5. We Can Do It at My Place

"Mum? I'll have a friend over to study, maybe starting next week," I say in the evening during dinner. Which I immediately realise is a mistake, since everyone is now paying attention to me. 

"What friend?" Maria asks, nose turned up. 

"None of your business," I mutter and keep my eyes on mum. I should have asked her when nobody was around. "He was assigned to me by Ms. Fernandez, to tutor."

"He?" Lilly sputters, covering her mouth that's full of food. She appeared at home earlier on in the evening, saying there's something she needed to talk to mum and dad about. She goes to a university some four hours away, in her second year. 

Maria tosses her blonde hair back and leans forward. Nobody in our family has blonde hair, - Dad has dark hair, and there's nothing like blonde hair in Mum's entire race. She dyed it on her fifteenth birthday, shortly after she got her first boyfriend. A fact I always scoffed at, but then I'm seventeen and I've never ventured into that territory, so I thought it a bit ridiculous. Then again, I'm a social dwarf and she's a social butterfly. 

Mum waves her hand dismissively. "Of course, whatever you want."

"Thanks mum." I smile and pick my fork once again. 

"Don't you want to know who he is?" Maria asks mum, as if she's overlooking her motherly duties by not grilling me about it. 

"Because you want to know?" Trey breaks his silence from beside me. I look at him, pleased. I however lift an eyebrow at the phone he has beneath the table, texting. If mum catches him with a phone at the dinner table, he's going to be in a dilemma similar to Simon's. 

Maria scoffs and turns back to her dinner. 

"Who is he, Ava?" Lilly asks, apparently still hung up on the subject. 

I shrug. "Just some random guy at school, you wouldn't know him," I dismiss. 

She makes a face and shrugs. 

The door bell rings and Sam jumps down from his seat. 

"Sam, don't..." Mum starts, but stops because he has already disappeared into the other room, heading for the front door. 

"He's going to let in burglars some day," Trey mutters. 

Mum rises and is about to go after Sam when he comes back, tugging dad behind. Sam lets go of his hand and rushes back to his chair. 

"Sorry I'm late. I was held up at work, then I forgot my house keys," he apologises, wrapping an arm around my mum and kissing her on the cheek. His eyes land on Lilly and he frowns. "Lilian? Why are you here?"

I look at Lilly who's fidgeting, visibly nervous. "This is home, dad. Should I have a reason?"

Dad just lifts his eyebrows, loosening his tie. 

"Lilian wants to talk to us, how about you join us for dinner now that you are here?" Mum suggests, taking his coat and case. 

"Thanks, dear," he says, taking the seat at the head of the table. 

                ***

I'm almost asleep when the door to my room opens and Lilly steps in. Before she went off to school, she had a room of her own while me and Maria shared the one I'm using now. Maria moved into hers when she moved away, thankfully putting some distance between us. Whenever Lilly comes home for breaks, she stays in my room.

After dinner when everybody else went to sleep, she stayed back to talk to our parents, and since I'm curious about what it was all about, I shift so that I'm lying on my back and wait for her to slide in beside me. 

She shuffles around in the dark, and I reach over and turn on the bedside lamp. She shields her face, but I've already seen the tears shining in her eyes and the ones running down her cheeks. 

Instantly concerned, I sit up. "Lilly? What's wrong?"

She shakes her head and wipes her face, then heads to my closet that carries some of her stuff. As she sorts through the clothes, different ideas run through my mind, presenting all types of possibilities to me.

Is she pregnant? Is she getting married? Did she drop out? 

She finally comes to bed, in a comfy pair of shorts and a strap top. I wait as she sniffs for a while longer, a handkerchief in hand. Then when her breathing has calmed down a little, she talks. 

"I told you how I've been working some times, modelling part time?"

I nod, swallowing. Maria might be a show off, but Lilly is the family beauty queen. She is tall, getting it from dad, then she has this really soft, curly dark hair that falls to the small of her back. She has high cheekbones, another thing she got from dad, then there's the intense dark eyes from mum. She got the best from both, and she never needed make up to stand out. When we were younger, I always teased her that she should be a model, but she wasn't really interested, more focused on becoming a doctor. Yep, our eldest is the perfect definition of beauty and brains. In her first year in university, she met some people who pushed her more on the modelling issue, and she decided to give it a try. 

That night, she called me all breathy and excited, saying how she had loved it. 

"Well, I got this offer from an agent who works with top models. He's offering to sign me, then I can model for several famous designers, and a bunch of other stuff. Which would basically make me take it up as my full-time occupation."

