A few months later
"For once in your life can you care about someone who isn't yourself?" Her voice cold on the phone, "I get they are hurt but that won't change the fact that it happened, Chris and I have a daughter, they have a granddaughter, one that is dying to have some sort of relationship with them, it's not her fault."
Scarlett was on the phone with her older brother, Adrian, trying to convince him to tell her parents, who have been promptly ignoring her, to come to Christmas. Adrian, while upset with his sister, had agreed because he wanted to get to know Nicole, the only problem was convincing their parents.
"I am thinking about others Scarlett, they are in pain too." He spits right back at her. "Wouldn't want Christmas to be ruined now would we?"
"Ruin it? I am doing nothing of the sort." She hissed. "It's been months Adrian they won't so much as answer their phone, if I try to go see them they aren't home it's ridiculous."
"What did you expect Scarlett? Warm welcomes? Because you kept a secret from them for thirteen years."
"Are you taking there side?"
"I am not taking anyone sides Scarlett." he sighed. "I just think that it's ridiculous for you to be so mad-"
"I have to go."
"Scarlett-"
"Goodbye, just forget about Christmas, Chris and I will have a great Christmas with his family, hunter Chris, and Vanessa." She said. "Just like we did for the fourth of July, Halloween, and Thanksgiving." She hung up the phone and fell backward on the bed she was currently on.
"Are you okay?" Chris's voice filled Scarlett's ears as she laid on his bed with her hands over his face.
"Why are they still angry Chris? They won't even talk to me. Your parents didn't act like this." She muttered as Chris sat on the bed rubbing her leg.
"They are a bit hurt babe, it's kind of a hard thing to process." He said softly.
"Doesn't change the fact that they could come to talk to me." She quickly said.
"You didn't talk to them." he pointed out.
"Don't pin this on me, Chris, you and I both agreed-"
"I know I know. I am not. Just give them time." he said. "Things will get better. Now get up," he said.
"Why?" She complained as Chris reached for her hands to pull her up from her bed. "I don't want to go anywhere, I want to stay in bed, where nothing bad can happen. If I get out of bed something bad can happen but if I leave. Plus it's comfortable."
"Nope, you gotta get up, with only a few days to go we need to Christmas shopping- what are you doing?" He asked when he saw her crawl back under the blanket.
"Too cold."
"Scarlett it's LA, it's 70 degrees outside." He said.
"I don't want to get up," She said peeking out of the blanket.
"What's the matter? Why don't you wanna go Christmas shopping? If we don't get it done now than we- Oh My Gosh you didn't."
"I am sorry. Don't be mad, look at how cute I am acting."
"You went Christmas shopping without me?" He asked. "Scarlett we agreed to do this together." he sighed. "What did you buy?"
"Don't blame me. Blame the salesman, he kept showing me cool accessories and things that Nicole would love and I had to get them. It's our first Christmas with her, I was excited!" She said. "I am sorry." she gave him frown with big eyes.
"No don't do that." He warned pointing a finger at her. "Don't make that face I'm mad at you."
"Don't be mad at me." She said and reached out for him slowing pulling him down on the bed. "Are you mad at me?"
"I want to."
"But?"
"But for some odd reason, everything in me is telling me to not be mad." He sighed. "You are going to be the death of me woman."
"Look at the bright side, we can stay in bed." She said as Chris wrapped his arm around her waist pulling her closer. "Doesn't this feel much better than going to some store packed with millions of people?"
"Scarlett some times I question if you actually feel bad for doing what you are doing me."
"What makes you say I don't," She asked all innocently.
"Maybe it's the smirk lacing your face." he teased.
"I'd never trick you, Chris."
"Mhmm." He said rolling his eyes at that. "whatever you say," He said and pulled her in for a kiss. "at least there are much better things for us to do," he mumbled against his lips.
"See, what I do, I do for us."
"What am I going to do with you?" He asked.
"Love me?"
"You already know it."
|~~|
Christmas day came quickly and went just as fast. Both sets of parents had collectively agreed that Nicole would be home on Christmas day but would be able to visit Scarlett and Chris the day after. She did have family traditions that wouldn't just abandon, and everyone understood that.
Scarlett spent Christmas with Chris and his family, and as always, nothing came from her parents. Not that she was expecting anything to happen, she just had a tad bit of hope they would have said anything.
That didn't matter, however, because today they would spend the day with Nicole, their first Christmas, no matter what anyone thought of it.
"Nic, you really didn't have to get us anything," Chris said as he and Scarlett pulled the wrapping off of their gifts.
"I know but I wanted to, it's nothing much I really didn't know what to get two people who already have so much," She said. Scarlett had gifted Nicole practically a new wardrobe so when she came down here she wouldn't have to bring a lot of items, and Chris, despite Scarlett buying so much, did go out to buy her something, which was a set of books she mentioned once she wanted to read. Another gift that would potentially be in the works was Chris and Scarlett buying a house down near Nicole's home town that way when they are off they can come see her and won't have to stay in some crappy hotel. Let's just say that was Nicole's best gift by far that holiday season.
