Okay so things are gonna suck at first but they'll get better okay.
#$#$
"Now you wanna do this? I wanted to do it a month ago!"
"That's why I didn't wanna do it." Rowan muttered while handing her insurance card to the lady at the front desk "And Kuki talked me into it so blame her."
"We're gonna have enough to worry about without being unable to plan on what we're having."
"Eh everything is gender neutral if you don't give a shit." Rowan sat down with Ace next to her and looked at her stomach "I was doing so damn good in life and now I can't even go to college..."
Ace turned to her "Who says you can't go to college? Plenty of moms go to college."
Rowan glared at him "Are you gonna stop jumping on buses that go across the country to audition for some 16 bucks per hour hair gel commercial and raise this baby? No, you wanna be an actor and I know for a fact that you'll just take the baby with you and my child is not traveling cross country before they even know what travel means."
"Well you wanna go study in Egypt, nothing like your child not even knowing what country they're from."
"It's gonna be part Egyptian so at least that would make sense!"
"Why are you acting like you're gonna be all alone in this, if I didn't care I wouldn't be here!"
"Rowan?"
The two teens stopped fighting and looked towards the nurse who called her, Rowan grabbed her backpack and walked towards the nurse, Ace continued sitting.
"Well?"
"Well what?"
Rowan groaned and grabbed his hand "This is your fault too so get in here!"
#$#$#
"No ma'am, you do need you mom's consent to get pierced. Yes even a nose piercing. I understand it's a simple thing but you're only 17 so either wait 4 months or get your parent's permission. Sorry ma'am."
Duke hung up the phone and turned to his boss James "The young ones who think they can sneak the whole 'under 18' thing past us" he shook his head "It never gets old."
James laughed "That girl has called 4 times today, that's why I let you pick up the phone."
The door bell jingled and Duke turned to greet the customer "Hel-" he froze as Daniella Tresbacher stood and smiled at him.
"Hi Duke. Nice to see you out of prison."
James looked between the two and sighed "Maybe you should take your break now?"
# #
"What the fuck are you doing here?!" Duke yelled while standing behind the shop with Daniella "Why are you calling Sonia or going anywhere near Sadie's shop?!"
"Maybe I missed my family?"
Duke scoffed "Oh cry me a fucking river Dani! You had me almost locked up for rape! What the fuck is your problem?!"
Daniella just rolled her eyes "Duke you're such a fucking victim! 'I was locked up for manslaughter but I didn't kill anyone' 'I only joined a heist group because I was homeless and 17' 'I spent all these years in prison away from my daughter cuz of Dani' cry ME a fucking river Duke!"
"You beat me, you verbally and physically abused me! You threatened Sadie!"
"She was trying to take my daughter away, the exact same thing you and that European stripper you're fucking are trying to do!"
"You are never ever setting foot near Sonia! I'll protect her from you if it kills me Dani!"
Duke turned around to walk back into the shop. "You can't stop her from tracking me down herself Duke."
"Stay the fuck out of my life Daniella!"
# #
The door to the Ajaya house slammed open and Duke stormed in, Doug Ajaya lowered his book and looked at Duke with a raised eyebrow. "Can you treat my door nicely please? I know your parents taught you manners."
"Dougie listen, Dani is back in town!"
Doug dropped the book "SHE'S WHAT?!"
"Sonia mentioned it and I tried to ignore it like an idiot but she just showed up at work!"
Doug groaned "Sadie is gonna throw a fit!" He ran to the landline and dialed a number really quickly "Hey mom, yeah, yeah, LISTEN I have a problem! Yeah...yeah...okay so Daniella is back in town! Daniella...Sonia's mom? NO Sonia's REAL mom! You have a state database right? YES I know it's illegal! You've done it before! Okay...yeah call me when you get there then. Love you too." He hung up and turned to Duke "She's out of prison?!"
"Isn't that what you just called her about?"
"Yeah but that's cuz I wanna know if a charge got dropped or what...she was in there for 15 years supposedly so she should still be there!"
"Well I got my manslaughter cut from life to 7 years so maybe same with her? I haven't exactly kept up on it."
"Who's Daniella?" Seth walked in the living room with his phone in front of his face.
"Uh..." Duke looked at Doug "Your dad can tell you...BYE!" He rushed out the front door leaving the two Ajaya's behind. Doug sighed and fell onto the couch.
"Do me a favor Seth...don't mention this to your mom?"
Seth shrugged and sat next to his dad "I'm bisexual."
Doug froze, then sat up slowly and looked at Seth "Okay...congrats?"
Seth sighed "For what?"
"I don't know man! What do you want me to say? I've always known that!"
Seth smiled and looked up from his phone "That's what I've heard, just figured I should 'come out' at some point."
"Did you tell Sadie yet?"
"No, but I will, I don't think she'll react badly...probably just cry all over me or something annoying."
# #
"Where have you been? I've been waiting for 45 minutes!"
Ace sighed "Sorry, Kuki talked Rowan into finding out the sex of the baby and I found out about that 5 minutes before we needed to leave for the hospital." Ace sat on the bench next to her "Although you ditched me yesterday to go dress shopping."
"With Natalie and Savannah."
"Oh okay...I would also ditch me to be around Savannah Drilovsky so that's fair. Anyway, my teacher from my drama class wanted to meet you. I figured we could meet at Cas Cooks."
"Okay...why does she wanna meet me? Lee is the actor not me..."
"I don't know, just told me she wanted to meet you specifically when I said I knew you."
# #
"Hey Ms. Tresbacher, this is Sonia that you wanted to meet."
Sonia froze and stared at the lady in the booth in front of her, she had long red hair and violet eyes and they looked alike.
"Mom?"
Ace froze too and looked at Sonia "Holy plot twist."
