(Author's Note: I want to apologize for taking so long to continue the
story! My delay can be summarized as: School, my mom's kidney transplant,
and more school. I start spring break tomorrow, so I figured I'd get a head
start on this fanfic again.)
Nick sat in the backseat of his sister's rented car. Unlike him, she and Luke had to fly in from New Orleans. He took hold of Cherry's hand, rubbing his thumb over the pulse point of her wrist. She smiled at him, but turned her face back to the window quickly. Something was wrong there, and Nick didn't like it. Usually Cherry didn't shut up. For her to be so quiet for so long meant something was wrong. He hoped it was just a little nervousness over meeting his rather large family.
He moved a little closer to her in the car and began pointing out parts of the town as they passed it, and some of the things that had happened there - the time he and Buddy had accidentally kicked a soda off the balcony railing in that movie theatre and had been banned for a month, the time he and his first girlfriend, Kerri, had been caught kissing in the band room of SMS and given detention. Anything to distract her from whatever was on her mind.
Before he knew it, they were pulling up in front of his house. It looked bigger than he remembered, always did, but maybe that was because eight kids didn't live there anymore. Only one - Claire - and she was about to leave for Arizona State in a few months. It was depressing, in a way. What a cycle of life. His parents go nuts raising so many kids, and then the kids scatter to different parts of the country. Mallory in New Orleans, Adam in DC, Jordon was going to move out to Iowa where his girlfriend lived, Vanessa in Pennsylvania, Margo tended to stick to the Midwest.. The only kids who still lived close were him and Byron, who went to school at Johns Hopkins. He was shocked, when he found out, that Johns Hopkins was only one exit on the Long Island Expressway away from Cherry's school, the City University of New York at Queens.
Stepping out of the car into the fresh air, it suddenly didn't matter who went where. Everyone called, everyone emailed, and everyone came home for important events like this. Someone could move to Nepal, and it wouldn't matter. Family was family.
But his family, today, was silent. The front yard was empty, the house dark.
"They should all be out back," Mallory offered. "They were when we left. Go on - we got the luggage."
"C'mon," he whispered to Cherry. "You ready for the tribe?"
She raised her eyebrows. "You're asking an only child - an adopted child at that - if she's ready to face her boyfriend's six other siblings? The answer, hon, is 'never.' But let's go. This might actually be one of the easier trials in my life."
He wasn't sure what she meant by the trials in her life, but made a mental note to ask her later. In the meantime, he took her hand and hurried towards the tall fence around the backyard. Even before he opened it, he could hear the sound of nearly a dozen voices carrying on four or five different conversations.
His gaze sweeped the yard before he went any further. His parents over by the potato salad. Vanessa reading poetry to her boyfriend and Byron, who always had a softer side. Jordan and Adam were in a heated debate about something. And Claire and Margo were bent over a sketchpad, Margo pointing to various parts of Claire's body. He noticed his parents shooting them worried looks, but decided not to interfere at all.
His siblings had grown up in quite normal ways. He sometimes looked at older family portraits and realized that they all looked nearly the same..just older.
"There's my parents," he told Cherry, pointing. "I'll run introductions in a second. Vanessa's the dark-haired poetry reader. Byron's in the red shirt, Adam the gray, Jordan the green. That's the easiest way to keep them straight at first. Claire's the one in the dress, and Margo's the one with the piercings. She's probably trying to get Claire to get a tattoo."
The only one who turned out much differently was Margo. Always obsessed with beauty and makeup and ribbons and bows, she later turned that passion to decorate into a fascination with tattoos. She made an excellent living in the Midwest as a tattoo artist, although most of hers were hidden. She understood the necessity of being able to appear, well, normal. Although most of the time she went around in black plastic, black PVC, or black silk. Her makeup was black. Her hair was dyed black. She had a nosering, a bellyring, an eyebrow ring, and several earrings in each ear. Not surprisingly, she was still the sibling Nicky got along best with.
She chuckled. "I have the feeling we'll get along, then."
"Don't bet on it," Nick answered dryly. "We were really close as kids, and she hated every girl I brought home. Every one. She picked fights, she was mean. I think she was jealous or something, but just be prepared." He tugged her hand. "Let's go make introductions."
