Chapter 6: Zendaya is done with her family
While the parents argued with Elijah, no one noticed that Zendaya had not gone into the airport with them, and instead she took a taxi to her aunt's house. Zendaya was hoping that she could stay with her aunt for a while as she was fed up with her mother's gambling habits as well as her drinking habits. When Zendaya got to her aunt's house no one was there. Little did she know that her aunt was not at home because she worked twelve hour shifts at a local hospital. Zendaya ended up waiting outside her aunt's house for hours because she had nowhere else to go. When her aunt got home she was surprised to see Zendaya especially without the rest of her family. Once inside her aunt's house Zendaya explained to her aunt why she was there. Which made her aunt feel sorry for her, but also explained that Zendaya’s father should know that she was safe.
The rest of her family only realized that Zendaya was not there when they all were sitting in their seats on the plane and the plane was about to take off. Abeba had a talk with the flight attendant about what had happened to Zendaya. The flight attendant explained that they had made multiple announcements for Zendaya to come but she never showed and for the sake of the other passengers, the plane had to leave. It was decided that Michael would get off the plane and look for Zendaya because they didn't know at that time where she was. Abeba and Elijah would take the airplane back to Florida.
Michael had looked all over the airport for Zendaya in case she went to the wrong gate. After looking for a few hours, he still did not find her. He was about to phone the police when he got a text from his sister letting him know that Zendaya was safe at her place. He replied asking for more information about why Zendaya had gone there. At first she would not give any information, but then when he made it clear that Abeba was not going to find out, he learned why Zendaya had gone there. It was agreed that he would come and get her because there was no way Zendaya could stay with her aunt. She had to go to school in Florida and her aunt lived on the other side of the country.
Zendaya was not happy that she couldn’t stay with her aunt. She was scared her mother would find out which would make things worse with her mother. The aunt made it clear that she would have liked to help Zendaya, but there was no way she could take good care of Zendaya. Soon after that Michael arrived and he took Zendaya back to the airport without showing any anger as he understood why Zendaya didn't want to be around her mother. Michael wished his daughter would have come to him about the problems instead of scaring him by running away. Michael then texted his wife that he found their daughter but didn't give any details. He used the excuse that he had to find a new flight so there was no time to explain, which was partially true. He also didn't know what to say while still being able to keep his promise he had made to his daughter.
Even on their flight back to Florida he could tell that his daughter was not happy based on her body language. They both knew that there was no way her mother would not find out. About halfway through the flight the stress of the day had made Zendaya fall asleep on the plane, while her dad tried to figure out how to help his daughter deal with her Mother.
Meanwhile Abeba and Elijah's plane had landed, and Abeba took a taxi home because she felt that it would be too hard to care for Elijah while she had to drive home. Once home Abeba went on the family computer and did some online gambling as a way to remove her stress she felt from Zendaya running away. Elijah went to his bedroom when they got home and got himself undressed in order to be more comfortable while he played a video game until he fell asleep. Some hours later Michael and his daughter were landing in Florida where they picked up the family car and drove home. When they got home it was midnight so they went straight to bed. Michael was so tired that when he got into bed he didn't realize that his wife was not in bed yet. Abeba was so into gambling on the internet that she fell asleep at the computer in the middle of the game and only found out that her husband and daughter had come home at midnight the next morning.
Meanwhile Zuphixy and his caregiver got to the Netherlands which took the plane twelve hours. When they got off the plane Zuphixy's wheelchair was broken, not bad enough that he couldn’t use it, but it was broken to the point that they didn't know how long it was going to stay working. After a long time of fighting with the airline, the airline finally agreed to pay for a new wheelchair.
When Zendaya got up the next morning she was scared that her mother would be mad at her for running away, so she tried to avoid her mother as much as possible and still get to school on time. As for Abeba, she woke up the next morning and was surprised to find herself still by the computer. Once she realized the time she went and helped Elijah get ready for school. Now Abeba would have liked to have been able to talk to her daughter about her running away, but she knew that because she was busy helping Elijah, there was no time before school to talk to Zendaya. Abeba could tell Zendaya was avoiding her, but decided to just let her be until the school day was over, then the three of them could have a talk about what happened at the airport.
When Zendaya was at school the teacher could tell that something was upsetting her. They had a talk with Zendaya and she decided to not hide things from her teachers anymore. She explained to them how her mother has been gambling so much and leaving Zendaya to care for her autistic brother while her father was away at work. Even when they were on holiday it was just her and her father sharing the care of her brother. She did let the teachers know that she had ever run away because of how it was bugging her.
Before the children got home from school, Michael had a chat with his wife and told her that if she keeps drinking and gambling like he saw her do on the cruise ship, then he would take the children and move in with his sister in San Diego. Abeba agreed to try to change her ways, but begged him not to move out because she was scared of what that would do to Elijah. Soon after the chat was over the children came home, and along with Zendaya there was a teacher from her school who wanted to talk with Michael and Abeba about what Zendaya had said to her about their holiday.
Michael and Abeba had to prove to the teacher that the children were not in danger because of Abeba’s addiction. Michael admitted that he only realized how bad his wife's addiction was when he saw what Abeba had done on the cruise ship. The fact that Zendaya had run away made it clear to Michael that something had been happening for sometime. He knew then that things needed to be changed and he told the teacher what he told Abeaba about leaving if things don't change.
