MUMUS: A Cattle Creek Gang Halloween
So I cut this very close and technically it's November 1st, but because we're going back an hour tonight and I've already reset my clocks, I'm still counting this as being posted on Halloween. I'm really happy with the way this last story of the Cattle Creek Gang shorts came out and I hope you guys enjoy it.
This Halloween short joins the other six holiday based shorts in this series: Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, Father's Day.
Couple: Ryan & Gabriella
Rating: M
Quote: “uh huh, you can look but you can’t touch”
Setting/Event: Gabriella stripping for Ryan
Random Stuff:
- striper pole
- black sequenced gloves
- vampire
They were the unlikeliest group of friends-everyone thought so. Early on in their public school careers they were labeled by their peers: 2 jocks, 2 nerds and 2 drama freaks. But for the six kids who were born and raised on a Albuquerque, New Mexico cul-de-sac called Cattle Creek Loop (which led to them being referred to as the Cattle Creek Gang), there were no cliques that separated them, they were just best friends.
Between 1988 and 1989, Cattle Creek Loop welcomed five families into its homes all of them in different places in their lives, some were newly weds others and others had been married for several years. There must have been something in the water, or so the saying goes, because all five families became pregnant about the same time and all had their babies during the summer of 1990.
Charlie and Yolanda Danforth were the first couple to welcome their baby on June 5. It was a little boy with a head full of hair and they named him Chad Daniel, after his mom’s grandfather. Six years later, Chad would be followed by younger brother Christopher Scott.
Jose and Miranda Montez were the next couple to welcome a baby a couple weeks later on June 21st. It was a little girl and they christened her Gabriella Marie.
With July came Vance and Darby Evans’ double blessing on the 15th. They named their baby boy, the oldest of the two twins, Ryan Benjamin and their baby girl Sharpay Danielle.
On August 1st, Griffen and Sheryl McKessie welcome their second daughter Taylor Renee to the family. She joined older siblings Logan (4) and Madelyn Rose (2).
The last of the six 1990 babies was born to Jack and Lucy Bolton on August 12. Having decided to wait until the baby was born to find out the sex, they didn’t know until the baby was born that he was a boy and they named him Troy Walker.
From the very beginning of their existence the Cattle Creek Gang did everything together. When they were little it was play dates, birthday parties, potty training, preschool, field trips, sports, learning to ride bikes and learning to swim. And as they got older it started to include school dances, learning to drive, going to prom, graduating, everything that normal kids do with their friends.
Now as adults, they were still doing things together, sort of. They were all married-Troy to Taylor, Chad to Sharpay, and Ryan to Gabriella; lived on the same street-Troy and Taylor next door to Chad and Sharpay with Ryan and Gabriella at the opposite end of the block; and starting families-Troy and Taylor have seven-year-old twins, Bekah and Ben, Chad and Sharpay have Charlie (named after Chad’s dad), 6, Shayla, 3, and are pregnant with baby number three, while Ryan and Gabriella don’t have any, yet.
Even though they had all grown up, the many annual Cattle Creek Loop festivities had continued. Things had changed a little after Chad’s mom had remarried and sold her house-to Taylor’s sister-to move in with her new husband, but for the most part, things had remained the same.
The annual Night Before Halloween Bash on Cattle Creek Loop was one of the few events where people outside of the neighborhood were invited to join them all. Unlike all the other holiday traditions, it had been put in place by the fathers of the Cattle Creek Gang. Every year the five families rotated duties, taking turns hosting a haunted house, game place, food hub, scary movie theater and adult area; this year the Boltons’ were in charge of the haunted house, the Montezs’ the games, the McKessies’ hosting the food, Taylor’s sister hosting the scary movie theater and the Evans’ hosting the adult area.
With an hour before the bash was to begin, Gabriella stood in front of the mirror in her walk in closet and smiled at her reflection; Ryan was going to die when he saw her sexy vampire costume (not to mention what she wasn't wearing underneath it). Considering how short the thigh high black mini dress of the costume was, Gabriella was happy to have a black cape, with a red satin lining, to wear over it.