"This is beautiful," Scarlett said as she opened her gift, it was a necklace with a butterfly pendant on in.
"All the woman in my family have one, my mom and I thought it would be great for you to have one as well because you're apart of our family now," She smiled at Scarlett before looking at Chris, "Your pocket knife," She had gifted him a blue pocket knife with his initials carved into it. "Is something all the guys in my family get."
"It's amazing Nic, I love it." Chris thanked her, and truly did like it, he knew these gifts took a lot of thought and held so much meaning.
"We love it," Scarlett smiled. Before anyone could say anything else there was a small knock on Scarlett's front door. "That's odd," She muttered before getting up to go see who was at the door. When she opened the door she was shocked to see her mother and father standing before her. "What are you guys doing here?"
"We came to see Nicole."
"No."
"What?" Her mother asked.
"It's been months, and now you just show up here and act like you didn't just ignore her for months?" She asked.
"Oh don't act that way Scarlett, we had a right to be angry." her mother rolled her eyes.
"Yeah at me! Not her, do you know how much it hurt her, she thought you guys hated her! I don't care if you are mad at me, you had that right but she didn't deserve that from you guys. You walked away from her in that restaurant and treated her like she was nothing."
"We walked away from her?" Her mother said in shock. "What exactly do you call what you did?"
"That was different, what Chris and I did we did for, you left that day for your own reasons. You didn't even look at her, completely ignored her. Hate me for all I care, but you hurt her."
"You're being a bit hypercritical," Her brother, Adrian, said walking up to her front door.
"Did you all just come here to insult me? Because I don't appreciate it, I am trying to celebrate with people who care about one another."
"We didn't come to here to fight Scarlett." her father stopped the two women. "Look we have all made some questionable choices lately and maybe it's time we all move on, for once can we all agree that it's time to move on?" He asked. "It's the holidays, let's not be that family who won't see each other for years and act like it's no big deal."
"I want to know her Scarlett, I want to be part of her life," Her mother said. "Please."
Scarlett thought for a minute, she had no right to prevent them from seeing their granddaughter any longer, no matter how angry the pair was to one another. What mattered was Nicole, and she knew this is what Nicole wanted, to meet her entire family.
"Come on," She said quietly before retreating from the door and leading them into the living room where wrapping paper scattered the floor and the sound of Chris and Nicole laughing filled their ears. "Nicole there are some people I'd like you to meet." She said and Nicole looked over her shoulder, "These are your grandparents."
"Hi." They both breathed out to Nicole. "It's so good to meet you," Nicole could only stare in their direction, she didn't really know what to say. With Chris's parent's it had been so easy, they had been so excited it was a bit weird.
"I know you must be confused as to why were are here now," Melanie said. "But we want you to know that our absence has nothing to do with you."
"We truly do mean that," Karsten spoke.
"We got something for you," Melanie handed her a gift bag and Nicole carefully took it. "I hope you like it."
"If not I wouldn't blame you," Adrain said who came into the room with a cookie and glass of hot chocolate, apparently he had already raided their fridge.
"Really Adrain?" Scarlett scolded hitting her older brother on the side of the head.
"ow what was that for?" he asked rubbing his head. "I didn't know I was going to be assaulted coming here." He muttered, Nicole smiled and then turned her attention back on the bag.
Carefully she unwrapped it and pulled out a jewelry box with a firefly image on top of the wooden box.
"Fireflies make the world brighter, just like you are going to do with our world."
"This is beautiful, I really love it," Nicole smiled. "Thank you."
"It was our pleasure really."
The rest of the night, despite the small hint of tension in the air, went well. Nicole knew that she and her grandparents would turn out okay, they were both loving people, and Nicole was sure that Scarlett and her parents would soon fix what was broken between them.
The year was coming to an end, and it has been one crazy year. Her life literary turned upside down. She was no longer getting bullied, she had two sets of parents, a great best friend. Four sets of grandparents, if anything she only gained more people to love her. Although sometimes it felt like her parents loved Scarlett and Chris more than she did, which was hard to beat.
To think, this story started off with a drunken mistake at the bar. It seems everything happened for a reason, and everything worked out much better then anyone could have guessed.
There was so much more than needed to be fixed and mended, but that was a story for another time.
I would like to apologize for taking so long to update this story, this was by far one of my favorite stories to write and due to stress from school I started losing time, I needed to finish and not leave you guys on cliff hangers for months at a time. I may start this story again but if I don't you guys have some closure, I hope you all understand. I love you all and thank you for going on this journey with me!
Note I will still be writing on the widows prey, just because I know I have a lot of ideas to expand that story and a lot of suggestions, I wish I had the same mindset for this story still. I honestly believe a lot of you have gotten tired of waiting for the next update that this story is no longer intriguing so I do apologize for that and let's hope I can do a better job now that I am only handling one story! Love and appreciate you all.