My Therapy

Chapter 7

December 13th, 2022

Madison's POV

"I booked one bay, which is enough for all of us. I didn't include my parents or sister though," I told Ella when we were up in my room getting changed.

"That's fine,"

"Alright this parent thing is stressing you out isn't it?" I said sitting down next to her.

"You say that as if we're having a child or something," She replied laughing.

"What is it? Tell me,"

"I just don't want to tell them yet,"

"Then don't but you will eventually,"

I wasn't about to make her answer a thousand questions about why she was scared and stuff, because that would make me an extreme hypocrite if I tried to help her.

"I need to pack up my stuff," Alessia said, walking into my room.

"Alright," I said.

"Did I interrupt something or-"

"No, you're fine. Go ahead and pack up," Ella said before we both went back downstairs.

The 3 others shared the guest room while Alessia had gotten the air mattress on the floor of my room but had pulled a Georgia because she hated it.

When we got downstairs, Georgia and Hannah were colouring at the kitchen table. I took out my phone and took a video of them before Georgia knew.

"Jasmine is my favourite," Georgia said, picking up a new crayon.

"Well, I like Tiana because I like frogs. Is Jasmine your favourite movie too?" Hannah asked.

"Yes,"

"My favourite movie is Boss Baby. But Princess and the frog is my favourite princess movie. I want to go to Disneyland one day,"

"Me too. I went to Disneyworld, but I heard Disneyland is better," Georgia said.

Ella and I walked to the table and sat down with them.

"Aunt Ella, what's your favourite princess?" Hannah asked.

"That's a good question," Ella said.

"How about you, Aunt Madison?"

"My favourite was always Tiana," I replied. "Are you having fun colouring with Aunt Georgia?"

"Yes. She's so good at colouring. And she liked princesses too like me. Tell your mom to learn more about them because she doesn't count as my grandma until she learns the ones other than Tiana and Aurora and Snow White," Hannah said.

"She's still your grandma, Hannah," I said.

"Yes, but she's boring because she doesn't get it!"

"Han, your grandma loves you," Ella said.

"Madison? Are you down there?" Charlotte called from upstairs.

"Yeah. You need me?" I replied.

"For a second, please,"

I went to her and she had put a bunch of boxes in the room that used to be hers and our parents made Hannah's room.

"What's all this?" I asked.

"I was looking for something of mine that I left here but I found this and I thought you might want it," She said pushing a box towards me.

"It's just old kits and stuff," I said after opening it and looking inside. There were a few medals and trophies, but nothing I really needed to take back home.

"Under all that,"

I dug under a bit, throwing kits and medals to the sides.

There were 2 photo albums one of my teams and pictures of me playing football from when I was younger, but the other one was Leonor's.

I opened it and flipped through it carefully. It was just a bunch of pictures of the three of us but mostly just her and I. Some were us from when we were babies, from from when we were older.

"Why's she making this?" I asked.

"I dunno. I did see it once before though," Charlotte replied.

"When?"

"Last time I talked to her,"

"When was that?"

"About a year ago. Right before you left for uni, she told me to give it to you because she's been working on it since she was 5 years old and wanted to give it to you for your birthday, but that didn't work out obviously. Mom and Dad don't know she left it here, so don't let them see it or they'll take it,"

I cleaned up the stuff I had thrown on the ground, put that box in my room and the photo album in my suitcase. I had to just pretend like it wasn't killing me to know if there was a note or something. She always had a nice handwritten note with everything.

"Ready to go golfing?" I asked everyone when I got downstairs.

------

I was alone bringing everyone to the airport and train station because Ella went to her parents. Alessia had her train at 7:45, but bad weather pushed her train back to 8:00 so I stayed with her and we got food and hung out.

"I'll see you next week alright?" I said.

"Yeah. You be good,"

"I'll be as good as I can,"

"Keep Ella out of trouble," Alessia laughed.

"She's a tough one," I joked.

"I promise you'll be okay. Ella will take good care of you," she said giving me one last hug before she got in line to board the train.

I stayed to watch the train leave, and then I texted Ella and my parents I was on the way home.

As I walked to my car it poured it down.

It was hard to drive, but I made it out of the city faster than I thought I would. I felt safer on the not-as-busy roads and didn't feel like I would hit any pedestrians.

I was about 20 minutes from home when traffic started to get bad again, so I made sure to let my parents and Ella know that it would be longer. I think Ella was still at her parent's place because none of them had mentioned that she was back.

Finally, the traffic wasn't bad and I was actually driving more than 5 feet at a time. I was about 15 minutes from home when the rain started coming down so heavily I couldn't see anything and as I tried to pull over to the side I heard the skid of tyres and had a bad feeling.

As soon as I felt my mom's car get smashed, I screamed.