She was pulling on her thigh high boot when she heard a whistle from behind her. She knew without looking that it was Ryan and didn’t say anything until she felt him step behind her and grab her hips. Pulling out of his grasp, she stood up straight and wagged a finger at him. “Uh huh, you can look but you can’t touch,” she said.
“But you look so sexy,” he whiningly growled.
“I know, but you’ll have to wait until after the party,” she winked. “Go get ready, your costume is on the bed.”
With a sigh, he left the closet. Knowing it would only take him a couple minutes to change into his vampire costume, she pulled on her second boot then followed him into the bedroom. She found him pulling the black vest with a silver shirt sewn in over his head and let her eyes follow the blonde trail of hair run until it disappeared under his jeans.
“Uh huh, you can look but you can’t touch,” he mimicked her after catching her watching him.
“Put your cape on and let’s go,” she rolled her eyes. “The sooner we go, the sooner we come home and try out that new little toy we had installed last week.” Her eyes flickered to the French doors that separated the master bedroom from the home office.
“Let’s go,” he said as his pulse quickened and he mentally pictured whatever he could to keep his loans from tightening. He grabbed the cape off the bed then grabbed her hand and all but pulled her from their bedroom.
Leading her to the car, he opened her door then ran around to his side of the car. He drove them to their old neighborhood, parking around the corner from the cul-de-sac so those with kids could park on the street.
He and Gabriella met at the front of the car and walked hand in hand to his parents house when they knew they’d find everyone since the party wouldn’t start for another thirty minutes. Though it wasn’t necessary, many of the couples that attended the party came dressed in pairs, so it surprised them both when they saw their brother-in-law Chad dressed up as a basketball player and his wife, Sharpay, dressed as a pregnant fairy.
“He refused to be a fairy and didn’t to be a pirate,” Sharpay had shrugged to Gabriella’s inquiry. “So tonight I’m matching my little fairy.”
As if summoned, Chad and Sharpay’s daughter Shayla, dressed in a Tinkerbell like costume, came outside with Taylor and Troy’s daughter Bekah, dressed as bumblebee. Both girls smiled when they saw Ryan and Gabriella and hurried over to them.
Gabriella smiled as Ryan hoisted Shayla up and tickled their youngest niece, who looked just like her mom with her dad’s coloring. Bekah, on the other hand, looked like a combination of both her parents with dark curly locks.
“Where are your brothers?” Ryan asked the girls.
“They’re coming with Troy and Taylor,” Chad answered for them. “They went to a Halloween party at a friend from soccer’s house, so they’ll be a little late.”
They talked for a few more minutes before Ryan and Gabriella excused themselves and headed inside to greet the others before the party really started. They greeted their respective parents and in-laws and each got something to drink.
When they returned outside, Troy and Taylor, dressed as the Spartan cheerleaders from SNL, had arrived with their son, Ben, and Chad and Taylor’s son, Charlie, in tow, dressed as Batman and Spiderman, respectively.
With Sharpay ready to pop any minute, Ryan took turns with Chad and Troy keeping an eye on the four kids, though the older three insisted they didn’t need to be babysat, while Taylor and Gabriella sat with Sharpay.
It was around 8:30 when Taylor and Sharpay decided it was time to round up the kids and husbands and go home, knowing their kids would be up early the next morning ready to trick or treat. After helping Chad get Shayla, who was sleeping in Ryan’s arms, into the car, Ryan and Gabriella headed to their own car.
When they got home, she told him to lock up for the night then hurried up to their bedroom to get everything ready. She stopped in the bathroom to fix her hair and make up then went into the office turned adult room and turned on the red spot lights affixed to the ceiling. Then she slipped on a pair of black sequence gloves and queued up a song before taking position with her back to the doors.
As they had rehearsed, Ryan entered the room silently and turned on the music. Then took a seat on the couch they had in there, his eyes fixed on the pole in the center of the room, anchored to the floor and the ceiling, and Gabriella behind it.
