Doesn't this look super cute? Check it out!
One
kiss can change the future...for better or for worse.
Belle
and her cousins have conquered their fears. Now as they navigate their way
through the dating world, they start to see a "happily ever after" on
the horizon. But when an unexpected school assignment forces them to examine
their past, the Princess sisters realize they have a lot of questions about the
fathers they've never met. Secrets are revealed, long lost family members are
discovered, and now the girls must decide who belongs in their future and who
should be kept in the past.
Sounds awesome, right? Here's an excerpt!
Chapter Eight
Cinderella sat back in her
chair, completely stunned. She licked
her lips, which were growing drier by the second. She started to raise her hand, in preparation
to ask a question, but she didn’t know what to ask. She didn’t know where to even begin.
The few brief moments in her
life when she tried bringing up her father resulted in Dana usually being angry
and bitter. Then she typically followed
it with guilt. “Why would you even bring
him up? Haven’t I been a good enough
parent to you?” Blah blah blah. Cinderella had even tried to Google him once,
but without the knowledge of his last name, she knew she wouldn’t get
anywhere. All she knew about him was
that his name was Steven...or Stephen.
Since she wasn’t sure how it was spelled, she tried both. “Stephen” brought up 94, 600, 000
results. “Steven” brought up 528, 000,
000. The only thing the search had
taught Cinderella was Steven with a V was clearly a more popular spelling.
She wanted to ask a question
about the assignment, but didn’t know where to start. She quickly gave up and dropped her head into
her hands. Cinderella was not looking forward to talking to her
mom tonight.
Aurora and Ariel exchanged
worried looks. Their father was in jail,
that’s all they knew. After hearing from
their aunts how abusive he was to their mother, they didn’t really care to know
any more. What kind of man could hurt
such a tender, sweet woman like Rachel?
They made a pact when they were young not to bring him up, or even think
about him. They had each other, their
mom, their cousins and aunts. They
didn’t need to know about a man who still gave their mother nightmares. The few times he was brought up when they were
little resulted in Rachel freezing in terror, shaking violently, or having a
full-on panic attack. She couldn’t talk
about him, she couldn’t even look at wedding pictures without losing it
completely. The girls had a vague idea
of what he looked like, from glancing at the pictures a few times. But the pictures were destroyed one night
after Rachel had gone to bed, when Dana and Mary came into their house and
burned them all. When the twins had
questioned them, their aunts simply said it was for Rachel’s own good and then
left quietly as soon as the deed was done.
Several years ago Rachel
received word that he had been transferred from the California state prison to
the one in Draper, Utah. He had gotten
in a fight with another prisoner or something.
The girls didn’t really know the details surrounding his transfer, nor
did they care. But they had never seen
Rachel so scared in all their lives.
Even though Draper was a good 40 minutes south of Layton, Rachel was
seriously contemplating whether she should pack up the twins and move. Thankfully her sisters had been able to talk
her down.
“Do we have to explore both
our mom and our dad’s sides of the family?” Ariel asked without raising her
hand.
“In order to complete the
family tree, yes,” their teacher replied.
“You can choose which side to explore further, but you need to at least
know the basics of both of your family lines.”
Ariel blew out a huge breath,
shooting her blonde bangs into the air.
She hadn’t even realized she’d been holding it in. Now she wished she could take that breath
back. Maybe if I forgot to breathe and passed out, I could play the sick card
and get out of this assignment. She
heard a similar exhalation from her sister and looked over at her. Call it twin intuition or whatever you want,
but from the look Aurora gave her, she knew they were thinking the exact same
thing.
Snow White sat in her desk,
wringing her hands silently on her lap.
She felt completely dumbfounded.
She didn’t even know her dad’s name!
The few times he was brought up, her aunts simply referred to him as
“the sperm donor”. When she questioned
her mom, Elizabeth would just treat her like a little kid and say the stork had
dropped her off. No matter how much
pushing or questioning she had done, Snow White always came up empty. Maybe she didn’t really have a father at
all. Maybe her aunts weren’t kidding
when they said he was a sperm donor.
It’s not like her mom ever dated, or even appeared to like men for that
matter. Snow White looked around at her cousins
and knew this was going to be the most difficult assignment they would have.
Belle sat frozen to her
chair. She was already trying, no,
trying wasn’t the right word, more like being forced into the idea of her
father existing outside her imagination.
Now she had to somehow get in touch with him and have a father/daughter
chat over cocoa about his parents and where he came from? Absolutely not! She would simply refuse and take an F on the
assignment. She didn’t even care
anymore.
“And if some of you are
thinking of skipping out on the assignment, perhaps it seems like too much
work, well...” Mrs. Payne paused for effect.
“It will be twenty percent of your grade, so I don’t recommend it.”
The witch can read minds! The fire that began boiling
down inside of Belle suddenly built up so intensely, it shot her hand straight
into the air. She didn’t wait to be
called on before diving in. “What if our
fathers aren’t a part of our lives?” she asked, eyes narrowed. Belle did not want her classmates knowing
this information about her, but she had to let Mrs. Payne know how unreasonable
she was being.
“Well, even if you have
step-fathers, or no real contact with your dad at all, there’s always someone
you can talk to. Your mom, a grandma or
aunt maybe, you just need the basic information for the tree itself.”
Without even thinking, Belle found herself running
away for the second time in less than twenty-four hours.
Find it here:
About the Author!
Stacy
Lynn Carroll has always loved telling stories.
She started out at Utah State University where she pursued a degree in
English, learned how to western swing, and watched as many of her fellow
students became ‘True Aggies’. She then
finished her BA at the University of Utah where she got an emphasis in creative
writing. After college she worked as an
administrative assistant, where she continued to write stories for the
amusement of her co-workers. When her
first daughter was born, and with the encouragement of a fortune cookie, she
quit her job and became a full-time mommy and writer. She and her husband have three children, two
Corgis, and a fish named Don.
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