Chapter Text
A Santa Cruz Evening
The night air was inviting in Santa Cruz. The neighborhood lights were lit, the atmosphere calming and scene very chill. Right down the street was a housewarming party... and a baby shower. It was nice, as it had an excellent catering service and a wonderful atmosphere. Linda was at the party, sporting a yellow dress as it was themed that way. “Did you get a piglet in a baby blanket?” Linda said, looking at a guest who had food on her plate already, to which Linda moved on.
The party itself was on the quiet side, some elevator music set up by Linda. Mika had been dressed up as a butler with finger foods. As anyone could tell, Linda had orchestrated the party.
Her daughter, however, was the better half of Linda. She had dark red hair and brown eyes and looked just like her mother. “Alright everyone, get your presents and set them on the table,” Melly said. Everyone had placed large and small boxes on the table, all having different wrapping paper designs. “Mom, should I go and see if she’s ready?”
“No no no, I’ll check,” Linda said as she placed down the tray of finger foods and had headed up the room. She knocked on the door and had waited, “Sweetheart? Everyone’s downstairs waiting for you,” she said. She opened the door to see her.
There sat a woman in white. She had a maxi dress that covered her figure. Her hair was down to her shoulder and wavy. She looked at herself in the vanity mirror sorrowfully, her eyes drooping and her lips curled into a frown.
“Oh, Ericka…” Linda said. She had approached her from behind and placed a hand on her shoulders, “come downstairs, everyone is waiting…"
“I can’t,” she said, a hand on something underneath her dress.
“But everyone had changed their schedule just to have you here,” Linda said, rubbing her shoulders, “they wanna see that baby bump of yours.”
“More like a baby bomb,” she said as she stood up and faced her. She had more than bump alright. Her stomach looked as though it was housing a fill preteen, her stomach like a torpedo. Her breast was large and swollen, but her hourglass figure had looked even more impressive than before.
“D’oh you look so beautiful,” Linda cooed as she had hugged her, but the belly was in the way.
“I don’t feel pretty,” Ericka said, looking at herself in the mirror.
“Oh hush,” she said, “you looked way better than I did when I was pregnant with the boys and Melly. I looked like the elephant foot from Chernobyl!”
“And this baby is about to explode,” she said, her hand rubbing her stomach up and down, “I mean, how can this baby be three months into my pregnancy? I feel like I should be in my third trimester by now.
“Babies are supposed to develop sweetheart,” Linda explained, but had sighed, “which reminds me… when are you going to check and see if the baby is okay? I mean just because it’s a half-vampire that’s no excuse to not check to see if the baby is alright.”
“I would but I’m too afraid to know. And even if I did go to check, the baby won’t even show up. They are half a vampire you know…” Ericka said. Ericka didn’t want to go to any hospital to check and see if the baby was healthy, and not because she didn’t want to. She was scared of whether or not the baby would even show up on the monitor.
“But they’re also half-human,” Linda urged, “just go and see if it’s alright. It could be a great time to see if the baby is a boy to a girl,” she said excitedly, her face getting wider, “you could be having twins!”
“Oh god no, please!” Ericka said, her face in her hands. The idea of having more than one mini Dracula flying out of her womb could be catastrophic.
“Alright, alright,” Linda said, “I just want to have an ultrasound to the new little one,” she added.
“Well Johnny and his wife had Dennis, and they never had an ultrasound,” Ericka said. “In fact, I don’t even think they went to any appointments…”
“Well you know them, trying to keep it traditional,” Linda said. She soon witnesses Ericka on the bed and looks down.
“Sweetheart?” Linda called, sitting next to her, “are you okay?”
“Do you think they’re thinking about me?” Ericka asked.
“The guys back at the hotel?” Linda confirmed, “oh of course… you can pop up there and visit you know…”
“Please… I can’t go back… not after everything that happened,” Ericka said.
“Which you still haven’t told me…” Linda said.
“I can’t focus on it anymore… I need to focus on this,” she said, her hand on her stomach.
