Cinderella's Twist

chapter twenty: high school sweethearts or something

"Caterina, where's my mom?" I ask stopping Cat as she runs around the house trying to make it look perfect for Thanksgiving.

We all had a lot of fun on Monday night (if you know what I mean), Tuesday and Wednesday. My parents were home and when they realized I wasn't dead or harmed in any way, they invited Noah and his parents for Thanksgiving. His brother, Johnny, and his girlfriend, Danielle, are also going to come.

"I believe she is in the foyer with your father letting in your cousins," she says kindly and goes into the kitchen.

I walk into the foyer and my mom and brothers are talking in hushed voices. I have a puzzled look on my face as I walk in. "What are we talking about?"

They turn and look at me and my mother smiles wearily.

"Sweetheart, come here," she says and ushers me over.

I slowly walk over to them and my heart starts racing. "Is Dennis out of jail? Is that why you guys are whispering? Is he out to get me? Was he proven not--"

"Jaclynn, slow down," Derek says.

"Babygirl, we'd never hide that from you," dad says and hugs me.

"It's about Chance," mom says and chokes on her words a little.

"What about him?" i ask.

"You were right when you were suspicious on Halloween,"  Sanders says.

My breath hitches in my throat and I feel like I can't breathe. "He-he has cancer again?"

Mom keeps herself from crying and nods. I move from dad to her and hug her tight saving myself from crying. 

"It's not serious yet. Just a little bit of pain here and there. I'm treating him," Lauren says. "I promise he's going to be fine."

"Jackie!"I hear Chance yell and he runs up to me and I'm careful when I pick him up. I remember he would cry when I would hold him when he was a baby. I was only like eleven or twelve so that scared me.

"Hey, Bubba," I say and smile at him before planting a kiss on his forehead.

"All we need to do is just love him as much as our heart desire, okay?" Mom asks all of us and we nod. "Good, now let's have an amazing Thanksgiving."

The front door opens just as those words are said and I watch as Andrea, Aunt Bella, my mom's sister, Uncle Ron, her husband, Lewis, Uncle Jordan, my mom's brother, Aunt Wendy, his wife, Uncle Weston, my dads brother, Uncle Frank, my dad's brother, Aunt Regina, his wife, Uncle Elton,my dad's brother, Aunt Kendall, his wife, Becky, Maria, Danny, and Iris. 

I swear this family travels in packs.

I put down Chance who runs and hugs Iris who's his age. I grin and hug Andrea and she twirls me around

"Ugh, I've missed you so much," she says and pulls away from me.

"I have too, but we have a lot of catching up to do..." I say trailing off.

Someone's arms snake around my waist and kiss my cheek and I smile. "Hey, Red."

"You've got to be shitting me," Andrea says grinning. "Noah Reed?"

"Andrea Somers," Noah says and smiles.

"What are you doing here?" she asks. 

"Well for starters I moved here," He says holding me in front of him. "Then I met this pretty lady. It took a while but at some point, we went out and now here we are."

"He's the guy from the ball," i whisper to her and smile.

"You're joking!" she yells. "That's so cute."