Unbeknownst to Dorian, the rest of the day at Hollywood Studios was going rather smoothly. After the minor catastrophe of the morning, the Llanview crew decided to hide out for a bit, get into some A/C, and do something a little more kid friendly. The 'Disney Junior – Live on Stage' show was the perfect thing. The toddlers laughed and played and danced with their favorite Disney Junior characters while the adults either danced with their babies in their arms, or just sat back and enjoyed watching the little ones have a blast.
"I love seeing all the little cousin's all playing together." Vicki leaned over and said to Blair as she watched Liam and Ryder dancing and bouncing with Hope.
"It is really sweet. We need to make sure it lasts past this vacation." Blair said, also enjoying seeing the kids getting along.
Before they knew it, the half hour show was over, and the family was thrust back into the heat, ready for their next adventure.
"So who's headed where?" Ford asked as he put Ryder back in his stroller.
"Well, I think me and the girls are finally going to hit the Rock 'n' Roller Coaster." Dani said, looking over at Langston and Starr who both agreed.
Tomas put his hands on both Jack and Sam's shoulders. "And I think Sam is going to explode if he doesn't become a Jedi today, so I'm going to take these two guys and head over to the Star Wars area. Anyone else want to join us?"
"We do!" Cole, Markko, and Matthew all raised their hands, following Tomas and the others towards the Star Wars ride.
"Wait, if we're both going on rides, who's taking Hope?" Starr asked Cole.
Before Cole could answer, Natalie piped in. "Jess and I were actually going to take the boys and Bree to do Toy Story Midway if Hope wanted to tag along."
Starr knelt down next to her daughter. "Do you want to go with Auntie Natty and Liam, Ryder, and Bree to play Toy Story games?"
Hope nodded furiously with a huge smile on her face.
"Guess that settles it. You guys have fun!" Starr said as everyone headed in their respective directions.
The rest of the family basically split up towards two main attractions. The ladies: Vicki, Nora, Tea, Blair, Destiny, Vivian, and Phylicia all headed towards the 'American Idol Experience' show while the rest of the guys: John, Ford, Richard, Shaun, Clint and Bo, as well as little Drew and J.J. all headed toward the 'Lights Motors Action! Stunt Show'.
"This is so cool!" Shaun yelled excitedly, watching a car drive backwards through a flaming hoop.
"It really is. Even my little grandson seems to being loving it." Bo said, watching Drew giggle and bounce on his lap as they watched a motorcycle go off a jump.
"Looks like he's becoming quite the Buchanan boy." Clint laughed.
"Yeah, little J.J. is loving it too." John said, watching the little one have the same reaction as Drew.
Ford nudged John. "If only our boys were this into cars."
John leaned over and said to Ford, "I know. I swear they spend way too much time with their moms."
The two men laughed as they continued to get pumped up during the show.
Richard loved seeing all of the men in the family bonding over action vehicles. Too bad it wasn't all the men in the family.
"It's just not the same without David. I know how much he wanted to come see this."
"Who said I was going to miss it?!" The band of boys heard a familiar voice behind them. David had been sitting just behind them the entire time (well almost the entire time, he had been about two minutes late and only missed the first stunt).
"David!" All of the guys cheered.
"So the old ball and chain finally cut you loose?" Clint asked.
"More or less." David explained as he took an empty seat next to his dad. "She still feels bad about the whole shoe debacle, which according to the text she just got they found the shoe and some other kid's cell phone, so it was actually kind of a good thing, and the Tower of Terror is back up and running."
"Vickers, get to the point?" Clint rolled his eyes.
"Dorian decided to stay back at the hotel for a few to change her outfit and her shoes and to let you guys have a good day without her because she thinks she is spoiling your vacation." David added.
"Nonsense." Richard said. "Sure we had some issues this morning, but what's a family get together without a little family drama every once in a while."
"He's right. I don't know how the girls feel, but you tell Dorian that all of us guys would love to have her join us again whenever she feels up to it." Bo added.
David smiled and took out his phone to text Dorian. "Aww, thanks Paw. You're the best!"
Once he sent the text he went back to enjoying the show with his fellow boys in the family. He was usually kind of the outcast, so it was nice to be able to feel like he belonged, even if was only for a short time.
The Llanview ladies were all sitting outside near Echo Lake in the center of the park when the rest of the smaller groups began to rejoin them.
"Hey ladies! How was your show?" Bo asked.
None of them could contain their excitement, so they all tried talking at once.
"Ok, ok, one at a time!" Shaun tried to calm the excited group.
"It was amazing." Phylicia said, taking her grandson from Bo.
Vicki added, "Yeah, at first we thought it was just going to be people from the park performing, so we thought it would be fun if all of us auditioned. Turns out half of us have some pretty good talents."
"Destiny, Blair, and Tea all got chosen to go and perform, along with a few other people." Nora added, "And I must say our girls did the best out of everyone."
"Ok now you're just being nice." Tea said, slightly blushing. "We did alright."
