"Mommy, do you think Daddy will love me?" My seven year old had a worried look on her face.
"Of course I do honey, why wouldn't he?" We were getting ready to go to the show, Gracie kept her face clean because she wanted to make a good impression. She was scared Monte wouldn't love her.
"Well, Because he never bothered to try and see me before." I had a pang of guilt hit me in the chest, it was my fault he didn't, because he didn't know. I told his brother not to tell him, I told his best friend not to tell him.
"Gracie Bear, it's my fault that he didn't, I was so mad at your dad, that I didn't want to talk to him or anything, he didn't know about you untill yesterday." I wanted to cry, thinking it was my fault that my daughter didn't have a dad.
"Oh yeah! I remember you telling me about that. Mommy, do you still love him?" I didn't have to think about it. I put the curling iron down as I finished the last curl. I knew I still had feelings for Monte, I never stopped having them.
"Hey, let's put a pretty dress on you okay?" She smiled and jumped of the counter and into the room and came out with jean shorts, an Escape The Fate shirt, and her purple VANS. I simply shrugged and smiled because hey, she is my child. I walked into my closet and picked up a nice Rob Zombie fitted tank top and grabbed my VANS that matched Gracie's. I walked over to my dresser grabbed my Robin belt, and pulled out a pair of jean shorts that had little rips in them.
"Okay Mommy, lets go!" She was bouncing and already had my Nightmare Before Christmas bag and my keys by the door. We stepped out into the San Diego heat and turned to lock the door.
"Violet! Gracie!" I turned around and saw Tony and Stephanie walking up as Gracie Ran to them. (Did I forget to mention they're our neighbors?)
"Uncle Turtle! Aunt Steph!" Tony picked her up and swung her around.
"Where are you guys headed off to?" Steph smiled at us as she pinched Gracie's cheek.
"We're going to go see my uncle's and daddy play!" Tony and Steph suddenly had horrified looks on their faces.
"Honey go to Aunt Steph for a second." Tony handed Gracie to Steph and pulled me over to the car.
"Violet, what's going on?" He had a worried look on his face, he was scarred and I can tell.
"Craig and T.J. came into the shop yesterday and said that they were bringing a friend to get his first tattoo, well, their friend happened to be Monte. Well soon Mike and Robert came in and I just quickly did the tattoo so I wouldn't have to keep seeing him. Then Mike asked if we wanted to go to a show and then to the carnival. So of course I said yes." I left out the part about Monte coming to the carnival too, he wouldn't be able to handle that part.
"Okay, as long as its just Mike and Robert, I don't want you or Gracie getting hurt by this asshole again. okay? You might say your a big girl and can take care of yourself, but if anybody hurts you, Serenity, OR Gracie, they are dead, and you know I won't be the only one to do it." I smiled at Tony and nodded, because when it came down to it, Tony was like a big brother to me. He was just always there.
"Trust me Turtle, if ANYBODY hurts Gracie, they have to face ME first!" he smiled and walked back to Gracie and Steph.
"Come on Gracie Bear, we're gonna be late." She hopped out of Stephanie's arms and hugged them both as she ran to the car. I smiled and waved at them.
"Wish me luck." I gave them a kind of sad smile and started walking towards the car.
"Good luck babe!" I gave them a smart ass smile as I got in the car, whether I liked it or not, today was going to be a long day.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
We Finally got to the venue as I called Mike and told him we were here. I grabbed a hold of Gracie's hand as we walked up to where Michael was standing.
"Uncle Mike!" She jumped in his arms as he came over and hugged us.
"You Lady's looks nice today!" he smiled and gave us both little pecks on the cheeks. "You guys ready?" He gave me a worried smile.
"As ready as we'll ever be!" I smiled at him to let him know I was okay and he walked us back to where the guys were. Immediately Gracie ran over and hugged every one and so did I, but we both stopped at Monte.
He looked at us and we all just stood there for a second, then he looked down at Gracie and smiled.
"Can I get a hug?" He stretched his arms out and she smiled and jumped in his arms. She hugged him really tight and whispered in his ear, I could only assume she said something along the lines of I love you daddy. Because a tear went down his face as he said I love you too darling. All I did was smile, it was all I could do. He set her down as she went to go play with T.J. and he looked at me in the eyes.
"Hey Violet. How are you?"
"Hi Monte. I'm good, what about you?" I watched as his shoulders tensed up, he was nervous, and honestly, so was I.
"I've been better honestly." He gave me a sad look. His brown eyes looking right through me, my heart started racing and I thanked Zeus that he didn't have super hearing. He took off his shirt and adjusted his ear monitor.
"Really? I thought being a Rock star is what you've always wanted?"
"Well it is but, I don't know, it's not the same as it was when I was younger you know?" I did know, The line up for ETF changed almost completely since they started. Omar left, Max and Ronnie got kicked out, they only thing that was still the same was that him and Robert stayed, of course so did Mike, but he was never officially in the band then.
"Yeah I know, it's crazy how things changed huh?" I turned as their stage Manager told them they had three minutes till show.
"Well, I'll see you after the show!" He smiled at me with that same FUCKING smile he had since high school.
"Good Luck." I smiled at him as the boys hugged and kissed Gracie for luck. She jumped up and gave Monte a kiss on the cheek and hugged him.
"Good luck daddy!" she looked up at him with her bright green eyes as he leaned down and Gave her a kiss on the cheek and walked on stage.
Me and Gracie stood on the side stage and watched as the boys played songs like The Flood, Ashley, You are so beautiful, Issues, and ended with Georgeous Nightmare. My personal favorite. They walked off the staged and smiled.
"Gracie, Violet, I do believe that you guys are good luck charms, that was our best show ever!" The boys all hollered and high fived in agreement.
