COACH BUZZER HAD been a massive part of marcus and mackenzie higgins and that is why it was such a shock when marcus higgins received a call from the coach's late wife stating he had passed. obviously the man was old but that didn't mean it hurt any less, the coach was the man that had basically brought up the man due to his own parents going down their whole alcohol and drug path, and then helping raise his own daughter mackenzie. even though he only had the one successful team when higgins was younger he still taught until retirement briefly teaching mackenzie how to play basketball in middle school. coach cared a lot about higgins and his friends and it filled him with guilt and sadness that the whole group hadn't seen each other in so long, especially lenny feder.
he sat with his leg bouncing anxiously until his daughter arrived home, stressing about breaking the news to his daughter. the coach had been as big of a part in his life as his daughters, and this would hurt the young girl. the sound of the door being slammed meaning she had arrived home from school. walking into the room she sensed the atmosphere wasn't it's usual cheery one and spotted her dad looking distraught on his bed. he had obviously already kicked out the woman that was there earlier in the day when she left for school and now looked like he was about to cry.
"dad?" she dropped her bag by the door of his room. he stood up walking over to his daughter placing his hands on her arms, "kenz, i need to tell you something"
MARCUS HIGGINS HAD four childhood best friends. this included eric who was married to a lovely woman called sally, they had two children donna and bean, donna being the oldest out of the two. then there was kurt who was married to a caring woman called deanne with their two children andre and charlotte, and one on the way. the other two friends mackenzie had never met and these were lenny and rob, lenny had his wife roxanne and his three children greg, keithie and becky. when roxanne and kenny's wedding occurred charlotte, andre, donna, and mackenzie all got left with deanne's mother mama rozoni and that is why she had never met any of the feder family. no one ever saw them as they lived their fancy lives in hollywood whilst the rest were living in their home town new england. lastly there was rob, but mackenzie barely knew anything about the man and he still lived in new england.
after learning of the death of the beloved coach, kenzie remained by her father's side for the rest of the night deciding to watch movies, which included her all time favourite of course, the lost boys. star cuddled up on her lap as a takeaway pizza was shared between the two, by time the third filmed had been put on kenzie was fast asleep cuddling star before her dad carried her to her own bed. placing a kiss on her forehead and watching her peacefully sleep with a slight snore, he knew this week was going to be hard for the both of them so he took himself to bed rather than ringing up any bootycall he could think of. the funeral was in a week, the weekend that the 4th of july would fall so plans were being made for a proper send off for the coach.
THE WEEK FLEW around quicker than expected and soon kenzie higgins was packing her bags for a weekend which she was aware was being spent at a cabin from the groups childhood. she packed all the necessities for the summer days and began getting ready for the actual funeral. she wore a short black dress with long sort of puffy sleeves, it seemed an appropriate outfit so she shook with it. she was only young so there wasn't a lot of makeup up on her face, just mascara and lipgloss to make her look "presentable". her blonde her accustomed with pink highlights was in its natural waves framing her face perfectly, as she looked at herself in the mirror she wondered if she looked more like her mom or her dad, but because she didn't know what her mom looked like she had no judgement.
walking through the bungalow her and her father lived in, she spotted her dad eating left over pizza from whenever not caring how old it was, "when will you ever eat a nutritional breakfast?" she smiled at her dad taking a slice of his place a biting into the cold pizza.
"like you're any better" he rolled his eyes playfully at her, "are you ready for today?" his smile disappearing as he asked, this day was going to be hard for everyone. she walked over to her dad placing a arm around his shoulder as he was sat down, "yes and i'll be there to hold your hand if you need it"
"you know how funeral make me, it's weird i'll probably just awkwardly make comments"
patting his shoulder, "yeah let's maybe try not to do that"
soon enough all their belongings were placed in marcus' small, old car and they were on the road heading towards the church. they would've likely walked but seen as it had been planned and payed for by lenny feder the group would be staying at the lake house for the weekend and was heading straight there after the funeral, the car was needed.
"you ready to meet hollywood?" he asked as they walked down the long roads of new england. hollywood was one of marcus higgins childhood best friends, along side eric and kurt. his name was lenny feder, and angela had never met him, and today was the day.
