I know it's been a long while since I posted for this story- life got in the way. Thanks to readers and reviewers.

Things were better after that day with Adam. It was as though him telling me that he thought of me and loved me like his own child stripped away a cloak of insecurity that had been shrouding me for months. Insecurity I didn't even know I had fully felt until he allayed my fears.

The summer dragged on. I recovered from my depression so slowly that I wasn't even aware of it at first. But then I'd be doing something, and afterwards, I'd realise I had enjoyed it. Actually enjoyed it, rather than pretended to. Or I'd realise that it had been an hour since I had wanted to cry or sleep or thought about my mom and dad. And then one hour turned into two and then three until some days were good overall. It started to become manageable again to get out of bed without someone forcing me or forcing myself. Food regained its taste and my throat stopped feeling constricted. Some days I even felt hungry again. I began eating what the family ate at meals again, rather than subsisting on whatever took my fancy on that day. I even started feeling excited about Adam and Hannah's baby. Hannah bloomed like a sunflower after the first trimester- she had that pregnant lady glow that you hear people talk about. I think it was happiness: both she and Adam. I'd never seen Adam as happy as he was now.

As the end of the summer approached, I felt almost normal again. Sure, I would have bad days, but as Crane reminded me, no one feels happy all the time. For the most part, my brothers refrained from commenting or asking me too much how I was doing, but I could tell they were really glad I was starting to feel like myself again. One time, after supper, Guthrie and I had had dish duty together and we'd fooled around and laughed like we did when we were little kids, flicking each other with water and soap and generally getting each other as wet as possible. It was immature, and in times gone by, Adam or Brian might have scolded us for it, especially if we soaked the kitchen floor. But this time, when I spun around shrieking, trying to get away from Guthrie's efforts to get me wet, I saw my three oldest brothers and Hannah, who were still at the table finishing pie and ice cream, just watching me with smiles on their faces.

"Are you seeing this? Guthrie's attacking me," I said, laughing.

"Seems to me you can hold your own," Brian said, smiling back at me.

Later, before I had headed up to bed, Adam had caught me in a spontaneous hug at the bottom of the stairs and kissed the top of my head wishing me good night.

"It's good to hear you laugh again," he'd said, "It's been too long."

/

Despite the never-ending open invitation from Olivia and the other girls, I hadn't left the house much during the vacation apart from going to hang out at Olivia's a few times and accompanying my brothers on whatever errands they were running. A few times I'd gone out to the movies with whatever brother was heading there. But nothing major. I just hadn't felt like it: socialising had been the last thing on my mind. But one night, a couple of weeks before we were due to go back to school, Olivia called and said she was hosting a small BBQ at her house in Sonora that weekend. Even though her parents would be there, they were very permissive, so I knew that a gathering at Olivia's house would mean boys and alcohol. And Olivia and the girls had been hanging around all summer with a bunch of older guys from school. They were seniors, so still at school, but older, nonetheless.

I was really torn. I felt like I wanted to go to the BBQ at Olivia's, but I knew that my brothers would have serious reservations about letting me go to a party of sorts with alcohol and older boys which was essentially unchaperoned. And my relationship with Adam and Brian had really improved over the summer, so I was loathed to lie outright to them. I knew that if I were to be caught, all the trust I had built up over the summer with them would be destroyed. Plus, I wanted to save my backside from Adam's belt. I'm terrified of that damn belt, so I guess Adam's threat has been effective. Earlier in the year, when I was doing a lot of reckless and dangerous things, and generally getting into a lot of trouble, Adam had resorted to using the paddle on me a few times and if you think that doesn't half hurt, you're crazy. But it hadn't curbed my actions, so the last time Adam had busted my butt with it, he had threatened that if I engaged in any further equally reckless or dangerous behavior, he would use his belt on me. For Adam, that's really extreme. He's strict, but he's gentle at heart. So for him to be prepared to use his belt meant he was really at his wit's end with me. I didn't know if lying about going to a BBQ with older boys and alcohol would constitute as 'reckless and dangerous behavior' but I sure wasn't keen to find out.

