THE UNSERIOUS

We lost a lot of things in the fire,
So it took a year for me to find out,
I can't lose you babe

***

BONUS CHAPTER

*****

“ARACELI,” I CALLED out her name softly, breaking her out of her daydreaming and making her look up at me from where her head rested on my chest. “You're very quiet today,” I pointed out as I placed a hand on her forehead to get her temperature. “Are you okay?”

She quickly slapped my hand away from her head, making me chuckle as she leaned up to kiss my lips as a form of an apology. “I've just been thinking,” she said, her voice coming out soft as she gave me a small tentative smile.

“About what?” I asked, making her sigh again as she pursed her lips.

“It's been three years I put in my IUD,” she began, making me furrow my eyebrows at where this was going. “That means ny appointment to get it replaced is near but...” she trailed off as she delicately placed her hand on my chest, a hopeful smile on her face. “I was considering that maybe I don't get it replaced.”

I stayed staring into her eyes silently before looking down at her stomach briefly. “You want another baby?” I finally asked after a long moment of silence as I met her gaze again.

She nodded in response, her big brown eyes staring up at me in adoration and love and hope before she rested her head on my chest, allowing me time to think about what her words meant.

There really wasn't much to think about. She wanted another child and she wanted me to give it to her. She trusted me enough to want to have more children with me; to want to start a family with me.

The question came when I wondered if I wanted another child. I had never been a family oriented person until she had come back into my life with the little family I didn't know I helped her create. That's when everything changed and as I envisioned our future, her in my arms, rubbing her swollen stomach with Teo running around us, I realised I did want a family. A family of more than two children really, but she'd be the one to decide how many she had.

I'd give her as much babies as she wanted.

Not until I married her though. Which then posed a question. She wanted a baby now and I wanted a baby now, so naturally I'd have to marry her now.

“Marry me,” I said after a long moment of silence, making her look up at me with humour dancing in her pretty eyes.

“Didn't I already say I would?” she asked, her voice sounding like the sweetest of melodies ringing through my ear. “Or maybe I was hallucinating.”

“I mean, marry me Araceli. Next week,” I explained  specifying what exactly it was I meant so it didn't sound like I was experiencing a sudden bout of amnesia. “Be my wife.”

Her eyes widened with realisation, her lips slightly parting with shock of what I was requesting her to do before, slowly, a small smile had stretched across her face. “Okay,” was the only thing she said before she rested her head back against my chest and snuggled tighter into me.

Okay. As long as I didn't screw up, she would legally become my wife next week and I would be happy. Not that I wasn't already now, but I would be happier. I didn't think that was possible before, but I was beginning to realise that surprised were a normal, expected thing when it came to living life with Araceli. Nothing was ever as it seemed and that was okay.

***

“Pablo,” I greeted as I walked into the office where Pablo and guillermo had been patiently waiting for me. Pablo had his legs crossed, his suit jacket off to the side and a gun being cleaned in his hand. Guillermo threw and caught a ball which had actually just been a scrunched up page from a newspaper. Both of their current interests right now seemed pretty true to their personalities.

“Daniel,” Pablo briefly greeted me back without taking his eyes off his gun, making me roll my eyes and redirect my attention to Guillermo who was already watching me expectantly for his own greeting.

I briefly considered not saying a word to him just to spite him but ended up rolling my eyes and speaking instead. “Guillermo.”

“Daniel,” he responded back, sounding way too pleased for him just to have received a greeting from me. I couldn't help but wonder how Celeste, the most bitchy, most sarcastic woman he had ever met, got along with Guillermo, the stark opposite of that.

Guillermo was so unserious that his first ever day job was a chicken mascot for a local fried chicken joint in his home town. Everyone clowned him for it, but it was obvious that the guy had a blast whenever he was called in for a shift. It was weird. He was weird.

I decided not to pick Gillermo apart for his life choices again — we already had that conversation when he first proposed to Celeste — and instead decided to get straight to the point of why I had called them for the meeting in the first place.

“As you know, I and Araceli are back together,” I said casually as I took my seat at the other side of the desk to which both Pablo and Guillermo rolled both their eyes at my words like I had said something dumb.

“We're aware,” they both groaned, sounding as if they were already bored with the conversation yet it hadn't even started. I supposed they were tired of constantly hearing about me and Ara, but could I ever stop myself from taking about her? That woman took over my entire head; every second thought of mine was about her.

Deciding that I didn't give a fuck about their feelings, I ignored their obvious disinterest in the conversation at hand and instead continued to speak. “We may only just be engaged, but that woman is my wife. I need her safe.”

“So what? Screw every other woman?” Guillermo asked to which which only looked at him with a small glare before rolling my eyes at him again in annoyance and ignoring him. That very obviously wasn't what I meant, but of course he was going to be the nuisance amongst the three of us, the dumbass.

“I need Mateo safe and I need any future children we have safe,” I continued to which Guillermo sighed loudly and shook his head in disappointment as if I had just ordered for the genocide of millions.

“I guess that means screw every other child too.”

“So what are you hinting at?” Pablo asked, also deciding not to pay any attention to Guillermo who didn't seem like he cared in the slightest whether we acknowledged him or not.

“We need to start applying pressure and removing our enemies,” I said, shrugging because to me, it was as simple as that. Pick off our opponents one by one until it was only us standing.

“We already got rid of the Ivanovs,” Pablo said, making me raise an eyebrow at his statement. Why was I supposed to care about that? Better yet, what did that have to do with my desire to take out the Costillo's in one smooth sleep?

“And?”

He sighed as he set his gun down and met Mt gaze gaze the first time. “Can we handle a war if one breaks out?” he asked to which I only shrugged. “People of this town and surrounding respect us now only because they don't know about how you took out a whole entire family in New York,” he pointed out. “They think you're killing streak is over and feel somewhat... safer,” he hesitated yo say because even I'd argue that "safe" wasn't the correct adjective to use. “If we instigate things with the Costillo's, they will retaliate and another war will break out. One that we may win, but at what cost?”

“So we should just let them hurt Araceli?” Guillermo asked, making both Pablo and I look to him in surprise because wasn't he just the one to advocate for every other woman when Araceli had been brought up. “I must look extremely beautiful today for the both of you to be staring at me like that,” he said sarcastically as he batted his lashes before dropping the facade and rolling his eyes while kissing his teeth.

I couldn't help the small chuckle that escaped my lips at his words while Pablo shook his head and barely contained a laugh. “I didn't say we should let them hurt her,” he said, responding to the serious part of Guillermo's question and nothing else. “All I'm saying is that we should wait for them to make the first move so when they do, we fault them and take little blame if any at all.”

“What if they never do?” Guillermo asked to which Pablo shook his head and chuckled before picking up his gun again and going back to cleaning it.

“Believe me, they will. They've been quiet way too long now. It's only a matter of time,” he said before meeting my gaze, a confident look in his eyes. “And when they do, we'll show them our cartel isn't the one to mess with.”

*****

So I figured, why not treat yall to some extra bonus chapters while you wait for the next one? I mean, it's written but if you don't want to read conpleyetrash, wait for me to edit it.

This is the problem I have with writing ahead, I also just want to post everything all at the same time but anyway, here yall go I suppose. Its not much, but I at least hope its interesting. I have another chapter following Dandan in like two chapters so keep an eye out for that.