Thank you for all your support with Expectant!
I was absolutely floored with how nice you guys were. I love you all!
Anyway, so here is the first chapter of Sequel.
Hope you all like it!
How fast time goes. Five years had past almost suddenly. In which there had been two weddings, a degree was finished along with the beginning of getting a Master Degree; there was a death in the family, and the adoption of a pet rabbit. However, one thing dominated Chiara's life. Her daughter had grown up; sprouting like a weed she had become the center of the woman's world. She truly cared for the girl who was kind and sweet and all the things Chiara wasn't.
Suddenly, she was dropping off her little girl at her first day of Kindergarten.
However, Rosalia was hardly Chiara's child. She was small for her age and almost skinnier than Alice had been at five years old, which was saying something. Her hair was curly and brown, stopping at her shoulders. The worst part of it was her eyes. They weren't brown like Sadiq's, nor hazel like her mother's. They were bright green. The eyes were the only things that stood in the way of Chiara getting away with the lie that now enveloped her life.
"You ready to go?" Chiara asked the girl, putting on her expensive overcoat that Sadiq had bought her. He liked to give her gifts and she liked expensive stuff so it wasn't like she could say no.
"Is Papa going to say goodbye?" Rosalia asked curiously, carrying an empty backpack with princess decorating it.
"Papa left earlier to go to work, Rosie. Let's get you in the car." Sadiq was always gone by six, heading into the deep city to work until nine…Chiara knew full well that his workday ended at five. What he did after hours was his business, though she had a guess what he was doing. It didn't take a genius to guess that she was being 'cheated on'. Even though the relationship wasn't completely real in the first place and they had made it clear at the beginning that seeing other people so long as it didn't interfere with the lie was okay…so why was she bothered by it? It wasn't as if she loved Sadiq, but she didn't hate him. Their relationship was so fucked up.
"Mama…I don't want to go." Chiara sighed. She completely understood why the girl would be scared.
"Rosie, it's going to be fun! And you're going to make lots of friends!"
"But what if I don't?"
"You're already going to know two people there, right? So even if you don't make friends right away, which I'm sure you will, you can hang out with your cousins." Chiara held out her hand to her daughter, who hesitantly took it. "Come on bambina."
The car ride over to the elementary was uneventful. Rosalia was quiet, shuffling her hands in her booster seat and Chiara was focused on the road. What a day for it rain heavily. Add the weather from the fact that Chiara may be one of the worst drivers in the city and was well aware of it, caused her to be extra cautious.
"Mama?" A small voice called from the back.
"Yes?"
"Will Papa be at dinner tonight?" Rosie asked this every day. The answer was always the same. Chiara always felt like lying to the little girl, but found that she alone was the only girl she couldn't lie straightly to.
"No, Rosie. He has to work."
"Papa's always working."
"He has to make money."
"I know. I just want to see more of him."
"Me too…me too."
And it was true in a way. At the beginning it was nice to have someone there. It was nice to have someone who understood her situation and was willing to help her with figuring it out. They went to Sadiq's family dinners and she tried her best to charm his parents. It was going well, there was hardly a problem.
Well, besides the fact that they didn't love each other the way they claimed to. Sadiq dealt with it by never being home. Chiara dealt with it with cigarettes and too many glasses of wine. Rosie was somewhere in the middle, just growing.
"Mama…I think we're here."
"Okay, one sec." She pulled in and messily parked in the school's parking lot. It was average sized, brick building with a large playground out back. As she helped her daughter out of the car, she could feel the little girl's eyes drift to the playground. "You can later, baby. Let's go meet your teacher."
One of the perks of leaving earlier than needed, was that the school halls where basically empty except for the occasional teacher bustling in the hallways, making last minute adjustments before the students arrived. Walking with Rosie shortly in toe, she headed to the Kindergarten hallway. If she remembered correctly, her daughter was in KBB. Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted construction paper sign with 'KBB' written on it with a big sharpie marker.
"It's this way Rosie." She looked back at her daughter who toddled to her mother's side. She looked adorable today with her hair drawn back with a blue bow and a cute pale pink dress and white cardigan.
"Mama will you come in with me?"
