The next week was hell. Mother wasn't happy and took it out on the rest of us, she made Kitty cry at least three times and dad was snapping and sighing at everything we said.

On the Saturday I woke up to screaming from down stairs, and when I walked from my room to the top of the stairs, mum was down stairs yelling at the top of her lungs at Jane who was looking near tears in the door to the living room, her eyes were wide and slightly red.

"YOU PARADE AROUND ACTING LIKE YOU ARE WORRIED ABOUT LYDIA AND THEN YOU SHOW YOUR TRUE COLORS BY HOGGING THE PHONE, WHILE WE COULD BE USING IT TO LOOK FOR LYDIA, AND CALL YOUR BOYFRIEND TO MOAN ABOUT HOW HARD YOUR LIFE IS AND IT'S DESPICABLE! IF YO'RE NOT GOING TO HELP THEN YOU SHOULD JUST LEAVE AND TAKE LIZZIE WITH YOU! NO ONE WANTS HER AROUND WITH HER PITY ROUTINE GOING" she was bellowing at the top of her lungs and glaring with a ferocity at Jane who I notice had the phone in her hand, she tried to open her mouth but mother just kept yelling over top of her lungs, she was bright read and had tear stairs on her checks, I knew she was just scared but I had had enough and started to stride down the stairs but before either of them noticed me Jane exploded.

"SHUT UP" she yelled and I froze on the stairs "YOU DON'T KNOW ANYTHING; I LOVE YOU BUT RIGHT NOW THE ONLY PERSON YOU SEEM TO LOVE IS YOUR DAUGHTER WHO BY THE WAY MAY HAVE DONE THIS WILLINGLY. YOU GO ON AND ON ABOUT HOW MUCH YOU ARE SUFFERING BUT YOU PUT US THROUGH SO MUCH MORE BECAUSE AS WELL AS WORRYING FOR LYDIA YOU ARE BLAMING ALL OF US FOR WHAT HAS HAPPENED INSTEAD OF EXCEPTING THAT YOU GAVE HER AND KITTY TO MUCH RAIN TO DO WHATEVER THEY LIKED AND KITTY CHOSE RIGHT BUT SHE DIDN'T AND YOU LET IT HAPPEN BECAUSE YOU FAVORED HER, YOU SHOULD JUST EXCEPT THAT YOU SCREWED UP! WHAT WAS IT DIDN'T WANT ANOTHER ARMY DAUGHTER? SO YOU PUSHED THEM TO BE SOCIAL AND NEVER RAINED THEM IN IF NEEDED, YOU CHOSE THIS PATH AS MUCH AS LYDIA DID! AND YOU BLAME US FOR IT BECAUSE YOU DON'T HAVE ANYONE ELSE" I had barely heard Jane yell that much in my entire life and never anything like that. I walked down the rest of the stairs and walked over to Jane and put my hand on her shoulder

"Jane, come on" I said as mother was getting ready for another attack. I shepherd her towards the stairs and she followed me, right after she had stopped yelling I had seen her visibly deflate as if losing all her energy.

"Where do you think you are going?" asked mother not yelling anymore but still audible angry.

"We're going to my room to think" I replied sharply, she had always told us to do that when she was angry at us and it felt good to throw that in her face and see shock all over it. We walked up the stairs and when we got to the top I saw kitty standing on the landing and I jerked my head towards my bedroom door when I meet her eyes.

When we were all sat down on my old bed and Jane burst into tears, she laid down on my bed and put her head in my lap, I started to stroke her hair like I did when we were younger and kitty lent her head against mine, she sighed and stated what we were all thinking

"Life sucks right now" she said and I nodded.

"Yes it does but it will get better," I said and Kitty scoffed "it will, we'll find Lydia and everything will settle down and mother will get over herself and dad will go back to working a lot and everything will be better" I had to say it no matter how much I thought it was unlikely, if I didn't say it, it would just seem so much worse. I wasn't the oldest but when we were younger I had always been the one to punch boys for Jane not the other way around, and not it looked like I was looking out for Kitty as well and I could accept that, maybe she hadn't always made the best choices but I she had never had anyone to tell her that what she was doing was a bad choice and I had always liked the idea of being someone's protector, even though I wasn't very good at it.

We sat and talked for hours together and by about four in the afternoon we were all laughing around a board game I had pulled out of my closet, no one could remember the rules so we had made up our own and then there was a shriek from down stairs. We all sat up and shut up listening for any sounds from downstairs, we all heard someone running up the stairs.

Then mother had opened the door to my room and shrieked "They found her! They found her!" we all jumped up and started to ask questions all at once.

"Where is she?"

"How is she?"

"When is she coming Home?"

"How did they find her?"

"Shush," said mother "I don't know what you're saying when you all talk at once, but your dad has gone to get her from Toronto and should be back around 8:30 to 9:00 o'clock" she smiled and left the room, one of the worst things she always did was to never apologize for her actions, if you demand one she will apologize for making you feel l that way but never for doing the thing in the first place.

At 9:45 that night the door opened and Lydia stumbled in with dad stomping after her, it was obvious that she had no idea that everyone there would be angry wih her because she wondered in to the living room and saw us sitting there.

"Hiya," she said and moved to her favorite chair which Kitty was occupying "Move that's my chair" she demanded, Kitty didn't respond-in fact she hadn't acknowledged her at all since she had come in.

"Lydia" said dad "Don't be rude to your sister" he sat down beside mother and looked at her "Why did you run away with someone you barely knew?"

She sighed, like she thought we would understand "I like had to, I had to go somewhere else to let everything flow ya know?" she said and stuck her hip out resting her hand on it.

"No we don't know" I said and she rolled her eyes "see, we all are people with some empathy so we don't run away just to torture our family"

"Whatever" she said "I would of like come back, you always over react to everything I do"

"NO, WE REACT LIKE NORMAL PEOPLE WITH SOULS" it was Kitty who had yelled and silenced us all "YOU UPSET MUM AND DAD AND EVERYONE ELSE AND LIZZIE HAD TO COME HOME AND JANE TOOK A WEEK OFF WORK, YOU ALWAYS RUIN EVERYTHING BECAUSE YOU ARE A SELFISH, SELFISH PERSON YOU NEVER LOOKS OUT FOR ANYONE BUT YOURSELF" she stormed out of the room and we all heard her door slam.

"Well talk about needy" said Lydia.

"Shut up" said Jane and left as well.

"You won't be leaving the house for the next month, we will be hiring an in-house tutor for you and if you don't understand by the end of the month we will be keeping up this arrangement and that is final" dad said and left the room leaving Lydia with a gaping mouth.