Life Goes On (A Hunter Hayes Fanfiction, Book 2 of the Hardships Saga)

Chapter Sixteen

❝meet (pronouned miːt  or as spelled), verb
to happen upon someone, to introduce yourself and find out about another's existence.❞

That Monday, Elle sat in Music class, where Ryan had given the class some colouring to complete. She was sitting with Drew, who was now her best friend. "My Papa's looking for a wife."

"Why?"

"The company are saying that if he doesn't get a new wife, then they'll fire him."

"Fire him?!"

"Yeah."

Drew put down the red crayon and reached for a blue one, to colour in Humpty Dumpty's pants. "Why?"

"Dunno. Papa won't tell me."

He nodded. "My brother's looking for a girlfriend."

"A girlfriend?"

"Yeah."

"How old is he?"

Drew thought carefully. "I think he's eighteen."

"Oh."

Jonah, who was the little boy in their class who made funny jokes, put up his hand and yelled, "MOM!"

Everyone started laughing, including Ryan herself. "Hon, did you need me for something?"

Jonah had gone bright red, and nodded, looking embarrassed. "Yeah."

Drew was laughing quite hard, but Elle looked very, very deep in thought. Drew stopped laughing, and nudged her. "Elle?"

"Drew, do you know how old Miss Lockhart is?"

He shook his head. "Maybe eighteen?"

Elle put up her hand, and Drew asked, "What are you doing?"

"I'm gonna ask her how old she is."

"Don't do that!" said Drew very quickly. "My brother said that you should never ask a lady how old she is."

"It's okay, I'm a lady too." She put her hand up higher. "Ryan?"

"Just a moment, honey!"

Elle nodded and put her hand down. Drew looked confused, and asked, "Why do you want to know how old she is?"

She smiled slightly. "Because I want her to be my new Mama."

"What?!"

But it made perfect sense to Elle. Ryan was smart, pretty, nice, and she loved music, just like her Papa did. She sung so beautifully as well- once, while Elle was packing up some of the instruments after class was gone, and she was humming one of Hunter's songs under her breath, and it had sounded beautiful. She was perfect!

"Elle, did you need something?"

"I just wanted to ask how old you are?"

Ryan raised her eyebrows, but said, "I'm 24, sweetie. Why do you ask?"

"Would you marry my papa?"

"We'd have to see. Is your papa cool?"

"Yeah!"

Ryan just chuckled, and moved on to the next person who had their hand up. Drew just shook his head. "You really think she would marry your dad?"

"Well, tonight they'll get to meet each other, so maybe!"

"Oh yeah, parent teacher night. Your dad is coming?"

"Yeah!"

"So's my mom."