Chapter Three

I woke up to the sound of laughter. It startled me, to say the least. The sound was so pure it was hard to ignore.

Glancing at my clock, I groaned. True to form I didn't sleep much that night. It wasn't that I didn't want to (believe me, I was always tired), but because no matter what or how hard I tried, there was always something that plagued my mind. And it never failed that it was darker and louder in the wee hours of the night then it was during daylight. Even when I did manage to fall asleep it was never very sound or for very long. My dreams always managed to be worse than the ongoing reality…but only because they retold the story of my past.

After restlessly dozing off and on throughout the night, I finally heard life, hence the laughter that woke me up.

I sat up and stretched before making my way to the window. Peeking outside I saw that already the streets were filled with people, more so now then the night before. Apparently the people here loved the day and night life equally.

My phone buzzing once, twice, three times on my bed brought me away from the window. Sighing, I opened the messages from who I knew would be Adrian.

—Im happy u made it safely Mos— read the first message.

—But seriously child if u dont start getting some sleep Im going to come over there & knock ur ass out—

Then the last read: —Keep me posted & enjoy urself. Love & miss u baby girl—

I made my way to my suitcase at the end of the bed and dug around until I found some decent looking jeans and a t-shirt that I threw on before trying to calm my messy hair by putting it up in a ponytail. I wasn't usually one big on caring what other people thought of how I dressed (especially lately), but I was about to make a very important first impression, and I sure as hell didn't want to screw it up.

Smiling to myself I couldn't help but think of how Adrian would mock me for this. "They won't care how you dress, they're going to love you because who couldn't love you?" is what he'd tell me. I was lucky to have him…he was probably the best thing I had in my life. He was the only constant I had left and he always did so, so much for me. He was more than just a family friend, he was my best friend. He was my shoulder to cry on, my rock, my therapist. He was like a brother and a father to me…

I immediately gripped the door handle and let myself out of the room, trying not to slam it like I was trying to do to the door in my mind. I began to make my way down a hallway, trying to follow the sounds of the voices.

"Este într-adevăr ea aici? Un pot să aştept să se întâlnească—"

"Tăcere. Are nevoie de somn, nepoata."

"Eugen probabil speriat-o deja!" Laughter followed that, making me wonder what it was they had said about Eugen. Aside from Eugen's name I was only able to pick out words such as "her" and "scared." God I needed to catch on to the language, and I needed to do it fast.

"Hmph. They have much faith in me as you can see." I jumped at the sound of Eugen's voice behind me. He gave me a rueful smile before yawing as he rubbed the sleep out of his eyes. He then took me by the hand and led me the rest of the way, calling out, "Ea a fost aspirat de farmecul meu, frate! Nici o femeie nu poate rezista zămbetul meu!" We rounded the corner then and I was able to take in the sight before me.

The kitchen was enormous, and it had to be to fit all the people inside of it. Counting Eugen, there were at least four people my age, fourteen people around Adrian's age give or take a few years, four elderly people, and at least twenty kids aged anywhere from seventeen down to, well, babies. One of the older ladies and a middle-aged woman were at the stove cooking something that smelled unfamiliar and heavenly.

I had to blink a couple times to make sure I was seeing it all correctly. I'd never seen so many people gathered together in one house in one kitchen just for breakfast. It was unreal.

The room had gone silent when Eugen and I appeared, and all eyes were on me. I tried not to shift uncomfortably, but I really didn't like to be the center of attention.

"Nu fi nepoliticos," Eugen said into the silence. "Cineva să spună ceva." Despite what I'm sure was his best intentions to take some attention off of me, I couldn't help but be a little frustrated at the language barrier. I knew I was just moments away from being embarrassed yet again.

His words seemed to stir them to action. Everyone all at once started to say something and a few rose to their feet and approached me. I glanced at Eugen, slightly overwhelmed. This was almost too much to take in all at once.

Grinning at my expense, Eugen held out his hands as if signaling them all to stop what they were doing. "Mihaela vorbeşte engleză. Ea ştie doar un pic românesc. Ea spune că se va întoarce la mai mult timp, ea petrece printre noi." Everyone seemed to exchange glances at the information they had just received. An average-sized older man with wrinkles etched across his face rose from what I assumed was the head of the table to his feet and made his way over to me.

"Welcome Mihaela," he said in a deep, thickly accented voice. "We have been waiting to meet you for a very long time."

I gave the man a small smile, but the color of his eyes made me want to crawl into a hole and bury myself alive. Trying to take a deep breath, I held my hand out to the man and shook his roughly callused hand. "It's good to finally meet you all," I agreed, swallowing around the lump in my throat.

"Mmm." The man looked me over before he gestured to the older woman at the stove. She came over and stood by his side and gave me a wide, toothy smile…just like he used to give me... "I am Serghei, and this is my wife, Ionela. We are your father's parents, God rest his soul."

Gripping my hands in tight fists behind my back I tried to not let my smile waver. "I, uh, have heard a lot about you two. Well, about you all actually." I glanced at the others around the room, trying to guess who was who and not let on that I in fact hadn't heard anything about half of the people in here.

"Please, come sit. Introductions can be made over breakfast, yes? Eugen will make sure you are well acquainted." Ionela, my grandmother, said in a cheery tone as she returned to the stove. Serghei looked me over one last time before he returned to his seat at the head of the table, watching as Eugen once again took me by the arm and led me to a seat next to his and a girl who seemed around my age.