"You guys should come on tour with us!" T.J. looked too serious for his own good.
"That would be awesome Uncle T.J.! But I have school!" Gracie always had her priorities straight, even for a child. T.J. looked down in defeat.
"Okay well Me, Robert, and Monte are gonna clean our selves off then we can go to the carnival!" Mike smiled and picked up Gracie and watched as her face quickly became horrified and she pinched her nose.
"Eww Uncle Mike you stink!" We all laughed as he sat her down and grabbed her hand instead. I felt a heavy arm wrap around my waist a pull me as I hit a very built body. I looked up at Monte as he pulled me away from the others and smiled at me, I knew right then that I wasn't mad at him anymore, but I still didn't trust him.
"Violet, I missed you." he looked down at me and tried to pull me into a kiss. I quickly stopped him and pulled away.
"I missed you too, but I just can't forgive you so easily." I was still hurt honestly.
"I know and I'm sorry, it's just, having you here, and seeing Gracie, makes me remember how much I still love you, and how stupid I was to ever hurt you." He looked down sadly and I took the opportunity to spray myself down because now I smelled like Monte sweat.
"Monte, if you really want to make it up to me, you have to first prove that you can do good by Gracie, she's really nervous that you aren't going to love her." He looked up with complete shock on his face.
"Why would she think that?" That pang of guilt shot through me again, remembering that it was all my fault.
"Its my fault really." I looked down and held back the tears. "She said it was because you never tried to come and see her before, but it was all my fault. I didn't tell you about her because I was selfish, and I knew that once you found out, you would have came, and I just didn't want to see you. I didn't think about what was best for Gracie, and by the time I slapped my self out of stupidity, I had no way to get a hold of you anymore." a tear fell down my face as I though of how bad of a mother I was to keep my child from her father, I hated myself for it, and its always been something that I just couldn't forgive myself for.
"Hey, no it's not your fault, It's all mine. I'm the one who hurt you, if I wouldn't have done what I did, you would have never left, and we would have been together and raised her together." He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me into a hug as I let another tear fall, this time though, I didn't fight the hug, I hugged him back. I really did miss him like crazy, and I knew that I still loved him.
"Come on Mr. Money Maker, they're probably looking for us." he smiled at the name I used to call him and put his arm around my shoulder and walked to the bus.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
We got back to the bus and seen that Mike and Gracie were on the couch, Mike already cleaned off.
"What took you guys so long?" Craig gave us a look as we stepped on the bus.
"Serenity called me and asked me where my spare key was, she forgot her make up at my house last night. Monte Just stayed so that way I wouldn't get lost on the way to the bus." I looked at them with a serious look, luckily I was a good liar because they bought it.
"Okay well when Robert gets out Monte will get in then we'll be ready to go!" Mike smiled at us as I sat down, and almost on cue we heard Robert open the bathroom door. Monte quickly jumped up and ran to the bunks to get his clothes then into the bathroom.
"Mommy can you spray me with perfume, I still smell like stinky Uncle Mike sweat!" I laughed and sprayed her a little then sprayed myself again, remembering that I hugged Monte again while he was still sweaty.
We waited for about five more minutes then heard Monte walk out of the bathroom.
"Okay I'm ready!" he ran out in a black muscle shirt and black jeans. Oh. My. Zeus. He still dressed the same too! We stood up and Gracie immediately reached up for Monte to pick her up, which he gladly did.
"Okay, I'll have them back by ten!" I smiled and started to walk of the bus as Michael got off holding the door open.
"I want my sons back by nine!" T.J. said in his "fatherly" tone.
"You know I could just not bring them back at all! Try and explain that to the fans!" I looked at T.J. and smiled.
"okay, okay, ten it is!" We all waved as we headed back to my car, there we got Gracie between Mike and Robert with Monte in the passenger seat next to me.
"Okay! Carnival here me come!" we all cheered as we pulled out of the parking lot. I smiled at Monte who was already smiling at me. Please Zeus, don't let this day go downhill!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
We pulled up to the carnival and Gracie started bouncing as we got out. Mike picked her up and we walked to the ticket booth. Monte bought a total of five hundred tickets, a hundred for each of us. Mike, Gracie, and Robert all ran off to play a game and I put my tickets in my bag.
"So, how's your mom and dad?"
"Good, you know I have a little sister now." He looked at me with wide eyes.
"Really? How old is she?"
"Cindy's the same age as Gracie." he laughed knowing that my parents named her after Cinderella.
"Your parents really do like Disney princesses huh?"
"Yeah they tried to get me to name Gracie Arora." We both made a face and laughed
"So what's her whole name?" I smiled at him.
"Graciela Margaret Holliday." He smiled at me, Margaret is his mother's name and he knows that I loved his mom like she was my own.
"So how long are you guys staying in town?" I broke our eye contact and looked to see Gracie and Mike begging Robert for something.
"Well we have our last show tomorrow, but you know we live in LA now."
"Oh really?" My heart started to race and prayed to Zeus that it would stop, only to have it beat faster.... Thanks Zeus.
"Yeah, so you and Gracie live far from here?" I shook my head.
"We live over in San Diego."
"Sweet! So how about we get together and go out to eat, maybe go to the movies?" He looked at me with these pleading eyes, the same eyes that I couldn't resist when we were together years ago.
"Sure! Gracie would love that!" We both smiled at each other as he handed me his phone to put my number in.
"Mommy! Daddy! Come on let's get on the Farris wheel!" we both smiled and nodded as we ran to her Mike and Robert. Today was going to be okay. I just know it!
Hey guys! I was thinking about doing the next Few parts on Monte's POV let me know what you think, I'll post his first chapter soon! bye!