"What about this one?" Whitney waved a top for judging. She liked having her own entourage that followed her every move, even though they were too young to understand half of the things she talked about.

Thor looked up from his coloring book. "No, I like this one." The five year old reached out to pet the sequined pattern of the top that he approved earlier. If an outfit didn't shine, he didn't want his sister in it.

"Whitney!" Prince called as if she had ignored him before. He pointed at the page of the YA book he took from his sister's shelf. "What's this word?" The six year old had sounded out the words of the first chapter, but the letter Y could usually make him pause.

The teen leaned over her bed and read the upside down word. She straightened and explained, "Dystopia is a place where everyone is sad and broke, and the king doesn't care because he gets everything he wants… It's like-"

Sam tapped at the open door. He leaned against the frame and greeted his family. Home from work, he glowed as he found all the kids upstairs.

"Everything's cool here. They're just helping me pick an outfit for my performance tonight," she explained before asking the man for his opinion on the rejected piece.

His wide smile quickly fell when he saw the thin cover. "Where is it?" he asked. He didn't need her to explain what sheer was. He finally knew there was more evil than a crop top. "No," he sternly declared, but internally wished she'd burn it.

"Kids, come downstairs!" Mercedes yelled up to trigger the usual song.

"I didn't do it!"

"I can't reach it!"

"It was like that when I got home!"

Mercedes leaned into the bannister and called, "All of you, please."

Jackson rolled his eyes and joined the line down the stairs. "If she's pregnant, I'm running away," he mumbled before bumping into the stepsibling in front of him. He looked ahead to the first floor, and unlike the blondes, he was unbothered by the guests.

While half of the group saw the two men as more family, the other half saw Mercedes' ex and Kyle Hanks, midfielder for Nashville Soccer Club.

Braxton politely welcomed the men but didn't like the interruption. "Going back to my movie." He threw up two fingers as his goodbye. He carved a trail through the crowd, and led Jackson up.

Kyle greeted the family, and after Reed introduced himself, he complemented, "I heard how good you were on the field. Mercedes wouldn' stop talking about you. Your mom will always be your number one fan." He threw an arm around the woman, ignoring the eight year old's sinking smile. "I'm in town for two weeks. When can I see the beast on the field?"

Mercedes explained, "Reed got into a little trouble during practice and isn't allowed to play with his team for a while."

The man defended the kid. "Teams can't win if no one's passionate about the game." He joked about having more yellow cards than he did shots and goals.

Tank shook his head at his friend and promised that God was right not to make the soccer player a father of kids.

He brushed off the disapproving looks from the adults and offered the kid, "You can show me a few kicks right now."

As badly as the boy wanted to run off, his punishment kept him nailed in place. His father didn't give forgiveness as easily as his stepmother. After the phone call from the soccer coach, Sam insisted that his son needed to be punished. Mercedes still disagreed with isolating him in his room, but negotiated a plan to "ground" him for a few hours a day until they added up to the set amount of time. She thought it was good for the kid to have daily quiet time to organize his thoughts. The timer started when Sam returned home, and that day, the boy had only served four minutes.

Sam looked into Reed's pleading eyes. He hated his options: let the kid go without having learned his lesson or send him back to his room to grow resentment towards the man that stood between him and a game with his idol. Massaging his neck, he urged all the kids, "Go ahead." He gave a weak smile as the blonde boys ran off.

Mercedes smiled, "This is going to make their year."

"Right," he breathed as he climbed down the last steps. He shook Tank's hand when his wife introduced them to one another, but closed off any potential conversation by deciding that he had to watch his kids. He refused to give their goodbyes a reaction.

Tank smiled at the last kids. He lifted Prince to his side and hugged Whitney close. He asked them about their plans for the day. Hearing a six year old cheer for reading would make any father proud, but seeing the book's cover splattered with blood could darken that fantasy. Taking the book from Prince's little hands, he asked, "Do you think this is something you should read? Your mama bought some really good books for you."

"I read them all," he shared, and he was determined to finish his new book.

Whitney shrugged, "Not like he knows what he's reading."

Tank suggested that she never underestimate her brother. Knowing, now or later, the kid was going to read that book, he passed it back and put him down to go.

It was Whitney's turn to gush over her day. She considered herself booked and busy. Her classmate was having his eighth birthday party that month, and by that point, she had been the hired entertainment for five. "People celebrate their birth month now, so can I?"

"No," the parents, as one, vetoed her idea.

The father warned, "There's a boyband having a party in North Hollywood. The police will be sensitive out there, so wear your seatbelt and be safe."

"Okay, but I'll be in the Hills," she announced, pointing in the opposite direction. "I'll be fine. I wrote the address down in the kitchen, I'll text when I get there, and Sam can find my phone location."

