Love & Care

Chapter 23

Alexandra P.O.V.:

"I was thinking that we should look for new schools for you guys. Schools that are closer to here." Selena announced and while Maya and Layla seemed sad I was kind of relieved.
Eventhough I wasn't bullied at school I wasn't really popular or included. When there were group projects I'd usually end up being the last one to be picked same with games in P.E.
Maybe a new school would help me with this.
So I just nodded taking another bite of my pancakes.
After breakfast we cleaned up and Taylor got her laptop so we'd able to look at some schools closer to here.
"Here's a kindergarden/ preschool. It's a five minute walk just down the street. It's called 'Sunny day preschool'." I said pointing at one of the schools on the map.
Taylor opened their website. The pictures looked nice but they didn't have a music program so we quickly decided against it.
The next preschool we looked at was called 'Sparrow Nest'.
"This sounds promising. They have a good music program on different levels so that would be covered and they are known to prepare the kids very well for first grade." Selena read out.
Layla and I nodded. While Maya looked at the pictures. "They have a nice playground." She said smiling at us.
"Would you like to go there for school?" I asked her and she nodded.
Taylor nodded and looked at the contacts.
"I'll call them and you continue looking for a school for Layla and Alexa." She had took her phone out and was dialing a number.
She left the room and Layla took her place entering middle school in Google maps so we'd see the middle schools to our adress.
There were three in total. We looked at the first one but disregarded almost immediately. It was a really small school. They didn't have a good cheer or gymnastics program and there choir wasn't active anymore.
The second and third one both fit Laylas criterias of the club's so now it was more about the educational level.
"This one is a private school." I suddenly realized. "So it's the other one. A private school is really expensive."
Taylor was walking back in. "You said yourself that good education costs money and you know we have money so don't worry about that. I mean Maya's going to a private preschool now." I looked at her my eyes widened. "But.." Selena who was sitting next to me with Maya on her lap just took a grab of my hand. "No buts sunshine. We want you to succeed in life. So you'll get good education. You know how important education is." I nodded looking down. How would I repay them for doing this.
"You don't need to repay us." I looked at Selena shocked. Did I say that out loud? "Yes you did." She laughed at me but still gave my hand a squeeze.
Taylor and Lay were reading over the courses the two schools had. "This one is definitely better at preparing you for high school. The educational level is higher so I'll guess I'll call them." Taylor said looking at the website of the private school.
"By the way Maya can go there on the first day of school. The 8th of January."
Maya smiled at Taylor who was getting up to call the school. I sighed. They were spending so much money on us. More then they should.
"Let's look for a school for you." Layla said and went back to maps.
I looked at the two public schools so I'd not cost anymore money and figured I'd just go to one of them.
Neither of them had a good art program. One of them had a lot of college preparation courses so I'd just choose this one.
I heard Selena sigh next to me. "At least look at the other schools." I groaned and went onto the pages for the two private schools.
One of them was more focused on sports but there was one that focused on arts. They'd a musical program, art program and a lot more. And they were known for preparing kids for college very well.
"This one looks good." Taylor said looking at the Laptop when she came back but I just shook my head. "I'll go to this one." I said while opening the side of the public school.
I could hear both of the grown ups sigh. "Layla honey. Can you help Maya get dressed. We'll go to the mall to pick stuff for school and tomorrow after we finished with the schools." Selena asked her and she nodded. "But uhm did I get in?" Taylor nodded giving her a hug and a kiss on the forehead.
Layla smiled and together with Maya she went upstairs.
While Selena had been sitting on my left, Taylor now sat down on my right.
"Alex. You can choose whatever school you like and we won't force you to change schools or to go to a private school if you don't want to but we'd like you to consider it." Taylor started talking.
I just looked down. "I just don't see the sense in you spending so much money in my education if I'll end up working in target and not going to college."
"Sunshine who said you won't go to college? You're so smart. You have really good grades even though you've been through so much and had to play the part of a grown up for so long. If you want to go to college I'm sure you'll be able to." Selena said. I felt her fingers under my chin. She slowly forced me to look up.