Nick sat in the backseat of his sister's rented car. Unlike him, she and Luke had to fly in from New Orleans. He took hold of Cherry's hand, rubbing his thumb over the pulse point of her wrist. She smiled at him, but turned her face back to the window quickly. Something was wrong there, and Nick didn't like it. Usually Cherry didn't shut up. For her to be so quiet for so long meant something was wrong. He hoped it was just a little nervousness over meeting his rather large family.
He moved a little closer to her in the car and began pointing out parts of the town as they passed it, and some of the things that had happened there - the time he and Buddy had accidentally kicked a soda off the balcony railing in that movie theatre and had been banned for a month, the time he and his first girlfriend, Kerri, had been caught kissing in the band room of SMS and given detention. Anything to distract her from whatever was on her mind.
Before he knew it, they were pulling up in front of his house. It looked bigger than he remembered, always did, but maybe that was because eight kids didn't live there anymore. Only one - Claire - and she was about to leave for Arizona State in a few months. It was depressing, in a way. What a cycle of life. His parents go nuts raising so many kids, and then the kids scatter to different parts of the country. Mallory in New Orleans, Adam in DC, Jordon was going to move out to Iowa where his girlfriend lived, Vanessa in Pennsylvania, Margo tended to stick to the Midwest.. The only kids who still lived close were him and Byron, who went to school at Johns Hopkins. He was shocked, when he found out, that Johns Hopkins was only one exit on the Long Island Expressway away from Cherry's school, the City University of New York at Queens.
Stepping out of the car into the fresh air, it suddenly didn't matter who went where. Everyone called, everyone emailed, and everyone came home for important events like this. Someone could move to Nepal, and it wouldn't matter. Family was family.
But his family, today, was silent. The front yard was empty, the house dark.
"They should all be out back," Mallory offered. "They were when we left. Go on - we got the luggage."
"C'mon," he whispered to Cherry. "You ready for the tribe?"
She raised her eyebrows. "You're asking an only child - an adopted child at that - if she's ready to face her boyfriend's six other siblings? The answer, hon, is 'never.' But let's go. This might actually be one of the easier trials in my life."
He wasn't sure what she meant by the trials in her life, but made a mental note to ask her later. In the meantime, he took her hand and hurried towards the tall fence around the backyard. Even before he opened it, he could hear the sound of nearly a dozen voices carrying on four or five different conversations.
His gaze sweeped the yard before he went any further. His parents over by the potato salad. Vanessa reading poetry to her boyfriend and Byron, who always had a softer side. Jordan and Adam were in a heated debate about something. And Claire and Margo were bent over a sketchpad, Margo pointing to various parts of Claire's body. He noticed his parents shooting them worried looks, but decided not to interfere at all.
His siblings had grown up in quite normal ways. He sometimes looked at older family portraits and realized that they all looked nearly the same..just older.
"There's my parents," he told Cherry, pointing. "I'll run introductions in a second. Vanessa's the dark-haired poetry reader. Byron's in the red shirt, Adam the gray, Jordan the green. That's the easiest way to keep them straight at first. Claire's the one in the dress, and Margo's the one with the piercings. She's probably trying to get Claire to get a tattoo."
The only one who turned out much differently was Margo. Always obsessed with beauty and makeup and ribbons and bows, she later turned that passion to decorate into a fascination with tattoos. She made an excellent living in the Midwest as a tattoo artist, although most of hers were hidden. She understood the necessity of being able to appear, well, normal. Although most of the time she went around in black plastic, black PVC, or black silk. Her makeup was black. Her hair was dyed black. She had a nosering, a bellyring, an eyebrow ring, and several earrings in each ear. Not surprisingly, she was still the sibling Nicky got along best with.
She chuckled. "I have the feeling we'll get along, then."
"Don't bet on it," Nick answered dryly. "We were really close as kids, and she hated every girl I brought home. Every one. She picked fights, she was mean. I think she was jealous or something, but just be prepared." He tugged her hand. "Let's go make introductions."