Daniella stood up and walked over to Sonia "Hello sweetie! I've missed you! Look at you, you're all grown up!"
Sonia just continued to stare at Daniella while the women hugged her, Ace also stood there in shock for a second before wandering off towards the bar. "I think I'm gonna go sit over here..."
Sonia finally reacted and pulled away, sitting in the booth. Daniella sat across from her.
"God you're so beautiful, I knew you would be when you were a baby."
"Why did you pierce my ears when I was 8 months?"
Dani froze "What?"
Sonia just stared at her with a blank face before pushing her hair back and showing off her ears "I had to have them removed and repierced when I was 10 because they hurt so much. Why did you pierce them when Sadie and daddy said no."
Daniella laughed "Because you looked cute with them? Really Sonia, we haven't seen each other in almost 9 years, can we be mommy and daughter for a bit?"
"What in the fuck?"
The turned to see Duke had just walked through the door with Sadie, Sadie was white as snow and staring in shock at Daniella and Duke looked ready to kill.
"Dani what the fuck did I say?!"
"What the fuck did I say?! I told you I was going to see her!"
Cece walked into the dining room with Bo and immediately ran over to the Witherspoon clan "What is going on?!"
Dani rolled her eyes "Get your pet whore out of here Duke!"
"Hey! Shut the hell up Daniella!" Duke yelled stepping closer to her, Sonia pushed herself in the middle of the two just as Dani reached out to slap Duke, smacking Sonia instead almost knocking her over, Duke caught her while Sadie shoved between them and Dani.
"What the hell is wrong with you Daniella!?"
"Sonia honey I didn't mean to hit you I meant to hit this asshole!"
Sonia glared at her mom while Duke tried to shove past Sadie and Cece. "How dare you lay hands on my kid! What the fuck is wrong with you!?"
Bo came back from the kitchen with Nikki and they both walked over to the fighting group.
"Guys please get the fuck out!" Bo yelled
Cece and Sadie grabbed Duke and pulled him towards the bar "Duke calm the hell down!" Cece yelled "Sonia's fine!"
Dani walked towards the front door and turned back around to look at Sonia.
"Honey I'm sorry it went this way, I'll be in touch."
Sonia hardly noticed because she was trying to calm her dad down.
"Daddy I'm fine! I swear! Calm down!"
"Duke they're gonna cart you back to prison if you don't calm the fuck down!" Bo yelled from behind the bar "Now I gotta comp all this shit cuz you all had to cause a scene."
Duke took some deep breaths into Cece's shoulder and then hugged Sonia. "I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry she's like that and that you got hit."
Sonia hugged her father and buried her face in his shoulder. "I know, it's not your fault, I didn't know what to do when I saw her..."
Sadie sighed and hugged both of them. "Why don't we all three head back to the house before she comes back and starts more trouble?"
"Yes please!" Bo yelled from the kitchen.
#
"Kinda epic, not gonna lie." Harvey muttered while looking at Sonia with Paddy holding ice to her cheek "I'm not the only one who has been slapped by a parent anymore so that's cool."
"Harvey can you not be a dick for 5 seconds?" Paddy asked while glaring at his friend.
"No, not really."
Natalie came stomping in the room on the phone, screaming in Polish, a scared looking Tommy trailing behind her. Sonia sighed "Look what I'm descended from, how can my dad even look at me?"
Lee grabbed her hand "You're not your mom, I'm not my mom, Paddy isn't his mom."
"Unfortunately." Paddy muttered
"Your dad loves you, your mom does too in a creepy possessive way that isn't healthy love."
"You trying to be a therapist? You have to actually talk to people to do that Lee." Tina said from the chair next to Paddy.
"Therapists listen better than they talk Tina." Lee sneered back "Who asked you anyway? The therapist your parents never sent you to?"
Tina glared at him "Least I like my parents."
"Least my parents like me."
"Ok! Got it thank you!" Paddy yelled trying to shut everyone up "Sonia has had a bad day." He looked at Natalie who was still yelling into the phone in Polish. "And Natalie is obviously busy with some poor Polish soul who may or may not be related to her."
Natalie rolled her eyes and hung up "Fuck you too Tatra."
Tommy backed away from her "So...should I run so I don't die?"
Natalie scoffed "I'm not mad at you Thomas. Tatra says Cece can handle herself so he isn't getting on a plane, yet he's sending Zoe?"
"You don't think Cece can handle herself?" Harvey asked
"Oh she'll kill a bitch, but the issue is so will Duke, and Tatra doesn't seem to understand how risky of a position Duke is in with his freedom."
Sonia looked at the ground "I really hope daddy doesn't go back to prison."
Natalie sighed and crouched in front of her "Listen, I know I said Tatra was sending Zoe like that's a bad thing, but Zoe knows how to avoid prison and is married to Peter who knows everything. Peter is deployed but when he gets back next month he can come help out if your mom is still causing issues. For now he has Cece, and Duke can defend himself anyway."
Harvey crouched next to her "And we're here to make sure you're happy."
Sonia smiled at them "Leighton is the only one missing." Tina scoffed "She hasn't left yet has she?"
Paddy sighed "No, she just has a bunch of packing today, tell you what, we're supposed to go hiking near The Point later today, why don't you come. We can have a picnic."
The blonde giggled and hugged him "Yes please! I could use some exercise." She hugged Natalie next "I love your family, thank you so much for helping my dad."
"Pretty sure eventually he'll be my uncle so..."
Sonia gasped "WE COULD BE COUSINS!"
Natalie stood up "Now is time for me to leave cuz I can feel more hugging coming on, you coming McKenzie?"
"Absolutely."
Takes me 5 years to write a chapter I know, sorry about that, lots has happened so...anyway...next chapter continues the 2X5 shit and PROM