She pauses, and I can already see where this is going. 

"I'm ready for it, I swear I am, and I knew I couldn't do it without talking to mum and dad first, since I can't manage med school if I accept. I'll be travelling all over the world, Ava."

My wanderlusted mind drools. "So you want to drop out."

"Ideally. I would still study something else, but dad won't have any of that."

"And mum?" I ask.

"She said she would talk to me in the morning."

"She'll talk to him," I say, convinced. I turn to my side so that I'm facing her. "What if he refuses?"

She sniffs again and wipes her nose. "I'll do it anyway. I just wanted to make sure I let them know, and maybe get their support. But since that won't be happening..." she trails off, shrugging. 

I wrap my hand around her, pulling her into an embrace. "He might change his mind by morning," I say, at the same time having doubts in my mind because if there's one mind I've realised is hard to change over the years, it's my dad's. 

"Hope so," Lilly whispers. "I really don't want to do anything against his wishes, but I also can't let this opportunity go."

I nod, understanding. It couldn't be an easy decision for her.

We fall silent, and I know she is still wide awake when I feel sleep grabbing me. I can only hope that everything will turn out alright for her. 

                 ***

In the morning when the rest of us leave for school, Lilly is sitting in the living room with mum and dad, before they can go off to work. I motion to her, requesting her to call me later, and she nods. 

"What are they talking about?" Trey asks as we walk down the sidewalk.

I sigh and reply, "Lilly wants to be a model."

"Oh, wow, she would totally make it," he says, impressed. 

"What!" Maria shrieks. "She's so lucky, that's the dream!"

I nod, deciding not to bring up the trouble with dad disagreeing. Sam is skipping ahead of us, tightly curled hair bobbing up and down. Mum usually drops him at his school, but today he has to take the bus. 

After a while, Maria joins her friends and me and Trey take Sam to the stop where the school bus stops. After that we head over to school, my head still whirling around the whole Lilly issue. 

"Dad isn't so happy about it, is he?" Trey asks. "He looked sort of pissed off this morning."

I suck my bottom lip in between my teeth. "No, he isn't happy," I confirm. 

"He should let her do what she wants, right? It's not like it's wrong," he argues, and I smile at my younger brother. Younger by eleven months. This guy right here stole my mommy-time.

"Yeah, he should," I agree. 

A jeep swerves to the curb a few paces from us, and a redhead boy leans out, yelling for Trey. It's Luke, his friend from his class. Trey jogs forward, leaving me to walk to school alone, because that's what I get for having a handful of friends. 

When I get to school, I'm headed to my locker when I spot Jude at his locker and go straight to him. He is going through his locker, his blonde hair falling forward. 

"Hey," I say. 

He looks over at me and his lips pull up. His eyes search my face, then he snorts. "Don't you take time to actually do something to your hair in the morning?"

My hand flies to my head, feeling my ample bun. It's very loose, held up at the top of my head. Does he know how hard it is to get it into the perfect messy bun? I take a look at his straight blonde hair and mentally shake my head. I guess that's a no.

"I didn't come hear to talk about my hair," I say. Then add, "We can do it at my place."

His smooth brow creases in a frown, but before he can say something, Cole appears out of nowhere. "Back up a little, darlin'. Do what at your place?"

He wiggles his brow at me. This early in the morning, his hair is actually neat, doused in hair products and laid back. I have a feeling it won't stay that way for long. 

"Tutoring," I reply. 

"Oh," he let's out a whoosh of breath and leans back, placing a hand on his chest dramatically. "I almost thought you two were doing the nasty."

My face heats up and Jude scoffs, punching Cole in the arm. Then he turns to me, "Okay, I'll always be there after practice."

"But we can do it here on Mondays and Thursdays, since I also stay back for my meetings," I tell him. That leaves only Wednesdays for the sessions at home, since on Tuesdays he has no practice and we can study at school. "But only if they go on for long. I won't sit here waiting for your practice to end," I add. 

"Yeah, okay, that's fine," he agrees. 

I'm about to take my leave when some girl pushes herself between us, and before I can catch up to what's happening, she is already attacking Jude with her lips, pushing him against his locker. My eyes widen at the display, especially since Jude's arms immediately wrap around her, and soon they are producing some weird noises. I wrinkle my nose and move back, looking at Cole who's snickering. Did I forget these two are our school's own bad boys? 

Cole catches my look and grins at me. 

"I'm off," I announce, then half run to my locker. 

Hopefully, today won't turn up like yesterday. But I'm already worried about Lilly, so it isn't so perfect, is it?