I out-ate Tum-Tum, but it was an incredible challenge. That kid was a garbage disposal. I smiled at him as he glared menacingly at me.
"I won," I declared teasingly.
"That's because I had breakfast before I ate this breakfast."
"So? I'm shorter. I should have a smaller stomach capacity than you."
"But you don't," Colt said in awe. "I'm amazed at your eating ability, Kate. I mean, I'd bow down but I'm just kind of perplexed."
Laughing, I finished off my orange juice. "Thanks for breakfast, Mr. Tonaka. It was really good."
"Well, feeding you was the least we could do, considering what my grandson put you through this morning," he replied.
Rocky put his head down on the table in defeated frustration. "I already said I was sorry," he muttered, his voice muffled.
The way his mousey brown hair peeked out from underneath his blue hat was kind of cute. I said, "I've forgiven this morning's festivities."
Rocky glanced up at me. He had these icy green eyes that kinda freaked me out, until his cautious smile brightened them. "Thanks."
The four of us walked around with no direction in mind. Colt and Tum-Tum were hitting each other with sticks. I found it funny, therefore I laughed.
"Why are you laughing?" Rocky asked.
I looked up at him. "Your brothers entertained me. Sometimes I laugh, you see."
"Sorry, I was spacing." He yelled to his brothers, "Guys, you're going to gouge out each other's eyes!"
"Cool!" Tum-Tum cried enthusiastically.
"Awesome! Hold still, Tum-Tum, and try not to blink--"
"Colt!" Rocky called. "Get that stick away from his eyes!"
Once they went back to civilized stick-fighting, Rocky looked back at me. "So, uh…who are you?"
I smiled at his awkwardness. He didn't seem to be too much of a lady-charmer. But I thought it was borderline endearing. "Kate. Who are you?"
"No, I meant, where are you from? What were you doing when I…um…assaulted you?"
I giggled. "You didn't assault me, you just scared the crap out of me. And I'm actually from the city, but my mom lives here, and I'm just visiting her for the summer."
"The city? You mean Hargrove?" he asked curiously. "That's where me and my brothers live. We stay with Grandpa here during the summer every year." (Author's Note: I don't know where the boys lived, so I just made up a name. If you know, could you fill me in?)
"Well, then I guess I'll have to be seeing you around more often, eh?" I said, smiling. "Oh, and I was just going for a walk to escape my psychotic brothers. They're psychotic."
"I know how you feel," he sighed.
"Your brothers are cool," I told him.
"I know," he said. "They just have a hard time taking stuff seriously sometimes, you know? Colt's like my best friend and everything, but he spazzes sometimes and it gets us in trouble. And Tum-Tum…is Tum-Tum."
I nodded. "My older brother, Gavin, pretty much leaves me alone because he's usually out prowling the streets looking for girls. He's under the illusion that he's God's gift to the female-folk. And then Jesse, my younger brother, is always trying to kill me. Last week, he set up this intricate system of pulleys in the kitchen that he believed would result in my head getting chopped off. He could be quite the evil-genius if he could get the whole smart thing down."
Rocky laughed. "Me and my brothers get along pretty well. We've gone through a lot together."
I was about to ask for an example of what they'd been through together, but we suddenly came to a log that stretched over a ravine. Rocky was already standing on it like it was solid ground, and he looked back, confused at my hesitation.
"What's wrong?"
"The ground just quit," I said. "And the log is looking at me funny."
"It's like a bridge," he said indifferently. "Come on, we lost Colt and Tum-Tum."
I stared at the log warily.
"You're afraid of heights, aren't you?" he said, grinning softly.
"I am not afraid of heights," I growled indignantly. "I'm afraid of falling off a decaying log to my miserable death."
"You won't die, it's like six feet from the ground even if you did fall, which you won't," he laughed. "Come on."
"But I'm only sixteen," I whined. "I don't even have a license yet. I run into walls on a regular basis and fall out of bed all the time, so I have no faith in myself crossing this bridge without falling. I'm too young to die and I haven't done enough idiotic things to qualify for really living."
He tentatively took me by the hand, a sweet pink blush spreading across his face. "If you fall, I'll fall, okay? And I've crossed this thing with buckets of water strapped to me, so our chances of making it are looking pretty good."
"Gah, it wobbles," I muttered.
"It does not," he laughed.
We hopped off the log to blessed sturdy ground. He let go of my hand, and I knew that I was as red as he was. "Let's go," he said. "They're probably waiting for us."
I snickered as he walked slightly ahead of me. Yep, he was definitely cute.
