Hey guys! Thanx for all the great reviews and I just wanna thank Lotus-Blossom-Arnoweedfor the evil stalker plot. Except I used it on a different character for chapter 5. But you will be my inspiration for the rest of the story. Thanks again guys. Hope you like chapter 7!
Disclaimer – I only own all the new characters such as the Slater brothers and the de Silva kids and the plot! The rest is Meg Cabot's.
The next day, I woke up bright and early…well actually; I couldn't get to sleep 'coz I was so happy. I had a shower and put on my favourite outfit. My black skinny jeans, brown Rmk flat boots, red, puffy sleeved bolero and a black singlet with my dog tag around my neck reading CANCER, my star sign. I straightened my hair and made my face up.
No one could wreck my second good mood day in a week. Now that was a record. I'm always too pissed at a ghost or Sister Ernestine to notice what a lovely day it is around me. It was 9:00am on a Saturday. I walked downstairs singing, yet again.
"You ain't got to buy nothing
It's not what I want
Baby it's you
We don't have to go nowhere
Its not what I want
Baby it's you
It's not for what you got
Cause I know you got a lot
No matter what you do
You always gettin' hot
It's You,
It's You
Baby all I want is you, yeah" Why am I singing Jojo? God, I think I am officially crazy. Oh well. Hmmmm! What's cooking? Smells like pancakes. We never have pancakes.
I walked into the kitchen where dad was cooking. I love it when Dad cooks. I mean, Mum makes a mean bowl of noodles but Dad has that special cooking touch.
"Morning, Daddy." I smiled at him. "That smells good. What's up?"
"You look dressed up. Remember you're grounded for a week. You're not going anywhere." He said. That's right. Dang it!
"Well, what am I going to do today? Can I have someone over?" I asked, thinking I could have Jordo over and we could swim in the pool and I could wear my gorgeous new bikini.
"I know who you want over and no. Even if it was Melanie or Hilary." He replied. Dang it! "You can help me today. I want to paint the shed."
"You want me to paint. In this?" I gestured to my black and red ensemble, horrified.
"Get changed. We have a lot to do."
"Speaking of a lot to do, is Morgan up yet? Or Mum? How about Cam? We need to have a family meeting later today." I informed him.
"Your mother had a client. She'll be back by lunch. Morgan isn't up yet (yeah whatever.) and Cameron is working." It's sometimes a bonus when your brother works at Cold Rock ice creamery. You get 10 discounts!
"Okey dokey. Are those ready yet?" I asked, meaning the pancakes.
"Here." He placed a stack of three on the table. I got the syrup and smothered the pancakes in it. I then went to the freezer and took out the ice cream and put a huge dollop onto my pancakes. YUMMY!!! What? I know. It's so bad for me, but like I said, we never get pancakes. I want to make the most of it. Dad was watching me in disgust. I was half way through my pancakes when Dad said
"Do you know how much fat that is? It will clog up your arteries and you could have a heart attack." Gosh, sometimes there's a downside to your Dad being a doctor.
"Do you know that it's rude to watch people eat?" I know. He's my father, I should respect him blahdi blah blah. But then he gave me this whole lecture on how it digests and becomes fat. I suddenly wasn't hungry anymore and slid my plate away from me. He took it and ate the rest. I HATE it when he does that.
"Dad!" I exclaimed. He smiled. I scrunched my napkin up and threw it at him. But he dodged it. He always does. He does that every time. He gives us this big health lecture, very graphic and then when he talks us out of eating our food, he eats it himself. "Hypocrite! Why do you do that?" I asked him.
"Because I'm hungry. And whatever you don't want is too good to waste." He answered.
"It wouldn't be wasted if you wouldn't talk us out of it." Then I took my fork, walked over to him and took the last piece of pancake. Yummy!
"Hey! Well now that you have finished, get changed! And I'd wipe that face paint off. It's rather hot today."
"Dad, it's called make-up and I was not finished, you just stole it from me. Can you please make me more?" I asked, with puppy dog eyes.
"There's some more here. And no more ice cream!" He handed me another plate of three.