"Ahem, yes," Eugen cleared his throat, grinning as he looked around the table. "We will start here, with the Stanislavs," he gestured to the girl I was sitting next to. "Ramona, my younger sister."

"Nice to meet you," Ramona said in a heavily accented voice, smiling (although not as brightly as Eugen) at me.

"Next," Eugen went on, not giving me a chance to respond as he quickly fired off names and pointed to who was who, "Victor Stanislav, my brother. Ovidiu and Oana, they are twins. Their younger sisters, also twins, are the babies over there, Florina and Felicia. Marcela, Luiza, Petronela, and their brother Lucian. Tiberiu, Radu, and their sister Silvia are Dalcas, but their mom is your aunt. Valentina, Tereza, Sorina, and their brothers Remus and that baby there, Traian."

I blinked, trying to process all the names and faces as fast as he was introducing them. And he wasn't even halfway through everyone in the room.

"Now these are the parents of all those lovely children. Ciprian and Sabina are my and Romona's parents, Ciprian being the oldest Stanislav sibling, followed by your father of course. Then there is Gavril who married Ruxandra, and we will get to her family here in a minute. Next is Fane, another Stanislav brother, and his wife Marina. Cătălina is the eldest Stanislav daughter, and that is her husband Răzvan Dalca. The last sibling is lovely Lenuța with her husband Simeon Lupei." Eugen finally took a breather and glanced at me. "Are you still with me?"

"Vaguely," I responded, nodding slightly. "Family's a really big deal here, isn't it?"

"Indeed. And big families are a, umm, big deal, as you say."

"I see that," I muttered as he started firing off again.

"The other people here are the Bălan family," he began. I knew before he named the man that he had to be Adrian's father. They had the same facial structure and long, crooked nose. "Iuliu and Larisa are the mother and father of the family, as Serghei and Ionela are of the Stanislavs. You know Adrian is the eldest sibling, followed by his sisters Nicoleta, Olga, and Ruxandra, who I mentioned earlier. The youngest, Mihăiță, who is actually close to our age, is the only one of the second generation in this home who is not married, although I am sure his time is near," Eugen said with a wink in the man's direction. The man, who also looked a lot like Adrian, minus the eyes and hair, smiled kindly at me.

"That is Nicoleta's husband, Beniamin Negrescu, and their son, Atanase. Olga's husband, Claudiu Vasile and their sons, Emilian and Gabi, and daughters, Denisa and Corina. And, of course, you have already met Ruxandra, Gavril, and their children. That concludes the long, drawn-out introductions of the Stanislav/ Bălan families."

"I feel like you need a round of applause for taking that head-on and dealing with it so effortlessly." I gave him an admiring look. "I don't think I would've made it through that in one piece."

"It helps that Eugen likes to hear himself speak," Mihăiță, who had a pleasantly deep voice, said laughing slightly.

"So I'm beginning to see," I agreed, giving the room a small smile. "Well, I'm guessing you all know who I am already, but I'm Mihaela Oana Stanislav, and I go by Mos for short. Umm, I'm twenty-three years old and, as you all can probably tell, my Romanian sucks and I sound very, very American. It's really nice to meet all of you, really." There were some chuckles and lots of smiles before the attention was finally drawn away from me when my grandmother and Cătălina, my aunt, started to load the table with the freshly cooked food. My stomach growled at the sight and smell of the food, making me realize that the last time I'd eaten anything had been over a day ago.

Once my grandmother and aunt had taken their seats at the table, everyone began to help themselves. I was just about to take a bite of something that looked like a chimichanga, but less Mexican and more Romanian, when my grandfather cleared his throat.

"While it is nice to finally have you here, Mihaela, we must get some important business taken care of before we can genuinely enjoy your stay."

Confused, I placed the food back on my plate and met his eyes. "What kind of business? Adrian didn't mention you guys needed anything specific—"

"Ah, well it would seem Adrian has forgotten a tradition that we hold dear and still follow to this day."

"Oh." Now I was really confused, because Adrian had spent weeks giving me a crash course of anything and everything our two families did because, as he kept reminding me, the head of his family and the head of mine were very traditional. "Well, I can try my best to help. What's going on?"

"We have waited five months, and I do not want to wait any longer. It is time we gave your father a proper funeral."

It was with those words that my head started spinning and my blood ran cold. I dropped my hands in my lap, trying to use the pain from digging my nails into my palms to ground me, but it didn't seem to be working, not this time. Not with something like this.

"Serghei, the girl just got here," I heard my grandmother say from a distance, "now really is not the—"

"We agreed to wait until she got here," I heard him reply, "and she is here, so now we will get it done. It has been too long as it is."

My heartrate picked up and felt like it was about to explode out of my chest while my breathing became ragged and shallow and my body started to shake. I had to get out of here. I couldn't handle this right now, I just couldn't.

"Mihaela, are you alright?" I heard Eugen ask as he placed his hand on my arm.

I stood up abruptly, wrenching my arm from his grasp. "I-I have t-to go," I managed to stutter before I made my way shakily to the doorway.

"You cannot just leave when I am talking to you, Mihaela," I heard my grandfather's stern voice call. But the only response I could manage to give him was to slam the front door shut as I took off running down the street.

A/N: I'm sorry this is late and overdue, but I'm hoping updates will soon become a more regular thing. I can't promise that, but I can hope! So thanks for staying with me and reading guys! It means a lot!

I hope all of you have a safe, wonderful, and happy New Year this weekend! And I'll see you all in 2017!

R&R?

Nike