Feeling the beat of the music filling her body, she brought her arms up and unhooked the cape, letting it fall to the ground. Then she unzipped the back of her dress and let it slide down her body before turning around to face her husband. She kicked the piles of clothes out of her way as she rolled the gloves down her arms then tossed them to him. Then, dressed in only a black thong, she mounted the pole and used the skills she had learned in the pole dancing class she had taken that summer in preparation for this.
She was only halfway through her routine, and hanging upside down, when she saw him stand up, the tent in his pants showing his obvious enjoyment. She righted her self and with her feet firmly planted to the ground, watched as he pulled his shirt over his head then dropped his jeans to the ground.
It took one motion of his finger for her to go to him willingly, wrapping her legs around his waist after he lifted her up. He carried her through the French doors and to the king size bed that awaited them. He didn’t bother to turn down the covers as he laid her back, pressing his hard, concealed manhood against her inner thighs.
Time seemed to stop as he covered her body in kisses, preparing her for what would come next. When their mouths finally met, they did so in near starvation for one another, making them both realize how badly they needed each other.
They peeled away the remaining cloth barriers that kept them apart and with nothing else to stop them, he slid deep inside of her. Pulling out and pushing in repeatedly until they came together so violently that he collapsed on top of her, face pressed to her heavy breasts, completely spent.
It was the ringing of the phone that brought them out of their trance enough to realize that it was a little after one in the morning.
Groaning as he leaned over, Ryan grabbed the phone from the bedside table and answered it.
From where Gabriella laid, she could hear what she recognized as Chad’s voice say something about Sharpay’s water breaking and the kids sleeping. Putting two and two together, she was already out of bed when Ryan promised that they would be over in a couple minutes.
Seeing as Chad needed to get Sharpay to the hospital quickly, Ryan jumped into the shower while Gabriella packed an overnight bag for the two of them. Once he was out of the shower, he got dressed and headed over to Chad and Sharpay’s. She showered then headed over as well.
Not wanting to scare the kids if they woke up, Ryan and Sharpay slept in Chad and Sharpay’s room and were woken up shortly after seven by Shayla and Charlie, who was full of questions.
“Why are you here? Where’s mom and dad?” Charlie asked, not giving his aunt and uncle a chance to wake up after being barged in on.
“I want mommy,” Shayla pouted, her lower lip trembling.
“Come here, you guys,” Ryan said, motioning them over. He lifted Shayla up on to the bed as soon as she was close enough and put her between himself and Gabriella while Charlie climbed onto the foot of the bed.
“Where’s mom and dad?” Charlie repeated.
“Your parents are at the hospital,” Gabriella told them. “Your baby brother decided he didn’t want to wait a whole year to celebrate Halloween.”
“Mom had the baby?” Charlie’s eyes showed excitement.
“We don’t know yet,” Ryan replied. “But we can call grandma and find out.”
Both kids nodded eagerly; though Ryan and Gabriella were both sure that Shayla didn’t know what exactly was going on.
Grabbing his cell phone, Ryan dialed his mom’s cell phone number and put her on speaking phone.
“Hello?” She answered, her voice sounding very tired.
“Did mom have the baby?” Charlie asked excitedly.
“Hey pumpkin,” Ryan’s mom replied. “No, your mom hasn’t had the baby yet, but it should happen any time now.”
“You’ll call us right?” Charlie asked.
“Of course, you will be the first person I call,” she replied. “Let me talk to your uncle Ryan.”
Ryan took the phone off speaker and listened to his mom as she filled him in on Sharpay’s emergency c-section and promised, again, to call as soon as they knew anything. Then he said goodbye and hung up.
“So, who wants to make chocolate chip pancakes and watch cartoons in our pajamas?” Gabriella asked, distracting the kids from the pending arrival of their baby brother.
“Me!” Shayla shrieked in the tone that Ryan was sure only she and her mother could reach.