"Fine!" I took the plate as he kissed my forehead and headed to the backyard. This time I had lemon juice and sugar on my pancakes. To die for! I finished my pancakes and juice and headed back upstairs. I went into my room and changed into a yellow pair of shorts with the scrunch look pocket. I also put on a blue, paint covered shirt which went down to my knees like a dress. Underneath my painting clothes I put on a bikini so that after I finished I could take a quick dip. Dad said I'm a champion painter because I'm so fussy and get all the cracks and crevices. I only do the cracks because he misses them. Ok, so that sounds fussy, but then the jobs only half done and so it wouldn't look as good as it could. Anyway I put on some yellow flip flops, grabbed a cap and went down to the backyard. Dad had the paint ready and waiting.
"Right. The colour today is…"
"White?" I said. Dad likes to paint everything white.
"How'd you guess?" Anyway, we painted all day until like 1pm. 4 hours. I was SO sore. It was really hot so I had a dip in the pool, which was heavenly and soothing. I finished and went back upstairs to change. While I was coming up the stairs I ran into Morgan.
"Where have you been today?"
"I was…" She tried
"Actually, you know what? I don't want to know. Mum should be home soon so we can talk about mediating." I told her.
"Well, there's nothing much to say! Zach said we should take a break!" she cried.
"Oh…well it's good though. Now you can have a live boyfriend" I said to make her feel better.
"I don't want a live boyfriend! I just want Zach! I lov-"
"Who's Zach, Morgan?" Dad was at the bottom of the stairs. "You two, in the kitchen. NOW!" He said. Oh great! Morgan groaned. We went down and found Mum and Dad in the kitchen and boy, did they look angry!
"Morgan, who's Zach?"
"Hi mum-" I tried.
"Have you been sneaking boys into your room because if you have-" Dad said. But Morgs cut in.
"It's not that! Well, I mean I can't help sneaking him in because…well Mum, Dad I need to tell you something." They looked at her quizzically.
"Yes…?" Mum urged.
"Well, its hard for me to tell you-"
"Oh, Morgan just tell them!" I said, shortly.
"Tell us wha-"
"I see dead people!" She said extremely fast.
"What?" Dad said.
"I can too…" I added.
"Well I knew you could, but-" He said.
"Mum! You told Dad about my secret!"
"Honey, It's not much of a secret, you're father's a mediator too." She told me.
"Really?"
"Well, actually, he's an ex-ghost" She told Morgan and me. Dad ran his hand through his hair and swore in Spanish.
"Querida, I thought we weren't going to tell them that story." He said with gritted teeth.
"Well, why not? Now that we're a big mediating family-"
"Is Cam a mediator?" I interrupted.
"Well…actually, I don't know" Mum said. She looked at Dad. He shrugged.
"So we're almost a big mediating family" Morgan corrected Mum.
"Yes. Anyway, Jesse, I think they have a right to know. They're going to find out sooner or later." She said.
"I would have preferred later." He replied.
"Jesse…" She looked at him like he was a child.
"Well, we have to tell them now, don't we? Now that you told them, they're going to be curious." Dad replied.
"Yes, we are curious. Please tell us how that's even possible." -Morgan
"What's possible?" Dad asked, being a loser.
"You know very well what!" I said.
"Ok…It all started when Susannah was sixteen…" And he told us the story, Mum coming in at times. He told us about the day Mum went back in time with Paul Slater and saved Dad from being murdered by this freak, Diego, who was in love with Maria de Silva, Dad's cousin, but Dad was meant to marry Maria (EWWW!) but Dad wasn't happy after he found out what a skank Maria was and wanted to break it off but was murdered by Diego, and so never made the wedding and the family thought he was too chicken to call it off and so Maria got what she wanted until Mum saved him. (A/n etc. you know the story) I was almost crying by the end of it. That's so sweet! Like a fairytale! I hope Jordo's that sweet to me. But then something occurred to me.
"So, were you in love back then? Even though he was a ghost and no one could see him." I was curious because that's exactly what Morgan's going through.
"Yes. We couldn't stand to be apart. Even if I didn't think we had a future together. But see how wrong we were. We had you girls and Cameron. That was a miracle." She wiped a tear away.