"Of course I will." The pair arrived at the door and Chiara knocked and heard a voice call them in. Opening the wooden door, she looked around the classroom. It was brightly colored with the alphabet bordering the room. A man was bent over with his back to two of them. He was in the corner, seemingly put a carton of toys on a shelf.
"Excuse me for a just a second, we're still getting things sorted for the day so Mr. Beilschmidt and I are still setting it up." Beilschmidt…Ludwig wasn't a Kindergarten teacher, but he did have a brother who had gotten shit faced at Ludwig and Alice's wedding two years ago…well, wasn't the world a small place. The teacher turned to the face the mother and daughter.
Perhaps it was too small. It had been five years since Chiara had seen Antonio. And that record was just broken. The man looked the same. He was still fit and still beautiful as she remembered him to be. He froze for a brief second before smiling.
"Hello and how are you? I'm Mr. Bonnefoy one of the teachers for KBB as you could've guessed." Bonnefoy? So he gotten married the French bastard? What the fuck? And was he just going to pretend that they didn't know each other? Well, two could play at this game.
"It's nice to meet you Mr. Bonnefoy, I'm Chiara Vargas and this is Rosalia...my daughter." Rosie had taken to shyly clinging to her mother's leg in attempt to shield her body from Antonio. The teacher bent down in response.
"Hiya sweetie. Why don't you go outside to the playground! Mr. Beilschmidt is outside playing with the other children." Rosie nodded and put her backpack down on the floor before turning to her mother.
"Bye Mama! I'm going to miss you!" Chiara chuckled.
"Rosie, I'll pick you up at twelve."
"Okay, see you." She hugged her mother and then ran outside to greet the other teacher and children. Well, the girl could never resist a playground. When they were alone, Chiara rolled her eyes.
"So…Bonnefoy?" Antonio sighed, running his hand through his hair.
"Yes, Francis and I got married two years ago."
"And why wasn't I invited to the wedding?"
"It didn't feel right." So he was still mad…well so was she, so she supposed it canceled it out. "Is that…you know-"
"Sadiq's child? It is." She cut him off. "I can ask to transfer classes and shit if you don't want to teach her. We'd get it." She said we as if Sadiq and her were functioning on the terms.
"No, no, it would seem too weird…there's no need to trouble anyone else." Look at him always wanting to help others. "She's quite pretty." Chiara smiled sadly.
"Yeah, I know. Takes after her mother." Antonio laughed a little at that.
"No doubt. And what's her name again?"
"Rosalia."
"Pretty name."
"It was my mother's." Antonio knew that Chiara's parents had died when the girl was very young so he let the statement hang for a couple minutes.
"We're going to adopt soon. Francis and me."
"Why the fuck should I care?" Chiara wanted to throw up. Antonio frowned slightly before returning his face to neutral.
"Have you and Sadiq gotten married yet?"
"No we're taking it slow."
"It's been five years if I think about it correctly."
"Like I said we're taking it slow." The last thing she needed was Antonio questioning her relationship.
"It still seems like a long time to date without getting married…especially with a child. I would've married you…" He stopped, seemingly have remembered the circumstances the two of them were in.
"Well too bad we were never going to work out…just like you said." She was still bitter and still head of heels in love with the man who apparently was married to another man.
"That was out of line, I'm sorry about that." Antonio said quietly.
"A little too late, Mr. Bonnefoy." Chiara ran her fingers threw her hair frustrated. "Look, this isn't going to work. I'm going to get the nanny to take her to school. I just…can't."
"Neither can I." Well, he was honest.
"I've got to go. Sadiq's at home waiting for me."
"Ms. Vargas…I'll be good to your kid."
"And I never thought you'd be as petty as to be mean to a child." And with that, Chiara hurried out of the room and to her car. She drove straight home and opened a bottle of wine and not bothering to get out glass drank from it. She then texted the babysitter, a woman named Elizabeta and asked her to pick up Rosalia from school and to watch her afterwards. Taking another gulp of alcohol, she collapsed on the kitchen floor, tears running down her face. Chiara knew that she about four hours before her daughter came home and she would have to clean herself up, but her stubborn selfish side took over, making her unable to move from the floor.
Her already complicated lie just got a whole lot more complicated.
Just her rotten luck.
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