After the teacher left, Abeba and Michael sat down with Zendaya and let her know that Michael understood why she had run away, but made it clear to her that was the wrong thing to do. Abeba also admitted to her daughter that she knew she had made things hard on Zendaya and said she would try to do better, but she wouldn’t go as far as to promise that things would change right away, as addiction takes time to get over. Zendaya rolled her eyes and said “That is what you said last year.”
Michael looked at his wife with a questioning look. He was wondering if Zendaya was telling the truth about what Abeba told her last year, as he was out working for a long time. He then told Zendaya what he said to Abeba about leaving if Ababa didn't get help the next day. They explained to Zendaya that even with help there would be bad days. They also told Zendaya that she will still be doing a lot for her brother while her mother goes for help with her addiction. Zendaya was ok with doing stuff for her brother if that meant her mother was actually getting help. But she said she would not be happy doing the things if she saw her mother gambling or drinking like nothing changed.
The following morning Micheal had left for work for his month-long shift. It was another day where the children had to go to school. This time Zendaya helped her mother get her brother ready as part of her agreement; to help out as much as she could so that her mother could go to therapy, while the children were at school. But when the children got home from school, Zendaya saw her mother was gambling again. She was about to say something when she remembered what her father told her, that it would take a long time; most likely years before she would see any big changes. So instead, she went and played video games with her brother.
Little did she know her mother had seen her, and decided to stop gambling at that moment. She went to Zendaya to see if Zendaya or Elijah needed anything. In the typical teenage way, Zendaya told her mother she was fine playing video games with Elijah. Soon after that her mother called the children down for dinner, and to Zendaya's surprise it was a homemade meal! Normally Abeba would order take out food at the last minute before it was time for the children to start getting ready for bed.
Abeba, over supper, acknowledged that Zendaya had seen her gambling and apologized to her daughter. She reassured her that she was trying to quit gambling and used the home made dinner as an example that things were changing. Zendaya was disappointed that her mother was still gambling, but she also understood that she had to give her mother time, so she pretended that everything was fine. Even though, in her head she was planning how to let her father know that she didn't see much improvement in her mother while her father was away for work.
The rest of the school week went basically the same. The only difference was that some of the days Zendaya didn't help with her brother as much in the morning, and Abeba didn't make homemade supper every night. Abeba was gambling on the computer most afternoons when the children got home, which was a big disappointment to Zendaya. She decided to text her father every time she saw her mother gambling on the computer, even though she knew that her father could not do anything about it. She just wanted to keep a record with her father.
Little did Zendaya know that even though Abeba was caught gambling most days when the children got home, Abeba had cut back a lot. It had started with her doing gambling most of the afternoon, she ended the week with only half an hour on Friday. Then on the weekend she was outside playing with her children most of the day. Abeba and Zendaya even made a homemade meal together on the weekend which is something they had rarely done before they had gone on the cruise.
The next Monday while the children were at school, Abeba went to gamble on her family computer. When she turned it on the computer crashed right away. Now she was not smart with computers and didn't understand why she couldn’t use it, so she tried to gamble on her cell phone. But she found out that she had run out of data, which upset her even more because she could not gamble. The children would be home from school soon and then she would have to care for them. In her anger she drank most of a bottle of wine and was so drunk she had passed out on the floor.
When Elijah got home, he was so eager to play his video game that it didn’t even register that his mother was passed out on the kitchen floor, nor did it occur to him that she didn't respond to him coming home. Elijah went straight to his room and played his video games.
When Zendaya got home from school a few minutes later she found her mother had passed out. Zendaya in frustration attempted to text her aunt in San Diego and asked her for some advice. But little did she realise that instead of texting her aunt, she accidently texted Jacklyne van den Berg in the Netherlands. Jacklyne was shocked to get a text from Zendaya. She decided to respond by asking if Zendaya meant to text her, as well as to make sure Zendaya was safe. When Zendaya realized who she had texted she apologized and tried her best to reassure Jacklyne that she and her brother were not in any major danger.
Jacklyne couldn’t stop thinking about what Zendaya accidentally texted her. She decided to see if she could make arrangements with the Make A Wish Foundation in the USA, to surprise the Wilson's family with a free trip to the Netherlands. At first the Make A Wish Foundation in the USA didn't want to help ,as Jacklyne was from the Netherlands. But when they heard the whole story about the Wilsons, they agreed to see what they could do.
Meanwhile, once Zendaya had stopped texting, she finished making the supper that her mother started. Just as super was ready to eat, Abeba recovered and was surprised to see that supper was ready. Before the cooking class they took on the ship, Zendaya was too scared to cook. Usually they would go get pizza whenever Abeba recovered from passing out, tossing out the unfinished meal. But this time Zendaya decided to put her new knowledge of cooking to the test, which worked so well that from that day on it became Zendaya’s job to make supper, when she didn't have too much homework to do. 57 Abeba was so happy that her daughter liked cooking that she cut back with how much alcohol she was drinking and spent more time with her son Elijah, making jigsaw puzzles or Abeba would play some basketball with him while Zendaya was cooking. Zendaya was surprised that her mother was drinking less alcohol but she thought that it wouldn't last.
The next day, someone from Make A Wish in the USA came by their house to tell them that the children of the family had won a free trip to the Netherlands for one week without parents. The trip was then set for the week before Christmas that the children had off from school.