The parents' heads tilted to the side. They never asked the teen to do all of that. "Why does Sam, um…" Confused, they couldn't think of the words to question her last point.

"If I miss his call, he'll think I was kidnapped and trafficked out of the state," she teased but wouldn't doubt if the idea ever crossed his mind.

"Oh, okay." Before releasing his daughter, he asked, "Can Whitney the Superstar clear her schedule so I can have time with my kids on Monday?" He smiled when she agreed and skipped away to get ready for her performance.

Alone, Mercedes led Tank to sit in the living room. She thought she knew his mind. She frowned, "I didn't know that Sam was following her location."

He reasoned, "Whitney never does anything unwillingly." He knew how strong his daughter was. "It's been a while since I've gotten a call with her screaming. The kids look happy."

Her smile returned as she thought of her family. She swore, "I finally understand all the stuff Braxton says about the matrix. I left for a while and came back to a different family. It's only been three days, but I should have heard someone arguing by now. They're patient and encouraging to one another."

"That's good."

The pause in their conversation ran too long for comfort.

Tank was a man that was rarely short on words. It was easy to notice that he was dragging. He knew his ex wife would always be his friend, but he bet, "You're not going to like me after I say what I have to say."

She took a deep breath before encouraging, "I'm ready to listen."

Diving right in, he shared, "I want to move Whitney and Prince to Nashville." He frowned when she flinched back as if she was slapped in the face. Knowing she wanted to argue, he rushed out. "They're already comfortable with the area, and I found good schools for them."

Mercedes' stomach twisted at the idea of losing two of her kids. She objected, "I know they complained a lot in the start, but they stuck it out. They're happier now."

"We're the parents. They're supposed to vent to us. When I decided that I wanted them with me, it wasn't just because they weren't happy with you." He asked her to stand in his shoes, think like a person that grew up in a big family. "Let them have a year or two where they don't have to compete for attention. I know you're not neglectful, but they might fall into the cracks sometimes. There's eight kids, and two months is still the honeymoon phase. If they're with me, it's less stressful for you when you're adjusting to life outside of your fantasy."

He inched closer to the speechless woman. He promised it would be easier to understand if she thought of his idea as the parents switching roles in their custody plan. Like he did, she'd get visits from the kids for the holidays, school vacations, and every weekend after she'd call to say that she misses them. "You never kept my kids away from me, so I wouldn't stand between you and them."

"Tank, this-" She stopped while struggling with her argument. She believed that he wanted the best for the kids and that he'd uphold his promises, but it was a big ask. She only knew of one thing that could stop his plan. "You can't take them if they don't want to leave."

He agreed that he would never take them by force. "I'm going to ask them Monday at dinner." He hated seeing her crushed, but even more, he hated being the reason. He took her hand before requesting, "That's four days away, so don't lose that time being fixated on this. I'm going to be at peace with whatever the kids want. Can you promise me that you'll do the same?"


Mercedes didn't say much else for the rest of the day. She'd crash into reality when the kids spoke to her but then quickly fade back into her fog. As blind as she was, she felt Sam's frozen attitude. Standing over her side of the bed and watching her husband lying on his was enough to end her numbness.

"I know you're not sleeping," Mercedes announced to his back. "I had enough of the silent treatment in my last marriage. I'm not doing this with you." She ordered him to say something.

"I didn't like what you did today."

"But the kids did. I haven't seen Reed smile like that before. He looked so precious and-"

Sam rushed to sit up and turn to his wife. "You can't buy my kids. They were happy before they got new books and hundred dollar paints. Now, you're flying in celebrities to win them over."

"Kyle is Tank's friend, and he is in town for a charity game." She shrugged, "There's nothing wrong about surprising our kids with nice things."

"Reed was grounded," he recalled. "I let him have the movie night because you wanted the family time, but today, you threw away everything I said. There's rules, and you have to pay when you break them. That's life. There's- there's consequences and- and structure," he stuttered out as his pent up anger was finally being released.

"No, you threw away everything I said. These kids have enough rules and standards put on them just for existing. They don't need that when they come home. I want them to trust me. I want them to feel safe to tell me things without fear of being punished for their honesty. I'm teaching the kids to be open BECAUSE YOU AREN'T!" she exploded. She snatched a page out of her side drawer and threw it into Sam's lap.

It was a receipt from her insurance company that stated that Prince's visit to the hospital was fully covered.

The man deflated at the realization, but he promised, "We didn't want you to worry."

"How do you think I felt when I found this? I should have been there. Why didn't I get a call from the hospital?"

He refolded the paper and kept his gaze down. "The hospital only had an old number of yours." He protected his wife's peace of mind, but he knew what he did that day was wrong. "I let Whitney pretend that she was you. She gave permission for me to stay in the room while doctors treated Prince and gave all his information from a folder on your computer."

Because keeping secrets wasn't bad enough, she challenged, "So you coached my kids to lie?"

