"Mary!" five year old Emma Gibbs shouted in fear from her bedroom. "Maaary!"
Across the hall, fourteen year old Mary stirred from her sleep. As much as she loved her sister, it wasn't worth getting up out of her warm and comfortable bed for. Not worth it at all. A few minutes of not going to see what was wrong with her sister, Mary's door opened to an annoyed looking girl. The little girl crawled up into Mary's bed and snuggled beside her.
"You know," Mary groggily told her sister, "I never had a big sister to go to when I thought I saw a monster in my closet."
"You never had monsters that broke into your house to tell you a silly story about talking cars." Emma shot back. Mary didn't have it in her at the moment to retort back, and went back to sleep. She'll save the argument for the morning when she had to explain to her mother about her lack of sleep.
. . . . . . . . . .
"Good morning ladies." their grandfather greeted as they came into the kitchen and dining room area. Emma and Mary mumbled a reply in unison, and sat in different places. Mary sat at the table, Emma scrambled onto the bar stool at the counter. Their grandfather looked at Mary.
"Why aren't you over at the counter seat? You love sitting there."
"Don't have enough energy Grandpa." Mary said drowsily. "I don't wanna walk that far."
"Since when?" her grandfather laughed.
"Since Em decided to wake me up in the middle of the night because of monsters in her closet." Mary said, leaning her head on the table with a dreamy smile.
"Well, it's not MY fault he doesn't know how to tell good jokes!" Emma said defensively as their grandmother served her a plate of pancakes and eggs.
"Not my fault you come into my room to begin with." Mary sleepily retorted, giving a yawn. "Again I repeat little darling, I never had a big sister I could run to when I thought there were monsters in my closet."
"Now see here Marion," their grandmother imputed as she gave Mary her plate of pancakes, "You may not have had a big sister, but you had me and your grandfather right down the hall when you'd come panicking about them."
"And Mommy and Daddy argued that you were spoiling me." Mary agreed with a smile, sitting up. "Good times."
"For the record," their grandfather added, "You were very spoiled Mary. You got away with a lot of things when you were younger. Including that one issue you had when you were nearly three."
"It was Kitty, wasn't it?" Emma asked proudly, she knew the story well. Mary had told Emma a lot of things that Mary remembered from her life before her sister. One of them was a vague memory of a person she called 'Kitty.'
"Yes sweetie, the exact same." her grandmother confirmed with a smile. Emma smiled proudly at her guess before digging in to breakfast. Mary slowly followed suit.
"Where are Mommy and Daddy any way?" Emma asked, after swallowing a large amount of pancake down her throat.
"Your father had to go into work early today." their grandmother told them, "Your mother is still at her meeting in DC."
"I didn't think hair cutters needed to have meetings." Mary said. "They just get a degree to cut hair and off they go!"
"But they need to have their license renewed to own their salon to begin with." her grandmother reminded her.
"And they have to have a week long meeting in DC to do that?" Mary asked, smiling a little to show she was only teasing her grandmother. "That's a little asinine, don't you think?"
Her grandmother gave her a smile.
"Eat your breakfast Marion." she said. Mary laughed and did as she was told.