“Alright then, let’s go down stairs,” Gabriella smiled.
It was shortly before noon when the call came from Ryan’s mom; the baby had arrived, all 7 pounds, 8 ounces and 18 inches of him and Sharpay was doing fine. Ryan let his mom tell Charlie and Shayla then left the room to talk to her about bringing the kids to see Sharpay and the baby.
They decided that the best time for them to bring the kids in was before they went trick or treating. So that evening, they piled Charlie and Shayla into Sharpay’s minivan and drove them to the hospital dressed in their costumes.
To the thrill of Charlie and Shayla, the nurses stations they walked past gave them each a handful of candy and by the time they got to their mom’s room, they’re candy buckets were heavy.
They found Chad, Sharpay and baby Cohen in the room when they got there and both Charlie and Shayla got a chance to hold their new baby brother, with help from Chad, of course. Then, since Sharpay didn’t want her picture taken, Ryan took a picture of Chad holding Cohen in one arm and Shayla in the other as Charlie stood by his side, his finger being clutched by his baby brother.
Later that night, as Gabriella was taking the pictures they had taken of Charlie and Shayla trick or treating off her camera, she paused at the picture of Sharpay and Chad holding Cohen. Just looking at the small bundle wrapped in a blue blanket made her want a baby; she and Ryan hadn’t officially been trying to have a baby, but they hadn’t not been trying to either.
She gave Ryan a sideways glance, wondering what their son or daughter would look like when they finally had one, if they had one.
As if he knew what she was thinking, he said, “It’ll happen when it’s supposed to.”
One Year Later
Dressed as bad-girl Sandy from Grease, Gabriella wondered how Taylor and Sharpay had made juggling themselves and kids seem so easy all these years and with multiply kids. She only had three month old Jayden and was about to lose her mind.
“I’m ready,” Ryan said, coming into the nursery, dressed as Danny from Grease, where she was changing Jayden’s diaper. “Why don’t you go finish getting ready and I’ll get him in his costume.”
Ever grateful, she kissed her husband then left the room to finish getting ready.
By the time they reached Cattle Creek Loop the party was in full swing. With Jayden seated safely in his carseat, Ryan and Gabriella made their way over to the new family friendly area in front of Taylor’s sister’s house-a substitution for the scary movies part of the party.
They joined Sharpay and Chad, dressed as a disco couple, and Taylor and Troy, dressed as a Grecian couple, at their table. Gabriella freed Jayden from his carseat and held him up as Ryan straightened the pumpkin costume the baby was dressed in.
Ryan was about to ask where the others’ kids were when his mom headed over with Cohen, also dressed as a pumpkin, in her arms and the four others following. The girls were dressed up as superheroes, Bekah as Wonderwoman and Shayla as Spidergirl, while Ben was dressed up like a bloody doctor and Charlie was dressed up as a grungy skeleton of sorts.
“I want a picture of you all,” Ryan and Sharpay’s mom said after handing Cohen to Chad. “It’s been far too long since we’ve gotten a picture of you six all together and I don’t think we have a picture of you all with your kids.”
“So take a picture,” Sharpay replied.
“I have to get my camera,” her mom replied.
In the end, it ended up being each of their mothers that returned with cameras. As the cameras flashed, Gabriella was taken back to the many-a-moments like this very one, where their mothers had insisted on taking pictures of the six of them.
There were times when Gabriella hadn’t being seen only as one of the Cattle Creek kids, but she had grown to appreciate it. Because of pure coincidences, and maybe something in the water, she had known her best friends her whole entire life and while they didn’t have the same parents, they felt like her siblings.
She wasn’t sure how many kids she and Ryan would have or if their friends would have any more kids, but one thing was sure: she wanted them to grow up the same way she, Ryan and their best friends had-in a community of people that loved them and encouraged them to dream their biggest dreams.
It didn’t matter how long the houses on Cattle Creek Loop lasted or who moved into them after their parents all moved out. Chad, Gabriella, Ryan, Sharpay, Taylor and Troy, the babies of Summer 1990, would forever be the one and only Cattle Creek Gang.