Linda had rubbed her back,” come on,” she said as she wanted to distract her from her worries, “we have a party downstairs with your name on it.”
Ericka had chuckled and stood up, waddling down the stairs and taking in a deep breath.
Back At Hotel Transylvania
The hotel was booked, everyone running around and having such a good time. The monsters were awake at this time, in which they all had the pool at this time. One monster was eating in the pool, which wasn’t allowed. A vampire figure had approached behind him. It cleared its throat, to which the monster had turned around and yelped. “Uh! Dracula Senior!”
“That’s Mista Dracula Senior to you,” Vlad said. He leaned in with an angle, meeting face to face to the monster, “unless you wanna live the rest of your centuries as a goldfish, don’t eat in the pool!” he said before roaring, causing the monster to swim out the pool and ran off, along with his associates. Vlad had smirked and fixed his cape and turned around to see none other than his grand-daughter. She had a scowl and arms crossed.
“What,” Vlad said, “I had it covered.”
“Covered?” Mavis said incredulously, “you scared off a guest. Now they probably won’t come back.”
“Well sorry, but I’m not as cool and collected as your dad,” he said.
“Well, dad isn’t here…” Mavis said, arms crossed and eyes closed.
A silence had fallen over the two like the universe had sucked the sound from the universe. Vlad had placed a hand on her shoulder, “hey… hey,” he said as he had her face him.
She had tears in her eyes. Her hair no longer had the bottom of her ends curl out and was cut to look like a cropped bob. She had a newer design for her outfit. She had a long pencil skirt that wrapped around her bottom half with red stitching at the hem. She wore a long-sleeved black shirt with a turtle neck design. She traded her sneakers for kitten heels and had worn sheer black stockings. She had to improve her look to have customers come in more, as she wasn’t being taken seriously.
“I know it's been hard, trust me, I know,” Vlad said, rubbing his head, “but we just gotta keep our heads up for a little bit.”
“But I miss him…” Mavis said, “he just disappears for days and nights, and no one will tell me where he’s at…”
“Shhh,” he said before pulling her in for a hug.
Ericka’s House
The party had finished up, Ericka receiving so many presents. The baby clothes were ambiguous as she didn’t want to know the gender. The stroller and new diapers were piles. Ericka had sat in a purple wicker chair, Ericka removing her shoes, letting her toes breath. Melly had been taking down the decorations when she saw Ericka and had approached her. She had gotten on her knees and began to rub her feet.
Ericka had immediately objected, “n-no no no sweetheart, you don’t need to do that,” she said.
“You’ve been standing all evening,” Melly said. Ericka had leaned down and relaxed as Melly rubbed her feet. “I took some nice pictures of the party if you wanna look through my camera.”
“I would love to, thank you,” Ericka said, “and maybe I can post them.”
“Yes!” Melly said. “By the way, when are you gonna add something to your profile on QikPik?”
“I don’t know. I don’t wanna have people knowing where I’m at…” she said as she blushed.
“That’s what social media is for, duh,” Melly said.
“Melly, don’t bombard her. In a few months from now, she won’t need to go on social media,” Linda said, Melly having mimicked her mom as Ericka chuckled under her hand.
“Okay, mom,” she said as she stood up. “I gotta go, have a huge art thing happening at one of the museums,” she said.
“Okay, bye,” she said as she watched her leave and had relaxed. “Well, that’s that…”
“Yeah,” Linda said, soon sitting in front of her, “I know you said you didn’t want to tell me, but I wanna know… what happened at the hotel…” Linda asked.
Ericka was about to start, but then had closed her eyes and breathed, “I’m not ready to talk about what happened…”
“Honey, it’s been three months. You gotta budge,” Linda said, her hands on hers, “look, I promise I won’t tell anyone, not a soul.”
Ericka had looked at her and her hands. She couldn’t keep it in anymore. She had to tell her. She didn’t want to be dishonest with what was happening. She didn’t want history to repeat.
“Okay… but you gotta promise…” she said as she looked at her.
“Cross my heart and hope to die,” Linda said as Ericka chuckled.
“Okay… It started just around September of last year…”