Sam disagreed, but their argument was doomed to snowball. Sam stood ten toes down for the betterment of his kids. Mercedes believed that she had done enough backing down in their relationship. They revealed every gripe they held in for the past two months.

"... You're tracking my daughter's phone, but I can't give Reed a phone so he can call and ask me about the buses in the city."

"... Why would you have maids when the kids can clean after themselves? What are their allowances for? They don't have chores."

After fifteen minutes, Mercedes still had plenty on her chest, but she boiled it down to, "You treat these kids like they're little robots that aren't supposed to feel or want for anything new. If it doesn't fit onto a chart, why do it, right?" Her hand rested against her forehead as she was baffled. "I don't know how your kids do it."

"My kids got along just fine before we moved into this free-for-all castle of yours."

Soft knocks on the door stifled their argument, and Thor peaked in. "Can I have another story?" he asked. He hugged his stepmother and fluttered his long lashes up at her.

Mercedes awed at him. She hugged him close, deafening the boy by covering his ear with her hand and holding the other ear to her side. Her smile fell as she looked back to the father. She asked him, "Should I, or is it going to spoil him?"

The man huffed at his wife's sass and stomped away to use the bathroom.

She read the kid a third story and decided to share a bed with her daughter. She brushed the girl's curls as she promised, "I miss being close to you." As the finished day replayed in her mind, she bit her tongue and buried her face into her pillow.

Even with their backs to each other, Whitney was hypersensitive to her mother's feelings. She lay under the weight of the woman's unspeakable problems. She reached behind her and gave her mother's hand a squeeze as she waited for her to doze off.


Braxton read the text update from his sister. "Ma's asleep," he announced to Logan. He groaned and dropped the phone to his chest. With his eyes fixed on the ceiling he remembered, "As bad as their fights got, Ma never cried over her last husband."

Logan filled his cheeks but let the breath out through his nose. "They'll say sorry in the morning, and everything will go back to normal… Right?" He wished for the best.

The fourteen year olds sat up as the door opened. They loudly whispered, "What?" They scooted in their beds as their three young guests invited themselves in for a seat.

"We can't sleep," Reed admitted. "Can we stay here?"

Thor climbed to the top of the bed. "Please?" He snatched the pillow from behind Logan and cuddled it as he pretended to be tired.

Prince explained, "Whitney said that we can't sleep in Mama's room anymore, and she locks her door. Jackson and Peter aren't in their room."

Logan hopped up to investigate the claim. After seeing the empty beds, he began to search the house, ignoring the party on his heels. He found the two in the theater. "It's two in the morning," he reminded with a sternness. He stopped the movie and looked down on them. "What are you doing?"

They picked cookies off a tray. "We're celebrating." They raised their glasses of milk and cheered, "To two families."

"They had one fight."

"But we made sure it was the big one," Peter smirked. "A fairy left a letter about Prince's hospital visit on Mercedes' pillow."

Braxton declared that was impossible. "I ripped up the mail and deleted all the emails from the insurance company." His brown eyes rolled as the preteens stayed smug.

Jackson pointed, "You always forget to empty the deleted bin." He admitted that they had been scheming since the first minute they were forced to live together. He revealed all the fake fights he had with Peter and how they set their parents up to talk about every topic that they'd disagree on. "Before Ma left, I was giving the kids a dollar a week to sleep with her and Sam every night." He laughed at the plot, but he knew the last thing the couple needed was a baby.

Thor moved closer and leaned against the armrest that separated the boys. With a frown and soft eyes, the five year old boy asked Jackson, "So you're not my brother anymore?" He didn't get much else from the story.

Peter answered, "No, and he never was." He pulled Thor into his lap and passed him a cookie. "I told you that this wasn't forever."

"Good," Reed pouted.

"Little Dude gets it!" He passed a cookie as the boy took a seat. He eyed the three that couldn't be tempted to the dark side as he warned, "You can start packing boxes."

Logan kneeled in front of Reed and pulled his brothers to listen as he softly explained, "I know this is about Mom, but Mercedes-" He paused to think over his words. "When people leave, we get to meet new people."

"No," Peter snapped. "When you say stupid stuff like that, you're saying that like it's okay for Mercedes to replace Mom. She's nothing like her. She's a hippie, and we don't need her."

Jackson admitted, "And I want all of you, and your charts, out of my house."

Braxton shook his head at their reasons. "You should feel bad. Ma cried herself to sleep tonight." He huffed, but remembered his mantra, "Why get mad when you have an older sister?" He left, promising to write nice obituaries.

When his oldest brother ordered him to leave with him, Thor argued, "I want to watch the movie."

"No," Logan sighed. He took the cookie from the kid and scooped him into his arms to stop any struggle. He carried him out of the theater, never needing to check if Prince was following him.