"Dad, about the boy sneaking into my room…It's not really like that. I mean, well because, it's like your story." Suddenly, a dark haired boy who looked a lot like Zach Efron actually, materialized beside her. I guessed this was Zach. That's funny because they are both Zachs. I'd laugh if his name was Zach Efron.
"Morgan? Who's this?" Dad asked. She turned to look at Zach then looked at Mum and then back to Dad.
"Dad, this is-" but she was interrupted. Interrupting is quite a frequent thing in our house. Aurora materialized beside me.
"Zach? Oh My God!" She ran and hugged him. He hugged her back. "Are you dead too?"
"Wait, you two know each other?" I asked.
"Well, yeah! This is Tatiana's brother! But how did you die?" She turned to him.
"We'll discuss that later. Morgan, Amelia, explanation please."
"Oh, yes Dad. Um, well, you see Zach is my boy-"
"Ex-boyfriend." He finished for her. She looked at him with teary eyes. She sniffled and said "Ex-boyfriend. Zach, these are my parents Susannah and Jesse."
"Pleased to meet you." I cleared my throat.
"Oh, yeah and this is my sister Milly" I shook his hand and smiled.
"Hi, I remember you from Friday."
"Yes…" I replied. Dad and Mum now looked at me curiously.
"Aurora, I don't believe you've met Mum and Dad" She smiled at them.
"Hello." She said to them.
"Yes, um, Amelia who's this now?" Mum asked.
"Aurora showed up in my room last Monday and ever since then we kind of became friends. I know, she's a ghost and all but she's actually not that bad. Besides, you were in love with a ghost so I don't really see the problem." I said to them.
"Honey, the problem is that Aurora will need to move on eventually." Mum told me.
"How come dad didn't move on eventually?" I asked.
"Well you're father was a special case."
"Who's to say Aurora isn't?" I tried her.
"Milly, You're father had a reason to stay, Aurora needs a reason to go. She died and is here for a reason. That reason being to move on. Dad was different because we were destined to be together just like Aurora is destined to find why she's still here so she can move on. Same with Zach." She told me.
"Mum, Zach's not going to move on because we are also destined to be together." Morgan tried.
"No, Morgan. We're not." Zach told her. "I tried to tell you. I know why I'm here. I was at a party and I died but I don't know how. I am determined to find out. And when I do I will probably move on. I know you're upset about us breaking up, but it's for the best."
"Was that the one at your place like three weeks ago or whatever?" Aurora said.
"Yeah, you too?" He asked.
"Yes! OMG! I want to find out too. Milly said she was gonna help me. Maybe you could come too! We were going to visit Tati on Monday after school. Maybe you should come." She said.
"Wait a minute. Amelia's not going anywhere after school. She's going to come straight home and do her school work."
"Oh Dad!"
"No, Amelia. You're grounded remember?"
"But Dad this is important!"
"I know. That is why your mother will do it and teach Morgan a few things."
"Um, Jesse about that. I was thinking that now that Slater's in town, maybe we could…?"
"Absolutely not!" He said, immediately.
"Oh, Jesse! I thought you were over that. It was like 20 years ago!" She said, annoyed.
"I am, but we don't know what he's like nowadays. He could have become even more of an abomination. As he is the Spawn of Satan, his sons could be the next generation of Satan's Spawn, as you would say." He smiled at her.
"Jesse!" She smiled back. Um, ok...
"I will not allow Paul Slater to teach my daughters mediation! It is out of the question! I was thinking Father Dominic could teach them a few things."
"Jesse. Father Dominic? He knows stuff but not enough. Paul Slater taught me a lot. I was very grateful apart from all the seducing. I only want the best for our girls." She replied.
"I don't-" but I interrupted. I noticed that Zach and Aur had dematerialized.
"Why don't we visit Paul Slater? We can find out what he's really like nowadays! Don't you think Morgan?" I urged.
"Absolutely! That'd be great!" She answered.
"I agree with the girls. I think we'd have a blast catching up. Jesse?"
"Fine! But just so you know, you will owe me quite a lot." He grinned mischievously. Um, EWWW!!!
"Of course, darling husband, love of my life!"
OMG! I just realized how long this chappy was! Way longer than any of the others. Hope you liked it! Please review!