"Sunshine. All we want for you and your sisters to be is happy. If you'll end up working at target than that's okay if you're happy with it. And if you're going to college then we'll be at your graduation ceremony. You can do and be whatever you want to. We just want to support you. So if you want to go to the private school because of the art program we'd love to pay for it." While Selena talked I was looking at her and I could feel my eyes stinging from the tears.
"Thank you." I mumbled. I heared Taylor getting up. "I'll call them." I nodded. "Thanks."
She left the room. "Come on. We'll leave soon to go to mall." Selena said and we walked to put on our shoes.
"What exactly do we want to buy?" I asked Selena sitting on the floor.
"Things for school and anything else you might need. And of course everything we might need for tomorrow." "What's tomorrow?" "New year's Eve." She said looking at me like I was silly. "And?" I asked her. "We'll have some people coming over. Usually we'd have a bigger party but we figured with Maya being still so young we only invited a few people."
"Who's comin'?" I asked her.
"Uhm Karlie, you know her, then Taylors family and a few more friends." I looked at her raising an eyebrow. "Ed Sheeran, Cara Delevingne, Gigi Hadid. That's it I think. Maybe Hailee Steinfeld will come as well."
I nodded and gave her a small smile eventhough the thought of meeting even more people stressed me out.
She smiled back at me.
Layla and Maya came downstairs. I helped Maya put her shoes on and Layla got dressed as well.
"Hey I am ready." Taylor walked in and quickly put on her shoes. "All of you can go to the new school at the 8th of January." "Thank you." I answered.
They just smiled at us.
"Let's get going." After Maya was strapped in her car seat and we others seat down, with us kids sitting in the back we drove to the mall.
We listened to music from the radio while driving and after we arrived we stayed to listen to the end of the song.
But then we finally went inside.
"So we'll look for backpacks and stuff like pencil case, pencils mostly but if you need anything else just tell us." Taylor said.
We nodded and Maya was almost running away from how excited she was. I wasn't fast enough to grab her.
She was almost out of sight because it was so busy.
"Maya. Come back here." I heard Taylor yell but I was already pushing past some people and ran after Maya.
Apparently Selena also had started to run because she found her before me.  She picked her up.
"Maya you can't just run off. It's way to busy and it's dangerous. What if something happened to you. How would we be able to find you. You'll stay on one of our arms till it's a little less busy." Taylor said her voice was stern and Maya flinched at her voice. "Are you mad mommy? I'm sorry I didn't mean to." She was whimpering  and tears were watering in her eyes. Her lower lip was quivering.
"Bunny I'm not mad at you. I was worried." Taylor said. "Are Mama and my sisters mad?" "Nobody is mad at you princess. We were just really scared when you ran off." Selena said while bouncing her up and down.
"Promise?" Selena nodded.
"Promise bunny." Taylor answered her question.
Maya nodded but she still seemed unsure of what to expect so she clung to Selena.
"Come on baby bunny let's see if we can find a backpack for you." Taylor said and played with Mayas braids.
My baby sister nodded.
We walked into a store where they had tons of bags and backpacks.
The store wasn't really busy so we Selena set Maya down. "You can walk on your own on but stay close to at least one of us." She said smiling at Maya who nodded.
We walked around the small store and Layla quickly choose a blue backpack with different types of patterns.
I was looking at some simple bags more on the cheaper side of the prices.
"Look look I found a bunny one and it's pink." Maya suddenly exclaimed.
I looked around and saw her holding up an adorable little backpack. In pink with dots and bunny on it.
"That's the perfect one for our baby bunny right?" Taylor said while picking her up as she still carried the bagpack.
Maya nodded happily. Her eyes fixated on the bag.
She seemed so happy. Taylor smiled and went to look with her to find a pencil case.
Layla was already done with picking those things out so she just waited.
"What about you?" Selena asked. I had already picked out a simple black pencil case and was looking at different black backpacks.
Maybe I could get embroidery thread and decorate it.
"Couldn't choose yet. Maybe one of those." I said looking at the black backpacks.
"You can choose whatever you want you know?" I nodded.
"Yeah I just like it simple." She smiled and looked at the black backpacks with me.
"This one is nice." She said while pointing at one from a brand called Fjallraven. It was one of the pricier brands. "Yeah it's nice." I said quietly.
"Don't look at the price sunshine." She said apparently she knew me quite well.
"But it's a habit. It's not like I can look at prices all my life and then decide not do it anymore." She nodded. "Then tell yourself not to worry about it." I sighed but nodded.
"Would you like this backpack?" I nodded while looking down. She took it with her and now that all of us were done we paid.
"Do you need something else?" Taylor asked while we left the shop.
Maya shook her head just like Layla. I was about to do the same when I remembered the embroidery thread. So I hestiated before shaking my head.
