Maddie strolled down the path through a park close to her house. Daphne was running ahead and Rayna and Teddy were behind her. Maddie looked back to see them holding hands and talking to each other softly. Unwilling to ruin their moment, she sprinted ahead to catch up with her sister.
When Daphne had finally found a good spot, the family laid out a checkered blanket and sat down. Maddie grabbed the picnic basket from Teddy and took out the sandwiches Rayna had made that morning. While they ate they talked and laughed. Teddy put his arm around Rayna and the girls cuddled against them, smiling.
"BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!"
Maddie's alarm clock woke her out of her happy dream, and as soon as she was fully conscious, and the events of the previous days came to her, her mood changed drastically.
Two days ago her parents had told her they were getting a divorce. Yesterday, her mother had told her that the man she had grown up thinking of as her father really wasn't. And today, she had to go to school and bear with everyone asking her whether the gossip about her parents was true. Having the queen of country music as a mother and the mayor of Nashville as a dad wasn't always that great.
Maddie swung her legs out of bed and pulled on a pair of jeans. She grabbed a t-shirt from her drawer, not caring what it looked like, and headed down the stairs.
When she came into the kitchen she just caught the end of Rayna saying something to her dad in a furious voice. They stared at each other for a moment before realizing that their daughter was there, then they both looked down.
Rayna broke the silence. "Get some breakfast, honey, your Dad's going to drive you to school"
Half an hour later, they were in the school parking lot. Daphne leaned over to hug Teddie. Maddie just jumped out and waved.
"See you tonight, girls" He said out the open door.
"Bye, Dad." The girls said in unison.
Two of Maddie's best friends, Kayla and Isabelle, were close to the old tree where they usually stood before school.
"Maddie, where were you yesterday?" asked Isabelle.
"I heard about your parents on the news yesterday? Is it true?" asked Kayla.
This was going to be a long day.
The classes were terrible. The teachers talked on and on but Maddie's mind was only on one thing. She had to ask them to repeat questions several times because her thoughts had drifted. For once, recesses were not enjoyable, as she was constantly being crowded by kids who wanted to know what was going on in her family. No one else gets this much attention when their parents split up, thought Maddie. They don't care about me, they just want the gossip.
When Daphne came up to Maddie again, she was in tears. Maddie pulled her sister out of the crowd and to somewhere quiet.
"Why do people keep asking me these stupid questions, Maddie? I feel crowded and I don't even know the answer to most of them. Ryan told me Mommy was cheating on Daddy. Is it true, Maddie?"
"I don't know, but I think if there was anything we needed to know, Mom and Dad would tell us. Just ignore what everyone's saying, they don't know what they're talking about."
Maddie kept her sister close for the rest of the day, and when the end came, she was more than grateful. But she couldn't wish her time away too fast, because tomorrow Rayna would leave on tour again, and without a husband waiting for her loyaly, who knew when she would be back to visit.
A/N Thanks for reading! I'll try to have a new chapter up tomorrow but I'm not sure what the episode will be like and how it will fit, so I'll see how it goes from there.