Destiny added in her usual sassy attitude, "I don't know what you're talking about. We did better than alright, we kicked butt!"
"Amen sister!" Blair high-fived the young girl.
Clint took a seat on the half wall surrounding the lake, next to his wife. "So it sounds like a really great time."
"It gets even better!" Destiny shouted excitedly.
By now, the young guys had also rejoined the group.
"How? Did they have like celebrity judges or something?" Markko asked.
"Not exactly." Vicki explained. "Remember how I said we thought it was just going to be people from the park performing…"
Before Vicki could finish, Destiny excitedly jumped in. "NEW KIDS AND BACKSTREET BOYS PERFORMED!"
"WHAT?!" Dani, who had just come back with the girls from Rock 'n' Roller Coaster, exclaimed.
"Yeah, after all of us performed, the host of the show said they had a special treat for the performers and the audience. Next thing we know New Kids and Backstreet come onstage and perform their new single 'Don't Turn Out the Lights'." Nora said.
Blair adds in as Tomas takes a seat next to her, "And then they pull all the performers out on stage with them to perform some classics. They had the entire theater dancing and singing along by the end of it."
Dani and the other young girls took a seat near Destiny.
"Des, I'm so jealous! You got to sing with Backstreet Boys and New Kids on the Block!" Dani was happy for her best friend.
"That must have been amazing." Langston said.
"It was! I mean who else gets to belt out 'I Want It That Way' with the band who wrote the freakin song?" Destiny still couldn't believe what had happened.
The ladies finally decided to let the other groups have the spotlight for a moment.
"Ok, enough about our adventures, what about yours? Girls, how was the Rock 'n' Roller Coaster?" Phylicia asked.
Dani, Langston, and Starr all looked at each other at the same time and smiled. They said in unison, "It was crazy!"
"But in a really good way!" Dani added.
"Probably my favorite ride of the whole trip so far." Starr said. She took her daughter into her lap. "And did you have fun playing Toy Story games with your cousins, princess?"
Hope nodded excitedly with a huge smile on her face.
"I'll say!" Natalie said.
"Hope and Bree teamed up and kicked our butts." Jess laughed.
Cole high-fived his daughter, "Great job, my big girl!"
"And speaking of kicking butts…" Jack jumped into the conversation. "My pretty cool little bro here kicked Darth Vader's butt during Jedi training."
"They said I was a real Jedi!" Sam exclaimed. He was very proud of himself.
Blair gave her son a side hug. "Sounds like you had an awesome time little man."
Sam nodded happily.
"And he was the youngest and least scared person once we got on the ride." Tomas said, running his hand through the boy's hair.
Matthew nodded in agreement. "Yeah, even I got a little nervous, but this kid held it together."
"You, nervous, come on?" Destiny poked fun at Matthew.
"I'm serious. I was expecting a roller coaster or something, but this was way more immersive than any of us thought."
"Yeah, I almost jumped too when I thought we were going to crash into that asteroid." Markko added.
Jess and Natalie looked over at their guys.
"Speaking of crashes…" Jess started.
Natalie finished her sentence, "How was your crash derby thing?"
Ford chuckled. "Oh, you know…a few speeding motorcycles, some cars doing flips and jumps through rings of fire."
"Nothing we haven't seen on the force before." John finished. Both men downplayed how fun and action packed it actually was.
Clint added, putting a hand on David's shoulder, "And we even picked up this goof while we were there."
Everyone was happy to have David back with the group. As much as they all didn't want to admit it, the family trip was not the same without him.
"Yeah they let me join in on their manly adventure. It was great!" David smiled.
"Is Aunt Dorian still back at the hotel?" Blair asked.
"Yes. She wanted me to tell you all that she's very sorry about this morning. She feels simply terrible. Before she sent me back here she said something about having a surprise for us all later as her way of apologizing. She said she would give us the details at dinner. She didn't even tell me and she tells me everything."
Now everyone was wondering what the surprise was. They couldn't wait to find out, but first they still had the rest of the day to ride a few more rides before dinner. They broke up into a totally different set of smaller groups from earlier and hit the last couple of big rides. Before they knew it they were all enjoying pizza and pasta at Mama Melrose's, still all waiting for Dorian to spill her big secret.
As everyone got refills on their drinks, Dorian stood up and raised her glass.
"First, I would like to raise a toast…to family. It's the end of day two and nobody has tried to kill each other yet. Even after the shoe incident from this morning, which I deeply regret causing and apologize for, you have proven that this family sticks together and that nothing will tear us apart. So here's to you!"
"Here Here!" Everyone raised their glasses in response.
Jack, being his usual slightly obnoxious self, decided to address the elephant in the room first. "Ok, ok, enough with the nice toast. What is this special surprise that you have planned?"
Everyone gave him an annoyed look at first, but they also agreed with him. They wanted to know what Dorian had up her sleeve.
"Well, if you must know, after dinner we are heading back to the Magic Kingdom. And that is all I am going to tell you." Dorian said sternly, not wanting to give too much of her surprise away.
