn't want to do any of the work," I grunt as I kneed the cookies and he takes a swig of water.
"It's bad enough her teachers have already sent child services to our house three times because they hate the way three men are raising her and try to have her taken away. And with everything going on with Matty's condition, he hasn't exactly been in the best fucking mood," I rant, so pissed off that I was nearly growling.
"They look at me, they see my legs. 'oh how did that happen?' a fucking accident, it's not like I cut off my own fucking legs. They ask, 'oh did you sue? No? Why not?' I say it's none of their god damn business and if they want to they can look it up in public records and find out for themselves. They come back today and they said..." I throw the metal bowl so hard that it bounces back into my hands and Wesley drops his water bottle.
"Thomas, I think-"
"And then there's Matty, fucking oblivious to it all. 'It will be fine' he says like Jaydean being taken away is just a passing thought. And then you don't need this stress right now either so it's just on me, and if Jayde gets taken away then!"
"Thomas stop," Wesley puts his hands over mine in the bowl and slowly plucks them out of the cookie mixture.
"First of all, you're going to turn the dough back into water if you keep going at it like that," He says in a calm voice layered with his thick British accent.
"Matthias will be back tomorrow and I'm sure he'll have his two cents to put in then," He says taking the bowl of dough from me and going into the counter to find flour.
"And lastly, why did you keep this to yourself Thomas? Why did you hesitate to tell me?" Wesley asked as he slowly spread the flower on the marble countertop and I took out the roller.
"Because I know about the therapy Wes. You use to go once a month and now it seems like your going every other day. I'm worried about you is all," I explained, starting to feel the anger cool down in Wesley's presence. He stayed quiet for a few moments as he plucked the dough out of the bowl and took the roller from me, rolling it out onto the counter.
"I haven't been sleeping recently. Just stupid nightmares that haven't been leaving me alone and she's helping me get through them," He explains with a softened voice and I blink a few times to watch him as he worked.
I see this man every single day since he lives in the guest house on our property and not once did I notice the heavy bags under his pale blue eyes along with the dark circles that covered some of his deep brown freckles.
"I'm sorry about that," I sighed as I scratched my chin, forgetting my hands were covered in cookie dough.
"It's okay. Nothing you did obviously," He sighs and rolls the dough into a rectangle when we press little star-shaped cookie cutters together and put them on a cookie sheet. I turn around to preheat the oven to 350 when I'm suddenly splashed with white powder. I looked over my shoulder to find Wes had been the one to flick the flour in my direction.
"Why so serious?" He chuckled and I smirked, picking up a handful of flour off the table and tossing it in his face. He coughs out and nearly wheezes from the attack as he laughs the seriousness off. With his laugh, I felt all the anger I had boiling over inside me start to melt away.
He throws an extra star-shaped cookie next and it lands flat on my big forehead, Wes then bursts out laughing and I narrow my eyes.
Oh, it's war now.
I tossed more flour in his direction to blind him and he cries out in fear when I pick up the extra dough and flick large balls in his direction. Letting Houston eat whatever didn't stick to him off the floor.
Blinded by flour and tears of laughter, he trips on one of the barstool legs, falling forward I quickly position myself in front of him and catch him mid-fall. Hearing the loud thunk as his head smashed into my chest head on and he groaned.
"Ow, that hurt like hell, you really need to stop working out if you...if you..." Wesley's eyes met mine as I held him in my arms and for some reason, I didn't let him go right away.
"If...you..." He tried to finish his sentence through his hooded gaze but couldn't when I kissed him first..