Costumes
Year 1 (click to view)
Year 2 (click to view)
Story Index
This Halloween short joins the other six holiday based shorts in this series: Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, Father's Day.
Couple: Ryan & Gabriella
Rating: M
Quote: “uh huh, you can look but you can’t touch”
Setting/Event: Gabriella stripping for Ryan
Random Stuff:
- striper pole
- black sequenced gloves
- vampire
They were the unlikeliest group of friends-everyone thought so. Early on in their public school careers they were labeled by their peers: 2 jocks, 2 nerds and 2 drama freaks. But for the six kids who were born and raised on a Albuquerque, New Mexico cul-de-sac called Cattle Creek Loop (which led to them being referred to as the Cattle Creek Gang), there were no cliques that separated them, they were just best friends.
Between 1988 and 1989, Cattle Creek Loop welcomed five families into its homes all of them in different places in their lives, some were newly weds others and others had been married for several years. There must have been something in the water, or so the saying goes, because all five families became pregnant about the same time and all had their babies during the summer of 1990.
Charlie and Yolanda Danforth were the first couple to welcome their baby on June 5. It was a little boy with a head full of hair and they named him Chad Daniel, after his mom’s grandfather. Six years later, Chad would be followed by younger brother Christopher Scott.
Jose and Miranda Montez were the next couple to welcome a baby a couple weeks later on June 21st. It was a little girl and they christened her Gabriella Marie.
With July came Vance and Darby Evans’ double blessing on the 15th. They named their baby boy, the oldest of the two twins, Ryan Benjamin and their baby girl Sharpay Danielle.
On August 1st, Griffen and Sheryl McKessie welcome their second daughter Taylor Renee to the family. She joined older siblings Logan (4) and Madelyn Rose (2).
The last of the six 1990 babies was born to Jack and Lucy Bolton on August 12. Having decided to wait until the baby was born to find out the sex, they didn’t know until the baby was born that he was a boy and they named him Troy Walker.
From the very beginning of their existence the Cattle Creek Gang did everything together. When they were little it was play dates, birthday parties, potty training, preschool, field trips, sports, learning to ride bikes and learning to swim. And as they got older it started to include school dances, learning to drive, going to prom, graduating, everything that normal kids do with their friends.
Now as adults, they were still doing things together, sort of. They were all married-Troy to Taylor, Chad to Sharpay, and Ryan to Gabriella; lived on the same street-Troy and Taylor next door to Chad and Sharpay with Ryan and Gabriella at the opposite end of the block; and starting families-Troy and Taylor have seven-year-old twins, Bekah and Ben, Chad and Sharpay have Charlie (named after Chad’s dad), 6, Shayla, 3, and are pregnant with baby number three, while Ryan and Gabriella don’t have any, yet.
Even though they had all grown up, the many annual Cattle Creek Loop festivities had continued. Things had changed a little after Chad’s mom had remarried and sold her house-to Taylor’s sister-to move in with her new husband, but for the most part, things had remained the same.
The annual Night Before Halloween Bash on Cattle Creek Loop was one of the few events where people outside of the neighborhood were invited to join them all. Unlike all the other holiday traditions, it had been put in place by the fathers of the Cattle Creek Gang. Every year the five families rotated duties, taking turns hosting a haunted house, game place, food hub, scary movie theater and adult area; this year the Boltons’ were in charge of the haunted house, the Montezs’ the games, the McKessies’ hosting the food, Taylor’s sister hosting the scary movie theater and the Evans’ hosting the adult area.
With an hour before the bash was to begin, Gabriella stood in front of the mirror in her walk in closet and smiled at her reflection; Ryan was going to die when he saw her sexy vampire costume (not to mention what she wasn't wearing underneath it). Considering how short the thigh high black mini dress of the costume was, Gabriella was happy to have a black cape, with a red satin lining, to wear over it.
