𝐅𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐬 | 𝐒. 𝐂𝐮𝐫𝐫𝐲

36.

Alani Marie Castillo
Oakland, CA.

It's New Years Eve!

I'm almost 7 months pregnant and I can't wait for this baby to be out. I feel like I've been pregnant for 5 years. Raelyn is about the size of a eggplant and she can hear my voice now. She's moving a lot lately which can be uncomfortable, but I'm used to it.

She's a daddy's girl already. Obviously. What was I expecting?

Like I said, she's recognising our voices now and she gets restless when she Wardell hasn't been around. I had to play a YouTube interview so she thinks he's in the room with us just to calm her down.

Crazy right?

Camila and I were getting the house ready for our guest to arrive. I can't believe she and Wardell talked me into this.

I will be meeting my dad and new my siblings today and I'm freaking out. I'm not able to fly anymore so they're flying out here. I still had my reservations about this whole thing but I'm going to put my pride aside and look at the bigger picture.

"Alani, relax. You're going to hurt yourself with that knife." My mom placed her hand on my shaky one.

I totally forgot I was cooking.

"I'm freaking out." I put the knife down and let my mom take over. "We don't even know these people."

"That's the point of tonight. We're going to get to know everyone." Camila said.

"When you went to see dad last month, what was he like?"

"Same chill guy I remembered. Full of wisdom. He asked me a lot about you and he said he was proud of you." Mila said, and I didn't know how to react to that. He doesn't even know me.

"What about Miguel and Manuela?"

"They were really nice too. Miguel is a retired boxer and Manuela does social media. She reminds me a lot of you actually." I rolled my eyes at that last part.

"Look, babygirl. I know this is going to be hard for you but go into it with an open mind, okay." My mom advised. "Think about Raelyn and how you'd want Steph to be in her life no matter what happens between the two of you."

What she said made sense, but I'm not a kid anymore. I don't need my dad as much as I needed him when he left. But I'm looking at the bigger picture. I want to know why he did what he did.

"What about you, though, Ma? Are you okay with all this?" I asked.

"Why wouldn't I be?" She raised an eyebrow.

"Dad didn't just leave us. He left you too." Camila said.

"I forgave your father a really long time ago. As much as I loved him, I knew he'd never leave his wife for me. It hurt at first but I got over it. I couldn't really hate him. He gave me two beautiful daughters and that's all I really needed." She finished. That explains why my mom never dated after my dad.

"Aww, mommy." Camila tightly hugged mom.

"Let's get ready to meet the rest of our family, shall we?"

Hours later.

It's finally that time.

Camila and Terrence left to pick our guests up from the airport.

"Aunty Lani, when is my little cousin getting here? She's been in your belly for a really long time." Cameron said.

Tell me about it.