Ken-15, Ben-11, Gewn-11

English wasn't his favorite subject. He didn't hate it like some kids seemed to, but he didn't excel at it like he did math and science. How did one even really excel at English? Writing books? Writing things in general, probably.

This sentence diagramming stuff seemed dumb though. It just over-complicated things. He knew what the subjects and adjectives and all were, why did he have to graph it out? Maybe the visual helped some kids, but why did they all have to do it? Ken found it more confusing than helpful.

A patter of footsteps made Ken look up from his homework to see the long lost distant cousin they were currently housing. He was still a little confused on how exactly they were related and why she was staying with such distant relatives. He knew how they were related, she was Grandpa Max's nephew's wife's cousin, he just didn't know what you called that. It was a cousin of some kind. A four times removed cousin? Was that how that worked?

"Hey, Lucy," Ken greeted. "You here for cookies?" The plate of fresh baked chocolate chip cookies sat a seat away from where he was doing his homework at the kitchen table.

The freckled blonde nodded eagerly. She was the same age as Ben and Gwen, a nice girl overall. A bit of a prankster, a tomboy in many ways, she and Ben got along great. She and Gwen though… It wasn't that surprising the two hadn't hit it off. Lucy's personality was much closer to Ben's than Gwen's, and Ben and Gwen hadn't gotten along for ages until that miracle summer road trip. They still bumped heads quite a bit. Ken hoped Gwen and Lucy would work it out soon (mainly Gwen, Lucy seemed to like Gwen fine, she was just a bit oblivious) because Lucy had another month and a half of being here. Things would go a lot smoother if they did. Ken did try to help but some of the things Gwen complained about… didn't make sense. There were 'pranks' Gwen blamed Lucy for that Lucy couldn't possibly have done. And while there did seem to be more mud around the house than usual, he'd never actually seen Lucy muddy. And when Ken pointed these things out, Gwen just got really frustrated and stomped away. At least for Ben and Gwen he'd fully understood the problem.

"Limit of two," Ken told her, scooting the plate further down the table towards her.

"Hmm," Lucy hummed, rocking back and forth on her heels. "Okay." She grabbed her two cookies and ran off.

Phew. He was glad she'd agreed so easily. Mom had put him in change of guarding the cookies, they needed enough leftover for her to bring to her get together tomorrow. He had to be stern on the limit.

He went back to working on his diagrams. A few minutes later, he heard another person walking down the hall and looked up to see Gwen enter the room, already in her pjs.

"Mom says only two cookies," Ken informed her.

"'Kay," Gwen nodded, taking her two cookies.

"Don't stay up too late playing with Ben and Lucy," Ken reminded her. "We have to leave around eight thirty tomorrow if we want to get to the mini golf before the crowds." Ben was sleeping over tonight and then they were all going to the dinosaur mini golf in the morning. It was a cool course, there were even dinosaur animatronics. It was very popular. It had opened last summer but Gwen and Ben had been off on their road trip so this would be their first time.

Gwen nodded again. "I'll make sure they know. Don't worry." Then she walked out.

Ken was a little surprised she'd left so quickly, but she'd probably been in the middle of something with Ben and Lucy. Once Ben heard the cookies were done, he'd come running too.

Ben came running in a couple minutes later. "Just two, I know," he said abruptly, grabbing his allotted cookies then dashing out again. Ken didn't think much of it.

About three minutes later, Ben and Gwen walked into the kitchen together, bickering over which Superstars character had the best ability in the game.

"Hey, limit of two, remember?" Ken enforced, pulling the plate back when they reached for it.

"What?" Ben startled.

"We haven't had any yet," Gwen frowned.

Ken's eyebrows furrowed. What were they trying to pull here? They both knew he'd seen them. "Sorry you two, but mom is being particularly strict with this batch. She needs enough for tomorrow. And they are pretty big cookies, two is plenty anyway."

"But we haven't had two yet!" Ben protested, eyes wide with surprisingly convincing. Ben usually wasn't the best actor. "We didn't even know they were done yet, we came down to check."

"I'm not sure what you two think you're doing, but you can't gaslight me about this," Ken told them. "I saw both of you. You spoke to me."

Ben leaned towards Gwen and asked her, "What's 'gaslight' mean?"

"It means he thinks we're trying to manipulate him into thinking something that happened actually didn't happen," Gwen answered.

Tilting his head, Ben asked, "What does that have to do with lighting gas?"

"I think the term comes from a movie called Gaslight," Ken answered for her. This was all very odd, he didn't understand why they were trying such an elaborate act instead of the usual puppy dog eyes. Was it a dare? Did they think it was funny?

"But why-?" Ben started.

"It's obviously Lucy, Ben," Gwen snapped, interrupting him. "Is it funny now?"

"Lucy?" Ken repeated, baffled. "She came and got her cookies before you two did. She only took two."

Ben's eyes narrowed. "She did, did she?"

"Um, yes," Ken confirmed, uncertain of what they were accusing Lucy of.

The pair of them looked angry but it quickly faded into resigned disappointment. Dang it, they looked so dejected…

Ken sighed, resolve breaking. He really needed to build up a thicker little sibling resistance. "Okay, you can each have one more cookie, but then that's seriously it. Don't tell mom."

Their eyes lit up. "Thanks, Ken!" They chorused.

They went to pour themselves a glass of milk as they started to eat their cookies, muttering to each other as they did.

"She's gone too far this time," Ken overheard Ben mumble.

"Oh, so when it affects you, that's when it's not okay," Gwen whispered back harshly.

There was something Ken wasn't understanding. He couldn't even guess what though.