I decided that I would talk to Hannah about it. She has a lot of influence over Adam and he really listens to her and values her opinion. It was towards the end of the week on a midmorning that I found her sitting at the kitchen table, sipping on a glass of lemonade and flicking through a baby book. It was one of those stiflingly hot days outside. Because we don't have air conditioning in the house, she'd opened the back door and all the windows in the living room and kitchen, plus switched on the ceiling fans which made a faint whirring sound as they spun.

She looked up as I wandered in.

"Hi Sweetie, what you up to?" she said.

I took a seat at the table next to her.

"Not much. Are the guys all outside?"

"I think they were heading out towards high country last I heard from Adam. I packed a lunch for them- they won't be home until suppertime."

"Oh. Okay."

With my brothers out of earshot, I felt like this would be the perfect time to talk to Hannah about the BBQ at Olivia's.

"Hannah?"

"Mmmm?" she said, not looking up from the baby book that she had gone back to flicking through.

"Can I talk to you about something?"

Hannah looked up again. "Of course." She folded over the page she was at in the book and then looked at me expectantly. I thought absently that her pretty face was starting to fill out slightly with pregnancy.

I quickly told Hannah about the BBQ at Olivia's, including the fact that there would be alcohol and older boys there.

"Heidi…" Hannah said, in a sort of warning tone when I got to that part.

"I know, Hannah, but Olivia's parents will be there!"

Hannah gave me a wry look. "That doesn't mean much with Harry and Violet, Heidi. You know I like them a lot, but I wouldn't call them the most responsible of parents. At least that's what Adam thinks."

"I know…" I said, although I didn't necessarily agree with Hannah. In my view, Olivia's parents, Violet and Harry, were just the right amount of responsible and my parental figures were way too strict.

"Why are you telling me this anyway?" said Hannah. "Is it because you want me to work your brothers for you?" Hannah said, eying me.

I smiled back at her. "Yea..."

"Who says I think it's even okay for you to go anyway?"

"Come on Hannah," I said pleadingly. "Don't you remember what it was like being my age? I promise I won't drink anything. I just want to go and have fun. I'm ready to do that again. And I didn't want to lie about it- I don't want to go back to constantly fighting with Adam and Brian."

From those words I could see Hannah was swayed to my side. She gave me a long look and then she said, "Okay, Heidi, I'll talk to them about it. I do want you to go out and have some fun. Especially after the summer you've had. But I don't know if I can bring your brothers round, and you have to be prepared for if they say no. No fit throwing or sneaking out."

"Those days are behind me," I said, "But can't you just talk to Adam about it? And not both Adam and Brian?"

I had a feeling that Brian would be harder to convince in this case than Adam would. In certain instances, he was more protective of me than Adam. Even though I knew it came from a place of love, I still felt it was frustrating so have so many people to answer to when my friends were able to do as they pleased.

"Nope," said Hannah, cheerily. "If you want me to do the talking, I'll be talking to them both."

/

I spent the rest of the day helping Hannah with various things. I don't like to do housework or cook and it irritates me when my brothers expect that I'll do those things just because I'm a girl, especially as duties were fairly egalitarian before Hannah arrived because we didn't have an adult woman living with us. As Hannah's pregnant though, I wanted to make sure that she didn't get too tired. We did loads of laundry and vacuumed, dusted, cleaned the windows and then made supper for the family for when they would arrive home. But they didn't arrive home until later than we expected, and then, by the time that everyone had washed up and we had eaten, it was getting late and both Adam and Brian were looking tired. I hovered around in the living room for a bit with whoever had stayed home that evening- namely Hannah, Adam, Brian, and Guthrie, but then I went up to my bedroom to read. I wondered when Hannah would have the chance to talk to my brothers about the party. It was already Thursday, so time was running out- or that's how I felt anyway. But I did trust that Hannah would find the time and that she would make a solid case for me. She has a way with Adam that's quite remarkable in my opinion.

Much to my impatience though, Adam didn't bring it up until after supper the following evening. We were all in various stages of finishing. Crane was absent- he was out somewhere, probably with Molly, and Daniel had also split early saying he had a gig with his band. I had just got up to stack my plate by the side of the sink and was planning to clear out of the kitchen since I wasn't on dish duty, when Adam caught my arm and said, "Why don't you sit down a minute, Heidi, so we can talk."