"Alex are you sure? You can tell us if you want or need anything." Taylor said. I was struggling inside. I knew that they would buy me everything I wanted immediately without thinking about it but I didn't really wanted them to spend more money on me.
"Sunshine." Selenas hand brushed over my arm pulling me out of my thoughts. I looked up and saw all four of them looking at me.
"Yeah?" "What is it that you want to buy?" I hestiated but answered. "Embroidery thread and needles." I said before looking down.
"That's something we can manage. I know where we'll find it." Taylor said with a smile and we started to is her. She showed us to a small shop for handicrafts.
Inside there were cabinets full of yarn, threads and fabrics. Tons of needles and other things you'd use for sewing or embroidery.
I felt myself getting excited. My eyes wandered over the different materials.
"Sunshine choose whatever you want." I looked at her still hestitating but seeing both Selena and Taylor smile I started to look at everything.
"Can I have this?" I was still hestitating as I didn't want to seem greedy or like I was using them.
"Of course you can." I was holding a set with a bunch of different colored threads in my hands.
I looked around until I found the right needles. I held the set up and Selena nodded.
"Do you want anything else?" I shook my head and Selena took the things from me ,as Maya was on Taylors arm, and paid for them. She didn't let me know what it cost but just handed the small bag to me.
We walked outside of the shop and this time we had some company. We had almost reached the door to leave the mall when someone recognized the two singers and within no time we were surrounded by people yelling at us.
I felt my anxiety spiking but tried to stay calm.
"Alex I know this is scary but I need you to take Maya and go with Layla and her to the car." Taylor said and handed me my sister before handing Layla the car keys.
"Get into the car." Selena said and quickly shoved us out of the door.
Up until noone had seem to realize that we belonged together but no people were asking who we were.
Luckily the door closed behind us and with on look at Layla we both ran towards the car.
Layla unlocked the car.
"Lay climb in I'll put Maya down into her seat." Layla nodded and got into the car while I put Maya down. I heard footsteps behind us.
I closed the door. Luckily the glasses were toned so they people weren't able to take pictures of Maya or Layla.
I ran around the car. My hands covering my face.
"Get away from the girl." I heard Selena yell.
"What's your name?"
"How do you know Selena and Taylor?"
"Look over here." I continued to hide my face before quickly opening the door and getting in the car. I closed the door behind myself.
I felt myself shaking. There were way to many people and all of them tried to look at us.
"Maya, Layla hide your faces don't look outside." They both nodded and I could see that they were shaking.
"Guys. It'll be okay." I said but I couldn't hide the fact that I was scared as well.
After a while we heard someone trying to open the passenger door of the car.
I looked out and saw Selena. "Layla give me the keys." She handed them to me and I quickly unlocked the car doors.
"Layla hold Maya's door closed." I told her while making sure I'd hold onto mine.
Selena opened the door and slid in before closing it again.
"Lock the car." She sounded scared but not as bad as we sounded.
I quickly locked it again before handing her the key.
She took a few deep breathes before turning around.
"Are you alright? Did someone touch you? Did someone hurt you?" She asked. She seemed so worried.
I looked at my sisters. "I think we are fine just a little scared. We didn't get hurt. They only came close to us when Maya and Layla were in the car so there shouldn't be many pictures of them." Selena nodded. "Okay did they take many pictures of you?" She asked me. "I don't think so. I tried to hide my face as good as I could." She nodded. "That's good. And yeah they were really intrusive today. I'm just glad you're okay."
"What about Taylor? Where's she?" Selena sighed.
"We made the deal that we'd go back to the car and however was faster should go back first."
I nodded. "You think she's alright?" Selena nodded. "We called security as soon as we realized that this was going to happen. When I reached the car they were almost there so they should be there by now. And she's used to do dealing with people being intrusive. She'll be fine."
Maya nodded she was scared. We all could see that.
Then we heard a knock at the window.
Taylor stood there and Selena quickly unlocked the car so Taylor could come in. As soon as she closed the door we locked the car again.
"As much as I love the fans. This was an awful experience." She leaned her head back into her seat and just like Selena before she took a few deep breaths.
"Everyone is alright?" We all nodded.
"You're alright mommy?" Maya asked her voice was slightly shaking fearing that maybe someone had hurt her new found mommy.
"Yeah I am bunny." Taylor turned to look at my sister.
"Let's go home." Taylor said taking the car keys from Selena before slowly pulling out of the parking lot.

Maya

Layla

Alex

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