She was pulling on her thigh high boot when she heard a whistle from behind her. She knew without looking that it was Ryan and didn’t say anything until she felt him step behind her and grab her hips. Pulling out of his grasp, she stood up straight and wagged a finger at him. “Uh huh, you can look but you can’t touch,” she said.
“But you look so sexy,” he whiningly growled.
“I know, but you’ll have to wait until after the party,” she winked. “Go get ready, your costume is on the bed.”
With a sigh, he left the closet. Knowing it would only take him a couple minutes to change into his vampire costume, she pulled on her second boot then followed him into the bedroom. She found him pulling the black vest with a silver shirt sewn in over his head and let her eyes follow the blonde trail of hair run until it disappeared under his jeans.
“Uh huh, you can look but you can’t touch,” he mimicked her after catching her watching him.
“Put your cape on and let’s go,” she rolled her eyes. “The sooner we go, the sooner we come home and try out that new little toy we had installed last week.” Her eyes flickered to the French doors that separated the master bedroom from the home office.
“Let’s go,” he said as his pulse quickened and he mentally pictured whatever he could to keep his loans from tightening. He grabbed the cape off the bed then grabbed her hand and all but pulled her from their bedroom.
Leading her to the car, he opened her door then ran around to his side of the car. He drove them to their old neighborhood, parking around the corner from the cul-de-sac so those with kids could park on the street.
He and Gabriella met at the front of the car and walked hand in hand to his parents house when they knew they’d find everyone since the party wouldn’t start for another thirty minutes. Though it wasn’t necessary, many of the couples that attended the party came dressed in pairs, so it surprised them both when they saw their brother-in-law Chad dressed up as a basketball player and his wife, Sharpay, dressed as a pregnant fairy.
“He refused to be a fairy and didn’t to be a pirate,” Sharpay had shrugged to Gabriella’s inquiry. “So tonight I’m matching my little fairy.”
As if summoned, Chad and Sharpay’s daughter Shayla, dressed in a Tinkerbell like costume, came outside with Taylor and Troy’s daughter Bekah, dressed as bumblebee. Both girls smiled when they saw Ryan and Gabriella and hurried over to them.
Gabriella smiled as Ryan hoisted Shayla up and tickled their youngest niece, who looked just like her mom with her dad’s coloring. Bekah, on the other hand, looked like a combination of both her parents with dark curly locks.
“Where are your brothers?” Ryan asked the girls.
“They’re coming with Troy and Taylor,” Chad answered for them. “They went to a Halloween party at a friend from soccer’s house, so they’ll be a little late.”
They talked for a few more minutes before Ryan and Gabriella excused themselves and headed inside to greet the others before the party really started. They greeted their respective parents and in-laws and each got something to drink.
When they returned outside, Troy and Taylor, dressed as the Spartan cheerleaders from SNL, had arrived with their son, Ben, and Chad and Taylor’s son, Charlie, in tow, dressed as Batman and Spiderman, respectively.
With Sharpay ready to pop any minute, Ryan took turns with Chad and Troy keeping an eye on the four kids, though the older three insisted they didn’t need to be babysat, while Taylor and Gabriella sat with Sharpay.
It was around 8:30 when Taylor and Sharpay decided it was time to round up the kids and husbands and go home, knowing their kids would be up early the next morning ready to trick or treat. After helping Chad get Shayla, who was sleeping in Ryan’s arms, into the car, Ryan and Gabriella headed to their own car.
When they got home, she told him to lock up for the night then hurried up to their bedroom to get everything ready. She stopped in the bathroom to fix her hair and make up then went into the office turned adult room and turned on the red spot lights affixed to the ceiling. Then she slipped on a pair of black sequence gloves and queued up a song before taking position with her back to the doors.
As they had rehearsed, Ryan entered the room silently and turned on the music. Then took a seat on the couch they had in there, his eyes fixed on the pole in the center of the room, anchored to the floor and the ceiling, and Gabriella behind it.
