September 5th 2021

Chapter 248
Our Competition With Company

That very same day, the young Friars would be headed to the Hunter Hart house for dinner. It had not been part of their plans for the evening, which would have been spent quietly back home… if not for the three of them being out at the ranch when the Hunter and Davis twins were picked up by the boys' parents. Jeanette and Robert Davis were to bring all four of the kids back to the girls' home, responding to an invitation from Shawn and Katy. It would be all of them, and the grandparents, and Hunter Matthews on top of it, as he was sleeping over at best friend MJ's. Cory and Topanga were enjoying a date night to themselves. Nellie had explained all this to her big sister and her brother-in-law and then invited them to come and join them almost in the same breath. There was no need to check with their parents. If Maya, Lucas, and Marianne wanted to drop in, they just dropped in.

Whether they accepted the offer out of a desire to be with family or because they wanted to see the next chapter unfold after the 'Scout saga,' well, that was entirely for them to know, wasn't it? Anyway, Marianne had been right there, and of course she wanted to go to the house, to see her aunts and uncle, and her grandparents, and her great-grandparents… So, they were all set.

Lucas couldn't just follow them, not when he was still needed at Sullivan Stables. He would be staying for a few hours more but would absolutely make it to his in-laws' for dinner time. Until then, Maya would take Marianne and they would follow after the Davises. She might have turned and given her husband a very pointed look as she went, like a spy promising to give a full report once they were reunited. Lucas smirked and nodded.

He had no chance to see the time go by. He was as busy now as he'd been since his day had started, especially once he wasn't looking after that pack of twelve-year-olds. Finally, it was time to get in his car and make his way to the Hunter Hart house. When he got there, he found the living room in the full chaos of eight children aged two to twelve thrown together before making it into the 'shelter' of the kitchen where he found Maya, with her parents and grandparents and the visiting Davis couple, all of them in the middle of a lively conversation. Maya excused herself from this when she saw him, the better to pull him aside and briefly catch up.

"How's it going out here?" Lucas whispered with a smirk. They were spies, weren't they? Maya stopped herself laughing and pulled herself together again, demanding for him to do the same before she could respond.

"I'd say that so long as they can be out there, playing around together, they're fine. Dinner might be more… interesting though," she appraised.

"Right," he agreed with a nod.

"You know, when they're all together like that, with MJ and Haley, and Hunter, and Marianne… I don't know, you wouldn't guess that they were so… messy, usually," Maya added as quietly as she could. "I don't think they even realize it, and I'm sure not about to point it out to them."

"No, of course not," Lucas agreed.

"Mm mm," Maya squinted at him before chuckling and pulling him back toward the kitchen. "Come on."

Now that Lucas had arrived, play time was quickly brought to pause. The table was set, and dinner began. There had been some work done on the ground floor since Shawn and Katy had returned to Austin, creating a vaster dining area than what they'd had back in the kitchen since Katy and Maya had first moved into this house nearly seventeen years ago. It had felt completely necessary, thinking of how there would be eight of them at breakfast, lunch, and dinner most days, before ever factoring in regular guests like the young Friars, or the elder Friars, or the Matthews… or any mix of these and others of their close family and friends. They would never have been able to accommodate the evening's group back in the kitchen without having to set up a whole other table for the kids.

Instead, they had all the children around one end of the table and the adults around the other. Marianne naturally wanted to sit with the other children, too, even if she was significantly younger than the next smallest, Haley, who was just four months shy of her eighth birthday, and Hunter, one month away from his. This kept her on one end of the kids' side, with her parents next to her. Maya and Lucas both were very aware of the position this put them in. Whatever was going on with the two sets of twins, whatever they knew, they understood very well that they'd be doing no one any favors if they went and drew attention to any of it.

As it was, the seating arrangement wasn't exactly helping matters. Nellie and Gracie sat next to Marianne, at their end of one long side. Hunter, MJ, and Haley sat along one of the short sides, and then directly opposite the Hunter sisters sat the Davis brothers, Ethan across from Gracie and Bobby across from Nellie. They were as good as made to face one another, and on both sides… It soon became clear that no one had considered what it would mean until they were already seated. Now it was too late to change anything without speaking up. Whether it left them uneasy or annoyed or confused or a mix of all three, they certainly had no idea, did they?

If that wasn't enough, they were here along with their parents, and whether they had the conscience of mind to be concerned about what they'd say or do about it or not, Maya certainly had a few ideas about the whole thing, and so did Lucas. The two of them may have been a couple for so long that it was all many years in the past by now, but they hadn't forgotten what it was like to be dealing with all those emotions while also being under the watchful eyes of protective parents, two of them right here at this table. At this point, all they could do was act normal and possibly keep the conversation going. The more they could get the twins involved in it the better.