Obviously, I knew what he wanted to talk about, but Guthrie looked at me in concern.

"What have you done now?" he said quietly to me.

I waved a hand at him to show it was all okay. "Nothing- it's fine."

"Can't keep out of trouble, huh, Heidi?" Evan teased, poking me in my side.

I rolled my eyes but didn't take the bait. It was my new tactic with Evan's teasing just to ignore him and so far, it was working out well though it didn't stop his smart comments.

I went to sit next to Adam and across from Brian since there was now an empty space there.

"If you lot are finished, make yourself scarce," Hannah said.

"What about dessert?" Guthrie said, looking disappointed.

"There's some brownies in the oven," Hannah said.

Guthrie's face lit up. He made to open the oven.

"The oven's still hot! Watch you don't burn yourself!"

"No worries, Hannah," Ford said, grabbing an oven glove and ceremoniously taking the tray of brownies out the oven, laying the tray down on the hob. "Voila!"

Guthrie, Evan and Ford proceeded to attack the tray of brownies, loading up their hands as if they were preparing for a famine.

"Leave some for the rest of us, you vultures!" Brian said.

The boys laughed and in response, Evan stuffed one cheekily in his mouth before grabbing another one off the tray. The three of them cackled and them disappeared out the back door.

Hannah shook her head.

"Honestly, I just can't keep up with those boys' appetites!"

"You're too good to them hon," Adam said.

I felt impatient to get on with this conversation and move it forward. I cleared my throat.

"So, what do you want to talk to me about?" I said.

Brian gave me a knowing look.

"This party that you've got Hannah tryin' to convince us to let you go to," he said.

Leave it to Brian to get straight to the point.

"We've got a few concerns, Heidi," Adam said.

I sighed internally but refrained from doing it out loud. Of course, they had concerns- they always had concerns about the things I wanted to do. Still, I had promised myself that as part of the new, mature me, I wouldn't throw a fit. I would talk this out like a rational human being. I would show my brothers I was grown up and capable of being trusted. I cast a look at Hannah, and she gave me one back which plainly said, "This is up to you now."

"Firstly, Adam continued, we appreciate that you're bein' honest with us. It shows that you've learned somethin' from the past year."

I nodded, feeling this was off to a good start.

"But, tell me, Heidi, how old are those boys that are goin' to be there?" Adam continued.

I glanced at Hannah. I had already told her that the boys who my group of friends had been hanging out with this summer were seniors so I didn't understand why Adam was asking me that. Maybe she hadn't mentioned how old the boys actually were.

"I think they're seniors…" I said.

"You think, or you know?

"I know." I admitted.

Brian shook his head.

"Who else is going to be there?" he said.

"Just the guys, and us…"

"By 'us' you mean you and your girlfriends?"

I nodded. Both Adam and Brian had that look about them I recognised. The one that plainly said they were going to say something I didn't like.

"But Olivia's parents will be there! And I promise I won't drink anything. Only coke. Or water even. Come on, please let me go. I mean, what can happen in the space of a few hours?"

"A lot!" Brian said. "Especially with Harry and Violet as chaperones."

I looked to Hannah for help again.

"I think Heidi should be given credit for coming to you with this, guys," she said. "She is a teenager after all. It's natural she's going to want to go to parties."

I gave her a grateful smile.

Adam still looked like he was considering and then he sighed.

"It's against my better judgement, Heidi, but I know you're gettin' older. And I appreciate your honesty. I don't like it, but you can go. Absolutely no alcohol though, not even a sip, and either Brian and I will drop you off and then pick you up at the end of the evening."

"But all the other girls are staying over!" I burst out, before I could help it. It would be embarrassing to be picked up at the end of the night like I was a little kid.

"You're definitely NOT stayin' the night. If it were solely up to me, I wouldn't let you go," Brian said.

"Those are the terms. Take them or leave them," Adam said.

"Take them," I said immediately.

I felt like I had won a small victory but for the millionth time in my life, I thought to myself that my brothers were too damn strict. Unfortunately, in the next few months, I would find out they had every reason to be.