Feeling the beat of the music filling her body, she brought her arms up and unhooked the cape, letting it fall to the ground. Then she unzipped the back of her dress and let it slide down her body before turning around to face her husband. She kicked the piles of clothes out of her way as she rolled the gloves down her arms then tossed them to him. Then, dressed in only a black thong, she mounted the pole and used the skills she had learned in the pole dancing class she had taken that summer in preparation for this.
She was only halfway through her routine, and hanging upside down, when she saw him stand up, the tent in his pants showing his obvious enjoyment. She righted her self and with her feet firmly planted to the ground, watched as he pulled his shirt over his head then dropped his jeans to the ground.
It took one motion of his finger for her to go to him willingly, wrapping her legs around his waist after he lifted her up. He carried her through the French doors and to the king size bed that awaited them. He didn’t bother to turn down the covers as he laid her back, pressing his hard, concealed manhood against her inner thighs.
Time seemed to stop as he covered her body in kisses, preparing her for what would come next. When their mouths finally met, they did so in near starvation for one another, making them both realize how badly they needed each other.
They peeled away the remaining cloth barriers that kept them apart and with nothing else to stop them, he slid deep inside of her. Pulling out and pushing in repeatedly until they came together so violently that he collapsed on top of her, face pressed to her heavy breasts, completely spent.
It was the ringing of the phone that brought them out of their trance enough to realize that it was a little after one in the morning.
Groaning as he leaned over, Ryan grabbed the phone from the bedside table and answered it.
From where Gabriella laid, she could hear what she recognized as Chad’s voice say something about Sharpay’s water breaking and the kids sleeping. Putting two and two together, she was already out of bed when Ryan promised that they would be over in a couple minutes.
Seeing as Chad needed to get Sharpay to the hospital quickly, Ryan jumped into the shower while Gabriella packed an overnight bag for the two of them. Once he was out of the shower, he got dressed and headed over to Chad and Sharpay’s. She showered then headed over as well.
Not wanting to scare the kids if they woke up, Ryan and Sharpay slept in Chad and Sharpay’s room and were woken up shortly after seven by Shayla and Charlie, who was full of questions.
“Why are you here? Where’s mom and dad?” Charlie asked, not giving his aunt and uncle a chance to wake up after being barged in on.
“I want mommy,” Shayla pouted, her lower lip trembling.
“Come here, you guys,” Ryan said, motioning them over. He lifted Shayla up on to the bed as soon as she was close enough and put her between himself and Gabriella while Charlie climbed onto the foot of the bed.
“Where’s mom and dad?” Charlie repeated.
“Your parents are at the hospital,” Gabriella told them. “Your baby brother decided he didn’t want to wait a whole year to celebrate Halloween.”
“Mom had the baby?” Charlie’s eyes showed excitement.
“We don’t know yet,” Ryan replied. “But we can call grandma and find out.”
Both kids nodded eagerly; though Ryan and Gabriella were both sure that Shayla didn’t know what exactly was going on.
Grabbing his cell phone, Ryan dialed his mom’s cell phone number and put her on speaking phone.
“Hello?” She answered, her voice sounding very tired.
“Did mom have the baby?” Charlie asked excitedly.
“Hey pumpkin,” Ryan’s mom replied. “No, your mom hasn’t had the baby yet, but it should happen any time now.”
“You’ll call us right?” Charlie asked.
“Of course, you will be the first person I call,” she replied. “Let me talk to your uncle Ryan.”
Ryan took the phone off speaker and listened to his mom as she filled him in on Sharpay’s emergency c-section and promised, again, to call as soon as they knew anything. Then he said goodbye and hung up.
“So, who wants to make chocolate chip pancakes and watch cartoons in our pajamas?” Gabriella asked, distracting the kids from the pending arrival of their baby brother.
“Me!” Shayla shrieked in the tone that Ryan was sure only she and her mother could reach.
“Alright then, let’s go down stairs,” Gabriella smiled.