"of course. gotta make a good impression for mr hollywood." she laughed with the nickname lenny had gotten himself, after leaving new england.
they finally reached the church, easily spotting two of marcus' friends and children, one being lenny, standing at the front of the church. angela looked over lenny, he was dark haired, about the same height as eric, and had three children and a beautiful wife.
"wait no cellphones then i'm out of here" higgins spoke overhearing the conversation prior.
"higgins!" all the adult men cheered seeing one of their best friends
"who's ready to get their funeral on?" he says doing a weird dance and making noises to match it, to which angela slaps him on the arm to get him to stop.
"sorry death makes me weird" he walks over to each of his friends hugging them all making a funny comment on each of their appearances and most of the time getting on back about his.
lenny looks over at angela who looks a bit nervous, "and this must be angela" he speaks cheerfully, earning a smile from the girl.
"yes this is my pride and joy, the only woman who won't leave me" higgins says patting his daughters shoulder.
finally gaining a bit of confidence she smirked, "hi hollywood" to which lenny gave her a shocked face and the rest of the adults just laughed.
"oh so you told her to call me that too, nice higgins. nice" he gives a fake angry look to her father and angela lets her eyes wander to behind lenny.
three kids stood behind lenny, and one what looked like to be a nanny. the oldest she presumed was around her age, he was pretty cute, but looked quite snobby in her opinion. the next, looked just a bit shorter than the oldest who just looked like a mini version of the oldest. they both looked a lot like their dad. and then the third was a young girl, who looked around bean's age. she looked much like her mother who angela had now noticed standing next to lenny.
she smiled a bit seeing how well put the family was, frowning a little when she realised it was only her and her dad.
the feder family looked like the perfect family, the right amount of people, they looked happy, well put. she loved her dad but she did wish she had a sibling to grow up with.
her attention was brought back to the adults when lenny was trying to explain that the woman brushing up the kids was an exchange student and definitely not a nanny. but everyone could see the bullshit in that but didn't touch on it anymore.
the lamansoff family suddenly pulled up in front of them, eric and sally in front and bean and kiki in the back alongside their dog.
jury's daughter charlotte had headed over to one of her close friends angela. even though charlotte was younger than angela they were still good friends due to their dads, also being good friends with kiki.
"looks like someone is staring at you" she spoke making angela jump. angela gave her a confused look before looking up at the feder children and seeing the oldest staring right at her, the sudden eye contact makes the boy look away.
"do you think he's cute?" charlotte asked the question catching angela of guard making her cheeks shine a bright red.
"i mean i guess so. he's not bad looking" she looked from the boy to charlotte, even with the age difference still being around the same height as charlotte.
"someone has a crush" she cooed pushing angela lightly.
"no i-i do not. i don't even know his name for christ sake" angela started fiddling with her fingers not liking this conversation.
"greg. his name is greg" charlotte smiled brightly at the girl.
"well i guess i know his name now"
- church -
the higgins had placed themselves behind the feders in the church. one of their childhood friends, rob, wanted to do a speech for coach buzzer so her stood at the front starting.
angela's eyes wandered to the windows at the top of the church letting her yes fall on two birds that seemed to be playing with each other. after a while the two birds cuddled up next to one another making angela smile lightly.
her attention was put back on rob when he was at the end of his singing and coming down to his knee. she looked over and saw kurt paying lenny some money and she laughed a little at the stupid bet.
I didn't pay much attention which was kind of rude of me but it was boring because one of the childhood friends Rob, but I got told he was weird and wasn't fully in their group, was speaking and then singing.
lenny then got called up for a speech warning a little tear from a few including angela. she couldn't imagine the emptiness some people were feeling in that church, coach buzzer being important to many and meant a lot to them.
once the funeral ended everyone headed outside the church were the reception was being held.
charlotte and angela sat together most of the time talking about anything their young minds could think of.
soon the reception was over and everyone was heading to the lake house getting ready for the weekend ahead of them. marcus hitching a ride in kurt's car and angela in the feder's squished between greg and who she now knew as keathie. she didn't say a word though, the boys were on their games and the parents barely speaking to one another, so she just stayed quiet not wanting to interrupt anyone.
edited - 09/01/2021