Nero and Kyrie have a daughter. Nero leaves when his daughter turns five and now his kid is having a kid. Aria refuses to tell her mom but maybe it'll be easier to confide in someone close enough to her but who really can't judge; like the dad that left.
Disclaimer: I own nothing but the storyline and a few OCs.
Enjoy!
Chapter 11
I showed up at Lady and Trish's apartment around seven thirty and pressed the worn, old buzzer to gain entrance to the dying complex.
I heard a crackling sound as Lady grabbed for the intercom. "Just a sec," she scrambled, and I heard a five-year-old screech and giggle. A minutes or so later she came back on, "Apartment one sixteen, who is it?"
I pressed the button and said, "It's Aria. Hey, what's going o–" but I was cut off by a bzztfollowed by the click of the unlocking door.
I entered the complex and made my way to their apartment. I knocked and heard Trish yell, "No, Ken get back here! Kenneth, come over here right now!" I heard the boy from earlier giggle again and next I know he's opened the door.
"Who're you?" the boy asks poking at my stomach, "And why're you so fat?" he said innocently.
I smiled at him, bent down, and ruffled his hair, "I'm gonna have a baby soon." I explained kindly.
"Oh . . . " he said, realization and understanding painted on his face and in his voice. He turned to Trish and hugged her legs.
"Okay Kenny, it's bedtime now, go brush your teeth and get in bed. Mama or I'll come in and read you a story in a few.
"Mama?" I asked under my breath. The little platinum blonde ran to what I assumed was his room and I asked, "Lady has a kid?"
Lady opened her mouth, unsure of whether she should talk or not. But Trish took over for her. "Not exactly," the blonde said. "That was Kenneth, myson."
An awkward silence befell the musty old living room; none of us knew what to say. It was short lived, however, as Trish made her way to me, gestured, and said, "Come in," closing the old yellowy door behind me.
I walked around taking in the decaying room. The walls were yellowing and water stained. The doors were dark brown, but worn wood. The carpet was tanned and had all kinds of unidentifiable and permanent stains in it. The nylon tile on the kitchen floor was a browning white and baby blue checkerboard pattern and the whole room looked like it was pulled straight from the seventies. Or at least as if the seventies were its prime. Lady came back from tucking Kenny in and pulled me out my reverie by saying, "So . . . not be rude, you know you're always welcome here, but why, exactly, areyou here?"
I turned to face them, a smirk playing on my lips as I strutted over to a beat up old recliner, regaining my focus and purpose, "We did it," I announced and watched as Lady and Trish exchanged confused glances, "and I may need a place to stay tonight because theymay do it," I added stifling a laugh. Lady's and Trish's eyes' grew wide and we all burst into victorious laughter.
We talked and laughed about my dad and Dante for a while, but I couldn't help but feel like the conversation from earlier was left unfinished, so I decided to bring it up again, and not a moment too soon because at around ten o'clock, just as I opened my mouth to speak, Kenny came running into the living room crying.
He dove into Trish's lap and started telling her stomach all about the horrible nightmare he had until she pulled him back, wiped his eyes, and told him to calm down and tell us slowlywhat he experienced.
He rubbed his eyes and began. "I was at school and . . . and this demon thing came and . . . and it started picking on Gabriella!" he explained, gesticulating, "and so I tried to show her what a hero I am," he puffed out his chest and flexed his "muscles" as he spoke but as the story went on his physique deflated, "I tried to attack him – and it looked just like Zachary!" he side tracked with wide eyes as I mouthed to his mother 'Who's Zachary?'.
She answered me out loud in the most informative way while still obviously not taking a child's over active imagination to heart. "Zachary is Kenny's arch nemesis," she told, tickling the boy on her lap.
Ken giggled and kept going. "But it didn't look like Zachary either!" he began correcting himself, "It looked more like a bluish white ghost that looked exactly like Zachary!" his eyes were nearly bulging out of his head and he almost fell out of his mother's lap more than once as his nightmare progressed, "Anyways, I tried to fight him and . . . and, but when I hit him my fist went right through making a big hole but, but it fixed itself and then he hit me and knocked me out! And then I woke up and came in here!" he shouted, bringing us all up to speed. What interested me, though, was his description of the demon. Aside from the part of it being of Zachary, this "demon thing" sounded a lot like the Adrian that landed me in the hospital. It could, however, just have been myover active imagination linking the two. After all, how descriptive was a five year old really? It could be a coincidence or a completely different thing altogether. I'd have to look further into that later. For now, I wanted to know more about the five year old who had the dream in the first place. And as Trish sent him back to bed, that's exactly what I started to do.
"So how old is Ken?" I asked Lady casually as Trish reentered the living room.
"He's five," Trish answered sitting back on the dusty old couch.
"He's really cute," I complimented genuinely.
"Thank you," she smiled kindly.
"Who's the father? Do you know or was he a donor or adopted?"
Trish and Lady looked at one another and seemed to make a telepathic decision. Then Trish leaned to the edge of her seat and whispered to me, "You have to swear you won't tell anyone," all the sudden I was in my classroom back at Fortuna telling my best friend about my baby as Trish went on to tell me, "Ken is Dante's son."