It was shortly before noon when the call came from Ryan’s mom; the baby had arrived, all 7 pounds, 8 ounces and 18 inches of him and Sharpay was doing fine. Ryan let his mom tell Charlie and Shayla then left the room to talk to her about bringing the kids to see Sharpay and the baby.
They decided that the best time for them to bring the kids in was before they went trick or treating. So that evening, they piled Charlie and Shayla into Sharpay’s minivan and drove them to the hospital dressed in their costumes.
To the thrill of Charlie and Shayla, the nurses stations they walked past gave them each a handful of candy and by the time they got to their mom’s room, they’re candy buckets were heavy.
They found Chad, Sharpay and baby Cohen in the room when they got there and both Charlie and Shayla got a chance to hold their new baby brother, with help from Chad, of course. Then, since Sharpay didn’t want her picture taken, Ryan took a picture of Chad holding Cohen in one arm and Shayla in the other as Charlie stood by his side, his finger being clutched by his baby brother.
Later that night, as Gabriella was taking the pictures they had taken of Charlie and Shayla trick or treating off her camera, she paused at the picture of Sharpay and Chad holding Cohen. Just looking at the small bundle wrapped in a blue blanket made her want a baby; she and Ryan hadn’t officially been trying to have a baby, but they hadn’t not been trying to either.
She gave Ryan a sideways glance, wondering what their son or daughter would look like when they finally had one, if they had one.
As if he knew what she was thinking, he said, “It’ll happen when it’s supposed to.”
One Year Later
Dressed as bad-girl Sandy from Grease, Gabriella wondered how Taylor and Sharpay had made juggling themselves and kids seem so easy all these years and with multiply kids. She only had three month old Jayden and was about to lose her mind.
“I’m ready,” Ryan said, coming into the nursery, dressed as Danny from Grease, where she was changing Jayden’s diaper. “Why don’t you go finish getting ready and I’ll get him in his costume.”
Ever grateful, she kissed her husband then left the room to finish getting ready.
By the time they reached Cattle Creek Loop the party was in full swing. With Jayden seated safely in his carseat, Ryan and Gabriella made their way over to the new family friendly area in front of Taylor’s sister’s house-a substitution for the scary movies part of the party.
They joined Sharpay and Chad, dressed as a disco couple, and Taylor and Troy, dressed as a Grecian couple, at their table. Gabriella freed Jayden from his carseat and held him up as Ryan straightened the pumpkin costume the baby was dressed in.
Ryan was about to ask where the others’ kids were when his mom headed over with Cohen, also dressed as a pumpkin, in her arms and the four others following. The girls were dressed up as superheroes, Bekah as Wonderwoman and Shayla as Spidergirl, while Ben was dressed up like a bloody doctor and Charlie was dressed up as a grungy skeleton of sorts.
“I want a picture of you all,” Ryan and Sharpay’s mom said after handing Cohen to Chad. “It’s been far too long since we’ve gotten a picture of you six all together and I don’t think we have a picture of you all with your kids.”
“So take a picture,” Sharpay replied.
“I have to get my camera,” her mom replied.
In the end, it ended up being each of their mothers that returned with cameras. As the cameras flashed, Gabriella was taken back to the many-a-moments like this very one, where their mothers had insisted on taking pictures of the six of them.
There were times when Gabriella hadn’t being seen only as one of the Cattle Creek kids, but she had grown to appreciate it. Because of pure coincidences, and maybe something in the water, she had known her best friends her whole entire life and while they didn’t have the same parents, they felt like her siblings.
She wasn’t sure how many kids she and Ryan would have or if their friends would have any more kids, but one thing was sure: she wanted them to grow up the same way she, Ryan and their best friends had-in a community of people that loved them and encouraged them to dream their biggest dreams.
It didn’t matter how long the houses on Cattle Creek Loop lasted or who moved into them after their parents all moved out. Chad, Gabriella, Ryan, Sharpay, Taylor and Troy, the babies of Summer 1990, would forever be the one and only Cattle Creek Gang.
Costumes
Year 1 (click to view)
Year 2 (click to view)
Story Index