"So, are any of your classmates going to come and watch you compete at the Grand?" Lucas asked of Nellie and Bobby once they started to eat. Both of them looked over at him, then to each other. Bobby, who never forgot his sirs and ma'ams, automatically deferred for Nellie to speak first. Of course, as her policy – at least where he was concerned – was one of annoyance and retaliation, it put her in a position of having to accept the gesture rather than jeopardizing any of her freedoms with the competition days from starting. She did her very best to look away from him and instead answer her brother-in-law's question.

"I wasn't going to say anything about it, but then Desi got up and told everyone about the competition, and how they should go to encourage me. I told them they didn't have to, and then our teacher went on about how it was important to support each other, and then she said whoever wanted to go should do it. Some of them might show up, I don't know for sure. Desi, definitely," Nellie explained.

"I'm sure a few more of them will come, too," Katy smiled over to her daughter.

"Not really. A lot of the kids in my class, they just sort of…" Nellie started to speak, then stalled and started again, making herself appear suddenly a lot more nonchalant about the whole thing. "They don't really care about horses like I do."

"In Texas? Since when?" Shawn joked. Nellie shrugged and focused on her plate, which got her family to pay more attention to her instead of less, if that was her intention. They could see very well that she wasn't telling them the whole story. If they needed any more proof, they only had to look to Gracie, who would be the closest person to the situation and very tuned in to her twin's feelings. She looked very aware of this, much more than Nellie, but she couldn't hide it very well.

"What's up?" Maya asked, reaching around Marianne to put her hand at her sister's shoulder. Now Nellie seemed to realize how they were all looking at her, which forced her to decide how to respond. Of all the times and places, with present company especially, to have to let this out, she looked as deeply uncomfortable and ready to bolt as ever. Finally, Gracie took the initiative. No one else would have been allowed but her.

"A bunch of kids in our class, they've been rude to us, picking on us or ignoring us because of… well…" She stopped, didn't want to say it. She settled by timidly pointing toward her mother and big sister.

Maya and Katy looked to one another before turning to the twins again. They hadn't been aware of this, and they felt bad at once. They should have known, shouldn't they? They should at least have suspected that something like this could happen, with them being who they were to the world beyond. They didn't see themselves as anything big, definitely not in this house, but that only made it so that they sometimes forgot about how others would see them, others who would cross paths with their loved ones.

"I don't care about them anyway, they're being dumb," Nellie spoke up now that it was in the open. "It's like Grandpa says, they're not worth my time. They don't get to make me feel like I don't deserve things just because of who I'm related to."

"That's right," Tanner Clutterbucket tipped his head to his granddaughter, and she tipped hers back to him. She was handling it, but she didn't want either her mother or sister to be made to feel bad and that was really why she hadn't mentioned it before. She tried to apologize for not telling, but they wouldn't have it. Katy called both girls over to where she sat and hugged them close. They hugged her back with all their might. On their way back to their chairs, Maya got in her own turn.

After this bit of revelation, Bobby Davis looked like he was hoping very hard that no one would remember how the question was also turned to him, but Nellie wouldn't let him fade into obscurity. She may have kicked his foot under the table to make him tell his side of it. He quietly revealed that his entire class was coming to watch and cheer him on.

"Well… good," Nellie frowned and nodded. He looked back at her. "What?" she shrugged. "You're one of the best ones we've got; they should see it. Even if you are the biggest slowpoke at the ranch," she made a face at him.

Neither Maya nor Lucas could do a thing except give the statement the laughter it deserved. Both Gracie and Ethan went louder than them. The other kids did the same, while the parents and grandparents took this exchange with surprise and curiosity. For his part, Bobby Davis looked just a bit like he'd been knocked upside the head at hearing the compliment out of Nellie. Then, he probably realized she'd kick him again if he didn't stop being weird about it, but he couldn't let it go uneven, so he looked back at her.

"So are you… If the kids in your class can't see that, then… it's their loss." There, he'd said his piece, and he nodded to acknowledge as much. Nellie's eyes looked stuck for a moment, and then she blinked and focused on her plate again after letting out a mumbled thanks. At this point, everyone was compelled to put those kids out of their misery, and they started talking over one another, the better to change the subject. Neither Nellie nor Bobby said much for the rest of the night, especially to one another, but either way they were all looking forward to the start of the Spring Grand.

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners